Latest / NO FILTER / Marine vet kills cop wife with her own service weapon in fatal on-duty ambush(MP3_160K)
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: I'm Chris Hansen right now on Crime Watch Daily.
- 0:03Speaker 2: From here in New York City.
- 0:12Speaker 3: A.
- 0:14Speaker 1: Beloved woman in blue ambush from behind and shot dead.
- 0:19Speaker 4: Took her gun over her holster while she laid on
- 0:22Speaker 4: the ground, shot her three times in the face.
- 0:24Speaker 1: Her devoted husband, a decorated former marine, absolutely shattered. The
- 0:31Speaker 1: hunt is on for a cop killer and whoever assassinated
- 0:34Speaker 1: Officer Jen Sabina had a deadly grudge.
- 0:37Speaker 5: It was very personal.
- 0:39Speaker 1: Nearess a Knight on the case of Footprints in the snow,
- 0:42Speaker 1: a mystery car and the most surprising suspect of all.
- 0:46Speaker 6: He had been stalking her.
- 0:49Speaker 1: Then a Las Vegas murder mystery. An aspiring actor and
- 0:54Speaker 1: amateur boxer, He goes out for a run and never
- 0:57Speaker 1: comes back.
- 0:58Speaker 7: Any enemies, No, what could the motive possibly beat?
- 1:02Speaker 3: It?
- 1:02Speaker 5: To kill this guy?
- 1:03Speaker 1: Jason Materira uncovers the secret that will shock everyone.
- 1:07Speaker 2: That's some freaky style right now, go, let's go.
- 1:11Speaker 8: Jason Mattara with Prime Watch Daily.
- 1:13Speaker 7: I'm miss also going up from Crimewatch Day.
- 1:15Speaker 9: Yes, let's be smart.
- 1:16Speaker 2: From Crimewatch Daily.
- 1:17Speaker 10: It's Ana Garcia from Crime Watch Daily. You got anything
- 1:20Speaker 10: to say?
- 1:21Speaker 2: Is Crime Watch Daily?
- 1:22Speaker 7: What do you mean, you don't know if she's thirteen,
- 1:24Speaker 7: you're running away. Now.
- 1:28Speaker 1: Welcome to Crime Watch Daily everyone, I'm Chris Hansen. First
- 1:31Speaker 1: up today, the calm of Christmas Eve in Wisconsin is
- 1:34Speaker 1: interrupted by gunfire. Five shots, but only one target. Our
- 1:38Speaker 1: nursing night is in the Midwest. Now with today's.
- 1:41Speaker 9: Top story, Chris. Officer Jennifer Savina had just taken a break.
- 1:45Speaker 11: She was on her way back to her patrol car
- 1:48Speaker 11: when she was ambushed, the attacker grabbing her service weapon
- 1:51Speaker 11: and shooting her five times, including several shots to the face.
- 1:58Speaker 9: It's barely Christmas Eve than Walla Tosa, Wisconsin. When five
- 2:04Speaker 9: shots shadowed this pretty police officer's silent night.
- 2:10Speaker 5: She was ambushed from behind.
- 2:13Speaker 4: She was shot two times in the back of her head.
- 2:17Speaker 9: But Officer jen Sabina's killer wasn't done.
- 2:21Speaker 4: Took her gun out of her holster while she laid
- 2:23Speaker 4: on the ground and shot her three times in the face.
- 2:27Speaker 9: Her broken hearted husband erupts in rage, and so her
- 2:36Speaker 9: brothers in blue track her killer's footprints in the snow.
- 2:41Speaker 12: This was the hardest that I've dealt with in my career.
- 2:47Speaker 5: Clearly indicates that it was very personal.
- 2:52Speaker 9: Thirty year old Jen Sabina was married, by all accounts,
- 2:56Speaker 9: happy and didn't have an enemy in the world. Fellow
- 2:59Speaker 9: officer say she was the kind of comp most people
- 3:02Speaker 9: actually loved to see coming.
- 3:05Speaker 4: Her smile was infectious around the station.
- 3:07Speaker 13: Just a very good person who wanted to help people.
- 3:11Speaker 9: In a round of uniform. Jin Sabina was always there
- 3:14Speaker 9: for people. She even served as church leader in a
- 3:17Speaker 9: youth group.
- 3:18Speaker 14: She had like a group of girls that she would
- 3:20Speaker 14: just keep track of to keep tabs on. But you've
- 3:23Speaker 14: never felt like you were just a number in her
- 3:25Speaker 14: like book.
- 3:25Speaker 6: It was always just.
- 3:27Speaker 14: You know you were her favorite. She was the most fun, loving, caring,
- 3:32Speaker 14: energetic person that you would ever meet.
- 3:35Speaker 9: Her husband, Ben, a marine and Purple hard War hero,
- 3:39Speaker 9: was seriously injured in a rock I'm away around.
- 3:42Speaker 5: Came down here.
- 3:43Speaker 3: I looked on at my knee and my pants are
- 3:46Speaker 3: just soaked in blood, and look over and my arm
- 3:48Speaker 3: is drooping off my body and just holding by a
- 3:50Speaker 3: couple of tendants.
- 3:51Speaker 5: Strapnel ripped right through it.
- 3:54Speaker 9: Ben spent months in the hospital, but in this YouTube
- 3:57Speaker 9: video done for his church, Ben credits Jin with saving
- 4:00Speaker 9: his life.
- 4:02Speaker 3: I came back on to Wisconsin and started spending more
- 4:04Speaker 3: time with Jen and we are love flourished.
- 4:10Speaker 9: Just hours before her murder, Ben texted using his pet
- 4:14Speaker 9: name for Jen Beto, writing Merry Christmas, Bedo. Jen writes
- 4:19Speaker 9: back eve ha. A few minutes later, Ben texts Jen again,
- 4:25Speaker 9: well call me if you get too bored. I love you,
- 4:28Speaker 9: Merry Christmas. Jen writes back, I love you too, smiley face.
- 4:33Speaker 9: A little more than five hours later, Ben texts Jen again,
- 4:37Speaker 9: This time there is panic in his words, Baby, are
- 4:41Speaker 9: you okay? They just said an officer is down in Tosa.
- 4:45Speaker 9: Jen does not respond. Nine minutes later, Ben sends another text, Baby,
- 4:51Speaker 9: please text or call me. I'm scared. Still no response.
- 4:55Speaker 9: At five point fifty one am, Ben sends one last
- 4:58Speaker 9: desperate message, Babe please. Minutes later, Ben calls the Walla
- 5:05Speaker 9: Tosa Police Department in a panic dispatch can't reach her either.
- 5:11Speaker 9: The department quickly tracks her squad car to the parking
- 5:14Speaker 9: lot of the fire department, where police would often park
- 5:17Speaker 9: to fill out paperwork.
- 5:19Speaker 7: Sixteen o one Underwood Avenue.
- 5:22Speaker 9: Park cops from Jen's watch were first on the scene.
- 5:28Speaker 10: They are re questioning back up for an ambush off
- 5:31Speaker 10: the pronund It.
- 5:33Speaker 9: Took only minutes for her fellow officers to get there,
- 5:36Speaker 9: but when they found her, it was already too late.
- 5:39Speaker 4: I can't imagine what those officers immediately went through when
- 5:42Speaker 4: they came upon her in that parking lot.
- 5:44Speaker 9: Officer jen Sabina had been shot hours earlier. How is
- 5:48Speaker 9: her body found?
- 5:50Speaker 4: She was laying on a cold, wet parking lot. She
- 5:55Speaker 4: was shot multiple times in her head and in her face.
- 5:58Speaker 4: That's just not right for her to have been left like.
- 6:00Speaker 10: That, This young beautiful woman shot in the face.
- 6:08Speaker 5: Did that add insult to the jury, Yeah, it does.
- 6:11Speaker 5: It's not a normal homicide.
- 6:15Speaker 9: The attack calculated and cold.
- 6:19Speaker 4: There was no indication, based on the medical examiner's report
- 6:23Speaker 4: that Jennifer wasn't dead from the first two rounds that
- 6:28Speaker 4: were fired. There was no reason to remove her gun
- 6:31Speaker 4: to shoot her in the face.
- 6:34Speaker 9: But who would be so vicious to this loving wife
- 6:38Speaker 9: and beloved police officer in the early morning hours of
- 6:41Speaker 9: Christmas Eve?
- 6:43Speaker 5: Clearly indicates that it was very personal.
- 6:47Speaker 9: Cop started tracking footprints in the snow found in the
- 6:50Speaker 9: parking lot as detectives deliver the tragic news to her
- 6:54Speaker 9: husband Ben at the station.
- 6:59Speaker 11: Excuse, okay, how did he react?
- 7:03Speaker 5: He was visibly upset.
- 7:05Speaker 13: He was emotional as you would expect him to be
- 7:08Speaker 13: a wonderful person.
- 7:11Speaker 14: She was helping me.
- 7:17Speaker 9: Just hours before Jen was assassinated ben Tell's detectives, he
- 7:21Speaker 9: kissed his smiling wife goodbye for the last time, happy.
- 7:29Speaker 15: As just happy.
- 7:30Speaker 3: We hugged.
- 7:32Speaker 15: Hugging a kiss.
- 7:34Speaker 9: Cops are baffled. Then a break that would turn the
- 7:37Speaker 9: case upside down. Detectives start checking surveillance cameras in the
- 7:42Speaker 9: area around the shooting. Suddenly they spotted familiar vehicle, this
- 7:47Speaker 9: black Prius with black rims.
- 7:50Speaker 4: His vehicle is basically tracked through Apartment of Transportation cameras
- 7:56Speaker 4: from locations up near their residence and all the way
- 7:59Speaker 4: down through the freeways and through the side streets to
- 8:03Speaker 4: where it appears on camera a block away from the
- 8:06Speaker 4: murder scene.
- 8:07Speaker 9: Up next, cops closed in on the killer who hunted
- 8:11Speaker 9: down Officer Jen Sabina.
- 8:13Speaker 6: One of the things that no one knew until he
- 8:15Speaker 6: told us is that he had been stalking her.
- 8:20Speaker 1: Officer Jennifer Sabina is gunned down while on patrol in
- 8:24Speaker 1: the suburbs of Milwaukee, and police are about to uncovered
- 8:27Speaker 1: chilling videotapes of the suspect talking about killing people on YouTube.
- 8:32Speaker 1: Let's head back to our Eurysanit.
- 8:36Speaker 9: Early Christmas Eve morning, Officer Jen Sabina lays in the
- 8:40Speaker 9: freezing cold snow ambushed, shot five times, three in the face.
- 8:46Speaker 12: In my head, I was obsessed with the fact that
- 8:49Speaker 12: she was lying out in the rain, and I couldn't
- 8:52Speaker 12: get out of my head. It ate me alive for
- 8:56Speaker 12: months after the fact that she was lying out in
- 8:59Speaker 12: the rain all alone.
- 9:01Speaker 11: He wanted to protect her from the rain.
- 9:03Speaker 9: Yeah, her brothers in blue are heartbroken.
- 9:07Speaker 12: I looked at all of the younger officers almost like
- 9:10Speaker 12: my kids, and tell all the families how we were
- 9:13Speaker 12: going to keep them safe. And I failed. I failed
- 9:18Speaker 12: miserably in this case. I didn't keep her safe.
- 9:22Speaker 9: And when they deliver the news to her husband at
- 9:25Speaker 9: seven o three am that morning, he's inconsolable. Waalato's the
- 9:34Speaker 9: police are baffled. Officers Sabinas seemed to be loved by all.
- 9:38Speaker 9: Could there be a crazed cop killer on the loose?
- 9:41Speaker 9: Investigators don't think so. The three shots to the face
- 9:45Speaker 9: tell them something different.
- 9:47Speaker 5: Clearly indicates that it was very personal.
- 9:51Speaker 9: Police track footprints and the snow at the scene. At
- 9:54Speaker 9: first it leads nowhere, Then a break. Detectives begin checking
- 9:59Speaker 9: surveillance in the area around the shooting. Suddenly they spot
- 10:03Speaker 9: a familiar vehicle, this black prius with black rims. Who
- 10:10Speaker 9: is it? Unbelievably, the prius looks identical to the one
- 10:14Speaker 9: Jennifer's husband Ben drives.
- 10:16Speaker 4: His vehicle is basically tracked through Apartment of Transportation cameras
- 10:23Speaker 4: from locations up near their residence and all the way
- 10:26Speaker 4: down through the freeways and through the side streets to
- 10:30Speaker 4: where it appears on camera a block away from the
- 10:33Speaker 4: murder scene.
- 10:34Speaker 9: Ben's called back down to the station. It's four point
- 10:37Speaker 9: thirty in the afternoon on Christmas Day. He rushes over
- 10:41Speaker 9: without hesitation. beIN's there to get answers about what happened
- 10:45Speaker 9: to his wife. Instead, he gets questions and.
- 10:50Speaker 5: Something happened that morning?
- 10:54Speaker 15: And the only humor what happened here?
- 10:57Speaker 4: I do know.
- 11:00Speaker 13: Then, I know you're upsetting me with I don't want
- 11:04Speaker 13: any disrespect.
- 11:07Speaker 15: Yeah, just anything I can explain to you is that
- 11:10Speaker 15: I loved her. There's no rage. There was no outburst
- 11:14Speaker 15: ever directed at her, and I never would because I
- 11:17Speaker 15: had such true love for her that I couldn't hurt her.
- 11:21Speaker 9: Despite Ben's denial, cops go to Gin and Ben's house.
- 11:25Speaker 9: They find footprints in the snow there too, but at
- 11:28Speaker 9: first they come up empty inside. Detectives go back to
- 11:32Speaker 9: grilling Ben later that Christmas Day.
- 11:34Speaker 2: I could never hurt her.
- 11:36Speaker 15: If I was there, I would have seen your ass anyway.
- 11:39Speaker 15: I would have anything.
- 11:41Speaker 7: He stopped her handing.
- 11:42Speaker 12: He made so many different statements that it's it's difficult
- 11:47Speaker 12: for me to really gauge how much of it was
- 11:50Speaker 12: true and how much of it wasn't.
- 11:53Speaker 9: Now convinced Ben's the killer, police go back to the
- 11:57Speaker 9: house again for a closer look. This time they hit
- 12:00Speaker 9: the jackpot, literally, finding the smoking guns stuffed in the ceiling.
- 12:06Speaker 4: Hidden behind several pieces of insulation in the rafters of
- 12:11Speaker 4: the basement. We located both the nine millimeter Makarov style
- 12:16Speaker 4: weapon and we located Jennifer's duty weapon.
- 12:20Speaker 9: Cops would soon learn Ben was hunting another very dark secret.
- 12:25Speaker 3: I was a marine, and we're trained to kill. We're
- 12:27Speaker 3: trained that death is okay.
- 12:31Speaker 9: In this YouTube video made by his church before Jennifer's murder,
- 12:35Speaker 9: the former marine who fought in Afghanistan in Iraq reveals
- 12:39Speaker 9: he's now battling PTSD.
- 12:42Speaker 7: The first time he.
- 12:42Speaker 3: Came back from Iraq, I was extremely angry and very
- 12:47Speaker 3: lost in my ways. I was scared out of my
- 12:49Speaker 3: mind and I was angry all the time.
- 12:52Speaker 9: But was his dark and lonely world so bleak It
- 12:55Speaker 9: made him kill the one person who loved him unconditionally, like.
- 13:00Speaker 16: When he kissed her goobye when she went to work
- 13:02Speaker 16: that night. Did he have an idea that this was
- 13:04Speaker 16: going to happen.
- 13:05Speaker 17: I think the war and PTSD did make a contribution
- 13:10Speaker 17: to his acting out and murdering his wife. However, I
- 13:13Speaker 17: don't think that was sufficient enough explanation.
- 13:18Speaker 9: Doctor Schukbadi, a board certified psychiatrist for more than forty years,
- 13:22Speaker 9: is an expert on PTSD. He never interviewed Ben Sabina,
- 13:26Speaker 9: but after looking at the case, tells Crime Watch Daily
- 13:29Speaker 9: he thinks Ben was afraid of losing Jennifer. Prosecutor Mark
- 13:34Speaker 9: Williams claims Ben Sabina was insanely jealous and angry about
- 13:39Speaker 9: his wife's success as a police officer.
- 13:41Speaker 6: One of the things that no one knew until he
- 13:43Speaker 6: taught us is that he had been stocking her and
- 13:45Speaker 6: he said a lot of This was to because of
- 13:48Speaker 6: the jealousy was motivating him. He wanted to find out
- 13:51Speaker 6: what she was doing. Obviously made a choice at some
- 13:54Speaker 6: point that he would have to kill her in order
- 13:58Speaker 6: not to lose her.
- 13:59Speaker 16: Jennifer was very professional. She was friendly, but never flirtatious
- 14:03Speaker 16: with anybody that I saw. He was struggling in his
- 14:06Speaker 16: own life as far as to get a successful career
- 14:09Speaker 16: or job, and of course she had hers all laid out,
- 14:12Speaker 16: so I think that was a source of friction probably
- 14:14Speaker 16: between them.
- 14:16Speaker 9: Jennifer had only been with the department for a little
- 14:19Speaker 9: less than two years, and in public, she and Ben
- 14:21Speaker 9: seemed to be a merried couple madly in love.
- 14:25Speaker 12: My first encounter with him was actually at Jennifer swearing in,
- 14:29Speaker 12: and the two of them were like giddy teenagers in
- 14:34Speaker 12: love and all outward appearances holding hands and giggling and
- 14:38Speaker 12: staring into each other's eyes.
- 14:41Speaker 9: Remember when Cops first told Ben Sabina about his wife's death,
- 14:44Speaker 9: he flew into a rage. Now Copps believe Ben was
- 14:54Speaker 9: just trying to throw them off his track.
- 14:56Speaker 13: Keith flipped over the interview table a fit of rage,
- 15:01Speaker 13: and I think that was just something he probably thought
- 15:05Speaker 13: would be appropriate or something that somebody who just found
- 15:08Speaker 13: that out would do. I don't think it was because
- 15:11Speaker 13: he was that angry or that upset putting on an
- 15:14Speaker 13: act for you.
- 15:14Speaker 17: Yes.
- 15:15Speaker 9: Finally, at six point fifty two, the day after Christmas,
- 15:19Speaker 9: following sixty grueling hours of interrogation, Ben Sabina comes.
- 15:23Speaker 13: Clean confession that right, I did it.
- 15:27Speaker 9: I did it, confessing to shooting the woman he claimed
- 15:31Speaker 9: to love twice in the back of the head, then
- 15:35Speaker 9: pulling out her very own police pistol and firing three
- 15:39Speaker 9: more rounds wide into her face.
- 15:42Speaker 10: Do you think she knew who killed her?
- 15:45Speaker 4: I can only hope that it was quick, that it
- 15:46Speaker 4: was painless, that her last thoughts were nothing but positive,
- 15:51Speaker 4: happy as she walked out of that fire station, ready
- 15:53Speaker 4: to continue on her shift.
- 15:55Speaker 5: You're going to keep doing the job that she loved.
- 15:59Speaker 9: And the marine war hero now sits calmly describing the
- 16:03Speaker 9: vicious attack to the same detectives his beloved wife used
- 16:07Speaker 9: to call her brothers in blue.
- 16:10Speaker 5: Shattered and uh, she went down and I don't have
- 16:17Speaker 5: to do an a shot. And she started getting out, and.
- 16:19Speaker 7: She started going for a gun, sorrowing for a time, and.
- 16:22Speaker 5: Then they shot her at the head of crystol again
- 16:24Speaker 5: and then.
- 16:24Speaker 1: Grabbed the other one and shot her a couple part times.
- 16:27Speaker 2: Has you how because yes, do.
- 16:31Speaker 5: You think she knew it was you? I don't think so.
- 16:34Speaker 9: Ben's cold confession sends a chill through Jennifer's fellow cops.
- 16:39Speaker 7: Why did you share her in her face with her
- 16:41Speaker 7: own time?
- 16:42Speaker 5: That was just because you want to make sure your dead.
- 16:44Speaker 4: He took the extra time and effort to remove her
- 16:46Speaker 4: gun out of her duty holster, and while looking down
- 16:50Speaker 4: at his wife, shot her three times in the face.
- 16:52Speaker 5: That's personal.
- 16:53Speaker 4: That means something that's premeditated.
- 16:56Speaker 9: Up next, Ben's twisted motive behind his loving wife's murderer,
- 17:01Speaker 9: Why did she deserve to.
- 17:03Speaker 10: Guy like that?
- 17:05Speaker 1: We're back now with more on the murder of a
- 17:08Speaker 1: Wisconsin police officer. It's the first on the job killing
- 17:11Speaker 1: ever in the department's ninety six year history. Once again,
- 17:15Speaker 1: here's Narissa Knight.
- 17:16Speaker 9: Chris Officer Jennifer Sabina is gunned down while on patrol
- 17:20Speaker 9: here in a suburb of Milwaukee. The suspect her husband,
- 17:25Speaker 9: a decorated Iraqi war veteran. It's the day after Christmas
- 17:31Speaker 9: and sixty grueling hours of police interrogation finally have Ben
- 17:35Speaker 9: Sabina ready to cave.
- 17:37Speaker 5: Profession right, I did it.
- 17:42Speaker 9: What Sabina did was boutly execute his pretty young wife, Jennifer,
- 17:46Speaker 9: a police officer she was very well of. During his interrogation,
- 17:52Speaker 9: Vin Sabina shocks detectives again, telling them he was the
- 17:56Speaker 9: one who was supposed to die.
- 18:01Speaker 5: Why didn't you? Because she would have killed herself after that.
- 18:05Speaker 9: Believe it or not, Sabina claims that's the reason he
- 18:09Speaker 9: executed his wife. In his warped reality, Ben tells detectives
- 18:13Speaker 9: he believed if Jennifer killed herself, she would go to
- 18:17Speaker 9: hell part so I wanted to be deal with the too.
- 18:23Speaker 9: But doctor a Shock Badi, a board certified psychiatrist, has
- 18:27Speaker 9: a hard time believing Jennifer Sabina's vicious murder was a
- 18:30Speaker 9: mercy killing.
- 18:31Speaker 17: A lot of hatred. If you want to make sure
- 18:34Speaker 17: someone is not suffering, you shouldn't it with the heart.
- 18:38Speaker 17: As a soldier, he would know that that shooting someone
- 18:41Speaker 17: in the face is not the faith to kill someone.
- 18:44Speaker 9: That's anger, and Sabina showed a terrifying glimpse of that
- 18:49Speaker 9: anger when detectives left him alone in the room with
- 18:52Speaker 9: the camera still rolling the document before King Dick and
- 18:58Speaker 9: killed her. Ben Sabina is charged with first degree intentional homicide.
- 19:05Speaker 9: He first pleads not guilty, then changes it to not
- 19:09Speaker 9: guilty by reason of insanity.
- 19:11Speaker 6: The defense has to prove is that Benjamin could not
- 19:16Speaker 6: determine right from wrong.
- 19:18Speaker 9: Kaf say. Everything Sabina did after gunning down his wife
- 19:22Speaker 9: proves he knew the difference, running from the scene, hiding
- 19:26Speaker 9: the guns, denying it through sixty hours of interrogations.
- 19:30Speaker 15: Because as anything I can explain to you is that
- 19:32Speaker 15: I loved her. There's no rage. There was no outburst
- 19:36Speaker 15: ever directed at her, and I never would because I
- 19:39Speaker 15: had sastrula.
- 19:40Speaker 2: For her that I couldn't hurt her.
- 19:42Speaker 4: He came across as somebody who felt as though he
- 19:46Speaker 4: was going to get away with this. He believed he
- 19:49Speaker 4: was smarter than everybody in the room. He believed he
- 19:52Speaker 4: was smarter than everybody in this police department up until
- 19:55Speaker 4: the point that he confessed.
- 19:57Speaker 9: Ben Sabina eventually changes his plea in court too.
- 20:01Speaker 15: What's your plea to that guiltier honor?
- 20:04Speaker 9: What did Benjamin ultimately plead to and what was his sentence?
- 20:07Speaker 6: I pled to first degree intentional homicide.
- 20:10Speaker 9: Ben Sabina's mother pleaded with a judge to remember her
- 20:14Speaker 9: son was sick.
- 20:16Speaker 18: Our military is skilled in training our young men and
- 20:18Speaker 18: women how to fight and to kill, but when their
- 20:21Speaker 18: service contracts are fulfilled and they come back home, they
- 20:25Speaker 18: failed to teach them how to live again.
- 20:27Speaker 9: Ann Sabina's parents sent an impassioned seven page letter, writing,
- 20:32Speaker 9: in part, we asked for mercy. Ben, in his illness,
- 20:36Speaker 9: thought he was helping his wife. Then, just before sentencing,
- 20:41Speaker 9: Ben Sabina offered his apology to Jennifer's family.
- 20:45Speaker 3: Place all right, I didn't have anything else left for me,
- 20:50Speaker 3: and after our discussion, I didn't want to do that
- 20:54Speaker 3: to her. And I'm sorry that I took away your daughter,
- 20:56Speaker 3: and I'm sorry to take away your sister. If I
- 20:59Speaker 3: can replace my life with hers right now, I would
- 21:01Speaker 3: do it.
- 21:03Speaker 9: The judge sentences Ben Sabina to life without the possibility
- 21:08Speaker 9: of parole for thirty five years.
- 21:11Speaker 12: Mister Sabina will be about sixty five or sixty six
- 21:13Speaker 12: years old, and he's allowed to petition for release.
- 21:18Speaker 13: The fact that Jennifer was such a good person, and
- 21:20Speaker 13: through our investigation we learned and that Ben was truly
- 21:24Speaker 13: an evil person. It's not like this was a crime
- 21:27Speaker 13: of anger in the moment, a crime of passion in
- 21:30Speaker 13: the moment. This was a calculated evil person laying in
- 21:36Speaker 13: wait for somebody that they supposedly loved, and then just
- 21:42Speaker 13: completely violently killing her.
- 21:48Speaker 16: I just wonder if every day, if he stops to
- 21:50Speaker 16: think about what happened at him. Yeah, I hope so,
- 21:54Speaker 16: because he destroyed something beautiful for whatever reason, had a
- 22:00Speaker 16: good reason.
- 22:02Speaker 9: Jennifer Sabina seemed to love everyone, and everyone seemed to
- 22:06Speaker 9: love her. She only served as an officer for two years,
- 22:10Speaker 9: but she touched so many hearts, especially those behind the
- 22:14Speaker 9: Wahwatosa Police badge.
- 22:17Speaker 19: As we are present here today remembering Jen, as we
- 22:24Speaker 19: are present here today remembering honor gen A piece of
- 22:28Speaker 19: us is gone, one that can never be replaced. Rest
- 22:32Speaker 19: in peace, our sister in blue, you have joined the
- 22:34Speaker 19: ranks of Heaven's angels. We have your watch from here.
- 22:40Speaker 1: In honor of Jennifer Sabina's service, her name was added
- 22:44Speaker 1: to the National Law Enforcement Memorial in Washington, DC. Also,
- 22:48Speaker 1: her fellow officers in Wahwatosa have dedicated a memorial to her.
- 22:52Speaker 2: At police headquarters.
- 22:55Speaker 1: Up next a frantic call for help.
- 22:58Speaker 10: He said, these guys are here. Both guys are following me.
- 23:01Speaker 1: Fo months later, murder.
- 23:04Speaker 20: Who would want Josh de Fort killed?
- 23:06Speaker 1: Crime watched daily in Las Vegas searching for answers in
- 23:10Speaker 1: the death of a young aspiring actor.
- 23:12Speaker 7: Did Josh know that there was a life insurance policy
- 23:15Speaker 7: taken out on him?
- 23:17Speaker 5: Coming up?
- 23:21Speaker 1: Our next story starts on the Las Vegas Strip, a
- 23:24Speaker 1: place where a Michigan man was hoping to make a
- 23:26Speaker 1: new life for himself, lost his life, and now police
- 23:30Speaker 1: need your help solving his murder. For more, let's head
- 23:33Speaker 1: out west to our Jason Mattera.
- 23:36Speaker 7: He tied his.
- 23:37Speaker 8: Running shoes, put in his earbuds, and went jogging on
- 23:41Speaker 8: the trail.
- 23:42Speaker 7: But he wasn't alone.
- 23:44Speaker 10: He said, these guys are here.
- 23:47Speaker 7: Out of nowhere, evil emerged from the desert shadows booth.
- 23:51Speaker 10: Guys are following me.
- 23:53Speaker 8: Beaten and strangled.
- 23:56Speaker 10: He was so scared and so antike.
- 24:01Speaker 8: His body dumped by the side of the road.
- 24:03Speaker 20: Who would want Josh Dufort killed?
- 24:07Speaker 8: Was Josh Dufort the victim of a random attack.
- 24:10Speaker 10: Josh's apartment was three blocks down.
- 24:12Speaker 8: The road, and that's when he was murdered, or was
- 24:17Speaker 8: Josh Worth more dead than alive.
- 24:20Speaker 5: It's too many coincidences.
- 24:23Speaker 7: Josh grew up in the.
- 24:24Speaker 8: Small town of Dansville, Michigan. He packed up and left
- 24:28Speaker 8: for the bright lights of Las Vegas to become an actor.
- 24:32Speaker 1: Hi names Jos.
- 24:35Speaker 8: This is Josh's audition real, Oh.
- 24:38Speaker 2: Why is she always leaking people in?
- 24:40Speaker 5: You're so early?
- 24:41Speaker 8: Was good enough to lend him a bit part in
- 24:44Speaker 8: Astro Zombies M three cloned. That's Josh in the black
- 24:50Speaker 8: cap and red shirt. Josh met his close friend Nikolaus
- 24:55Speaker 8: Nitanos in acting class.
- 24:57Speaker 7: How would you describe Josh his personal passions, likes, dislikes.
- 25:02Speaker 21: Josh was a really, really great and passionate guy.
- 25:05Speaker 7: He was always there for his friends, and.
- 25:08Speaker 8: The girl who worked at the local bakery was smitten
- 25:12Speaker 8: so much so that Shannon Lutz fell in love then
- 25:16Speaker 8: moved in with Josh.
- 25:17Speaker 7: Was it a serious relationship?
- 25:19Speaker 4: It was.
- 25:19Speaker 7: Yeah.
- 25:19Speaker 10: We were very quickly, completely inseparable. Our lives fused together.
- 25:24Speaker 10: I moved out of the house, moved in with him,
- 25:26Speaker 10: and we were together twenty four to seven. The most gregarious, sweetest, caring, sarcastic,
- 25:36Speaker 10: lightest person in the room. He walked in and everybody
- 25:38Speaker 10: was immediately drawn to him. He was a magnet any enemies, No,
- 25:44Speaker 10: there was not a person who didn't love him, want
- 25:47Speaker 10: to be with him, or want to be him.
- 25:50Speaker 8: But there was something else that ignited Josh's passions boxing.
- 25:57Speaker 7: Josh became fast friends with the lightweight champion name Don
- 26:00Speaker 7: Juan Fatrell. Yes, that's his name, don Juan. What do
- 26:05Speaker 7: you know about Josh's relationship with Don Juan Fatrell.
- 26:09Speaker 10: Josh was young and naive, but hungry for any opportunity
- 26:14Speaker 10: in town. He came in and was a sort of
- 26:17Speaker 10: mentor and helpful wing for Josh and was seemingly a
- 26:22Speaker 10: really great influence.
- 26:24Speaker 7: Well you say seemingly a great influence. Why do you
- 26:27Speaker 7: have that caveat?
- 26:28Speaker 10: From what Josh thought of him, he saw someone who
- 26:33Speaker 10: was like a big brother and was trying to help him.
- 26:35Speaker 10: It would never pan out. They would be supposed to
- 26:38Speaker 10: have lunch, supposed to work out together, supposed to have
- 26:40Speaker 10: a little meeting, talk about their goals, and Don Juan
- 26:42Speaker 10: would cancel on him.
- 26:45Speaker 8: One of those goals, Shannon says, was to make bank
- 26:48Speaker 8: selling T shirts on the Vegas Strip.
- 26:50Speaker 10: They just one day had an idea putting clever or
- 26:55Speaker 10: cool looking designs on T shirts. Don Juan said, Okay,
- 26:57Speaker 10: come over, jog over, we're going to work out, and
- 27:00Speaker 10: then we're going to talk about this T shirt business.
- 27:03Speaker 7: And they never got to speak about it, so this
- 27:05Speaker 7: business never got off the ground.
- 27:06Speaker 10: Yep.
- 27:07Speaker 7: Do you think that was on purpose? Yes?
- 27:10Speaker 10: I don't think that the T shirt business. Josh thought
- 27:12Speaker 10: it was going to be an actual thing, but I
- 27:14Speaker 10: think that it was just Don Juan praying on Josh,
- 27:17Speaker 10: wanting to do everything he could, and coming up with
- 27:23Speaker 10: a reason to get him over there to guarantee that
- 27:26Speaker 10: he would come over.
- 27:29Speaker 8: Josh's acting coach, Shari Flaherty, worried about her star pupil
- 27:33Speaker 8: climbing into the ring and taking punches.
- 27:36Speaker 22: I got kind of confused about it, and I said, Josh,
- 27:38Speaker 22: I thought you wanted to be an actor. You're going
- 27:40Speaker 22: to end up hurting your face. I mean, you think
- 27:41Speaker 22: about those things. Because we had booked him several commercials
- 27:44Speaker 22: already at that time, and he mentions that I just
- 27:47Speaker 22: have to last three rounds. I can make an extra
- 27:49Speaker 22: thousand bucks and I need the money.
- 27:53Speaker 8: Shari says one day, when she was complaining about the
- 27:56Speaker 8: high cost of health insurance. Josh surprised her with a zinger.
- 28:01Speaker 22: He nonchalantly says, yeah, I have my health insurance. Now
- 28:05Speaker 22: I don't have to pay for it, and I go
- 28:07Speaker 22: health insurance. And he proceeded to telling me that he
- 28:10Speaker 22: called them dj dj got me health insurance.
- 28:12Speaker 7: I looked at him and I go, what, don Juan?
- 28:14Speaker 22: Yeah, don Juan, And I said, don Juan got you
- 28:17Speaker 22: health insurance?
- 28:17Speaker 7: He goes, yeah, I go, what.
- 28:21Speaker 8: Health insurance for a healthy, twenty three year old athletic guy.
- 28:24Speaker 10: That raised, you know, suspicions to me, Like huh.
- 28:28Speaker 8: Suspicions were raised even further. One warm November evening, Shannon says,
- 28:32Speaker 8: Josh told her he was going to jog over to
- 28:34Speaker 8: Don Juan's house, nestled in negated community on a golf course.
- 28:38Speaker 7: Do you remember the last conversation you'd had with Josh.
- 28:42Speaker 10: Yeah, we had never gotten in a fight before. I
- 28:46Speaker 10: think we pecked each other aggressively on the cheek and
- 28:49Speaker 10: it was a see you later, and that was the
- 28:51Speaker 10: last we spoke.
- 28:52Speaker 7: Is that row for you? I mean, the last time
- 28:54Speaker 7: you had a conversation with Josh, you guys were fighting.
- 28:59Speaker 10: Yeah, we had never it had been sunshine and.
- 29:04Speaker 8: Rainbows, but quickly a menacing dark cloud would wipe out
- 29:09Speaker 8: the sunshine forever. Shannon says, on the way to don Wants,
- 29:13Speaker 8: Josh left him a terrifying voicemail.
- 29:16Speaker 7: So you're listening to these voicemails now, and what do
- 29:19Speaker 7: you hear?
- 29:20Speaker 10: There's three messages from Josh and he said, these guys
- 29:23Speaker 10: are here. I don't know what to do. I don't
- 29:25Speaker 10: know how to get into the gate. They're following me.
- 29:28Speaker 10: He's on the corner of Eastern and Paco's Ridge and
- 29:30Speaker 10: that he's just frantic and he's like, you need to
- 29:34Speaker 10: come get me right now. These guys are following me.
- 29:36Speaker 10: And he repeats it several times and then times when
- 29:39Speaker 10: the phone cuts.
- 29:40Speaker 7: Out, probably his last moments.
- 29:43Speaker 8: Yeah, but who were they? Henderson, Nevada police say Josh
- 29:48Speaker 8: was attached. His life was body discovered at sunrise the
- 29:52Speaker 8: next morning.
- 29:53Speaker 23: It's a jogger who basically finds Josh to Ford on
- 29:57Speaker 23: the side of this road, beaten and strangled to death.
- 30:00Speaker 20: He may have died that morning or the night before.
- 30:04Speaker 8: As detectives retraced Josh's last steps and talk to his friends,
- 30:09Speaker 8: the trail leads them in a direction no one saw coming. Next,
- 30:15Speaker 8: investigators uncover a diabolical plot hidden in the insurance policy.
- 30:21Speaker 8: Was it all just a ruse or could it spell
- 30:23Speaker 8: something far more sinister?
- 30:26Speaker 7: So your understanding is that Josh was tricked.
- 30:29Speaker 10: I think that.
- 30:33Speaker 1: Josh Dufort left his home in Michigan for the bright
- 30:36Speaker 1: lights of Las Vegas, his dream to become an actor,
- 30:39Speaker 1: but his life would be cut short in a violent attack,
- 30:42Speaker 1: a murder that remains unsolved.
- 30:45Speaker 2: Jason Mattera is back now with more.
- 30:47Speaker 7: Chris has investigators dug deep into the mysterious death of
- 30:50Speaker 7: Josh Dufort. They would make some eyebrow raising discoveries, such
- 30:54Speaker 7: as someone had taken out two life insurance policies on
- 30:58Speaker 7: Josh just before he was murdered. Las Vegas a sunny
- 31:04Speaker 7: place for shady people, But Josh Duffort wasn't one of them,
- 31:08Speaker 7: so says his girlfriend Shannon Lutz, he.
- 31:12Speaker 10: Was everybody's hero.
- 31:13Speaker 7: Josh is indestructible, but sometimes a hero, even an indestructible one,
- 31:19Speaker 7: can fall victim to evil. Josh was beaten, strangled, murdered,
- 31:26Speaker 7: his body dumped beside this road in the Vegas suburb
- 31:30Speaker 7: of Henderson.
- 31:31Speaker 10: I stood by the casket almost the entire time just
- 31:34Speaker 10: looking at him. I just didn't want him to go away.
- 31:39Speaker 7: What are you feeling now just talking about this whole thing?
- 31:43Speaker 10: Devastation? Of course, there is not a day that's gone
- 31:47Speaker 10: by that I don't think about him, that I don't
- 31:54Speaker 10: miss his smile and his jokes.
- 31:58Speaker 8: Josh's close friend, Nicko Gaetanos, wonders, why would anyone want
- 32:03Speaker 8: to kill this aspiring actor with a baby face?
- 32:06Speaker 7: Like? What could the motive possibly be to kill this guy?
- 32:10Speaker 8: The motive could be money, aho lot of it. Apparently
- 32:14Speaker 8: Josh was well insured.
- 32:15Speaker 7: There were two life insurance policies worth a whopping one
- 32:19Speaker 7: point seventy five million dollars. And who was the beneficiary
- 32:24Speaker 7: his mentor and friend, boxer Don Laan Fatreue. What friend
- 32:29Speaker 7: takes out a life insurance policy on his other friend?
- 32:32Speaker 7: Like you and Josh were boys, would you take out
- 32:34Speaker 7: life insurance policies on each other?
- 32:37Speaker 17: Not at all?
- 32:38Speaker 7: I mean, does that even cross your mind?
- 32:40Speaker 4: No?
- 32:40Speaker 7: No, it's that's some freaky stuff.
- 32:43Speaker 2: It really is.
- 32:45Speaker 8: But wait a minute, didn't Josh allegedly tell his acting
- 32:49Speaker 8: coach Chari Flaherty that Don Juan paid for health insurance,
- 32:53Speaker 8: not life insurance.
- 32:54Speaker 22: I just thought it was very odd for somebody who
- 32:56Speaker 22: only knew Josh for less than eight months. I thought
- 33:01Speaker 22: that was a bit strange.
- 33:02Speaker 7: Did Josh know that there was a life insurance policy
- 33:05Speaker 7: taken out on him?
- 33:07Speaker 4: No.
- 33:07Speaker 10: My understanding from Joshunight's conversations is that Don Juan was
- 33:12Speaker 10: helping him get health insurance because he didn't have any.
- 33:15Speaker 7: So your understanding is that Josh was tricked completely into
- 33:20Speaker 7: applying for life insurance. He thinks of health insurance. The
- 33:24Speaker 7: day after Josh's body was found on this busy road,
- 33:28Speaker 7: cops searched Don Juan's house. In this search warrant, it
- 33:32Speaker 7: says they seized miscellaneous life insurance paperwork. Back during the
- 33:37Speaker 7: initial investigation, Henderson Police said Don Juan was in their sights.
- 33:42Speaker 20: Don Juan Futreil is still considered our prime suspect in
- 33:45Speaker 20: this open case.
- 33:46Speaker 8: The two insurance companies denied Don Juan's claim for the payout.
- 33:49Speaker 8: One company took him to federal court and he counter sued,
- 33:53Speaker 8: And you won't believe what was revealed in court papers.
- 33:56Speaker 20: Also on the application, there's a bizarre twisp.
- 34:01Speaker 23: Josh Toft and Don Juan are listed as domestic partners,
- 34:06Speaker 23: but neither one was in a relationship with the other
- 34:09Speaker 23: one aside from a friendship.
- 34:11Speaker 8: In the deposition, an attorney asked Don Juan to explain,
- 34:15Speaker 8: if I say the words domestic partner, what does that
- 34:17Speaker 8: mean to you? Domestic partner mean like married or something?
- 34:21Speaker 7: I don't know.
- 34:23Speaker 8: Do you think domestic partners could be gay or straight?
- 34:26Speaker 8: I think if you live together, it's domestic.
- 34:28Speaker 7: So you don't buy it. No, not at all.
- 34:32Speaker 8: And whoever filled out the application claimed that Josh made
- 34:36Speaker 8: one hundred and eighty thousand dollars selling T shirts for
- 34:38Speaker 8: the company that he and Don Juan co owned and
- 34:42Speaker 8: the life insurance forms that were taken out on Josh.
- 34:45Speaker 8: It stated that he earned one hundred and eighty thousand
- 34:48Speaker 8: dollars via this T shirt company. You're smirking right now.
- 34:53Speaker 17: I mean.
- 34:55Speaker 21: Josh didn't have any money, and I hung out with
- 34:58Speaker 21: him a lot. He was not living as though he
- 35:00Speaker 21: was banking one eighty k nowhere close.
- 35:05Speaker 10: I believe in the year of twenty ten he'd made
- 35:07Speaker 10: a total of sixteen thousand dollars for his entire salary
- 35:11Speaker 10: for the year. We pinched pennies like crazy, and now.
- 35:15Speaker 8: This story about two boxers takes a wild left hook.
- 35:19Speaker 8: It may be Josh's signature on the policy, but the
- 35:22Speaker 8: voice on a mysterious audio interview with the insurance company
- 35:26Speaker 8: apparently doesn't sound like Josh. So if it's not Josh,
- 35:31Speaker 8: who is it. Believe it or not, Don Juan says
- 35:34Speaker 8: it sounds like his own brother.
- 35:36Speaker 7: We really want to talk to Don Juan, but he
- 35:39Speaker 7: lives in this gated community and we can't get to him.
- 35:41Speaker 7: So we're gonna give him a call and see if
- 35:42Speaker 7: he'll come out here and talk to us. Don Juan
- 35:49Speaker 7: Jason matterra with Crime Watch Daily. We're doing a story
- 35:53Speaker 7: on the murder of Josh Dufort, and your name came
- 35:57Speaker 7: up in our interviews. We're hoping you can respond to
- 36:00Speaker 7: some of these allegations made against you. Did you orchestrate
- 36:04Speaker 7: Josh's murder or is this just pure coincidence? He hung up.
- 36:11Speaker 2: Don Juan hung up.
- 36:13Speaker 7: We called Don Juan a second.
- 36:15Speaker 8: Time to ask him to sit down for an interview,
- 36:17Speaker 8: but he hung up again. Even though court documents showed
- 36:21Speaker 8: Don Juan's brother allegedly was an imposter posing as Josh,
- 36:25Speaker 8: cops have never charged Don Juan in connection with the killing.
- 36:28Speaker 8: Our legal expert Amy Dash explains why that may be.
- 36:32Speaker 23: Proving that someone submitted or played a role in a
- 36:35Speaker 23: fake insurance application doesn't amount to charging someone with murder.
- 36:40Speaker 23: So in order to arrest somebody and charge them with murder,
- 36:43Speaker 23: you really need direct evidence connecting that person to the
- 36:48Speaker 23: crime that was committed. So, either that means that the
- 36:51Speaker 23: police do not have sufficient evidence to connect Don Juan
- 36:56Speaker 23: Fatrell to joshja Ford's murder, or it means that that
- 37:00Speaker 23: evidence just doesn't exist.
- 37:02Speaker 8: In November, it will be seven years since Josh's untimely death.
- 37:07Speaker 7: Is still miss him? Oh yeah, still love him?
- 37:10Speaker 10: I won't ever stop loving it.
- 37:13Speaker 7: What do you miss most about Josh?
- 37:15Speaker 10: I would say a sense of humor. You can make
- 37:17Speaker 10: anybody smile.
- 37:18Speaker 8: All that Shannon has left is this box.
- 37:21Speaker 7: So what's in the box?
- 37:22Speaker 10: This is my Josh box. I guard it with my life.
- 37:26Speaker 10: It's all that I have left of him.
- 37:29Speaker 8: Shannon kept everything Josh is doole, It's movie tickets, even
- 37:32Speaker 8: the T shirt he wore the last day they spent together.
- 37:37Speaker 10: I keep this box sealed up really tight, and it
- 37:39Speaker 10: still smells like him. I also keep his cologne, and
- 37:45Speaker 10: I very infrequently because it is an immediate sensory memory.
- 37:51Speaker 10: Take it out and I smell it, and I'll immediately
- 37:55Speaker 10: start crying all over again because this whole box just
- 37:59Speaker 10: smells like him.
- 38:00Speaker 7: Still, what's a light to go through his items now?
- 38:05Speaker 10: It's a little bizarre. It's so familiar. It feels like
- 38:11Speaker 10: he was just wearing this, and at the same time,
- 38:13Speaker 10: it also feels so distant, feels like yesterday, and it
- 38:18Speaker 10: feels like forever ago. At the same time.
- 38:21Speaker 8: For Shannon, yesterday does seem so far away. Her dream
- 38:25Speaker 8: of spending forever with the love of her life was
- 38:28Speaker 8: snuffed out on that dark day in the city where
- 38:32Speaker 8: the neon lights never stop blinking.
- 38:35Speaker 10: I think we could have and would have been together forever,
- 38:40Speaker 10: and that's my whole course of life is different without him,
- 38:45Speaker 10: and the world is missing out by not having him
- 38:49Speaker 10: in it.