How the Supreme Court Judge’s Brother Got Away with Murder

W. Wood Porter was riding his bicycle on Florence’s main street on June 24, 1892, when he was shot and mortally wounded by Frank Kibbey. Kibbey had recently concluded that his wife and Porter were having an affair. Kibbey was the brother of territorial supreme court justice and future territorial governor Joseph H. Kibbey. His victim was the nephew of former supreme court justice William Wood Porter. The prominence of victim and attacker guaranteed that the criminal proceedings would be sensational. This presentation tells the story of the murder and its aftermath, and explains how a judge’s brother got away with murder.

Paul Hietter currently serves as a history professor and the chair of the Social Sciences Department at Mesa Community College. He received his Ph.D. in history from Arizona State University and has published a number of articles and book reviews on his area of specialization, crime and criminal justice in frontier Arizona and the West. Hietter has been a member of the Arizona Humanities Speakers Bureau for more than 10 years and is excited to continue sharing his knowledge and passion with Arizonans statewide.