← I Wish You Were Here
I Wish You Were Here
He Threw Her Off a Cliff and Left Her For Dead: The Story of Mary Vincent
00:23:26
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Girl, winter is so last season and now spring's got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders that perfect hang on the patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done. Hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear open that envelope. It's time for a little in person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic.
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Hi, beautiful people of the Internet, you guys. Today we have a survival story for a change. I'm not gonna lie to you guys. The true crime all the time and the research and just the constant of always thinking about these really, really heavy stories has really been getting to me lately. And I'd like to think that I'm pretty mentally stable. Is that the word? That's not really the word. Mentally healthy. I don't know. I'm not sure what the right word would be. But I do put so much effort into making sure that I'm doing things that make me happy and things that are good for my mental health when I'm not talking about these stories. Because you have to, right? But naturally, things do get to a point where it can be mentally exhausting to be in the mindset that I have to be in, that I have to put myself in in order to tell these stories in the way that they deserve to be told. So every once in a while, I do like to focus on survival stories and talk about victims who although have without a doubt suffered a lot. They survived and they're still here with us and they're still here to be able to tell us their story in their own words. I think it's so important to talk about them too. And I think it's good not only for me, but also for you guys to listen to these cases to have more of a positive ending than where you're. Than what we're used to when we're talking about the stories that we talk about on my podcast. So that's what we're doing today. I'm going to tell you guys about the story of Mary Vincent. I have talked about this story before on the Internet. It's been a while, though, at least a couple of years. So let's get into it, shall we? Thank you all for joining me today. Hope you guys are having a good day so far. And welcome to this episode of I wish you were here. I'm your host, Michelle Cuervo. The year is 1978. We're in California today. But before we get into the awful events of today's case, let's take it back to Las Vegas. Mary Vincent grew up in Las Vegas. She was one of seven children and she lived at home with her entire family. And her childhood was full of love, happiness and joy. Until it wasn't. As she entered her teenage years, she had to deal with the stress that comes when your parents get divorced. And Mary's character changed a little bit in the way that she began acting out because being at home started to feel like being in the middle of an unhappy environment. In the middle of her parents trying to figure out their relationship. There was a lot of tension as they tried to navigate the how to deal with their separation. So she began pushing against the boundaries that her parents had once set. Skipping school, running away for long periods of time, searching for something that she couldn't quite name. I don't think she knew what she wanted or what she was looking for, but she definitely knew that she did not want to be at home. She had been briefly living in the streets in California when she decided that she wanted to head south to visit her grandfather and in a place called Corona. It was a city just outside of la. Mary as a child was a promising dancer. She had danced and performed not only in Vegas, but also in places like Australia and Hawaii. Her future was one that was genuinely bright. But in the fall of 1978 when she was only 15 years old, far away from home and trying to find her way down south, than things would change for her forever. Mary did what thousands of young people did in that era. She hitchhiked. Lauren Singleton was a 51 year old merchant seaman. He had previously been in the army but was now working as a merchant, working on a lot of big machinery. He was this tall, large man known to those who had encountered him as a rough and violent person because, because not only was he a severe alcoholic, but he was a very angry one. Add to that the fact that he was at a very, very low point in his life, very unwell mentally and really had nothing in his life to look forward to. Lawrence was a dangerous man, to put it simply. And he was also a man that found himself aimlessly cruising Northern California in his blue van and, and if you didn't know Lawrence and the type of person that he was, he would genuinely just look like a guy. Like if you saw him on the street, you would walk right past him and you wouldn't think twice about him. He didn't look like this big scary guy, even though we know that he was. So if he pulled over on the side of the road for a hitchhiker that was holding their thumb out, he literally would just look like an ordinary older man who was offering a simple favorite. But that, of course, was exactly the point. It was a hot afternoon in Berkeley, California, on September 29th of 1978, when Lauren Singleton slowed down his van alongside of Mary Vincent. She was standing with two other hitchhikers at the time, and the place they were standing on was actually commonly referred to as hitchhiker's corner. Remember, this was in the 70s. Entirely different world back then. But he pulls up, and despite having room in his van for multiple passengers, Lawrence insisted that he only had space for Mary. He told her that he was also heading south, and he promised her that he would take her as far as Interstate 5, which I guess was a reasonable offer in the language of hitchhiking. Mary climbed into his passenger seat. She was slightly concerned when he said that he could only take her and not the other hitchhikers because he very clearly had room for the others. So it was weird that he said that he didn't. But he was an older man. He kind of looked like a grandpa, Very wrinkly faced, looked innocent enough. And Mary was also just 15 years old. She genuinely didn't think that she had a reason to worry. So she got inside of his car and off they went. During the drive, Lauren started to get comfortable. He started making small talk. But then his comments started to get progressively weirder and weirder, and to the point that Mary started thinking, oh, this guy is weird. But whatever, Nothing too alarming. Yet. It wasn't until Lawrence failed to stop at Interstate 5, as he had promised, that the alarm bells really began going off for her because. What are you doing? You said that you were taking me to this place. You're clearly not. Something is wrong. She confronted him, and she demanded that he turn around. And Lawrence, still pretending to be this innocent little old man, played it off as an honest mistake. He just smiled, he apologized, and he turned the van back around. Mary relaxed just a little bit, and then she eventually fell asleep. When she woke up, they were traveling in entirely the wrong direction again. You can imagine how nervous Mary got. I mean, just put yourself in her shoes. Very quickly, she got alarmed. She wakes up, she looks around, she doesn't recognize where they are at all. She's scared, she's wary, and she starts looking around the van, trying to feel around to see if there's anything that she could use should she need something to protect herself. Out of the corner of her eyes, she finds a sharp stick inside the van and she grabs it. She points it at Lawrence and says, dude, now you're. Well, she doesn't say this, but it's kind of like, dude, now you're scaring me. I'm not going to let you hurt me. She very firmly tells him to turn around and take her to where he was supposed to be taking her this entire time. And Lawrence, yet again, calm and collected, told her that he was, quote, just an honest man who made a mistake, end quote. And he turned around the van once more and started driving the direction he was supposed to be driving in. They're driving for just a few minutes when Lawrence pulls over over to the side of the road, claiming that he needed a bathroom break. Mary also got out of the van to stretch out her legs, and just as she bent down to tie her shoe, Lauren Singleton attacked her. He managed to quietly grab a sledgehammer out of his van, creeped up behind her, hit her over the head with it, and rendered her unconscious. At this point, by the way, it's night time, it's quiet. They're also in a very secluded, lengthy road and there are no other cars around. It's literally just them. Once Mary was unconscious, Lawrence grabbed her, he dragged her on the ground, waited for her to come back to, and then he sa her, completely overpowering her, pulling her hair, taking full control over her. He then tied her up, placed her back inside of the van and her repeatedly. Lawrence did this at least six times throughout the entirety of that night, all while Mary was screaming, trying to fight back and pleading for her life. But Lawrence could not have cared less. He did everything and anything that he wanted to do to marry a 15 year old, very vulnerable girl all throughout the night and into the next morning. Taking a very quick break to thank today's sponsor. You guys, I've spoken about how much trouble I have sleeping on the podcast and on Tick Tock so many times. It's about to be less than a month until my wedding. Okay. So now you can just imagine the things that are keeping me up at night. 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My link, my code. That's it. So if you were already thinking about trying it, this is your sign. Go to bioptimizers.com wish and use code. Wish and grab it before it's gone. Make 2026 the year you finally start sleeping great again. Thank you so much, Bio Optimizers, for sponsoring today's episode. The following morning, Lawrence decided that he was satisfied. He did what he wanted to do. And now he needed to get rid of her. At this point, Mary was still fighting, still pleading, and still begging for Lawrence to let her go. And before Mary could even realize what he was about to do next, using a hatchet, Lawrence grabbed it. He swung it up and straight back down right below her elbow, causing Mary to fall straight back and into the ground. And then he did it again. Within minutes, Lauren Singleton used a hatchet to sever both of Mary Vincent's forearms. His plan was that he would leave her there in the middle of nowhere, in that secluded road, all by herself, alone, to bleed to death. He really believed that she would bleed to death. And he pushed her body down a 30 foot ravine into a canyon, then just walked back to his van, jumped inside and drove away. Mary Vincent was just 15 years old, lying at the bottom of a canyon with no arms, bleeding out as Lauren Singleton drove home. What happened next is the reason why this is a case that is very often talked about in a case that has never been forgotten. Mary did not die. In fact, she refused to. She regained consciousness at the bottom of the ravine. She packed mud into her wounds to slow down the bleeding, making this sort of paste. And it worked. And then knowing that she quite literally had no other option, using the stumps of her arms, she climbed. Mary walked approximately three miles through the canyon until she reached the nearest road, Interstate Highway 5. And luckily, a couple driving past saw her and they stopped. They saw the state of her and they were obviously absolutely horrified. They helped her as much as they could, put her in their car, and then they drove to the nearest phone, called authorities, and Mary was then airlifted to the nearest hospital. By the time that she got the medical help that she very much needed, Mary had lost over 50% of her blood. But she would survive. I don't know what you guys believe in, if you guys believe in miracles or not. I do. And I 100% would consider her surviving that horrible, horrible attack, a miracle. She was a fighter. And she fought so hard to survive, not only through that night, but throughout the very, very lengthy recovery process that she now had to face. But she did, and Mary Vincent would be okay. Despite everything that she had been through, Mary was able to give investigators an extremely detailed description of her attacker. The van, the man, his face, his words. Her account was so precise that when a police sketch was eventually created, Lauren Singleton was quickly identified and arrested. It was actually one of his neighbors that saw the sketch, called authorities and said, I know this man, he's my neighbor, and his name is Lauren Singleton. So he was arrested, and Lauren Singleton, I think at first tried to deny everything. Eventually, though, he did not deny the encounter. However, he claimed, in the way that many men like him do, that something else had happened, that he was not what she had said that he was. But luckily, the evidence said otherwise. Sitting in a courtroom just six months after the attack, Mary Vincent wore two prosthetic arms. As she took the stand, she looked directly at Lauren Singleton and she told the jury everything what he had done to her during the hours that she was held captive inside of his van. The attack, the canyon, the climb back to the road. She had been so scared, obviously, to have to face him again. But she knew that that's what she had to do in order to get the justice that she deserved. As she left the witness stand, Lawrence reportedly leaned toward her and whispered, quote, I'll finish the job if it takes me the rest of my life. End quote. I'm so happy to say that the jury found him guilty of sa kidnapping and attempted murder. But then came the sentence and the absolute outrage that followed it, because guess what? At the time in the 1970s, the maximum sentence allowed under California law was 14 years. One for 14. And that is what Lauren Singleton received 14 years for brutally essaying a 15 year old girl, severing both of her arms with a hatchet and throwing her body in a canyon, leaving her to die. And this is going to make you guys so angry. But it gets worse because Lauren Singleton served just over eight years before he was released on parole for good behavior. Can you literally believe that he was released? But people of the public were not happy, obviously. I mean, can you even imagine? The parole board's decision to set him free pretty much set off a firestorm. No California county would accept him. Community after community refused to allow him to settle there. He was eventually placed in a state owned property because he had to be, because anywhere else that he tried to live literally would caused people to cause chaos, and rightfully so. Mary Vincent for years had warned anyone that would listen to her that he was still a dangerous man. And it's so disappointing, but not surprising that the system refused to listen. Lawrence eventually ended up moving to Tampa, Florida, and he settled into what appeared on the surface to be a quiet life. But he was not quiet for long. On February 19th of 1997, almost two decades after he attacked Mary Vincent, Lorne singleton murdered a 31 year old mother of three named Roxanne Hayes in his Tampa home. He stabbed her to death with a knife. When the news of the murder reached Mary, she made a decision. She would face him again in a courtroom because she refused to let this man get away with taking the life of yet another victim. She was his first victim that we know of, and luckily she survived. But his second victim had not. And Mary would not let him have a third victim if it was the last thing that she did. During the murder trial for Roxanne Hayes, Mary Vincent took the stand once more, facing her attacker. Now 20 years on, she raised a metal prosthetic hand and pointed directly at Lauren Singleton. She spoke with so much emotion, yet so much strength in her voice, telling the courtroom what Lawrence had put her through all those years ago and making it clear that the jury understood just how much of a dangerous person he was. Lawrence Singleton was convicted of first degree murder and he was sentenced to death. The sentence that he should have received for what he did to marry Vincent. He. The sentence that might have saved Roxanne Hayes life finally came for a different victim 20 years too late. In 2001, Lauren Singleton died of cancer while incarcerated on death row. He never faced execution. He died in prison in a hospital bed. Yeah. Are you shocked? Because I was for the entirety of this case. But before we end this episode, I do want to make sure that I tell you about the. The kind of person that Mary grew up to be. Mary Vincent became an artist, a victims rights advocate, a motivational speaker, a wife, and a mother. She used her platform to draw attention to the specific laws and legal loopholes that would allow perpetrators to escape real justice. Determined that what happened to her would not be dismissed nor forgotten. Now in her 60s, she has spoken publicly about the attack and its aftermath in interviews and including on the podcast I Survived, describing the experience with a clarity and composure that continues to leave every single person who listens to this story speechless. And I do encourage all of you to look her up and listen to her talk in her own words. Because she truly, truly is such a remarkable human being. Yeah, this is one of those stories that I just feel like everyone should listen to because it is baffling in so many ways, yet so inspiring. People and women like Mary Vincent are complete and absolute heroes to me, but that is all I have for today's episode. Thank you guys for spending time with me today and for listening to Mary's story. I hope you guys are having the best day. If not, go do something to make it the best day. Make somebody happy and I will see you in the next episode. Massive kiss on the forehead to every single one of you. Thank you guys so much for tuning into this episode of I wish you were here. As a reminder, you can listen to this podcast any way you get your podcast written version also available on YouTube. Love you guys.