Latest / History Dark / Piers Morgan Exposes the _Sex Game Murderer_ Sheila Davalloo _ Killer Women S2
Transcript
- 0:06Speaker 1: What people have said to us about you, you're a
- 0:08Speaker 1: serial liar. You're a psychopath. You think you're smarter than
- 0:11Speaker 1: everybody else. You're brutal. You're capable of acts of appalling savagery.
- 0:18Speaker 1: You're a murderer. When you get in there, she'll try
- 0:21Speaker 1: and manipulate you. But she's a cold-blooded killer. That's what
- 0:25Speaker 1: they say about you. How does that make you feel?
- 0:28Speaker 2: I just feel that people don't know me. Did the
- 0:45Speaker 2: state prove to you that I was there on that day?
- 0:49Speaker 3: Well, they can't do that.
- 1:03Speaker 4: To brutally beat and stab Annalisa the way that she
- 1:08Speaker 4: did and watch her die, and then to attack someone
- 1:12Speaker 4: like she did her husband... It takes a unique personality.
- 1:25Speaker 5: She's the one you don't expect. Educated and comes from
- 1:27Speaker 5: a good background. She's the one that everybody goes, it's
- 1:31Speaker 5: not her.
- 1:34Speaker 6: Sheila Dablow killed one person and almost killed another person.
- 1:41Speaker 4: I think she's probably one of the most dangerous people
- 1:43Speaker 4: I've ever seen.
- 2:00Speaker 1: The crime scene is about half a mile from here, right?
- 2:04Speaker 7: Yes, yes.
- 2:06Speaker 1: But what strikes me immediately, it's just so peaceful.
- 2:09Speaker 7: On that day, the complex was filled with landscapers. FedEx, UPS, deliveries.
- 2:15Speaker 1: A lot of busy people.
- 2:17Speaker 7: Yes, cleaning people, yes.
- 2:19Speaker 1: Which is easy to mingle in if you want to
- 2:21Speaker 1: just keep incognito. On November the 8th, 2002, Annalisa Raimondo,
- 2:30Speaker 1: a rising star in the pharmaceutical industry, chose to work
- 2:34Speaker 1: from home.
- 2:34Speaker 8: Hello?
- 2:38Speaker 2: Yes, hello. I'm a guy in.
- 2:50Speaker 1: That decision would cost Annalisa her life.
- 2:56Speaker 7: OK, can you tell me what the guy looks like?
- 2:58Speaker 1: What does he look like? Homicide detective Greg Holt was
- 3:05Speaker 1: one of the first on the scene. Right here, this
- 3:09Speaker 1: is where It all happened. So that stairwell over there,
- 3:13Speaker 1: that leads up to Annalisa's apartment, right?
- 3:16Speaker 7: Correct.
- 3:17Speaker 4: The responding officer, he was a 20-year veteran, had been
- 3:20Speaker 4: to several homicide shooting scenes prior, and that never left him.
- 3:24Speaker 4: With the multiple stabs and even a stab in the face.
- 3:28Speaker 1: Just talk me through what you think happened in the
- 3:32Speaker 1: events leading up to Annalisa's death.
- 3:35Speaker 4: I think Dabalu went into work that morning because she
- 3:40Speaker 4: had to determine if Annalisa was going to work at
- 3:42Speaker 4: home or here. And when she determined that Annalisa was
- 3:45Speaker 4: working for home, that was the perfect opportunity. So she
- 3:49Speaker 4: came in through the unmanned security gate, parked somewhere in
- 3:54Speaker 4: the parking lot. I think she walked right up, knocked
- 3:57Speaker 4: on Annalisa's door. Once she got in, I envision Davalou
- 4:02Speaker 4: slammed that door and the blitz attack was on. And
- 4:07Speaker 4: Annalisa literally fought for her life. She was a small woman,
- 4:10Speaker 4: but she was in very good shape. Plants were turned over,
- 4:14Speaker 4: furniture was turned over, and you could tell that they
- 4:16Speaker 4: had gone around in a circle in that foyer.
- 4:20Speaker 7: She was stabbed all over.
- 4:22Speaker 4: And ultimately, Annalisa sustained a cranial injury, probably from a
- 4:29Speaker 4: dumbbell that we found in the foyer that Annalisa used
- 4:31Speaker 4: for workout.
- 4:34Speaker 7: This was targeted. Total, brutal rage.
- 4:42Speaker 1: You've never quite got over this case, have you? I mean,
- 4:44Speaker 1: this lived with you for a long time, and it
- 4:46Speaker 1: lives with you now.
- 4:47Speaker 4: This will be the one that cops say they'll always remember.
- 4:52Speaker 7: This is the one for me.
- 4:57Speaker 1: At the time of the murder, Sheila Davalou also worked
- 5:00Speaker 1: in the pharmaceutical industry. Highly educated, and earning a six-figure salary,
- 5:06Speaker 1: she lived in an affluent area of New York State.
- 5:11Speaker 1: She seemed an unlikely murderer. But of all the women
- 5:16Speaker 1: I've interviewed in this series, Sheila Davalou is the most dangerous.
- 5:22Speaker 1: I have been granted one hour with her inside Bedford
- 5:26Speaker 1: Hill's maximum security prison. You've never given an interview and
- 5:31Speaker 1: you've been here 15 years now. Why have you now
- 5:35Speaker 1: decided to talk?
- 5:37Speaker 2: I haven't given one before because I felt that it
- 5:41Speaker 2: really never served any purpose because my battle is in
- 5:48Speaker 2: the court, is with the law. That's where my focus
- 5:53Speaker 2: has always been and still is.
- 5:55Speaker 1: As we sit here, you're in the middle of a
- 5:57Speaker 1: 25-year sentence for the attempted murder of your husband. The
- 6:03Speaker 1: moment that finishes, you then commence a 50-year sentence for
- 6:07Speaker 1: the murder of a young woman. You maintain that you're
- 6:13Speaker 1: completely innocent of everything.
- 6:18Speaker 2: No, that's absolutely not right.
- 6:21Speaker 1: What do you admit to in terms of guilt?
- 6:26Speaker 2: I'm far from innocent. However... I think the story is
- 6:39Speaker 2: nobody's really care to delve into the story to see
- 6:44Speaker 2: if there is another possibility.
- 6:48Speaker 1: Here's the theory. In the end, the detectives and the jury,
- 6:52Speaker 1: everybody basically concluded was what happened. You fell in love
- 6:56Speaker 1: with this guy at work. You're in an unhappy marriage
- 6:59Speaker 1: and you want to be with this guy, but you
- 7:02Speaker 1: can't because he has this other girl he's in love with.
- 7:04Speaker 1: And when you confront her and tell her about the affair,
- 7:06Speaker 1: a fight starts and you end up killing her. That's
- 7:10Speaker 1: what everybody believes happened.
- 7:13Speaker 2: It's not the truth, though.
- 7:15Speaker 1: Isn't it?
- 7:15Speaker 2: No.
- 7:19Speaker 1: At first, police struggled to find any motive for Annalisa's killing.
- 7:24Speaker 1: It would take ten years before Sheila was convicted of
- 7:28Speaker 1: her murder. This case was an extraordinary one for you.
- 7:34Speaker 1: Why did it mean so much to you?
- 7:37Speaker 7: When we sat down with Dr. and Mrs.
- 7:39Speaker 4: Raimondo for the first time, I looked over and Mrs.
- 7:43Speaker 4: Raimondo is looking at me and she trusted us with
- 7:48Speaker 4: this investigation of her daughter's brutal killing. And that just
- 7:52Speaker 4: grabbed a hold of me and said, we've really got
- 7:56Speaker 4: to run this down somehow. Annalise was such an intelligent, sweet,
- 8:04Speaker 4: kind young lady who was living a good life. No
- 8:09Speaker 4: reason to believe that she was going to be targeted.
- 8:12Speaker 4: Great career ahead of her.
- 8:14Speaker 7: And just, I mean, this is just senseless.
- 8:16Speaker 1: Have you encountered a more dangerous person than Sheila Deverly?
- 8:21Speaker 4: Although she comes across very, very mild-mannered, psychologically, I think
- 8:26Speaker 4: she's probably one of the most dangerous people I've ever seen.
- 8:34Speaker 1: They say that you left your building at work and
- 8:40Speaker 1: that you had enough time between leaving and returning a
- 8:44Speaker 1: few hours later to have committed this murder. There's enough
- 8:47Speaker 1: time for you to have physically done it.
- 8:49Speaker 2: I think that it's very important in a circumstantial case
- 8:54Speaker 2: for the prosecutor to place me at the scene of
- 8:57Speaker 2: the crime.
- 8:58Speaker 1: So your conviction now is that you just went from
- 9:02Speaker 1: work and you went home.
- 9:04Speaker 2: I shopped, and I used to shop at a nearby
- 9:10Speaker 2: health food store, and I went home.
- 9:14Speaker 1: You never went anywhere near Annalisa's apartment?
- 9:17Speaker 2: Absolutely not. I am certain that I wasn't there in
- 9:28Speaker 2: that area. My cell phone records shows that I have
- 9:34Speaker 2: made a phone call two minutes after that 911 call
- 9:42Speaker 2: at 12.15 out of Portchester, New York. If the prosecutor
- 9:48Speaker 2: had cell tower records that would place me at the
- 9:51Speaker 2: scene of the crime, he would have used them.
- 9:58Speaker 1: Cell tower records work. never used at trial to place
- 10:02Speaker 1: Sheila in Annalisa's apartment. But she could still have been there.
- 10:09Speaker 1: Trying to make sense of this murder seems to come
- 10:12Speaker 1: down to this question. Is Sheila Davalou really capable of
- 10:18Speaker 1: viciously stabbing a defenceless young woman multiple times? In the
- 10:26Speaker 1: weeks after the murder, she wasn't even a suspect. Greg,
- 10:31Speaker 1: the strange thing was after Alisa died, within a few hours,
- 10:36Speaker 1: her boyfriend, Nelson, turns up. And his behaviour is just
- 10:40Speaker 1: a little odd.
- 10:42Speaker 4: You come home from work, You pull into your condo,
- 10:45Speaker 4: which is a very quiet area. You park your car,
- 10:48Speaker 4: and all you see are police cars, crime scene vans.
- 10:52Speaker 4: Your average person would just charge that police line and
- 10:55Speaker 4: want to get into their house, want to see if
- 10:57Speaker 4: their soon-to-be fiancé is okay. He went in the boat shed,
- 11:01Speaker 4: laid down, and went to sleep.
- 11:04Speaker 1: He, for quite a while, was your prime suspect because
- 11:07Speaker 1: of his behavior until you established a cast-iron alibi for him.
- 11:12Speaker 2: Correct.
- 11:14Speaker 1: Once you ruled out Nelson, you really hit a bit
- 11:17Speaker 1: of a wall because there's no obvious suspect after that, right?
- 11:22Speaker 7: We had absolutely nothing.
- 11:24Speaker 1: Then comes this breakthrough, this extraordinary breakthrough, which involves a
- 11:29Speaker 1: completely different crime, way away from Stanford. Tell me about
- 11:33Speaker 1: the breakthrough.
- 11:34Speaker 4: I was home, and I get a phone call from
- 11:37Speaker 4: one of the sergeants in major crimes, and he said, Greg,
- 11:42Speaker 4: suit up.
- 11:43Speaker 7: And come on in. I'll never forget it.
- 11:45Speaker 4: Quote, Annalisa's breaking wide open.
- 11:50Speaker 1: 20 miles from the site of Annalisa's murder, a man
- 11:53Speaker 1: had been found in a hospital car park with multiple
- 11:56Speaker 1: stab wounds. This attack, seemingly unrelated to Annalisa's, eventually led
- 12:04Speaker 1: police to a vital piece of evidence connecting the two cases.
- 12:10Speaker 1: Within one hour, detectives had a suspect for the man's stabbing.
- 12:17Speaker 1: His wife, Sheila Davalou.
- 12:30Speaker 6: This was a professional, educated woman in a marriage who
- 12:34Speaker 6: had tricked her husband into being in a position where
- 12:36Speaker 6: she could stab him multiple times, including once through the heart.
- 12:40Speaker 7: That is.
- 12:41Speaker 1: Uncommon, to say the least. Five months after Annalisa was
- 12:47Speaker 1: stabbed to death, police arrested Sheila Davalou. She had stabbed
- 12:52Speaker 1: her husband, Paul, and tried.
- 12:54Speaker 7: To kill him.
- 12:56Speaker 1: He comes back to the house that day, and they
- 12:59Speaker 1: start playing a game.
- 13:00Speaker 8: Right.
- 13:03Speaker 1: What is that game?
- 13:04Speaker 5: Sheila says, let's play this game. I heard about it
- 13:06Speaker 5: at work with a bunch of girls. I think it
- 13:07Speaker 5: would be fun for us to reconnect. So Paul does
- 13:10Speaker 5: anything because he sees his marriage a little bit starting
- 13:12Speaker 5: to part. So she says the idea is we'll use handcuffs.
- 13:16Speaker 5: We'll handcuff each other. And so Sheila starts. She's handcuffed.
- 13:22Speaker 5: Paul handcuffs her to the chair and blindfolds her. And
- 13:24Speaker 5: he's supposed to get items throughout the home. And she's
- 13:26Speaker 5: supposed to guess what they are. And that's what they do.
- 13:29Speaker 5: Like he rubs them on her face or on her stomach.
- 13:31Speaker 5: And she's supposed to say, you know, the dog collar.
- 13:34Speaker 5: And so that was the game that they were playing.
- 13:38Speaker 8: Joan, what do you think?
- 13:39Speaker 2: Hey, I'm not at all.
- 13:41Speaker 8: I just want to... No, I mean, you think I
- 13:43Speaker 8: did it.
- 13:43Speaker 4: Well, I think something went wrong.
- 13:44Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not saying.
- 13:45Speaker 5: Something went terribly wrong, but I didn't... I'm.
- 13:47Speaker 9: Not saying I did it with intent to hurt him.
- 13:49Speaker 8: I'm not saying that.
- 13:50Speaker 9: I just got a count where he's giving me a
- 13:52Speaker 9: story that we're playing a game and everything's fine.
- 13:56Speaker 8: And then he gets hurt.
- 13:57Speaker 9: I want you to understand an accident happened and he's
- 14:00Speaker 9: blindfolded and said, you know, something went wrong. And, you know,
- 14:03Speaker 9: but I'm trying to understand the second step, which I
- 14:07Speaker 9: know didn't occur at the same time the first one did.
- 14:11Speaker 9: And I know he didn't do it to himself because
- 14:13Speaker 9: it wasn't possible, but he did it to himself.
- 14:19Speaker 1: Tell me about Paul. What kind of relationship did you
- 14:22Speaker 1: have with him for years before you got married?
- 14:26Speaker 2: Paul and I had a very weird, weird relationship. This
- 14:34Speaker 2: is the part where... I think through tacit agreement or collusion,
- 14:39Speaker 2: we had decided to not discuss at all because it's
- 14:43Speaker 2: very embarrassing.
- 14:45Speaker 1: You play games. Yes. It's not that embarrassing. A lot
- 14:49Speaker 1: of married couples do that.
- 14:51Speaker 2: Oh, I don't know.
- 14:52Speaker 1: I don't think it's as uncommon as you think.
- 14:56Speaker 2: It's uncommon from what I've heard in terms of owning handcuffs.
- 15:03Speaker 7: It's not.
- 15:05Speaker 2: Okay, if you say so. Well, it's not something you
- 15:10Speaker 2: want to mention in a court of law, I think.
- 15:12Speaker 2: All right, did you say anything suggestive or anything like
- 15:18Speaker 2: that to your wife? No. While you were doing this,
- 15:20Speaker 2: did you ever slip any item underneath your clothes or
- 15:23Speaker 2: anything like that? No.
- 15:25Speaker 10: At that point of our marriage, we weren't even romantic anymore,
- 15:27Speaker 10: so there was no sexual aspect to the game at all.
- 15:32Speaker 5: The first part of the interview that I did with Sheila,
- 15:34Speaker 5: she was under the impression that Paul had died. She
- 15:36Speaker 5: didn't know he had survived. We kind of let her
- 15:39Speaker 5: think that he didn't make it to surgery. I think
- 15:41Speaker 5: she thought she would tell us a story, Paul didn't
- 15:43Speaker 5: make it, and we would never be none the wiser.
- 15:46Speaker 2: What position did she take up on?
- 15:50Speaker 10: She was sitting on my midsection, pretty much right on
- 15:55Speaker 10: my chest area. My legs kind of underneath her, and
- 15:59Speaker 10: she actually touched the item to my face. I couldn't
- 16:03Speaker 10: identify what it was. All of a sudden, I felt
- 16:06Speaker 10: like a large thrust on my chest. It felt like
- 16:09Speaker 10: a heavy weight was dropped on my chest.
- 16:13Speaker 8: He's very strong. I don't understand that, but his upper
- 16:15Speaker 8: body wouldn't have been able to come in.
- 16:16Speaker 4: He's sitting on top of himself.
- 16:19Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 16:39Speaker 1: She stabbed him. She stabbed him.
- 16:41Speaker 5: And then while he's kind of trying to, you know,
- 16:44Speaker 5: get his bearings, because he was just stabbed, he feels
- 16:46Speaker 5: an even heavier thrust to his chest.
- 16:52Speaker 10: She said, oh, my God, I think I hurt you,
- 16:54Speaker 10: you're bleeding. And I started to get winded, I started
- 16:58Speaker 10: to sweat a little bit.
- 17:03Speaker 1: Bleeding from the stab wounds and struggling to breathe, Paul
- 17:07Speaker 1: convinced his wife to take him to hospital. But it
- 17:11Speaker 1: appeared that Sheila had no intention of seeking medical help.
- 17:17Speaker 10: She exited the car, came around to the rear driver's
- 17:20Speaker 10: side door, As she's moving my foot, I see her face,
- 17:25Speaker 10: like with an angry expression, and she lunges at me.
- 17:29Speaker 8: You looked at her face, and you saw what kind
- 17:33Speaker 8: of expression?
- 17:34Speaker 10: Like a distressed, angry-type look. I didn't see the knife
- 17:38Speaker 10: at that point, but I felt a sharp jab into
- 17:40Speaker 10: my chest, and then when she recoiled, I saw the knife.
- 17:47Speaker 1: And what happens?
- 17:49Speaker 5: He starts screaming and he realizes that he has to
- 17:51Speaker 5: fight for his life and he gets the knife away
- 17:52Speaker 5: from her so she can't get it back and he
- 17:54Speaker 5: starts telling people, you know, help, help, and finally people
- 17:59Speaker 5: do come and she jumps in the car and takes off.
- 18:04Speaker 1: You drive to the back and Paul's in the back
- 18:08Speaker 1: seat of the car. You then open the back door
- 18:12Speaker 1: and you stab him again. That's not part of any
- 18:16Speaker 1: game now.
- 18:17Speaker 2: No.
- 18:17Speaker 1: Why did you stab him again?
- 18:21Speaker 2: We had another altercation there and we had a lot
- 18:25Speaker 2: of words and we wanted to talk, we were talking
- 18:30Speaker 2: about what to say and how to tell people what
- 18:35Speaker 2: happened and we had a big disagreement and I still
- 18:39Speaker 2: had the knife in my hand and he, I threatened
- 18:43Speaker 2: him with the knife And he took the knife, he threatened,
- 18:48Speaker 2: oh no, he threatened to take the knife out of
- 18:49Speaker 2: my hand that he was going to kill me. And we,
- 18:56Speaker 2: I just lunged at him and he grabbed the knife
- 19:00Speaker 2: out of my hand and threw it away. And I
- 19:06Speaker 2: have no good explanation for any of it.
- 19:09Speaker 1: I mean, the fairly obvious one is if you're not
- 19:14Speaker 1: you is that you're trying to kill him because you've
- 19:18Speaker 1: had two goes at it in this game. And he's
- 19:22Speaker 1: still alive, so he can tell perhaps the real story.
- 19:26Speaker 1: And the way to stop him telling the real story
- 19:27Speaker 1: is to finish him off.
- 19:29Speaker 2: True. However, I tried very hard in desperation to get
- 19:36Speaker 2: him out of the handcuffs. And that's contradictory to somebody
- 19:41Speaker 2: wanting to kill somebody.
- 19:42Speaker 1: But, Sheila, you stabbed him in the heart.
- 19:45Speaker 2: I don't think I knew where I was stabbing him.
- 19:48Speaker 2: I wasn't aiming.
- 19:49Speaker 1: Why are you still stabbing him at all, given you've
- 19:51Speaker 1: already stabbed him twice and he's now at a hospital
- 19:54Speaker 1: to receive emergency treatment, and now you think the best
- 19:57Speaker 1: way for him to get treatment is to stab him
- 19:59Speaker 1: in the heart? How does any of this make sense?
- 20:02Speaker 2: No, it really doesn't make sense. You're absolutely right. I just...
- 20:06Speaker 2: I think I wasn't... I think we were just very confused,
- 20:12Speaker 2: both of us. And he was.
- 20:14Speaker 1: Well, I bet he's confused.
- 20:16Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 20:16Speaker 1: He's wondering why his wife's stabbing him to death.
- 20:19Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 20:20Speaker 7: Right?
- 20:20Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
- 20:21Speaker 1: That's confusing.
- 20:24Speaker 4: None of this makes sense to me.
- 20:27Speaker 8: Can't go by that.
- 20:27Speaker 2: I mean, you're saying I stabbed him twice in the
- 20:29Speaker 2: house and then the third time in the hospital?
- 20:32Speaker 7: Mm-hmm.
- 20:32Speaker 8: Why wouldn't I stab him the third time in the hospital?
- 20:35Speaker 8: I don't understand at all.
- 20:45Speaker 6: The evidence from the very beginning was overwhelming that she
- 20:47Speaker 6: had stabbed Paul and almost killed him. You stab someone
- 20:52Speaker 6: in the heart, it actually nicks the heart, that's a
- 20:53Speaker 6: very precise act. And the fact that he was immobile
- 20:57Speaker 6: and she stabbed him in that area three times, one
- 20:59Speaker 6: time nicking the heart, that's a very precise act that
- 21:01Speaker 6: really shows intent to kill. Because there's no other intent
- 21:04Speaker 6: that's consistent with stabbing someone in the heart. She doesn't
- 21:09Speaker 6: appear like someone who would be a threat. She's not
- 21:11Speaker 6: a physically imposing person. She speaks in a very educated way.
- 21:15Speaker 6: And she doesn't come off as the type of person
- 21:18Speaker 6: who would be capable of extreme violence, which she clearly
- 21:21Speaker 6: was when we looked at the evidence.
- 21:28Speaker 1: My inclination would not be that I could imagine you
- 21:32Speaker 1: stabbing somebody as brutally to death as Annalisa was stabbed
- 21:36Speaker 1: to death. Just doesn't seem like you would do that.
- 21:40Speaker 1: But then I know about what you did to Paul.
- 21:42Speaker 2: I think that that plays, you're absolutely right. I think
- 21:44Speaker 2: that plays.
- 21:45Speaker 1: Why wouldn't it play into anybody's mind that you are
- 21:48Speaker 1: clearly capable of committing an act of savagery involving a knife?
- 21:56Speaker 2: He had used it earlier. On you?
- 21:58Speaker 7: Yes.
- 21:59Speaker 1: He'd used a knife on you?
- 22:00Speaker 7: Yes. How?
- 22:04Speaker 8: Um....
- 22:09Speaker 2: He ended up cutting me with the knife.
- 22:12Speaker 1: Where did he cut you?
- 22:13Speaker 2: Right in the chest. And I still have a scar
- 22:15Speaker 2: of it. And I think that.
- 22:23Speaker 3: I I.
- 22:26Speaker 2: Think the pain was just too much for me at
- 22:34Speaker 2: the time. I was always on the receiving end of
- 22:39Speaker 2: A beating. And I.
- 22:41Speaker 1: Wait. Your husband would repeatedly beat you?
- 22:47Speaker 2: No. I mean, it was consensual.
- 22:49Speaker 1: He beat you consensually?
- 22:51Speaker 2: Yes.
- 22:52Speaker 1: Out with his fists?
- 22:53Speaker 2: What?
- 22:54Speaker 7: Yes.
- 22:55Speaker 1: He'd punch you?
- 22:57Speaker 2: Slap, punch. And I think at that point with the knife,
- 23:02Speaker 2: it just... I couldn't take it anymore. I just wanted to...
- 23:10Speaker 2: I guess I just wanted him to see how it felt.
- 23:12Speaker 1: I mean, he's never said he's ever hit you like that.
- 23:16Speaker 1: In fact, he said the complete opposite. He said in court,
- 23:20Speaker 1: under oath, that you had never shown any violence and
- 23:24Speaker 1: there'd been no violence in this marriage ever.
- 23:27Speaker 2: I don't think we thought of it as violence.
- 23:29Speaker 1: Well, being punched and kicked and slapped and stabbed. Fairly violent,
- 23:34Speaker 1: isn't it?
- 23:35Speaker 2: Yeah, well, we didn't... I think we thought of it
- 23:37Speaker 2: as part of a game.
- 23:39Speaker 1: But was he lying in court then, under oath? Because
- 23:41Speaker 1: that's obviously a pretty serious offence.
- 23:43Speaker 2: I think we didn't want to... Neither of us wanted
- 23:45Speaker 2: to talk about that. I deferred to his testimony.
- 23:56Speaker 1: I've interviewed Sheila Davila. She says that they had played
- 24:00Speaker 1: this game many times before, but it had become increasingly violent.
- 24:05Speaker 1: That Paul would repeatedly punch her, including in the face.
- 24:10Speaker 1: He would slap her. And that she believed on that
- 24:13Speaker 1: day the level of violence after he took the knife
- 24:17Speaker 1: to her first and cut her across her chest had
- 24:21Speaker 1: reached such a point that she flipped and she attacked
- 24:26Speaker 1: him to defend herself.
- 24:28Speaker 5: Never once did she even mention that. She had no
- 24:30Speaker 5: injuries on her when we arrested her. Anybody that ever
- 24:33Speaker 5: met Paul would never believe that story. For five minutes,
- 24:35Speaker 5: you could meet Paul and know that wasn't true. And
- 24:37Speaker 5: I say that knowing that behind closed doors, things happen
- 24:40Speaker 5: in people's homes. You could put a gun to Paul's head,
- 24:42Speaker 5: he probably wouldn't punch her in the face. Paul's just
- 24:45Speaker 5: not that type of person.
- 24:46Speaker 1: Not a violent man?
- 24:47Speaker 8: Not at all.
- 24:47Speaker 5: She thinks she's truly going to fool us all.
- 24:49Speaker 1: The crucial moment of detective work by you, you find
- 24:54Speaker 1: her phone. What does it have on it that rings
- 24:57Speaker 1: alarm bells to you?
- 24:58Speaker 5: The last call on her phone was to Nelson Sessler. Well, actually,
- 25:01Speaker 5: it just said Nelson. We didn't know who he was
- 25:03Speaker 5: at the time. It just said a call to Nelson.
- 25:05Speaker 1: So you're immediately curious?
- 25:06Speaker 2: Yeah, because I'm nosy.
- 25:13Speaker 11: Detective Carpenteria came here with a phone, a cell phone
- 25:17Speaker 11: that had a person's name in it from a crime
- 25:19Speaker 11: scene they had over in New York. She asked if
- 25:22Speaker 11: anybody knows anything about this Nelson Sessler. One of our
- 25:26Speaker 11: guys here, Frank Licona, says, wait a minute, that's the
- 25:29Speaker 11: boyfriend in the Annalisa Raimondo homicide.
- 25:32Speaker 5: They let me look at the crime scene photos, and
- 25:35Speaker 5: they let me listen to the 911 tape. I told
- 25:45Speaker 5: them right away. I said, I just interviewed her for
- 25:47Speaker 5: 10 hours straight. That is Sheila Davalou.
- 25:50Speaker 11: Nelson, who is Annalisa's boyfriend, is in Sheila's phone. There's
- 25:56Speaker 11: got to be something going on here. I believe Sheila
- 26:12Speaker 11: probably decided, I want to be with Sessler. And she
- 26:15Speaker 11: went to the house and confronted Annalisa and things got
- 26:18Speaker 11: out of hand. And she had the knife with her
- 26:21Speaker 11: or something. She used whatever she could. There were dumbbells there.
- 26:25Speaker 11: There was, like I said, it was a brutal scene.
- 26:27Speaker 11: A lot of things bled all over and did what
- 26:30Speaker 11: she did and left.
- 26:35Speaker 1: The big breakthrough in this case, as far as the
- 26:37Speaker 1: police are concerned, comes when you are arrested in connection
- 26:42Speaker 1: with what happened with Paul, and there's a detective who
- 26:47Speaker 1: picks up your phone and sees that you called this
- 26:50Speaker 1: guy Nelson. And they confront Nelson, and eventually he concedes
- 26:57Speaker 1: that you've been having a relationship with him.
- 27:00Speaker 2: My relationship with Nelson was very much an affair. But
- 27:06Speaker 2: I think in my defense, Paul and I had already
- 27:09Speaker 2: started talking about divorce because we had grown apart way
- 27:13Speaker 2: before I had met Nelson.
- 27:15Speaker 1: You really like this guy, right? I mean, you fall
- 27:17Speaker 1: for Nelson.
- 27:18Speaker 3: I mean, I.
- 27:21Speaker 2: Didn't see it that way. I didn't see falling for him.
- 27:25Speaker 2: I think we weren't, he was very intelligent. You know,
- 27:30Speaker 2: he's a good looking man. very funny, witty. However, I think...
- 27:37Speaker 2: You were in love with him.
- 27:39Speaker 1: I don't know why you're shy of admitting that. I.
- 27:47Speaker 2: Didn' t see it that way. I didn't see Nelson as...
- 27:52Speaker 2: I could have... If I wanted to be with Nelson,
- 27:55Speaker 2: I could have easily divorced my husband.
- 27:58Speaker 1: Well, except Nelson's with Annalisa.
- 28:01Speaker 2: True.
- 28:02Speaker 1: You can only be with him if she's not on
- 28:06Speaker 1: the scene. How do you categorize Sheila Deverly?
- 28:13Speaker 5: She's very calculating and manipulative. She can use people to
- 28:17Speaker 5: get what she wants.
- 28:19Speaker 1: So when Sheila Deverly looks me in the eye and says,
- 28:22Speaker 1: it was nothing really important, I wasn't in love with him,
- 28:25Speaker 1: certainly wasn't obsessed with him.
- 28:27Speaker 5: Her obsession was extreme to the point where she was
- 28:31Speaker 5: googling every street name, Nelson. So she went to see
- 28:36Speaker 5: a doctor, a psychiatrist, in September, months before Annalise was killed,
- 28:39Speaker 5: because of her obsession. I mean, she was listening to
- 28:42Speaker 5: all his voicemails at work. Nelson Cecil would be on
- 28:45Speaker 5: a plane to Vegas, and all of a sudden, Sheila
- 28:47Speaker 5: Dowell was sitting next to him. And she's like, how
- 28:50Speaker 5: did we end up on the same plane?
- 28:54Speaker 1: Sheila was now the prime suspect in Annalise's murder. But
- 28:58Speaker 1: detectives in Connecticut still had no hard evidence until a
- 29:03Speaker 1: sample of her DNA was taken when she was arrested
- 29:07Speaker 1: for stabbing her husband. The real meat on the bone
- 29:12Speaker 1: came with a tiny piece of blood DNA sample that
- 29:18Speaker 1: you found on this tap at Annalisa's home. Tell me
- 29:24Speaker 1: about that.
- 29:26Speaker 7: Tom called me one day. and said, Greg, are you
- 29:29Speaker 7: going to be home?
- 29:30Speaker 4: Can I come over? And I said, oh, of course
- 29:31Speaker 4: you can come over. And he knocked on the door.
- 29:35Speaker 4: And he looked at me.
- 29:38Speaker 7: And I'm, what? Tom?
- 29:40Speaker 4: He goes, I'll never forget this. He goes, we got her,
- 29:43Speaker 4: quote unquote.
- 29:44Speaker 7: And I said, what?
- 29:45Speaker 4: He goes, the DNA came back, and it's Sheila's. That
- 29:50Speaker 4: was just, that was overwhelming.
- 29:53Speaker 1: Are you 99.9% certain that that was her DNA, or
- 29:58Speaker 1: are you 100% certain?
- 30:00Speaker 4: 100% certain, absolutely. There's no question in my mind. When
- 30:05Speaker 4: someone is utilizing a knife in an attack, it's very
- 30:09Speaker 4: common as you stab and you get blood on your
- 30:12Speaker 4: hand for that hand to slip down the knife and
- 30:15Speaker 4: you cut yourself.
- 30:19Speaker 7: I know she cut herself there.
- 30:21Speaker 4: Then she went into the bathroom to at least clean
- 30:24Speaker 4: up so I can get out of here in broad daylight.
- 30:27Speaker 4: But I'm sure that she had blood. I'm sure she
- 30:29Speaker 4: was disheveled. I'm sure that, you know, Annalisa had.
- 30:33Speaker 7: Pulled her hair.
- 30:33Speaker 4: I mean, this was a drastic fight. I'm sure that
- 30:38Speaker 4: she was the perpetrator in this crime.
- 30:40Speaker 7: She was there. She was injured.
- 30:42Speaker 4: She bled in that sink. There was still work to
- 30:44Speaker 4: be done, but we knew we now had our purpose.
- 30:51Speaker 1: The obvious question, and it was one that the jury
- 30:54Speaker 1: found overwhelming in terms of evidence. How could your DNA
- 31:00Speaker 1: be anywhere near Annalisa's apartment if you'd only been there
- 31:05Speaker 1: once before? How do you explain it?
- 31:08Speaker 2: I think it was the summer before.
- 31:09Speaker 1: But way too long for DNA to exist.
- 31:13Speaker 2: Way too long. You're absolutely right.
- 31:14Speaker 1: You accept that? You accept it's way too late. You
- 31:17Speaker 1: accept it couldn't have been from when you went there
- 31:19Speaker 1: to the housewarming, right?
- 31:20Speaker 2: Right. In fact, I've never been in that bathroom before. Right.
- 31:24Speaker 1: So you've never been in the bathroom.
- 31:25Speaker 2: Right.
- 31:26Speaker 1: You've been to the apartment once for a housewarming, but
- 31:29Speaker 1: way before the time that any DNA could have been.
- 31:32Speaker 2: Absolutely.
- 31:32Speaker 8: Right.
- 31:33Speaker 1: So you accept that. Yes. So how do you explain
- 31:35Speaker 1: that your DNA is on that bathroom tap?
- 31:39Speaker 2: Of the 50 or so sealed pieces of evidence, only...
- 31:45Speaker 2: one piece of evidence left the crime lab. And that
- 31:49Speaker 2: one piece of evidence happened to be the sink handle
- 31:52Speaker 2: that left the crime lab and was resubmitted to the
- 31:55Speaker 2: crime lab. And I've been trying to, you know, rack
- 31:59Speaker 2: my brain and try to figure out why.
- 32:02Speaker 1: Even if you buy into your theory that there was
- 32:04Speaker 1: somehow some deliberate tampering to frame you, here's what I
- 32:09Speaker 1: can't work out. You were not a suspect. It was
- 32:13Speaker 1: a long time. for anybody ever raised your name in
- 32:17Speaker 1: connection with what had happened.
- 32:19Speaker 2: If they had the DNA and if it was conclusive,
- 32:25Speaker 2: they didn't come forward with the arrest warrant until five
- 32:31Speaker 2: years after.
- 32:32Speaker 1: Well, they didn't want to rush it from their point
- 32:34Speaker 1: of view. I just know what they say. You were
- 32:38Speaker 1: in a 25-year sentence. They had plenty of time and
- 32:41Speaker 1: they decided to arrest you when they felt they had
- 32:43Speaker 1: the evidence they needed. and it was pretty compelling to
- 32:46Speaker 1: a jury. The other thing that was compelling was the
- 32:50Speaker 1: 911 call that was made after Annalisa was killed.
- 32:53Speaker 8: Hello?
- 32:56Speaker 3: Yes, hello.
- 33:04Speaker 12: I think the guy is, is it, attacked my neighbor.
- 33:12Speaker 2: Do you think someone attacked your neighbor? First and foremost,
- 33:27Speaker 2: I'd like to thank God for giving me the courage
- 33:29Speaker 2: and the strength to stand here today. This is a
- 33:32Speaker 2: case where I am being accused of killing somebody. Did
- 33:40Speaker 2: the state prove to you that I was there on
- 33:44Speaker 2: that day.
- 33:44Speaker 3: Well, they can't do that.
- 33:50Speaker 1: Almost 10 years after Annalise's murder, Sheila Davalou was finally
- 33:55Speaker 1: brought to trial. She faced the possibility of a life
- 34:00Speaker 1: behind bars. Yet she took the extraordinary decision to defend herself.
- 34:08Speaker 2: Good afternoon, Mrs.
- 34:09Speaker 7: Sessler.
- 34:11Speaker 2: You had lied to the police?
- 34:13Speaker 1: Yes, I wasn't forthcoming to the police.
- 34:16Speaker 2: And what was the nature of that lie?
- 34:19Speaker 1: I hadn't told them that you had been my girlfriend
- 34:22Speaker 1: in the past and we had a relationship.
- 34:26Speaker 6: Sheila's definitely a smart person. There's no doubt about that.
- 34:28Speaker 6: She was successful in her career. She was able to
- 34:32Speaker 6: plan out horrendous acts, but she was able to plan
- 34:35Speaker 6: them out in a logical fashion and for a while
- 34:38Speaker 6: get away with one murder and almost get away with
- 34:41Speaker 6: what was almost another murder. I'm pretty sure that she
- 34:46Speaker 6: thought this was her best shot, but it is always,
- 34:50Speaker 6: always a terrible decision to defend yourself in court.
- 34:56Speaker 13: She did seem like a normal, you know, she was sympathetic. Yeah,
- 35:01Speaker 13: she was smiling, very polite, well-presented in court, dressed humbly.
- 35:08Speaker 14: You're sitting there being presented with this evidence of a
- 35:11Speaker 14: brutal crime. Bloody pictures, all kinds of biological evidence, that
- 35:17Speaker 14: kind of thing. And then you turn to look at
- 35:19Speaker 14: somebody who's talking in the courtroom, and it becomes hard
- 35:21Speaker 14: to tie those two together. It's hard to think that
- 35:24Speaker 14: anybody that you would ever talk to or listen to
- 35:26Speaker 14: would be capable of something like that, who's there in
- 35:28Speaker 14: the same room as you.
- 35:46Speaker 13: We heard the 911 call early during the trial, and
- 35:49Speaker 13: then every day is a huge amount of information to retain.
- 35:55Speaker 13: So at the end of the trial.
- 35:58Speaker 7: We wanted to hear this recording again.
- 36:01Speaker 10: I saw a guy go into her apartment.
- 36:04Speaker 2: He was in there and he had talked to her.
- 36:09Speaker 2: I heard yelling, I heard yelling.
- 36:14Speaker 3: Hello?
- 36:20Speaker 13: At the beginning of the trial, I don't think we
- 36:22Speaker 13: had heard Sheila Davenport's own voice enough to make our
- 36:27Speaker 13: own decision as to what we heard through.
- 36:29Speaker 7: The 911 call.
- 36:31Speaker 13: Listening to it again at the end was actually it
- 36:34Speaker 13: was it was shocking because you could hear really her
- 36:37Speaker 13: voice I mean that was my experience. I could really
- 36:40Speaker 13: recognize her voice.
- 36:43Speaker 1: The jury concluded that person who made the call was
- 36:46Speaker 1: you Well, I don't know that is that true Yeah,
- 36:51Speaker 1: that's what the jurors have said afterwards that they believed
- 36:54Speaker 1: it was you but you know why they think it
- 36:56Speaker 1: was you because you decided to defend yourself they listened
- 37:00Speaker 1: to your voice and Every day. If you hadn't defended yourself,
- 37:05Speaker 1: those jurors might have acquitted you.
- 37:08Speaker 2: What's very, I find that very odd because that's the
- 37:12Speaker 2: reason I defended myself. Because I wanted them to hear me.
- 37:17Speaker 2: And those who knew me.
- 37:19Speaker 1: You basically convicted yourself by doing that.
- 37:22Speaker 2: Those who knew me intimately and closely disagreed.
- 37:28Speaker 1: It doesn't sound like me. I've listened to it and
- 37:30Speaker 1: I've only been with you for an hour. Sounds like
- 37:33Speaker 1: you to me.
- 37:33Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I think my husband, who was the closest
- 37:36Speaker 2: person to me, said that it could be her trying
- 37:40Speaker 2: to disguise her voice. That's odd. I think.
- 37:45Speaker 1: Well, not really. I mean, if you've just killed somebody
- 37:47Speaker 1: and you're trying to build an alibi... But that's conjecture.
- 37:51Speaker 1: Of course. But we're not in court now. This is
- 37:53Speaker 1: me and you.
- 37:53Speaker 2: Right. I think that if.
- 37:57Speaker 2: If you're saying that it could be her, you're not
- 38:00Speaker 2: decisively saying it is her. And that's very odd for
- 38:05Speaker 2: somebody's husband not to be able to pinpoint his own
- 38:08Speaker 2: wife as the caller. He's not defending me.
- 38:11Speaker 1: Well, he couldn't be sure, he said.
- 38:13Speaker 2: And that's, I mean, you are sure.
- 38:15Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I just said it sounds like you.
- 38:17Speaker 2: Right.
- 38:18Speaker 1: I think that's... I think the DNA evidence is compelling.
- 38:21Speaker 2: Right.
- 38:21Speaker 1: I think the 911 call sounds like you. And I
- 38:25Speaker 1: believe you tried to kill your husband.
- 38:26Speaker 2: But you divorce a husband. You know, I am the breadwinner.
- 38:31Speaker 2: I'm supporting my husband. I have the higher income. He's
- 38:37Speaker 2: living in my house. I didn't have to get rid
- 38:40Speaker 2: of him. I could have divorced him. It would have
- 38:42Speaker 2: been cheaper. It would have been easier. I gained nothing
- 38:50Speaker 2: by killing Paul.
- 38:54Speaker 14: I think what I saw above everything else is she
- 38:56Speaker 14: seemed to be somebody who thought she was smarter than
- 38:59Speaker 14: everybody else around her. She thought she knew better and
- 39:01Speaker 14: that came out when she was defending herself.
- 39:05Speaker 6: It fit a consistent pattern that she was having an
- 39:08Speaker 6: affair and she eliminated the fiance of the man she
- 39:12Speaker 6: liked and then tried to kill her husband. She tried
- 39:15Speaker 6: to get rid of both people that were standing in
- 39:17Speaker 6: the way of her being with Nelson Sessler.
- 39:25Speaker 10: The defendant, Sheila Dablu, please rise and face the jury.
- 39:29Speaker 1: What say you, Mr.
- 39:30Speaker 2: Portperson?
- 39:32Speaker 1: Is she guilty or not guilty?
- 39:34Speaker 8: Guilty.
- 39:47Speaker 1: You don't get the impression of somebody incredibly dangerous, and
- 39:50Speaker 1: yet she clearly is very dangerous.
- 39:53Speaker 4: I think she can ramp up that danger in her
- 39:58Speaker 4: to a point where it becomes open physical aggression. I
- 40:02Speaker 4: think she's probably one of the most dangerous people I've
- 40:04Speaker 4: ever seen.
- 40:09Speaker 1: You're in here now for the rest of your life.
- 40:12Speaker 1: What is life like for you in here?
- 40:16Speaker 2: Um, life is decent. Um, it's peaceful. Uh, I, um,
- 40:25Speaker 2: I'm very active in the community. I'm at peace and
- 40:31Speaker 2: I'm fighting my case.
- 40:34Speaker 1: When your parents come to see you, when your parents
- 40:36Speaker 1: come to see you, it must break their heart, doesn't it?
- 40:39Speaker 1: There was this brilliant, beautiful daughter who had everything to
- 40:43Speaker 1: live for, who had a great job, was married to
- 40:47Speaker 1: a good guy. He lived in a lovely community, nice place. Yeah.
- 40:52Speaker 1: Two dogs. Everything was... Yeah. And now this. But the
- 40:58Speaker 1: saddest thing for me is your apparent self-delusion that you've
- 41:03Speaker 1: maybe convinced yourself you didn't do this.
- 41:06Speaker 2: No, because I didn't. I mean, I don't have a
- 41:10Speaker 2: split personality disorder or anything like that. I wasn't there.
- 41:16Speaker 2: It doesn't really affect me in any way if people
- 41:19Speaker 2: believe me or not.
- 41:21Speaker 1: But it Yeah, but you're doing an interview because presumably
- 41:24Speaker 1: you think people should believe you.
- 41:27Speaker 2: You know, if you were to believe me, it wouldn't
- 41:33Speaker 2: help me in any way. So I'm not sitting here
- 41:37Speaker 2: really to try to convince you. I'm just telling you
- 41:40Speaker 2: how it is and what it was. And it's not pretty. Still,
- 41:45Speaker 2: my story is not eloquent. It's not, you know... I'm
- 41:53Speaker 2: not denying what I did to my husband. I did
- 41:59Speaker 2: not want to kill him. I am beyond relieved that
- 42:06Speaker 2: at least I don't have two murders on my rap sheet. However,
- 42:11Speaker 2: I will, you know, to the last day that I'm
- 42:21Speaker 2: alive be working on proving my innocence in Connecticut.
- 42:29Speaker 7: Oh, I think she's very dangerous. I do.
- 42:33Speaker 1: I think if she was out, she'd probably do it again.
- 42:36Speaker 11: Find somebody to be with for a while and then
- 42:39Speaker 11: find somebody else and something probably would happen.
- 42:42Speaker 12: The deterrent effect of any sentence imposed really has very
- 42:50Speaker 12: little meaning here other than to send a message that
- 42:53Speaker 12: it cannot be tolerated in our society. That cold, calculated nature,
- 42:58Speaker 12: that terrible act that occurred cannot be accepted by the people.
- 43:11Speaker 2: You know, I'm hoping for the best. I'm still very
- 43:14Speaker 2: hopeful and I feel positive still.
- 43:18Speaker 1: Sheila, thank you.
- 43:19Speaker 2: Thank you.