Latest / NO FILTER / She was stalking her pastor_ but she had an even darker secret _ Killer Confessions(MP3_160K)

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She was stalking her pastor_ but she had an even darker secret _ Killer Confessions(MP3_160K) · NO FILTER

0:01
Speaker 1: The program you are about to watch contains actual police
0:04
Speaker 1: video and photos taken from the investigation's master file. Camdenton, Missouri,
0:16
Speaker 1: is a place known for its wholesome, family friendly way
0:19
Speaker 1: of life where everyone knows everyone.
0:22
Speaker 2: Campton is a nice small community down at Lake of
0:25
Speaker 2: the Ozarks about mid Missouri area. It's a nice bedroom community.
0:29
Speaker 2: A lot of good folks live in here.
0:32
Speaker 1: But in the spring of twenty thirteen, all is not
0:36
Speaker 1: perfect in this small, tranquil town. Someone here is harboring
0:40
Speaker 1: a dark secret. Nine years ago, someone brutally stabbed and
0:45
Speaker 1: killed forty eight year old Tommy Hope. It's an unsolved
0:50
Speaker 1: murder that now brings a pastor and.
0:53
Speaker 3: She gets into some explicit sexual encounters that she wants to.
0:58
Speaker 1: Have a housewife, and you could of hell it. Now
1:01
Speaker 1: I'm in jail and two cops to an interrogation room.
1:06
Speaker 4: So what's she writing? Like A fifty shades A great well.
1:09
Speaker 4: I don't know if fifty.
1:10
Speaker 1: Shades at the Camden County Sheriff's office really worth every
1:17
Speaker 1: day murder suspects and investigators come face to face in
1:21
Speaker 1: the police interrogation room.
1:23
Speaker 5: I did not kill my mom.
1:25
Speaker 1: It's where detectives separate truth from lives, and.
1:28
Speaker 6: You're gonna sit here and tell me this crap.
1:30
Speaker 1: The innocent from the guilty.
1:31
Speaker 7: What can I talk to a lawyer?
1:33
Speaker 1: It's a place where cases are closed with killer confessions.
1:47
Speaker 1: This is probably the last place. Thirty six year old
1:50
Speaker 1: Clara Rector, expected to be the devout wife and mother,
1:55
Speaker 1: has been locked up for the past few hours in
1:57
Speaker 1: the Camden County Jail on charge of stalking and sexual harassment.
2:03
Speaker 1: Clara will soon be questioned by investigators, but first they
2:07
Speaker 1: need to speak with the target of her harassment, her
2:10
Speaker 1: pastor Jerry Sousely. Inspector Eric Stax works this interview alone
2:16
Speaker 1: as cameras record every word.
2:18
Speaker 4: This is your interview. I just you take Captain to
2:20
Speaker 4: use your own words.
2:22
Speaker 2: You explain what is by The interview with the pastor
2:26
Speaker 2: was number one to verify all the facts and find
2:28
Speaker 2: out exactly what was going on from his side of
2:31
Speaker 2: the story. We also wanted to make sure that was
2:34
Speaker 2: there any underlying issues that him and Clara may have had.
2:38
Speaker 3: She began to like leave a note on my datas
2:44
Speaker 3: and they weren't. They were I don't remember who the
2:49
Speaker 3: subject matter.
2:51
Speaker 2: It all started with Clara coming on to him.
2:54
Speaker 8: Pastor Jerry by Clarah, I haven't heard from you, did
2:59
Speaker 8: you get note?
3:00
Speaker 2: He said it was like a schoolgirl infatuation. He even
3:04
Speaker 2: made a comment that he said, when you talk to her,
3:05
Speaker 2: you're going to see she's got the mentality of a younger,
3:09
Speaker 2: you know, like a fifteen year old girl.
3:10
Speaker 3: It's almost like a teenage kid, you know. And she
3:15
Speaker 3: would sign it with a heart and love c J.
3:18
Speaker 3: And I said, Claire, I mean, you'd come and talk
3:21
Speaker 3: to me. I said, but you can't do this several
3:24
Speaker 3: weeks a month or two, go buy nothing? What has
3:26
Speaker 3: her in those kinds of things? Then I got a
3:30
Speaker 3: letter on my desk from her, and she's complaining about
3:34
Speaker 3: how she feels left out of the church and that
3:37
Speaker 3: her and her family are probably going to go find
3:39
Speaker 3: another church. And then she wrote that plus, you're a
3:46
Speaker 3: big distraction to me, something along the lines.
3:51
Speaker 4: You're very attractive.
3:53
Speaker 1: According to the pastor, over the last few months, Clara's
3:57
Speaker 1: infatuation becomes an obsession.
4:01
Speaker 3: That's what was getting discern It was growing, it was
4:04
Speaker 3: getting a little more brazen than.
4:06
Speaker 4: Each time she started.
4:08
Speaker 3: Texting me and just asking questions. But I tell her,
4:11
Speaker 3: she just wanted a conversation, and I wanted to text
4:14
Speaker 3: her back.
4:15
Speaker 4: Well, that would make her mad. What's wrong with you?
4:18
Speaker 4: I don't know. Long as you talk to me.
4:20
Speaker 2: It got to the point where he said he was
4:22
Speaker 2: I started to getting afraid of her. He would go
4:24
Speaker 2: out early in the morning and find notes on his
4:26
Speaker 2: car where she had been to his home and left notes.
4:29
Speaker 1: Claire, I need you to listen to me really carefully,
4:32
Speaker 1: he told.
4:33
Speaker 2: Her on many occasions, this is very inappropriate. And I'm
4:36
Speaker 2: married and I have a reputation, I'm the pastor. We
4:39
Speaker 2: can't have this.
4:41
Speaker 3: I said, that's at the Devil's ride out to the Veil.
4:43
Speaker 3: I said that destroys churches, it destroys families.
4:47
Speaker 4: I'm married, I got a family. You have a family.
4:49
Speaker 4: I said, it's uncalled for.
4:51
Speaker 3: You need to stop doing that, and she said she
4:53
Speaker 3: was sorry, you know, and that she wouldn't do it.
4:57
Speaker 1: But the harassment never stops.
5:00
Speaker 2: She was making some very strong allegations and we needed
5:02
Speaker 2: to make sure that wasn't in fact the case, that
5:05
Speaker 2: he wasn't setting her up or something to that effect.
5:08
Speaker 1: From what Inspector Stax can learn about Clara, she doesn't
5:12
Speaker 1: fit the profile of a sexual stalker. She is known
5:15
Speaker 1: to be deeply religious, devoting hours of her time each
5:19
Speaker 1: week to church activities.
5:21
Speaker 9: I knew Clara director because we actually sat in the
5:24
Speaker 9: same pew at church. Her family and my family sat
5:27
Speaker 9: together at church. We knew each other's kids. Her husband
5:30
Speaker 9: and I were in the chili cook off together every year.
5:33
Speaker 9: We were close church family. She was a very nice
5:35
Speaker 9: Christian woman.
5:37
Speaker 1: Between taking care of her young kids and working, she
5:41
Speaker 1: runs her own Christian website and is popular with her
5:44
Speaker 1: fellow parishioners. The discrepancy between Clara's reputation and the pastor's
5:50
Speaker 1: scandalous statements has detective Stacks asking the tough questions.
5:55
Speaker 4: You know, as an investigator, we look at it.
5:57
Speaker 10: We try to look at every defiantle what led after
5:59
Speaker 10: her thinking she could just offer herself to you, knowing
6:03
Speaker 10: that you're not a dummy, You're gonna proud out that
6:05
Speaker 10: you're phoning to her, And so, you know, the obvious
6:10
Speaker 10: question is, you know, well, did they have something going
6:13
Speaker 10: on on our side?
6:14
Speaker 3: Writing so I know we did absolutely not. Another is
6:17
Speaker 3: absolutely nothing in faint my life from okay.
6:21
Speaker 2: I even followed up the question with we're gonna look
6:24
Speaker 2: at phones. We're gonna look at text messages. Is there
6:28
Speaker 2: anything that we're going to find that you haven't already
6:30
Speaker 2: told me that may indicate that you were involved in this.
6:33
Speaker 4: There is nothing out there as.
6:35
Speaker 3: You're gonna find at all that is inappropriate, not one thing.
6:38
Speaker 2: The pastor answered everything very directly, very openly. There was
6:42
Speaker 2: no reason to believe that he wasn't being honest with
6:45
Speaker 2: me whatsoever.
6:46
Speaker 1: The pastor's story may be true, but it hardly rises
6:50
Speaker 1: to the level of sexual harassment or stalking. Then the
6:54
Speaker 1: pastor tells the inspector about the notebook she left for.
6:58
Speaker 3: I'm front of it. It just had random stuff written
7:01
Speaker 3: all over.
7:02
Speaker 4: This is my book. This is a story.
7:06
Speaker 3: Read it, tell me what you think. So I opened
7:09
Speaker 3: it up, and I didn't. I kind of skimmed through
7:12
Speaker 3: it because right away I knew what it was. And
7:16
Speaker 3: it was about a woman.
7:19
Speaker 4: Who was in love with her pastor. And she's talking
7:23
Speaker 4: about his big feet, his.
7:25
Speaker 3: Big hands, and his dark, dreamy eyes and I know
7:29
Speaker 3: I can't have me, but.
7:30
Speaker 4: I can't help how I feel.
7:32
Speaker 3: And she gets into some explicit sexual encounters that she
7:36
Speaker 3: wants to have. I imagine him coming up behind me and
7:40
Speaker 3: kissing me on the neck, and you know, and like
7:43
Speaker 3: I said, I don't like stuff like that.
7:46
Speaker 4: And so was she writing me like a fifty shades
7:48
Speaker 4: of grade. I don't know what fifty shades of grade.
7:51
Speaker 2: So there was no names. It wasn't Claire in this pastor,
7:55
Speaker 2: but the inferences were so strong that it makes one
7:58
Speaker 2: wonder if she wasn't testing him them to see, maybe
8:02
Speaker 2: I want this to happen. Here's a book in maybe
8:05
Speaker 2: you'll take this under advisement. Maybe this could happen. You know,
8:09
Speaker 2: I'm open to it, are you.
8:10
Speaker 3: When I really got really uncomfortable was when she started
8:13
Speaker 3: talking about the encounter where you know, I come out,
8:16
Speaker 3: I'm saying I she she just said he, yeah, yeah,
8:21
Speaker 3: and he comes up behind me and something about her
8:25
Speaker 3: g string I don't remember.
8:27
Speaker 7: You know.
8:27
Speaker 3: And that's when I was like, you know, you know,
8:31
Speaker 3: he does get very specific. It's sexually. I don't oh yeah, yeah, yeah,
8:35
Speaker 3: and uh. And then I remember reading one thing, size
8:40
Speaker 3: does Matter.
8:42
Speaker 1: Page by page, the writing gets progressively jumbled and random.
8:46
Speaker 1: I signed, Clara could be losing touch with reality.
8:50
Speaker 3: You know, And we also got here to read the
8:52
Speaker 3: whole things. It was aggravating me she goes first ball,
8:55
Speaker 3: she just laid it on my desk where my wife
8:58
Speaker 3: picked it up. Or my little girl, she's eleven. She
9:01
Speaker 3: if you comfort him, will be ridden and uh so,
9:05
Speaker 3: you know that really.
9:06
Speaker 4: Made me mad.
9:08
Speaker 1: When Clara contacts the pastor's wife, his patience finally runs out.
9:14
Speaker 4: Claire starts just kind of rambling.
9:17
Speaker 3: I didn't they need to tell me everything that she said?
9:21
Speaker 3: But she said, I don't know what's wrong with pastor Jerry.
9:23
Speaker 3: He keeps avoiding me. You don't want to talk to me.
9:25
Speaker 3: It's not like I want to have sex with him.
9:27
Speaker 4: And that upset my wife.
9:29
Speaker 3: And she came when I was at home. She came
9:31
Speaker 3: in there and he said, you need to talk to her.
9:33
Speaker 4: And this is the dad of stuff. So I said, Claire, if.
9:37
Speaker 3: You want to play games with your family, that's fine, said,
9:39
Speaker 3: don't play games with mine. You know you need to
9:42
Speaker 3: leave us alone. Uh and and don't call me.
9:46
Speaker 5: You know you you you have you have.
9:48
Speaker 4: Crossed the line. And she said, she said.
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Speaker 3: Jerry, and she's never called me by my first name.
9:54
Speaker 3: She said, Jerry, if.
9:56
Speaker 4: You tell the law what you know about me, I
9:59
Speaker 4: will just destroy you. I will ef him destroy you
10:03
Speaker 4: to use the word, and I just I just hung up.
10:07
Speaker 1: That's when the pastor calls the police. It's not an
10:11
Speaker 1: easy call to make because it means this man of
10:14
Speaker 1: the cloth, we'll now have to admit he has a
10:17
Speaker 1: confession of his own.
10:19
Speaker 4: She began to talk about this, this guy.
10:21
Speaker 1: She said, the pastor is ready to share a terrible
10:24
Speaker 1: secret about Clara. He's been harboring for nine long months.
10:33
Speaker 4: It was fourth of July. We have a fireworks hand.
10:35
Speaker 4: They were selling fireworks and Claire showed up about nine
10:39
Speaker 4: thirty something like that.
10:41
Speaker 3: And she said, Passengerry, I need to tell you something
10:44
Speaker 3: and I said, okay.
10:46
Speaker 1: She tells him that eight years ago she had hit
10:49
Speaker 1: rock bottom and committed a terrible sin.
10:52
Speaker 3: And she said that she had, you know, donald drugs again,
10:56
Speaker 3: She's had substitute problems and got to pick still with
10:59
Speaker 3: this guy.
10:59
Speaker 4: She said, Eddy's name, but I'm not sure.
11:02
Speaker 3: And then she just kind of stopped and put her
11:04
Speaker 3: head down and she said, and I killed him, just
11:10
Speaker 3: kind of matter of factly. And I said, what do
11:14
Speaker 3: you what do you mean you killed him? And she said,
11:17
Speaker 3: I stab him, you know, And.
11:22
Speaker 4: You know, I didn't know what to say.
11:24
Speaker 2: They had a very long conversation, and I believe after
11:27
Speaker 2: that he didn't know what to do. He had told
11:31
Speaker 2: her at one time, you need to go tell the police.
11:34
Speaker 2: He's the pastor in a community, and he didn't want
11:36
Speaker 2: to be the one to go run into the police
11:39
Speaker 2: and say here's what I know. I think he was
11:40
Speaker 2: truly wanting to convince her to do this on her own.
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Speaker 3: I'm trying to justify what I did, but you know,
11:47
Speaker 3: I just, you know, to be honest with you, I
11:50
Speaker 3: felt like that she was under so much pressure and
11:53
Speaker 3: guilt she would just go do it herself.
11:55
Speaker 4: But she didn't.
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Speaker 2: And I believe what happened was the infatuation issue and
12:01
Speaker 2: her fantasy relationship with him got to such a point
12:04
Speaker 2: that it really started to concern him, and I think
12:07
Speaker 2: that's when he decided to just go ahead and notify.
12:09
Speaker 4: The law enforcement.
12:11
Speaker 9: The pastor told me that he could not remember his name,
12:14
Speaker 9: but he described in pretty vivid detail a crime scene
12:18
Speaker 9: at a location in the city of Cambington from approximately
12:20
Speaker 9: nine years ago. Jen I'll need a criminal history on
12:24
Speaker 9: Based on her vivid description of the brutal crime and
12:28
Speaker 9: the location and the time frame, well, there was only
12:31
Speaker 9: one unsolved murder case in this area that matched all
12:34
Speaker 9: of those. That's the Tommy Hope case.
12:42
Speaker 1: Tommy Hope was a forty eight year old carpenter and
12:45
Speaker 1: construction worker who moved to Camdenton from Texas a few
12:50
Speaker 1: years earlier. He was well known in the area to
12:54
Speaker 1: be a welcoming neighbor and a caring friend.
12:57
Speaker 5: Tommy had a heart of gold.
12:59
Speaker 2: He would help any body that needed help.
13:02
Speaker 8: He was constantly giving things to people he thought they
13:06
Speaker 8: might want.
13:07
Speaker 11: He really didn't have that much, but he would give
13:11
Speaker 11: you the shirt off his back. And that was my
13:15
Speaker 11: very first impression of him. Very giving.
13:21
Speaker 12: Again, book Cutter of Bond.
13:25
Speaker 1: Early on the morning of April twenty eighth, two thousand
13:27
Speaker 1: and four, a nine to one to one call directs
13:30
Speaker 1: police to Tommy Hope's house. They find Tommy lying on
13:35
Speaker 1: the floor in a pool of blood. He has been
13:38
Speaker 1: stabbed eight times and his throat slashed. Inspector Dave Rice
13:44
Speaker 1: is one of the first at the scene.
13:45
Speaker 6: There was a copious amounts of blood everywhere. You could
13:49
Speaker 6: see stab wounds on Tommy's body. You could see that
13:52
Speaker 6: his throat was cut, and there was blood throughout the house,
13:56
Speaker 6: even underneath his socks. On the bottom of his socks,
13:59
Speaker 6: you could see the bull blood where he had apparently
14:01
Speaker 6: walked throughout the house, and there was a blood trail
14:03
Speaker 6: throughout the various rooms, So it was obviously at that
14:05
Speaker 6: point that a serious struggle had taken place in which
14:09
Speaker 6: either the victimy and the offender had walked throughout the house.
14:15
Speaker 1: The trail of bloody footprints leads from the body to
14:18
Speaker 1: a side window, then disappears. Investigators assumed the killer escaped
14:24
Speaker 1: through the window and ran into the woods behind the house.
14:27
Speaker 1: The murder weapon is nowhere to be found. The sheer
14:32
Speaker 1: brutality of the assault suggests it's an anger filled personal attack.
14:37
Speaker 1: But who would want the affable Tommy Hope dead?
14:45
Speaker 11: Others internal shock. I just cried my eyes out and thought,
14:53
Speaker 11: oh my god, who could do such a horrendous thing.
15:01
Speaker 8: It was the darkest period in my life when Tommy
15:04
Speaker 8: was murdered. It was like the most horrific night mirror
15:10
Speaker 8: I could have ever had.
15:13
Speaker 1: The motive for Tommy's tragic death is revealed by several
15:17
Speaker 1: pieces of evidence left behind at the crime scene.
15:20
Speaker 6: Everybody said that he was a super nice man. He
15:23
Speaker 6: didn't have a history of violence, that we knew of.
15:25
Speaker 6: He just had a drug addiction and because of that
15:28
Speaker 6: drug addiction, began selling drugs to make money.
15:33
Speaker 1: Investigators focused their search for suspects on Tommy Hope's fellow
15:37
Speaker 1: drug users.
15:38
Speaker 6: There was a drug dealer that tom owed money too
15:41
Speaker 6: that was one of the prime suspects, and then there
15:43
Speaker 6: were several other individuals known to be drug users that
15:47
Speaker 6: had a history of some violence that were possible.
15:50
Speaker 1: Then DNA tests from the items they find at the
15:53
Speaker 1: crime scene yield a surprising clue.
15:57
Speaker 6: Between the blood droplets and the cans and the cigarettes
16:01
Speaker 6: and the various samples that we took at the scene,
16:03
Speaker 6: we got positive DNA hits on several individuals, one of
16:07
Speaker 6: which was Clara. We had her DNA in the syringes.
16:11
Speaker 6: We also had her blood on a swipe from the
16:15
Speaker 6: bathroom door, and so we did speak with Clara.
16:18
Speaker 13: She said that she had been there and had injected
16:21
Speaker 13: some drugs with a syringe, which would account for the blood,
16:24
Speaker 13: so that fit the story, but she denied that she
16:26
Speaker 13: had killed him or she knew anybody that she knew
16:31
Speaker 13: who killed him, And we couldn't really establish any real
16:35
Speaker 13: motive why she would want Tommy Hope dead.
16:39
Speaker 6: At the time, I felt there were two or three
16:41
Speaker 6: really strong possibilities. Honestly, Clara was not at the top
16:46
Speaker 6: of my list because there were so many stab wounds
16:50
Speaker 6: on Tom as vicious as the attack was. Was his
16:53
Speaker 6: throat cut and ate stab wounds to his body. It
16:56
Speaker 6: was a vicious attack and generally that's not something new
17:00
Speaker 6: would see out of a female suspect. It does happen,
17:03
Speaker 6: but that's not normal. So Claire was really not on
17:06
Speaker 6: our radar as far as being a top suspect. However,
17:09
Speaker 6: her husband was. We did talk to him and he
17:12
Speaker 6: was interesting in that from the beginning, her husband said
17:15
Speaker 6: that he did not kill Tom. However, he did admit
17:19
Speaker 6: that he was glad Tom was dead, and he even
17:21
Speaker 6: admitted that there was a time in his life that
17:23
Speaker 6: he wanted.
17:24
Speaker 5: To kill Tom.
17:25
Speaker 6: But he adamantly denied being the person that killed Tom.
17:29
Speaker 1: Investigators can find no evidence to ty Clara or her
17:33
Speaker 1: husband to the crime. In fact, they have nothing to
17:36
Speaker 1: connect anyone to Tommy Hope's murder.
17:39
Speaker 6: We just came to a point to where the case
17:40
Speaker 6: went cold. The physical evidence wasn't conclusive, and we didn't
17:45
Speaker 6: have anything else to go on that was as far
17:48
Speaker 6: as we could go at that point.
17:51
Speaker 8: When the case went cold, it was a very difficult time.
17:55
Speaker 8: At one point, I just prayed to God, and I
17:58
Speaker 8: heard God's whisper that in approximately ten years, someone's going
18:03
Speaker 8: to be somewhere running their mouth about it, and they're
18:05
Speaker 8: going to say a little too much and the case
18:08
Speaker 8: is going to be solved. So I just kind of
18:11
Speaker 8: had to accept that and let go of it.
18:18
Speaker 1: The Tommy Hope murder case languishes for nine years until
18:22
Speaker 1: the pastor comes forward, but charging Clara with the murder
18:26
Speaker 1: will have to be handled delicately.
18:28
Speaker 9: I knew we had to get Clara into custody in
18:31
Speaker 9: order to talk to her about the murder of Tommy Hope,
18:33
Speaker 9: but we couldn't just go up and grab her up
18:35
Speaker 9: and tell her she was under arrest for murder because
18:37
Speaker 9: she wasn't going to talk to us then. But I
18:40
Speaker 9: thought that if we could just get her into custody
18:42
Speaker 9: on the stalking case, we could probably get a confession for.
18:44
Speaker 6: Mon So let's be able to rapport and have you
18:47
Speaker 6: laid off with that.
18:49
Speaker 1: Dave Rice and Eric Stax are inspectors with the Missouri
18:52
Speaker 1: Highway Patrol, the State Police which often helps smaller towns
18:55
Speaker 1: with homicide investigations. They have thirty years of interrogation experience
19:00
Speaker 1: between them, so they know they'll have to proceed carefully.
19:05
Speaker 2: Let's just take it real slow, you know, starting to
19:07
Speaker 2: figure her out what her emotional ups and downs are,
19:10
Speaker 2: you know, and we'll start working that angle. I think
19:12
Speaker 2: the biggest mistake we could have made that day was
19:15
Speaker 2: to go in there immediately or very quickly and start
19:18
Speaker 2: in on the Tommy Hope thing almost immediately. We weren't
19:21
Speaker 2: ready for that, and we could tell she was not
19:23
Speaker 2: ready for that approach. All she had to say was
19:27
Speaker 2: I'm not going to speak with you about this, and
19:29
Speaker 2: we were done. I'll be primary and I'll just start
19:31
Speaker 2: talking about, you know, the pastor.
19:34
Speaker 1: So instead, the interrogator's plan on taking it slow, using
19:38
Speaker 1: Clara's arrest on the stalking charges to their advantage.
19:42
Speaker 2: It basically gave us cover or an excuse, a reason
19:45
Speaker 2: to be there and start that interview on that other subject,
19:48
Speaker 2: which we both knew that we were going to lead
19:50
Speaker 2: into the Tommy Hope murder investigation.
19:52
Speaker 6: Ultimately, she's got to have some suspicions of what's.
19:56
Speaker 5: Going on here.
19:58
Speaker 1: Inspectors stax and Rice must walk a fine line between
20:02
Speaker 1: building a safe environment for Clara to admit to the
20:05
Speaker 1: murder while maintaining full command of the situation.
20:09
Speaker 5: Control is very important.
20:11
Speaker 6: If you'll notice, when she's sitting down in the chair,
20:14
Speaker 6: I think she picks the chair that feels the safest
20:17
Speaker 6: for her. I believe subconsciously Claire probably picked where she
20:21
Speaker 6: felt most comfortable. And conversely, we put that person in
20:24
Speaker 6: a position where we have the most control over them.
20:27
Speaker 4: Hi, Claire, can you sit at your point?
20:30
Speaker 6: And if you'll notice with Claire, that's the first thing
20:32
Speaker 6: we do is we ask her to move over to
20:34
Speaker 6: the other seat so that we can create stress or
20:37
Speaker 6: take it away during the interview.
20:38
Speaker 4: We'll explain to you what's going on or why you've
20:40
Speaker 4: been brought up here here in just a minute, okay.
20:43
Speaker 6: Since we were interviewing with two different people, it's always
20:45
Speaker 6: important to have one is the primary and the other person.
20:49
Speaker 6: Try to disappear as much as possible so you can
20:52
Speaker 6: build that one.
20:52
Speaker 5: On one connection.
20:54
Speaker 6: And that's why when we started the interview with the
20:57
Speaker 6: pastor and the stalking charges, Eric was the prime mar.
21:00
Speaker 4: My name's Eric Statics. I'm investigative highway control. This iss
21:04
Speaker 4: day price. He's also the restcut of the highway control.
21:07
Speaker 4: The county's got this case. There's the reason why you're
21:10
Speaker 4: being held here is because I guess there was an issue,
21:12
Speaker 4: right Your pastor's my pastor.
21:14
Speaker 7: I tell you, he's my friend.
21:16
Speaker 2: We agreed I would go in and I would set
21:19
Speaker 2: everything up and establish some credibility and you know, build
21:24
Speaker 2: some rapport with Clara and understand that we're there to
21:27
Speaker 2: talk to her and understand what this is all about.
21:30
Speaker 1: Yes, but building rapport with a seemingly canatonic Clara will
21:33
Speaker 1: be tough.
21:34
Speaker 4: You understand, you have the right to remain silent. Anything
21:37
Speaker 4: you say can use against your court.
21:39
Speaker 2: I don't think she expected two investigators from the state
21:43
Speaker 2: police to come in and talk to her about this,
21:46
Speaker 2: and so that's why it was real sensitive that we
21:48
Speaker 2: take our time with her and you know, no shouting,
21:51
Speaker 2: no yelling, nothing like that. Uh, you're not gonna get
21:55
Speaker 2: somebody to talk to you when you you know, when
21:58
Speaker 2: you when you.
21:58
Speaker 4: Act that way.
22:00
Speaker 1: If the pastor's story of Clara's confession is true, the
22:04
Speaker 1: inspectors may be close to solving the murder of Tommy Hope,
22:08
Speaker 1: a homicide that's kept the town on edge for years,
22:13
Speaker 1: but only if they can get Clara to confess to them.
22:17
Speaker 6: My biggest concern was to make sure that we got
22:20
Speaker 6: that information from her in the best way without her
22:23
Speaker 6: becoming upset or asking for an attorney and shutting the
22:26
Speaker 6: process down to where we could not get to the truth.
22:29
Speaker 7: I didn't know what to do.
22:31
Speaker 1: Apparently keeping Clara calm and composed isn't going to be easy.
22:36
Speaker 7: I don't understand why I'm in too from this long way.
22:40
Speaker 14: I didn't need to make him feel scared.
22:45
Speaker 7: I was trying to tell him that I wouldn't. They
22:48
Speaker 7: didn't need to be scared of me.
22:50
Speaker 5: For the Tommy Hope case.
22:52
Speaker 6: We really did need a confession from her to make
22:56
Speaker 6: this a solid case.
22:58
Speaker 1: The plan is to start by focusing on the stalking
23:01
Speaker 1: charges made by Clara's pastor, but that approach will only
23:05
Speaker 1: work if Clara doesn't recognize Inspector Rice.
23:09
Speaker 4: Do you remember me? Claire?
23:11
Speaker 1: Rice and Clara met before during the original murder investigation.
23:15
Speaker 1: If Clara recognizes the homicide investigator, she could realize the
23:19
Speaker 1: real reason for their visit and shut the interview down.
23:23
Speaker 6: I wanted to gauge if she knew what this was
23:26
Speaker 6: really about. I wanted to gauge if Clara knew that
23:29
Speaker 6: we were really there to talk about Tommy Hope. If
23:32
Speaker 6: Clara had recognized me, we would know right away what
23:36
Speaker 6: direction we needed to go.
23:37
Speaker 4: Do you remember me, Claire?
23:41
Speaker 6: Since she didn't remember me, I dropped it and we
23:45
Speaker 6: continued to talk about the pastor. What kind of man
23:48
Speaker 6: can you tell us about him? I mean, because I
23:50
Speaker 6: don't know him.
23:57
Speaker 4: Almost.
23:58
Speaker 7: I mean, he's parade caring person and very patient.
24:03
Speaker 4: And kind and knowledgeable.
24:07
Speaker 14: He's just everything good about somebody you could ever imagined
24:12
Speaker 14: to do that good.
24:15
Speaker 4: I've never heard him.
24:17
Speaker 1: They tell her that the pastor described the notebook she
24:20
Speaker 1: gave to him, and we.
24:22
Speaker 10: Know the contents of what was in it, mainly for
24:24
Speaker 10: our understanding. What was it you were trying to explain
24:29
Speaker 10: to him? What was it you were trying to express
24:31
Speaker 10: to the pastor.
24:33
Speaker 14: That I had feelings for him that I wasn't gonna act.
24:39
Speaker 4: Or act on.
24:40
Speaker 7: And I knew that it was wrong to have him.
24:43
Speaker 4: And I couldn't explain it to him any other.
24:45
Speaker 14: Way, So I just wrote it in a story, and
24:48
Speaker 14: I wanted him to know that I would never do that.
24:51
Speaker 7: I Deman didn't trust me, and I just.
24:55
Speaker 14: Wanted him to be able to understand where I was
24:58
Speaker 14: coming from. That I wouldn't That's how I felt.
25:04
Speaker 4: But I would never do anything about it, and that's
25:07
Speaker 4: all I wrote.
25:08
Speaker 2: We needed to spend some time with Clara that afternoon
25:10
Speaker 2: and get her to open up with us and speak
25:13
Speaker 2: openly about the stalking.
25:15
Speaker 10: He told us that there was some very sexually explicit
25:17
Speaker 10: material in there and what your intentions were ultimately, because
25:21
Speaker 10: like I said, the man's.
25:22
Speaker 4: Frightened he you know, you kind of frightened it.
25:25
Speaker 7: So I just wanted to see if I could be
25:27
Speaker 7: a good writer.
25:27
Speaker 14: And I knew that if I would ever be a writer,
25:30
Speaker 14: I would have to write about my feelings and my
25:33
Speaker 14: experiences and the truth.
25:34
Speaker 7: About my life, because it's the only way he can
25:36
Speaker 7: be a good writer.
25:37
Speaker 14: But I didn't want to let anyone else read my
25:39
Speaker 14: book except Pastor Jerry, because it was about.
25:42
Speaker 7: Him, and if he couldn't handle the truth about that,
25:47
Speaker 7: then I wasn't going to write at all. And he
25:50
Speaker 7: couldn't handle it. Now I'm in jail. I didn't mean
25:54
Speaker 7: it was partly true and partly me.
25:58
Speaker 14: It was just as a story, but I didn't want
26:03
Speaker 14: anyone else to know about it, and I told if you.
26:06
Speaker 7: Ever tell anybody about it, I make you pay. But
26:10
Speaker 7: I didn't mean it like painfully.
26:12
Speaker 6: You meant the tip your Yeah, that's what.
26:15
Speaker 7: I tell him. That's all I do.
26:19
Speaker 2: We just see that emotional roller coaster start to roll out, and.
26:22
Speaker 7: I'm so lonely and I was so bored.
26:25
Speaker 4: That's why you didn't wrote the book.
26:28
Speaker 7: And I just wanted a friend to.
26:31
Speaker 4: Talk to you.
26:32
Speaker 2: It was sadness and emotion despair when you start seeing
26:36
Speaker 2: that we're in the right direction. We're getting here too,
26:39
Speaker 2: a place where we want you to tell us what
26:41
Speaker 2: really happened when we approach it.
26:43
Speaker 14: I kind of just used that to my advantage to
26:45
Speaker 14: get some attention.
26:46
Speaker 4: You really needed some attention. I needed some help, But
26:50
Speaker 4: I really didn't work out you.
26:53
Speaker 6: What I picked up on Claire repeatedly her saying how
26:57
Speaker 6: lonely she was, how no one would listen to her,
27:00
Speaker 6: and in everything that she was telling us, that was
27:02
Speaker 6: the message that she wanted to talk to somebody. What
27:06
Speaker 6: that told me is she was there to confess. We
27:09
Speaker 6: just needed to spend the time and show her that
27:12
Speaker 6: we would be those people and listen to her, so
27:14
Speaker 6: that would make it easy for her to tell the truth.
27:17
Speaker 1: Twenty two minutes into the interview, it's time for Inspector
27:21
Speaker 1: Rice to raise the stakes. He steers the conversation toward
27:25
Speaker 1: Clara's drug use, which they believe is the key reason
27:29
Speaker 1: Tommy Hope was murdered.
27:32
Speaker 4: Like you said, he needs somebody to talk to him.
27:34
Speaker 6: He kind of heard Claire that you'd like in the past,
27:37
Speaker 6: that you have a drug problem.
27:39
Speaker 4: Yeah, that was that a long time ago? Or was that?
27:43
Speaker 14: Oh, it's pretty much been pretty consistent.
27:49
Speaker 4: With different things.
27:50
Speaker 7: Over the years.
27:52
Speaker 6: By allowing her to talk on her own, she volunteered
27:56
Speaker 6: her history with drugs and her stance on drugs, how
27:59
Speaker 6: drugs were bad, and how they've ruined people's lives.
28:02
Speaker 5: And she began to expand a.
28:03
Speaker 6: Little bit more about her drug history and all the problems.
28:07
Speaker 14: What were into I used to do math at first
28:11
Speaker 14: a coke and then in math.
28:18
Speaker 7: Hankills hot, oh.
28:22
Speaker 14: Gosh, this whatever, whatever I could get my hands on.
28:26
Speaker 7: But I was doing better until.
28:29
Speaker 4: Until recently.
28:32
Speaker 6: And you could hear her shifting that blame towards someone else.
28:35
Speaker 6: That is, it wasn't her fault.
28:38
Speaker 1: Rice knows how profound the connection is between a suspect's
28:42
Speaker 1: ability to shift blame and their willingness to confess.
28:46
Speaker 6: You have to find a way during the interrogation, number
28:49
Speaker 6: one to save the person's ego and then secondly to
28:52
Speaker 6: provide them a way out. When I heard her talk
28:55
Speaker 6: about drugs, it played right into the direction I wanted
28:59
Speaker 6: to go generally, if a person is addicted to drugs,
29:02
Speaker 6: since we all need somebody to blame.
29:05
Speaker 5: It worked out pretty well with Claire because.
29:07
Speaker 6: She could blame the drugs, and she could blame that
29:09
Speaker 6: on Tommy Hope, and it gives her a motive and
29:12
Speaker 6: a reason why she can reconcile in her own brain,
29:17
Speaker 6: why it's okay that I did this, that I'm okay,
29:19
Speaker 6: I'm not a bad person.
29:21
Speaker 5: It's the drugs did this. The drugs made me do this.
29:25
Speaker 1: Eric Stax takes the blame game to the next level
29:27
Speaker 1: by making it personal.
29:29
Speaker 4: I know how that is. I lived through it. I've
29:31
Speaker 4: seen it. I've seen it take them down.
29:33
Speaker 2: You know, you always want to reach out, and there
29:35
Speaker 2: was always someone that I always in my case, I
29:38
Speaker 2: always had to blame somebody.
29:39
Speaker 4: That person that I know that got that person started
29:44
Speaker 4: you know the person I got started. I know who
29:45
Speaker 4: did it, and he still as far as I know,
29:47
Speaker 4: he's still alive. And it angers me.
29:49
Speaker 2: And I told her that we have all had experiences
29:52
Speaker 2: with family members, in our case as personal as as
29:56
Speaker 2: as immediate family members having dealt.
29:58
Speaker 4: With drugs the same thing.
30:00
Speaker 6: Overdosed and she was molested, and then my wasn't was
30:05
Speaker 6: the one that wasn't. So she always blamed for, you know,
30:10
Speaker 6: being the one that it didn't happen to her. And
30:13
Speaker 6: then she she hadn't taken her whole life and only
30:17
Speaker 6: three years ago.
30:20
Speaker 4: Yet three years ago, twenty ten, she had. So it's everywhere.
30:25
Speaker 4: I mean, there are drugs everywhere.
30:27
Speaker 6: And I told her, I said, Claire, that's kind of
30:29
Speaker 6: the reason we're here today is, you know, to talk
30:32
Speaker 6: about the drugs and to talk about some other things.
30:35
Speaker 1: With a clear moral escape root in place. It's time
30:38
Speaker 1: to take Clara back in time to two thousand and.
30:41
Speaker 6: Four once we were talking about the drugs and sharing
30:44
Speaker 6: personal stories about our lives at the time. In watching Clara,
30:49
Speaker 6: I felt like she had picked up on that, and
30:52
Speaker 6: so I felt like, Okay, it's it's time to start
30:55
Speaker 6: going towards Tommy. He said, it gets in everybody and
30:59
Speaker 6: makes do crazy things, things you wouldn't normally do.
31:02
Speaker 7: And you know.
31:03
Speaker 4: And that's part of the reason we're here today, Claire.
31:08
Speaker 6: And then you know, I wanted to talk to you
31:10
Speaker 6: about it that I wanted to be honest as well
31:13
Speaker 6: as far as why what's going on?
31:15
Speaker 4: Why we're here.
31:16
Speaker 2: You could see a look in her eyes. She starts
31:18
Speaker 2: to kind of give that head tilt, like that tongue
31:21
Speaker 2: in cheek, like, where are you guys going with this?
31:23
Speaker 1: Clara appears unsure where Inspector Rice is leading her until
31:27
Speaker 1: he mentions the word homicide.
31:30
Speaker 6: I've been working this area sixteen years and mainly homicide,
31:36
Speaker 6: and so I've been around here. I've been doing this
31:38
Speaker 6: a while and we.
31:41
Speaker 4: Go to different churches, but I'm a Christian too.
31:44
Speaker 2: And there was a moment, like an a haul moment
31:47
Speaker 2: in her head that she was like, I see what's
31:50
Speaker 2: going on here? Wow, you got me good. I was thinking,
31:53
Speaker 2: is she gonna shut us down right now? Said no,
31:55
Speaker 2: I know what this is about.
31:56
Speaker 4: We're done.
31:56
Speaker 2: We're done. I was thinking it's getting ready to happen here.
32:01
Speaker 7: I didn't know already know you're referring to and what
32:05
Speaker 7: do you think it's about.
32:06
Speaker 6: It's a critical moment during the interview where the person
32:10
Speaker 6: could decide not to talk. They're at a crossroads on
32:14
Speaker 6: what they're going to do.
32:16
Speaker 2: As a police investigator, you walk on eggshells. You've got
32:19
Speaker 2: to pick your words very carefully.
32:21
Speaker 1: For most of the interview, Inspector Rice has been silent,
32:25
Speaker 1: letting his partner and Clara talk. Now he's ready to
32:30
Speaker 1: take over.
32:31
Speaker 6: There is a process and there's a way we go
32:34
Speaker 6: about interview and interrogation. During the interview, we want to
32:38
Speaker 6: obtain information. I want to actively listen. I sincerely want
32:42
Speaker 6: to know from that person what makes them tick. Once
32:45
Speaker 6: we make that switch to the interrogation, I don't want
32:49
Speaker 6: that person talking very much. I don't want to give
32:51
Speaker 6: her an opportunity to say no, it wasn't me, I
32:54
Speaker 6: wasn't there.
32:55
Speaker 5: I want her to listen.
32:56
Speaker 6: You know, essentially, the interrogation is okay, I've heard what
33:00
Speaker 6: you had to say.
33:01
Speaker 5: Now you need to listen to me.
33:03
Speaker 15: Thank you.
33:04
Speaker 1: Inspector Rice suddenly adds to the pressure by moving his
33:07
Speaker 1: chair closer to Clara.
33:09
Speaker 6: Kind of in watching this case develop as it went through,
33:12
Speaker 6: for we did not find a weapon at the scene.
33:14
Speaker 6: But I wanted her to know that we did have
33:16
Speaker 6: physical evidence, that we had her DNA at the scene.
33:19
Speaker 6: It was important for her to know that this wasn't
33:21
Speaker 6: all hearsay from a pastor or what we thought might
33:25
Speaker 6: have occurred, that we had physical evidence to put her
33:27
Speaker 6: at the scene and to show that she was involved
33:30
Speaker 6: in the homicide. I can show you the evidence from
33:33
Speaker 6: the Missouri State Highway Patrol crime lab, and what I'm
33:36
Speaker 6: telling you is and we'll get your DNA under his
33:38
Speaker 6: left fingernail, okay, on the bathroom door. I told her
33:42
Speaker 6: that we did have her DNA on the syringes on
33:46
Speaker 6: the door, which we had, but frankly, we had had
33:48
Speaker 6: that since two thousand and four. The problem that we
33:51
Speaker 6: had we didn't have it matching up going out of
33:53
Speaker 6: the back window, which is where the suspect left through.
33:56
Speaker 6: Had we had her DNA on that window sill or
33:59
Speaker 6: in the back bedroom where the footprints led, we might
34:03
Speaker 6: have had a solid case at that point, but we didn't.
34:07
Speaker 1: Inspector Rice continues his monologue for nearly ten minutes, pressing her, So.
34:12
Speaker 6: What I'm telling you is there's kind of a culmination
34:14
Speaker 6: of events.
34:15
Speaker 1: Cajoling her from the woman that.
34:17
Speaker 6: I see in front of me. I talk to a
34:19
Speaker 6: lot of people, and I don't see somebody cold blooded.
34:21
Speaker 1: At all empathizing with her.
34:23
Speaker 4: What I suspect happened.
34:26
Speaker 6: Is you saw yourself getting drug back into drugs and
34:31
Speaker 6: the rest of it.
34:32
Speaker 1: Without giving her a real chance to respond.
34:34
Speaker 4: Out had the same feelings.
34:36
Speaker 1: So I get that it's a risky tactic. Clara could
34:40
Speaker 1: decide without a chance to respond, it's not worth talking
34:43
Speaker 1: at all.
34:44
Speaker 6: It's always a fear that somebody will lawyer up and
34:47
Speaker 6: not want to talk. It can be very easy to
34:49
Speaker 6: shut somebody down.
34:51
Speaker 1: And how's at this Yet there are no signs that
34:54
Speaker 1: Clara is thinking much about an attorney.
34:56
Speaker 2: We were breaking her down emotionally and she was doing
35:00
Speaker 2: the head nod and all that, and it's again, it's
35:02
Speaker 2: just time, time, time time, and if it takes another
35:05
Speaker 2: five minutes, we'll spend another five minutes. But it's coming.
35:09
Speaker 6: What I see is like things unfold in like a story.
35:11
Speaker 6: And we know what you told your conversations with with
35:17
Speaker 6: Pastor Jerry.
35:18
Speaker 2: You could tell as you're studying her her body language,
35:21
Speaker 2: her facial expressions. These guys know everything and it was.
35:26
Speaker 2: Collectively the three of us in the room were like, yep,
35:29
Speaker 2: we know, you know, let's go ahead and get there.
35:33
Speaker 6: The only options for guys like us when we look
35:35
Speaker 6: at this is either a person who's cold blood and
35:38
Speaker 6: they're evil and they planned it, and then I'm not.
35:41
Speaker 14: Asked it was an accident because they didn't think before
35:45
Speaker 14: it happened.
35:45
Speaker 4: It just happened. That's what I believe.
35:48
Speaker 7: It doesn't matter because I deserve you.
35:51
Speaker 11: For the rest of my life.
35:52
Speaker 2: I think that she told herself then and there, this
35:55
Speaker 2: is it. I'm gonna go ahead and tell them what happened.
35:57
Speaker 4: To do what I need you to do.
36:00
Speaker 7: I don't really I can't. I'm a lawyer and I can't.
36:02
Speaker 4: I can't make my.
36:03
Speaker 6: Parents pay first, I don't need Here's what I need
36:07
Speaker 6: from you, and here's what I think you need from
36:10
Speaker 6: this too. More importantly, it's not about what I think
36:13
Speaker 6: you want to tell this truth. I need you to
36:15
Speaker 6: just tell the truth. I want to Okay, I'm going
36:18
Speaker 6: to be quiet. Just tell me how and what happened.
36:21
Speaker 4: Just tell the truth.
36:22
Speaker 6: I wanted to make sure that we got the full
36:24
Speaker 6: information from her as far as her involvement without her
36:28
Speaker 6: becoming upset or asking for an attorney and shutting shutting
36:32
Speaker 6: the process down.
36:33
Speaker 1: The best way to keep that from happening is apparently
36:36
Speaker 1: to just let Clara talk.
36:38
Speaker 14: I snuck out of my house the other night because
36:42
Speaker 14: I really wanted to high, and I.
36:47
Speaker 7: Showed up down there and Stora was locked, and he
36:51
Speaker 7: what let me in.
36:53
Speaker 14: So I've been crawling through the window and I talked
36:56
Speaker 14: to him for a while and then like he didn't
37:00
Speaker 14: save me any and I said just a little bit,
37:05
Speaker 14: and so he gave me.
37:06
Speaker 15: Enough that I got really really high, cause then there
37:16
Speaker 15: was no more and.
37:18
Speaker 14: We just started fighting and arguing.
37:23
Speaker 8: And hm m m.
37:27
Speaker 4: He was going to.
37:30
Speaker 7: Ruin my life.
37:33
Speaker 14: And I thought that the only way that I forget
37:35
Speaker 14: my husband to not be mad at me for sneaking
37:38
Speaker 14: out and doing drugs and going back to Toms.
37:43
Speaker 7: I couldn't see any other way out. I was desperate.
37:47
Speaker 7: I just all I wanted to do. I just I
37:52
Speaker 7: wanted to be free from it. Okay, I just grewb
38:00
Speaker 7: the first thing that I saw could trip on his back,
38:10
Speaker 7: started fighting with him, screaming up and then I hate you,
38:14
Speaker 7: hate you, hate you.
38:17
Speaker 2: She according to her, without really even thinking, just grabbed
38:21
Speaker 2: a knife and started punching him with the knife, and he.
38:25
Speaker 14: Just kept coming at me like he wanted to hurt
38:30
Speaker 14: me more than I was hurting him, like he was
38:35
Speaker 14: gonna kill me, and.
38:36
Speaker 7: So I just was like going, like this, get away
38:39
Speaker 7: from me, and.
38:42
Speaker 4: I don't.
38:43
Speaker 7: He just stopped and then he went in the bathroom
38:50
Speaker 7: to look at his neck.
38:52
Speaker 14: And when he did that, I ran in the kitchen
38:54
Speaker 14: and grabbed a knife again cause he was coming back
38:57
Speaker 14: after me, cause he was pissed off that I cut
39:00
Speaker 14: his throat.
39:03
Speaker 7: Did I understanding?
39:04
Speaker 5: There?
39:04
Speaker 7: It's so well? And then he's like, you know, I
39:07
Speaker 7: think you're you're killing me. I think I'm dying, and
39:09
Speaker 7: he just fell over.
39:12
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm going, my god, what is this person?
39:17
Speaker 4: I mean wow.
39:18
Speaker 6: When Clara was going through the details of of the homicide,
39:22
Speaker 6: there was never that moment of oh my gosh, poor Tom,
39:26
Speaker 6: look what I've done.
39:27
Speaker 5: He didn't deserve this, and you just kind of sat there.
39:30
Speaker 7: I'm like, what the hell that's happened? And I didn't
39:34
Speaker 7: go into two.
39:35
Speaker 14: So I just grabbed from the nipe and then I
39:38
Speaker 14: grabbed his wallet cause I thought it make it.
39:43
Speaker 7: I didn't want to get in trouble. Yeah, so I
39:46
Speaker 7: just jumped up someone on and ran.
39:49
Speaker 4: Of course back of the house. Yeah, yeah, that's where
39:53
Speaker 4: the foot prints live.
39:55
Speaker 1: Inspector Rice presses Clara for more details. He needs to
39:59
Speaker 1: make sure her story fits the evidence.
40:02
Speaker 6: Jumped on his back and stabbed him in the back
40:04
Speaker 6: or no, which came first?
40:08
Speaker 4: Did you throw the throat?
40:09
Speaker 6: Claire said, the first cut was right across his neck,
40:13
Speaker 6: which I knew was consistent with the wounds that were
40:16
Speaker 6: on the body, and that information hasn't been released. So
40:20
Speaker 6: it was helping me believe more that she, in fact
40:23
Speaker 6: was the sole person who did this versus somebody else
40:25
Speaker 6: being involved.
40:26
Speaker 4: What happened to the knife? The truth? And now what
40:38
Speaker 4: would you do with the rest of it? The knife?
40:42
Speaker 6: When Claire mentioned the knife, that she ground up the knife,
40:46
Speaker 6: you know, in.
40:46
Speaker 5: A certain way.
40:47
Speaker 6: I guess it was providence, the fact that she told
40:51
Speaker 6: that to the wrong person. Here's the funny thing about coincidence.
40:55
Speaker 6: And when we talk about God and providence, you know
40:57
Speaker 6: what my hobby is, what my passion is making knives
41:02
Speaker 6: are blacksmith.
41:03
Speaker 4: I grind on them all day long. I understand that
41:06
Speaker 4: old very well.
41:07
Speaker 15: I don't know.
41:07
Speaker 6: I can't grind up a knife just like I can't.
41:10
Speaker 6: I can't, and I grind a couple hours a day.
41:13
Speaker 1: Clara back pedals and admits the knife was hidden at
41:16
Speaker 1: a construction site near her home.
41:18
Speaker 6: It worked out very well because then I can pull
41:21
Speaker 6: back in our theme of providence and saying, look, this
41:25
Speaker 6: is not all coincidence. You just told me a lie
41:27
Speaker 6: about something that very few people have a hobby of doing,
41:31
Speaker 6: you know, and it helps solidify that theme that God
41:35
Speaker 6: wants you to tell the truth.
41:36
Speaker 5: You can't lie here. You've got to do the right things.
41:39
Speaker 7: My life is over anyway, It doesn't matter.
41:42
Speaker 4: What it matters I think is between you and God.
41:45
Speaker 12: Right.
41:45
Speaker 7: That's why I told Jerry, Because.
41:48
Speaker 14: Between me and God, if I don't tell the truth
41:52
Speaker 14: right before.
41:53
Speaker 4: I die, I'm going to be a liar.
41:56
Speaker 7: When I need to heaven, and I don't want to be.
41:59
Speaker 4: I wanted to be honest.
42:01
Speaker 7: I wanted to tell the truth because I did something wrong.
42:04
Speaker 6: Yeah, although she's saying I've tried to confess and no
42:07
Speaker 6: one would let me, you know, that's minimizing her responsibility
42:11
Speaker 6: in the whole situation. She could have at any moment
42:15
Speaker 6: called the police and turned herself in and told the
42:17
Speaker 6: truth if it was truly weighing on her soul that heavily,
42:22
Speaker 6: and she didn't. Is there anything that we forgot or
42:25
Speaker 6: anything I didn't ask you? This important for us to
42:27
Speaker 6: understand about.
42:28
Speaker 4: This for right now, I might have.
42:34
Speaker 7: Sort of sight mental conditions.
42:36
Speaker 14: That might You know, my mom is my birth mom
42:41
Speaker 14: is a paranoid schizophrenic because she's been in an institution
42:45
Speaker 14: since nineteen seventy eight in California, and me and my
42:51
Speaker 14: brother suffered a lot of mental and physical setbacks.
42:57
Speaker 7: From her starving us.
43:00
Speaker 14: Children, and I almost died and we both got.
43:03
Speaker 7: Brain damage from that. And I mean, I just have
43:06
Speaker 7: some issues.
43:07
Speaker 4: You know, I have a lot of issues.
43:10
Speaker 6: Well, if if you cause this will I mean, we're
43:13
Speaker 6: gonna write a report from what you said, and so
43:16
Speaker 6: you've got a record there. I mean, it's it'll go
43:19
Speaker 6: to the prosecutor and the judge. Is there something you
43:22
Speaker 6: want them to know.
43:23
Speaker 7: Or or that I at are you do honished?
43:26
Speaker 14: I know that, and that I don't want to waste
43:30
Speaker 14: anybody's time or money defending.
43:33
Speaker 4: Me because I don't.
43:36
Speaker 7: Need it to fend guilty and whatever whatever you guys
43:42
Speaker 7: wanna do with me, it's.
43:43
Speaker 3: Kind of understood, well, won't be a gut shoot me
43:46
Speaker 3: just but I I let me make sure.
43:49
Speaker 4: I mean and and cause it's sorry.
43:53
Speaker 7: No, I mean I would never do that.
43:55
Speaker 14: I in my right mind, I would never feel anybody.
44:00
Speaker 6: In every one of these cases that I've done with
44:03
Speaker 6: homicide confessions, most people say that they're sorry, but what
44:08
Speaker 6: they're really saying is I'm sorry I got caught.
44:11
Speaker 1: Finally, after sixty eight minutes, it's time to wrap things up.
44:16
Speaker 6: Is there anything you need us or want us to do,
44:19
Speaker 6: or any calls or anything that you want us to
44:20
Speaker 6: make for you, or is there anything we can do?
44:24
Speaker 14: So I've kind of got a ticket in a ryle
44:29
Speaker 14: out of yesterday or the day before that I would
44:32
Speaker 14: coordinated too that I'm obviously not going to show up for.
44:35
Speaker 7: I don't know how to deal with that.
44:37
Speaker 4: We can handle that.
44:39
Speaker 6: Okay, all right, thank you now, thank you for being
44:45
Speaker 6: honest about it.
44:46
Speaker 2: I mean, as we were leaving the room, she said,
44:49
Speaker 2: I just want to thank you guys for making this
44:51
Speaker 2: so easy for me, And I remember thinking, I don't
44:56
Speaker 2: think I've ever been thanked for getting someone to confess
44:59
Speaker 2: to a murder to me.
45:00
Speaker 6: You know, that's probably the only part of this that
45:03
Speaker 6: made me feel good. And I'm like, Okay, we did
45:05
Speaker 6: our job. We took her by the hand and helped
45:07
Speaker 6: her through that door to tell the truth. So that
45:10
Speaker 6: tells me that at least we were on that day
45:13
Speaker 6: and it worked out.
45:15
Speaker 7: I knew I wasn't going to get out of here.
45:20
Speaker 2: I do believe she was relieved because she finally got
45:23
Speaker 2: that ugly part of her life out of her psyche.
45:29
Speaker 2: She finally she did what she set out to do
45:31
Speaker 2: a year earlier, and that was to tell what happened.
45:34
Speaker 12: And you, pastor Jerry, he finally helped me. You should
45:44
Speaker 12: have been that last year.
45:48
Speaker 5: Was you ready remorseful?
45:50
Speaker 2: I don't know. I'm sure she's sorry for being in
45:52
Speaker 2: the position that she's in because she committed a murder.
45:56
Speaker 2: Was she's so sorry for doing that to Tommy? I
45:58
Speaker 2: don't know.
46:03
Speaker 6: One of the things that drives I think most homicide
46:06
Speaker 6: investigators or detectives is that reminder that ultimately we work
46:12
Speaker 6: for the dead. My job is to represent the victim,
46:17
Speaker 6: and my obligation is to pursue that and find the
46:21
Speaker 6: truth for them. And so, you know, the personal satisfaction
46:25
Speaker 6: that you get from working these cases comes from helping
46:29
Speaker 6: the victim, because they can't speak for themselves anymore, so
46:32
Speaker 6: we have to be that voice for them. And so
46:35
Speaker 6: regardless of how Tommy lived his life, I helped fulfill
46:39
Speaker 6: that obligation.
46:42
Speaker 9: Tommy Hope was not an angel, but Tommy Hope didn't
46:45
Speaker 9: deserve to die that way. Tommy was a victim of
46:48
Speaker 9: a crime and he deserved justice. And I hope that
46:49
Speaker 9: what we've done gives some closure to his family, and
46:53
Speaker 9: hopefully justice was served.
46:56
Speaker 8: I was really, really angry. I was very bitter and
47:00
Speaker 8: angry for a long time, but it gave a lot
47:05
Speaker 8: of closure after she confessed to this dreadful thing they
47:08
Speaker 8: had done to my brother.
47:14
Speaker 1: Clara Rector has offered a plea bargain of second degree murder.
47:18
Speaker 1: She accepts
48:00
Speaker 7: No