A neighbor saw a car pull into Alice McArthur’s driveway in Little Rock on July 2, 1982. It had no license plate and carried a homemade delivery sign. A man got out holding flowers.
Case brief
Little Rock, Arkansas · 1982
- Recorded outcome
- Mary Lee Orsini convicted of capital felony murder; affirmed 1984; died 2003
Key moments
People in this case
- Mary Lee Orsini
Convicted in Alice McArthur’s murder
Photo at source · Oxygen · labeled case photograph
The delivery was a pretext.
Alice had survived an earlier bombing. This time, she was shot and killed inside her home. The flower arrangement remained at the scene.
The prosecution of Mary Lee Orsini depended heavily on an accomplice, but it also traced purchases, telephone calls and witnesses who connected his account to events outside his own telling.
An earlier attempt
According to the Arkansas Supreme Court’s opinion [1], Eugene “Yankee” Hall testified that he and Orsini had planned to kill Alice.
He described their involvement in the earlier bombing. Two witnesses identified Orsini as the woman who accompanied him when explosives were obtained. Telephone billing also linked a call associated with that purchase to her number.
Alice survived the explosion without serious injury.
The later prosecution did not ask jurors to accept Hall’s entire account simply because he admitted participating. Arkansas law required corroboration connecting Orsini to the offense.
The earlier attack supplied a set of events that could be tested against independent witnesses and physical evidence.
A manufactured delivery
Hall said that after the bombing failed, the plan shifted to a shooting. Larry McClendon would accompany him, and the men would pose as a florist delivery service.
A florist identified the arrangement recovered at the scene. Another witness corroborated the collection of the delivery sign.
Hall described removing the car’s license plate and using the sign to make the visit appear legitimate. The neighbor’s observations placed the men and the apparent delivery at Alice’s home.
The telephone call that could be checked
A tracing device and recorder had been installed on the McArthur telephone.
The record captured a call made from Orsini’s residence at 1:59 p.m. on the day of the murder. Witnesses identified her voice. Hall said the purpose was to establish that Alice was home.
That evidence gave investigators something more concrete than a later recollection of a conversation. The call’s origin and timing could be compared with Hall’s description of the preparations.
Orsini had also arranged a late-afternoon appointment with Alice’s husband, attorney Bill McArthur. Prosecutors presented that appointment as part of the sequence.
It is essential not to transform the husband’s presence in the story into a finding of guilt. The Encyclopedia of Arkansas states [2] that Bill was investigated and arrested but never indicted. Hall’s allegation about promised payment was not a conviction of Bill.
A tip manufactured after the murder
The deception did not end when the men left Alice's house. Within days, Orsini told an acquaintance, Larry Burge, that an anonymous caller had identified Larry McClendon as the killer. She asked Burge to pass the information to the sheriff without identifying himself. He did, and the sheriff later confirmed receiving it. That first message gave the appearance of an outside lead arriving independently of the people already connected to the case. [1]
The next day Orsini contacted Burge again. This time, according to his testimony, she supplied yellow pages containing information she wanted him to repeat. He agreed to call her and pretend to be an anonymous source. Orsini recorded the performance and took the recording to the sheriff as though an unknown informant had called her. At trial, Burge identified the handwritten pages she had given him. [1]
For the prosecution, the important connection was between the recording and its preparation. A tape alone could have sounded like a new witness implicating McClendon. Burge's account and the notes instead placed Orsini behind the supposedly independent message. The Arkansas Supreme Court treated the staged call and its inside information as corroboration of Hall's account of the conspiracy. This was evidence about how the story was constructed, not simply another repetition of Hall's accusation. [1]
The ordinary errands behind the false delivery
Other witnesses described pieces of the day that were less theatrical. A florist on Kavanaugh Boulevard identified the arrangement carried to Alice's home. A witness at Phillips Wrecker in North Little Rock connected the men with the florist sign used for the supposed delivery. Two people at Bill McArthur's law firm confirmed Orsini's appointment for 4 p.m. [1]
Those details did not independently reveal every part of the murder plan. Their value was that Hall's account made checkable claims about objects, errands and timing. The jury could compare his testimony with witnesses who had seen separate portions of the preparation, as well as with the telephone evidence and Burge's description of the fabricated tip. [1]
Testing an accomplice
Orsini argued on appeal that Hall’s testimony was insufficiently corroborated.
The court disagreed. It pointed to witnesses associated with the earlier bombing, the telephone evidence, the flower arrangement and other circumstances connecting her to the preparations.
The distinction was not between a perfect witness and a wholly useless one. An admitted participant could describe the plan while independent evidence helped jurors evaluate whether the account was reliable.
The Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed Orsini’s capital felony murder conviction in 1984. She had been sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.
The secondary biographical account records her death in 2003. It also distinguishes a separate conviction concerning her husband’s death that was overturned. That separate case should not be used to blur the outcome in Alice’s prosecution.
What the delivery concealed
Alice’s murder attracted competing claims and extensive publicity. The case is clearest when it returns to the evidence the courts actually considered.
A car arrived. A neighbor saw flowers. A florist recognized the arrangement. A recorded call placed a voice and a location in the hours before the killing.
Those details supported a prosecution built around a planned deception. They also show why an accomplice’s account must be connected to evidence outside the accomplice himself.
Alice survived one effort to kill her. The later appearance of a routine delivery concealed another.
Look closer · 3 visuals
Inside the evidence.
Open a visual to explore what it contributed to the case—and the limits of what it shows. These original illustrations explain the record; they are not photographs of the actual evidence.
The flowers at the door
Original editorial illustration — not an actual evidence photograph or exhibit.
Read the evidence notes
The arrangement and florist sign made the cover story concrete; independent witnesses corroborated preparation details.
Original drawing of generic flowers, not the actual bouquet.
A call recorded in two ways
Original editorial illustration — not an actual evidence photograph or exhibit.
Read the evidence notes
The call to Alice’s home supplied timing and voice evidence beyond Hall’s account.
No authentic telephone, waveform or call recording is presented.
An “anonymous” tip with a script
Original editorial illustration — not an actual evidence photograph or exhibit.
Read the evidence notes
Burge identified notes supplied by Orsini for the staged call. The court treated this as corroboration of her involvement.
The diagram paraphrases the sequence and does not recreate the yellow pages.
★ Key evidence used in a conviction · ✓ Exclusion or reversal · ◇ Disputed evidence · ⊘ Excluded at retrial · ◆ Identity / investigative finding, not a conviction. A symbol does not mean one item proved the whole case.
Follow the locations
Put the story on the map.
Follow the dated entries, then select an event to find its regional setting. Shared-location pins open a group of events. Evidence symbols identify important findings and their limitations.
Open the map in its own window ↗Sources & further reading
- Orsini v. State
- Mary Lee Orsini — Encyclopedia of ArkansasBill McArthur never indicted; Orsini died 2003; separate conviction overturned.
Editorial review: 2026-09-29 · 995 words