calsfoundation@cals.org
July 2, 1982
Alice McArthur, the wife of Mary Lee Orsini’s defense attorney Bill McArthur, was murdered in her Pleasant Valley home in west Little Rock (Pulaski County). Orsini was tried and convicted for hiring two hitmen to kill Alice McArthur. Orsini was the central figure in this murder, as well as the earlier murder of her husband, and the ensuing media frenzy that took place in Little Rock in 1981–82. After many dramatic turns, including the arrest of her defense attorney on suspicion of conspiring to kill his wife, Orsini was ultimately arrested and convicted. She died in prison in 2003.