Latest / The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories / The Boy Who Killed His Twin - True Crime Documentary

Transcript

The Boy Who Killed His Twin - True Crime Documentary · The Evolution of Evil - True Crime Stories

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: There's kind of no more. What's the location of your emergency?
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: My sister, tell me what your name is? The dam alias. Okay,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: tell me exactly what happened.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I thought it was a dream.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: I took my stabbed her a weird one. How old
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: is she more twins? Is she awake?
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: Yes, it's like rearly awhile?
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Is there anyone else there in the house with you? Parents?
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: There a sleep? Okay, I need you to go wake
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: them up? Wow, Dad, We're gonna have to start CPR
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: right now. One two three four one two. Keep helping
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: her chest just like that.
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: Okayre's your son? Where's your son? Okay, okay, we got
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: asking you a message.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Comment you can blow down a little bit. One two
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: four one two.
• 1:17
  Speaker 4: So it was a dream, he said, it was a dream.
• 1:20
  Speaker 4: Honey what.
• 1:24
  Speaker 5: I don't know what, I don't know what we'll do?
• 1:27
  Speaker 5: She it was just a dream and it wasn't.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna do it.
• 1:31
  Speaker 6: Start jug you real quick and then put in the
• 1:33
  Speaker 6: back seat.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: I'm just rying. Okay.
• 1:37
  Speaker 7: What was your first reaction when you heard about the case.
• 1:40
  Speaker 8: I was skeptical. Why does he have a knife next
• 1:43
  Speaker 8: to his bed at night? This is the first study
• 1:46
  Speaker 8: that we did on ben I'm doctor Gerald Simmons. I'm
• 1:49
  Speaker 8: a neurologist, sleep disorder specialist. See these are rapidi movements.
• 1:53
  Speaker 8: I was asked to review the case of Benjamin Elliott.
• 1:57
  Speaker 8: The claim was that he was sleepwalking and stabbed his sister.
• 2:01
  Speaker 3: We have a video film right here.
• 2:03
  Speaker 7: Oh there he is. Yeah, Okay, you are convinced this
• 2:06
  Speaker 7: was a sleep walking incident.
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: Yes?
• 2:10
  Speaker 7: Are you saying then that he did kill his sister
• 2:14
  Speaker 7: but he didn't intend to kill his sister.
• 2:18
  Speaker 9: I wouldn't say that it's impossible for someone to commit
• 2:22
  Speaker 9: a crime while sleepwalking. I just don't think that was
• 2:24
  Speaker 9: the case with Benjamin Elliott.
• 2:26
  Speaker 7: Were you able to find any evidence that there was
• 2:29
  Speaker 7: a problem with these twins?
• 2:32
  Speaker 9: No, we definitely looked into it and tried. The biggest
• 2:35
  Speaker 9: thing that they're hanging their hat on is the lack
• 2:38
  Speaker 9: of motive. My name is Megan Long and one of
• 2:41
  Speaker 9: the prosecutors on the case.
• 2:47
  Speaker 7: So this is really hard, isn't it.
• 2:49
  Speaker 4: Mike, She's gone.
• 2:57
  Speaker 10: This was not Benjamin's fault.
• 2:59
  Speaker 4: I've never thought of him. Is somebody responsible for this?
• 3:02
  Speaker 7: What makes you so sure that you stabbed your sister
• 3:05
  Speaker 7: while you were sleepwalking?
• 3:06
  Speaker 5: I would never have done that. I loved her. She
• 3:10
  Speaker 5: was my best and closest friend.
• 4:04
  Speaker 7: On the morning of September twenty ninth, twenty twenty one,
• 4:08
  Speaker 7: seventeen year old Benjamin Elliott was in a Harris County
• 4:12
  Speaker 7: Sheriff's interrogation room in Houston, Texas.
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: So what happened, Benjamin?
• 4:18
  Speaker 5: Do you ever have like a really.
• 4:22
  Speaker 11: Realistic nightmare or like just everything feels real but also
• 4:28
  Speaker 11: off at the same time.
• 4:31
  Speaker 7: Benjamin told Detective fred Or Munos that he stabbed his
• 4:36
  Speaker 7: twin sister once with this knife, but had little memory
• 4:41
  Speaker 7: of what had happened.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: So you go to sleep? Was the next thing you remember?
• 4:46
  Speaker 11: The next thing I remember is like the feeling of
• 4:53
  Speaker 11: stabbing something. I was in her room and I turned
• 4:58
  Speaker 11: on the light. I was panicking and I tried to
• 5:02
  Speaker 11: stop leaving the.
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: Pillow.
• 5:06
  Speaker 11: So I run in my room and I un put
• 5:08
  Speaker 11: my phone and dial mine one one.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: What's the location of your emergency?
• 5:12
  Speaker 5: I stabbed my sister?
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: How many times did you faver her?
• 5:17
  Speaker 5: Just once?
• 5:19
  Speaker 12: I heard the nine one one call and I screamed
• 5:24
  Speaker 12: and I went to go move into the bedroom. As
• 5:26
  Speaker 12: I moved, as I saw Megan and she was okay,
• 5:36
  Speaker 12: she was gray, you know.
• 5:39
  Speaker 7: Michael Elliott remembers calling out to his wife Kathy.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: I heard Michael Gill.
• 5:46
  Speaker 13: I was trying to fiure out what's going on, and
• 5:48
  Speaker 13: Michael said, the police are here, where's the brother?
• 5:51
  Speaker 10: And I just.
• 5:55
  Speaker 7: Arriving. Paramedics took over CDR.
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: They took Benjamin out of the house. It was shocked.
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: He said, it was a dream.
• 6:03
  Speaker 10: What did you make of that?
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: I don't. I mean, I just I couldn't believe it.
• 6:07
  Speaker 7: I mean, I couldn't not the ben you knew, So
• 6:09
  Speaker 7: it would have to have been that he was.
• 6:11
  Speaker 10: Something would have had to happen.
• 6:13
  Speaker 7: Benjamin, his parents say, sat handcuffed at a police car
• 6:17
  Speaker 7: for three hours while police, confronted with an apparent homicide,
• 6:23
  Speaker 7: took control of the crime scene.
• 6:25
  Speaker 6: I I.
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: Nobody would tell us if Megan was, okay, what's going on?
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: Take a picture for me? Let me see can we
• 6:34
  Speaker 4: see something, sir.
• 6:35
  Speaker 7: The Elliots say they felt isolated by the police and
• 6:39
  Speaker 7: eventually called a longtime friend who was also an attorney.
• 6:44
  Speaker 13: He went and got some information, and he told us
• 6:46
  Speaker 13: that Megan had died.
• 6:51
  Speaker 7: It was news police didn't share with Benjamin. Benjamin asked
• 6:56
  Speaker 7: detective Munos several times if his sister was all right.
• 7:00
  Speaker 7: She is okay, but the detective withheld the truth.
• 7:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah, let's I know about She was being checked out.
• 7:07
  Speaker 7: By the ear Mass authority say this is a textbook
• 7:10
  Speaker 7: police technique to keep a suspect talking, and they wanted
• 7:15
  Speaker 7: Benjamin talking about his feelings for his sister.
• 7:19
  Speaker 8: Is hes your relationship with Megan good?
• 7:22
  Speaker 11: She's my twin sister.
• 7:23
  Speaker 5: I do anything for her.
• 7:24
  Speaker 14: The rivalry there, No, you douys have any recent fights
• 7:28
  Speaker 14: or anything like that.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: No, we're pretty.
• 7:31
  Speaker 4: Close for siblings.
• 7:32
  Speaker 7: Benjamin, who spoke to police without a lawyer, said he
• 7:35
  Speaker 7: loved his sister and describe what he says he remembered
• 7:39
  Speaker 7: before the stabbing. Phone record show he was scrolling the
• 7:43
  Speaker 7: web and Benjamin says he thinks he fell asleep somewhere
• 7:47
  Speaker 7: around two thirty or three thirty in the morning.
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: Where with the phone be at.
• 7:52
  Speaker 11: Right now somewhere at the crime scene.
• 7:56
  Speaker 7: Benjamin provided Munos with his iPhone password and permission to
• 8:01
  Speaker 7: search his phone.
• 8:03
  Speaker 11: Have you ever been diagnosed with an emailtal illnesses?
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: No?
• 8:06
  Speaker 7: Benjamin said there were no problems at home and said
• 8:10
  Speaker 7: that he was looking forward to college.
• 8:12
  Speaker 5: I'm thinking about mechanical engineering. I'm taking the SAT.
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: I think.
• 8:19
  Speaker 5: Friday, no Saturday, And let me ask you.
• 8:22
  Speaker 8: The knighte that you had in your hands, where'd you
• 8:24
  Speaker 8: get a.
• 8:25
  Speaker 11: Problem for my dad? He had given it to me
• 8:28
  Speaker 11: that day. It's like a Air Force survival knife.
• 8:33
  Speaker 5: I was really enamored with it.
• 8:36
  Speaker 7: Benjamin and Meghan's parents had a big collection of knives
• 8:39
  Speaker 7: and gear. The family is big into camping. Kathy is
• 8:43
  Speaker 7: senior manager with the Girl Scouts of America. Michael is
• 8:47
  Speaker 7: a stay at home dad.
• 8:49
  Speaker 4: I know that if I had not given him that knife,
• 8:52
  Speaker 4: this would not have happened.
• 8:55
  Speaker 15: And after two hours in that interrogation room at eleven am,
• 9:09
  Speaker 15: Munnos finally revealed that Meghan was dead.
• 9:15
  Speaker 16: Megan, He and Megan are so close, so you could
• 9:24
  Speaker 16: never picture anything bad happening between them.
• 9:27
  Speaker 7: Longtime friend Drew Whittaker was stunned to learn Benjamin was
• 9:31
  Speaker 7: in police's custody.
• 9:33
  Speaker 16: He was very protective of her, she says.
• 9:36
  Speaker 7: Her family and the Elliotts have been closed since two
• 9:39
  Speaker 7: thousand and five.
• 9:41
  Speaker 16: Ben was very engineering focused.
• 9:43
  Speaker 7: Whittaker, herself an engineer, described Benjamin as soft spoken, smart, funny,
• 9:49
  Speaker 7: and a bit nerdy. While Meghan was sensitive, wrote poetry
• 9:54
  Speaker 7: and loved to draw. As a teenager, Meghan had been
• 9:57
  Speaker 7: diagnosed with autism. How did she feel about Ben She
• 10:02
  Speaker 7: loved him.
• 10:03
  Speaker 13: She looked up to him.
• 10:04
  Speaker 16: You would see her walk up next to him when
• 10:08
  Speaker 16: she would feel uncomfortable and just kind of stand bying.
• 10:11
  Speaker 7: Did he ever get tired of having to take.
• 10:13
  Speaker 3: Care of me?
• 10:14
  Speaker 4: I think he was proud of it. He liked being
• 10:16
  Speaker 4: a protector.
• 10:17
  Speaker 7: The Elliots say. The twins seemed happy in the weeks
• 10:20
  Speaker 7: before the stabbing, with their eldest child, Elizabeth, already off
• 10:25
  Speaker 7: at college. The twins toured separate universities.
• 10:29
  Speaker 13: Megan at this point had started coming out of your
• 10:31
  Speaker 13: shell as well.
• 10:32
  Speaker 10: She was finding her voice, and she had found friends.
• 10:35
  Speaker 13: Online, and she had a YouTube channel where she was
• 10:37
  Speaker 13: doing art.
• 10:39
  Speaker 7: The night before Megan's death, father and son spent hours
• 10:43
  Speaker 7: playing popular video games such as Survive the Nights. It
• 10:48
  Speaker 7: was in that video game that Benjamin noticed a military
• 10:52
  Speaker 7: style knife that his father said resemble one that he owned.
• 10:57
  Speaker 7: Michael offered to give it to Benjamin.
• 11:00
  Speaker 4: Unfortunately I went and got the knife out.
• 11:02
  Speaker 7: The Elliots remember, heading off to bed. Was there any
• 11:07
  Speaker 7: you know, any problem at all between the twins. The
• 11:13
  Speaker 7: Elliots like police couldn't make sense of why Benjamin stab Megan,
• 11:19
  Speaker 7: but police had the teenager's confession, the bloody knife he used,
• 11:24
  Speaker 7: along with the disturbing detail discovered at autopsy. Megan hadn't
• 11:30
  Speaker 7: been stabbed just once. She had two stab wounds. Benjamin
• 11:37
  Speaker 7: Elliott was charged with the murder of his twin sister.
• 11:57
  Speaker 7: After several days on suicide watch, seventeen year old Benjamin
• 12:03
  Speaker 7: Elliott was released on bail. His parents were there waiting
• 12:11
  Speaker 7: for it.
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: I saw them put him out and he just kind
• 12:14
  Speaker 4: of stood there on the sidewalk and.
• 12:18
  Speaker 10: Okay.
• 12:19
  Speaker 12: I went up Twitt, and he seemed I told him.
• 12:22
  Speaker 12: I said thank Ben, you know, and he seemed like
• 12:25
  Speaker 12: like he didn't see me. He's surprised to see me.
• 12:30
  Speaker 12: We started driving and we were asking him if he
• 12:33
  Speaker 12: was okay, and we were getting very very quiet. It's
• 12:39
  Speaker 12: not quiet like you know, single word answers.
• 12:44
  Speaker 13: So Michael pulls the car over and stops and he
• 12:48
  Speaker 13: gets up, comes around and takes his face in his
• 12:51
  Speaker 13: hands and he says, he's like, hi, I love you, Hi,
• 12:55
  Speaker 13: and he.
• 12:56
  Speaker 4: Just yeah, And I saw him kind of sort breach.
• 13:08
  Speaker 10: And then he just hugged ye.
• 13:13
  Speaker 7: The Elliots knew they could never sleep in their home again,
• 13:16
  Speaker 7: and had already moved in with Kathy's mother.
• 13:19
  Speaker 13: Ben was worried that he might walk around, and he
• 13:22
  Speaker 13: was worried that he might do something, and he wanted
• 13:24
  Speaker 13: to make sure everybody was safe.
• 13:25
  Speaker 7: The Elliots were worried too.
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: The first two us have slipped on a chair in
• 13:30
  Speaker 4: front of the door.
• 13:30
  Speaker 7: The couple even installed an alarm on Benjamin's door. Because
• 13:36
  Speaker 7: his attorneys had asked them not to speak with their
• 13:38
  Speaker 7: son about the night Megan was killed. They couldn't ask
• 13:42
  Speaker 7: him the burning question, why.
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: He'd never been anything wrong with them all?
• 13:46
  Speaker 10: Or my manduin was a mental health something.
• 13:51
  Speaker 7: Kathy's father was schizophrenic, she now feared her son might be.
• 13:56
  Speaker 7: So did Benjamin's lawyers, Wes Rucker and Carrie Hart.
• 14:00
  Speaker 4: So we had a psychiatrist sit down with him.
• 14:03
  Speaker 17: I fully expected her to come back and say he's
• 14:06
  Speaker 17: got schizophrenia or he's severely bipolar.
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: When she calls me up, she said, Wes, he's fine.
• 14:12
  Speaker 10: It blew my mind.
• 14:14
  Speaker 7: They came to suspect that Benjamin experienced something else entirely.
• 14:19
  Speaker 7: He was actually sleepwalking when he killed his sister. I
• 14:23
  Speaker 7: had either one of you ever had a case quite
• 14:26
  Speaker 7: like this.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: Never.
• 14:28
  Speaker 17: No, you have a twin causing the death of the other,
• 14:32
  Speaker 17: and the last thing you think of is this a
• 14:35
  Speaker 17: sleepwalking case.
• 14:36
  Speaker 7: But Benjamin had told police that ID stabbed his sister
• 14:40
  Speaker 7: it felt like a dream, and his lawyers say that
• 14:44
  Speaker 7: sleepwalking defenses have been used successfully in the past. In
• 14:49
  Speaker 7: nineteen eighty seven, Canadian Kenneth Parks drove his car fourteen
• 14:54
  Speaker 7: miles to his mother in law's home, beat her to
• 14:57
  Speaker 7: death with a tire iron and after he claimed he
• 15:02
  Speaker 7: was asleep the whole time, and a jury believed him.
• 15:07
  Speaker 7: And in North Carolina in twenty ten, Joseph Mitchell strangled
• 15:12
  Speaker 7: his four year old son and attacked two of his
• 15:15
  Speaker 7: other children, all while sleepwalking. A jury also found him
• 15:20
  Speaker 7: not guilty. The big question here is just whether ben
• 15:24
  Speaker 7: Elliott in fact killed his sister while he was sleepwalking?
• 15:27
  Speaker 13: Correct, he's here?
• 15:34
  Speaker 7: So Benjamin's lawyers reach out to doctor Gerald Simmons, a
• 15:38
  Speaker 7: neurologist and a sleep disorder expert.
• 15:41
  Speaker 8: When I first was approached, I was very skeptical. The
• 15:45
  Speaker 8: next question is did I even want to deal with this?
• 15:47
  Speaker 8: My first reaction to this is you know, well, who
• 15:52
  Speaker 8: else are they going to go to? I mean, within
• 15:54
  Speaker 8: the field of sleep medicine, this is what I do.
• 15:57
  Speaker 7: Simmons wanted to do a sleep study with ben Benjamin
• 16:00
  Speaker 7: to test if it's possible Benjamin could experience something called
• 16:05
  Speaker 7: a parasomnia.
• 16:07
  Speaker 8: In general, think of a parasomnia as an abnormal behavior
• 16:11
  Speaker 8: that occurs during.
• 16:11
  Speaker 7: Sleep, like sleepwalking.
• 16:13
  Speaker 8: Sleepwalking would be a parasomnia.
• 16:16
  Speaker 7: Simmons asked if Benjamin had a history of sleepwalking, and
• 16:20
  Speaker 7: his lawyers say he did. When he was about ten
• 16:23
  Speaker 7: years old, Benjamin's older sister, Elizabeth, found him sleepwalking by
• 16:28
  Speaker 7: her bedroom door. There was also a sleepover with childhood
• 16:33
  Speaker 7: friends the night this photo was taken. When Benjamin was
• 16:37
  Speaker 7: found asleep on a couch eating a donut. When they
• 16:41
  Speaker 7: woke him, he seemed surprised and confused. Simmons also learned
• 16:47
  Speaker 7: that there were other members of the Elliott family whose sleepwalked.
• 16:51
  Speaker 8: The likelihood genetically is hired to have a parasomnia specifically
• 16:56
  Speaker 8: non am piasomnius if there are other family members that
• 16:58
  Speaker 8: have had that.
• 17:00
  Speaker 13: My uncle apparently used to sleepwalk when he was a teenager.
• 17:03
  Speaker 13: He would go out into the garage and you know,
• 17:05
  Speaker 13: with tools, and apparently he walked in on my mom
• 17:08
  Speaker 13: one time when she was in the shower.
• 17:10
  Speaker 7: Kathy also had an aunt who once walked out of
• 17:13
  Speaker 7: her house while she was asleep.
• 17:15
  Speaker 13: Ran out in the woods in the middle of the night,
• 17:17
  Speaker 13: and you know, waking up in the middle of a
• 17:19
  Speaker 13: thunderstorm outside.
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: You know, here's a video of him right here.
• 17:23
  Speaker 7: Simmons conducted two sleep studies with Benjamin in his sleep lab,
• 17:27
  Speaker 7: six weeks apart. In each, Benjamin was hooked up to
• 17:31
  Speaker 7: machines that monitor just about everything his body did as
• 17:36
  Speaker 7: he slept.
• 17:37
  Speaker 8: This is brainwave activity here. So we did the sleep
• 17:40
  Speaker 8: study activity. I saw that he had obstructed sleep apnea.
• 17:43
  Speaker 7: Obstructive sleep apnea, says Simmons, is where the airway becomes
• 17:48
  Speaker 7: partially blocked, creating a disturbance in the sleep pattern. So
• 17:53
  Speaker 7: he's sleeping struggling a bit to get bread right then,
• 17:58
  Speaker 7: that could be the trigger. Yes, a trigger that Simmons says,
• 18:02
  Speaker 7: could cause a sleepwalking episode, particularly when Benjamin's brain waves
• 18:08
  Speaker 7: enter what is known as a non rem slow wave sleep.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: Now he's been slowly sleeping.
• 18:14
  Speaker 7: This is slow wave sleep.
• 18:16
  Speaker 8: Sleepwalking will typically occur in non rems slow wave sleep.
• 18:20
  Speaker 7: During the sleep studies, Benjamin did not sleepwalk, but Simmons
• 18:25
  Speaker 7: observed how quickly Benjamin entered that non rem slow wave sleep.
• 18:30
  Speaker 8: So it was eleven minutes from the time we turn
• 18:32
  Speaker 8: off the lights until he was in slow wave sleep.
• 18:36
  Speaker 7: This is important because on the night Benjamin stab Megan,
• 18:40
  Speaker 7: his phone activity stopped at four seventeen am. It was
• 18:46
  Speaker 7: just twenty four minutes later that he was on his
• 18:49
  Speaker 7: phone calling nine one one. Simmons says, the fact that
• 18:56
  Speaker 7: Benjamin is able to reach slow wave sleep so quickly
• 19:00
  Speaker 7: means it's possible Benjamin was sleepwalking during that period of
• 19:05
  Speaker 7: time his boat was inactive. Do you believe Ben killed
• 19:15
  Speaker 7: his sister without even realizing he was doing it in
• 19:18
  Speaker 7: his sleep?
• 19:19
  Speaker 8: Yes, Ben definitely killed his sister. He did it, There's
• 19:27
  Speaker 8: no question. He's the one that had the knife and
• 19:28
  Speaker 8: he stabbed her. But I believe it was part of
• 19:30
  Speaker 8: a parasomnia. He didn't do this voluntarily. There was no motivation.
• 19:37
  Speaker 7: Doctor Simmons findings took Benjamin's parents by surprise.
• 19:42
  Speaker 10: It's scary as hell.
• 19:44
  Speaker 13: If that can happen to us, then that could happen
• 19:47
  Speaker 13: to anybody with the sleep problem.
• 20:04
  Speaker 8: He realized he was sinking the knife into something or someone,
• 20:09
  Speaker 8: and then woke up and realized it was his sister.
• 20:15
  Speaker 7: After sleep expere doctor Gerald Simmons made his assessment that
• 20:18
  Speaker 7: Benjamin was sleepwalking when he killed his twin sister, the
• 20:22
  Speaker 7: Elliots were hopeful prosecutors might drop the case.
• 20:26
  Speaker 10: At that point. We thought it might not go to trial.
• 20:31
  Speaker 7: But in April twenty twenty three, a year and a
• 20:34
  Speaker 7: half after Meghan's death, a grand jury indicted Benjamin Elliott,
• 20:39
  Speaker 7: then nineteen years of age, a first degree murder.
• 20:44
  Speaker 9: We just didn't think that what we saw was sleepwalking.
• 20:48
  Speaker 7: Meghan Long and Maroon Kutani would handle the prosecution. It
• 20:53
  Speaker 7: wasn't Long's first sleepwalking case. In twenty nineteen, she successfully
• 20:59
  Speaker 7: convicted a man who claimed he was sleepwalking when he
• 21:02
  Speaker 7: shot and killed his wife, and Long told us she
• 21:06
  Speaker 7: herself was a sleepwalker, as were her children. Still, Long
• 21:11
  Speaker 7: disputes the Elliott's claim of a family history, since she
• 21:15
  Speaker 7: says neither of Benjamin's parents have been sleepwalkers.
• 21:20
  Speaker 9: From our conversations with our sleep expert, family history of
• 21:24
  Speaker 9: sleepwalking is a factor. It's more prevalent when it's like
• 21:28
  Speaker 9: first gay family member, so your parents.
• 21:31
  Speaker 7: The prosecutors hired their own sleep consultant, psychologist doctor Mark Pressman,
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: who concluded Benjamin was not sleepwalking when he stabbed Megan.
• 21:42
  Speaker 7: He says, sleepwalkers become aggressive only when someone physically interferes with.
• 21:48
  Speaker 6: Them, and they respond by hitting or kicking or throwing furniture.
• 21:53
  Speaker 6: But that's that's like a reflex, you know, an instinctive
• 21:57
  Speaker 6: reflex to protect themselves.
• 22:00
  Speaker 7: And he points out that Benjamin would have had to
• 22:02
  Speaker 7: have unsheathed the knife before he used it in the stabbing,
• 22:07
  Speaker 7: which Pressman believes is a complex conscious action, not an
• 22:12
  Speaker 7: unconscious one.
• 22:14
  Speaker 11: The next thing I remember is the feeling of stabbing something.
• 22:20
  Speaker 7: He also says it's unusual for a sleepwalker to recall
• 22:24
  Speaker 7: details the way Benjamin did to authorities after he stabbed Megan.
• 22:29
  Speaker 6: He remembered the feeling of the knife going into the neck. Okay,
• 22:34
  Speaker 6: that's a memory. Okay, I should be able.
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: To have that memory.
• 22:38
  Speaker 7: Aren't there sometimes pockets of memory?
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: Not in these cases?
• 22:41
  Speaker 7: No. Doctor Simmons disagrees. He says Benjamin told police what
• 22:47
  Speaker 7: he could recall.
• 22:48
  Speaker 8: If he was trying to fabricate this or just use
• 22:51
  Speaker 8: this as an alibi, it would have been just as
• 22:52
  Speaker 8: easy for him to say I don't remember anything. Instead
• 22:55
  Speaker 8: he's I interpret it as he's trying to be as
• 22:59
  Speaker 8: honest as he can.
• 23:00
  Speaker 7: But Pressman felt he had enough information to make his determination.
• 23:05
  Speaker 7: You didn't think you needed to talk to ben No,
• 23:09
  Speaker 7: prosecutor long news she needed more than an experts assessment
• 23:13
  Speaker 7: to convict Benjamin, especially because she couldn't identify a motive
• 23:18
  Speaker 7: for murder. No one had witnessed any problems between the twins.
• 23:24
  Speaker 9: Is there no motive because he was sleepwalking, or is
• 23:27
  Speaker 9: there no motive just because no one's willing to come
• 23:29
  Speaker 9: forward and tell.
• 23:30
  Speaker 7: Us, And they think they could convince a jury that
• 23:33
  Speaker 7: Benjamin's actions were intentional that night stabbing Megan twice. One
• 23:39
  Speaker 7: wound was four inches deep and severed her carotid artery
• 23:43
  Speaker 7: and jugular vein.
• 23:45
  Speaker 9: So he's saying that he stabbed her in the neck,
• 23:48
  Speaker 9: removed the knife with where she was stabbed, blood would
• 23:52
  Speaker 9: be coming out of her neck, and you should see
• 23:54
  Speaker 9: some sort of blood spatter on the walls, and there
• 23:57
  Speaker 9: isn't any of that.
• 23:58
  Speaker 7: Benjamin had told police he used a pillow to stop
• 24:01
  Speaker 7: the bleeding, and I tried.
• 24:03
  Speaker 5: To stop bleeding with the pillow and what was behind her.
• 24:07
  Speaker 8: I like to do that.
• 24:09
  Speaker 7: Long doesn't believe that.
• 24:11
  Speaker 9: I think he wanted to cover her face. I think
• 24:14
  Speaker 9: maybe even muffle if she were to scream or anything
• 24:17
  Speaker 9: like that. The only way for there not to be
• 24:19
  Speaker 9: that blood spatter is it had to be there when
• 24:21
  Speaker 9: he took the knife out. It wasn't there for life
• 24:23
  Speaker 9: saving measures.
• 24:24
  Speaker 7: But he's calling nine one one, so he's not trying
• 24:27
  Speaker 7: to hide what he had done, right.
• 24:29
  Speaker 18: I think at that point when he's making that nine
• 24:32
  Speaker 18: one one call, he realizes I can't hide, right, just.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: Stop name.
• 24:42
  Speaker 7: Kutani claims Benjamin is whispering on the nine one one call,
• 24:49
  Speaker 7: and it's suspicious why he's not yelling to his parents
• 24:53
  Speaker 7: for help.
• 24:55
  Speaker 18: I think he's whispering the because he doesn't want his
• 25:01
  Speaker 18: parents to come to the same reality that he's not
• 25:03
  Speaker 18: living in that he took his sister's life. I think
• 25:06
  Speaker 18: that that's why he doesn't awake them before calling nine
• 25:09
  Speaker 18: one one. I think that's why he doesn't scream in
• 25:12
  Speaker 18: the house when he realizes what he's done.
• 25:15
  Speaker 7: And they argue Megan was already dead by the time
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: Benjamin called nine one one.
• 25:24
  Speaker 9: By the time ems got there. She wasn't breathing on
• 25:27
  Speaker 9: her own, she had no heartbeat. Our medical examiner said
• 25:32
  Speaker 9: that with the wound that she suffered from, she would
• 25:35
  Speaker 9: have been dead within minutes.
• 25:38
  Speaker 7: Benjamin's interrogation raised even more questions, they say, especially when
• 25:43
  Speaker 7: Benjamin described his house as a crime scene.
• 25:47
  Speaker 18: Benjamin Ellie is asked by Deputy Munio's where's your phone?
• 25:51
  Speaker 18: Benjamin Ellie responds with it's at the crime scene, and
• 25:55
  Speaker 18: to us that was significant. Not many seventeen year old
• 25:58
  Speaker 18: would respond with at the crime scene. Most people would
• 26:02
  Speaker 18: say at my house, in my room.
• 26:04
  Speaker 7: And there is more, says Kutani.
• 26:07
  Speaker 18: His demeanor and his behavior is very calm, certainly not
• 26:11
  Speaker 18: the type of behavior you would expect from somebody who
• 26:14
  Speaker 18: comes to with a knife in their hand and their
• 26:17
  Speaker 18: sister dead in the sleep of her own bedroom.
• 26:20
  Speaker 7: Could he be in shock, I mean, realizing what he
• 26:24
  Speaker 7: had done. Isn't that possible?
• 26:27
  Speaker 18: I think based on his response to Deputy Munos in
• 26:30
  Speaker 18: a couple portions of the interview, we can tell that
• 26:33
  Speaker 18: he's not necessarily in shock with what the consequences of
• 26:36
  Speaker 18: his actions were.
• 26:37
  Speaker 7: During the interview, Benjamin told believes that his sister had
• 26:41
  Speaker 7: struggled with her mental health.
• 26:43
  Speaker 11: My sister had a pretty severe depression of camorrow maya.
• 26:51
  Speaker 7: To prosecutors that suggested maybe everything wasn't so perfect in
• 26:56
  Speaker 7: the Eliott family, a contingent that Benjiman's lawyers find ridiculous.
• 27:03
  Speaker 7: They say investigators made virtually no effort to learn about
• 27:07
  Speaker 7: the Elliotts or Benjamin.
• 27:11
  Speaker 17: They don't have a clue about this kid. They weren't
• 27:13
  Speaker 17: even curious he.
• 27:15
  Speaker 14: Would know what was going to happen to him if
• 27:17
  Speaker 14: he killed his sister. There was nothing for him to gain.
• 27:20
  Speaker 14: There was everything for him to lose. There's just no
• 27:24
  Speaker 14: reason why he would have done that.
• 27:27
  Speaker 7: Before trial, prosecutors offered Benjamin a thirty year plea deal.
• 27:33
  Speaker 7: He turned it down.
• 27:35
  Speaker 17: The tragedy is now the family lost their daughter, but
• 27:38
  Speaker 17: they're now losing their son. He's on trial for his life.
• 27:52
  Speaker 10: All he's a victim.
• 27:55
  Speaker 13: He went to sleep, he woke up, and he found
• 27:59
  Speaker 13: out he'd sister.
• 28:01
  Speaker 7: After struggling with Meghan's loss, Movis, the Elliots now faced
• 28:05
  Speaker 7: the possibility they could lose Benjamin too.
• 28:09
  Speaker 10: It's a nightmare that happened to all of us.
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 28:12
  Speaker 7: For the jury, Benjamin's first degree murder trial began on
• 28:16
  Speaker 7: February eighteenth, twenty twenty five.
• 28:19
  Speaker 14: You tell your colleagues of a client who killed us
• 28:22
  Speaker 14: twin sister, and we believe he was sleepwalking, then they
• 28:24
  Speaker 14: think you're crazy.
• 28:26
  Speaker 7: But with no evidence of any problems between the twins,
• 28:29
  Speaker 7: Benjamin's lawyers hoped they could convince a jury that sleepwalking
• 28:34
  Speaker 7: is the only explanation. Even prosecutors knew the lack of
• 28:39
  Speaker 7: motive could be a problem.
• 28:41
  Speaker 9: I think our biggest hurdle going into this trial was
• 28:43
  Speaker 9: the why.
• 28:44
  Speaker 7: So you made sure you had jurors who at least
• 28:46
  Speaker 7: be open to the idea they may never know why
• 28:50
  Speaker 7: Meghan Elliott was stabbed. Right in his opening remarks my room,
• 28:56
  Speaker 7: Katani made it clear that while there was no mo
• 29:00
  Speaker 7: they had their murderer.
• 29:02
  Speaker 18: He calls nine to one.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: One at four forty one, Hello, Hello, I stabbed her
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: with a knife.
• 29:15
  Speaker 5: He's whispering.
• 29:16
  Speaker 7: Prosecutors told Jerrors about Benjamin's behavior during that interrogation.
• 29:22
  Speaker 18: And you'll see his demeanor of the.
• 29:23
  Speaker 7: Interview, pointing to Benjamin's reaction when the detective tells him
• 29:28
  Speaker 7: Megan is dead.
• 29:30
  Speaker 18: I'm sorry to tell you this, but Megan has succumb
• 29:33
  Speaker 18: to her injuries, and the defendant.
• 29:35
  Speaker 7: Says witnesses offered details about her wounds, the lack of
• 29:43
  Speaker 7: blood spatter, and the prosecution's theory that Benjamin covered Meghan's
• 29:48
  Speaker 7: head with a pillow while he stabbed her, and Benjamin's
• 29:52
  Speaker 7: father was surprised to learn that prosecutors would ask him
• 29:56
  Speaker 7: to identify Meghan's body for the record.
• 29:59
  Speaker 9: Is photo taken from an autopsy?
• 30:10
  Speaker 4: Yeah?
• 30:14
  Speaker 10: For the question drama.
• 30:15
  Speaker 7: After the prosecution rested, defense attorneys carry Hart and Wes
• 30:20
  Speaker 7: Rutger took over more making their case about sleepwalking.
• 30:25
  Speaker 4: And this is not a ruse.
• 30:27
  Speaker 17: This is not some defense to get them off of
• 30:30
  Speaker 17: a tragic set of circumstances.
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: This is a real phenomenon.
• 30:35
  Speaker 7: And that call Benjamin made to nine one one, the
• 30:39
  Speaker 7: defense says, that's evidence he was desperate to save Megan.
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: He's saying things like, oh my god, I thought it
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: was a dream.
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: I don't I don't want her to die. He's trying
• 30:51
  Speaker 4: to do CPR.
• 30:55
  Speaker 7: Family friend Drew Whittaker told the jury about Benjamin's devotion
• 30:59
  Speaker 7: to ever.
• 31:01
  Speaker 17: Noticed that if the sweet kid or the tender kid
• 31:04
  Speaker 17: change into somebody else, absolutely.
• 31:06
  Speaker 7: Not appearing by zoom. Childhood friend Annan Singh told the
• 31:11
  Speaker 7: jury about that sleepover when he found Benjamin asleep and
• 31:16
  Speaker 7: eating a donut, just the sheer confusion on his face,
• 31:20
  Speaker 7: like he genuinely seemed baffled.
• 31:22
  Speaker 10: As to how that happened.
• 31:23
  Speaker 7: Benjamin's great aunt, Martha Knight Oakley, a psychologist, told the
• 31:28
  Speaker 7: jury about her own sleepwalking history, including finding herself in
• 31:33
  Speaker 7: the woods one night.
• 31:34
  Speaker 13: All I know is I came to in the bushes.
• 31:39
  Speaker 5: Clutching my dog.
• 31:41
  Speaker 7: But the defense team's star witness was doctor Gerald Simmons.
• 31:46
  Speaker 7: He testified for four hours detailing the science and sleep
• 31:51
  Speaker 7: studies that convinced him of Benjamin's innocence.
• 31:56
  Speaker 8: It totally fits in line with a process we call
• 31:59
  Speaker 8: sleep sleepwalking violent behaviors.
• 32:02
  Speaker 7: On rebuttal, prosecutors called their own sleepwalking expert, doctor Mark pressmo.
• 32:08
  Speaker 4: I, concluded he was not in a sleepwalking state.
• 32:11
  Speaker 9: How did you come to that conclusion?
• 32:13
  Speaker 4: He had memory.
• 32:15
  Speaker 6: He is said to have come out of the state
• 32:18
  Speaker 6: much faster than any sleepwalker could ever do.
• 32:21
  Speaker 7: In closing arguments, prosecutors described a deliberate murder.
• 32:27
  Speaker 18: Benjamin Elliott walked into his sister's room with this very knife,
• 32:31
  Speaker 18: and he stabbed her in the neck twice. There's no
• 32:34
  Speaker 18: blood spraying in the room. You know why.
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: The only thing.
• 32:36
  Speaker 18: Soaked in blood is the pillow that he muffled her screams.
• 32:40
  Speaker 7: With Benjamin's defense attorneys pushed back, if.
• 32:44
  Speaker 14: You're trying to cover something up, you're not calling nine
• 32:47
  Speaker 14: one one, You're not begging for someone to help your sister.
• 32:50
  Speaker 7: And they appealed for justice.
• 32:53
  Speaker 17: You do not convict a young man, a seventeen year
• 32:55
  Speaker 17: old because of how he looks or because how he
• 32:58
  Speaker 17: answers interrogation questions.
• 33:00
  Speaker 7: But prosecutor Megan Long had the final word, and she
• 33:04
  Speaker 7: suggested the family was involved in a cover up that
• 33:08
  Speaker 7: began with calling the friend who is a lawyer.
• 33:11
  Speaker 9: Look, I'm a mother. I understand wanting to protect your children.
• 33:17
  Speaker 9: I get it, but you can't let them get away
• 33:19
  Speaker 9: with it. They have been protecting him from the get go.
• 33:24
  Speaker 7: Long didn't leave it there.
• 33:26
  Speaker 9: They want to say that this family life was perfect,
• 33:29
  Speaker 9: but we don't necessarily know what happens behind closed doors.
• 33:33
  Speaker 7: And what she said next done the courtroom filled with
• 33:36
  Speaker 7: the Elliott family and friends.
• 33:39
  Speaker 9: I want you to look in this courtroom. There are
• 33:42
  Speaker 9: so many people here for Benjamin. There is not one
• 33:46
  Speaker 9: person here for Megan.
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: I'm going to check about.
• 33:50
  Speaker 18: That.
• 33:50
  Speaker 7: The judge let the prosecution continue.
• 33:53
  Speaker 9: You have to be her hero. He knew exactly what
• 33:57
  Speaker 9: he was doing. There's been no remorse shown here in
• 33:59
  Speaker 9: this courtroom by him.
• 34:03
  Speaker 7: After four days of testimony, the case went to the jury.
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: We took a vote immediately.
• 34:10
  Speaker 7: Jurors were divided.
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: It was split from seven to five.
• 34:15
  Speaker 7: Could they reach a verdict?
• 34:31
  Speaker 15: I was a sleepwalker when one of my own children
• 34:33
  Speaker 15: used to sleepwalk too.
• 34:34
  Speaker 7: As several of the jurors who decided Benjamin's fate knew
• 34:38
  Speaker 7: a lot about sleepwalking. You know someone who was a sleepwalker?
• 34:42
  Speaker 5: Absolutely yes, had a family member, yes, on my mom's side,
• 34:46
  Speaker 5: my grandfather.
• 34:47
  Speaker 7: But even with their experience, they were deeply conflicted about Benjamin.
• 34:52
  Speaker 4: And we spent a lot of time with the interview by.
• 34:54
  Speaker 10: The detective I'm taking the SAT.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: I think.
• 35:00
  Speaker 8: He talked about how he was going to go take
• 35:02
  Speaker 8: the SAT. He just seemed to not have a lot
• 35:07
  Speaker 8: of remorse.
• 35:10
  Speaker 7: It didn't take them long to come to a unanimous decision.
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: My understanding is that y'all have a verdict? Is that correct?
• 35:21
  Speaker 7: After four hours of deliberations, we.
• 35:24
  Speaker 19: The jury find the defendant Benjamin David Elliott guilty of
• 35:27
  Speaker 19: murder is charging the indictment signed by the foreman of
• 35:29
  Speaker 19: the jury, up printed by the foreman of the jury.
• 35:34
  Speaker 5: I remember hearing guilty and I was completely shocked.
• 35:40
  Speaker 7: Benjamin Elliott, who did not testify a trial, later spoke
• 35:44
  Speaker 7: to forty eight hours inside the County jail.
• 35:47
  Speaker 5: I feel like this has been a I don't know,
• 35:53
  Speaker 5: a miscarriage of justice seconds. I am not guilty of
• 35:58
  Speaker 5: murder for my sister, Megan Elliot.
• 36:02
  Speaker 7: Benjamin, now twenty one years old, said he and his
• 36:06
  Speaker 7: family were appalled by the way prosecutor Megan Long ended
• 36:10
  Speaker 7: her closing argument.
• 36:12
  Speaker 10: There are so.
• 36:13
  Speaker 9: Many people here for Benjamin. There is not one person
• 36:17
  Speaker 9: here for Megan.
• 36:19
  Speaker 5: That was crazy to me.
• 36:22
  Speaker 7: What do you mean.
• 36:25
  Speaker 5: Everyone in that courtroom was there for Megan.
• 36:28
  Speaker 9: I understand wanting to protect.
• 36:30
  Speaker 7: Your children and his parents were outraged by this statements
• 36:34
  Speaker 7: made by prosecutors hinting to problems within the family.
• 36:38
  Speaker 9: We don't necessarily know what happens behind closed doors.
• 36:42
  Speaker 10: They were lying, yeah, it was warm.
• 36:44
  Speaker 13: They waited until the closing, when they knew that nothing
• 36:47
  Speaker 13: could be said afterwards, to pull out these outlandish implications
• 36:52
  Speaker 13: about you don't know what happens behind closing.
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: Yeah, she knows, Dan Will.
• 36:54
  Speaker 12: There's not a shred of evidence that anything on toward
• 36:57
  Speaker 12: was happening in our house, in our family.
• 37:04
  Speaker 7: Okay, Benjamin and his parents had little time to let
• 37:11
  Speaker 7: the guilty verdicts sink in.
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: Does he have to say?
• 37:15
  Speaker 12: Yes.
• 37:16
  Speaker 7: They were back in court for sentencing the following day,
• 37:20
  Speaker 7: and he is the.
• 37:22
  Speaker 18: One that went into her room that night and saw the.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: Life out of her.
• 37:27
  Speaker 7: Prosecutors asked for forty years, but a member of the
• 37:31
  Speaker 7: jury asked the judge for leniency because he worried about
• 37:34
  Speaker 7: Benjamin's family. Judge Denilo Lecayo told the court he wanted
• 37:41
  Speaker 7: a sentence that he could live with.
• 37:43
  Speaker 19: I sentenced you to fifteen years in prison. This time
• 37:46
  Speaker 19: you will go with these.
• 37:47
  Speaker 7: The request for leniency, says Benjamin, makes him wonder if
• 37:51
  Speaker 7: a few jurors had more doubts than they wanted to admit.
• 37:55
  Speaker 5: If you believe that I crept into my sister's bedroom
• 38:00
  Speaker 5: and murdered her while she was asleep, why would you
• 38:05
  Speaker 5: possibly want leniency for that person? That person is horrible?
• 38:11
  Speaker 7: Are you that person?
• 38:13
  Speaker 5: No, I'm not, I'm not that person. I mean I'm
• 38:20
  Speaker 5: I'd try to be genuine, I'd try to be honest.
• 38:23
  Speaker 5: I'd like to think of myself as a good person.
• 38:27
  Speaker 7: Benjamin says authorities misconstrued everything he did. Started with that
• 38:35
  Speaker 7: nine to one one call. The prosecutors say, you were
• 38:38
  Speaker 7: whispering on the phone.
• 38:40
  Speaker 5: Were you No, that's ridiculous. I wasn't whispering.
• 38:42
  Speaker 7: I was parent.
• 38:47
  Speaker 5: I wasn't screaming into the phone because I'm just not
• 38:50
  Speaker 5: a I don't really yell.
• 38:53
  Speaker 7: And Benjamin insists that as soon as he realized what
• 38:56
  Speaker 7: he had done, he was trying to help megan using
• 38:59
  Speaker 7: the pillow to try to stop the bleeding. The state
• 39:03
  Speaker 7: says that you didn't use the pillow to try to
• 39:05
  Speaker 7: stop the bleeding. You did it to keep her from screaming.
• 39:11
  Speaker 7: What do you say to that.
• 39:13
  Speaker 5: That's crazy to me, And there's absolutely absolutely zero forensic
• 39:20
  Speaker 5: evidence for that at all.
• 39:22
  Speaker 7: And what about his seemingly calm demeanor throughout the police interview.
• 39:27
  Speaker 7: The plan is I'm taking the SAT, you're talking to
• 39:30
  Speaker 7: a deputy, and you're talking about SATs and collegists.
• 39:35
  Speaker 5: I'm trying to get my mind off of things. I've
• 39:39
  Speaker 5: had some issues with school stuff. Sometimes I think you
• 39:42
  Speaker 5: can see it in the conversation. I keep pretty much
• 39:45
  Speaker 5: steering the conversation away from what happened. I don't want
• 39:50
  Speaker 5: to think about it.
• 39:51
  Speaker 7: As for learning Meghan had died, Benjamin says he just
• 39:55
  Speaker 7: shut down and that he was desperately hoping she'd be Okay,
• 40:00
  Speaker 7: do you feel you're guilty of anything?
• 40:02
  Speaker 5: No, you don't, No, No, I don't think this is
• 40:08
  Speaker 5: my photo. I used to blame myself for it because
• 40:11
  Speaker 5: it's like, I mean, I was the one holding the knife, right,
• 40:17
  Speaker 5: But I mean I've come to realize that I'm not
• 40:21
  Speaker 5: you know, I couldn't have done anything any different than
• 40:24
  Speaker 5: what I had done.
• 40:30
  Speaker 7: And Benjamin says he misses his twin.
• 40:36
  Speaker 5: It's really hard that she's not here.
• 40:43
  Speaker 7: Isn't it hard to know that it's because of you
• 40:46
  Speaker 7: she's not here.
• 40:48
  Speaker 5: Yeah, Yeah, it's really hard. We did everything together. We
• 40:55
  Speaker 5: were very very close. She was a wonderful person. She
• 41:02
  Speaker 5: was an artist. The way she looked at the world,
• 41:06
  Speaker 5: she looked at it with like a creative mind. So
• 41:10
  Speaker 5: she would just see just beautiful things everywhere.
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: H m h m hm, m hm hm hm