PAM, I first read And the Sea Will Tell right after I moved to Hawai'i the first time in the early 1990s. "The Sea Wind Murders" were still discussed heatedly in the Islands at that time and Bugliosi's book sparked new interest. Although nearly everyone agreed that Buck Walker was guilty of murdering the Grahams, the split was about half and half concerning Stephanie's involvement in anything but the stealing of the Sea Wind, for which she was convicted and served time.

Over the years I've reread the book several times and researched other sources. I've thought about it and tried to work it out as to what I think is most logical. Of course when I got the chance to visit Palmyra I tried to apply what I learned about the physical layout of the place and whether it was possible for Stephanie to not have known what happened to the Grahams. I have to admit that my opinion of Stephanie's complicity has vacillated.

On the one hand, assuming for the sake of argument that Stephanie was not involved:

• It was certainly possible that she heard nothing. The noisy birds and the constant rustling of the tree fronds would have masked just about anything short of a large explosion.
• The Iola was tied up to dolphins on the other side of a spit of land that projected from Cooper Island into the western lagoon from where the Grahams had anchored the Sea Wind. If Stephanie was aboard the Iola as she said she was, she would not have been able to see what was going on 'around the corner' with all the flora blocking the view.
• If Stephanie was as busy as she claimed that day on board the Iola getting ready to sail to Fanning Island, it's quite possible that she was simply unaware of what was going on outside her own boat.

On the other hand, a lot of what Stephanie did indicates 'consciousness of guilt', in my opinion. Such as:

• As soon as she and Buck got on board the Sea Wind, the first thing they did was help themselves to the Grahams' food and alcohol (Stephanie said that a bottle of peach brandy was sitting on the table, seemingly for her since it was her favorite liquor).
• Stephanie appropriated Muff's wardrobe. She was photographed wearing one of Muff's blouses that Mac's sister Kit recognized.
• Stephanie lied about the scuttling of the Iola until she was confronted with a photograph that showed both the Iola and the Sea Wind outside the channel into the western lagoon of Palmyra Atoll.
• Stephanie was certainly aware of Buck Walker's temperament. He was selfish (he ate most of their own stores in spite of Stephanie begging him to go easy); he was lazy (he only grudgingly helped Stephanie with their 'roof garden' of vegetables, preferring to cultivate marijuana seedlings instead); he didn't give a damn if his vicious dogs terrorized other people; and above all else he resented the Grahams' presence and he coveted their boat, the Sea Wind.
• Then, as you mentioned, as soon as Buck and Stephanie sailed back to Hawai'i on the Sea Wind, they had its appearance altered somewhat by painting the trim lavender! They had no intentions of informing the authorities of why they were on the Grahams' boat without the Grahams.

No, I don't think things add up. Stephanie does not seem to have been afraid of Buck. In many ways, she was the dominant personality, or at least she seems to have been the smarter of the two (she was the navigator on the way down to Palmyra; Buck could not have managed that without her).

Was she a sociopath? I don't know. Buck certainly was. Stephanie had lousy taste in men. She seemed to like down-and-outs, thinking somehow that she could 'help' them. Wasn't one of her later boyfriends also a convicted felon? At any rate, when Stephanie threw her lot in with Buck Walker, she accepted his reality (being on the lam because he was afraid of going back to prison) as her own reality. It seems stupid of her, but women have done plenty of stupid things when they think they are in love. Would she have helped her lover murder people who had been kind to them and on whom (she acknowledged) they had become dependent? Of course she could have, but did she? I don't think there is conclusive proof that she did. Suspicion, yes, but there is that shadow of doubt in my mind.

As for Vincent Bugliosi as a narcissist: He does come across as a trumpeter of his own successes.

PAM, I appreciate you getting back to me. I hope you found the book at least interesting, although perhaps exasperating! ;-)

Hi Frieda,

Sorry for the delay. I found your post to be enlightening and thought-provoking. My comments, of course, are based on just the exposure of this book and the scant information available online. I have never been to Hawaii, nor sailed the Pacific and the Palmyra Atoll was never on my radar nor my bucket list. In fact, as I think I mentioned previously, this entire story was new to me. Your mention of it was the first time I heard it anywhere.

Boats are not the quiet, silent creatures they are romanticized to be. They squeak and settle and the water thumps against the sides, sailboats more so than power cruisers. So between that and the noises of the islands, I can see where Stephanie MAY have been or CLAIMED to have been unaware of what was going on around her. However, any normal person with even a smidgen of morals or ethics would have had a big problem sailing off on someone else's boat under all but the most extreme of circumstances. But perhaps I just answered my own question.

Buck did most definitely have social issues, anger management issues, all sorts of issues. She may have felt she could "fix" him, but again, sailing off in someone else's boat... did not questions arise? Obviously she now knew that the atoll was far from a deserted island. Why not stay there and wait for the next boat instead of staying with someone like Buck? (I know, a long shot) Did she have any thoughts or questions in her mind about what happened to the real owners of the Sea Wind? I have a hard time believing that someone who taught herself celestial navigation while underway was completely ignorant to the violent ending of Mack and Muff.

Sailors, we are a superstitious bunch. We do not name our boats anew, we avoid certain colors, we do not name boats after men, we do not begin a journey on certain days. They were so obviously NOT the people they tried to pretend to be. Why weren't folks more on guard around them?

In my extremely limited knowledge of the crime, I will always believe that Stephanie was more guilty than admitted. She was so obviously the brains of the outfit. "If only we had their wine." "If only we had their sugar." "If only we had their stores." "If only we had a boat like theirs." She may not have pulled the trigger, but I cannot shake the feeling that she planted the seeds.

So many questions that will never be answered. Such a sad, unnecessary crime. Mack and Muff would have taken Stephanie and Buck back to Hawaii if they were truly stuck on Palmyra, of this I am certain.

Thank you ever so much for your comments. You are the reason I knew about and read this book. I am very happy that I did. I am also grateful that Bugliosi did not continue to write.

PAM

Oh, gosh, ladies - I've read this book twice and now you've made me want to read it again! Just to remind myself of the details.

If you want more of Bugliosi's writing, he also wrote Helter Skelter about the Manson family murders and a very, very long book about the Kennedy assassination. I'm sure there are others, but those are the ones I've read.

Donna

Donna, did you have any visceral feelings the two times you read the book about whether Stephanie could have been as unknowing or unsuspecting as she claimed to be?

PAM, I agree that there are too many unanswered questions.

I think it's interesting that most of the yachties at Palmyra -- at least part of the time that the Grahams and Buck & Stephanie were there -- said that they didn't like Buck but they thought Stephanie was all right. Stephanie was described as friendly, outgoing, and likeable. Some felt sorry for her because she worked hard to get her garden going (without much help from Buck) and she baked bread, gathered coconuts, made coconut butter and such to exchange for food and other items from other people. She at least attempted not to be a complete mooch. Even Bernie and Evelyn, the couple with the little poodle that was friendly with Stephanie's little dog, Puffer, interacted with Stephanie and gave her gifts and their unneeded stores before they left, although they later claimed that they didn't like her. Most of the people wondered about her judgment in her choice of a boyfriend, however, and they were appalled at how decrepit the Iola was.

And what about the 'invitation' that Buck told Stephanie the Grahams had made for a 'bon voyage' dinner that evening of the day the Grahams disappeared? It might not have been as preposterous as it would later seem -- after all, the Grahams hosted similar send-offs for others leaving Palmyra, and Stephanie (and Buck, too, at least once) had been invited before aboard the Sea Wind. Stephanie had played chess with Mac a few times with Muff as an onlooker. And Mac had sent radio messages from the Sea Wind on behalf of Stephanie and Buck. Muff, in her letters to her family and friends, lumped Stephanie and Buck together but most of her dislike was obviously toward Buck. The Grahams might have been happy to give them a farewell meal, because they were glad to be rid of them, at least for a while.

Some readers of the book and in Internet discussions have assumed that Buck and Stephanie colluded and made up the invitation as an excuse for them to go on board the Sea Wind. But there are a couple of other possibilities: 1) the Grahams really did invite them and Buck killed them some time after, while Stephanie was working on board the Iola, as she said, or 2) Buck had already killed the Grahams before he told Stephanie about the invitation which he invented because he didn't want her to know what he had done.

I could probably think of dozens of other questions! I think it's one of the most perplexing true crime cases -- unlike, say, that of Vincent Bugliosi's other famous book Helter Skelter which is wacko weird but more understandable in a perverse way. I haven't read his book about the Kennedy assassination.

I read the year-end summaries of "Who We Lost in 2015" and saw that Bugliosi had died. I know that Buck Walker died a few years ago. I don't know about Stephanie Stearns, but if she's still alive she would be 70 years old this year.

Frieda, it's been a while since I read it, but I remember thinking Buck was a USDA Prime jerk. He treated Stephanie (and evidently everyone else he encountered) like crap. Whether she was involved in the plot or just knew what Buck was planning (or had already done), she must have had more knowledge. Maybe she continued to act like nothing was wrong, and went off with Buck on the Sea Wind, because she was afraid of him. But I think she probably tended toward being a sociopath like he was.

I remember hearing that Buglosi had died recently. The Kennedy book is very, very detailed. I skipped the detailed section about the rifle Oswald used (because I really don't care), and I skipped the large section about the autopsy.

Donna

I remember this horrific story from when I was little and watching the news back home in Hawaii. I always wondered if they found out who killed these people and to my shock (today I found out) not only does money talk (Mr. Buglosi) but I guess if you're given a life sentence in California BUT "oh wait you get sick" you can get paroled.

I am extremely upset that justice was not served for the Graham's. It's like their life had no purpose!

I say bring back the DEATH PENALTY and actually carry it out every six months and get rid of people people who drain our resources. Maybe if criminal's see that California doesn't play, that the crime rate would go down.

I'm willing to give it a 22 year program (in honor of the Graham's) for some real data. I'm sure the stats will be positive and people will think twice about mess around with California Law.

This for rapist, murderers and child molesters.

Sincerely,

#mesosad