Original subtitles

[audio logo]

If you believe in justice or family, I beg for your help.

My son and I are innocent.

There is a huge, evil cover-up going on.

The police have made a terrible mistake

and are attempting to cover up what they have done to us.

My son and I were arrested on July 5, 1998, for a crime

that we did not do.

[theme music]

Hello, and welcome to How It Really Happened.

I'm Jesse L. Martin.

It was July 5, 1998, when 82-year-old Irene Silverman,

a wealthy widow, mysteriously disappeared from

her New York City townhouse.

While police went on a frantic search to find her,

they had no idea that their investigation would unravel one

of the most shocking crimes they had ever seen, a deadly trail

of deceit and fraud that stretched from the Bahamas

to Los Angeles.

This is how it really happened.

[music playing]

On the Upper East Side of Manhattan, July

4th weekend is absolutely dead.

It's hot weather.

It's muggy.

You can hardly breathe.

The residents of the Upper East Side

basically scurry out to Long Island to be in their houses

on the ocean.

We had three detectives working.

The uniformed officers had a what I would

consider like a skeleton crew.

We were told that a gentleman was downstairs who was looking

to report someone missing.

And that's where I met Mr. Jeff Feig.

He was the manager for Irene Silverman's accounts.

Irene Silverman was known as a Manhattan socialite.

Jeff Feig is very nervous, very worried about Irene

Silverman at the time.

He was very insistent something happened to her.

He was very, very adamant and credible

that she never left the house.

If she's not there, there's a serious problem.

She was an unusual person to suddenly

go missing at age 82, when she never left the house alone.

[music playing]

Irene Silverman lived in a beautiful home less than a

block away from Central Park.

It's an extremely wealthy area.

She had been in that neighborhood and that house

for many years.

She lived by herself and had a small but very close

group of friends.

She had a certain reputation among people in the arts,

in show business.

She's a former ballerina for Radio City, which is

how she met her banker husband.

Irene Silverman was married to Sam

Silverman, who was a mortgage broker and a very

successful businessman.

She was red hair, vivacious, very outgoing, charismatic.

THOMAS RYAN: She was probably around 5 feet tall,

probably 100 pounds, if that.

After Irene Silverman's husband passed away,

she converted her townhome into individual apartments.

And she started renting them out.

She was an early version of an Airbnb.

To me, it seemed not so much to make money as to have company.

[music playing]

Irene Silverman was very cautious about the people

that she rented apartments to.

You'd have to be affluent and recommended by someone.

She didn't advertise.

A couple of the famous people she had in there

was Daniel Day Lewis, Chaka Khan,

and other business tycoons.

Irene Silverman was last seen in her office at about 11:45

in the morning on July 5 by a worker who had been sent off

to do some chores and to take the dog up

to the roof for its daily walk.

First order of business is to go

around and Make sure we've went through every nook and cranny.

We call every hospital-- do you have an Irene Silverman?

Do you have a Jane Doe with this description?

We called friends, anyone that might have any contact with her.

Anything at all that may give us

any clue as to where Irene was.

[eerie music]

At the initial stages of the investigation,

there was no forensic evidence.

As far as a struggle, that was not visible at all.

But as we got further into the investigation,

we realized that something was definitely amiss.

It was noticed that approximately $10,000 which

several people knew that she kept was, in fact,

missing from the closet.

We interviewed her staff.

And they told us that a man in apartment 1B has been very

suspicious, to the point where Irene

Silverman told them about him.

Apartment 1B was located about 20

feet from Irene Silverman's office on the first floor.

This was a young man going by the name of Manny Guerin.

He's 6 foot 1, dark hair, green eyes, broad shoulders.

The staff members told us about a woman

who would come to apartment 1B.

She was known as Ava.

And the tenants became suspicious of her

as well because she would never look at people,

would never talk to anybody.

She seemed too old to be his girlfriend,

but yet she'd spend the night with him.

So this was making Irene very nervous and scared.

[eerie music]

Manny Guerin was renting the apartment

for approximately three to four weeks

prior to Irene Silverman's disappearance.

JOE REZNIK: Manny Guerin had apparently

made arrangements to rent the apartment 1B for one month.

We learned that Irene charged $6,000 for the one month's rent.

Usually, she didn't rent out her apartment until she

had vetted their references.

But she is taken in by the fact that Manny Guerin has

$6,000 in cold, hard cash that he's willing to pay right there

for the first month's rent.

And he says he's going to get her his references ASAP.

MARIA ZONE: But his references never came.

[music playing]

Irene Silverman realizes pretty quickly

that Manny Guerin is sketchy and she should never

have let him into her home.

THOMAS RYAN: There was some talk that he

was seen right by the door sort of listening for her.

She had security cameras in her vestibule,

and he would duck those security cameras every time he went

in and out of the building.

JOE REZNIK: Irene had video cameras,

but unfortunately, they were just

used for monitoring purposes.

There was no recording devices.

It was just where she could look.

In case the doorbell rang, she could see who, in fact,

that person was.

Irene was so suspicious of Manny Guerin

that she did a trace of his face, like a sketch.

And she even took meticulous notes about his behavior.

On July 4, on a party that she threw,

she mentioned to Jeff Feig that she wanted to evict him.

And they did make plans that on or about July 6 that Monday,

they would serve him with papers to have him evicted.

CICI MCNAIR: She wanted him out.

On the morning of July 5, 1998,

Manny Guerin was the only tenant in the building.

Shortly after Irene disappeared,

Manny Guerin was nowhere to be found either.

We tried to locate him, and we couldn't.

We did background checks on the name-- nothing came back.

So we were at a dead end at that point.

[music playing]

Questions tonight on the mysterious disappearance

of a very wealthy woman.

And it's not just Silverman who's missing tonight.

Also gone without a trace is one of her tenants.

On Monday evening, July 6, there's a press conference held.

And at that time, we released a sketch of Manny Guerin

and a photo also of Irene Silverman.

Just to tell people, you know either

of these people or any information,

please contact the tip line.

[music playing]

A big break came in the case on the morning of July 7.

A detective from the NYPD working this case

received a phone call from the FBI.

One of the agents saw the press conference.

As a result of him recognizing the sketch

he conveyed that he, in fact, thought that they

had Manny Guerin in custody.

The FBI had arrested the fugitives the night before.

REPORTER: The tenant from the millionaire's mansion

has been found and is behind bars tonight.

Police think her tenant, 23-year-old Kenneth Kimes,

is a con artist who gave the fake name "Manny Guerin"

to live on the first floor of Silverman's townhouse.

Kimes' mother, Sante Kimes, was also arrested Sunday night.

JOURNALIST: The Kimes allegedly wrote a car dealership, a bad

check for $15,000 in March.

TOM HOVAGIM: Sante and Kenneth Kimes

were arrested for the bad check just

a few hours after Irene Silverman

had been reported missing.

After meeting Sante for the first time,

you would think she was the best woman in the world.

I was assigned to sit with her.

The first thing she says is, that's a beautiful tie.

Your wife must have really great taste in ties and men.

They had ID on them of Irene Silverman.

They had her passport, her Social Security card, and keys

to Irene Silverman's house.

Sante said Irene couldn't have really disappeared because they

were going to have plastic surgery together,

and that's why she had the passport

and all these documents.

Irene trusted her.

We don't know where she is, but we pray for her.

The biggest injustice is that there's no crime.

They don't know where the woman is.

They manufactured a crime.

TOM HOVAGIM: When my partner and I went to interview Kenny Kimes,

I said, this kid is the boy next door--

clean cut, good-looking young man, very

intelligent, very well-spoken.

I was a UCSB college student.

I had a lot of friends.

I had-- I had a fun life.

He started to get emotional.

And I thought that he was going to start to talk

to us about Irene Silverman.

However, he changed on a dime.

He became stone cold, and he asked for an attorney.

As hard as we tried, neither Kenny or Sante Kimes

were forthcoming with any information in regards

to the disappearance of Irene Silverman.

Our first concern, of course, is

the welfare of Mrs. Silverman.

And if there's any possibility that she is, in fact, unharmed,

that's what we're concerned about.

[music playing]

LARRY KING: The connection between you

and your son and this woman was what?

I met Irene in 1994.

An Equitable Life Insurance man had invited me to New York,

and I met her--

very friendly.

She called me in 1996 and told me that she was worried

and that she wanted to sell her apartment.

And she knew that I had a lot of connections,

and could I help her? And I said, I'd be happy to.

LARRY KING: Did you eventually rent it or buy it?

- No, I-- - Your son lived there?

We did not rent the apartment.

[music playing]

REPORTER: Police say the mother and the son

are accomplished con artists.

Authorities think they may learn more about the Kimes

from evidence found in their car.

We located a green Lincoln Continental, the car that they

paid for with the bad check.

We send down one of the best crime scene people.

This detective spent 24 and 32 hours painstakingly

fingerprints, hair samples, blood,

testing every inch of the car.

Because right now, it's our feeling

that Irene Silverman may have been transported in that car.

[music playing]

[chatter]

The big question every day to me was, where's Irene?

At first my initial reaction was, um,

all right, these people definitely have something to do

with Irene's disappearance.

But as far as arresting them for Irene Silverman,

more work had to be done.

The fact of the matter is, the more we looked into the Kimes,

the more we found, and the more complex the case became.

TOM HOVAGIM: That was just the tip of the iceberg.

[music playing]

We started doing some background checks.

As far as Kenny was concerned, he had one prior

arrest down in Florida.

But then we had Sante.

We found multiple aliases, 11 prior arrests.

REPORTER: Sante Kimes has a string

of arrests dating back to 1961.

One was for stealing a mink coat down in Washington, DC,

at some kind of high-end party.

Another time, she was arrested for slavery

in two different states.

JOE REZNIK: How does someone, in 1985, get arrested for slavery?

[music playing]

[inaudible]

[man chuckles]

Sante was very flamboyant.

She looked like Elizabeth Taylor.

She would even get mistaken for her

and would sign autographs, which, of course, she loved.

She was a very charismatic person--

effervescent.

She was very, very exciting.

For the outsider looking in, we were living the life.

She wanted money and had anxiety around money.

She was obsessed with getting it and spending it.

She was a very accomplished shoplifter,

and she had a lot of techniques for getting away with it.

KENT WALKER: We drove a lot of nice cars, but none of them

were paid for.

In 1970, Sante finally meets her millionaire

that she's going to lock down.

His name is Kenneth Kimes.

He's a very successful motel developer.

CICI MCNAIR: Ken Kimes was a self-made multi-millionaire.

He was divorced.

He had a son and a daughter, and 17 years older than Sante,

but he was intrigued by her.

My mother could make any man in the room feel

like the most important man on the planet.

And Ken eat it up.

His favorite color was white.

She always dressed in white from that moment on.

He loved the scent of gardenia.

She walked around in a cloud of gardenia perfume.

She thought of herself as irresistible.

Sante would mold herself to be his dream girl.

She's seducing him, babying him.

She's keeping him drunk.

She's filling his cocktail glass over and over.

And then, on the flip side, he's terrified of her sometimes.

Her personality was fearsome, on the good side

and the bad side.

You never knew.

TORI TEFLER: Ken recognizes who Sante is,

so he's always a little bit suspicious of her.

THOMAS RYAN: Ken also is fairly paranoid, man,

but he's also kind of cheap for a millionaire.

He didn't like paying for stuff.

It was his money, and he knew it.

That was his power.

And he knew that if mom had access to it,

he'd lose his power.

And that's why he made sure that my mom never had a credit card,

never had a checkbook, never had access to the money.

CICI MCNAIR: Sante was nearly 41 years old when Kenny was born.

This baby is her lockdown millionaire baby.

He can't leave her now because she's had his son, who

she names Kenneth Karim Kimes.

They call him Kenny.

[music playing]

Sante and Ken wanted a staff, because what's more rich

person than having a staff?

So they would drive down to Mexico or Central America

to find girls from poor families who

didn't speak a lot of English.

And they would present them with this amazing offer,

this American dream--

we're going to pay you so much money

that you can send money home to your family.

And then they would put the girls in the trunk

and drive back over the border.

When they arrived, the nightmare would start.

They were being kept locked in rooms.

They worked seven days a week.

She never paid them a cent.

She would say, if you go to the police,

they're going to rape you.

She poured boiling water on one of them.

She hit another one with a coat hanger.

She had a gun that she wasn't afraid to wave around.

One of them did eventually manage to escape

and run to the authorities.

REPORTER: Suspect Sante Kimes and her husband

were arrested for violating US slavery laws for smuggling

and abusing four Central American women

from San Diego to Las Vegas.

TORI TEFLER: Ken takes a plea deal,

but Sante does go to trial.

For the slavery charge, Sante was sentenced to five years.

However, after three years, she was released.

Her maids decide to bring a $35 million

civil suit against her and Ken.

Sante eventually gets her insurance company to pay it.

How?

Coercion, threats.

She actually was threatening one of the CEOs of one

of the insurance companies.

And they found a dead raven in the front seat of his car.

That's what she could do.

[music playing]

Here in New York, Irene was still missing.

So as we're looking for Irene herself,

we learn more and more about Sante and Kenny Kimes.

REPORTER: Police say in New York City, Kenneth Kimes

and his mother may have been scheming to defraud

the wealthy former socialite.

Police in Los Angeles have a similar suspicion about

the couple in a murder case.

David Kazdin was a friend of Kenneth

Kimes Sr. They had some business ventures together.

And that's how the connection grew between Sante and David.

I first met David about 1971.

It was a casual slash business relationship.

I would say David was very sharp, very quick,

good sense of humor.

He had come from New York, so he had what in California we

would call a New York attitude.

[chuckles] When David wanted to know something, he asked you.

David calls, says, Phil, you available?

And I said, sure.

We went out to lunch.

He said, you remember Sante Kimes?

He said, I have a little issue going on.

A few years ago, I let her and her husband

put my name on a piece of property on a house

over in Las Vegas.

She didn't want it in her name, he says,

so I let her put my name on it.

And now I find out that my name has been

forged on some loan documents.

And as if this isn't shady enough, the house burns down.

And there is so much gasoline on it

that the arson investigating dogs are just going wild.

PHIL: He said, these people will do anything.

[music playing]

TORI TEFLER: On Saturday morning, March 14, David's body

was found in a dumpster by LAX.

He had a gunshot wound in the neck and no shoes.

I mean, his green Jaguar was found parked a few blocks away.

I was contacted by LAPD.

And I think my first response was, I think I know who

your first suspect should be.

But by the time they contacted me,

I think maybe Sante was already in New York.

[music playing]

Welcome back to How It Really Happened.

Shortly after 82-year-old Irene Silverman was reported missing,

Sante and Kenneth Kimes were arrested

on a warrant out of Utah for using a bad check to buy a car.

But investigators in both New York and Los Angeles

had reason to believe the mother and son con artists

could be responsible for far more heinous crimes,

including murder.

[music playing]

During the investigation, we found out that Sante Kimes was

involved in insurance fraud.

And one of the cases was with a man named Elmer Holmgren.

Back in 1991, Holmgren admitted setting fire

to a residence belonging to the Kimes

and admitted he had been paid $3,000

by the Kimes to set that fire.

Sante had asked him to do that so they

could collect the insurance money on the house.

Wherever Sante had owned property,

there was the whiff of arson, insurance fraud.

KENT WALKER: He was interviewed by ATF.

They were going to have him wear a wire.

He calls the ATF the night before and says,

hey, we got to change it because they found out what's going on.

They know I'm talking to you.

Elmer is going to report Sante.

And somehow, Sante finds this out.

So she says, let's go on a trip.

Elmer Holmgren decided to go away with Sante

and Kenneth Kimes Sr.

Elmer has a really bad feeling about this.

And he tells his son, look, if you don't hear from me in three

days, go to the authorities.

And nobody ever hears from Elmer ever again.

TOM HOVAGIM: I believe that Sante was definitely

responsible for Elmer Holmgren's disappearance

and probably murder.

[music playing]

As time went on, I felt that the chances

of finding Irene Silverman alive were slim to none.

The chief of detectives would call every day--

what's going on?

So the pressure was on, especially when you

have the suspects in custody.

We had an entire room full of evidence.

REPORTER: Police say they found a mountain of evidence

in the suspect's green town car and in a gym bag that

was stored at the Plaza Hotel.

There was an unknown fluid that was determined

to be a date rape drug.

Syringes, rubber gloves.

REPORTER: Guns, wigs, and the suspect's handwritten notes

detailing their alleged crime.

Notebooks, journals of what they'd done,

what they planned to do, shopping lists such as buy milk,

large garbage bags, stun gun.

TOM HOVAGIM: Two masks from the movie Scream.

A number of blank Social Security cards and blank power

of attorney forms.

But the most important piece of evidence

was the forged deed with Irene Silverman's name on it.

Once we recovered that forged deed,

we knew we had motive right there.

They were intending to transfer

Mrs. Silverman's multimillion dollar townhouse to themselves.

In fact, Mrs. Kimes posed as Mrs. Silverman to get

one of the documents notarized.

Sante dressed in wigs, a hat and played

the part of a frail woman.

It would be comical if it wasn't so tragic.

[music playing]

New York City became so enthralled with this case.

THOMAS RYAN: It was everywhere.

CICI MCNAIR: The tabloids just loved it.

They were calling them the grifters from Los Angeles.

Mommy and Clyde.

CICI MCNAIR: It was Dragon Lady.

People were just fascinated by it.

JOURNALIST: Attorneys representing the mother and son

team say their clients have been wrongly

linked to the disappearance.

It seems that the public now has an impression

that these individuals are responsible for the

disappearance of this elderly woman.

And there isn't any good, hard, reliable evidence.

This is a case of a witch hunt and persecution by [inaudible].

But the obvious question is, why you and your son?

Because we just happened to be there at the apartment.

And they made the worst mistake in history.

I mean, there is no crime.

There's no body.

CICI MCNAIR: I was working in New York

City as a private detective.

This was my first murder case.

They were held on Rikers.

And Sante would be paraded in wearing cuffs.

And immediately, even with the handcuffs,

she began to flirt with her lawyer, Matthew Weissman.

Oh, you're so wonderful to come.

I'm so delighted to see you.

She was like the Grand Dame about to call the Butler

and bring champagne.

Sante was a enormously gifted individual.

She had the gift of gab.

And intelligent-- she was very intelligent.

Stop it.

Sante used her charm on everyone.

It was constant seduction.

It was leaning forward and saying,

Cici, You're the only person who understands the case.

The lawyers are idiots.

They don't get it.

You are the one to bring justice to this,

which is the greatest miscarriage of justice

in the American history.

[music playing]

TOM HOVAGIM: After recovering all the evidence in question,

we knew we had overwhelming evidence

to take this case to the district attorney's office.

But there was a huge problem for NYPD

when it came to charging Kenny and Sante

with Irene's murder, which is that they

couldn't find Irene's body.

They couldn't find a scrap of physical evidence.

I felt that they are 1,000% guilty.

JOE REZNIK: The problem was, how do we prove that they did it?

[eerie music]

[chatter]

Every place you look where the Kimes have been,

there's either a body or somebody's missing.

At that point, we had a lot of very incriminating

circumstantial evidence.

We really had a mother and son that were deadly.

[music playing]

Sante went through a transition

when Ken Kimes Sr. died.

Back in 1994, Kenny Kimes Sr. dies while waiting in a car

while Sante ran into a bank.

Ken died of an aneurysm, took about 15 seconds to die.

And afterwards, she couldn't find a will.

He only has this old will that gives

everything to his first two children

from a previous marriage.

CICI MCNAIR: Sante decided to keep him alive by pretending

he was alive.

[music playing]

She needed him alive to sign the checks and make the withdrawals.

He had money in various banks all around the world.

She was forging checks and getting money

out of these various accounts.

So whenever anyone would call and ask to speak to her husband,

Sante would say he was traveling, he was in the shower,

or he had laryngitis.

Kenny doesn't find out for three months

that his dad is dead, but Ken's two children

from that previous marriage don't

find out for about two years.

[music playing]

The difference in the relationship between mom

and Kenny from the time before Ken

died to afterwards, incomparable.

They were two totally different people.

CICI MCNAIR: And he suddenly becomes

very, very close to his mother.

She encourages him to drop out of college in '96.

And this is when they really become

partners in crime, literally.

As part of our investigation, we

did come across some information about them being involved

in a homicide in the Bahamas.

[music playing]

We had a property in the Bahamas on the beach.

The Bahamas had an appeal to Ken because of the offshore banking.

Sante and Kenny are trying to get money

out of Ken's offshore account.

KENT WALKER: But the problem was the bank was going belly up.

[music playing]

CICI MCNAIR: Syed Bilal Ahmed became a little suspicious

with certain transactions.

Kenny and Sante took the banker to dinner.

The banker was never seen again.

[music playing]

REPORTER: The mother and son pair is

accused of the murder of 82-year-old

millionaire Irene Silverman.

Sante and Kenny are finally slapped

with this huge indictment--

84 counts.

It's a huge circumstantial case against them.

And so they're finally charged with the second-degree murder

of Irene Silverman.

I felt more and more confident each day,

and so did the district attorneys, that this is worth

a shot.

Before the trial in 1999, Sante and Kenny did an interview

with 60 Minutes' Steve Kroft.

Well, I would describe myself as a mom.

I was married to a wonderful man, who was a big old Irishman.

Kenny looks a lot like him.

I would say that I'm a son of a very wonderful, beautiful mom.

I think she's a beautiful person,

spiritually and intellectually and then physically.

Many people have suspected or alleged that it

was a sexual relationship.

They held hands throughout the entire interview.

It was very, very strange.

Kenny is a mama's boy, and that's

how I looked at all of that.

TORI TEFLER: Their trial starts in 2000 on Valentine's Day.

CICI MCNAIR: They wanted to be tried together.

[music playing]

No one saw anybody coming out of that house.

How did they get her out if they got her out?

Not just that there was no blood evidence and no body,

but there wasn't even a trace, not a trace.

The strongest pieces of evidence for the prosecution

was Irene Silverman's ID being recovered

from Sante and Kenneth, in addition to the forged deed.

The mansion was worth millions and millions.

The sale price was so low as to be laughable.

But it was supposed to be transferring ownership.

[music playing]

The notebooks were the most challenging

thing in terms of the defense.

The prosecution referred to the notebooks as a roadmap

to the crime--

everything Sante and Kenny wanted to do,

thought they should do in order to ideally get Irene's mansion,

but ultimately kill Irene.

They also recorded phone conversations

that they made to Irene.

Listening to those cassettes, we learned that they apparently

tapped into the phone lines and they were able to listen

in on Irene's conversations.

They tried to get Irene's Social Security number.

She knew something was up.

She did not provide them with that Social Security number.

And that was evidence that was on the tape.

Sante insisted that they were being framed.

The evidence was being planted.

The police were corrupt.

(SOBBING) I used to believe in this country.

I don't believe in this country anymore.

Americans are endangered.

Trust me, it can happen to you.

The prosecution had over a hundred witnesses

at the trial that testified.

And the defense had one.

Nobody could say they had seen Sante

and Kenny when they were purportedly

dealing with Irene Silverman.

MICHAEL: But Sante wanted to testify.

That judge stopped me from taking the stand.

We had a defense!

We were ready to tell a brainwashed jury what happened.

[music playing]

CICI MCNAIR: Nobody wanted to bring up

her past of arson and shoplifting,

but particularly the slavery charge.

There was no defense.

All the jury had heard were lies.

A bombshell courtroom verdict today in Manhattan--

a jury found Sante and Kenneth Kimes guilty.

Kenny came down the hall, and his face was gray.

He never thought they would be convicted.

REPORTER: The eight women and four men

finding Sante and Kenneth Kimes guilty of murder, robbery,

eavesdropping, weapons possession, and forgery,

among other charges.

Kenneth and his mother were each sentenced to more

than a hundred years in prison.

[music playing]

Are you optimistic about an appeal?

The only reason I think I'm alive

is that I must prove his innocence.

TORI TEFLER: But they were facing another murder charge.

And unlike the Irene Silverman trial, in LA, they had a body.

[music playing]

My mom is--

is a wonderful, caring mother.

And her world is me.

And she is my world.

Once the New York case was over with,

Sante and Kenny Kimes now had to face

murder charges out in California for the killing of David Kazdin.

We all knew California was the death penalty case.

And they would have been the first mother and son

to face the death penalty.

[music playing]

But before going to LA, Kenny Kimes

did an interview at an upstate prison called Dannemora.

I was a freelance producer at Court TV.

On October 10, 2000, I had a planned interview

with Kenneth Kimes.

And right away, I noticed there was

something really off about him.

He was acting very strange, very fidgety.

Could, um-- if I may ask, uh, could we take a break

in maybe five or 10 minutes?

Sure, better.

Oh, just a little-- put a little water on my face.

And then he said to me, I'm really hungry.

Do you mind if you get me something?

The only thing left in the vending machines

was a Snickers bar and a bottled water.

And I handed him these things.

And before I knew it--

[clamoring]

--he had his arm across my neck.

And he said to me, this is a hostage situation.

[inaudible] Get back!

Camera man, back!

He took a ballpoint pen and held the pen to her neck.

The guards were watching.

No one knew what to do.

He demanded to be extradited to Canada.

I really didn't think I was going

to make it out that day alive.

I was extremely terrified.

He threatened to kill her for four hours.

I cried with him.

And I finally said to him, do you know how to pray?

And he looked at me and he said, yes.

Like, he really wanted to.

So we actually said the Lord's Prayer together.

And it gave me lots of comfort.

And I saw it gave him comfort.

One of the hostage negotiators said to him, OK,

Kenneth, let's end this now.

This is my business card.

And Kenneth went to grab it, and I found that moment

and just took advantage and ran.

And I heard everybody just pounce on him.

And I just thanked God that he had let me go.

[music playing]

On November 19, 2003, The Los Angeles Times

announced that Kenny was going to confess.

He was going to betray his mother,

something he had always been terrified to do,

trained not to do.

He appealed to the LA DA and said,

I will tell every detail of the murder of Irene Silverman

and the murder of David Kazdin if you

take the death penalty off the table for me and my mother.

I was in the courtroom when he described the murders,

and I think my heart stopped.

I had heard this person proclaim his innocence

thousands of times, and here he was

talking about gruesome details.

[music playing]

JOE REZNIK: Apparently, that morning on July 5,

he'd left his apartment.

He'd met Irene out by the office and asked her for a newspaper.

I think he used that opportunity to see, was Irene alone?

Kenny then returns to his apartment.

And now she happens to be standing right outside his door.

TORI TEFLER: Kenny flings open the door,

grabs Irene and pulls her inside.

And Sante yells at Kenny, do it.

And so Kenny puts his hands around Irene's throat,

and he strangles her to death.

[music playing]

He confessed to putting her in the trunk of his car

and driving her out to New Jersey,

where he said he dumped the body in a dumpster.

Kenny confesses that he killed David Kazdin as a result

of David wanting to go to the police

because of a $280,000 loan that was taken out on his name.

Kenny drove to David Kazdin's house.

And David Kazdin had known Kenny for years

because he'd been friends with his father, friends with Sante.

He opened the door, said hello to Kenny,

invited him in for a cup of coffee.

And Kenny shot him in the back of the head.

On the way home, after disposing

of David Kazdin's body, Kenny decides, this calls for flowers.

He spends $100 on a bouquet of flowers.

He goes back to his mother, said, mom, we did it.

Kenny also admitted to the killing of Mr. Ahmed

in the Bahamas.

Kenny confessed to drowning him in a bathtub

and throwing his body into the Caribbean.

Finally, the truth was out.

Sante was softly crying, and then

Kenny was manacled and trying to stop the tears on his face.

I don't think that Kenny ever turned and looked at his mother

during this recitation of events.

[music playing]

After the trials, Sante was sent back to New York State,

and Kenny was kept in California.

And they weren't allowed to contact each other ever again.

Over the years, I've been involved in about

1,300 homicide investigations.

I'd say it's the most complex and strange.

A mother and son murdering people--

it boggles the mind.

Why did they do it?

She was a multimillionaire's wife.

It's pathological.

It's a sickness.

Her answer to resolve things was violence.

That's the way she took care of loose ends.

Sante was the mastermind.

It was her idea to kill Syed.

It was her idea to kill David.

She was the one who found out about Irene

Silverman's existence then put this scheme in motion.

She has ruined countless lives, including her own son's.

Mom was evil from day one, no doubt about it.

Kenny made her more dangerous.

Kenny didn't care about people.

And put the two together, they were that lethal.

Sante Kimes died at the Bedford Hills Prison in 2014.

She was 79.

Kenneth Kimes is currently serving life without parole

in a California state prison.

To this day, Irene Silverman's body has never been found.

I'm Jesse L. Martin.

Thanks for watching.

Good night.

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