Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Woman Uses Eyedrops to Poison Lover, Steals Idea from "Wedding Crashers" Movie

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Woman Uses Eyedrops to Poison Lover, Steals Idea from "Wedding Crashers" Movie · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Why did Lana Clayton allegedly
0:12
Speaker 1: poison her husband? It's the common over the counter medicine
0:15
Speaker 1: used to relieve red or irritated eyes. But this morning,
0:19
Speaker 1: investigators say they still have no clear motive as to
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Speaker 1: why fifty two year old Lana Clayton allegedly used eyedrops
0:26
Speaker 1: to kill her husband of four years, or she did
0:28
Speaker 1: admit during interviews with our detectives that she committed the crimes.
0:33
Speaker 1: Stephen Clayton was found dead in the four year of
0:35
Speaker 1: this eight hundred thousand dollars South Carolina mansion he shared
0:38
Speaker 1: with his wife in July. Police say they never suspected
0:41
Speaker 1: foul play was involved until toxicology results from his autopsy
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Speaker 1: revealed high levels of tetrahydros lane, the chemical found in
0:49
Speaker 1: eyedrops and nasal sprays in his bloodstream. If ingested orally,
0:54
Speaker 1: it can cause respiratory failure, seizures, and even coma death
0:58
Speaker 1: by eyedrops. I Nancy Grace, this is Crime Stories. Thank
1:02
Speaker 1: you for being with us. You are hearing our friend
1:04
Speaker 1: at GMA, Amy Robot. Did a South Carolina woman murder
1:08
Speaker 1: her husband by putting eyedrops in his drinking water that's
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Speaker 1: making me look at my bottle of water that sits
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Speaker 1: by the bed every night in a whole new light
1:18
Speaker 1: with me an all star panel. Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State University,
1:23
Speaker 1: author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. Joseph Scott Morgan,
1:27
Speaker 1: death investigator, Joining us from New York. Psychologist Karen Stark
1:32
Speaker 1: at Karen Stark dot com. Renowned civil and criminal attorney
1:37
Speaker 1: in the Tristate area. Jason Oceans Joining me right now.
1:40
Speaker 1: Crime online dot Com investigator reporter Dave mac Okay, Let's
1:44
Speaker 1: get right down to it. Did this woman, Lanna Clayton,
1:48
Speaker 1: very pretty lady, very pretty? Did she kill her husband?
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Speaker 1: Not try to kill him Brett murder him by eyedrop Okay,
1:57
Speaker 1: hit me, Dave, what happened to you know what the
2:01
Speaker 1: police are saying. She actually confessed to them that she
2:05
Speaker 1: used the eye drops to kill her husband. But it's
2:09
Speaker 1: kind of interesting when you look back at this relationship.
2:11
Speaker 1: There were a very very wealthy couple. None of the
2:14
Speaker 1: neighbors had any clue anything was going on, but there
2:17
Speaker 1: were a couple of incidents that took place, and on
2:20
Speaker 1: top of anything else, when Stephen Clayton's body was found.
2:24
Speaker 1: He was actually found at the bottom of the stairs,
2:27
Speaker 1: making it look like he had had an accidental fall. Well,
2:29
Speaker 1: Dave mac Dave mac uh, hold on, I'm going to
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Speaker 1: speak for Jason Oceans defense attorining just one moment, Jason,
2:36
Speaker 1: can't Dave Matt clearly see that this guy had vision problems.
2:40
Speaker 1: That's why he had the eyedrops, That's why he fell
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Speaker 1: down the stairs. Jason, It's so clear to me his
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Speaker 1: eyes were so red he needed to clear them with
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Speaker 1: gallons of vic If you will, uns, did you just
2:55
Speaker 1: call me Nan? Wait a minute, did you just call
2:57
Speaker 1: me Nan? Because please don't do that and the worst
3:01
Speaker 1: would be honey or sugar or just just don't okay,
3:04
Speaker 1: please now continue. It just shocks me that most of
3:10
Speaker 1: the time when these things occur, there's some inklings within
3:14
Speaker 1: the community somewhere that uh, something's going. It's just not
3:20
Speaker 1: just out of the clear blue. But well, we'll hold on.
3:23
Speaker 1: I think you're right. I think you're right. Jason Ocean's
3:26
Speaker 1: renowned defense attorney. And the Tri State area. You know,
3:29
Speaker 1: every time I say the Tri State area, Jackie, what
3:32
Speaker 1: is the cartoon? Um? Okay, yeah, it's not phibious it's Phinniss.
3:39
Speaker 1: It's finishing for her. Yeah, and the tries and Professor Duseldorf,
3:43
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you so much. I'm glad you knew that,
3:46
Speaker 1: you know, Karen Start, I want to talk about what
3:47
Speaker 1: he just said about red flags. This couple. Hold on,
3:51
Speaker 1: Dave Matt, what did they do for a living? I
3:53
Speaker 1: know you said they were wealthy, which always makes me suspicious,
3:55
Speaker 1: But what do they do for a living? She worried
3:57
Speaker 1: for the va a nurse, but he actually his success
4:01
Speaker 1: came from founding physical therapy resources. They've got branches all
4:05
Speaker 1: across the country, so actually dealing with people that are
4:08
Speaker 1: recovering from injuries and things like that. Okay, you know
4:10
Speaker 1: I have a one track mind, Dave Matt, because when
4:12
Speaker 1: you said she's a nurse, I heard nothing else. It
4:16
Speaker 1: was like Nancy, she's a nurse, blah blah blah blah
4:18
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. So, Karen Start, if I see medical
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Speaker 1: training and then this guy dies and police suspects she
4:26
Speaker 1: committed murdered bike, I drop. But back to what Jason
4:29
Speaker 1: Ocean's defense attorney was saying, Karen Start, Let's see a
4:33
Speaker 1: red flag like um shooting him with a crossbow in
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Speaker 1: his sleep. They did have a little bit of a history. Yes, yeah,
4:40
Speaker 1: was it in the head? The guy wasn't he asleep
4:44
Speaker 1: and she shot him with a crossbow in his sleep?
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Speaker 1: Karen Start, Yes, she did, Nancy. She shot him in
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Speaker 1: the head while he was sleeping, and it was he
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Speaker 1: in the bedroom. Okay. Jackie's saying yes, because I was
4:58
Speaker 1: thinking he was outside in a hammock near her archery course.
5:02
Speaker 1: And heyby, but how do you accidentally, Karen Start, shoot
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Speaker 1: somebody in their sleep in the head with a crossbow
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Speaker 1: in the bedroom and say it was an accident, Karen,
5:14
Speaker 1: I mean she was practicing the crossbow on the television.
5:19
Speaker 1: I don't know, okay, Joe Scott Morgan. How do you
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Speaker 1: survive a crossbow to the head. That's a mystery. A
5:28
Speaker 1: lot of that, Nancy is going to be depended upon
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Speaker 1: where the shot rested. If it went kind of obliquely
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Speaker 1: on the side of the head, maybe just struck the temple,
5:37
Speaker 1: the side of the temple ahead. It's a survivable injury.
5:41
Speaker 1: My question is, was the bolt or that's what they
5:44
Speaker 1: referred to as the arrow in crossbows, was a bolt
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Speaker 1: still lodged in his head? And how in the world
5:50
Speaker 1: that go about extracting this thing. Did you have to
5:53
Speaker 1: undergo major surgery? That'd be a great question to ask,
5:56
Speaker 1: you know, Joe Scott, are you one of those people
5:58
Speaker 1: like me that when you see an article they have
6:00
Speaker 1: an X ray and you can still see that the
6:04
Speaker 1: knife or the arrow or whatever in the person. You
6:09
Speaker 1: just look at it and think, how in the hay
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Speaker 1: did that happen? Not you know whether they lived or not,
6:15
Speaker 1: how did this happen? I think back, how in the
6:18
Speaker 1: world did that get And here we've got a crossbow
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Speaker 1: to the head. As a matter of fact, listen to this.
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Speaker 1: The woman accused of poisoning her husband with eyedrops once
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Speaker 1: shot him in the back of the head with a crossbow.
6:30
Speaker 1: Police have reopened an investigation into the bizarre incident at
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Speaker 1: the home of millionaire Stephen Clayton and its fifty two
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Speaker 1: year old wife, Lana. Two years ago. Lana Clayton told
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Speaker 1: police she was having trouble loading a crossbow like this one.
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Speaker 1: She says, she took it into the bedroom where her
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Speaker 1: husband was sleeping. Then, she claimed it accidentally went off
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Speaker 1: and this called a bolt struck him in the back
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Speaker 1: of the head. Miraculously he was not seriously hurt. The
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Speaker 1: stock itself is going to go into your shoulder. Crossbow
7:00
Speaker 1: expert Nanny CIRCA Safety and fire, you would have to
7:04
Speaker 1: manually push up to the fire position and then this
7:07
Speaker 1: finger could come down to the trailer. Got it. So
7:10
Speaker 1: if you're walking around carrying this and you don't move
7:13
Speaker 1: this button, there's no way it could go on, never
7:15
Speaker 1: go off. According to documents obtained by Inside Edition, Stephen
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Speaker 1: Clayton told detectives he did not believe she was trying
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Speaker 1: to kill him. The incident was ruled an accident. Okay,
7:27
Speaker 1: you know my children, Jason Oshans. You know my children
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Speaker 1: very well since before they were born, because we would
7:34
Speaker 1: sit on the set at Court TV and talk and
7:36
Speaker 1: talk and talk about should I get married, should I
7:39
Speaker 1: have children? Oh, I don't know how you did it.
7:41
Speaker 1: But this past week they were at Scout camp. And
7:46
Speaker 1: you know, of course, when I hear camp, not just
7:48
Speaker 1: Scout camp, any camp sleepaway, I think murdering, molestation. So
7:53
Speaker 1: I suddenly had to become a Scout volunteer and forced
7:55
Speaker 1: my husband to become a Scout volunteer. What killed him
7:59
Speaker 1: as being away from work for a week anyway, we
8:02
Speaker 1: both go, we camp out. It rained in the tent.
8:04
Speaker 1: All that's another story. But my son, who you know,
8:07
Speaker 1: a very anti gun, had to learn to shoot a shotgun.
8:12
Speaker 1: So he was at this range every day. Let me
8:16
Speaker 1: just point out that he ended up getting the dime Award,
8:19
Speaker 1: which is you can shoot at fifty feet five shots
8:23
Speaker 1: in the space of a dime the coin. Okay, So
8:27
Speaker 1: but the other side of that is I was so
8:30
Speaker 1: upset about him with a gun in his hands. I
8:33
Speaker 1: went there every day. It was like a mile walk.
8:35
Speaker 1: One day I walked thirty two eight hundred steps. I
8:38
Speaker 1: took a picture of it. Anyway, So my point is,
8:43
Speaker 1: beside that is the archery range. How do you accidentally
8:48
Speaker 1: pull a crossbow and shoot somebody? I mean the power,
8:52
Speaker 1: it's like a trigger pull. I would tell Jerry's how
8:55
Speaker 1: many pounds, Well, how much pressure it took to pull
8:58
Speaker 1: a trigger? Yea, the test poundage right, and you can
9:01
Speaker 1: go up to you know, eighty pounds, which almost only
9:05
Speaker 1: a bare could pull with great strength. So some of
9:09
Speaker 1: them are much lighter to the finger. And I think
9:11
Speaker 1: anyone knows who's involved in anything that could be dangerous,
9:14
Speaker 1: whether it's a bow archery, the possession of weapons, shooting.
9:20
Speaker 1: You don't do it in the bedroom. You're always alone
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Speaker 1: and private and safe and well lit and not with
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Speaker 1: anyone around at all. So it's just poor safety and
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Speaker 1: poor practice. I don't even know what you're saying poor safety,
9:35
Speaker 1: but I mean, Joe Scott, can you talk some sense
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Speaker 1: into his hand, Nancy, Safety procedures dictate that you don't
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Speaker 1: do that with other people around. You're not involved in
9:46
Speaker 1: testing or trying or doing anything. It's a poor safety protocol. Okay,
9:50
Speaker 1: Joe Scott, let's just break it down. She shot him
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Speaker 1: in the head with a crossbow and for some reason
9:55
Speaker 1: which we're gonna have to have a shrink explain. He
9:58
Speaker 1: convinced himself it was an accident. Crime stories with Nancy Grace.
10:18
Speaker 1: During our search of the home, we found several bottles
10:21
Speaker 1: of the eye drops. Police say Clayton admitted to poisoning
10:25
Speaker 1: her husband's water with the drops over the course of
10:28
Speaker 1: three days before his death. Neighbors sat Clayton, an active
10:31
Speaker 1: member of her local church, held her husband's funeral in
10:34
Speaker 1: their very own backyard last month before investigators determined his
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Speaker 1: cause of death this morning. Clayton remains behind bars without bond,
10:42
Speaker 1: facing murder and unlawful tampering of food charges. Her husband's
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Speaker 1: family speaking out, telling ABC News they are shocked and
10:50
Speaker 1: mortified at the cause of Stephen's death. All of our
10:53
Speaker 1: family and friends knew how much he loved his wife,
10:55
Speaker 1: Laana and how devoted he was to her. Such a
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Speaker 1: shocking story, and under South Carolina law in this case
11:01
Speaker 1: qualifies for the death penalty, but prosecutors say it is
11:05
Speaker 1: far too early to decide whether to seek that against
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Speaker 1: Lana Clayton. Hearing our friend GMA's Amy Robot. Wow, Okay,
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Speaker 1: back to you, Joe Scott Morgan. We are talking about
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Speaker 1: women who poison, and we're starting with Lana Clayton. Lana
11:20
Speaker 1: Clayton with a background and nursing. Her husband apparently the
11:25
Speaker 1: money man with many many branches of a healthcare facility. First,
11:31
Speaker 1: she shoots him with a crossbow in the head while
11:33
Speaker 1: he's asleep in his bedroom. He didn't fall asleep in
11:36
Speaker 1: a lounge chair in the backyard or a hammock near
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Speaker 1: her archery set. Mmmmm. She was practicing the crossbow in
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Speaker 1: the bedroom and for some reason. Karen Stark New York
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Speaker 1: Psychologists joining us, you can find her at Karen Stark
11:49
Speaker 1: dot com. He convinced himself that that was an accident.
11:54
Speaker 1: How do you do that. That's called denial. That's denial, Nancy.
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Speaker 1: That's somebody who really does someone to admit that this
12:03
Speaker 1: love that they had between them is actually dangerous and
12:06
Speaker 1: he could be good. He's so attached to her that
12:10
Speaker 1: he's going to go along with some kind of story
12:13
Speaker 1: that includes she accidentally killed him in the bedroom. It
12:17
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense, I k Karen. Karen, Yeah, I
12:23
Speaker 1: know that you are a sophisticated, cosmopolitan New Yorker, but
12:28
Speaker 1: I assume that you, like everybody else in the country,
12:31
Speaker 1: listens to country music. I'm sure you've heard the song
12:35
Speaker 1: denial it Ain't just a river in Egypt, because you
12:38
Speaker 1: may want to use that with some of your clients,
12:40
Speaker 1: your patients. How do you get yourself in such deep
12:43
Speaker 1: denial that you can reason away getting shot in the
12:47
Speaker 1: head with a crossbow in your bedroom in your sleep. Well,
12:51
Speaker 1: there's a disconnect, Nancy, when there's something that you believe
12:54
Speaker 1: so strongly, and then there's evidence to show you that
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Speaker 1: it's not true, but your mind can't grasp that fact,
13:02
Speaker 1: and so our unconscious just says, oh, no, she's right,
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Speaker 1: it was an accident. Because you can't make the two
13:09
Speaker 1: things connect. You have to believe that she's in love
13:12
Speaker 1: with you, and that's unsure what happened to him. He
13:15
Speaker 1: could not accept the fact that she was trying to
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Speaker 1: kill him. I know it sounds very strange, but happens
13:21
Speaker 1: all the time. It does sound strange, and I think
13:24
Speaker 1: it does happen all the time. Joseph Scott Morgan, author
13:28
Speaker 1: of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. Death investigator Joe
13:32
Speaker 1: Scott two things. Number One, unlike a gun where you
13:35
Speaker 1: can tell from gunshop how to residue whether it was
13:39
Speaker 1: shot within say three ft thirty six inches, or if
13:42
Speaker 1: they're stippling around the entry wound, you know, if it's
13:45
Speaker 1: point blank with a crossbow, you don't know. She was
13:49
Speaker 1: two inches from his head when she shot it. Asked
13:51
Speaker 1: my first question, and the second question is what does
13:55
Speaker 1: odan over Joe sing on eyedrops to your body? How
14:01
Speaker 1: is it? I think I know the answer in lay
14:03
Speaker 1: person's terms. If it shrinks red vessels in your eyes,
14:07
Speaker 1: it must shrink the veins to your heart. Just guessing
14:10
Speaker 1: you tell me. Yeah. First off to the crossbow you're
14:13
Speaker 1: right on the money. Hey, you're right on target. Nancy,
14:16
Speaker 1: There is no way. It's what we refer to as
14:19
Speaker 1: an indeterminate distance. You can't because, as you stated, there's
14:23
Speaker 1: nothing coming out of a muzzle. Now to the eye drops,
14:27
Speaker 1: think about it in two terms. There's two things. There's
14:29
Speaker 1: what's referred to as a vasodilator, which means that opens
14:33
Speaker 1: the vessels up. And there is a vaso constrictor. In
14:37
Speaker 1: the case of tetrahydralazine, which is found in all manner
14:41
Speaker 1: of eye drops and even some sprays that are used
14:46
Speaker 1: in the nostrils, it is a vaso constrictor. And so
14:51
Speaker 1: what happens is is it tightens down the vessels and
14:54
Speaker 1: it can lead to hypertension, severe hypertension, very very quickly.
14:59
Speaker 1: This is a highly lethal, lethal substance and it doesn't
15:03
Speaker 1: take very much. It just takes a very small amount
15:06
Speaker 1: and it can literally send the individual, in worst case
15:09
Speaker 1: scenario into a coma. Some people out there even have
15:14
Speaker 1: attempted to use this drug in order to initiate date rate.
15:18
Speaker 1: That means it gets the person into an unconscious state,
15:20
Speaker 1: they fall to coma, and they can take advantage of
15:23
Speaker 1: the individual. Wow, I'm also like completely intrigued with the
15:27
Speaker 1: fact that she held the funeral in the backyard. Jason Oceans,
15:33
Speaker 1: I thought that was against the law. I'm not sure
15:35
Speaker 1: which state this was in, Nancy. You'd have to refresh
15:38
Speaker 1: me on that. South Carolina, South Carolina, Wait, Dave Dave
15:43
Speaker 1: Mattcrime online dot Com investigative reporter. Did she hold the
15:46
Speaker 1: funeral in the backyard or did she want to hold
15:48
Speaker 1: the funeral in the backyard, because I am totally burying
15:50
Speaker 1: David in the backyard. What she did bury him in
15:54
Speaker 1: the backyard. The funeral was held in the backyard in
15:57
Speaker 1: North Carolina and South Carolina. I don't know how many
15:59
Speaker 1: other states both of those allow for that. There are
16:02
Speaker 1: certain things, certain accommodations after you made but not as
16:06
Speaker 1: uncommon as you would think. Okay, I'm just drinking that in.
16:08
Speaker 1: I'm trying to absorb that that. Yeah, dis Nancy, just
16:12
Speaker 1: just thinking about wanting to exhume the body for anything.
16:15
Speaker 1: I mean, just just thinking the restrictions to you know,
16:18
Speaker 1: my backyard or access or anything else that could you
16:23
Speaker 1: alter the state of the body. I did not know
16:27
Speaker 1: you could just bury a body. I don't remember as
16:31
Speaker 1: a little girl I hear you, Joe Scott. Way out
16:35
Speaker 1: in the country, we would drive by a house getting
16:38
Speaker 1: back and forth to somewhere, and a guy had buried
16:42
Speaker 1: made a cemetery in his yard because his wife died.
16:45
Speaker 1: He was completely well, we thank you, as completely in love,
16:49
Speaker 1: and he had built kind of a monument to her
16:51
Speaker 1: with a raw arm fence around her grave, and he
16:53
Speaker 1: would go out there and sit with her every day,
16:54
Speaker 1: kind of like Forrest Gump. Okay, and even as a
16:58
Speaker 1: little girl, I would like sh ink away in the
17:00
Speaker 1: back seat of the car when we chose by, because
17:02
Speaker 1: something was just wrong with it. Okay, So Joe Scott Morgan,
17:07
Speaker 1: she shoots him with the crossbow, he lives, she allegedly
17:12
Speaker 1: poisons him with eyedrops, he dies, and then she just
17:16
Speaker 1: digs a hole and sticks him in the backyard. Can
17:18
Speaker 1: nobody see that pattern right there? Is it just me
17:20
Speaker 1: that something's very wrong? Well, you know again, you know
17:23
Speaker 1: what Jason was saying. You want to maintain control. And
17:27
Speaker 1: I think that this goes to this. This might be
17:29
Speaker 1: an issue to care and could address. But I gotta
17:31
Speaker 1: tell you, as far as burying somebody, there's family plots
17:34
Speaker 1: all over the place, and This is the reality. The
17:38
Speaker 1: only thing you need is actually a burial permit. And
17:42
Speaker 1: this is another curious thing. If I remember correctly, I'm
17:45
Speaker 1: thinking that bodies do not have to be embalmed. You
17:49
Speaker 1: can literally place the body directly into the crypt after
17:52
Speaker 1: it's been dugged. Only consideration or things like we're referred
17:56
Speaker 1: to as water tables. You don't want to pollute the
17:58
Speaker 1: water table by burying the body back there. So other
18:01
Speaker 1: than that, hey, it's free and clear. Take a listen
18:03
Speaker 1: to our friend at Inside Edition, Megan Alexander. The couple
18:07
Speaker 1: lived in an enclave of million dollar homes on Lake Wiley,
18:10
Speaker 1: South Carolina. The funeral was held in the backyard before
18:14
Speaker 1: toxicology reports showed he had been poisoned. Frank Keith and
18:18
Speaker 1: Ken Sandford were at the funeral. She's saying a stoic,
18:22
Speaker 1: I guess is a word. There was no evidence that
18:25
Speaker 1: she was grieving. That's part of the mystery of all
18:30
Speaker 1: of this. He always appeared to be happy, go lucky,
18:35
Speaker 1: grateful for his success, grateful to be alive, grateful to
18:39
Speaker 1: be in the community. And that's all the more reason
18:41
Speaker 1: it's so stunning to us. Crime story with Nancy Grace
19:05
Speaker 1: if she revealed that she used the liquid, which is
19:08
Speaker 1: normally like eye drops, put it in his food, and
19:10
Speaker 1: she did that without his knowledge, we don't have a
19:13
Speaker 1: clear cut reason why she committed the crime that she did.
19:18
Speaker 1: We are talking about women who poison and we're starting
19:23
Speaker 1: with Lana Clayton. Lana Clayton, where they put a background
19:29
Speaker 1: and nursing her husband apparently the money man with many
19:33
Speaker 1: many branches of a healthcare facility. First, she shoots him
19:39
Speaker 1: with a crossbow in the head while he's asleep in
19:41
Speaker 1: his bedroom. He didn't fall asleep in a lounge chair
19:44
Speaker 1: in the backyard or a hammock near her archery set. Mmmmm,
19:48
Speaker 1: she was practicing the crossbow in the bedroom. And Nancy,
19:51
Speaker 1: before we go much further, I gotta point to something.
19:54
Speaker 1: You know, motive hasn't been discussed really, and I know
19:56
Speaker 1: you say that, you know, prosecutors don't have to prove motive,
19:59
Speaker 1: but everybody wants to know what a motive is here
20:02
Speaker 1: because you've got somebody who seemingly is happily married, very
20:07
Speaker 1: very well off, living in a beautiful home with a
20:09
Speaker 1: rich husband. And the neighbor said that, you know, they
20:12
Speaker 1: didn't see anything wrong. She led a Bible study every week.
20:15
Speaker 1: But check this out. We know that she's accused of
20:18
Speaker 1: killing him with eye drops. We know that a couple
20:20
Speaker 1: of years ago she got out of an attempted murder
20:24
Speaker 1: charge because they claimed it was an accident when she
20:26
Speaker 1: somehow shot her husband while he was asleep in bed
20:30
Speaker 1: in the back of the head with a crossbow, something
20:33
Speaker 1: that after we examined the type of crossbow she had,
20:36
Speaker 1: was an impossibility. It doesn't accidentally fire. So even though
20:40
Speaker 1: he you know, the police said, hey, do you think
20:42
Speaker 1: your wife was trying to kill you? And he goes, no, man,
20:44
Speaker 1: it's an accident. She loves me, I love her, and
20:46
Speaker 1: by the way, everybody we talked to he was in
20:50
Speaker 1: love with her. We're talking about when a man loves
20:52
Speaker 1: a woman. Here, you know, Percy a Sledge and you
20:55
Speaker 1: know when a man loves a woman, she can do
20:57
Speaker 1: no wrong. Well, this woman did some serious wrong trying
21:00
Speaker 1: to kill him with a crossbows and killing him with
21:02
Speaker 1: with the eye drops. But back up a little bit
21:05
Speaker 1: and you'll find out that in a previous marriage there
21:08
Speaker 1: was a problem and on social media, on Facebook in particular,
21:11
Speaker 1: she actually posted a defense of that husband back years ago. Oh,
21:15
Speaker 1: he's not a drunk, he's not violent. And she gets
21:19
Speaker 1: out of that marriage and finds a guy who's self
21:21
Speaker 1: made millionaire. They've got this beautiful, huge house, so big,
21:25
Speaker 1: in fact, the yard so manicured that she could bury
21:27
Speaker 1: him in the backyard. Now this nurse at the VA
21:31
Speaker 1: becomes the wealthy widower of a multi millionaire. So my
21:36
Speaker 1: question is to Jason Ocean's New York attorney, if she
21:44
Speaker 1: confesses to police that she poised her husband, what can
21:48
Speaker 1: Lanna Clayton expect when she goes to trial. I don't
21:55
Speaker 1: know if this is the death penalty type of case,
21:59
Speaker 1: but why why why why? It's it's a long planned,
22:05
Speaker 1: premeditated and practiced crib I understand, I don't Uh, and
22:11
Speaker 1: just it's a gut feel sometimes on you know where
22:14
Speaker 1: it's going to go better? Uh, and just might as
22:17
Speaker 1: well wait wait, wait just a minute. Did you just
22:19
Speaker 1: say you're going to decide if somebody gets the death
22:21
Speaker 1: penalty based on a quote? Get feel? You know what?
22:24
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go to a different guess, Dave mat because
22:27
Speaker 1: are they are they seeking that you did it? You said?
22:30
Speaker 1: Nan again? M yeah, Nancy, I'm sorry, busted now now
22:35
Speaker 1: now you're a recidivist. Sometimes in a in a I
22:38
Speaker 1: am it's but sometimes in a certain profile case obviously
22:42
Speaker 1: we're doing it in a quick nutshell, but uh, it's
22:45
Speaker 1: sometimes it's just best not to and just uh and
22:48
Speaker 1: just go ahead and you know, uh, you know, try
22:51
Speaker 1: it on a you know, murder one versus death penalty
22:55
Speaker 1: murder hold on Dave mac has a state announcer seeking
22:57
Speaker 1: the death penalty. They have an announced that they're seeking
22:59
Speaker 1: the death penalty, but she is being held without bail
23:02
Speaker 1: because it is a death penalty typecake. Take a listen
23:04
Speaker 1: to our friend at Inside Edition. She was a grieving
23:07
Speaker 1: widow who claimed her wealthy husband suffered a fatal fall
23:11
Speaker 1: at home, but police say church going Lana Clayton poisoned
23:15
Speaker 1: him with of all things, eyedrops, available over the counter
23:19
Speaker 1: at every pharmacy in America. Court documents say the fifty
23:23
Speaker 1: two year old mother of two confessed to administering the
23:26
Speaker 1: poison to him in his water over a three day period.
23:30
Speaker 1: Millionaire businessman Stephen Clayton lived with his wife in a
23:33
Speaker 1: South Carolina mansion that is a replica of George Washington's
23:37
Speaker 1: Mount Vernon plantation. His wife's alleged poisoning scheme was straight
23:42
Speaker 1: out of the two thousand and five movie Wedding Crashers,
23:46
Speaker 1: Thank You. Owen Wilson puts eyedrops into Bradley Cooper's drips,
23:51
Speaker 1: sending him running to the bathroom. Funny stuff, but in actuality.
23:55
Speaker 1: The chemical in eyedrops works great on the eyes, but
23:59
Speaker 1: if swallow a load insignificant amounts, it attacks the nervous
24:03
Speaker 1: system and can be deadly. Chills, sweats, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea.
24:12
Speaker 1: I felt awful. Ginger Watson knows what it's like to
24:15
Speaker 1: be poisoned by eyedrops. When she was a manager at
24:19
Speaker 1: Pizza Hut in twenty eleven, a disgruntled coworker spiked her
24:23
Speaker 1: soda with eyedrops. She was hospitalized, but fortunately survived. If
24:28
Speaker 1: I had an underlying medical condition or I had gotten
24:31
Speaker 1: a little more of the drug, I could have been
24:35
Speaker 1: seriously injured or died. Now, a product seen in so
24:39
Speaker 1: many medicine cabinets has allegedly been used by a wife
24:42
Speaker 1: to get rid of her husband. The dead man's family
24:45
Speaker 1: members said they are shocked and mortified by the cause
24:48
Speaker 1: of Steven's death. All our family and friends know how
24:52
Speaker 1: much he loved his wife and how devoted he was
24:55
Speaker 1: to her. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A North Carolina
25:20
Speaker 1: woman is accused of trying to make her fiance sick
25:22
Speaker 1: by putting eyedrops in his drink. If this sounds familiar
25:26
Speaker 1: to you, you've probably seen it in the movie Wedding Crashers,
25:29
Speaker 1: and that is where the woman told police she got
25:31
Speaker 1: the idea. Jamie Cruse facing felony charges this morning because
25:35
Speaker 1: eyedrops can actually put someone in a coma or even
25:39
Speaker 1: kill them. He locked himself in their baby in a
25:41
Speaker 1: bedroom and then called police. She told officers she was
25:45
Speaker 1: trying to make him sick so that she can move
25:47
Speaker 1: out with her daughter. A North Carolina woman allegedly admit
25:51
Speaker 1: she tried to poison her fiance with eyedrops climbing. She
25:55
Speaker 1: got the idea from a movie. Her name Jamie Lynn Cruise.
25:59
Speaker 1: She's been arrested after her fiance calls nine one one
26:03
Speaker 1: when he spots her putting eyedrops into his soda. Wow, okay,
26:10
Speaker 1: straight to Dave Matt Crime online dot Com investigative reporter,
26:13
Speaker 1: what happened? You know exactly what you heard? This woman?
26:16
Speaker 1: Jamie Cruz was caught red handed. The boyfriend suspected as
26:20
Speaker 1: much he saw her trying to put the eye drops
26:23
Speaker 1: in his drink. Once he saw that, he grabbed their
26:26
Speaker 1: child and locked himself into bedroom, called the police, and
26:29
Speaker 1: that's how all of this began. She told them though,
26:32
Speaker 1: that she watched the movie Wedding Crashers and thought this
26:35
Speaker 1: was a good idea because she just wanted to get
26:37
Speaker 1: away with her daughter. Obviously, they have a child together,
26:40
Speaker 1: and there was a real problem with this relationship that
26:42
Speaker 1: the husband of fiance suspected she might do something like this. Okay,
26:47
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Under the law, Jason Oceans. Let's just
26:51
Speaker 1: say I point a gun at Jackie Howard and then oops,
26:57
Speaker 1: it goes off and I kill her, And I say, well,
26:59
Speaker 1: you know what, I was just trying to scare her.
27:03
Speaker 1: That doesn't matter, because the law presumes you intend the
27:09
Speaker 1: natural consequence of your act. In other words, as I
27:12
Speaker 1: would tell a jury, if you take a piece of
27:14
Speaker 1: fine china, the kind you can kind of see through,
27:17
Speaker 1: and you throw it to a cement floor, the law
27:21
Speaker 1: presumes you intend to break it the natural consequence of
27:25
Speaker 1: your act. So if I hold a gun to Jackie's
27:28
Speaker 1: face and pull the trigger to scare her. The law
27:33
Speaker 1: presumes I mean to kill her. In this case, she
27:36
Speaker 1: gave her fiance a sufficient amount of I try to
27:41
Speaker 1: I drops to him sick. Well, you know, into the
27:44
Speaker 1: consequences of an intentional or an unintentional act, right, So
27:49
Speaker 1: you know in this jurisdiction here in New York, that
27:52
Speaker 1: would certainly be up for a charge. In your example
27:54
Speaker 1: of criminally negligent homicide, you know's what's the intent an
28:00
Speaker 1: are up to manslaughter? And it depends how you look
28:03
Speaker 1: in the facts. Uh, you know collectively, well he lived,
28:09
Speaker 1: I would still say it's aggravated assault. I would agree
28:12
Speaker 1: with you, if not attempted murder. I think you're right
28:14
Speaker 1: on the charge, and see if it drops further. But
28:19
Speaker 1: I think it's certainly eligible for a top charge. The
28:24
Speaker 1: unintended consequences of a bad act. Right. You can't drive
28:29
Speaker 1: down the street at ninety miles an hour thinking well
28:31
Speaker 1: it's deserted the three in the morning and just so
28:33
Speaker 1: happens people are coming home from work and you mow
28:36
Speaker 1: them down. Oh, that's a good example to you, Kieren
28:39
Speaker 1: start New York psychologists joining us. You can find r
28:41
Speaker 1: at Karen Start dot com. What can you tell us
28:45
Speaker 1: about the mindset of someone who uses poison as their weapon? Well,
28:51
Speaker 1: I think that anyone who's trying to kill another person,
28:55
Speaker 1: Nancy is a psychopath no matter what they're trying to use.
29:00
Speaker 1: Someone who's trying to use poison, though, it is very
29:03
Speaker 1: smart because most of the time, at least in the past,
29:07
Speaker 1: you couldn't be able to tell that they had used poison.
29:11
Speaker 1: These days it tests us so minister, that's so refined
29:16
Speaker 1: that you actually can tell something that like eyedrops. But
29:23
Speaker 1: if you think about it, it's somebody who doesn't care
29:27
Speaker 1: about killing another person. But it's very wise because who
29:31
Speaker 1: would think of eyedrops as a way to kill another person?
29:36
Speaker 1: To Joe Scott Morgan forensics expert j Scot when I
29:40
Speaker 1: was working on my last Hallmark movie, I had a
29:45
Speaker 1: scene where someone died, a female hospital administrator prescription for
29:50
Speaker 1: murder by the way, died of digitalis overdose. And you
29:54
Speaker 1: know digitalis comes from the foxglove plant. Okay, so at
30:02
Speaker 1: first something like that may not show up as care
30:07
Speaker 1: and Start was describing and your standard toxicology tests. So
30:13
Speaker 1: that indicates very very smart perpetrator. Because they know how
30:19
Speaker 1: to use a certain type of substance that won't show
30:23
Speaker 1: up in a toxicology test. Yes, you're right, and see
30:25
Speaker 1: it's it's what I would refer to as an exotic
30:28
Speaker 1: poison because when when we do a stand what's called
30:33
Speaker 1: a standard toxicology panel at autopsy, it's you know, all
30:38
Speaker 1: the usual suspects are there as far as like opiates, cocaine, benzodiazepine,
30:43
Speaker 1: all those things that you would normally think that are
30:46
Speaker 1: associated with death. Potentially, it's not like she went out
30:50
Speaker 1: and shot a bullus of heroin into a drink or
30:54
Speaker 1: something that he was ingesting to try to offer him
30:57
Speaker 1: that way, because that would be found. With this tetrahydrolozine poisoning.
31:02
Speaker 1: This is something that's exotic, so we might not see
31:05
Speaker 1: it on the initial reports. But what would what would
31:08
Speaker 1: take place is that through the gross findings that means
31:11
Speaker 1: the things that we can see with our unaided eye
31:14
Speaker 1: at autopsy and under the microscope that'll put us down
31:17
Speaker 1: a different path. For instance, in a fatal case where
31:21
Speaker 1: we would have to go back and retest again, what
31:24
Speaker 1: would the physical symptoms be off. I'm gonna I'm gonna
31:28
Speaker 1: try it tetra hydrosolene poisoning. Wow, first try to Wow.
31:34
Speaker 1: I'm just so happy with myself. Go ahead, good job, Nancy,
31:38
Speaker 1: Thank you. I knew you were going to chine in. Jason,
31:44
Speaker 1: I've been waiting to say that. Okay, go ahead, Joe's
31:46
Speaker 1: got What would they see if you had tetrahydrosolene poisoning?
31:52
Speaker 1: What would the body manifest? Well, some of the things
31:56
Speaker 1: that you're going to see are going to be irritated membrane. Say,
32:00
Speaker 1: for instance, also in the soft lining of cardiac tissue,
32:06
Speaker 1: you're going to see problems in the lungs. It's going
32:09
Speaker 1: to lead to a congestive failure. So it's going to
32:12
Speaker 1: if somebody, say, for instance, has no they don't have
32:15
Speaker 1: any kind of predisposition to some kind of outstanding medical problem,
32:19
Speaker 1: and you begin to see these manifestations, hopefully a smart
32:22
Speaker 1: pathologist will look at this and say something else is
32:26
Speaker 1: up here, and so it's going to give you the
32:28
Speaker 1: impetus to dig further. Got another question. You said, Karen,
32:33
Speaker 1: start that she would have been a psychopath. What do
32:36
Speaker 1: you mean by that? That's a technical phrase in your
32:39
Speaker 1: line of business, but not everybody knows what it really
32:42
Speaker 1: means a psychopath is somebody who is not like anybody else.
32:48
Speaker 1: I hope that you know. It's someone who has no
32:51
Speaker 1: feelings whatsoever, and there's no guilty conscience, and they actually
32:58
Speaker 1: enjoy the idea that they can get away with killing
33:01
Speaker 1: another person. They take pleasure in being able to do that,
33:05
Speaker 1: and in this case just okay, I'm not happy here,
33:10
Speaker 1: so I think I'll use some poison and I'll get
33:14
Speaker 1: this person to die. A psychopath is capable of doing that.
33:19
Speaker 1: They don't even need a motivation. They're just out to kill.
33:22
Speaker 1: I got another question. Do you believe there's any way,
33:26
Speaker 1: Joe Scott, that we are looking at a trend? Yeah,
33:30
Speaker 1: the possibility certainly exist, and I think that this has
33:33
Speaker 1: happened in the past with other agents where people will
33:38
Speaker 1: see it an opportunity and take it. Let's keep in mind,
33:40
Speaker 1: this case happened in North Carolina, Nancy, and this was
33:45
Speaker 1: not too far away from the previous case that we're
33:48
Speaker 1: referring to that was out of York, South Carolina. I
33:51
Speaker 1: think that there's an awareness on that end. We had
33:55
Speaker 1: talked about the wedding crashers. I think that this has
33:57
Speaker 1: brought to light and so the potential certainly exist. I
34:02
Speaker 1: think that what you're going to see is there will
34:05
Speaker 1: be an impetus that will come about as a result
34:07
Speaker 1: of probably trying to restrict access to things as seemingly
34:11
Speaker 1: innocuous as eye drops, particularly if these cases continue to
34:16
Speaker 1: track in these way. Side effects include abnormal drowsiness, sedation,
34:22
Speaker 1: as Joe Scott was telling us, low or high blood pressure,
34:26
Speaker 1: difficulty breathing, decreased heart rate, even a coma tetrahydros lene
34:33
Speaker 1: made up of carbon hydrogen nitrogen. It's also found in
34:38
Speaker 1: nasal decongested sprays. Most example, high profile example is viazine.
34:44
Speaker 1: It constricts your blood vessels and because of that, that's
34:48
Speaker 1: how it stops your nose from running and clears up
34:51
Speaker 1: your eyes. Now I've been doing some very very deep
34:58
Speaker 1: legal invest tigation, and I have learned that there is
35:04
Speaker 1: a scene in Wedding Crashers where one of the main
35:08
Speaker 1: character puts eye drops in a rival's drink. Now, that
35:13
Speaker 1: scene is alleged to have inspired a trend. Students in
35:17
Speaker 1: Milwaukee nearly killed a classmate doing it. In June two
35:22
Speaker 1: thousand and six, a Wisconsin woman jail for ninety days
35:26
Speaker 1: for poisoning her roommate with a Vizine two eleven. She
35:32
Speaker 1: got the idea from the movie A California man charged
35:36
Speaker 1: with domestic violence from poisoning. He spiked his girlfriend's drink
35:41
Speaker 1: as a prank after an argument. If you google vizine prank,
35:47
Speaker 1: you get over nearly You get nearly twenty thousand results. Okay,
35:55
Speaker 1: poisoned by eye drops It is a trend. Nancy Grace
35:59
Speaker 1: crimes too. Or he's signing off goodbye friend.