The evening of May 11, 1982, was unfolding as Larry Race had hoped. He and his wife Debbie were celebrating their fourteenth anniversary with dinner on the veranda of an upscale restaurant with a breathtaking view of Lake Superior. Afterwards, they enjoyed a romantic evening on the shores of the lake, drifting in their small boat as they talked and listened to music. To Larry, the enchanted evening felt like a second honeymoon. But the events soon took a drastic turn resulting in death and debate.

On the following afternoon, Debbie’s body was found along Lake Superior’s shore, having succumbed to hypothermia. Larry said he had done everything he could to save his wife. The state of Minnesota disagreed saying what happened in Lake Superior’s frigid waters was a clear cut case of cold-blooded murder.

Larry and Debbie’s families both supported Larry’s story. A jury, however, did not.

Debbie And Larry Race

Larry and Debbie Race, each thirty-three-years-old, lived in Hoyt Lakes, Minnesota, in the northeast part of the state, seventy-five miles from Lake Superior and roughly two-hundred miles north of the twin cities.

Larry worked for the local Erie Mining Company while Debbie was a housewife who was active in many of their church activities. They had three children, daughters Michelle and Jennifer, and son Steven.

The Race Family

The couple’s marriage had been rocky for several years because of Larry’s multiple girlfriends. He says he was putting an end to his affairs and that Debbie had forgiven him and was giving him another chance. The romantic evening along Lake Superior was to be the start of repairing the relationship.

The following is Larry Race’s account of the events that unfolded that evening.

Larry Says His Dalliances Are Done

At 7:30 p.m., after eating dinner at the Lakeview Castle Motel along Lake Superior’s north shore, Larry says the sun was setting as he and Debbie set sail from the Knife River Marina aboard the Jenny Lee, their twenty-two-foot wood and fiberglass boat named after their daughters (Lee being Michelle’s middle name.) For nearly an hour-and-a-half, they drifted approximately a mile off the Lake Superior shore, approximately twenty miles northeast of Duluth.

After darkness had fallen around 9:00, Larry says they noticed the Jenny Lee was taking on water. He says he turned off the engine and the leakage stopped, but the boat would not restart. Larry re-examined the engine and heard gushing noises at the bottom of the boat. He says he grew concerned and that Debbie panicked.

As the Jenny Lee continued to take on more water, Larry says Debbie insisted on getting off the boat and that he, not using sound judgment, agreed. He is steadfast that he had two life rafts on board and that he attempted to inflate one of them but found holes in it and tossed it into the lake. Larry says he was then able to inflate the second raft, but it was meant for only one person.

Larry Aboard The Jenny Lee

According to Larry, Debbie put her purse and other valuables, as well as Larry’s shoes, into a gear bag which she took, along with the scuba tank, onto the life raft. Larry had his dry suit and scuba tanks on board the boat. He was a strong swimmer and thought he could tow Debbie and the raft to shore because he had done so with his daughters when the Jenny Lee had broken down the year before.

Larry says he was making progress on getting the raft to shore but was getting cold and developing cramps. When he attempted to get into the raft with Debbie, it started to sink. The effect of the cold water on his body hindered his judgment and he made another poor decision. He saw lights in the distance that appeared to be closer than shore, so he decided to swim toward them. As he did so, Debbie continued to inch her way to shore.

However, it soon dawned on Larry the light was from the Jenny Lee. He make it back to the boat and, this time, the engine started. After catching his breath, Larry says he continued to search for Debbie, all the while firing distress signals into the air. The flares were seen and reported by crew members aboard a passing ship, the Carriana Peony, near 2:00 a.m. on May 12.

Unable to find Debbie, Larry says he then returned to shore and notified the Coast Guard; their records showed the time was 2:38 a.m., roughly five-and-a-half hours after the trauma commenced. They conducted a grid search of the lake but to no avail.

Larry’s Story

While walking home from school that afternoon, thirteen-year-old Johnathan Swenson saw Debbie’s body, lying face-up, along the Lake Superior shore near the east edge of Duluth.

Debbie’s Body Being Retrieved

An autopsy found no water in Debbie’s lungs, meaning she had not drowned. She had instead succumbed to hypothermia, a reduced body temperature occurring when the body dissipates more heat than it absorbs and its functions are slowed until the heart stops.

Dr. Robert Pozos, a professor at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, estimated Debbie had lost consciousness roughly twenty minutes after hitting the water. The undigested food in her stomach led St. Louis County Medical Examiner Dr. Volker Goldschmidt to estimate hypothermia began one-to-two hours after being in the water.

Normal body temperature in humans is 98.6°Fahrenheit; hypothermia is defined as a core body temperature below 95.0 °Fahrenheit. Although the weather was warm on the evening of Larry and Debbie’s debacle, the temperature of Lake Superior’s waters was only 37 °Fahrenheit, easily cold enough to kill someone who had been in the water for prolonged period, although the chilling effects on the five-feet-five inch tall and one-hundred-eighty pound Debbie may have been staved off because she was significantly overweight.

Debbie did not have any bruises on her body or any marks suggesting she had been involved in a struggle.

Hypothermia Is Deemed The Cause of Debbie’s Death

Neither the police nor prosecutors bought Larry’s contention that his wife’s death was an accident brought about by circumstances beyond his control. They believed the actions leading to Debbie’s demise were purposefully initiated by an adulterous husband wanting out of his marriage.

Larry Race was charged with Debbie’s murder in October 1983.

Larry Is Charged With Murdering Debbie

Prosecutors believed Larry’s motive for murdering his wife was one of the oldest in the books: to collect insurance money. In November 1981, seven months prior to Debbie’s death, Larry had taken out life insurance policies on Debbie totaling $108,000 through Credit Life Insurance.

Larry’s Appellate Attorney countered that $37,000 was mortgage insurance on their house and the rest was part of a group policy through his credit union. Several relatives also contend it was Debbie who had sought the extra life insurance.

The Insurance Argument Is Debated

Multiple women testified to Larry’s infidelities. Prosecutors established that he had had at least four extramarital affairs during his fourteen-year marriage to Debbie.

One woman testified that she had been with Larry the weekend before Debbie’s death and that he had professed his love for her and his disdain for his wife. Two other former mistresses testified Larry had made disparaging remarks about Debbie, such as criticizing her for being overweight, a spendthrift, and a poor housekeeper.

Larry Is Proven Unfaithful

Larry’s lawyers acknowledged his infidelities. His defense was orchestrated around the supposed mechanical problems of the Jenny Lee.

Several friends who had been on the boat only a few days before Debbie’s death, however, testified the Jenny Lee had no malfunctions then, and that its unused bilge pump was operating sufficiently to pump out any water.

Larry Claims The Jenny Lee Broke Down

The raft became a cornerstone of the prosecution’s case against Larry Race. Five puncture cuts were found in its bottom. Several experts testified the cuts had been made while it was inflated because no knife cuts on the top of the raft corresponded with the bottom punctures, meaning the air chambers were inflated when the cuts were made.

Prosecutors argued this shows the cuts were not random acts such as vandalism or that they had developed through wear and tear. They contended Larry pushed Debbie into the raft well away from the Jenny Lee and then returned to the boat to don his scuba equipment. He then swam back to the raft and slashed it with a knife, leaving her to sink and freeze to death in the icy waters. Once Debbie had been set adrift, Larry dragged the life raft back to the Jenny Lee to support his story about attempting to inflate a first raft.

A knife was found aboard the Jenny Lee, but its punctures did not match those in the raft. The knife which prosecutors believe Larry used to cut the raft was never found, nor was the gear bag in which Larry says Debbie had put her valuables.

Most notably, the second defective raft Larry insists was aboard the boat was also never found.

The Found Raft

Multiple friends testified on Larry’s behalf, but none could recall ever seeing two rafts aboard the Jenny Lee.  Tom Race, however, testified he had sold Larry a raft approximately six months before Debbie’s death, but he did not tell investigators of the purchase until shortly before his brother’s trial began. Larry’s daughter, Michelle, also insisted her father had two rafts, which were kept in their garage when he was not on the water.

St. Louis County Deputy Sheriff Bill Hall testified that approximately two weeks before Debbie’s death, Larry had told him he had two life rafts aboard his boat, but the deputy did not see them. When he was initially questioned eleven days after Debbie’s death, however, Hall made no mention of hearing of two life rafts. 

The Coast Guard’s search and rescue team are certain that if that second raft had been tossed into the water as Larry contends, they would have found it during their search. The defense countered that the raft could have been carried off by smelt fishermen or anyone else along the shore.

Were There Two Rafts?

Witnesses place the Jenny Lee near the mouth of the Talmadge River at 8:30 p.m. and again at 9:30. Debbie’s body was found seven miles west of that spot.

Talmadge River

University of Minnesota diving instructor and underwater expert Jean Aubineau testified for the defense, saying it would have been impossible for a body to drift seven miles without a raft.

Debbie was found wearing a life preserver, insulated jacket, a blazer, and polyester slacks. Aubineau says a body with a life vest such as the one Debbie was wearing would have traveled only one or two miles before hitting shore, and that the only way Debbie could have traveled seven miles down shore was on a raft.

The prosecution, however, negated the testimony by arguing that because the Jenny Lee’s location was unknown at the time Larry and Debbie abandoned her, it was impossible to develop a legitimate drift theory.

Jean Aubineau 

Underwater Expert

Larry’s attorneys claimed the skin lividity in Debbie’s body also proves she came ashore in a life raft.

Lividity is a settling of the blood in the lower portion of the body postmortem, causing a purplish red discoloration of the skin. Debbie’s blood had not sunk to her feet and the defense claimed it would have done so if she would have been kept in an upright position by a life vest.

The state countered the lividity of Debbie’s blood following her death was toward her back which is consistent with floating in the water with a life jacket without a raft. An expert testified for the prosecution that the particular life jacket worn by Debbie would have kept her face-up on her back, as she was found, while she floated after her death.

The Lividity Issue

On his attorneys’ advice, Larry says, he did not testify on his own behalf at his trial. One of his attorney’s, William Malthum, disputes this, saying it was Larry who insisted on not testifying.

In November 1983, Larry Race was found guilty of first degree murder and was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after seventeen-and-a-half years.

Larry Is Convicted Of Murder

After his conviction, Larry hired a new team of lawyers for his appeal. They argued he should be granted a new trial because of ineffective legal counsel and because of subsequent discoveries of mechanical problems aboard the Jenny Lee.

Following his trial, Larry sold the Jenny Lee to help pay his legal bills. In May 1984, seven months after his conviction, the small boat again malfunctioned on the waters. The new owner, familiar with Larry’s case, contacted authorities. They had an independent mechanic, unfamiliar with the case, examine the boat.

The mechanic said the starter was worn and would have caused an intermittent failure with engine akin to what Larry says occurred. He could not, however, say with certainty that the problem existed on the evening of Debbie’s death two years earlier.

The appellate court ruled the ex post facto mechanical difficulties aboard the Jenny Lee as irrelevant and denied the request for a new trial.

Larry’s Glimmer Of Hope Is Squashed

In 1992, two sisters came forward claiming to have seen a life raft floating on Lake Superior in May 1983, approximately one year after Debbie’s death. They said the raft was blue and yellow, the same colors as the recovered raft from the Jenny Lee.

The women’s contentions, however, were inconsistent. In some instances, they claimed they found the raft in 1983, but they later seemed to think it was much later. Furthermore, they gave differing accounts of where the raft was found, sometimes saying it was in Lake Superior but at other times saying it was found in a nearby river. As a result, their contentions were deemed insufficient in warranting a new trial.

Four years later, a married couple believes they saw a similar raft in a Wisconsin lake, but because the lake did not have a tributary from Lake Superior, their claim that it might have been the supposed second raft from the Jenny Lee was also rejected.

No New Trial

Larry Race’s multiple additional appeals for a new trial were all denied, as was his first attempt when he became eligible for parole in 2001.  Four years later, he was successful.

In May 2005, after serving over twenty-one years in prison, Larry Race was granted parole. He continues to maintain his innocence in Debbie’s death. He remarried sometime after his release from prison.

Paroled But Not Exonerated

Larry Race’s children still do not believe their father murdered their mother.

1983 Family Photo

Shortly Before Larry’s Arrest

Debbie’s parents, Frank and Sylvia Selvey, also staunchly stood by Larry. Although both said they did not know of his affairs until after he was arrested, they did not believe he had murdered their daughter.

A minor controversy arose during Larry’s trial in which the Selvey’s were asked to leave the courtroom. On several occasions during trial recesses, Larry and his former in-laws were seen talking and often embracing. Judge Jack Litman believed the signs of affection could influence the jurors.

Mr. and Mrs. Selvey both died in 2010 at ages ninety-five and ninety-seven. They, like their grandchildren, never wavered in their belief of Larry’s innocence.

Frank and Sylvia Selvey

Debbie Race’s Parents

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/58432984/deborah-jean-race

SOURCES:

• Duluth News Tribune
• Minneapolis Star Tribune
• St Cloud Times
• United Press International
• Unsolved Mysteries