Latest / The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories / Matthew Hoffman： The Leaf Killer - Serial Killer Documentary

Transcript

Matthew Hoffman： The Leaf Killer - Serial Killer Documentary · The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories

0:09
Speaker 1: Sheriff Barber's office that is covered in blood.
0:13
Speaker 2: When we saw the enormity of the crime scene, it
0:20
Speaker 2: was very clear that something really terrible had happened.
0:25
Speaker 3: This is the first time they have ever seen Matthew Hoffman,
0:29
Speaker 3: but this is not the first time Matthew Hoffman has
0:31
Speaker 3: seen that.
0:33
Speaker 4: With the amount of blood that we saw, it's clear
0:35
Speaker 4: that they could die very shortly if we didn't recover them.
0:39
Speaker 5: When you look at it, I think it certainly is
0:41
Speaker 5: a domino effect. Where do I stop.
0:46
Speaker 2: The level of violence that he displayed is far beyond
0:52
Speaker 2: anyone that I've ever really seen.
1:31
Speaker 6: Matthew Hoffmann.
1:32
Speaker 3: His mom described him from an early age as somebody
1:35
Speaker 3: who was interested in trees, loved to climb, take his
1:39
Speaker 3: friends in trees. Friends of his said he was incredibly bright,
1:43
Speaker 3: but had no common sense, kind of a quiet kid,
1:47
Speaker 3: somebody who liked to jump on things and jump off
1:49
Speaker 3: of things, kind of a risk taker, and also a
1:53
Speaker 3: kid sometimes who seemed to struggle sometimes socially. Not a
1:58
Speaker 3: behavior problem. Oh, they just kind of I think shrugged
2:01
Speaker 3: it off for the most part as well. That's just Matthew.
2:04
Speaker 7: In two thousand and one, twenty year old Matthew Hoffman
2:07
Speaker 7: has his first encounter with the law.
2:10
Speaker 6: After he graduated.
2:11
Speaker 3: He seemed to kind of get lost, like he didn't
2:14
Speaker 3: really know exactly what he wanted to do. He's living
2:17
Speaker 3: with his mom and so he eventually decides to get
2:20
Speaker 3: a job in Colorado. So he moves to Colorado Springs
2:24
Speaker 3: and he's working as a plumber's assistant. People tend to
2:26
Speaker 3: like him. He makes a good impression. At the beginning.
2:30
Speaker 3: He realizes that one of his jobs, the owner of
2:34
Speaker 3: the condominium, is going to be out of town, and
2:36
Speaker 3: so he decides to essentially visit and set up camp there,
2:44
Speaker 3: cooking meals there, watching cable TV.
2:48
Speaker 6: He's using the jacuzzi, the hot tub.
2:51
Speaker 3: He ends up stealing some things out of the home
2:54
Speaker 3: and then in his head he is concerned about all
2:58
Speaker 3: these fingerprints that he might have left behind, and so
3:03
Speaker 3: what does he decide. He decides to burn up the condominium.
3:09
Speaker 5: Our sin was one in which we often find juveniles
3:13
Speaker 5: are very much involved in, but to hav an our
3:17
Speaker 5: sin to cover up another crime is another level. We
3:22
Speaker 5: start to see the development here of an individual that
3:26
Speaker 5: has tendencies that are not socially bonded, that can lead
3:31
Speaker 5: to more serious crime in the future.
3:34
Speaker 3: It suggests a couple of things that suggests certainly poor judgment,
3:38
Speaker 3: poor decision making, and just a complete disregard for the
3:43
Speaker 3: safety of other people who were in that condominium complex.
3:50
Speaker 3: So at this point he decides he needs to go
3:52
Speaker 3: back to Ohio and live with his mom. Meanwhile, in Colorado,
3:58
Speaker 3: they're these investigations, ask him, did you do it? And
4:01
Speaker 3: he goes, YEP, I did do it, And so they
4:04
Speaker 3: said you got to come back and face these charges.
4:05
Speaker 6: So he gets in the car and.
4:06
Speaker 3: He drives back to Colorado and he ends up serving
4:08
Speaker 3: six years.
4:14
Speaker 2: My name is Bob Maugladore and I'm a retired Columbus
4:18
Speaker 2: police officer. I was assigned to the Columbus Resident Agency
4:23
Speaker 2: FBI as a member of their Violent Crime Task Force
4:28
Speaker 2: after he'd committed the burglaries in Colorado and set those
4:33
Speaker 2: buildings on fire to cover his crime. Being caught and
4:37
Speaker 2: sent to prison was very hard on Matthew. He had
4:43
Speaker 2: a very difficult time in prison and it was a
4:47
Speaker 2: very bad experience.
4:51
Speaker 3: Eventually he gets out at six years. He gets a
4:53
Speaker 3: job as a tree tremor. He ends up saving up
4:57
Speaker 3: some money and he buys little house. His neighbors initially
5:04
Speaker 3: describe him as as a good guy, and then starting,
5:11
Speaker 3: you know, at the end of the summer of twenty ten,
5:15
Speaker 3: people just notice this abrupt change in him. He had
5:18
Speaker 3: developed this fascination with squirrels in his yard, and neighbors
5:22
Speaker 3: had had noticed this, and all of a sudden, he
5:25
Speaker 3: starts trapping and killing and eating them. Whenever somebody's behavior
5:32
Speaker 3: starts changing, particularly of course, when it's changing for the worse,
5:35
Speaker 3: that's a red flag something is going on.
5:38
Speaker 5: As we look at the research related to serial killing
5:42
Speaker 5: and violent crime, we often do see a pathway to that,
5:48
Speaker 5: the mistreatment of animals, the abuse being shown early age.
5:53
Speaker 4: And here we have another.
5:54
Speaker 5: Example of this, the ability to control ones in It
6:01
Speaker 5: is seen as something that we all want to do,
6:03
Speaker 5: but the question becomes how.
6:05
Speaker 7: We do it.
6:11
Speaker 3: He becomes violent with his girlfriend, who then leaves. His
6:15
Speaker 3: boss finds out that he's misrepresented his qualifications and that
6:21
Speaker 3: he had failed to tell them they had a criminal record.
6:25
Speaker 3: He's starting to watch the neighbors. They talk about him
6:28
Speaker 3: just literally sitting in a tree and staring at them
6:30
Speaker 3: for hours. I believe that Matthew Hoffman made a good
6:36
Speaker 3: faith effort when he got out of prison to lead
6:38
Speaker 3: a normal, law abiding life, and.
6:40
Speaker 6: I think it wore on him.
6:43
Speaker 3: And I think over time he got tired of pretending
6:47
Speaker 3: to be something he was not, because in reality he
6:50
Speaker 3: was a deeply disturbed and troubled person.
6:54
Speaker 4: My name is Harry trum Bidas. I'm a retired FBI agent.
6:59
Speaker 4: During the Matthew Hoffman case, I was involved in investigations
7:04
Speaker 4: of violent crime.
7:12
Speaker 7: Matthew Hoffman spends the night camped out in the woods
7:15
Speaker 7: overlooking the home of the Herman family, around twenty five
7:18
Speaker 7: minutes from his house. Mom Tina works at a local
7:22
Speaker 7: fast food restaurant, while her children, Sarah thirteen and Cody eleven,
7:27
Speaker 7: are popular pupils at the local high school. Hoffman appears
7:32
Speaker 7: to be sticking out the area for burglary Tuesday night.
7:37
Speaker 4: He had seen the house, he drove his vehicle, parked
7:41
Speaker 4: it not too far from the area there, and he
7:44
Speaker 4: actually spent the night in the woods right across the
7:48
Speaker 4: street from the house.
7:51
Speaker 5: We have Hoffman literally camping out across the way from
7:57
Speaker 5: this house in suburban Mount Vernon, Ohio. But there becomes
8:01
Speaker 5: this question of staying overnight is a very long time
8:06
Speaker 5: to look at your potential victim's house. A typical burglar
8:12
Speaker 5: has the ability to see the issues, see the lack
8:15
Speaker 5: of security, and say that is a good target.
8:24
Speaker 4: So he waited for a while. He walked across the
8:27
Speaker 4: street from the woods and he was able to crawl
8:31
Speaker 4: underneath the garage door. He went into the garage. He
8:36
Speaker 4: kicked the door into the house, actually into the kitchen.
8:42
Speaker 4: He said there was a sense of excitement of being
8:46
Speaker 4: in somebody else's house when they weren't there. He hears
8:51
Speaker 4: the pickup truck pulled back into the driveway, and he
8:56
Speaker 4: hears Tina Herman come back, parked the vehicle in the
9:00
Speaker 4: driveway and come in through the front door.
9:10
Speaker 5: A burglar is one that wants to get in and
9:14
Speaker 5: out without any contact with an individual. A burglar usually
9:19
Speaker 5: is not prepared to physically have an altercation with an individual. Instead,
9:24
Speaker 5: we find that he attacks Tina.
9:30
Speaker 4: He immediately confronted her with the knife, made her lie
9:34
Speaker 4: down on the bed. All of a sudden, another woman,
9:38
Speaker 4: Stephanie Sprang, shows up, and she starts yelling at him,
9:45
Speaker 4: and he's panicked. He doesn't know what to do, but
9:49
Speaker 4: he brought a knife in with him. And he panics
9:54
Speaker 4: and stabs Tina Herman a couple of times in the back,
9:57
Speaker 4: gets up and runs after st and Stephanie. Instead of
10:02
Speaker 4: leaving the house, she goes back into another bedroom. He's
10:06
Speaker 4: able to catch her, stabs her a couple of times
10:09
Speaker 4: in the chest. Then he goes back to where Tina
10:14
Speaker 4: is and stabs her a couple of more times, and
10:18
Speaker 4: he said it. By this time, it's clear both women
10:21
Speaker 4: are dead.
10:25
Speaker 3: Matthew Hoffman's motive depends on what you believe. He says
10:30
Speaker 3: that he just wanted to break in to burglarize the house.
10:33
Speaker 6: However, there are.
10:35
Speaker 3: Some things that don't add up for me. Number one,
10:38
Speaker 3: he brought a huge knife with him. Number two is
10:44
Speaker 3: he apparently attacks Tina the minute she walks in the door.
10:50
Speaker 3: Number Three, he takes nothing from the house. There's no
10:54
Speaker 3: evidence that he's burglarizing anything. Not only did Matthew Hoffman
11:00
Speaker 3: totally kill Tina and Stephanie, he continued to stab them
11:06
Speaker 3: long after they were dead. There was no reason to
11:09
Speaker 3: keep stabbing them, and yet he did.
11:12
Speaker 5: When you look at it, I think it certainly is
11:14
Speaker 5: a domino effect. I'm already in a terrible situation. Then
11:18
Speaker 5: it moved to that of a murder, then another murder,
11:22
Speaker 5: Where do I stop?
11:26
Speaker 3: After Matthew Hoffman kills Tina and then kills Stephanie, the
11:32
Speaker 3: dog is barking and he's worried that's going to draw attention,
11:35
Speaker 3: and so he kills the dog as well. He then
11:39
Speaker 3: proceeds to take each one, one at a time into
11:43
Speaker 3: the bathtub, where he then basically dismembers all of them
11:51
Speaker 3: and puts them in plastic bags.
11:54
Speaker 5: So killing has occurred. The mother, the mother's friend, even
11:59
Speaker 5: the dog had been killed. Now the children come home.
12:15
Speaker 7: Matthew Hoffman has murdered Tina Herman and her friend, Stephanie Spring.
12:20
Speaker 4: So he carried them both into the bathroom and started
12:25
Speaker 4: sawing their body parts. And while he's in there and
12:31
Speaker 4: finishing up with the two women, the family dog was
12:34
Speaker 4: barking at him, and that so he killed the family
12:37
Speaker 4: dog as well. And all of a sudden, he hears
12:42
Speaker 4: said children come in the door.
12:46
Speaker 3: They opened the door and they see drops of blood
12:49
Speaker 3: on the floor, and so immediately Sarah and Cody call
12:54
Speaker 3: out for their mom, and instantly Matthew Hoffman comes running
12:59
Speaker 3: out full force toward them. Sarah manages to run by him,
13:07
Speaker 3: Cody tries to run out the door. He grabs Cody
13:11
Speaker 3: and stabs in the back of the head and kills
13:15
Speaker 3: him pretty much instantly. Meanwhile, Sarah is in her room
13:21
Speaker 3: desperately fumbling for her phone, trying to call nine one one. Unfortunately,
13:26
Speaker 3: before she can do that, Matthew bursts into the room
13:30
Speaker 3: and does not kill her, stops and then ties her up.
13:37
Speaker 6: I know it's horrendous.
13:44
Speaker 5: Here we have a horrific situation where the brother is
13:47
Speaker 5: killed but the daughter is kept alive. I think we
13:52
Speaker 5: see control factor here. Thirteen year old child exists in
13:56
Speaker 5: the picture. She is saved, I think to be his
14:00
Speaker 5: controlling element. Perhaps he's even thinking she can humanize me
14:06
Speaker 5: for the demon type activities that I have just done.
14:13
Speaker 5: Serial killers we often find are more interested in those
14:16
Speaker 5: people in which they can control, and for a male,
14:20
Speaker 5: it is often that of a female. Multiply that even
14:23
Speaker 5: to a smaller female, a younger female, and the control
14:28
Speaker 5: element goes up.
14:31
Speaker 7: Tina works at a local fast food restaurant, and on
14:34
Speaker 7: the evening of her murder, Tina's boss is the first
14:37
Speaker 7: to worry that something isn't right.
14:40
Speaker 1: Share barber's office, Hi, I work out a directly on
14:44
Speaker 1: the general Nader out there.
14:45
Speaker 3: Uh huh.
14:46
Speaker 1: One of my employees is not short for workers afternoon
14:48
Speaker 1: four o'clock, okay, which is totally uncharacteristic of her. She's
14:52
Speaker 1: one of my managers.
14:53
Speaker 4: Okay. This is Wednesday, November tenth of twenty ten. The
14:58
Speaker 4: first information I received was that Tina Herman failed to
15:02
Speaker 4: show up for her four pm start time at the
15:05
Speaker 4: local dairy queen. The manager was so concerned about Tina
15:12
Speaker 4: not showing up because she had never missed work before,
15:15
Speaker 4: she had never been late. So about seven o'clock that night,
15:20
Speaker 4: a sheriff's deputy went to the home. Saw a blue
15:27
Speaker 4: pickup truck in the driveway, which was registered to Tina.
15:33
Speaker 4: But when the deputy knocked on the door, nobody came
15:36
Speaker 4: to the door. Still, he left, and then he went
15:41
Speaker 4: back later that night around eleven o'clock, knocked on the
15:44
Speaker 4: door again, no activity, nobody came to the door. There
15:49
Speaker 4: didn't seem to be any problem.
16:02
Speaker 7: The day after the attack, Stephanie Sprang's boyfriend reports her missing,
16:06
Speaker 7: and the police discovered that Sarah and Cody haven't gone
16:09
Speaker 7: into school. Tina's boss is even more worried.
16:14
Speaker 4: Tina still hadn't shown up for her shift. The manager
16:18
Speaker 4: got so concerned she went ahead and drove to Tina's house.
16:24
Speaker 4: There were no cars in the driveway, and she noticed
16:27
Speaker 4: a window was partly a jar, so she was able
16:32
Speaker 4: to raise it and actually get into the kitchen.
16:38
Speaker 1: Chef Barber's office. I called in last fight about Tina
16:41
Speaker 1: Mervin being missing. I am out at her house now.
16:45
Speaker 1: I just went in her home because I'm so worried
16:46
Speaker 1: about her. There's blood everywhere. Okay, just give us a
16:53
Speaker 1: few minutes and we'll be in around okay, okay.
17:00
Speaker 7: And seeing the crime scene, the local sheriff's office asked
17:03
Speaker 7: the FBI for assistance.
17:06
Speaker 2: Harry just contacted us and said, looks like we have
17:08
Speaker 2: a homicide up here and we're gonna need some help.
17:11
Speaker 2: When we saw the enormity of the crime scene, it
17:16
Speaker 2: was very clear that something really terrible had happened.
17:21
Speaker 7: Investigators arrive just hours after Hoffmann has left. At this stage,
17:26
Speaker 7: investigators are unaware of his involvement. It's not clear if
17:30
Speaker 7: any of the victims are still alive or where they've gone.
17:34
Speaker 5: Do we have any inclination was this self inflicted? Do
17:37
Speaker 5: we have any information that tells us was there another person,
17:41
Speaker 5: Are there any cameras, any neighbors, or any individuals that
17:45
Speaker 5: can give us time frame so that we can have
17:48
Speaker 5: a picture of when did this happen.
17:51
Speaker 2: There's not a lot of wealth in the house. There's
17:55
Speaker 2: no indication that there's any kind of narcotics activity taking
17:58
Speaker 2: place at the house. So we had four people that
18:02
Speaker 2: seemingly disappeared off the face of the earth. We felt
18:07
Speaker 2: as though there had to be at least one other
18:09
Speaker 2: person involved, possibly too. We had a real life who
18:15
Speaker 2: done it on our hands.
18:19
Speaker 4: If they weren't already dead. With the amount of blood
18:22
Speaker 4: and everything that we saw, it's clear that they could
18:25
Speaker 4: die very shortly if we didn't recover them.
18:32
Speaker 7: Police immediately conduct interviews with known contacts of Tina and Stephanie.
18:37
Speaker 4: Tina's boyfriend was a suspect at the time, but he
18:41
Speaker 4: was very cooperative. It was provided an alibie to us.
18:44
Speaker 4: It appeared as though he had nothing to do with this.
18:48
Speaker 4: We knew Tina and actually Stephanie had been out and
18:52
Speaker 4: about on Wednesday, could have met anybody, Could somebody have
18:56
Speaker 4: followed him home. It was pretty much an unknown because
19:00
Speaker 4: we had received no information, no suspicious people or vehicle
19:05
Speaker 4: reports in the area, so it was it was truly
19:09
Speaker 4: a mystery.
19:10
Speaker 7: At that point, police are still looking for the perpetrator
19:19
Speaker 7: and the victims of what appears to be a murder.
19:23
Speaker 4: The crime scene was pretty much based out of the bathroom,
19:27
Speaker 4: yet there was blood also down the hallway. There were
19:31
Speaker 4: two bedrooms where they found blood. And once they finished
19:36
Speaker 4: inside the house, they went into the garage and started
19:40
Speaker 4: processing the items inside the garage and they found a
19:45
Speaker 4: bag from Walmart. They looked inside and they found a
19:49
Speaker 4: receipt where somebody had gone on Thursday and made a
19:57
Speaker 4: purchase of some heavy duty garbage back and a couple
20:01
Speaker 4: of parts.
20:04
Speaker 2: That is where the first big break in the case
20:07
Speaker 2: came was a discovery of a receipt at the crime scene.
20:12
Speaker 2: That receipt really broke the case open.
20:15
Speaker 5: Now people should know there's a lot of information on
20:18
Speaker 5: your receipt from Walmart. It tells what items you purchased,
20:23
Speaker 5: it tells the location in which you purchased them, and
20:27
Speaker 5: the time and date in which you purchased them. That's
20:30
Speaker 5: a lot of information that can get an investigation going.
20:34
Speaker 5: So good Policing says, let's go to this Walmart. Let's
20:39
Speaker 5: look at the cameras. Let's try to put evidence together
20:42
Speaker 5: to see who does this bag belong to.
20:48
Speaker 7: Police are yet to identify Hoffman as a suspect. Since
20:52
Speaker 7: breaking into the Herman's house and killing Tina, Stephanie, Cody,
20:56
Speaker 7: and the family dog, He's moved the bodies, still keeping
21:00
Speaker 7: Sarah alive. She's now his prisoner.
21:11
Speaker 4: And he takes Sarah to his home, binds her, keeps
21:16
Speaker 4: her bound up, puts her in the crawl space, told
21:20
Speaker 4: her that he had accomplices, that you know, if she
21:23
Speaker 4: made any noises or anything, they would be there to
21:27
Speaker 4: take care of her and perhaps kill her if she
21:29
Speaker 4: didn't continue to cooperate.
21:32
Speaker 3: Won't let her take a shower, won't let her go
21:35
Speaker 3: to the bathroom. He sexually assaults her on multiple occasions.
21:45
Speaker 3: I think Matthew's motivation is sex and control. Not only
21:51
Speaker 3: does he want to have sex, I think with Sarah,
21:53
Speaker 3: but he wants to have complete control over her. I
21:56
Speaker 3: think that Cody and Tina and Teanie or collateral damage
22:01
Speaker 3: in this situation, that he just wanted to get them
22:04
Speaker 3: out of the way, and he was willing to kill
22:05
Speaker 3: anybody that he needed to get Sarah. I think this
22:10
Speaker 3: desire to essentially capture somebody and have them under your
22:15
Speaker 3: total control is so telling in terms of that person's psychology.
22:22
Speaker 3: I think there was some fantasy going on for him.
22:24
Speaker 3: This is going to be like a girlfriend, or this
22:27
Speaker 3: is going to be somebody who we're going to watch
22:30
Speaker 3: movies together, which of course would never ever, ever happen.
22:39
Speaker 7: Police don't know if Sarah or her family are alive
22:43
Speaker 7: or where they are. So far, their only lead is
22:46
Speaker 7: a Walmart receipt found in the herman's garage. They don't know.
22:50
Speaker 7: They're in a race against time to save the only survivor.
22:54
Speaker 4: The family went missing technically on Wednesday. We really didn't
22:57
Speaker 4: know about it until Thursday. It wasn't until Friday that
23:02
Speaker 4: they found the receipt. So the investigators went to the
23:07
Speaker 4: Walmart and they were able to pull up video of
23:11
Speaker 4: the individual that was in there shortly after midnight, and
23:14
Speaker 4: they saw this person walking in the Walmart store, going
23:18
Speaker 4: directly to the tarps and the garbage bags and buying those,
23:25
Speaker 4: going up to the cash register. Unfortunately paid with cash,
23:29
Speaker 4: so we weren't able to get a name, but we
23:32
Speaker 4: could see him walking to his vehicle turned out to
23:37
Speaker 4: be a Toyota Yaris. So let's pull up all the
23:41
Speaker 4: known Toyota yarises in this area, and they were able
23:45
Speaker 4: to click on the information about one of the yearses
23:49
Speaker 4: and it belonged to an individual by the name of
23:52
Speaker 4: Matthew Hoffman. So they pulled up his driver's license photo
24:00
Speaker 4: and he happened to have the same shirt on in
24:04
Speaker 4: his driver's license photo that we saw in the video
24:08
Speaker 4: of the individual that was walking around in the walmart.
24:12
Speaker 2: And that's when Matthew Hoffman was identified as a suspect.
24:17
Speaker 2: Once that occurred, they did some quick background information checks.
24:22
Speaker 2: He is a convicted felon for some crimes that he
24:25
Speaker 2: had done in Colorado, spend time out there in prison.
24:28
Speaker 5: You then now start looking at that person as your
24:31
Speaker 5: person of interest. They find Hoffman has been fired from
24:36
Speaker 5: his job, has a case of domestic violence against him.
24:40
Speaker 5: We're starting to see the puzzle gather pieces that may
24:45
Speaker 5: fit together.
24:56
Speaker 4: Saturday night, heading into Sunday morning, were able to get
25:00
Speaker 4: the search warrant and based on what we've found with
25:04
Speaker 4: the tarps and the garbage bags, we felt we had
25:07
Speaker 4: enough information there to get an arrest warrant for him.
25:12
Speaker 7: Police have two addresses for Hoffman. One of them is
25:16
Speaker 7: his house and the other his parents, both a short
25:19
Speaker 7: drive from the Herman's. Police plan to monitor both properties simultaneously.
25:25
Speaker 7: Harry Trombitis heads to Matthew Hoffman's parents' house. Bob Mullador
25:29
Speaker 7: heads to Matthew Hoffman's house.
25:31
Speaker 2: So we're going to the residents that belong to Matthew Hoffman.
25:38
Speaker 2: Because of the condition of the crime scene, I don't
25:40
Speaker 2: believe that anybody there really expected that we were going
25:46
Speaker 2: to find anyone alive.
25:51
Speaker 5: So right now in the investigation, you know that Hoffman
25:54
Speaker 5: is a person of interest, but you don't know where
25:57
Speaker 5: the people who lived at the crime I'm seeing where
26:00
Speaker 5: they are. So this is a very tense time.
26:08
Speaker 2: The question still remains, where are these people and how
26:12
Speaker 2: are we going to find them.
26:25
Speaker 7: Police have evidence linking Matthew Hoffman to the suspected murders
26:28
Speaker 7: of Tina Herman, her children Sarah and Cody, and her
26:32
Speaker 7: friend Stephanie Sprang. They have no idea that Sarah is
26:36
Speaker 7: still alive, and are preparing to search his parents' home
26:39
Speaker 7: and his own residence. Has he fled the state? If not,
26:43
Speaker 7: where is he?
26:45
Speaker 4: We had to assume that the possibility was there that
26:49
Speaker 4: Hoffman would be at either house. We pulled up in
26:54
Speaker 4: front of Matthew's mom's house. We're wearing our bulletproof vests.
26:59
Speaker 4: We've got our guns out. I said, I'm with the FBI.
27:03
Speaker 4: We're looking for Matthew as he here. The stepdad said no.
27:10
Speaker 4: We were disappointed that we didn't find him there, but
27:13
Speaker 4: we realized that more than likely Matthew would be at
27:18
Speaker 4: the house in Mount Vernon.
27:25
Speaker 2: When the officers went to the door, they knocked and announced,
27:31
Speaker 2: and he actually came to the door, so he was
27:36
Speaker 2: taken into custody right away. As far as Matthew's demeanor,
27:42
Speaker 2: he was quiet. He almost seemed relieved that we were there.
27:47
Speaker 2: But as you go into the house, the first thing
27:50
Speaker 2: that you see off to your right hand side is
27:54
Speaker 2: a living room without any furniture inside, but there's a
27:59
Speaker 2: enormous pile of leaves covering the floor. It covers an
28:08
Speaker 2: entire room. It was really shocking. We looked at that
28:14
Speaker 2: and wondered, right away, are we going to find four
28:17
Speaker 2: bodies and covered up in this pile of leaves?
28:21
Speaker 7: With Hoffman now in custody, the swap team search for
28:25
Speaker 7: survivors fearing the worst.
28:28
Speaker 2: Anytime a tactical team enters a house like that, the
28:31
Speaker 2: first thing is that they do is conduct a room
28:34
Speaker 2: to room search. There were carcasses of animals in his refrigerator,
28:41
Speaker 2: The house itself was in a state of disarray, and
28:46
Speaker 2: it was during that search that Sarah was located in
28:50
Speaker 2: the basement of the home. Everyone who was involved in
28:55
Speaker 2: that was just shocked that we had this young girl
28:59
Speaker 2: and she was.
29:02
Speaker 4: She was bound and.
29:05
Speaker 2: Sleeping in a pile of leaves with some blankets. She
29:09
Speaker 2: was pretty confused. Obviously, she was scared but relieved.
29:19
Speaker 5: The main point now is to move that thirteen year
29:22
Speaker 5: old Sarah to safety and then to get her to
29:25
Speaker 5: give us as much information about what occurred.
29:29
Speaker 4: We quickly interviewed Sarah to see if she knew where
29:33
Speaker 4: her family was. He had indicated to her that he
29:36
Speaker 4: was holding her hostage until the family provided whatever money,
29:42
Speaker 4: and that that they were negotiating. He even showed her
29:45
Speaker 4: what the word ransom means in the dictionary.
29:50
Speaker 7: With Sarah now safe, investigators are desperate to learn the
29:54
Speaker 7: fate of Hoffman's other victims.
29:56
Speaker 4: A ruger around her have to pear to Sheriff's offs.
30:02
Speaker 5: You now have Hoffmann in custody. And usually what we
30:06
Speaker 5: find is that an individual that's in this situation is
30:10
Speaker 5: usually fearful, uncertain, and scared, and so with all of
30:14
Speaker 5: that coming at them, they want to defend themselves and
30:17
Speaker 5: they usually say at least something.
30:20
Speaker 4: Think, you know what we want to talk about, but
30:24
Speaker 4: we need to find some find some people. Can you
30:31
Speaker 4: hear me?
30:34
Speaker 5: But he does not. He does not for four hours.
30:39
Speaker 4: Wow, he just sat there like he was in a trance.
30:43
Speaker 4: After a a couple hours of him just sitting there,
30:46
Speaker 4: he made emotion like.
30:51
Speaker 1: Her.
30:52
Speaker 4: Then he does this like he's breaking something broken. Your
30:57
Speaker 4: heart's broken because what happened, and he kind of nods yes,
31:03
Speaker 4: and that was all they could get out of it.
31:08
Speaker 3: I think the longer this capture or kidnapping went on,
31:12
Speaker 3: I think the harder it would have been for Matthew
31:15
Speaker 3: to let Sarah go.
31:17
Speaker 6: For a couple of reasons.
31:18
Speaker 3: One is she's been missing for so long and the
31:20
Speaker 3: criminal charges are going to be just racking up longer
31:24
Speaker 3: and longer, and I think he would have considered her
31:28
Speaker 3: kind of his He's also killed most of her family,
31:32
Speaker 3: so if he lets her go, she is now going
31:35
Speaker 3: to find out that he has murdered her mother, her brother,
31:39
Speaker 3: and her dog.
31:42
Speaker 7: With Hoffman offering no information, police use other tactics to
31:46
Speaker 7: help them understand what's happened to Tina, Cody, and Stephanie.
31:50
Speaker 2: I was given the responsibility of escorting his ex girlfriend.
31:56
Speaker 2: He would take this young lady on dates and he
32:00
Speaker 2: would find a huge tree, put up his equipment, hoist
32:04
Speaker 2: them up thirty or forty feet in the air, and
32:06
Speaker 2: they would hang out for a whole saturday in the
32:08
Speaker 2: hammocks in the canopy of these trees.
32:12
Speaker 7: Bob hopes that he'll find some clues by driving to
32:14
Speaker 7: the places that Hoffmann visited with his ax.
32:17
Speaker 2: She said that he was actually polite most of the time,
32:21
Speaker 2: but towards the end of their relationship, he was prone
32:25
Speaker 2: to fits of anger and they would come on quickly.
32:28
Speaker 2: When she finally put an end to the relationship, it
32:31
Speaker 2: was because he had held her down and choked her
32:33
Speaker 2: to the point that she thought she was going to
32:35
Speaker 2: lose consciousness, and that really scared her. It seems like
32:42
Speaker 2: Matthew liked the thrill of being in someone's house that
32:47
Speaker 2: didn't belong to him when they weren't there. That's what
32:49
Speaker 2: I was hearing from the words of his former girlfriend,
32:54
Speaker 2: and in her case, that led to the demise of
32:57
Speaker 2: their relationship as she came to know him better. So
33:02
Speaker 2: she and I drove all over Knox County, put hundreds
33:06
Speaker 2: of miles on my truck that those couple of days,
33:10
Speaker 2: but to no avail.
33:12
Speaker 4: We just assumed that they were dead and that they
33:15
Speaker 4: were hidden somewhere and it was going to be up
33:19
Speaker 4: to Matthew Hoffman and tell us where they were.
33:22
Speaker 5: You can start to then think, was there a movement
33:26
Speaker 5: of body parts? The piece is all in one place,
33:30
Speaker 5: and this is where they make the horrific finding.
33:47
Speaker 7: Matthew Hoffman is in custody for the kidnapping of Sarah
33:50
Speaker 7: Maynard and the suspected murder of her mom Tina, her
33:53
Speaker 7: brother Cody, and her mom's friend Stephanie.
33:56
Speaker 4: Hi.
33:57
Speaker 6: Matt, Hi, my name is Chris Wanda. Talk you for
34:00
Speaker 6: ID if I could.
34:01
Speaker 7: After two days of interrogation, the police have no information
34:05
Speaker 7: about whether or not he's killed Sarah's family or what
34:09
Speaker 7: he might have done with their bodies.
34:11
Speaker 2: He didn't talk a lot. He seemed easily frustrated. He's
34:17
Speaker 2: just sort of a haunted personality.
34:20
Speaker 4: It was extremely frustrating. We just weren't able to get
34:25
Speaker 4: him to admit anything or tell us any of the information.
34:29
Speaker 4: At that point, he was eligible for the death penalty,
34:33
Speaker 4: but we wanted to find out where the family was.
34:38
Speaker 4: So basically, the prosecutors said, we think that if we
34:42
Speaker 4: dropped the death penalty charges against Matthew Hoffman in exchange,
34:47
Speaker 4: he'll tell us where the family where your family members are,
34:51
Speaker 4: And all of the family members were in agreement that
34:55
Speaker 4: they wanted to know where their loved ones were so
34:58
Speaker 4: they can bring him home.
35:00
Speaker 5: What's extremely important is trying to bring closure, not just
35:06
Speaker 5: to that of the case, but what is very important
35:10
Speaker 5: to the families.
35:11
Speaker 4: Not knowing is.
35:13
Speaker 5: Often the question that eats at them every single day.
35:19
Speaker 7: The deal works with the prospect of the death penalty removed,
35:23
Speaker 7: Hoffman reveals the truth in a written statement.
35:28
Speaker 4: In his statement, Matthew Hoffman indicated that while he conpleted
35:34
Speaker 4: processing the bodies, he realized that those bags weren't going
35:39
Speaker 4: to be strong enough for him. So he loaded Sarah
35:43
Speaker 4: and the body parts into Stephanie's vehicle and he parks
35:49
Speaker 4: the vehicle, goes back and gets his vehicle, and he
35:54
Speaker 4: takes Sarah to his home, binds her, keeps her bound up,
36:00
Speaker 4: goes to the walmart where he purchases the garbage bags
36:04
Speaker 4: and the tar, transfers the body parts that are in
36:07
Speaker 4: the smaller bags into the larger bags. Goes to Cocusing
36:12
Speaker 4: Wildlife Area, which is about ten miles from Tina's house,
36:17
Speaker 4: and had remembered a tree that he had a particular
36:21
Speaker 4: liking to. This is a sixty foot tree, and about
36:25
Speaker 4: halfway up is a hollowed out area, and he hauls
36:29
Speaker 4: the body parts up, drops him down the center, and
36:33
Speaker 4: then he goes back home. He tells us these different things.
36:39
Speaker 4: You know, it's just very difficult for us to believe
36:42
Speaker 4: what he went through to do this, so we were
36:45
Speaker 4: very skeptical.
36:47
Speaker 2: During his interviews, they talked to him about why he
36:52
Speaker 2: chose to dispose of the bodies in that manner, and
36:56
Speaker 2: he said that at one point he had thought about
36:58
Speaker 2: putting the bodies in to Stephanie Sprague's jeep vehicle and
37:03
Speaker 2: driving it into a pond and letting it sink. The
37:07
Speaker 2: reason he didn't do that was because he was concerned
37:10
Speaker 2: that because of the water temperature and the time of year,
37:13
Speaker 2: that he would not be able to safely escape from
37:17
Speaker 2: the vehicle and swim to shore. So that tells me
37:19
Speaker 2: that this is a guy who's he's worrying about himself.
37:25
Speaker 4: So the attorney leads us out to Cocasing Wildlife Preserve,
37:32
Speaker 4: and all of a sudden, after a quarter a mile
37:34
Speaker 4: or so, he stops. He gets out of his vehicle.
37:38
Speaker 4: He's looking at the map, and he comes back to
37:42
Speaker 4: the sheriff's car and he goes, I think that's the
37:46
Speaker 4: tree right there. You gotta be kidding me. This tree
37:50
Speaker 4: is sixty feet tall. There is a hollowed out portion
37:54
Speaker 4: in the tree, but it's thirty feet off the ground.
37:57
Speaker 4: And you know, we're just real skeptical. I'm seeing guys.
38:01
Speaker 4: They got a saw and they cut out about six
38:04
Speaker 4: feet off the ground a little hole where they could
38:08
Speaker 4: stick a pole and a mirror attached to the end.
38:12
Speaker 4: And as they're looking, they go, I think we see
38:16
Speaker 4: garbage bags down there. And sure enough, just like Matthew
38:21
Speaker 4: Hoffman had said that, he had dropped seven garbage bags
38:24
Speaker 4: down the center of the tree, and the inside the
38:27
Speaker 4: garbage bags were the body parts.
38:33
Speaker 2: Those bodies may not have been discovered for decades in
38:39
Speaker 2: that tree. The way that they were. It's very possible
38:42
Speaker 2: it could have been fifty or sixty years ago by
38:45
Speaker 2: until that tree rotted and fell, that those bodies would
38:48
Speaker 2: have been discovered.
38:50
Speaker 3: I think that for Matthew Hoffman, trees meant so many things.
38:55
Speaker 3: And I think one of the things they did mean
38:56
Speaker 3: to him is like it's a sacred space for him,
38:59
Speaker 3: and it's a that's his. And so I think by
39:02
Speaker 3: putting these bodies down in this tree, number one, it'd
39:06
Speaker 3: be almost impossible to find them. Is they're a practical
39:09
Speaker 3: part of it. But I think even more importantly for
39:11
Speaker 3: him psychologically, is it was kind of like, if not
39:15
Speaker 3: like an offering.
39:18
Speaker 6: A sacred place that was his.
39:21
Speaker 3: So it was a sense of ownership as well that
39:23
Speaker 3: he's putting them in this tree.
39:34
Speaker 5: He faces aggravated murder, abuse of a corpse, burglary, kidnapping,
39:42
Speaker 5: and rape. When you're going into trial with such an
39:46
Speaker 5: emotional case that has the loss of life and still
39:51
Speaker 5: has a thirteen year old that went through this ordeal,
39:57
Speaker 5: you've got a lot there to deal with.
40:00
Speaker 4: The family was all there. I remember being in the courtroom.
40:03
Speaker 4: There was no trial, it was just a plea. He
40:07
Speaker 4: pled guilty, and you know, It's just awful situation for
40:12
Speaker 4: the families, certainly for Sarah.
40:16
Speaker 5: He is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility
40:23
Speaker 5: of parole.
40:25
Speaker 4: We see some horrific things throughout our careers, and that
40:29
Speaker 4: and to recover, you know, a family is just a
40:33
Speaker 4: horrific thing. Nobody should ever have to go through that.
40:37
Speaker 4: But you know, that's what we do in law enforcement.
40:40
Speaker 4: We see the worst of the worst. But you know,
40:44
Speaker 4: it was closure for them. Matthew Hoffman will never ever
40:50
Speaker 4: get out of prison again. As far as Hoffmann's mindset,
41:02
Speaker 4: it's so difficult to tell exactly where he was at
41:07
Speaker 4: the particular time. I've been involved in a number of
41:10
Speaker 4: cases where this kind of thing will repulse somebody, and
41:15
Speaker 4: I've also worked cases where when somebody actually does this
41:20
Speaker 4: and they feel the power of control, it can fuel
41:26
Speaker 4: a fire inside them that you know. I like this feeling.
41:34
Speaker 2: I think that he was escalating once he had killed,
41:38
Speaker 2: I think he would have killed again. My daughter, who
41:46
Speaker 2: is now an adult, actually teaches at the middle school
41:51
Speaker 2: where Sarah and her brother went to school at, and
41:55
Speaker 2: she lives in the.
41:57
Speaker 4: Mount Vernon community.
41:59
Speaker 2: Cody would have graduated in twenty nineteen and for the
42:03
Speaker 2: graduation ceremony. The school placed a chair with Cody's cap
42:08
Speaker 2: and gown and his diploma on that chair, along with
42:15
Speaker 2: a white rose. And when my daughter sent me that photograph,
42:23
Speaker 2: it hit me like a load of bricks. This particular
42:26
Speaker 2: case has always stuck with me. I have kind of
42:31
Speaker 2: followed after Sarah to just kind of see how she's
42:36
Speaker 2: getting along in life. It's unimaginable to me how you
42:40
Speaker 2: could experience something this horrific and still go on. I'm
42:45
Speaker 2: just honored to have been able to afford her the
42:49
Speaker 2: opportunity to have a life and just hope and pray
42:53
Speaker 2: that she finds solace and can go on with her
43:00
Speaker 2: life and not allow this experience to define who she is.