In July 2021, Dane County Sheriff’s detectives Sabrina Sims and Brian Shunk were assigned to investigate the disappearance of Windsor, Wisconsin, couple Bart and Krista Halderson. Their 23-year-old son Chandler had reported them missing, telling police they went to the family cabin for the Fourth of July holiday weekend but never returned.
Bart and Krista Halderson
Dane County Sheriff’s Office
Bart and Krista Halderson were the proud parents of two sons, Mitchell, 24, who worked in tech, and Chandler, 23, who was in college studying for an IT degree and living at home. Chandler had big dreams and was excited about a lucrative job he had landed with SpaceX, owned by one of the richest people in the world, Elon Musk.
Everything seemed to be going well for the Haldersons, so when the couple seemed to just disappear there was real concern. “48 Hours” correspondent Erin Moriarty reports on how detectives solved the case in “The Snapchat Clue,” airing Saturday 10/9c on CBS and streaming on Paramount +.
Police interviewed neighbors, friends and family and eventually got a break. Chandler’s girlfriend, Cathryn “Cat” Mellender, allowed investigators to download data from her phone. Sims heard that Chandler had cheated on Mellender in the past, so she would keep tabs on him via Snapchat. The popular app allows users to track their friends’ location in real time. Early on July 3, Mellender opened the app and spotted Chandler at a remote location near the Wisconsin River and saved a screenshot of it.
A screenshot of Cat Mellender’s Snapchat app, showing her boyfriend Chandler Halderson at a remote location near the Wisconsin River days after his parents went missing.
Dane County Clerk of Courts
The app placed Chandler at that remote location during the time his parents were missing. Detectives later decided to search that area and to their surprise, they discovered human remains. The remains belonged to Chandler’s missing mother Krista Halderson.
The remains of Bart Halderson, Chandler’s father, were discovered at a farm located about 20 miles away from the Halderson home. The farm owner told detectives she was surprised to see Chandler on her property. She told police she saw him coming out of the farm’s wood line. When deputies searched the area, they found Bart’s remains. Bart Halderson had been shot at least twice in the back.
Chandler Halderson
Chandler Halderson was charged with the murder of his parents, Bart and Krista. He was also charged with dismembering them and lying to police. He pleaded not guilty.
But why would Chandler kill his parents?
In January 2022, his trial began. Prosecutors told the jury Chandler murdered his parents because they had discovered he had been lying to them.
Prosecutors presented evidence that Chandler, without his parents knowing, had flunked out of college. And that job at SpaceX? It was made up. Prosecutors believe that on the day Chandler murdered his parents, his father had scheduled a meeting for the two of them to meet at the college he claimed he was attending.
Prosecutors also showed the jury a video that a neighbor’s security camera captured the day they believe Bart and Krista were killed. It was a flickering light from a window in the Halderson home. Prosecutors say the flickering light was from the Halderson’s fireplace. A forensic expert later testified that more than 200 human bone fragments were discovered in the Halderson’s fireplace.
Chandler Halderson’s defense team argued the prosecution didn’t have enough evidence to prove their case. They claim no one really knows what happened inside the Halderson home or how Bart and Krista were killed. Chandler did not testify at trial.
After two hours of deliberations, a jury found Chandler Halderson guilty on all charges. At sentencing, Chandler told the judge he had something to say and asked if there were any lawyers willing to take on his appeal.
Chandler was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He has a new lawyer, but has not yet filed an appeal.
Schanda Handley was at her home in the suburban neighborhood of Lafayette, Louisiana, with her daughter, Isabella, when the doorbell rang around 2:30 p.m. on August 6, 2017.
Two men, posing as deliverymen, forced themselves in with guns. “They started to scream … to ‘get the F on the floor,’ and ‘don’t move,’” Handley told “48 Hours” contributor David Begnaud in her first television interview.
The two men handcuffed Handley and threw her into the back of a van.
“I’m hooded. They hooded me as soon as I went into the van. It was a van that didn’t have the windows in the back. And it was just a rubber mat without seats back there, and — laid me on the floor,” she said.
Handley said one of the abductors was straddling her in the back of the vehicle, forcing pills into her mouth, and holding a gun to her head, while the other erratically drove them out of town. She recounted beginning to lose consciousness, as she says the men threatened to sexually assault and then kill her.
“And I started praying,” said Handley.
Then she heard the sirens.
RESCUE OF A LIFETIME
Isabella Cumberland: I didn’t know what was going on with my mom. There was no one really telling me what was happening.
KLFY REPORT: “Police say the woman was forcefully removed from her home in Lafayette …”
With her childhood home now a crime scene and her mother Schanda Handley just abducted by armed intruders, Isabella Cumberland found herself confused amidst a crowd of investigators and forensic analysts.
Isabella Cumberland: They wanted to go over the fingerprints on the doors, upstairs, my phone. And it just kinda felt like I was another piece of evidence.
Isabella, then just 14 years old, was trying to process the sight of the violent kidnapping she had just witnessed at her family’s home.
David Begnaud: As they’re driving away with her, did you think that was the last time you’d ever see her?
Isabella Cumberland: I thought there was a chance.
Lafayette investigators and Isabella had no idea that about an hour after the kidnapping, just across the state near Baton Rouge, Chad Martin, an Iberville Parish sheriff’s deputy, had pulled over a suspicious white van after a brief pursuit. There were two men inside.
They got stuck in the mud. So, the men jumped out and took off running. They jumped into the Intercoastal Waterway and disappeared.
And when Martin went to investigate that vehicle, he discovered Schanda Handley, handcuffed and naked in the back.
Deputy Chad Martin: She looked at me and I’ll never forget this, she said, “Are you the real police? Are you the one that’s gonna kill me?”
Schanda Handley: And he was like, “You’re safe. You’re safe.”
Just minutes before, Martin was rushing home for Sunday dinner in his squad car after clocking out, unaware of Schanda’s kidnapping nearly 60 miles away. His biggest worry at that time? His wife’s wrath.
David Begnaud: I heard you were habitually late for dinners.
Deputy Chad Martin: I had a tendency — to be late for everything.
Now, he had unwittingly made the rescue of a lifetime.
Iberville Parish Deputy Chad Martin approached the van and found Schanda Handley naked and handcuffed in the back. “She looked at me and said, ‘Are you the real police? Or are you the one that’s gonna kill me?’” Martin told “48 Hours.”
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David Begnaud: What’s going through your head? I mean, you were just tryin’ to pull over a couple of guys who looked a little suspicious.
Deputy Chad Martin: I can’t really tell you what was goin’ through my head. Almost like I went into, like, robot mode. … I was just tryin’ to get this woman help.
Schanda told him a harrowing story: that the kidnappers had drugged her and threatened to rape her and kill her.
David Begnaud: If not for Chad Martin —
Schanda Handley: Oh. I would be dead. … I can’t even imagine, but I know it wasn’t gonna be quick and swift.
Martin relayed the news of Schanda’s rescue to dispatch, and it soon reached Isabella.
Isabella Cumberland: Whenever they told me that she was safe … I felt this relief.
Deputy Chad Martin: She had said that — she believed that her husband is the one that had paid them to kill her.
Her estranged husband, Michael Handley. Schanda says that before the difficult months leading up to the kidnapping, Michael would have been the last person she could’ve imagined would harm her. They had met in 2005 through friends in Lafayette, at a time when both were single parents and emerging from failed marriages.
Schanda Handley: He … was … really catering and just sweet and compassionate.
Another thing they had in common — both were in recovery for addiction.
Schanda Handley: At that time, I had been sober for about … 18 years.
David Begnaud: Oh. Wow.
Schanda Handley: Michael was newly clean and sober. … He had about a year.
Isabella Cumberland, center, with Schanda and Michael Handley.
Schanda Handley
The new couple hit it off, and a year later they were married in Hawaii. Isabella took an immediate liking to Michael.
Isabella Cumberland: He — well, was my dad from when I was 2 years old … And so that’s how I saw him, was really as my dad.
In 2007, Michael and Schanda found success channeling their experience in recovery into a new business, partnering with a doctor to start a chain of addiction treatment centers.
Schanda Handley: So, we wound up … opening at one point, I think, there were 14 centers throughout the south.
Eight years later, they made a decision.
Schanda Handley: We sold the company.
David Begnaud: How much did y’all make on the sale?
Schanda Handley: The two of them, Michael and his partner, we sold the company for $21.5 million.
David Begnaud: Wow.
Schanda Handley: Yeah.
But their life as happy millionaires didn’t last long say prosecutors Donald Knecht and Kenny Hebert.
Kenny Hebert: You know, money and free time with someone with … an addictive personality isn’t a great combination.
Schanda was seeing that firsthand with Michael in 2017, less than two years after the sale of their company, when she found a bottle of Adderall with Michael Handley’s name on it.
Schanda Handley: So, what we believed at our treatment center was that use of something like that amphetamine could open the doors to a world of trouble. So, when I found the bottle, … it terrified me. … And I can remember telling him, “This could lead to death. This could lead to something devastating.”
And soon things got even worse when Schanda discovered that Michael was seeing another woman.
Schanda Handley: He was having an affair. … And all I could think was, like, “I don’t even know who this man is.”
Michael and Schanda Handley
Schanda Handley
Schanda issued an ultimatum: Michael had to go into treatment, but when he refused to get help, she made a difficult decision.
Schanda Handley: I change the locks, and Michael was locked outta the house. And he started to lose his mind at that point … and so after a coupla weeks, he said, “You’re gonna regret this.” And then that turned into, “I’m telling you, it’s gonna get bad.”
The Handleys’ life together was falling apart fast. Michael accused Schanda of assaulting him; she was charged, but later acquitted by a judge. All while Schanda was begging the authorities to see that she was the one in danger.
Schanda Handley: If Michael wasn’t apprehended, he was going to kill me.
LIVING IN FEAR
As Schanda Handley was recovering in the hospital, investigators were learning the details of her tumultuous past with Michael Handley. They knew they had to find him and the kidnappers fast. They started scouring the canal – the last place her abductors had been seen.
Kenny Hebert: There was a fisherman … And … he reported these two individuals wading by him in the water … And one of ’em pointed a gun at him and said, “Be cool.”
But as the kidnappers had been swimming towards freedom, the canal’s unforgiving current had other plans.
Kenny Hebert: They found them floating in the Intracoastal Canal, drowned.
David Begnaud: Dead?
Kenny Hebert: Dead.
They were later identified as Sylvester Bracey and Arsenio Haynes.
David Begnaud: What did you think when you found out they were dead?
Schanda Handley: I thought … “I’m not gonna have to worry about them hurting me,” as sad as that is.
While investigators suspected Michael Handley was responsible for the abduction, proving it might have been difficult with their main witnesses — the kidnappers — dead. But, Handley, it seemed, had made it kind of easy for them.
Kenny Hebert: Detectives were running the VIN number on the white van … That VIN number leads them to an Enterprise dealership in Baton Rouge. … They said, “Well, a few days ago, an individual named Lawrence Michael Handley came in a rented the van.”
Kenny Hebert: And then a couple days before that, he went to Barney’s Police Depot, which was a store … that carries specifically police-issue merchandise.
While investigating the case, authorities found evidence that they say pointed to Michael Handley as the mastermind behind the kidnapping. In this surveillance footage, he is seen purchasing handcuffs from a police supply store three days before Schanda’s kidnapping.
15th Judicial District Attorney’s Office
Handley was seen on store surveillance cameras as he pulls up, and purchases handcuffs. Finding evidence allegedly connecting Handley to the kidnapping wasn’t difficult but finding him turned out to be the challenge.
Schanda Handley: I’m asking if Michael’s been apprehended. And they said, “No.” And so, they said, “We need to, like, lay low for a little while.”
With a fortune at his fingertips, investigators feared he could be anywhere and a danger to Schanda once she was released from the hospital. So, they came up with a plan of action.
Sid Hebert: We decided on a safe house outside of Lafayette
Sid Hebert, a former Louisiana sheriff, was part of the security detail watching Schanda 24/7.
Sid Hebert: We had a Lafayette Sheriff’s deputy in a marked unit on premises. … No visitors, no … package deliveries, nothing until further notice.
Even in hiding, Schanda was feeling relief that Michael was finally being recognized as a threat after living in constant fear prior to the kidnapping.
Schanda Handley: The terror that I was in for those three months… the kidnapping was nothing in comparison … The kidnapping was a blessing.
David Begnaud: What?
Schanda Handley: The kidnapping is what allowed me to get to a place where people were willing to support me.
David Begnaud: In the beginning, how many people believed Schanda?
Christine Mire: Not many.
But Schanda had found a fierce ally in Christine Mire, her divorce attorney. Mire knew all too well what Schanda had experienced.
Christine Mire: The most dangerous case I have ever heard about, let alone been a part of.
David Begnaud: What made it so dangerous?
Christine Mire: Michael Handley. … He was constantly stalking her, telling her that he knew where she was, threatening her, threatening her daughter with harm.
Schanda called the police several times, but felt she wasn’t taken seriously. Mire helped Shanda secure a restraining order, but says Michael found creative ways to make it effectively worthless.
Christine Mire: He disguised his voice, he also used an app that picked up dummy numbers that he used to contact her. … So, there was no proof that it was him that was actually violating the protective order.
And he seemed to be tracking Schanda’s every move.
Sid Hebert: He was able to spy on her through her own laptop computers. … her alarm system. … he compromised all of that. … nothing was out of bounds.
Michael’s behavior was growing increasingly erratic. Even though he was the one to initially file for divorce in the spring of 2017, he soon changed his mind and Schanda says now he was demanding they reconcile, or she’d pay a humiliating price.
Schanda Handley: He says, “Some of our private videos are gonna go out to people in the community.”
David Begnaud: Intimate videos?
Schanda Handley: Intimate videos.
Schanda struggled over this but knew she couldn’t take him back.
Schanda Handley: So, videos went out to hundreds of people in the community. … My cousins, uncles … administration at the school, political friends, neighbors. … I sat and cried and was sick to my stomach … I almost didn’t stand up.
Just when Schanda thought she couldn’t take any more, on June 8, 2017 — almost two months to the day before the kidnapping — Michael Handley slipped into her house through the garage.
Schanda Handley: He was enraged. He reeked of alcohol. He was — he was furious … And he had me pinned up against the wall. And … I screamed, “Isabella.” Well, he put his hand over my mouth, and he pulled out a gun, a 9mm.
David Begnaud: A gun?
Schanda Handley: He pulls out a handgun. … And — and he said, “If you scream or anybody comes to interfere, I will shoot you both. I will kill you both. Do you understand me?”
Schanda says that after hours saying anything she could think of to calm him down, she finally convinced Michael to leave.
“When Michael left that day after he had attacked me, I was 100% positive he was going to kill me,” said Schanda Handley.
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Schanda Handley: As soon as he walked out of that gate, I ran in the house, bolted the door … And I started screaming and crying.
Schanda Handley: When Michael left that day after he had attacked me, I was 100% positive he was going to kill me.
Police were called once again, but they didn’t arrest Michael Handley.
David Begnaud: I can see in your eyes that you’re getting emotional.
Schanda Handley: Oh … I felt as though I was being told … that I was lying and that I was making it up.
Christine Mire: This is why women don’t report abuse. Because they fear they will not be believed
David Begnaud: How many times had Schanda filed a report against Michael?
Kenny Hebert: I believe that the … actual reports filed were a couple dozen, if not more. As far as how many times was there an arrest made, there wasn’t.
David Begnaud: Why?
Kenny Hebert: A lotta times he was out of state. Sometimes the investigators felt like they didn’t have enough evidence to actually go forward and get a warrant for the arrest.
After the kidnapping, investigators were confident that this time they had more than enough evidence to make an arrest. But could they find him in time?
Kenny Hebert: So, somehow, Michael is able to track Schanda down to the place that she’s seeking refuge.
A DAMNING DISCOVERY
David Begnaud: Does Michael Handley know that the cops are onto him?
Kenny Hebert: Yes. … because at some point he tried to … charter a private plane … And so, the pilot essentially said, “I am not going to be taking you anywhere—um, because you’re a wanted man.”
The pilot reported it to police, but Michael was long gone. And as he continued to evade authorities, Schanda got a text message from a strange number, claiming that Michael had also been kidnapped, saying in part “pay the ransom for your husband” and “pay us 500 large or we will send him home in pieces.” A day later, friends received a shocking photo of Michael — he was nude, handcuffed, and seemingly injured.
David Begnaud: And he’s got blood on him?
Kenny Hebert: Right.
It appearedto be from Schanda’s kidnappers, but investigators knew that couldn’t be true.
Kenny Hebert: We know that, obviously, it wasn’t from them because they’re dead at this point. So, Michael, is behind these messages.
On August 11, 2017, after a four-day manhunt, detectives finally cornered the multimillionaire, once accustomed to private jets and five-star hotels—he was in an off-ramp motel in Slidell, Louisiana.
After a four-day manhunt, detectives found and arrested an oddly smiling Michael Handley at a Super 8 motel in Slidell, Louisiana.
15th Judicial District Attorney’s Office
As they took an oddly smiling Michael Handley into custody, investigators began sifting through the nearly $10,000 in cash, pizza boxes, and illicit drugs, finding a “to-do” list. On it were things like “burner phone, hair dye, cash” — but its final task was even more ominous, says prosecutor, Kenny Hebert, since Schanda’s safehouse was just 35 miles away.
Kenny Hebert: But on the bottom of that list were the words, “Finish the job.”
David Begnaud: And finish the job would mean?
Kenny Hebert: In our opinion, he was gonna kill her.
With Michael Handley now in a jail, Schanda and her security team decided it was finally safe to come out of hiding.
Sid Hebert: It was time to go home. And that’s what she said, “I just wanna go home … and rebuild my life.”
But with his track record of evading justice, Isabella was skeptical that the worst was behind them.
Isabella Cumberland: I remember thinking that … it was almost pointless that he was being arrested. … It felt like he had all the power, and he was gonna keep all of the power.
Michael Handley pleaded not guilty to a litany of charges, including conspiracy to commit second-degree murder, and prosecutors got to work building their case against him.
Kenny Hebert: Anytime you’re on our side of the table, you start thinking, “What’s the defense gonna be?” We could not figure out what (laughs) his defense was gonna be.
Kevin Stockstill: There was no question that she was a victim of a kidnapping.
But, says Kevin Stockstill, the man who Michael Handley hired to defend him, the physical evidence doesn’t prove his client played a part in any of it.
David Begnaud: Were the van and handcuffs enough to convict him?
Kevin Stockstill: I don’t think so.
That is because, Stockstill says, there is an explanation for everything. It started when Michael hired Sylvester Bracey — not to kidnap his wife — but instead, he claims, to move some furniture. That was the reason Michael rented the van, he says, and made no effort to hide it.
Kevin Stockstill: Mr. Handley, you know, goes into the Enterprise Rent-A-Car location with his … credit card in one hand and driver’s license in the other.
David Begnaud: So, you thought you could explain to the jury, “Hey, listen. Nobody who’s actually gonna commit this crime’s gonna go in with their license and ID and buy it themselves.”
Kevin Stockstill: Correct.
It was all innocent enough, Stockstill says, until the would-be “mover” went rogue. Stockstill theorizes Sylvester Bracey saw Michael’s desperation to get his wife back and decided to use it to his advantage. That’s when he enlisted Arsenio Haynes to help him kidnap Schanda and hold her for ransom.
David Begnaud: So, you’re thinking the kidnappers could have wanted to extort Michael to get money from him, so they would have kidnapped his wife.
Kevin Stockstill: Potentially.
And of course, he did buy the handcuffs, but Stockstill says he only used them to stage that fake kidnapping photo.
Kevin Stockstill: So, as he’s bound and gagged, he’s bound with handcuffs.
It was just the latest example, according to Stockstill, of photos and videos that Michael had been sending to Schanda for months showing him in emotional distress, and, in one case, apparently beaten up in a misguided attempt to try to win her back.
MICHAEL HANDLEY (crying in video): I love you. I love you.
Kevin Stockstill: Because Michael had … he had a proclivity to try … and stage these things … to get, you know, sympathy from Schanda.
But as the defense prepared to argue that the kidnappers acted on their own, Schanda Handley made a damning discovery while cleaning out a remote Mississippi property they owned.
Kenny Hebert: Schanda starts gettin’ some of her personal belongings. Well, one of the things that they found was this camera.
It was a type of camera called Arlo and Michael Handley used it for security.
David Begnaud: When Arlo detects sound and video, Arlo starts recording.
Well, it turns out he accidently turned the camera on himself.
David Begnaud: All put together, what did the camera record?
Schanda Handley: I mean, hundreds of hours, hundreds of hours.
One of the first videos is from two months before the kidnapping. Michael is by himself in a hotel room and is apparently talking to himself.
Kenny Hebert: You see him movin’ around. And at some point, he picks the camera up and he puts it in a bag. And you hear him say the words, “I’m gonna kill her. I’m gonna kill her.”
MICHAEL HANDLEY (video): Kill her … kill her.
Prosecutors believe the “her” he intended to kill was Schanda, and that Michael was even more explicit just days later in a conversation with a friend in the living room of the Mississippi house.
Kenny Hebert: They’re havin’ beers and they’re discussing the issues that he’s having with Schanda.
FRIEND (video): Y’all are both pretty stubborn …
MICHAEL HANDLEY: Neither one of us is going to surrender to the other.
FRIEND: Right. Yeah, she’s not going to and you’re not going to.
The friend later said he didn’t recall hearing what Michael said next.
MICHAEL HANDLEY (video): And that’s why she’ll die.
Schanda Handley: Michael says … “That’s why she’s gonna have to die.” Just so matter of fact.
Michael Handley, right, is caught on camera with one of the kidnappers, Sylvester Bracey, prosecutors say, planning Schanda’s abduction.
15th Judicial Court
In yet another clip from just two weeks before the kidnapping… Michael Handley is caught with Sylvester Bracey at that property planning how it was the perfect place, prosecutors say, to bring Schanda to torture her — and possibly worse.
Kenny Hebert: He specifically says, “It’s almost impossible for anyone to get in here.” … to which Bracey responds, “And it’ll be impossible for her to get out.”
MICHAEL HANDLEY (video): Thing is, you can’t break in this place. You can’t break in here …
SYLVESTER BRACEY: And she can’t break out.
David Begnaud: I mean, did you think you had a rock-solid case before that?
Kenny Hebert: Yes.
David Begnaud: But what’d you think after it.
Kenny Hebert: I thought, “I must have done somethin’ right in the world.”
Then, in a move no one saw coming,Michael Handley agreed to tell his side of things.
QUESTIONS FOR MICHAEL HANDLEY
While awaiting trial for the kidnapping of his estranged wife, Schanda, Michael Handley was held in the Lafayette Parish Correctional Center. But Schanda says even though Michael was behind bars, he continued to harass her.
Schanda Handley: I’ve received a lot of mail, letters … while he’s been incarcerated. … I got numerous calls.
David Begnaud: Can’t they stop him from calling you?
Schanda Handley: I guess not.
Schanda Handley said Michael continued to harass her from behind bars.
15th Judicial District Attorney’s Office
On top of that, Schanda lived in fear that Michael just might get out. That’s because, at one point, the defense argued that Michael was suffering from mental illness and was not guilty by reason of insanity.
Kevin Stockstill: When Michael was — was sober … he was a fantastic individual, you know … Very talented — willing to help people. … when he was found at the hotel in Slidell, I mean, there were drugs there. You know. There’s no question that he was using again. … I don’t know the level of his responsibility, but … I think it’s a combination of — substance abuse and … some mental illness.
For prosecutor Kenny Hebert, however, it was a desperate attempt to get Michael released.
Kenny Hebert: They did it so that they could get some psychological — professionals on the stand to say, “He needs to be out of jail, and he needs to go to these mental health facilities.” … Well, we’re talkin’ about mental health facilities that don’t have nearly the security that a jail has.
Michael’s defense team submitted mental health records showing that he suffered from bipolar disorder complicated by drug addiction, which they say rendered him legally insane during the time leading up to the kidnapping. Two court-appointed doctors agreed. But the judge ruled Michael was competent to stand trial and must remain behind bars.
Kenny Hebert: Once they initially failed to get him out … they withdrew that plea.
David Begnaud: And what did they change it to?
Kenny Hebert: They just changed it to regular not guilty.
While Michael Handley’s criminal battle was heating up, in March of 2018, his divorce from Schanda became finalized. Schanda was awarded all of the assets. There was only one problem.
Schanda Handley: There is no money. There’s no money. You know, millions of dollars vanished.
Christine Mire: Michael was a very eccentric person. … he was obsessed with the collapse of the American dollar. So much of their money was in gold bars.
Kenny Hebert: Schanda said she had seen gold before and knew that there was gold somewhere on that … property. … I believe people actually went out with metal detectors to try to figure out if he stashed it somewhere. … No gold was ever recovered … So, there’s all of this money that’s unaccounted for … But we know it’s gotta be out there somewhere.
On top of being left with nothing, Schanda says she suddenly found herself responsible for repaying her now ex-husband’s massive debts.
David Begnaud: How much of a hole did he leave you in?
Schanda Handley: $750,000. … I can’t comprehend how I’m now in a position where I owe this sort of money.
Schanda felt like it was a slap in the face after enduring so much. But it wasn’t all for naught. During the settlement negotiations Schanda’s divorce attorney Christine Mire had subpoenaed Michael for a deposition. And surprisingly he agreed.
David Begnaud: I mean, that’s wild.
Christine Mire: It is.
Kenny Hebert: I can imagine that someone with the arrogance that Michael Handley had, insisted that he was gonna testify and it was gonna be fine, ’cause he is the smartest person in the room.
Schanda’s divorce attorney and the prosecutors had agreed to cooperate with each other. And everyone was interested in hearing what Michael Handley had to say.
Kevin Stockstill: It was a risk.
David Begnaud: Because he might go into that deposition and say stuff that really jeopardizes his criminal case.
Kevin Stockstill: I’ve never been more nervous in a deposition than that one.
Dressed in a striped prison uniform, Michael answered questions for 10 hours over three days.
Kevin Stockstill: I was hanging on every question.
David Begnaud: I bet you were.
Kevin Stockstill: Yeah.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: It was a chaotic and hectic time. I was living out of hotels. I’d been moving from hotel to hotel for several months.
Michael was asked about his relationship with Sylvester Bracey, and the reason he rented that van.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: Sylvester Bracey, I had hired him to move furniture. … I rented the van to make a move, to move the furniture.
He stuck with his original story.
Christine Mire: He said that he had hired movers in order to move furniture, and they went rogue, because they thought he had money.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: I got a phone call. … As soon as I answered the phone and I said “Hello,” they screamed — they screamed, “We’ve got your mother******* wife.” And — I just remember ’cause it was like I got punched in the gut … It was like one of those moments when you go into — not real.
Michael Handley answered questions for 10 hours over three days.
15th Judicial District Attorney’s Office
But when pressed about the details of how he first met Bracey, Michael claimed he couldn’t remember much about the weeks leading up to the kidnapping.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: I don’t recall.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: The reason that I don’t recall is because I was high. I was living like a rock star. I was on and off medications during this period of time … and I was under the influence of substances.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: Mental illness is tough, you know.
But, he insisted, despite the gaps in memory, there was one thing he knew for certain.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: I would not kidnap my wife.
Christine Mire: He would cry, and say that he loved her so much, that he was so sorry. It was that type of manipulation.
MICHAEL HANDLEY: I have tremendous regret.
During the deposition, Mire pulled that Arlo camera recording in which prosecutors believe Bracey and Michael Handley were caught talking about the plot to kidnap Schanda — the wife Handley claimed he loved so much.
Christine Mire: I queued up where one of the kidnappers was telling Michael, “And, you know, if she gets outta line, I won’t hesitate to kill her.”
SYLVESTER BRACEY TO MICHAEL HANDLEY (camera recording): I’ll kill that mother f*****.
Christine Mire: And I said, “What kind of movers tell that to you?” And his fear was palpable, and he said, “Oh, I don’t know Christine, people tell me all sorts of things.”
Michael Handley withered under questioning, poking holes in his owndefense with his own words.
Kenny Hebert: The civil attorneys provided us with those deposition transcripts shortly after receiving ’em.
And with the trial date fast approaching, Michael’s defense attorney feared the worst.
Kevin Stockstill: We were of the opinion that he ran a significant risk of — of a conviction.
With the walls closing in, and hours before the trial was to start, Michael Handley indicated he was open to a deal.
Kevin Stockstill: He would plead, you know, second-degree kidnapping. The minimum sentence would be 15 years. The maximum sentence would be 35 years.
Prosecutors Donny Knecht and Kenny Hebert say there was a lot to take into consideration.
Donny Knecht: The problem with a jury trial is you — you almost never know.
Kenny Hebert: But also knew that there’s Schanda Handley. … there’s Isabella. … You’ve got victims that have to relive that moment if you go to trial.
Ultimately, the decision to take the deal or go to trial was Schanda’s.
Schanda Handley: I was so scared that if we went to trial that it could work out beautifully for him. … because Michael always lands on his feet. … once Michael’s out, I’m no longer free.
SCHANDA’S DECISION
In July 2021, all Schanda Handley wanted was for her ex-husband Michael Handley to stay behind bars. So, she agreed to accept his plea of guilty to second degree kidnapping.
Schanda Handley: I didn’t want to take any risks … I would rather the plea deal than to take the chance and go to trial.
Less than a year later, on March 24, 2022, Schanda was in the courtroom to find out what Michael’s sentence would be. Isabella was there, too, as was Michael.
David Begnaud: What was it like to come face-to-face with him in court?
Isabella Cumberland: It was so surreal, you know? … And I think honestly for both of us, it was this really strong, powerful emotion that we both felt, but mine was hatred.
Hoping to help convince the judge to give Michael the maximum sentence, Isabella chose to give a victim impact statement.
David Begnaud: What did you say at the hearing?
Hoping to help convince the judge to give Michael the maximum sentence, Isabella Cumberland chose to give a victim impact statement.
CBS News
Isabella Cumberland: I really kind of told a story about … how difficult it really made my life, and how difficult it still makes my life. … because I didn’t think he knew that it affected me as well as it affected her.
Schanda also had something she wanted to say to Michael.
Schanda Handley: I told him that he wrecked everything, and that he destroyed everything, … and how could you … like, we had, like, a really — we had a good life. We … had a good family. And we … we adored each other. … He was the person I most admired in this world until then.
David Begnaud: Do you think Michael understands his actions have had an effect on his former wife and stepchild?
Kevin Stockstill: I think that he does.
David Begnaud: You get the sense the guy is sorry?
Kevin Stockstill: I think so. … I think he’s capable of remorse.
Yet, when it was Michael’s turn to speak, instead of a tearful apology, he gave yet another new story. This time he admitted he did, in fact, hire the two men to kidnap Schanda. But he claimed it was all fake, and staged so that he could swoop in, save her, and be the hero.
Donny Knecht: What he really wanted to do was emerge as the white knight … who came in and rescued her. … It was a way for him to try to win her back, but he never really intended to hurt her. … it was all a big game.
In the end, the judge sided with the prosecution and gave Michael Handley the maximum penalty.
NEWS REPORT: A Lafayette man was sentenced today in the 2017 kidnapping case of his estranged wife. Lawrence Michael Handley received 35-years in prison for the crime.
Schanda Handley: Thirty-five years, minus five for time served … puts him out when he’s 79.
David Begnaud: Seventy-nine. … Are you OK with that?
Schanda Handley: I’d rather he never get out.
David Begnaud: Are you still afraid, even with him behind bars?
Schanda Handley: Oh, yeah.
That concern is something Isabella shares.
David Begnaud: Do you fear for your safety from Michael Handley?
Isabella Cumberland: Yeah. I do. … Nothing could stop him.
Isabella Cumberland: I just see him as a villain, not a good person. And … I’m not sad about it. In my mind, he’s changed to a completely different person. So, it doesn’t feel like I’ve lost my dad. It feels like I’ve lost a stranger.
“It’s so powerful to see how my mom handled this situation,” said Isabella Cumberland. “She’s amazing, you know. And she’s really, really strong.”
CBS News
The now 20-year-old college junior chooses to focus on the valuable lesson that she learned from her mother.
Isabella Cumberland: It’s so powerful to see how my mom handled this situation, … She’s shown me how she can overcome something so horrible, and turn it into something great, and become an even better person out of it.
Schanda has found renewed purpose working with others like her. She sold property, took out a loan, and opened two sober living homes dedicated to helping women get back on their feet.
Schanda Handley (outside of sober living home): It’s been really, really rewarding. … And you know, from my experiences that I’ve had — the challenges that I’ve had … I’m … able to … show them firsthand that … We get up, we keep goin’. We put one foot in front of the other and— we will persevere.
An important part of moving forward for Schanda has been recognizing those who stood by her. And while she did speak on the phone with Chad Martin, the officer who saved her, she never got the chance to thank him in person until now. “48 Hours” arranged for them to meet.
DEPUTY CHAD MARTIN: It’s good to see you again. (They hug)
SCHANDA: Yeah, I’m looking at you to see if I can remember.
DEPUTY CHAD MARTIN: I remember. … I’m really glad that — I was in the right place at the right time to help you. Really glad.
SCHANDA HANDLEY: Thank you. … I feel like I owe you everything. … I guess my greatest gratitude in you saving my life is that my daughter gets to have her mom and have a good life. … Thank you. Give you another hug.
Handley is appealing, saying he was not properly informed of his rights when he pleaded guilty. He is also arguing his sentence of 35 year was too harsh.
Produced by Chris O’Connell, Betsy Shuller and Rich Fetzer. David Dow is the development producer. Marlon Disla, Michelle Harris and George Baluzy are the editors. Morgan Canty is the associate producer. Lourdes Aguiar is the senior broadcast producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer
Schanda Handley and her daughter, Isabella Cumberland, were at their home on a quiet street in Lafayette, Louisiana, on August 6, 2017, when two men appeared at their front door. At first glance they looked like deliverymen, which was a welcome interruption, since Handley had been anxiously awaiting a clothes steamer she had ordered.
“I was so excited,” Handley told David Begnaud, CBS News lead national correspondent and “48 Hours” contributor. “I was like, ‘Oh, my steamer.’”
Her joy was transformed into terror, when instead of dropping off a package, the two men held Handley at gunpoint, handcuffed her and threw her into the back of a van.
Schanda Handley was taken from her home at gunpoint by two people posing as deliverymen. It was a brazen kidnapping in the normally quiet suburban town of Lafayette, Louisiana. And it was not a random attack
CBS News
“They hooded me as soon as I went into the van,” Handley said. “It was a van that didn’t have the windows in the back.”
Cumberland watched helplessly as the men sped off with her mother.
“As they’re driving away with her, did you think that was the last time you’d ever see her?” Begnaud asked Cumberland.
“I thought there was a chance,” Cumberland answered.
Handley said one of the abductors was straddling her in the back of the van, forcing pills into her mouth, while the other erratically drove them out of town. She recounted beginning to lose consciousness, as she says the men threatened to sexually assault and then kill her.
Her prayers were answered when Deputy Chad Martin with the Iberville Parish Sheriff’s Office — who had just clocked out of work and was unaware of Handley’s kidnapping nearly 60 miles away — spotted the van and attempted to make a traffic stop. The kidnappers exited the highway and tried to get away. After making a turn onto a dead-end road, they got stuck in the mud and continued to flee on foot. As Martin investigated the van, he discovered a barely conscious Handley in the back.
“She looked at me,” Martin recounted. “She said, ‘Are you the real police? Are you the one that’s gonna kill me?’”
Martin assured Handley that she was safe. A day later, her kidnappers’ remains were discovered in a waterway not far from where they had abandoned the van — having drowned as they attempted to escape. Even then, Handley believed that the mastermind behind the plot was still at large and a danger to her.
“She had said that she believed that her husband is the one that had paid them to kill her,” Martin recalls Handley telling him shortly after her rescue.
Michael and Schanda Handley
Schanda Handley
Investigators began looking into Handley’s estranged husband, Michael Handley, and discovered that in the months leading up to the abduction, Schanda had called the police numerous times on Michael, and had even been granted a restraining order. They also found a rapidly accumulating list of evidence pointing to his involvement in the kidnapping itself. They learned he had rented the van a day before the abduction, and had also purchased the handcuffs used to restrain Handley during it. He was arrested after a four-day manhunt. He was charged with multiple kidnapping counts, as well as conspiracy to commit second-degree murder.
Then, as prosecutors were building their case, Schanda made a damning discovery of her own while she was cleaning out a remote property the couple owned in Mississippi. It was a camera that Michael had been using for security. But, with a motion activated recording feature, it turns out he had accidentally turned the camera on himself.
“All put together, what did the camera record?” Begnaud asked Schanda.
“I mean, hundreds of hours,” she responded.
Prosecutor Kenny Hebert watched the months’ worth of video documenting the time leading up to the kidnapping. Hebert said that on at least one occasion, Michael was recorded expressing how his wife needed to die. In a video clip from just two weeks before the abduction, Michael was caught on camera with one of the kidnappers, Sylvester Bracey, planning Schanda’s abduction while they chatted in the living room of the Mississippi property, Hebert said.
“[Michael Handley] specifically says, ‘It’s almost impossible for anyone to get in here,’” Hebert said. “To which Bracey responds, ‘And it’ll be impossible for her to get out.’”
Michael Handley, right, is caught on camera with one of the kidnappers, Sylvester Bracey, prosecutors say, planning Schanda’s abduction.
15th Judicial Court
On top of the other physical evidence, Hebert said, they now had documented proof Michael had plotted Shanda’s kidnapping — theorizing his ultimate plan was to have her killed.
“I thought, ‘I must have done somethin’ right in the world,’” Hebert said about the video evidence.
In July of 2021, Michael Handley pleaded guilty to second-degree kidnapping, and was later sentenced to 35 years in prison. A small relief to Schanda, who said she fears the day her now ex-husband will eventually walk out of prison.
“I’d rather he never get out,” Schanda said. “Once Michael’s out, I’m no longer free.”
A daughter watches in horror as her mother is kidnapped from their home by intruders posing as deliverymen. “CBS Mornings” lead national correspondent David Begnaud reports for “48 Hours.”
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(This story previously aired on May 8, 2021. It was updated on October 22, 2022.)
Nineteen-year-old Kristin Smart disappeared on Memorial Day weekend of 1996. For more than two decades, her family, friends, and supporters searched for answers and for justice. In October 2022, Paul Flores, the man long suspected in her disappearance, was found guilty of murder. His father Ruben Flores —charged with being an accessory after the fact—was found not guilty.
“48 Hours” looks back to their arrests and how the saga began.
After almost 25 years of suspicion, on April 13, 2021, San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Ian Parkinson announced the arrest of Paul Flores in the disappearance of Kristin Smart.
SHERIFF IAN PARKINSON [to reporters]: It’s been a puzzle and it’s a very slow process to find each of those little pieces … some of that information came to light through the podcast many of you are familiar with.
On April 13, 2021, almost 25 years after Kristin Smart went missing, longtime suspect Paul Flores, 44, was arrested at his home in San Pedro, California, and charged with murder.
San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office
The podcast, “Your Own Backyard,” has drawn millions of listeners and focused renewed attention on this decades old case.
In the crowd, taking it all in, was that podcaster, Chris Lambert.
Chris Lambert: It’s hard to take too much credit … But I was one piece of the puzzle that helped to make this all come together when it did.
But to fully understand Chris Lambert’s contribution, you have to go back to the beginning.
Kristin Smart 19, a freshman at California Polytechnic State University had gone to a party on Friday, May 24 , 1996 — and has not been seen since.
Carla Hoffman
Chris Lambert was just 8 years old when Kristin Smart vanished on her way home from a college party in San Luis Obispo, California.
Chris Lambert: I remember seeing it on the news … it was something scary and they were talking about it pretty regularly.
But 22 years later, when he couldn’t find any recent stories about the case, he decided to do something.
“YOUR OWN BACKYARD” PODCAST: EPISODE 1: It’s a cold and cloudy winter afternoon in San Luis Obispo and I’m retracing missing Cal Poly student Kristin Smart’s last known steps.
Even though he’d never investigated anything before, Lambert quit his job to create a podcast about the case.
PODCAST | EPISODE 1: At least once a day I asked myself what are you doing?
Lambert began looking into what happened to Kristin, collecting articles and documents, chasing down leads and tracking down anyone with information.
Chris Lambert: I didn’t know the scale. I didn’t know how many people were gonna listen. … but I knew that I could try to do a small part.
PODCAST EPISODE 1: I googled Kristin Smart’s name every few years…
Chris Lambert’s podcast caught the attention of millions of listeners and sparked new interest in the decades-old unsolved case of Kristin Smart.
CBS News
He never expected it would be a hit, but his podcast caught the attention of millions of listeners and sparked new interest in this decades-old unsolved case.
Back in May 1996, Kristin Smart was finishing her freshman year at California Polytechnic State University – better known as Cal Poly. Her younger sister Lindsey says their mother urged Kristin to go there.
Lindsey Smart Stewart: “You should go to Cal Poly. They’re known for being a really safe school.”
And it was only 250 miles from Stockton, California, where she grew up with Lindsey and their brother Matt. Her parents, Denise and Stan were both educators who encouraged their kids’ passions.
Ann-Marie Christian: She was who she was because of her parents, for sure.
Ann-Marie Christian: became friends with Kristin in elementary school.
Ann-Marie Christian: Her parents reminded me of my parents. Just very involved with their children. … A very close-knit family.
The Smart family. Clockwise from left, Kristin, Denise, Stan, Matt and Lindsey.
Carla Hoffman
Like the rest of the family, Kristin was an athlete. She loved swimming and skiing. But Lindsey says her sister was happiest when she was traveling.
Lindsey Smart Stewart: She had traveled the world before she even made it to college. By herself, which is pretty amazing.
She spent a summer in London, was an exchange student in Venezuela, and a lifeguard at a camp in Hawaii.
Lindsey Smart Stewart: She definitely, like, took advantage of life, seized the day … she was super ambitious and was determined you know, to find the next adventure. … to find the next challenge.
That turned out to be college. Like so many freshmen, Kristin struggled. Classes were difficult, she was trying to fit in, and she missed her family.
PODCAST EPISODE 1: Kristin broke down begging her mother to let her drop out and go somewhere else.
But every Sunday when she called her parents, they encouraged her to stick it out.
Denise Pearce | Longtime family friend: Things were gonna get better and, you know, and – and they did.
Friday, May 24, 1996, was the start of the Memorial Day weekend. Most students had taken off – but Kristin had stayed on campus. So had Margarita Campos, who lived in the next room in Muir Hall. They had become close friends despite their differences.
Margarita Campos: I was a little bit more introverted and inhibited and she was like, “no, we have to go out and we have to go like … live life.” … And she was growing as an individual. She was pushing herself out of her comfort zone. … and I was like, “Noooo.”
So, when they were invited to a party that Friday night, Kristin was excited to go.
Margarita Campos: Kristin was like, … “come on, let’s go, let’s go.” And I was like, “nah, I have to study.” … And so, she pulled me into this sort of like, “oh come on, let’s socialize. And these girls are inviting us out. Let’s go.” And I was, like, “uh OK, fine.”
Margarita Campos: But when we got to the house it was pretty dead too, it was really — it was like a couple of roommates hanging out playing video games … And Kristin was, like oh gosh, there has to be something better than this.
The two girls walked to an area off campus where there were fraternities, sororities and residential housing for students. Margarita soon decided she’d had enough.
Jonathan Vigliotti | CBS News correspondent: You wanted to go home, and you were trying to find a way to break it to your friend.
Margarita Campos: That’s exactly right.
They got to the parking lot of an apartment complex.
Margarita Campos: I was, like, “Kristin, I’m going to go back home. I’m going to go back to the dorms. You can go.” And she’s like, “please come with me. Please come with me.” …I told her I didn’t – I didn’t want to go.
Kristin did not have a purse, money, her I.D. or even her keys. So before leaving, Margarita handed over her keys to get back into Muir Hall.
Margarita Campos: She was absolutely sober when I left her.
Margarita Campos: I’ll never forget her shadow against the building, this apartment complex, just standing like kind of cross-armed with the long leg … And she was just kind of like looking at me like, [sighs] you’re really walking away now, like you’re really, you’re leaving?
The next morning, Margarita waited to hear from Kristin.
Margarita Campos: I was expecting her to knock on my door and be, like, “Oh, Margarita, you missed a rager. And here’s your key.” … I knocked on her door, and I thought she was just sleeping, or she went out and about, you know?
It wasn’t until Kristin’s roommate returned to their dorm room, that Margarita realized Kristin never came home.
Jonathan Vigliotti: How did you know she hadn’t been back?
Margarita Campos: Nothing had moved.
All of Kristin’s personal belongings – including her purse, her money, her I.D. – were in the room exactly where she had left them.
Margarita Campos: I mean, she was gone. She was gone.
By the time they called the Cal Poly campus police, Kristin had been missing for more than 48 hours. But Margarita says, the police did not seem concerned.
Margarita Campos: … they were, like, “are you sure she didn’t go out of town?” It’s, like, she has nothing on her. … How could she have gone out of town?
Jonathan Vigliotti: They thought she was off possibly having fun.
Margarita Campos: Oh, yeah.
But they could not have been more wrong.
Margarita Campos: To this day, like, I was like, why – why did I just let her go by herself? … I did have guilt about that. … But you have to understand, she was a really independent free spirit.
EVERY PARENT’S WORST NIGHTMARE
Kristin’s mother, Denise Smart, spent Memorial Day weekend at a swim meet with her two younger kids. She was looking forward to hearing from Kristin that Sunday.
Jonathan Vigliotti: And that phone call never comes.
Denise Pearce: The phone call never comes.
Instead, on Monday, May 27, Denise Pearce says the Smarts got a call from Cal Poly’s campus police asking if Kristin was with them.
Denise Pearce: Kristin hasn’t come home … And we’re not sure where she is … We don’t know anything.
Two days after her daughter went missing, Denise Smart got a call from Cal Poly’s campus police. They told her Kristin had not been seen all weekend and asked if Kristin was with them.
Carla Hoffman
That’s when Denise Smart learned her daughter had not been seen all weekend, and all her belongings were still in her dorm room.
Denise Pearce: She was becoming more and more alarmed, you know? She was – she was frantic … I don’t understand this, you know? What’s going on? … It is every parent’s worst nightmare.
The Smarts say they tried to file a missing person’s report with the local police but were told it was too early, and the FBI told them Cal Poly police were in charge. But as Chris Lambert learned, campus police did not act right away.
Chris Lambert: At that point I don’t think they had ever dealt with a missing person, a possibly murdered person.
By the time Cal Poly police began investigating, Kristin had been gone for four days. As they soon learned, she had ended up at a party at an off-campus house.
Chris Lambert: It’s mostly frat guys from the Kappa Chi fraternity. … I don’t know if Kristin knew anybody there.
Chris Lambert, who worked as a CBS News consultant, pieced together what he learned from people who were there that night.
Chris Lambert: Kristin became incredibly intoxicated, whether she was drugged or whether she just had a lot to drink in a short amount of time … She ends up passed out on the lawn next door.
Podcaster Chris Lambert
CBS News
Lambert says Kristin could not stand on her own, so fellow student Cheryl Anderson – who was also at the party – began helping her back to campus. They were soon joined by another partygoer, Paul Flores.
Chris Lambert: As they describe it, Paul Flores just sort of appears out of nowhere. … and offers to help. … He gets his arm around her torso and her arm around his neck, and he’s helping her walk.
Chris Lambert: Paul keeps stopping along the way and letting Cheryl Anderson know, you can go on ahead. I’ve got her. It’s fine. … She didn’t think that was OK. So, she slowed down and walked with them.
When they reached the turnoff to Cheryl’s dorm, she says Flores tried to hug and kiss her. She left them only after he promised to take Kristin back to her dorm.
Chris Lambert: I don’t think she ever imagined that Kristin would end up dead by the end of the night.
Jonathan Vigliotti [with Lambert outside of the the dorms]: Paul and Kristin then make their way here. What happens next?
Chris Lambert: So, if you believe Paul’s story, he goes into his dorm room here. And he leaves her to walk up this walkway. Her dorm entrance is right over here.
Chris Lambert: I personally think that wherever Kristin went, Paul was there with her. … I don’t think she went back to her dorm at all
Whatever happened in those early hours, one thing is indisputable: Kristin Smart has never been seen again.
Jonathan Vigliotti: She had just 40 yards to go … and yet she vanished.
Chris Lambert: That’s the upsetting part about it, isn’t it?
The investigation seemed to be hampered from the start by a series of missteps by campus police – beginning with their assumption that Kristin was off having fun and ignoring worried friends who said she was missing.
Chris Lambert: So much was lost in those first few days where if that very first phone call … was taken seriously … answers might have been uncovered the first week.
They also did not focus on Paul Flores immediately, waiting six days to formally interview him. Even worse – they never sealed his dorm room.
Jonathan Vigliotti: There was a lot of evidence that could have been gathered, that wasn’t. Why?
Chris Lambert: I wish I knew why. … They did an interview with the Cal Poly Mustang Daily … and explained that they didn’t think there was any evidence that a crime had taken place.
By the time they inspected Flores’s room, Kristin had been gone for 16 days. School was over, so campus police found an empty room that had been sanitized by the university’s cleaning crew. Any evidence that might have been there was long gone.
Denise Pearce: The investigation was completely botched by the campus police. There’s no question about it.
And while they did not rush to investigate Flores, Kristin’s family says campus police were very quick to judge her. Just days after she disappeared, an incident report seemed to imply that Kristin’s behavior contributed to her disappearance.
Jonathan Vigliotti: There was a lot of focus on how Kristin … was drinking – what sounded a lot like victim shaming.
Lindsey Smart Stewart: Right. A hundred percent that was happening.
The report said:
PODCAST EPISODE 2 [LAMBERT READING REPORT] Smart does not have any close friends at Cal Poly. Smart appeared to be under the influence of alcohol on Friday night. Smart was talking with and socializing with several different males at the party.
But while campus police weren’t doing much, Kristin’s parents were doing whatever they could to find their daughter.
Chris Lambert: Kristin’s father would come down and hike every trail he could find on the Central Coast. He’d go anywhere. He’d go through tunnels, under bridges, looking for his daughter and expecting best case scenario. … He’s going to find her body, which is awful for a parent.
Early on, a small group of volunteers also looked for Kristin. But a massive search did not happen until she’d been gone for more than a month. That’s when the campus police finally handed the investigation over to The San Luis Obispo Sheriff’s Office … but they did not find Kristin.
Five months after Kristin Smart disappeared, Paul Flores was brought before a grand jury but no charges were ever filed.
David Middlecamp/The Tribune_Zuma Press
Four months after that futile search, Paul Flores was brought before a grand jury. Little is known since the proceedings are kept secret, but no charges were ever filed. Just weeks later, Kristin’s frustrated parents contacted James Murphy, a local civil attorney.
James Murphy: It was just a sad phone call to have somebody say, our daughter disappeared … and we think she’s the victim of foul play and we’d like to pursue the guy that we think is responsible.
Murphy and his wife, Garin Sinclair, agreed to take the case pro bono – promising to go after Paul Flores and put pressure on the sheriff’s office.
Murphy immediately filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Flores in civil court.
James Murphy: And it says wrongful death and then … I put murder. … putting murder on the lawsuit was sending a message to Paul Flores and his family, that we believe that he killed Kristin and that we’re coming for him.
But trying to get him hasn’t been easy.
Lindsey Smart Stewart: It just amazes me the amount of evidence that’s available, yet nothing has happened. … The day after my sister disappeared, Paul Flores had a black eye and scratches on him.
CADAVER DOGS AT THE DORM
The Smart’s attorney James Murphy, and his wife – and office manager – Garin Sinclair, have had Kristin’s billboard in their front yard since late 1997.
James Murphy and Garin Sinclair look at the billboard that has been in their front yard for more than two decades. They believe they can prove Paul Flores is responsible for the disappearance of Kristin Smart.
CBS News
Jonathan Vigliotti: You look at Kristin Smart every day.
James Murphy: Every day. … It’s just a motivator for me. …[emotional] I will go outside at nighttime and I’ll look up at the full moon and I’ll think that that kid’s buried somewhere real close.
Murphy and Sinclair promised the Smarts the billboard will stay until their daughter is found.
James Murphy: I’d love to do anything to end their suffering.
Jonathan Vigliotti: And that weighs on you.
James Murphy: Yup.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Is there any doubt in your mind that Paul Flores is responsible for the disappearance of Kristin Smart?
Garin Sinclair: No.
James Murphy: No.
And Murphy and Sinclair believe they can prove it. They have not been able to proceed with the civil case while there was an ongoing criminal investigation, but that didn’t stop them from following every lead and preparing for an eventual trial.
James Murphy: There has been no other suspect. … every piece of evidence points directly at Paul Flores.
Like his black eye, seen faintly in a mug shot taken by the Arroyo Grande Police – just by chance – two days after Kristin vanished. At the time, they did not know about a missing college student. They were after Paul Flores for an outstanding DUI warrant.
James Murphy: Having a black eye doesn’t make you guilty of anything but if the person you were with disappeared from the planet … that’s physical evidence.
Chris Lambert says, two days after that, when Flores was interviewed by campus police, they asked how he got his black eye as well as scratches on his hands and knees.
Chris Lambert: And he says he got a black eye playing basketball with his friends.
But one of those friends told police Flores already had the black eye when he arrived.
Chris Lambert: He told those friends he just woke up with the black eye.
When authorities later confronted him with the two stories, Flores admitted lying and offered a new explanation.
Chris Lambert: He actually hit his eye on his steering wheel in the middle of the night while changing his stereo. … So now you’ve got three different stories about how he got that black eye.
James Murphy: He lied to the police about everything.
Two days after Kristin Smart vanished, Paul Flores went to the Arroyo Grande Police Department because of an outstanding DUI warrant. In his mug shot, a black eye can faintly been seen. When asked about how he got the injury Flores told three different stories.
James Murphy
Flores claimed after walking Kristin back from the party, he went to his room in Santa Lucia Hall while she walked alone to her dorm. But cadaver dogs told a different story.
Just days after taking over the investigation, the San Luis Obispo Sheriff’s Office brought several dogs trained to detect human remains, to the Cal Poly dorms.
James Murphy: They brought in the first dog and they’d had the dog go through the dorms.
There was no reaction until the dog reached Paul Flores’s room.
James Murphy: … they let the dog in, the dog makes a beeline to the bed of Paul Flores.
Remember, Flores’s room had been emptied and thoroughly cleaned. But remarkably, the same thing happened with three more dogs.
James Murphy: That suggests that something bad happened in Paul Flores’s dorm room.
The sheriff’s office still wasn’t convinced they had enough evidence against Flores. But Murphy says there were other incidents that should have raised alarm bells about him with law enforcement from the very beginning.
James Murphy: Paul Flores had a reputation amongst the girls that knew him at Cal Poly as being a creeper that he was always trying to hit on women.
In fact, Cheryl Anderson, who trusted Flores to walk Kristin back to her dorm alone, told police that her friends called him “Chester the molester,” because he was known for groping girls.
PODCAST EPISODE 2: So, with Cheryl’s account alone, we have an unsettling picture of Paul …
Just five months before Kristin disappeared, San Luis Obispo Police received a call from a student living off campus.
Chris Lambert: There was a man climbing her trellis and trying to get inside her balcony, very intoxicated and refusing to leave. When they showed up, it was Paul Flores.
No charges were filed, but Lambert discovered Flores’s troubles started at a young age. In high school he was known as a loner. Chris Lambert spoke with some women who knew Flores back then. They asked him not to use their names:
PODCAST EPISODE 2 | WOMAN #1: Well his nickname was “Scary Paul.”
PODCAST EPISODE 2 | WOMAN #2: You wouldn’t want to be alone in a room with him. You wouldn’t let any of your friends be drunk around him. Those were kind of unspoken things.
And they told Lambert they weren’t surprised when they heard about Flores’s connection to Kristin’s disappearance.
PODCAST EPISODE 2 | WOMAN #1: I wasn’t surprised, but there’s also that shock value of kind of “oh my god, I knew it!”
Although suspicion surrounded Flores almost from the beginning, any hopes for an arrest were dashed in May 1997 when then-Sheriff Ed Williams made an admission to the San Luis Obispo Telegraph: “We need Paul Flores to tell us what happened to Kristin Smart … so absent something from Mr. Flores, I don’t see us completing this case.”
Jonathan Vigliotti: How significant was that?
Chris Lambert: I think that might have been the biggest misstep that investigators have made to this day. To … declare to the public …if you stay quiet, you will get away with this.
And six months later, when Flores was deposed by James Murphy for the Smart’s civil suit, he kept quiet
JAMES MURPHY: Would you state your full name for the record please.
PAUL FLORES: Paul Ruben Flores…
In 1997 when Paul Flores was deposed for the civil suit, the only thing he would confirm on tape was his name. He invoked the Fifth Amendment 27 times.
James Murphy
Chris Lambert: The only thing he would confirm on tape is that his name is Paul Flores.
JAMES MURPHY: What is your present residence address?
PAUL FLORES: On the advice of my attorney, I refuse to answer that question based on the fifth amendment of the United States Constitution.
Chris Lambert: Everything else, he took the Fifth Amendment. …He wouldn’t answer a single thing.
JAMES MURPHY: In May of 96 were you a student at Cal Poly?
PAUL FLORES: On the advice of my attorney …
He invoked the fifth 27 times.
JAMES MURPHY: What is the name of your father?
PAUL FLORES: On the advice of my …
Chris Lambert … and it worked. … You just don’t talk, and you get away with it.
Flores wasn’t talking. But was there evidence possibly placing Kristin Smart at his mother’s home?
James Murphy: Somebody found an earring that they say … was Kristin Smart’s jewelry in the driveway.
An earring that appeared to match the necklace Kristin is wearing on the billboard.
SEARCHING FOR EVIDENCE
When Kristin Smart disappeared, Paul Flores’s parents – Susan and Ruben – were separated and living apart. Four months later, while attempting to reconcile, Susan rented out her house in Arroyo Grande.
Chris Lambert: A young couple moves into it with their kid. … The mother is washing her car in the driveway at one point
PODCAST EPISODE 3: Something shiny catches her eye next to the front driver side tire. A single woman’s earring.
That mother, Mary Lassiter, described it to Chris Lambert.
PODCAST EPISODE 3 | MARY LASSITER: It was like a red thing and it was like a smudge-like fingerprinted look on the back, just red, like maroon, like old looking and the smudge that it was like half a fingerprint.
It was turned over to a detective with the San Luis Obispo Sheriff’s Office, but Garin Sinclair says, the Smarts never knew it existed until the Lassiters were deposed in January 1997.
Garin Sinclair: He never once turned to the Smart family and said, hey, we have an earring, we’d like to show it to you to see if it matches any of your daughter’s jewelry.
The Smarts then demanded to see it.
Chris Lambert: And that’s when they’re told that earring has been misplaced.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Misplaced?
Chris Lambert: It was never marked as evidence apparently.
Mary Lassiter says the earring she found in the driveway matched the necklace Kristin Smart is seen wearing on this billboard.
CBS News
But Mary Lassiter says the earring matched the necklace Kristin is seen wearing on the billboard.
James Murphy: If it was, in fact, a piece of jewelry that matched Kristin’s jewelry, it would have been blockbuster evidence.
And might have connected Kristin to Susan Flores’s house, says James Murphy.
James Murphy: There’s no way to get evidence back once you’ve lost it.
Another frustration for the Smarts: at the time Kristin disappeared, investigators weren’t aware that Paul Flores’s parents were separated and living apart. So, they did not immediately get a warrant to search Susan Flores’s home.
Even more difficult to understand was why they waited two months to search the family home where Paul Flores was living with his father, Ruben. And when they did …
Chris Lambert: They didn’t bring cadaver dogs with them. They didn’t bring a forensics team. … They didn’t look at the Flores family’s vehicles.
They might have found evidence in those vehicles. Paul Flores did not have a car on campus, so Murphy surmises he had to have had help.
James Murphy: And it’s 2:30 and 3 o’clock in the morning at Cal Poly … this is not a – a location from which Paul alone could easily move a body without a vehicle.
But further investigation of the Flores’s two trucks seemed impossible. In the months after Kristin’s disappearance, one truck was traded in and the other was reported stolen.
But it’s Susan Flores’s concrete backyard that initially received a lot of attention. It had been the focus of widespread speculation for more than two decades – especially her planter boxes.
Chris Lambert: Around the time Kristin disappeared, they cut out planter boxes in the backyard, so they cut out big chunks of concrete and filled it in with soil. … In one of Paul’s police interviews … he mentioned that he wanted to be let out of the interview because he needed to help clean up concrete at his mom’s house … So, what was being done in Susan Flores’s backyard in the weeks after Kristin went missing?
Susan’s house was finally searched in March 1997 – nine months after Kristin disappeared – but nothing was found.
It would be three more years before the property was searched again.
Members of the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department and FBI searched the grounds of Susan Flores’s home in Arroyo Grande on June 19, 2000, for any evidence that might shed light on the disappearance of Cal Poly student Kristin Smart.
David Middlecamp/The Tribune_Zuma Press
PODCAST EPISODE 4: At 8 a.m. on June 19th, 2000, a team of sheriff’s investigators knocks on the front door of Susan Flores’s East Branch Street home. With them is a group of FBI evidence response team members and a search warrant.
That warrant allowed them to dig up the backyard, but deputies chose not to excavate. Denise Pearce says that was a crushing blow for the Smart family.
Denise Pearce: To be almost there. To think that you’re going to finally get some resolution, and then it doesn’t happen the way it’s supposed to. Devastating.
And there would be more disappointment in 2007, after the Smart’s legal team searched a small portion of Susan Flores’s backyard with ground penetrating radar and did not find any evidence.
Chris Lambert: They just have never given up and are never going to give up on their daughter.
Ruben Flores and his estranged wife Susan have always denied any role in Kristin Smart’s disappearance.
JAMES MURPHY: Do you have any information as to where Kristin Smart’s body is located?
SUSAN FLORES: [Long pause, grabs water bottle] Of course not.
JAMES MURPHY: Your husband have information as to where Kristin Smart’s body is located?
SUSAN FLORES: No.
When they were deposed by James Murphy, they also insisted their son was not involved.
JAMES MURPHY: Does your son have any information as to where Kristin Smart’s body is located?
SUSAN FLORES: Nope.
JAMES MURPHY: Has your son ever told you that he did not kill Kristin Smart?
RUBEN FLORES: [long pause] We never asked that question. We just, “do you know anything about it”. He says “no.”
Through the years, the Smarts have kept pressure on the Flores family. But the Flores’s have fought back, suing the Smarts for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Like the Smart’s civil case, theirs also has been on hold.
In the meantime, Paul Flores moved to Southern California, where he bounced from job to job. But as Chris Lambert learned, Flores’s pattern of behavior with women didn’t stop.
ARRESTS & NEW TIPS
Paul Flores may have wanted a fresh start in Southern California, but Chris Lambert says, he could not seem to break old habits.
Chris Lambert: Paul worked with a number of women that he made incredibly uncomfortable … girls who he tried to make a pass at sexually, girls that he tried to force to kiss him.
Some of those women – who did not want their real names used – told Lambert about their encounters with him.
PODCAST EPISODE 4: So, I walk him up to his sister’s apartment, and all of a sudden, he just like picked me up, carried me inside, turned around and shut the apartment door, and locked it. So, I said, “you better turn some lights on right now and let me out or I’m going to scream.” … so eventually he unlocked you know, the apartment door, and I left.
Lambert also interviewed a woman who dated Flores until, she says, he became physically and verbally abusive.
PODCAST EPISODE 4: And he had like a butter knife and he like held it to my neck. And I was screaming. And my roommate actually kicked down the door to make him stop.
But Paul Flores was never charged with any of these incidents. Back in San Luis Obispo, the Smarts, feeling ignored by the sheriff’s office, continued a relentless campaign to get them to do more to find their daughter.
Jonathan Vigliotti: What toll over time did this have on … your parents?
Lindsey Smart Stewart: I think they’re, like, carrying boulders on their back.
Then, in 2011, Ian Parkinson was elected sheriff.
PODCAST EPISODE 5: If you were making a film about a new law enforcer who’s coming to a small town to save the day, you’d probably cast Parkinson.
He promised the Smarts that solving Kristin’s case would be a priority.
Ian Parkinson: I committed to them that I was going to go back to the beginning … and re-examine every piece of evidence that we had.
But Parkinson acknowledges it hasn’t been easy.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Was this case, given the evidence that was lost early on, doomed from the very beginning?
Ian Parkinson: Yes. I guess the answer is yes. There was early mistakes made that you can’t recover from … when you’re missing those vital pieces.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Is this a case that takes a miracle to solve?
Ian Parkinson: I hope not.
Since Parkinson came on the scene, investigators have dug up hillsides; searched the homes and properties of all the Flores’; collected evidence; seized Paul Flores’ computers; monitored his cell phone and text messages, and found new witnesses — some with the help of Chris Lambert.
Chris Lambert: I brought them a number of witnesses that they were very interested in. I also brought them witnesses that they had no interest in whatsoever. And then months and months later, they’d reach back out and say, can you get us in touch with this person again?
In April 2021, investigators charged Paul Flores, left, with Kristin Smart’s murder, and his then-80-year-old father Ruben, as an accessory after the fact.
San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office
In April 2021, investigators finally put the pieces of the puzzle together and decided they had enough to charge the then-44-year-old Paul Flores with Kristin’s murder, and his then-80-year-old father with being an accessory after the fact.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: The allegation against Ruben is that he helped to conceal Kristen’s body after the murder was committed.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: We don’t have evidence sufficient to charge anyone else at this time. But … the investigation is ongoing.
And for the first time … clues about what may have happened to Kristin Smart.
SHERIFF IAN PARKINSON [at press conference]: Forensic physical evidence was located. And yes, we believe it’s linked to Kristin. And yes, we did find physical evidence at, at least two homes.
Like what may have been discovered in March 2021 when investigators searched Ruben Flores’ house using cadaver dogs and ground penetrating radar.
Chris Lambert:They did a significant amount of digging underneath the house. They took in soil, I assume, for some kind of analysis.
In March 2021, the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office served a search warrant at the Arroyo Grande home of Ruben Flores. Sheriff Ian Parkinson was able to confirm that forensic physical evidence that authorities believe is linked to Kristin was located at, at least two homes. In a civil lawsuit, the Smarts’ attorney claims that Kristin’s remains were buried at one time on Paul Flores’ father’s property.
AP Images
According to a county probation bail report obtained by the San Luis Obispo Tribune, “biological evidence” was found under Ruben’s deck.
James Murphy: The question for decades was “Well, where did the body go?”
Murphy has filed a new civil suit against Ruben Flores for the intentional infliction of emotional distress. And the complaint has some explosive claims about what led investigators to focus under Ruben’s deck in the first place.
Murphy has filed a new civil suit against Ruben Flores for the intentional infliction of emotional distress. And the complaint has some explosive claims about what led investigators to focus under Ruben’s deck in the first place.
James Murphy: The podcast is out. People are watching Ruben Flores and Susan Flores and Paul Flores. … suddenly major pieces of evidence came forward.
An important tip came in after a February 2020 search of Paul, Susan and Ruben’s properties. Murphy alleges four nights later, strange activity was seen at Ruben’s house.
James Murphy: An eyewitness actually documented the fact that … throughout the night that there was activity in the area of the underside of that deck.
James Murphy: I’m not at liberty to describe how it was documented. But I’ve seen it.
That witness initially came forward to Chris Lambert, who passed the information to the sheriff’s office and Murphy.
In his complaint, Murphy alleges, along with Ruben, there were two other unnamed individuals. He says they are Ruben’s ex-wife Susan and her boyfriend.
James Murphy: So why would Susan Flores, her boyfriend, and Ruben Flores be up all night long … working under that deck.
The lawsuit claims they were moving Kristin’s remains.
James Murphy: Well, the location where all this activity occurred is where they found the biological material. … And the body’s not there now.
And there are more horrifying allegations about what may have happened to Kristin after she was last seen with Paul Flores.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: It is alleged that Mr. Flores caused the death of Kristen Smart while in the commission of or attempted rape.
Because of the statute of limitations, Dow says, Paul Flores can’t be charged with rape.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: But the allegation that he was committing or attempting to commit a rape … when he killed her, is the basis for which we are able to file first-degree felony murder charges.
Authorities made clear that they plan to use Flores’ alleged predatory behavior against him.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: We intend to use evidence of other sexual crimes in this prosecution to prove the facts necessary for the attempted rape in this case.
And according to that probation report, “dozens of women have recounted Paul Flores’ sexual assaults and predatory behavior that document his 25 years as a serial rapist.” He has not been charged in those incidents.
D.A. DAN DOW [press conference]: We have evidence that we do believe there are other people that are not yet identified that have had some kind of a criminal act perpetrated on them by Mr. Flores.
“48 Hours” has learned these suspicions center around evidence found during that 2020 search of Paul Flores’ home. Sources tell us investigators discovered videos and photographs on Flores’ computer showing him engaged in sexual activity with at least 10 different women, apparently in various states of consciousness.
Nearly a week after their arrests, father and son both pleaded not guilty in San Luis Obispo County Superior Court. Paul Flores, lower left, remained in jail without bail while Ruben Flores, upper right, was able to post bail after a judge agreed to lower the bail amount from $250,000 to $50,000
San Luis Obispo County Superior Court/Zoom
Paul Flores and his father both pleaded not guilty to all charges at their arraignment. Ruben’s attorney, Harold Mesick, dismissed the evidence against his client as “so minimal as to shock the conscience.”
He later argued that the biological evidence found under the deck was not conclusively human blood. And DNA evidence could not be found linking any other evidence to Kristin.
Susan Flores and her boyfriend were never charged in the case.
Ruben Flores was released on $50,000 bail to his ex-wife. He was required to wear an electronic ankle bracelet. But Paul Flores remained behind bars help without bail.
James Murphy: To see them in custody was a feeling of great joy for me. … My job was to hunt them. And that’s what I’ve been doing for a long, long time, along with a lot of other people. That’s been our goal.
It is also what the Smarts have been waiting for — for more than a quarter of a century. Chris Lambert says they’re cautiously optimistic.
Chris Lambert:They’re hopeful, but they’ve also been let down so many times before. I think they’re just waiting to see what the outcome is going to be.
James Murphy: They’re interested in seeing Paul Flores get convicted and Ruben Flores get held accountable. … most importantly they wanna find their daughter.
On October 18, 2022, Paul Flores was found guilty of first-degree murder.
A jury acquitted Ruben Flores of the charge of being an accessory after the fact.
Kristin’s body has still not been found.
The Kristin Smart Scholarship has been established by her family to help other college bound women pursue their dreams.
Produced by Lisa Freed. Greg Fisher and Michelle Fanucci are the development producers. Mike McHugh is the producer-editor. Ken Blum is the editor. Alicia Tejada is the field producer and Addison Briley is the associate producer. Lourdes Aguiar is the senior producer.
Two men arrived at Schanda Handley’s door, handcuffed her, and threw her in the back of a van. They put a gun to her head and threatened to kill her, but she lived to tell the story.
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Louisiana sheriff’s deputy, Chad Martin, made the rescue of a lifetime when he pulled over two men who abducted Schanda Handley. Years later, Martin and Handley reunited.
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A college professor, her boyfriend and a former psychologist — three friends in a small Georgia town got together one spring night to swim and play and listen to music. Marianne Shockley was a respected college professor and renown entomologist. By morning, she and the former psychologist, Clark Heindel, were dead. Only her boyfriend, Marcus Lillard, was alive.
“There is good and there is evil and that night … evil came to play,” Lillard, the sole survivor, tells “48 Hours” contributor Jonathan Vigliotti in an exclusive interview.
Charged with his girlfriend’s murder, Lillard told investigators he had nothing to do with Marianne’s death and a jury acquitted him. Her family doesn’t believe him. So, what happened that night?
A DEADLY NIGHT
It was nearing 3 a.m. on Mother’s Day, May 12, 2019, when Baldwin County Sheriff’s deputies stormed into Clark Heindel’s house and found he’d killed himself with a shotgun.
DEPUTY (bodycam video): Sheriff’s Office!
DEPUTY: Sheriff’s Office!
DEPUTY: We’re gonna need to get that gun away from him … his hand’s still on it.
Only moments earlier, Heindel had called 911 asking paramedics to come to his home in Milledgeville, Georgia, and the scene was captured on police bodycams.
911 OPERATOR: 911.
CLARK HEINDEL: Yes, I need an ambulance.
Heindel said a friend of his, college professor Marianne Shockley, had seemingly drowned in his hot tub.
DEPUTY (bodycam audio): We gotta treat this like a crime scene.
From left, Marcus Lillard, Clark Heindel and Marianne Shockley.
Marcus Lillard/Clark Heindel, Facebook/Marcus Lillard
Within hours, Marianne’s death was being investigated as a homicide and authorities say they had two suspects: her boyfriend, Marcus Lillard, who was being held for questioning, and Heindel, a longtime resident of Milledgeville.
Penny Dearmin: I think a lotta people do think that because Clark Heindel killed himself, he had some kind of involvement.
Penny Dearmin investigated the case on her podcast, Blood Town.
Penny Dearmin:I’m doing this podcast because I need to know what happened to her.
As it turns out, Dearmin had previously met Lillard.
Penny Dearmin: I met Marcus when I purchased my truck.
At the time, Marcus Lillard was working as a car and truck finance manager.
Jonathan Vigliotti: And what was your impression during that transaction?
Penny Dearmin: He was very nice. He was very personable, making jokes, making me feel very comfortable, very at ease … and I liked him right away.
Pretty much everyone agrees that Lillard, who was married and divorced twice, was a charmer. But, as Penny Dearmin later learned, that charm came with a reputation.
Penny Dearmin: He was definitely known as a ladies’ man. Everyone, regardless of what they thought of him, knew that about him.
Marcus Lillard: … somehow God continued to send women my way that were way too good for me. And I would date ’em, and I’d take ’em for granted, one right after another. And it was — it was a steady pattern.
Carson Lillard: He’s the most … charismatic — person I’ve ever met. I mean he’s just got this kind of aura about him that sucks people in.
Carson is Marcus’ 23-year-old-son.
Carson Lillard: Anywhere he wanted to go, there was a woman there that he could shack up with and stay with.
And eventually, Marianne also fell under his spell. The two had met in the late 1990s when they were students at Georgia College in Milledgeville and working at the same local restaurant.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Was there a spark in that moment?
Marcus Lillard: No. I was a kid, man. I was probably 17, and she would have been 20 … I was a little, you know little — little wormy guy.
Ayla Crippen: I thought he was fine. I mean, nothing stood out to me to be irregular about him.
Ayla Crippen is Marianne’s younger sister. She went to the same college as Marianne and Lillard.
Ayla Crippen: He … dated one of my best friends and roommates at the time. Um, they didn’t date for very long. She said she got a weird vibe from him.
Lillard admits drugs got in the way of his college education and he dropped out.
Marcus Lillard: I just thought life was a party. And — I treated it as such.
Ayla Crippen: I never really thought about him again until Marianne started dating him, you know, two decades later.
The year was 2017. Lillard was on the road in Athens, Georgia. He knew Marianne lived there, so he invited her to lunch.
Marcus Lillard: I was on my motorcycle, we took a trip around Athens … we went to her home away from home, the … botanical gardens. … The motorcycle ride, I mean, that was s — it’s as romantic as you can get for lunch time on a — on a Wednesday.
University of Georgia Professor Marianne Shockley took Marcus Lillard along as her assistant on trips in China and Ecuador.
Some 20 years after they first met, Lillard says they clicked.
Marcus Lillard: We spent every possible moment together on the weekends.
Marianne enjoyed Lillard’s company so much that she brought him along as her assistant on trips to China and Ecuador.
Jonathan Vigliotti: So, this is a very serious relationship.
Marcus Lillard: Absolutely, yeah, yeah … we were super in love with each other.
Ayla Crippen: … to me, he was not relationship material. He’s somebody that you go have a good time with, and then you’d send him on his way.
Professor Shockley was known on the UGA campus as “Doc Shock.” Her passion for insects extended into the field of entomophagy: the practice of eating insects. She believed they could be a solution for world hunger.
Crippen says the relationship seemed to suit Marianne’s busy lifestyle. She’d been married and divorced three times and had two children. She had a PhD and was a star professor at the University of Georgia where she was known around campus as “Doc Shock.” Her specialty was entomology — the study of insects.
Marianne liked everything about insects, including their taste.
MARIANNE SHOCKLEY (video): Ants taste like citrus. Some grain state bugs taste like cinnamon.
She embraced entomophagy—the eating of insects. And she believed bugs could be used as a protein source to help solve world hunger.
Shakara Maggitt was one of Marianne’s students who became a true believer and something of a bug baker. At “48 Hours”‘ request, she brought some cricket brownie samples.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Let’s dig in. Let’s kind of try it. You can put … a few more crickets on mine. I’m not — I’m not squeamish.
Shakara Maggitt (topping a brownie with more crickets): OK, here (laughs).
Jonathan Vigliotti(holds up brownie): … To Marianne.
Shakara Maggitt: To Marianne. Ooh, and it’s so moist.
Jonathan Vigliotti: The brownie is perfectly cooked, perfectly baked. And the crickets add a little bit of added crunch.
Maggit says she could tolerate eating bugs more than she could tolerate Marcus Lillard.
Shakara Maggitt: I didn’t particularly care for him. I couldn’t really put my finger on it, but I didn’t like him.
Carson Lillard could relate.
Carson Lillard: Nobody knows a father better than their own son.
He had warned Marianne that Marcus had a Jekyll and Hyde personality, largely because of drugs.
Carson Lillard: He was on cocaine my whole life.
And he cautioned her to be careful.
Carson Lillard: “… he’s angry, and he’s violent and … you’re gonna see it.”… “if I could tell you anything it — it would just be to — get away …”
A “CONFUSING AND DECEITFUL” NIGHT
On the afternoon of May 11, 2019, Marcus Lillard and Marianne Shockley were in a celebratory mood. The college school year had just ended and as seen in surveillance footage the couple went bar hopping in Milledgeville before heading over to Clark Heindel’s house.
On May 11, 2019, Marianne Shockley and her boyfriend, Marcus Lillard, had spent the day together, drinking at bars and restaurants in Milledgeville, Georgia. Here they can be seen on CCTV footage at a local bar and restaurant called Aubri Lane’s.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
Marcus Lillard: … had a few beers, smoked a little pot, started listenin’ to some music … had a couple more beers.
Lillard spoke to “48 Hours” from jail; he’s been behind bars since Marianne’s death. He told us about that night and how it all began as an impromptu jam session. Clark Heindel played the accordion and Marcus tried his hand at the conga drums, just as they had done in the past.
Marcus Lillard: We had stepped down from his porch and were gettin’ ready to leave. And I said, “Hey Clark, I heard you got some acid.” And he says, “No, but I’ve got some ecstasy.”
Lillard says all three of them took the ecstasy pills — a drug that makes users feel euphoric but can also cause anxiety and paranoia.
Jonathan Vigliotti: What happened next?
Marcus Lillard: It got all fuzzy after that.
Marcus Lillard: I was so out of it … I couldn’t make a sentence, I couldn’t speak.
But Lillard did later piece together a timeline and told investigators that he thought he and Marianne got into the hot tub around 9 p.m. Marcus said, at one point, he got out of the hot tub and Marianne begged him not to leave.
Marcus Lillard: She says, “Baby get — get back in this water with me right now.”
Jonathan Vigliotti: … Was she afraid? Was she expressing any kinda concern —
Marcus Lillard: She had— she had — she had fear in her voice. And it was — it was definitely fear.
Lillard says it was not clear what Marianne was afraid of.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Why, in that moment, did you not turn back?
Marcus Lillard: ‘Cause I’m an idiot.
DEPUTY to MARCUS LILLARD (bodycam video): Leave that right there. Don’t touch nothin’.
Marcus initially told deputies that he went into the woods to collect firewood.
MARCUS LILLARD (bodycam video): I went over to get some wood to make firewood. I brought a whole bunch of stuff back …
But he later said the real reason he went into the woods was that he was trying to recreate a scene from a documentary called “The Last Shaman.” While on drugs, the lead character takes part in bizarre rituals like being buried alive.
Marcus Lillard: I said, “I’m goin’ to the woods to dig a hole.”
Lillard says he went into the woods and simply laid down; for how long, he says he does not know.
Marcus Lillard: I can’t remember anything past her saying, “Don’t leave me.”
“There is good and there is evil. And that night … evil came to play,” Marcus Lillard told “48 Hours” of the night Marianne Shockley and Clark Heindel died.
CBS News
Jonathan Vigliotti: What do you say to those who are hearing this story of a guy who has a history with drugs, who is claiming, you know, “I blacked out.” Convenient, it sounds like.
Marcus Lillard: The devil was at work. I mean, everything that he could have possibly done to line this thing up to make it confusing and deceitful and — it was all there.
Jonathan Vigliotti: You emerge from the woods … What is the first thing you remember seeing, hearing?
Marcus Lillard: I didn’t hear anything … I could see Marianne slumped down with her chin up to her nose under water.
CLARK HEINDEL (bodycam video): I — I’m sittin’ down there (points to the end of the pool). Hanging out swimming at that end of the pool.
DEPUTY: OK.
CLARK HEINDEL: Shallow end.
DEPUTY: And she’s in the hot tub.
CLARK HEINDEL (affirms): Mm hmm.
DEPUTY: Do you know at what point you noticed she wasn’t visible?
CLARK HEINDEL: I — I never saw that she wasn’t visible. But I got up, I guess when he was coming back.
Lillard says he pulled Marianne out of the hot tub and placed her on the pool deck. In doing so, Marcus admits dropping Marianne who suffered a gash to her forehead. At that point, he says Heindel walked over.
Marcus Lillard: And he actually said, “Should we call 911? …”
Jonathan Vigliotti: And what did you say?
Marcus Lillard: I said, “No, I think she’ll be fine.”
Marcus Lillard says he pulled Marianne Shockley out of the hot tub and placed her on the pool deck. Lillard admits that in the process, he dropped Marianne, causing her to suffer a gash on her forehead. Up to this point, Clark Heindel said he had been swimming at the far end of the pool. Lillard says Heindel approached him and suggested calling 911. Lillard says he decided against it and instead, they tried to perform CPR on Marianne.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
But Marianne was not fine. That gash on her head bled profusely and it appeared she was not breathing. Lillard and Heindel say they took turns giving her CPR but delayed calling 911.
Podcaster Penny Dearmin has her own theory about why Lillard did not immediately call police. In 2015, Marcus was convicted of selling marijuana and possessing methamphetamine and cocaine. He was still on probation for that crime.
Penny Dearmin: I would say that if you were an individual who’s been in trouble with the law before and you’re currently on probation, that you would be afraid to call 911.
Ayla Crippen: It makes my family so angry and so hurt … If he had a good heart, if he truly loved Marianne, he would’ve sacrificed anything to save her.
CLARK HEINDEL to 911: Yes, I need an ambulance at …
Investigators believe Marianne Shockley had been dead for at least two hours before help arrived. They questioned Marcus Lillard, left, and Clark Heindel about why they did not call 911 sooner, the gash on Marianne’s head, and their whereabouts when she was in the hot tub.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
It’s unclear how much time had passed before Heindel called 911, but investigators believe Marianne had been dead for at least two hours before help arrived. The questions from deputies on the scene got much more pointed.
DEPUTY (bodycam video): If she’s unconscious, y’all didn’t think to call 911? If she’s unconscious?
CLARK HEINDEL: It seemed like she was breathing.
Deputies decided to separate the men for further questioning. They put Marcus in a squad car.
DEPUTY (bodycam video): Marcus, OK. Policy says I have to put you in handcuffs any time I transport you, OK? Just place your hands behind your back for me, OK?
But, judging from the bodycam footage, deputies seemed to be having a hard time getting Heindel to cooperate.
DEPUTY (bodycam video): I done told him three times to stay off the pool … but he’s insistin’ to have his lawyer … Somethin’- somethin’ is not right here, bro.
DEPUTY to CLARK HEINDEL: Wait right there. It’s a crime scene now, wait right there. I asked you to wait back there, sir.
CLARK HEINDEL: What?
DEPUTY: I asked you to wait back there.
But then, the deputy watching Clark got a phone call, and Clark wandered off.
DEPUTY: We got a dead woman …
No one noticed that Clark had slipped into his house — not until deputies heard that shotgun go off and found his body.
DEPUTIES (bodycam video): Sheriff’s Office!
DEPUTIES: Sheriff’s Office!
DEPUTIES: Sheriff’s Office!
DEPUTY: He’s in the bathroom.
DEPUTY: In the bathroom?
DEPUTY: Yeah.
Ayla Crippen: … it tainted the case one hundred percent, because there weren’t two people there that could say what happened. There was only one.
But investigators say Clark did leave behind a potential clue: a handwritten suicide note.
Marcus Lillard: And I just said, “Well, he — he had to have done it.” … if that pill made me so stupid maybe it made him, for once in his life, a violent guy.
INVESTIGATORS FIND A KEY A PIECE OF EVIDENCE
Baldwin County Sheriff Bill Massee and Major Brad King say they still can’t shake the unease they felt when they arrived at Clark Heindel’s house on May 12, 2019 — during the early morning hours when Marianne Shockley was pronounced dead.
Sheriff Bill Massee: The feeling at this scene was totally different than any I’d ever been to … It was a very — a very strange, strange feeling that everybody noticed here.
Sheriff Massee remembers walking through Heindel’s house when he spotted what turned out to be a handwritten suicide note on the kitchen counter.
Sheriff Massee found a handwritten note written by Clark Heindel on his kitchen counter. In the letter Heindel wrote, “I don’t know what happened with [Marianne], but it was on my watch …” The letter also said that he was “so sorry for her family and friends” and advised his heirs of how to handle his possessions.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
Jonathan Vigliotti: This is the suicide note Clark wrote before taking his life?
Sheriff Bill Massee: That is the note, yes, that we found in the house.
Jonathan Vigliotti: He says, “I am very sorry. I don’t know what happened with Marianne, but it was on my watch, and I am so sorry for the family and friends.
Massee says Heindel did not admit any guilt in the letter; it mostly instructed his heirs on what to do with his possessions. Marcus Lillard was now the only surviving witness from the scene that night.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Why was Clark allowed to go back into his home?
Sheriff Bill Massee: I’ll be upfront with you. It was a violation of our policy and procedures.
Jonathan Vigliotti: How big of a mistake was that in this case?
Sheriff Bill Massee: Oh, it was a terrible mistake. Terrible mistake … It was a dramatic, a dramatic error in this case.
Soon after deputies discovered Heindel had taken his life, Lillard was brought in for questioning. Hours later he was interviewed by Michael Maybin, a special agent for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, also known as the GBI. Maybin broke the news about Heindel’s suicide.
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: During — during the time that, I guess, you were in the back seat of the car, Clark went inside his house, and he committed suicide inside the house.
MARCUS LILLARD: Oh, s***. You’re kiddin’.
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: I’m not — I’m not kiddin’. Why — why would — why would he do that?
MARCUS LILLARD: I don’t know. Maybe that’ll shed some light, but … I can’t believe this. I would never in a million years guess he would do that.
During questioning, SBI Special Agent Michael Maybin told MarcusLillard that while he was in the patrol car, Clark heindel had gone into his home and shot and killed himself. Video from that interview shows Lillard falling to the floor when he learned his friend was dead.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
Lillard immediately began speculating on what might have happened when he says he was in the woods and away from Marianne.
MARCUS LILLARD: There’s a pretty good chance that Clark got in that hot tub with her … I’m gonna say there’s a very high chance of that, I mean, a really high chance …
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: Help me out, man. Do you — do you think he did somethin’ to her?
MARCUS LILLARD: I don’t think she woulda did it to herself, and I know I didn’t do anything …
The investigation was in its early stages and authorities weren’t sure who or what to believe. Ayla Crippen found it impossible to believe her sister could drown in a hot tub.
Ayla Crippen: Made no sense. Marianne was intelligent. Like, even if she was drinking in the hot tub, I just could not see that happening.
Almost immediately, investigators found out about Lillard’s 2015 drug conviction. But they were also looking closely at Heindel, who was 69 years old and had his own issues.
Jonathan Vigliotti: And he had a bit of a — checkered past that really caught up with him and impacted his career?
Penny Dearmin: Yes, unfortunately he lost his license to practice psychology.
Podcaster Penny Dearmin says Heindel’s license to practice psychology was revoked in 2017 after a former female patient filed a complaint with a state licensing board. She claimed that Clark had engaged her in a sexual relationship and had given her marijuana.
Penny Dearmin: It’s a pretty sordid tale.
Sheriff Bill Massee says Clark Heindel was well-known and liked in the community. He had gone through some hard times including losing his 6-year-old son to cancer and recently losing his psychology license, but he had many friends and supporters throughout Milledgeville.
Emily Boylan
But investigators could find no proof Heindel had done anything to Marianne. Sheriff Massee had known Clark for years and knew his son had died at the age of six from a rare form of cancer.
Sheriff Bill Massee: … losin’ his psychology license, the death of a young son that had had him depressed for years, the embarrassment of it all, and it happened at his house.
After his son’s death, Dearmin says Heindel took the first of several trips to Peru to work with shamans, much like the main character in “The Last Shaman” documentary.
By coincidence, Lillard says he and Heindel discussed that film on the night Marianne died. And in another bizarre twist, Lillard says Heindel found some hydrangea branches and shook them around Marianne’s body.
Sheriff Bill Massee: It was— ritualistic, or a séance, or somethin’ …
Clark, who had opened a local yoga studio in recent years, had a lot of friends and supporters, including Lillard’s son who began seeing Clark for therapy when he was only 14 years old.
Carson Lillard: I did love Clark and I still do. And I think I didn’t realize how much he meant to me until he was gone.
Carson Lillard says that as soon as he heard Marianne was dead, he pinned the blame on his father whom he describes as a “malignant narcissist.”
Carson Lillard: … he was headed towards destruction and was determined to bring somebody with him.
And Carson Lillard wasn’t the only person who claimed Marcus had violent tendencies.
Sheriff Bill Massee: I was at my desk at the office and a young lady called me, extremely upset, and she said, “Sheriff Massee, Marianne Shockley didn’t drown.” She said, “Marcus choked her to death.”
MARCUS LILLARD’S PAST REEMERGES
Soon after Marianne Shockley was declared dead in the early morning hours of Mother’s Day, May 12, 2019, Sheriff Bill Massee received that phone call from an ex-girlfriend of Marcus Lillard’s who said she strongly suspected that Marcus had choked Marianne.
Sheriff Bill Massee: She said, “The same thing happened to me a long time ago when I was at a low point in my life,” and she said he choked her havin’ sex.
News had spread through word of mouth in the small town that Marianne had died in a hot tub, and Marcus was in jail.
Sheriff Bill Massee: I — I asked if she’d come give us a statement and she did.
Marcus Lillard’s ex-girlfriend told investigators that Marcus had a choking fetish and that it was a regular part of their sex life.
GBI AGENT: How many times do you think you and Marcus had sex?
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND: Maybe 100 times. Maybe more than that.
GBI AGENT: How many times do you think choking was involved?
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND: I would say at least 30 times.
The woman said the erotic choking was consensual, but one time she says Lillard went too far.
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND (to GBI Agent): He choked me long enough to where I lost consciousness, and my body crumpled to the floor, and he just left me there.
Lillard says his ex-girlfriend was exaggerating but he didn’t deny choking her during sex.
Marcus Lillard: It was really more of a place to put your hands for control … Just a little light pressure to the carotid arteries to — you know, that was — that was really about it. There was never any pressure here. (He touches his throat) The pressure was here. It was not that. It was blown way outta proportion.
Lillard said he only tried choking Marianne one time and not on the night she died. He said she told him she didn’t like it and he never tried it again. Ayla Crippen does not believe him.
Ayla Crippen: I believe that they were having sex, and he choked her, and that is what caused her death.
GBI agents had first interviewed Lillard on Mother’s Day morning and later placed him in custody on a probation hold stemming from his 2015 drug conviction. The following day, Monday, May 13, 2019, the autopsy results came in and investigators felt they were damning.
Sheriff Bill Massee: We were notified by the medical examiner that it was a classic case of strangulation … busted blood vessels in her eyes and … had nothing to do with any drowning.
Medical Examiner Dr. Melissa Sims-Stanley wrote that Marianne “died as a result of asphyxia due to strangulation. The manner of death … is best classified as homicide.”
Given the results of the autopsy and the information from Lillard’s ex-girlfriend, authorities say Lillard became the focus of the investigation. Hours after getting those autopsy results, GBI agent Michael Maybin requested another interview with Marcus, and he agreed. Again, he did not request a lawyer — at least at first.
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: Strangulation is what killed her, OK … and … you need to tell me what the hell happened because you know, and we need to talk about it.
MARCUS LILLARD: I don’t know.
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: Yes, you do.
MARCUS LILLARD: If I knew I woulda told you immediately.
Agent Maybin accuses Lillard of lying.
MARCUS LILLARD: So, I need to get a lawyer at this point, ’cause I mean you — you’ve already got your mind made up, you already — you already got your mind made up.
AGENT MICHAEL MAYBIN: Yep, I do … Well, you’re under arrest for murder, I’ll tell you that.
Marcus Lillard maintained that he did not know what happened to Marianne Shockley. On May 13, 2019, the day after Marianne’s death, Lillard was charged with her murder. He was formally indicted nearly two years later in March 2021 and charged with four counts: felony murder, aggravated assault, involuntary manslaughter, and reckless conduct. He was ordered held without bond.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation
It was only one day after Marianne’s death when Marcus Lillard was charged with her murder. He was formally indicted nearly two years later, in March 2021, and charged with four counts: felony murder, aggravated assault, involuntary manslaughter, and reckless conduct. He was ordered held without bond.
Ayla Crippen: It made sense that she was not responsible for her own death. Because I know my sister. She wasn’t a careless person … did it make me feel better? No. Because now I know that someone took her from us.
Lillard sat in jail; months turned into years. Sheriff Massee says investigators vetted Clark Heindel and cleared him as a suspect. And as the trial approached, Lillard settled on Matt Tucker as his defense attorney.
Matt Tucker: And he just says, “I’m not gonna admit to anything I didn’t do.”
Largely because of COVID, nearly three years went by before Marcus Lillard stood trial for the murder of Marianne Shockley, but on April 4, 2022, his trial began at the Baldwin County Courthouse.
Assistant District Attorney Tammy Coffey laid out what the prosecution believes happened between Marcus and Marianne on the night she died.
Tammy Coffey: After they got in the hot tub, I think that they engaged in sex. I think he choked her. I think he choked her too hard and for too long.
Assistant District Attorney Nancy Malcor told “48 Hours” there was no clear evidence of sexual activity because Marianne’s body had been in the hot tub for a prolonged period of time. Meanwhile, GBI agents had been busy talking to former sex partners of Lillard to determine if he had choked them. It turns out GBI agents found eight women.
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND #1: I went out with Marcus a few times back in the fall of 2016 … One night we were having sex … and he put his hands around my neck.
DEPUTY: You said he did choke you at times?
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND #2: Mm-hmm (affirms).
MARCUS LILLARD EX-GIRLFRIEND #3: He did try to choke me. That was something he was into. I stopped him twice. It’s not something that I’m into. I don’t like it. It scares me.
Prosecutors put six of the women on the stand. The women testified Marcus choked them or attempted to choke them during sex.
And two of those witnesses told jurors Marcus had choked them until they passed out.
Matt Tucker: All of it was consensual … “They’re still alive. So, I mean, how is it even relevant?”
But Ayla Crippen thinks their testimony was relevant and demonstrates how callous — and dangerous — Lillard could be.
Ayla Crippen: It’s one thing to gamble with your own life, you know. You wanna do drugs, if you wanna choke yourself out, I mean, OK … and one of his girlfriends, he just told her to shut up. So that showed a disregard for women period.
The medical examiner testified to her findings, but Tucker noticed that the autopsy revealed the hyoid bone in Marianne’s neck was intact and not broken. Some experts, including a surgeon Tucker consulted, consider that unusual in a strangulation case.
Matt Tucker: And he said, “That’s what you need to explore. Find out why it wasn’t broken. If somebody was to strangle … Marianne, why didn’t it break?”
In reviewing the autopsy results, defense attorney Tucker noticed that the hyoid bone in Marianne Shockley’s neck was intact and not broken. Some experts, including a surgeon Tucker consulted, consider that unusual in a strangulation case.
CBS News
Tucker suggested to Dr. Sims-Stanley that perhaps whoever killed Marianne was too old or not strong enough to break that bone. He asked: could that person be 70 years of age?
Matt Tucker: And she said, “Yes,” before she realized what she was saying. Clark was 69 at the time.
Tucker says that shows Clark, nearly three decades older than Marcus, could have been Marianne’s killer. But would this juror agree?
Tyisha Davis: I was not there to prosecute Clark. I was there to find whether Marcus Lillard was guilty or not.
ACCIDENT OR MURDER?
As Marcus Lillard’s trial progressed, defense attorney Matt Tucker floated the theory that Clark Heindel strangled Marianne after she rebuffed his sexual advances. It was a scenario that Lillard said had haunted him while he was behind bars.
Marcus Lillard: My theory for the better part of the three years was that he took a shot at her while she was alone, and she rejected him.
Marcus Lillard and Marianne Shockley
Prosecutors say there is no evidence Heindel did anything to Marianne, and they insist Lillard was the killer.
Tammy Coffey: In the autopsy— it shows manual strangulation … it was deliberate … the muscles themselves were severely damaged.
Marcus Lillard: I didn’t — I didn’t strangle her.
Jonathan Vigliotti: What do you say to people who are convinced you killed Marianne.
MarcusLillard: I’ve been defending myself for so long, I’m not even really concerned what they think …
At trial, prosecutors Tammy Coffey and Nancy Malcor put Marianne’s sister Ayla Crippen on the stand, and she talked about a private letter found in Marianne’s house.
AYLA CRIPPEN (in court): The letter was her being reflective on her relationships and how … she had selected guys to date or to spend time with that were not good for her.
NANCY MALCOR: Did she mention anyone by name?
AYLA CRIPPEN: She did … and that was Marcus … she wrote, “When he does white lady, he gets violent.”… the white lady, you know, I understood that to be cocaine.
Tests show that Lillard did have cocaine in his system the night Marianne died but could not pinpoint when he had taken the drug. As for that private letter —
NANCY MALCOR (in court): What did you do with it?
AYLA CRIPPEN: I gave it to my dad.
Crippen testified that her father burned the letter, leading Matt Tucker to question her memory.
MATT TUCKER (in court): You don’t recall what the beginning of this letter started as?
AYLA CRIPPEN: I do not.
Matt Tucker: She swore up and down she read it. But three years ago, how do you remember what was in there?
Tucker offered jurors a second explanation for Marianne’s death — a theory now embraced by Lillard, who no longer blames Heindel.
Marcus Lillard: I think the ecstasy and the hot tub killed her.
Marcus Lillard: I feel like in my– in my heart of hearts, that the medical examiners made a mistake.
Lillard’s lawyer tried to get the medical examiner to admit Marianne could have died because of the amount of ecstasy and alcohol in her system coupled with the heat of the hot tub. Ecstasy is also known as MDMA.
Matt Tucker: “Now, ma’am, it’s true that this hot tub was 107. They’re only supposed to be 104 … That didn’t have a factor with the body temperature bein’ that high, with havin’ the high levels of MDMA in her system, with them bein’ drinking all day … this had nothing to do with it?”
Matt Tucker: And she was like, “No.” She just disregarded that immediately.
But the medical examiner’s own autopsy revealed that Marianne had cardiomegaly, an enlarged heart, which is a condition that medical experts say could lead to sudden cardiac death.
“48 Hours” had some questions and sent all the autopsy information to Dr. Greg Davis, a forensic pathologist not involved with the case. After reviewing the documents, he said that it was “possible” Marianne was strangled but, “A valid competing cause of death is sudden cardiac death due to mixed drug intoxication, a lethal mix of MDMA, alcohol, and marijuana with a contribution from underlying heart disease.”
He said there was “no way” he would have called Marianne’s death a “homicide.” If it were up to him, he wrote, he’d classify her manner of death as “undetermined.” But no medical experts testified for the defense. No one did, not even Marcus Lillard.
Matt Tucker: He wanted to testify bad. He wanted to get across, but I didn’t think it’d be productive.
The trial moved swiftly. Jury selection started on a Monday and by late Friday afternoon April 8, 2022, the case went to the jury.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Time to deliberate. What are you thinking?
Marcus Lillard: I had peace, man. I had peace over — over the — really the whole thing.
Deliberations began and ended just like that.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Less than an hour goes by; there’s a verdict.
Matt Tucker: 38 minutes.
Tyisha Davis: My first impression was he did it. He committed this murder. And whatever they tell me … it’s not gonna prove to me that he didn’t do it.
Tyisha Davis was juror No. 11.
Jonathan Vigliotti: Why did you think that?
Tyisha Davis: Because the professor was his girlfriend. And Clark Heindel was a 70-something-year-old man. He couldn’t have murdered her. And I just — knew Marcus did it. I just knew he did it.
Largely because of the Covid-19 pandemic, nearly three years went by before Marcus Lillard stood trial for the murder of Marianne Shockley. On April 4, 2022, the trial began at the Baldwin County Courthouse in Milledgeville, Georgia.
CBS News
The top charge was felony murder, and the verdict was not guilty. Verdicts on the other charges followed in quick succession.
Carson Lillard: And it’s just not guilty, not guilty, not guilty, not guilty. With each one … my heart just kinda sunk lower and lower.
Carson Lillard: I thought there was no way that he could get off.
Ayla Crippen: We were in utter shock. … Everyone was shocked. And, of course, I look over at Marcus and he’s got a smirk on his face, and my blood was boiling.
How does Tyisha Davis explain her change of heart?
Tyisha Davis: I felt like the prosecuting attorney, she painted the picture that Marcus Lillard was a womanizer. He was a narcissist. But … they didn’t prove that he was a killer.
Jonathan Vigliotti: What do you think happened to Maryanne Shockley that night?
Tyisha Davis: I don’t know what happened … that frustrated me because we don’t know what happened to her. Or if she really was strangled, if she died from strangulation … Who strangled her?
Jonathan Vigliotti: So, it sounds like — you even question if there was a murder in the first place.
Tyisha Davis: I had my doubts about that.
Judge Alison Burleson also had doubts, but they were of a different nature.
JUDGE ALISON T. BURLESON: Mr. Lillard, I’ve come to quite a different conclusion than what the jury has come to. It is quite clear to this court that the only person you were concerned with that night May 11, 2019, was yourself.
She immediately found that Marcus violated his probation for that 2015 drug conviction and he was remanded to prison.
Marcus Lillard: My conscience is very clear when it comes to Marianne. Do I miss Marianne? Yeah. I was lucky to get (voice breaks) that time with her that I did. And I cherish that.
Marianne Shockley
Ayla Crippen: I think of Marianne every single day. I have her name on my bracelet … I’m wearing her earrings right now … Marianne was the most beautiful spirit.
Ayla Crippen: She worked hard … She cared about things that other people didn’t care about. The teeny, weeny creatures that keep us alive, that keep our world turning.
Marcus Lillard could remain in prison until October 2030, but it’s likely he’ll be released sooner.
Marianne Shockley’s children settled a wrongful death lawsuit against Clark Heindel’s estate for $500,000. There was no admission of liability or fault.
This story discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988.
Produced by Paul LaRosa. Elizabeth Caholo and Ryan Smith are the development producers. Morgan Canty is the associate producer. Jordan Kinsey is the field producer. Doreen Schechter, George Baluzy and James Taylor are the editors. Anthony Batson is the senior broadcast producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer.
Megan Hargan was suspected of killing her mother and sister. Her defense had an unusual theory: her sister was the one who pulled the trigger – with her toe. “48 Hours” correspondent Peter Van Sant reports.
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When investigators entered the McLean, Virginia homeof millionaire mother Pam Hargan, they discovered the bodies of Pam and her youngest daughter Helen, who was found with a rifle. Hours later, police told the family her wound looked self-inflicted. Did Helen shoot her mom and then take her own life? The crime scene suggested to some that she could have pulled the trigger with her toe. And her older sister, Megan, told investigators Helen had been struggling emotionally. How did Pam and Helen Hargan die? And why?
WHO ARE THE HARGANS?
On Friday, July 14, 2017, at about 5 p.m., Fairfax County Virginia Police visit the next of kin to deliver awful news: 63-year-old Pam Hargan and 24-year-old Helen Hargan are dead.
Det. Brian Byerson: Pamela was shot twice — in the mudroom.
Lead detective Brian Byerson says police are recording and whispering to avoid being overheard, when they give Pam’s ex-husband, Steve, more painful details about Helen.
OFFICER: She had a gunshot wound that appears to be self-inflicted … I’m really sorry.
Det. Brian Byerson: There was a thought that went around that it might have been a murder-suicide.
On July 14, 2017, Pam Hargan was discovered face down, covered with a blanket, in the mudroom of her McLean, Virginia home. Her youngest daughter, Helen, was found upstairs in her bathroom. Both women were shot to death.
LinkedIn/Carlos Gutierrez
Hargan soon summons his other two daughters: 32-year-old Ashley and 34-year-old Megan.
MEGAN HARGAN (to her father): What is happening? What is? … What happened?
They react with equal parts pain and panic.
MEGAN HARGAN (to her father): Oh God, what are we gonna do? Jesus, what are we gonna do? I don’t know. …
ASHLEY: Our mom took care of everything! …
MEGAN HARGAN: I just don’t even understand. We were at the freaking house!
Megan Hargan tells authorities she and her 8-year-old daughter, Molly, have been living with Pam and Helen while her husband is in the military. She says she’d left the home with Molly at about 1:30 p.m. that day, adding that there’d been an argument between her mother and Helen, who had been upset.
MEGAN HARGAN (to police): Helen has been so angry, like, just so angry all the time.
And struggling emotionally.
MEGAN HARGAN: I knew that Helen was depressed, but, like, to do this … I can’t wrap my head around this.
Peter Van Sant: Is it true that she once threatened suicide?
Det. Brian Byerson: I think that is possibly true, yes.
In fact, sister Ashley would later tell authorities Helen had thoughts about self-harm.
ASHLEY: I know my sister was depressed.
POLICE: Right. … Has she ever talked about hurting herself?
ASHLEY: Yeah.
But Megan also suggests her mother and sister could have been attacked, by offering a potentially important clue — something she reports she’d seen the day before.
Det. Brian Byerson: Two suspicious males … casing the neighborhood … And … she later tells us … those particular guys are the reason why she ends up bringing this rifle up to the main floor of the house.
It’s the .22 Ruger rifle found with Helen’s body, and it belongs to Megan’s husband. She says her mother had allowed her to store it in the house until the couple moved into their own place in West Virginia.
MEGAN HARGAN (to police): My husband and I literally just closed on our new home yesterday. My mom bought it for us.
Steve and Pam Hargan divorced when the children were young. Pam took them and moved around, before ending up in Potomac, Maryland — next door to Tami Mallios.
Tami Mallios: Megan was very upset about the divorce.
In the next few years, Mallios got to know Megan and her little sister Helen, and often saw them across the backyard fence.
Tami Mallios: The girls were out in the yard all the time with the dogs, that sorta thing, so.
Sisters Helen, left, and Megan Hargan.
Mallios says she always knew there was sibling rivalry.
Tami Mallios: Megan did bring that up a lot … saying that Helen was the favorite.
But she remembers that for the most part, the Hargan sisters seemed to get along fine. Pam was proud of them.
Tami Mallios: She talked highly of her girls whenever I did speak with her.
Michelle Sigona works for CBS News. She’s been covering this story for nearly four years and says the other love of Pam Hargan’s life was her job. Pam had spent decades climbing the career ladder to become a vice president of aerospace giant, Lockheed Martin.
Michelle Sigona: Pam Hargan … poured her life into those kids … She had built an $8 million estate. … But she didn’t keep it for herself. She was constantly giving to those around her, specifically to her children …
Helen seemed to have her mother’s ambition — double majoring in math and management science at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. That’s where Erin Roughneen met her in 2014.
Erin Roughneen: When I first met her, I was extremely scared of her, because … she didn’t laugh or smile … She’s kind of like an onion … You have to peel the layers off. And you really get to know the kind and genuine person underneath there.
Roughneen says they became close friends.
Peter Van Sant: It’s been said that Helen may have suffered from depression. Did you ever see any of that?
Erin Roughneen: I did not at all.
Roughneen says her friend spent a lot of time studying. Though Helen did have a job at a nearby restaurant.
Michelle Sigona: She was … working as a waitress.
There was a 30-something named Carlos Gutierrez working in the restaurant too. They fell for each other in short order.
Michelle Sigona: And they had plans to move in together.
Pam had started building a house for Helen in Northern Virginia. So, in the spring of 2017, Helen had moved back home from Dallas.
Michelle Sigona: According to Carlos … he hadn’t asked her to be his wife, but he was working towards that.
But Megan tells police, Pam hadn’t approved of Helen’s relationship.
MEGAN HARGAN (to police): She … believed that Helen was going to try to move Carlos into the house and my mom didn’t want him being there.
Still, Helen had been moving ahead … planning for the future.
Michelle Sigona: It was just a matter of figuring out her career path. It takes a little while to figure it out, but she was going to get there.
But Helen Hargan never got there.
911 DISPATCHER: Fairfax County Police and Fire. How may I assist you?
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: Yes, I have an emergency.
On the day of the shooting, it was Carlos Gutierrez who had first alerted authorities that something in the Hargan house was dreadfully wrong.
CARLOS GUTIERREZ to 911: I’m in Dallas, Texas and my girlfriend lives in McLean.
He says he and Helen had spoken earlier that morning. Now, he can’t get in touch with her and he’s worried.
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: My girlfriend won’t answer the phone … and I’m thinking my girlfriend’s life is in danger.
911 DISPATCHER: OK, sir. What I need you to do then is contact your local jurisdiction, file a report with them, and tell them that Fairfax County requires a teletype in order to do a welfare check.
Det. Brian Byerson: I feel really bad for Carlos, because … he’s bounced around all over the place just trying to get someone to listen to the fact that he thinks … his girlfriend’s life is in danger.
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: I think this is, like, life or death, like, I think someone might be dead.
Carlos Gutierrez would later testify about why he was so concerned. He would also tell a jury, he felt authorities were giving him the runaround that day — even when he called back later with something explosive to add; something Helen had told him.
A FATAL DISCOVERY
It’s 1:44 p.m. on July 14, 2017. Carlos Gutierrez, Helen’s boyfriend in Texas, is having a hard time with 911 dispatchers in Virginia.
911 DISPATCHER: Fairfax County Police and Fire. How may I assist you?
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: Yes, I have an emergency.
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: Like, I think someone might be dead.
911 DISPATCHER: Right, sir. Contact your local jurisdiction, file the report …
The call ends without a promise of help. So, 15 minutes later, Gutierrez calls again.
Around 11:30 a..m on Friday, July 14, 2017, Helen called her boyfriend, Carlos Gutierrez, who lived in Dallas, Texas. According to Gutierrez, Helen had shocking news: her sister Megan had just told her that she killed their mom. Gutierrez said Helen told him to remain calm and quiet.
Carlos Gutierrez/Facebook
And this time, he makes a startling revelation about something he says Helen had told him on the phone that morning.
911 DISPATCHER: Fairfax County Police and Fire. How may I assist you? …
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: My girlfriend told me that her sister killed her mom. … Now, my girlfriend won’t answer her phone.
Megan Hargan had murdered her mother, or at least that’s what Carlos said Helen had told him.
911 DISPATCHER: OK. Well, this was out of the blue? … Your girlfriend is sitting in a house with a dead woman?
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: Yes.
Why was Gutierrez — who was more than a thousand miles away — calling 911? Why didn’t Helen call herself? What was going on in that house?
CARLOS GUTIERREZ: I reported a murder earlier and I didn’t have the address. Now, I have the address.
When police arrive around 3 p.m., they find Pam is dead. But they discover Helen’s body, too. Gutierrez had offered authorities a possible explanation for Pam. But Helen was a mystery. Megan Hargan told police something interesting: her mother and sister had been arguing that day.
MEGAN HARGAN (to police): This morning, my mom let Helen know that she was canceling the contract on the house she’s building her, because she truly believed that Helen was gonna try to move Carlos into the house.
And when middle sister, Ashley, hears that Gutierrez is accusing Megan of murder, she makes it clear she doesn’t believe him.
ASHLEY: She would never do that ever. Never. OK?
Megan Hargan’s friend, Rebecca Wolfe, agrees.
Rebecca Wolfe: I do not believe that Megan killed her mom, Pam, or her sister, Helen. No piece of me believes that.
Wolfe and Megan met in 2015 when they both were volunteering in a program to find homes for dogs rescued from war zones. Wolfe says that Megan always had a passion for animals.
Rebecca Wolfe: She is very compassionate. Generous heart. … She is just a really good person.
And Wolfe says Megan often talked about her family: her generous mother —
Rebecca Wolfe: Megan admired Pam’s wisdom, her career … She always spoke very lovingly of her.
— and her sisters, especially the baby of the family, Helen.
Rebecca Wolfe: Megan talked about Helen struggling with things and feeling depressed. But I never got the impression that it was insurmountable.
Wolfe says that Megan called her on the day of the shooting and sounded like a woman who’d lost everything.
Rebecca Wolfe: Very distraught … And she did not give me details of what had happened. She just said, “We’ve lost Mom and Helen.”
By 8 p.m., police had told the media what they had told the Hargan family: this looked like a murder-suicide.
But, Det. Byerson says the more he saw of the crime scene, the less he thought so and the more he wanted to take a closer look at Megan Hargan. That night, he had officers test her hands for gunshot residue and photograph her.
The night of the shootings, officers tested Megan Hargan’s hands for gunshot residue and photographed her.
Fairfax County Courthouse
Peter Van Sant: Does she become a person of interest at that moment?
Det. Brian Byerson: She’s certainly a person of interest, because we know that she was in the house.
Police knew the house probably held answers. Crime Scene Detective Julia Elliott, who had joined Det. Byerson at the scene, spent the evening combing for evidence.
Det. Julia Elliott: I was shown Pamela’s body first.
One thing that caught her attention was Pam Hargan’s cellphone.
Det. Julia Elliott: It’s lying on top of the pool of blood and the blanket.
Peter Van Sant: Was it unusual to see the cellphone in this kind of position?
Det. Julia Elliott: Yes. … It certainly wouldn’t fall on top of the blanket and on top of the blood once you were already covered up.
Peter Van Sant: And what does it suggest that the cellphone is lying on top of this comforter?
Det. Julia Elliott: That suggests to me that it was placed there by someone.
Elliott says the Helen Hargan shooting scene was next.
Det. Julia Elliott: She had a lot of blood on her face.
So much blood that it was impossible to see an entry wound and there was more on the floor. But there was a lack of blood where investigators expected to see it.
Det. Julia Elliott: The rifle itself had very little blood on it.
Examining Helen Hargan’s death scene, Det. Elliott noticed there was a lot of blood on the floor, but very little blood on the rifle. “You would expect that if the rifle had been sitting there as she bled so heavily, it would also have blood on it” she says.
Hargan crime scene evidence
The rifle was leaning against Helen’s body, the butt was on the floor between her legs, the barrel was pointed up towards the ceiling.
Det. Julia Elliott: You would expect that if the rifle had been sitting there as she bled so heavily, it would also have blood on it.
Peter Van Sant: And was there anything on this gun from Megan?
Det. Julia Elliott: No.
Peter Van Sant: What about fingerprints on this rifle?
Det. Julia Elliott: None … that were usable.
There was DNA found on the trigger, but it wasn’t Megan or Helen’s.
Peter Van Sant: Is it true that Helen’s DNA was found on the rifle case.
Det. Brian Byerson: Yes, that is true.
But Byerson says only on the tip of the case. Megan’s DNA was on the case handles. It’s part of the reason police believe Helen Hargan never touched the gun that day.
Det. Julia Elliott: As she died, someone else was there to place it on her.
She says Helen’s phone was telling as well: there was almost no blood on it. And although Helen had used it that day to talk and text with Carlos Gutierrez, there were no fingerprints either.
Det. Julia Elliott (in lab) What we found was what looked like swipe marks, as if someone had taken their hand and wiped off the front of the screen.
Though it would take time to learn exactly how the Hargan women died. In the basement, Det. Elliott saw an immediate opportunity to learn how they had lived.
Det. Julia Elliott: I got a little, uh, nosy. And I wanted to see what my victims may have looked like in life … So, I pulled out one of the center photo albums to look at it and open it up.
Inside the photo album Det. Elliott pulled off the shelf were Megan Hargan’s’ bank statement — Pam’s too, and a spreadsheet full of passwords and security verification details to unlock all of Pam Hargan’s accounts.
Fairfax County Courthouse
Tucked away in that album of family photos was something that seemed out of place: Documents, Megan’s bank statement — Pam’s too, and a spreadsheet full of passwords and security verification details to unlock all of Pam Hargan’s accounts.
Peter Van Sant: Well, that’s interesting. Were you able to analyze the paper?
Det. Julia Elliott: So, at the time of us locating that, financial documents were not on our search warrant.
So, Det. Elliott photographed the documents and left them in the house. But when she entered with the proper search warrant days later…
Det. Julia Elliott: They were not there.
Peter Van Sant: They were not there.
Det. Julia Elliott: They were not.
The house had been returned to the Hargan family’s custody the day after the shooting. And something else had happened that day: The medical examiner delivered her report on Helen Hargan’s autopsy, casting doubt on the murder-suicide theory.
WHO PULLED THE TRIGGER?
A police spokesman was calling the Hargan shootings a murder-suicide, but the next day when Det. Brian Byerson saw Helen’s autopsy report, he was certain it was something else.
Det. Brian Byerson: The gunshot wound on Helen Hargan was in the top of her head.
The rifle bullet had traveled downward into her neck.
Det. Brian Byerson: She would have to hold it straight up and be able to reach the trigger to accomplish this. I’ve never seen that before, and I’ve worked a lotta murders.
Peter Van Sant: Well, what does that tell you … when you learn that information?
Det. Brian Byerson: It tells us that someone else pulled the trigger.
As Det. Byerson arrived to work two days later on Monday, July 17, there was a clue waiting for him — a clue that Byerson was able to take all the way to the bank.
Det. Brian Byerson: That Monday morning … I have a message on my desk phone from Capital One.
The bank had some startling news. Bank employees had seen reports of Pam Hargan’s death and wanted him to know about some strange activity on her account.
CAPITAL ONE BANK (phone call): Could you tell me your name, please?
CALLER: Pamela Hansen Hargan.
Someone claiming to be Pam Hargan had called the bank the day before the shooting with a request.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: What can I do for you today?
CALLER: I was … told that I could do a wire transfer.
Whoever it was was trying to transfer money — more than $400,000 — out of Pam’s account, to a real estate settlement company in West Virginia.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: Oh, you’re going to buy a house?
CALLER: Uh, for my daughter. Yes.
The caller was able to successfully answer Pam’s security questions.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: All right. … You aced the verification. Great job.
Det. Byerson discovered that the transaction hadn’t gone through, so the caller had tried again the next day — on the morning of Pam’s murder.
CALLER: Uh, yes. We attempted to yesterday and there was a bit of a mix-up. So, we would like to do it again now.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: OK. …
CALLER: They need it today.
Peter Van Sant: Somebody’s trying to perhaps steal Pam’s money.
Det. Brian Byerson: Yes.
And Byerson believed he knew who that “somebody” was.
Det. Brian Byerson: That is Megan Hargan, pretending to be her mother.
Peter Van Sant: Pretending.
Det. Brian Byerson: Pretending.
He decided it was time for him to get Megan Hargan on the phone.
DET. BYERSON: Megan. How are you holdin’ up?
MEGAN: I am really not OK.
Megan claimed the attempted wire transfers were just an innocent mix-up at the bank. But by now, Byerson was suspicious of everything she said. He began to think Megan Hargan had been trying to confuse police all along.
MEGAN HARGAN: I realize there’s a lotta confusion here.
Megan had stressed Helen’s depression and anger issues with investigators.
MEGAN HARGAN: Helen has been so angry, like, just so angry all the time over everything.
But Megan told Byerson her sister never would have killed herself or her mom.
MEGAN HARGAN: I can’t imagine my own baby sister doing that at all.
She repeated her story about two strange men in the neighborhood.
MEGAN HARGAN: I had to call the police about — these two guys. … Other people had called them, apparently.
But Byerson says that tip went nowhere.
Det. Brian Byerson: The only call that’s made about these guys in the neighborhood is from Megan Hargan.
He had run down every lead, every alternative theory. There were no other suspects. But there was a motive: the money. And the person who had needed it, couldn’t stop talking.
Det. Brian Byerson: She demanded to come in— and get an update on the case.
So, on July 19 — five days after Pam and Helen’s deaths — Det. Byerson brought Megan in.
MEGAN HARGAN: My mom…
He says that once Megan started —
MEGAN HARGAN: Just unimaginable.
— she wouldn’t stop.
MEGAN HARGAN: Everything. I could ask her for anything.
Det. Brian Byerson: We just can’t get her to leave!
MEGAN HARGAN: This is you.
On July 19, five days after the shootings, Det. Byerson brought Megan Hargan in for an interview. It would last more than four hours. Byerson says that Megan admitted she was the one attempting to transfer funds from her mom’s account, but she was adamant that she didn’t kill her family.
Fairfax County Police Department
She stayed for more than four hours.
MEGAN HARGAN: Long story short, the point I’m making …
Det. Brian Byerson: We would ask her questions that we knew the answer to and … she would either pivot to something else or just outright not answer the question.
MEGAN HARGAN: I don’t know what you want me to say.
DETECTIVE NEEDELS: We want you to tell the truth. The truth.
DETECTIVE BRIAN BYERSON: Oh, I just want you to answer the question.
At first, Megan insisted it was her mom who had made those calls to the bank.
DET. BRIAN BYERSON: I’m gonna play the call for you.
But when Byerson played the tapes for her …
DET. BRIAN BYERSON: Who — is that on the phone?
MEGAN HARGAN: It is me.
DET. BRIAN BYERSON: It’s you, right?
Detective Byerson says she finally admitted to lying to him about the wire transfer.
DET. BRIAN BYERSON: 06:23:55;00 Why in the world would you do that?
MEGAN HARGAN: (whispers) ‘Cause I knew how it would look.
DET. BRIAN BYERSON: No, no. It’s not how it would look. You knew that if we knew about this, that would shine a whole new light on you.
Still, she was adamant that she hadn’t shot anyone. So, it was truly bizarre, when halfway into the interview —
MEGAN HARGAN: Just blame me.
DET. BYERSON: Just answer the questions and explain it —
MEGAN HARGAN: Just blame me, just blame me, just blame me. … My family’s been through enough. … Just blame me so they can move on from this, OK?
Det. Brian Byerson: It seemed like she was acknowledging that we knew that she did it … without … openly giving us a detailed confession.
MEGAN HARGAN: This is not happening.
Though inadmissible in court, she readily agreed to take a polygraph.
Det. Brian Byerson: She … failed … three times.
Byerson says it was all adding up — he was sitting across from a killer.
Det. Brian Byerson: It becomes very obvious to us … it is exactly who we think it is and it’s Megan Hargan.
But despite everything, police let Megan leave that day.
Det. Brian Byerson: So, murder investigations can be extremely complex. … You not only have to be sure, you have to be right. And that decision is not — does not just rest on me. … I have to be on the same page as the Commonwealth Attorney’s Office. … So, in consultation with them, we decided to wait.
Law enforcement may not have moved, but Megan Hargan did. Though she never got Pam’s money, she and her husband used a VA loan to buy a different house in West Virginia.
Det. Brian Byerson: We kept an eye on her. We knew where she was.
Byerson methodically kept building his case. Evidence kept trickling in, including the results of Megan’s gunshot residue test, which showed she had it on both hands. And on November 9, 2018, almost a year-and-a-half after the deaths of Pam and Helen Hargan —
POLICE PRESS CONFERENCE: This morning, at approximately 7:40 a.m., detectives from our Major Crimes Bureau … stopped and arrested Megan Hargan near her home in West Virginia…
On November 9, 2018, almost a year-and-a-half after the deaths of Pam and Helen Hargan, Megan Hargan was arrested near her home in West Virginia.
Fairfax County Police Department
As Det. Byerson takes Megan Hargan in, investigators search her home and find yet another important clue: that missing password sheet to Pam Hargan’s accounts.
Peter Van Sant: Do you have any doubt … that Megan … was the person who pulled that trigger?
Det. Brian Byerson: I have no doubt at all.
Matt Troiano: What the defense would say is that there is doubt all over this case.
Megan Hargan’s defense will include a specific theory of how Helen could have killed herself.
Matt Troiano: She puts her head down and then she’s able to utilize the trigger … probably with her toe to be able to … discharge the weapon.
But will the jury agree?
Matt Troiano: Even the experts said it’s possible.
THE “TOE ON THE TRIGGER” DEFENSE
More than three years after her arrest for the murders of her mother and sister, Megan Hargan is going on trial.
Prosecutor Whitney Gregory: I think she’s pure evil.
Whitney Gregory and Tyler Bezilla are prosecuting the case.
Prosecutor Tyler Bezilla: Megan is a pathological liar. … That’s what she is.
The Commonwealth of Virginia opens by arguing Megan tried to steal more than $400,000 from Pam for a new house and got so desperate for the cash that she killed her. Then, she killed Helen to keep her quiet and staged the scene as a murder-suicide.
Tyler Bezilla: This is an individual who murdered two of her closest family members for money.
More than three years after her arrest for the murders of her mother and sister, Megan Hargan went on trial.
William J. Hennessy Jr.
The defense argues Helen was the killer— mentally unstable and furious at her mother, who had offered her a new house, but, the morning of the shooting, announced there was one devastating condition: Helen had to break up with the man she had hoped to marry — Carlos Gutierrez.
Peter Van Sant: What is your greatest challenge with this jury?
Whitney Gregory: Proving it wasn’t a suicide.
To do that, they begin by calling Carlos Gutierrez and Helen’s sister, Ashley, who testify that on the day she died, Helen seemed “normal” and “fine.”
Peter Van Sant: Did Helen have a diagnosis of depression?
Tyler Bezilla: No.
And she didn’t take her own life, says Det. Julia Elliott.
Det. Julia Elliott: It’s a homicide.
Detective Elliott tells the jury about the bloodstains and position of the rifle.
During the trial, Detective Elliot tells the jury about the bloodstains and position of the rifle.
William J. Hennessy Jr.
Det. Julia Elliott: She did not have … an arm span long enough to pull the trigger.
Iris Graff: Her fingers are not reaching the trigger.
Crime scene reconstructionist Iris Graff agrees.
Peter Van Sant: What’s on the screen?
Iris Dalley Graff: OK. This is a forensic animation … a virtual model.
Hired by the prosecution, crime scene reconstructionist Iris Dalley Graff used photos and measurements from the house to create a digital model showing Helen was not able to reach the trigger with her hand.
Iris Dalley Graff
Prosecutors hired Graff to use photos and measurements from the house to create a digital model.
Peter Van Sant: She can’t reach that trigger?
Iris Dalley Graff: Right. … We still need another five inches.
Peter Van Sant: So, based on your scientific analysis, was the wound that killed Helen self-inflicted?
Iris Dalley Graff: Within the context of this scene, it’s not possible that she can self-inflict that wound.
Gregory says that’s just common sense.
Whitney Gregory: (pointing at the top of her head) Did the tooth fairy put the gun hole here?
Helen’s wound isn’t the only evidence pointing at Megan. Megan’s conduct in her police interview is damning too, and so are those phone calls to the bank.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: Thank you for calling Capital One Bank … Could you tell me your name, please?
MEGAN HARGAN as PAM HARGAN: Pamela Hansen Hargan.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: I understand you wanna complete a wire transfer with us today?
MEGAN HARGAN as PAM HARGAN: Uh, yes. …
CAPITAL ONE BANK: That wire –
MEGAN HARGAN as PAM HARGAN: They need it today.
Tyler Bezilla: Megan’s panicking, because she still owes that money on the house.
Prosecutors reveal Megan lied to police about Pam buying her a house, saying the reality is that Megan was trying to buy that West Virginia property with her mother’s money. Turns out, Megan still owed more than $400,000 — due the day of the shooting. The prosecution contends she’d secretly substituted her name onto Pam’s bank statement as proof of funds.
Pam was apparently totally in the dark until the day before the shooting when the bank called the real Pam.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: Hi. Who am I speaking to?
PAM HARGAN: Who am I speaking to?
CAPITAL ONE BANK: My name is Jeff with Capital One.
PAM HARGAN: OK, this is Pamela Hansen Hargan.
A bank officer had called her to authenticate the attempted wire transfer.
CAPITAL ONE BANK: Somebody tried to do a wire out of your account for 400-and-some-odd-thousand-dollars.
PAM HARGAN: What? … I did not do that!
Matt Troiano: The defense would say … that there is doubt all over this case.
Matt Troiano is an attorney with decades in court. He didn’t try this case, but because the defense declined to be interviewed “48 Hours” hired him to review the file. To help prove reasonable doubt, he says the defense contends Helen was the suspicious one that day.
Matt Troiano: Helen … doesn’t call 911. She … doesn’t run out of the house for safety. She … tells her boyfriend, “Do not call for help.”
Peter Van Sant: Why didn’t Helen call 911?
Det. Brian Byerson: That is one of the pieces to the puzzle that we’ll never have. That’s a question that came up during the trial. Why didn’t she just leave? Why didn’t she call 911? We don’t know.
There’s a lot authorities may never know for sure about the roughly two hours they say lapsed between Pam’s and Helen’s deaths. If Megan killed Pam, why did she wait so long to kill Helen? And why on earth hadn’t Helen made a run for it? Testimony suggests she was worried about 8-year-old Molly, who was home at the time. Not a good enough explanation, says Troiano.
Matt Troiano: For hours, Peter! … She allowed what is claimed to be a murderer run loose in a home with a rifle without seeking help … without barricading her into a room.
He says Helen’s body showed no definitive signs of a life-and-death struggle.
Matt Troiano: Why wouldn’t she have fought back?
And how credible are the witnesses against Megan Hargan? Troiano says the defense wants the jury to believe one may not be credible at all — her sister, Ashley.
Matt Troiano: Her story has changed …
When she’d spoken to investigators soon after the shooting, Ashley told them Helen had once been in emotional turmoil.
ASHLEY: I know my sister was depressed.
POLICE: Right. … Has she ever talked about hurting herself?
ASHLEY: Yeah.
But once on the stand, Ashley testified she doesn’t remember ever saying that.
Matt Troiano: She says 150 times thereabouts that she doesn’t remember certain things. There’s two ways to look at that. Number one is that she doesn’t remember. Right? Number two is that she doesn’t want to say things that are not helpful for the prosecution.
Peter Van Sant: Ashley testified — that she couldn’t recall more than 150 times … why was that?
Det. Brian Byerson: Anytime you’re dealing with a victim of trauma … there are always going to be aspects — that she … can’t recall.
Whatever the jury thinks of Ashley, the defense wants to explain to them how Helen could have pulled the trigger on that rifle. And they have a theory: with her toe.
Matt Troiano: She puts her head down … and then she’s able to — utilize the trigger, probably with … her toe, to be able to discharge the weapon.
Peter Van Sant: Her toe?
Matt Troiano: She’s gotta figure out some way. And the — the critical question is: “Could it have been done?”
After analyzing photos of the scene, forensic specialist Iris Dalley Graff does not believe that Helen took her own life. However, Graff does concede that Helen’s legs are long enough to have reached the trigger.
Iris Dalley Graff
Even the prosecution’s expert witness concedes, while very unlikely, it is possible.
Peter Van Sant: Can her toe reach the trigger?
Iris Graff: Yes, her legs are long enough that her toe could reach the trigger.
Either way, the judge thinks Iris Graff’s digital reconstruction isn’t necessary, so he prevents the jury from seeing it. And though Megan Hargan never testifies —
Tyler Bezilla: Every shred of evidence shows that Megan Hargan was the one who committed these murders.
In closings, prosecutor Bezilla argues there’s no evidence Pam Hargan was actually going to cancel the contract on Helen’s new house. And he urges the jury to compare Helen’s behavior around the time of the shooting to Megan’s. He says Megan’s actions speak for themselves.
Tyler Bezilla: She’s doing all these things that a murderer would do.
But the defense insists there’s reasonable doubt in this case. They argue the prosecutors’ forensics are inconclusive, and the “toe on the trigger” theory cannot be ruled out.
Matt Troiano: It’s possible. And if it’s possible, that then lends itself to doubt.
Rebecca Wolfe: Megan Hargan is innocent.
Megan’s friend Rebecca Wolfe spent about five years working for the Justice Department. She knows her way around a criminal trial and has been at this one almost every day.
Rebecca Wolfe: I would not be comfortable sending someone to prison for the rest of their life without knowing … beyond a shadow of a doubt in my mind that they did it.
On March 24, 2022, almost five years after the shootings, the jury gets the case.
Peter Van Sant: Based on your review of this case, as the jury is heading into deliberation, could this go either way?
Matt Troiano: Sure.
IMMEASURABLE GRIEF
Peter Van Sant: As the jurors come back into the room, they have a decision, are you looking at their faces?
Prosecutor Tyler Bezilla: Yes.
After a three-week trial, it takes the jury less than two days of deliberations to reach a verdict.
Tyler Bezilla: I thought my legs were gonna go weak ’cause we were standing up, and it had been just, like — months of our lives that this is all we had done.
After a three week trial, it takes the jury less than two days of deliberations to reach a verdict.Megan Hargan is found guilty of the murder of her sister, H elen, and mother, Pam.
William J. Hennessy Jr.
Megan Hargan is guilty: two counts of first-degree murder for killing her sister Helen and mother Pam.
Peter Van Sant: How did Megan react to the verdict?
Whitney Gregory: Least for me as a prosecutor, I don’t wanna look over at that table. I think it’s not very classy. I’m just sort of in the zone, trying not to pass out.
Det. Brian Byerson: I think weight lifted off of everybody.
Tyler Bezilla: It was a very emotional moment.
The jury recommends a sentence to the judge of life in prison on each murder count. He will rule on that this fall.
Rebecca Wolfe: I thought for sure that I would be gettin’ a phone call and comin’ to pick her up, 100%.
Megan’s friend Rebecca Wolfe thinks this jury was short-sighted.
Rebeccca Wolfe: I thought … they were gonna see through all of this, they were gonna look at all the evidence, they were gonna ask the right questions. They were gonna do their job!
Det. Brian Byerson: This job is difficult …
Det. Byerson thinks there are parts of authorities’ conduct in this case that he would have changed if he could: how 911 dispatchers responded to Carlos Gutierrez and how quickly the Fairfax County Police Department went public with the murder-suicide theory.
Det. Brian Byerson: I don’t find it helpful to kinda make a blanket statement about what we think it is ’cause it doesn’t matter what we think it is. It — it only matters what it turns out to be.
Peter Van Sant: Was justice served in this case?
Matt Troiano: Depends on what justice is. Right? You’re never bringing back the two lives that were lost.
Det. Brian Byerson: The domino effect of tragedy from what happened is immeasurable …
Though the trial is finally finished, waves of grief still wash over the surviving Hargan family.
Det. Brian Byerson: It’s just immeasurable grief.
Helen and Pam Hargan.
Fairfax County Courthouse
And ripples still reverberate in the lives of people they touched. Like Pam’s former neighbor, Tami Mallios.
Tami Mallios: I was just … devastated. I mean just … I didn’t have any words. It was unbelievable.
And Helen’s friend Erin, who had moved abroad after graduation and had to hear about her death from “48 Hours.”
Erin Roughneen: I was in shock. I had no idea that happened to her.
Peter Van Sant: You’re convinced … if Helen were alive today, she’d be on the road to some great success, some great career?
Erin Roughneen: Absolutely. She’d be a trailblazer.
Peter Van Sant: How would you want your friend, Helen, to be remembered?
Erin Roughneen: For being kind and compassionate, driven and caring … just a very caring person.
Megan Hargan and her husband divorced. Their daughter Molly is living with her father in another state.
Megan Hargan is scheduled to be sentenced on October 28.
Produced by Josh Yager and Lauren A. White. Michelle Sigona and Sara Ely Hulse are the development producers. Jud Johnston, Grayce Arlotta-Berner and Diana Modica are the editors. Peter Schweitzer is the senior producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer
