Kriti Mehrotra
With Paramount+’s ‘My Killer Father: The Green Hollow Murders’ delving into the tale of how Donald Studey’s name became synonymous with a monster, we get a complex documentary. That’s because it comprises exclusive interviews with not only two of his daughters on opposite ends with their beliefs, but also his acquaintances, other relatives, police officers, and more. Amongst them was none other than his youngest sister, Marilyn Studey Moore Kepler, who passed away within months of making quite a few damning claims against him in the production.
Marilyn Studey Kepler Always Had Contrasting Feelings About Her Brother
Born on March 13, 1946, in Green Hollow near Thurman, Iowa, to Rose Drewel and Ira Studey, as the youngest of their 6 children, Marilyn Studey’s childhood was far from comfortable. That’s because, per her own account in the aforementioned original, all of her elder siblings had some sort of a proclivity for abuse and violence without a care for who they hurt or traumatized. They were: Viola Studey Lyons (1930-1993), Enid Studey Lawson (1932-1997), Doris Studey Bruns (1935-2014), Donald “Don” Studey (1937-2013), and Louis “Lou” Studey (1941-2014).
However, for Marilyn, her eldest brother Don was also like a father figure because of his care, his protectiveness, and everything in between, especially after their father passed in 1957. “I mean, whatever I needed. He always did things for me,” she once candidly said. “He taught me how to shoot a gun. He taught me how to hunt. He showed me how to look for mushrooms. … He was like my dad.” She believed he had issues as the years passed because she felt he held “no human compassion whatsoever,” but she still never confronted him despite their tight-knit bond because he had allegedly taken a life for her.
Marilyn has since claimed she was sexually assaulted by a group of boys and left for dead in a lake as a teenager, only for her eldest brother to be one of the only people she confided in. Therefore, according to the show, when the duo came across one of those boys at a gas station while on their way home from the horse races at Ak-Sar-Ben in Omaha, he allegedly did not hesitate to seek revenge. As if that’s not enough, she then asserted she believes Don also killed his 3rd wife, Lucy Studey, was probably responsible for the death of his 4th wife, Charlotte Studey and likely had a victim count of over a hundred.
Marilyn Studey Kepler Herself Once Had Trouble With the Law
While Marilyn never publicly expressed her suspicions about Donald while he was alive, she did admit in the documentary series that she believed he was indeed the Monster of Green Hollow. Part of it was because she witnessed some of his alleged crimes firsthand and saw how he could snap within a moment if angered, while another part of it stemmed from an alleged confession. She stated in the aforementioned show they had gone to the Hollow hills one day and sat under a tree, just for her to exclaim the place looked like a “graveyard,” to which he allegedly looked at her and seriously responded, “it is.”
Marilyn also claimed in the original production that she 100% stands by all the serial killer accusations made by her niece/Donald’s youngest daughter, Lucy Studey-McKiddy. The former’s daughter Linda also backs her cousin, revealing she is now also in possesion of the 186-page book her mot her handwrote on their family, appropriately titled ‘The Hollow People.’ As per records, she had penned it before she herself landed in trouble in 2021 for an attack on her then-boyfriend, allegedly because he did not turn the television off while she was trying to sleep.
According to the docuseries, Marilyn grabbed a hammer and used the claw end to hit her boyfriend in the head “seven times” before placing him in her vehicle when he begged her to take him to the hospital. Her daughter continued that she then pulled a gun on him while driving and was determined to shoot him, but he somehow fortunately managed to escape out the car, following which she fled. She was subsequently arrested for attempted murder, but she ended up pleading guilty to a lesser charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon for 8 years in prison.
Marilyn Studey Kepler Died at the Age of 78 in 2025
Although Marilyn was handed down a sentence of 8 years, she was granted a gubernatorial pardon due to ill health on May 24, 2024, resulting in her early release from an Arizona State Prison. A few months later, she gave an exclusive interview for the production, eerily refering to it as her “deathbed confessional” because she had to get what she knew of her brother off her chest. The gambling enthusiast who worked most of her life in the service industry or as a cross-country truck driver even gave a few interviews to local publications before her demise. She sadly passed away at her Mesa, Arizona, home at the age of 78 on January 27, 2025, leaving behind 3 daughters, several grandchildren, and many great-grandchildren.
Read More: Susan Studey-Olberding: Where is Donald Studey’s Daughter Now?
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