An Incestuous love affair turned into husband murder
Candace Mossler was a platinum blonde Barbie, born on February 18th, 1920. One notable trait about her was how she was very secretive about her real age. And, being a socialite was something that occurred naturally for her.
Mossler experienced an unsuccessful first marriage before meeting and marrying her second husband, Jacques Mossler. Jacques was a multimillionaire who spent most of his hours in the solitude of work. He was not precisely described as a workaholic but as a man who enjoyed and loved his work.
His inspiration to work and produce at a mastery level was mostly driven by his childhood experience. Jacques’s father died when he was young. He grew up in his widowed mother’s care, who worked extremely hard to provide for him.
This, in turn, inspired Jacques to be an independent individual. He could take care of himself financially without difficulty. Jacques owned several banks and financial equities from Florida to Texas.
Before Jacques got married to his second wife, he was previously married. Jacques brought along his four children from his previous marriage to his new one.
Married life
Mossler was approximately twenty years younger than her husband. The couple married in 1949. They moved into a luxurious 28 bedroom mansion in Houston after their marriage.
Mossler and her husband enjoyed a lavish lifestyle. They would often divide their days between their Houston mansion and their posh vacation home in Key Biscayne, Florida.
Eight years into their marriage, the couple decided to adopt four orphan children. The life of the Mossler family appeared to be very pleasant from the outside. Four years after the family adopted the orphans, everything was okay. Until the day that Mossler’s nephew, Melvin Lane Powers, entered into their lives, the family was pretty stable.
Powers was a twenty-four-year-old American businessman. He was originally from Birmingham, Alabama. And, he served in the United States Navy for two years before moving into the business world.
Powers decided to move to Houston after serving a ninety days sentence for a con offense. Jacques allowed Powers to move in with his family in their Houston mansion.
The Adulterous and Incestuous Affair
The relationship that Powers shared with Mossler was described as strange from the very beginning. The two got into a romantic affair even though Powers was around twenty-one years younger than Mossler.
And, Powers was Mossler’s blood nephew. This implies that Powers was the son of Mossler’s blood sister. The affair lasted for many years.
In her defense, Mossler forced herself into the affair with her nephew. This happened after she found out that Jacques was cheating on her. The hardest part of Jacques cheating was that he was cheating with men.
Thus, the discovery that Jacques was gay drove Mossler straight into the hands of her nephew, Powers. According to her explanation, Jacques became gay after suffering from a mysterious illness. This left Mossler shattered.
In his mid-sixties, Jacques found himself spending more time at the couple’s Florida vacation home. While he was away, Mossler would fully enjoy the sexual company of her nephew. At that moment, Powers worked for Jacques as a trailer salesman at Jacques’s firm.
Mossler’s Adulterous and Incestuous Secret Exposed
Mossler was in charge of all the finances involved with Powers’ job. After a while, Mossler and Powers became too comfortable in their affair. They became very careless in hiding their affair from Jacques.
Jacques was informed of his wife’s infidelity by one of his employees. Equipped with the information, Jacques decided to investigate for himself. He read his wife’s diary. He found various pages in which Mossler confessed about her burning and passionate sexual relationship with her nephew, Powers.
As a result, Jacques fired Powers and sent him out of his home. This did not settle well with Powers. During his outraged outburst, he mentioned to Jacques that he was going to get his revenge.
To be more precise, Powers promised Jacques that he would return to the mansion as the owner in the future. This threat from Powers left Jacques paralyzed with fear. In turn, Jacques wrote this in his personal memo:
“If Mel and Candice don’t kill me first, I’ll have to kill them.”
Separation
After Jacques kicked Powers out of his family’s life, his relationship with Mossler turned sour. The trust in their marriage was shattered. And, the love and respect between the couple quickly faded. Thus, the couple separated later that year.
After the couple’s separation, Jacques provided a $5 000 weekly allowance for Mossler. This amount is equivalent to approximately $45 000 in today’s currency.
Neither of them filed for divorce due to certain reasons. For starters, the couple’s relationship was very popular to the public. And Jacques was trying to protect his homosexual secret from the public. Being gay was not acceptable at that time.
Thus, Jacques refrained from filing for a divorce. He feared that Mossler would expose his gay secret.
On the other hand, Mossler feared that Jacques would expose her incestuous love affair. Thus, she also refrained from filing for a divorce. According to the couple’s prenup, if Jacques filed for divorce, he would have to split his wealth in half with Mossler. But, if Mossler filed for divorce, she would be obliged to receive only $200.000 from Jacques’s wealth. At that point, Jacque’s net worth was around $33 million.
Jacques’s Murder
On June 29th, 1964, Mossler took four of her adopted children to visit Jacques at their Florida vacation home. Mossler ended up spending a few hours at the vacation home.
She complained of experiencing a migraine. Hence, she rushed to an emergency medical room to ease her pain. Jacques was brutally stabbed to death by a male intruder on the same day. The murder occurred a few moments after Mossler left the apartment.
Mossler found Jacques drenched in blood the next morning. She immediately called the police. The investigators quickly discovered that Jacques’s murder was personal. In simple terms, the stabbing was from someone who knew him well. It was from someone who had some personal problems with him.
Neighbors informed the investigators of a man who left Jacques premises after they heard a commotion. Mossler suggested that the murder could have been from one of Jacques’s male lovers, as Jacques was gay.
Mossler and Powers’ trial
But, after investigators found Jacques’s personal diary, everything took a different turn. Jacques wrote of how he feared for his life. He specifically mentioned that Mossler and Powers intended to kill him for his money.
Thus, investigators narrowed down their focus onto Mossler and Powers. Crime scene investigators compared Powers’ fingerprints to the bloody fingerprints found at the crime scene. The fingerprints matched.
And, Powers was seen around the area at the time of the murder. He was arrested for the murder of Jacques. In turn, Mossler hired one of the best lawyers for Powers.
Investigators believed that Mossler had a direct link with her husband’s death. Therefore, Mossler was brought into custody. A year after the murder, both Mossler, and Powers were freed on bond.
The two lovers, Mosler and Powers, were set for trial. But, the Jury dismissed all the evidence provided at the trial as circumstantial. After the trial, Mossler threw a party to celebrate her victory. Mossler and Powers walked away clear from Jacques’s murder. And, Mossler inherited Jacques’s estate and banking equity.
She, later on, named the company after her as Candace Mossler Enterprises. Mossler and Powers ended their love affair a year after the trial. Later, Mossler was remarried to a man identified as Barnett.
The Aftermath
On October 26th, 1976, at the age of fifty-six, Mossler was found dead in a Miami hotel room from an overdose. Her real age is highly debatable. Other sources claim she was in her sixties at the time of her death.
Powers had quite a successful life. He owned a lot of luxurious properties. And, his fortune was estimated to be around $200 million dollars by 1979. Powers died in his Houston home at the age of 68. The cause of his death remained undetermined.