"Princess Die"

On a lone, rural Oregon road in 1983, gunshots rang out in the darkness.

At least, that's how I pictured the scene when reading Ann Rule's Small Sacrifices, tucked up in bed.

Diane Downs, the mother of the three children shot that night, would argue otherwise. Her story includes a car highjacker, Hollywood-film featured lines, and the fatal shooting of her children by another man, an attempted shot at her going straight through her forearm. In the years to come, Down's story would continue to change, small details being added or detracted in order to maintain innocence.

By her accounts, she sped to the hospital that night, where a very shocked staff worked diligently to save her children's lives. They were successful with Christie and Danny, but Cheryl, only 7 years old, was limp when removed from the vehicle that night, being declared dead after attempts to revive her failed.

It was this night that Diane Downs began to act strangely to those who paid enough attention.

Yes, there's no right way to grieve or act in shock, but Diane Down's was the furthest thing from what the doctors, nurses, and police officers expected to witness.

She became ringleader to a media circus, smiling and gloating in interviews, laughing at inappropriate times, and publicly changing details to what happened that night. She flirted shamelessly with one of the questioning officers and acted viciously towards another, picking sides and lying to everyone.

Why would a mother shoot her kids? That was the burning question that everyone seemed to ask.

What Diane tried to keep hidden from the press was her ex-boyfriend back in Arizona. A married man, he had refused to commit to Diane, his allegiance with his wife. He would not move to Oregon with Downs and had made the comment that he loved her but could not see himself being a father figure to three kids.

When the police confiscated her diaries, they were riddled with stories of hope and heartbreak, all centered around the man she left behind in Arizona. What they did notice was there was barely any hint to the fact that she had children at all, until after the incident, where pages upon pages of entries had been written, in what is now suspected to be a ruse to make her appear like a loving mother.

Meanwhile, Christie and Danny had a long recovery in the hospital, their mother's visitation rights were revoked, as a few nurses glimpsed the terrified look on Christie's face when her mother would come to visit. Danny would not walk again, he had been paralyzed in the shooting.

When taken to trial in 1984, Diane Downs worked the press in her favor. What worked against her was her need to speak. She spoke circles, incriminating herself with pieces of the story that contradicted. The jury was able to come to a verdict: Downs was guilty of shooting her children in cold blood while they slept in the back of her car. The guilty verdict was reached without ever finding the pistol that she had used to shoot her children and herself in the arm; only casings to that gun were found in her home, enough to prove she owned it.

Today, Diane is deemed "Princess Die" by those who remember her story, a name created by the press during the heat of the trial. If asked today, she will maintain her innocence.

This 1988 interview between writer Ann Rule, Oprah, and a Downs, wired in from her prison cell. It's a lengthy interview, but worth the watch, as Diane lets you decide for yourself if she is really as pathological as she appears to be.