Trials: Divorce, Rapid City Style

Despite occasional lurid headlines, most divorces are dull, sad and tediously routine. So when the case of Raymond v. Marie Bivins came up for settlement in Rapid City, S. Dak., last week, Court Reporter Frances Geyerman flicked on her tape recorder and prepared to be bored. She was almost shot to death instead.

After Circuit Court Judge F. Thomas Parker had read the settlement decree ($100-a-month alimony for 36 months), Bivins, 63, who operates a roadside tourist show, stood up. "You've had your say. Now I'm going to have mine!" he shouted. "I'm going to kill every son of a bitch in this courtroom." Hauling out a .38-cal. revolver, he shot his wife's attorney dead. Marie Bivins came next: dropped by one slug in the neck, she died in the jury box. Judge Parker heaved his swivel chair at Bivins, who was pumping a slug at his own lawyer, showering the deputy court clerk with plaster when the bullet pinged into the wall near her head. Then he turned and shot Parker in the loins. When his gun misfired, the judge and Bivins' lawyer managed to kick him into submission.

When Bivins is tried on two counts of premeditated murder, his attorney and Judge Parker will be prosecution witnesses, and Mrs. Geyerman's tape recorder prime evidence.

What drove Bivins berserk? "He didn't want the divorce to go through," his attorney said. It didn't. Since Judge Parker had not yet signed the decree, Marie was still the legal wife of Raymond Bivins when she died.