All language subtitles for Accident.Suicide.or.Murder.S06E10.1080p.WEB.h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

♪♪

-When the unthinkable happens

between a 10-year-old
boy and his father...

-He didn't realize
his finger was on the trigger.

It went off.

-The impact on a child,
it was very traumatic.

-It had to be an accident.

But there were things
that didn't make sense.

-My dad was my world.
He was my superhero.

Not a day goes by
that I don't miss my dad.

-...the case haunts
the community

until nine years later,

new information
changes everything.

-She told me that he told her
that it wasn't an accident.

-The way my dad died,

it wasn't the way
everyone thought it was.

-A heartbreaking allegation
makes police question

who the real killer is.

-I'm sitting there thinking,
this is crazy.

-You're talking to a teenager
about stuff

that happened
when they were little.

-Do you believe this?
Do you not?

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[ Phone ringing ]

-Moments after
the harrowing call,

Defiance County emergency
services raced to the scene,

knowing there's a good chance
the victim is

a friend or neighbor
in this small community.

-They just told me that
it was the Breininger residence.

And as soon
as they said Breininger,

I knew right away
where I was going.

Living in Defiance County all my
life, you get to know everybody.

I knew Robert Breininger,
owner of the property,

knew him growing up
through school.

He lived out there with
his wife, Judith, and Corey,

his 10-year-old boy
who made the 911 call.

Every case is personal.

But this was even more.

I arrived at
the Breininger residence,

and that's when
Corey opens the door

and he's just devastated.

He grabs my hand and he started
to take me to the back

where his dad was,
and I stopped him.

And I walked back there,

and as soon as I seen Robert,

I knew there was nothing
could be done.

It was clear that there had been
a bullet through his head.

I knew the devastation
that I'd seen.

He was gone.

My mind was shifted
to many things.

Was this suicide?

Had Corey shot his dad
intentionally,

or is this an accident?

-Shocked by his friend's death
and unsure of the circumstances,

Detective Vandemark heads back
out to his only known witness,

the victim's son.

-I take Corey outside.
He was crying.

I started talking quietly to him
to tell me what had happened.

-Corey's story was
that he and his dad

were going to go hunting,

and his dad was teaching him
about gun safety.

-Corey said he was
holding the gun.

He didn't realize
his finger was on the trigger.

It went off and the result was
his dad being shot in the head.

-The impact on a child
to an accident like that.

It was very traumatic.

-While Corey
is handed over to EMTs,

Detective Vandemark goes
back inside to assess the scene.

-Robert laid facing
up in the bed.

He was covered with sheets.

There was a large pooling
of blood around his head

and onto the floor.

The wound was just above
the ear on his right side.

-There's hunting pamphlets
that are tucked under

the deceased's arm on the bed.

-The gun was a shotgun, a 410.

A lot of children use
the 410 shotgun

versus the 12 gauges
and the 20.

There are more small and light.

It was laying on
the left side of the bed,

where you would have
expected it to be,

based on where
the wound entered.

-At first glance,
the crime scene matches

Corey's brief description
of what happened,

but Detective Vandemark notices
some elements don't make sense.

-Corey told me that
his father was teaching him

how to shoot guns,

but why was he in bed
covered with sheets?

And the other thing I noticed
was he had earplugs in his ears.

That just didn't make sense.

-After finishing
his examination of the body,

Detective Vandemark
notices Robert's wife, Judith,

who has been Corey's stepmother
for five years, arrive on scene.

-When Corey had seen Judith,
he became real quiet.

I don't know if it was
because he was going to

have to tell his mom there
was this horrible accident,

and that's when I whisper
in her ear that he's gone.

He's gone.

And a tear came into her eye.

-Judith,
appearing to be in shock,

is able to tell Detective
Vandemark some of the events

that led up to Robert's death.

-Judith told us Robert worked
third shift from 10:00 at night

until 5:00, 6:00 in the morning.

He would normally sleep
during the day,

but Judith and Robert
had been running errands

until about noon that day.

And then when Corey
got home from school,

she went over to her mother's
house, closing up a garage sale.

Corey didn't go.

He was going to stay
there with Dad.

So Robert hadn't had
much sleep that day at all.

Judith said that
the reason he wore earplugs

is to help him sleep
during the day.

And she also told us she
didn't know why the gun was out.

She makes the comment,

it was normally way up
high in their closet.

And then she reaches
out to Corey

and says
"Daddy's going to be okay."

-34-year-old
Robert Breininger was born

and raised in Defiance County.

-When I first met Robert, we
were teenagers playing baseball.

Robert was a down-to-earth
homebody type guy.

Pleasant, easy to talk to.

Just a great person
all around to be around.

-Robert was an avid
hunter-fisherman.

That was his pastime,

was to go hunting
with his buddies

or to take Corey fishing.

-His son was his priority.

He was a loving
and nurturing father.

-Robert had been
previously married.

The only child that
they shared was Corey...

and she left.

So Robert was raising
that child alone

until Judith came into his life.

-In 1998,
when Corey is 4 years old,

Robert meets and falls in love
with Judith Foudy,

who lives in their
small community.

-They hit it off pretty good.

She could be personable,
pleasant to be around.

-I didn't know Judith well,

but they married quite quickly
and she was bound

and determined
to be Corey's mom,

and she adopted
Corey right away.

Their married life seemed
to be the typical married life.

There wasn't flags going off

that it was a bad marriage
or anything like that.

Robert was a very good writer.

He worked at a steel mill.

He was an ironworker.

-In the late '80s,
I worked with Robert.

He was a hard worker,
very knowledgeable person.

Robert was so smart.

I couldn't imagine him
having a firearm of any sort

in the house being loaded,

let alone being something
that Corey could get.

-This 10-year-old boy
is devastated.

It had to be an accident.

However, there were things
I seen that didn't make sense.

-Just hours after
the shooting,

as law enforcement
finishes up at the scene,

Detective Vandemark goes to get
a more detailed statement

from Corey about what happened.

-During our second
interview with Corey,

Judith would not let
me talk to him alone,

and I wasn't going to
argue that fact that

she's the mom.

He was devastated.
He was crying.

I asked questions about the gun.

"Did he load the gun?"

"No, he didn't load the gun.

I didn't realize there
was a bullet in there."

-Corey said this was supposed
to be a hunting lesson.

Corey and his dad
were looking at

hunting magazines and pamphlets

when he and his dad
were exchanging the gun

when it went off.

-I asked why his dad
was still laying down in bed.

He didn't know,
is what he told me at the time,

and I asked him,
"Were you mad at your dad?

"Were you getting along
with your dad?"

And he indicated
through the tears that

"No, I wasn't mad at him."

At some point,
Judith just said,

"Enough's enough,"
and I felt that

it had reached that point, too.

-The next morning,
the coroner determines

Robert Breininger's
manner of death.

-The coroner felt there was
no reason for an autopsy,

and he gave the manner of death
as being an accidental shooting.

As to the investigation
at that point, it got closed.

It was clear Corey was saying

that he shot him
accidentally in the head.

-The focus at that time was

a 10 year old had
a terrible accident.

He's traumatized.

We don't want to make
this any worse.

-The news of Robert Breininger's
violent death

deeply affects
the tight-knit community.

-Everyone felt bad
for their family.

Corey was 10,
and he was home by himself.

I can't imagine
how scary that was for him.

-To hear that there was
a death as a result

of a gun caught
people by surprise,

because we know how
to handle guns out here.

There were questions,
but I think people said,

"Let's move on because this
child has suffered enough."

-Nine years later,
in March of 2012,

the case that haunted the tiny
community comes back to life.

-In March 2012,

I received a call
from Sheriff Westry

asking me to come to his office.

He just asked me
if I knew Lauren Beck.

I said, "Yes.
Teacher at Prairie View."

And he says,
"She told me that Corey told her

that it wasn't an accident."

And as soon as he said
Corey and no accident,

I knew exactly what
he was talking about.

-She was the blonde
bombshell charmer.

-Most of the people
were terrified of her.

-He needed a mom,
and she wasn't a mother to him.

♪♪

♪♪

-Nine years after the shooting
death of Robert Breininger

was ruled accidental,

his son Corey
is about to tell a new story

that may change everything

police thought
they knew about the case.

-We went to
Paulding High School

to do an interview of Corey
to find out what had happened.

♪♪

-As soon as I walk
in the principal's office,

I saw
Lieutenant Cliff Vandemark.

I'll never forget he just had
this look on his face of...

"It's been a long time."

-I said, "Corey,
it was my understanding

that you talked to somebody

and shared that you had
shot your dad intentionally."

-I said the way
my dad died was not an accident.

It wasn't the way
everyone thought it was.

-My mind was blown.

I asked him, you know,
"Why would you do that?"

Corey tells me,

"I shot my dad
because Judith wanted me to."

And he goes through
the whole story.

-November 3, 2003, I remember
getting off the bus and my mom,

Judith, was actually waiting
there, and the first thing

she said when she saw me was,

"This is the day."

And, uh,
I right away knew and...

Everything changed.

-Corey tells me
Judith walked him to the house

and went in the back door.

She had the gun ready for him.

Already loaded,
sitting, like, in a corner.

And then she told him,
"Okay, I'm going to leave.

You do this now."

-After Judith had left,
I opened the room

where my dad was sleeping
and I saw him in there.

Judith had mentioned she had put
some hunting magazines in there.

I took the gun in there as well.

There was a train going by,
and right after it went by,

I had decided this --

this must be the time
it's supposed to happen.

And, uh...

I raised the gun
and pulled the trigger,

and all it did was click.

in my mind,
I was actually excited.

I thought for sure either
the gun's broken or something,

and I'm not going to have
to go through with this.

And I decided, "All right,
just to prove to her

I'm going to do it
one more time,

then she'll understand that
it wasn't supposed to happen."

So I raised the gun,
and I was so certain

that the gun was not going
to go off, and it went off.

That was it.

I was 10 years old.

-Corey tells me that Judith
abused him over the years.

She would hit him, strike him.

It was going on right up
to the day he shoots his dad.

-About a week
before it actually happened,

Judith had told me that my dad
was dying from a brain tumor.

She had told me that
it was actually his idea of me

to shoot him so that we could
get the life insurance policy,

and we'd all be taken care of.

But I didn't want to do it.

She would say
that I was letting my dad down,

that he was going to be upset
if I didn't do it.

And, you know,

eventually it became more
threats of if you don't do it,

then I'm going to do it to you.

And I believed her.

I just -- I felt so helpless.

After my dad passed,
things got somewhat better.

However, the abuse persisted.

As I got older, I started
to realize more and more

how wrong things were.

I was at the point
where I wanted to tell someone.

I'd kept all of it
so deeply buried.

I had to let it out.

So when I was 18 and going into
my senior year of high school,

I actually confided in one of my
best friends about my home life

and they said, "You're not
going back there ever,"

and convinced me to come
to his house.

-Corey says he ceased
all contact with Judith

at that point, even though
she pleaded with him to stay.

-She wanted me to come home,

but I knew I was
never coming back home.

-I'm sitting here thinking,
this is crazy

that it wasn't an accident.

I said, "Corey,
I'll be honest with you.

We've got to dig into it
further."

-Wanting to believe Corey
but unsure of how to proceed,

Detective Vandemark reaches
out to the prosecutor.

-We immediately started
to talk about,

how are we
going to figure this out?

-Fortunately for us,
we were involved in a task force

for abuse against children
with the FBI.

This whole case had to have
fresh eyes on it.

We brought up the 911, call,

all the photos up,
and every interview

that had been
taken at the time --

we looked at them with the FBI.

-When I heard that 911 call

you hear a young 10 year old,
hysterical.

I shot my dad to.

When you see
those crime scene photos,

they seem very calm.

We're talking about hunting,

but you're laying in bed
with the sheet

perfectly pulled up with you,

and you still have
earplugs in.

It looked like Robert
was sleeping peacefully

when Corey shot his dad.

There's pamphlets there
laid methodically on the bed.

The crime scene seemed staged,

as opposed to something
that happened accidentally.

-After reviewing
the evidence from 2003,

it's clear to investigators

that this was
not an accidental shooting.

The question now is
whether Corey's version

of events holds up.

-We have now a 19 year old
who stating

that when he was ten years old,

his stepmom had made
him shoot his dad.

There's a degree of
"Do you believe this?
Do you not?

Has he manifested
some mental health issues

or did she really make
him kill him?

-You're talking to
a teenager about stuff

that happened when they were,
you know, little.

How do we add credibility
to their story?

-We need to establish
what that abuse looked like

and walk through everything

that built up to the day
of the shooting.

And so we made arrangements

to have Corey come in
for a forensic interview.

-Corey had moved out
of her home,

had no interaction with Judith.

But Corey was still fearful of
Judith, even in that interview.

-As a little kid, I didn't
even really know what a mom was.

I was between two and three
years old when my dad

and my birth mother
decided to split up.

And then it was just my dad,
and that's really all I needed.

My dad was kind of my world.

He was kind of my superhero.

When I first met Judith,

she just seemed really nice
at the beginning.

They both seemed pretty happy.

But when my dad
had married Judith,

a lot of things changed.

♪♪

♪♪

-In the summer of 2012,

the FBI conducts
a forensic interview of Corey

to determine if his version
of events is credible.

-I don't think my dad
ever really fully knew

what Judith was doing.

He didn't want to discipline me,

and she volunteered and he said,
"Yeah, go ahead."

I think she convinced him

that I was just
a troubled little kid,

and he just went with it.

-It's so horrific
that it's difficult to believe,

but Corey's story definitely
seems plausible at that time.

-Judith was, I guess,
fairly smart in a twisted way,

so I was always sent to school
in pants and long shirts

to cover the marks
and bruises on my body.

-That's hard
to wrap your brain around

that another human being
would do that to anyone,

let alone a child.

But it was significant
to talk about

because that left a scar

and that can help corroborate
Corey's statements

of this abuse.

-As we did the interview,

we realized that this wasn't
simply an abuse case,

but there was elements
of what we considered torture.

-It was very methodical.

Corey, he was under her thumb

very firmly at that time
in his life.

-I had fully convinced myself
that this was normal,

and this must just be how
every family and little kid is.

And my little mind knew
that none of this was right.

Yet I had no way of
doing anything about it.

So I just I had to endure it.

-Corey tells investigators that
one week before the shooting,

after four years of abuse,

Judith begins to push him
to kill his father.

-I really thought
that perhaps my dad was dying

from a brain tumor.

And I really think that's

how I convinced myself
to make it okay.

-Judith orchestrated
that by telling Corey,

"Here's where
the guns going to be,

after you shoot your dad...

...drop the gun, call 911

and say the gun
accidentally went off."

-She had already washed
his brain enough by then.

The only thought was
staying in his role,

that he had been set up
and had been programmed for.

-The magnitude of how much he
endured prior to 10 years old,

when this happened,
and now all the years after,

were just so stunning.

-From what Corey had told me,
he felt guilty,

that he didn't realize
sooner what he had done,

but he was a child
and he didn't realize

how wrong she was
and all the stuff

that she did to break him down.

He needed a mom,
and she wasn't a mother to him.

-It's difficult
for people to understand

how does a 10-year-old shoot
their father

at the direction of somebody?

But here we are with all
of these elements --

severe physical abuse,
psychological terror.

The interview changed everything
for what we thought this was,

from accident to this
is a homicide

at the direction
of his stepmother.

-Now that investigators have
Corey's full version of events,

they know that that is
only one side of the story.

-We had to prove that.

We got to not only
have Corey say it, which he did,

but we got to --
we got to prove it

in every other way we can
to charge Judith with murder.

♪♪

-Investigators now believe
that Corey Breininger

was coerced
into killing his father,

Robert Breininger,
by his stepmother, Judith,

after years of abuse.

-First of all, we needed
to change the manner of death.

The coroner spent time
reviewing the evidence

that we had collected in 2003.

Along with the confession
from Corey,

he changed the manner of death
from accidental to homicide.

-The objective then became,
let's see what else

is out there to correlate
Corey's description of his life.

-Cautiously, so as not to alert
Judith to their investigation,

police begin
to interview potential witnesses

from the area that may be
able to verify pieces

of Corey's story.

-Corey's teachers
from '98 to 2003 had seen

that he was always wearing
long-sleeve shirts.

He was hiding something,
hiding bruises, marks,

grab marks,
and one of his teachers

actually seen marks on him,

but nobody reported it
at that time.

A lot of the teachers,

they said he was such a sad boy
and they felt sorry for Corey,

but they didn't realize why.

We interviewed the neighbors.

They start telling us more.

What they seen was
that Judith was taking him

further away from his dad,

and Corey became more quiet,
withdrawn

over the years.

-My friends lived
across the street

from the Breininger family.

They had had issues with them.

Judith had allegedly
slashed their tires,

tried to kill their pets
that they had.

-She was always feuding
with the neighbors.

Most of the people
that witnessed this

were terrified of her.

They said she was very dominant.

-Judith had ex-boyfriends
in the nine years

after Robert's death.

They were interviewed
and they did corroborate

that there was abuse
that they saw happening.

One of the ex-boyfriends
characterized it

as a modern-day Cinderella,
but that was his perception,

even being in that home
with them

for a very short amount of time.

-Investigators also speak
to Judith's ex-husband,

who was a friend
of Robert Breininger.

-I was married to Judith
from 1991 to 1995.

When I first had met Judith,

she was the blonde
bombshell charmer.

We hit it off pretty good.

But the day that we got married,

it was like a switch
had been flipped.

She said, "Your family's dead.
Your friends are dead.

The only thing
that matters now is me."

She turned in more
to a controlling,

psychotic, unstable person.

I had been hit.
I had been kicked.

My nerves were shot.

By the time
our marriage was done,

I was an
entirely different person.

When I heard that she and Robert
got married, it shocked me.

Because knowing her and
knowing what I did of Robert,

that he was a very nice person,

I knew it was going to be bad
for him.

-As Defiance County police
continue to interview people

in the community,

experts are brought in to assess
Corey's allegations of abuse.

-We had Corey examined.

One of the psychological things
we learned

was that Corey had
a resilient gene,

and that's what enabled him
to survive.

-We also had Corey physically
examined by a medical doctor,

who was also an expert
in this area,

because we didn't have
actual medical records.

-Corey said Judith actually cut
him with a knife on the penis.

-The doctor finds that nine
years later, this scar is there.

-That was something

that told them what
this woman was capable of.

-As evidence supporting
Corey's story grows,

police look into what Judith's
possible motive was

to have her husband,
Robert Breininger, killed.

-Corey says
that Judith told him

that his dad had
terminal brain cancer,

and so that it was actually
his father's idea to kill him

so that they would be
able to get the insurance money.

-We looked into that and found
there was no medical history

that Robert had a brain tumor.

If somebody had been diagnosed
with something like that,

there's going to be
a paper record, right?

-That all was a lie.

-Investigators look into

whether Judith received a payout
from Robert's life insurance,

which could be her true motive.

-What we found out
was within 12 hours

of the death of Robert,

Judith was already filling out
all the insurance papers,

wanting the insurance
immediately.

She ended up
with $300,000 to $400,000.

The sole beneficiary was Judith.

-This seems like that's what her
motive was.

-She made him into a murderer

to collect money
on an insurance claim.

-And what kind of a mother,
a wife,

a human being...

could be that heartless?

♪♪

-With a strong
but circumstantial case,

investigators enlist
Corey's help to try

to get Judith to admit
her guilt.

-The police set up
a recorded phone call

where I was trying
to call Judith to see

if she would admit guilt.

-I wanted to get her
on the phone

to see what her reaction was
when Corey called her.

We all would love
to have that confession.

-This is the first time

he's confronting her
about what she made him do.

[ Line ringing ]

♪♪

-Investigators asked Corey
to make a recorded phone call

to Judith in the hopes

that she will
inadvertently confess her guilt.

Corey has not seen or spoken
to his abuser in over a year.

-I was pretty scared
calling her and talking to her.

It was something
I did not want to do,

but I knew it needed to be done.

-As his stepmother,
if you're not a threat to him,

why are you saying
there's cameras there?

-She was trying to let him know,

"You'll be safe
if you're with me."

She figured she could control
him better

if they were in person.

She acted like she didn't
know what he was talking about.

-That is when I knew that

she knew she was
probably being recorded.

-So after this call,
things kicked up a notch.

-There's strong evidence
that Corey was abused for years.

There's strong evidence that
Judith was this domineering,

controlling person.

There was a lot
of inherent credibility

that helped to corroborate
the story from Corey.

We felt confident
that Judith was responsible

for the death
of Robert Breininger.

-On March 8, 2013,

police arrest Judith Hawkey
at her home.

At the same time,

they execute a search warrant
of the residence.

-When we hit the house,
we find things

that help support
Corey's story.

They were, like, vignettes,

videos she took of Corey
when he was a child.

"Corey, why are you doing that?"

"I don't know."

Because she had told him.
That's why.

She had manipulated him.

It was all about that control.

-Judith would record me
tearing up the house

or breaking toys.

She was recording me
just to make my dad think

that there was something
wrong with me.

-Watching those videotapes
broke my heart.

There's abuse that's
inflicting pain purposefully,

but there's also
the psychological side of it

causing shame, humiliation,
embarrassment.

-It was all about working up
to the day

that she was gonna have
him pull the trigger

and take his dad's life.

All of that
brought more credibility

to what Corey told us
was going on.

-At the sheriff's office,

police interviewed Judith,
hoping she'll confess.

-Judith was being evasive.

She thought that she would --
She would beat this.

But that also goes hand in hand
with the abuse she did to him.

Is that "I'm never gonna
get caught."

-After refusing to speak
further with investigators,

Judith is formally charged.

-Judith is charged
with aggravated homicide

of Robert Breininger.

And there was several charges
of child abuse

and child endangering.

-We felt
that she was a dangerous person

because of what she did.

-So she was put on
a large bond to retain her.

It was $3 million.

♪♪

-Cliff called me and told me
that Judith was arrested.

That was probably one of
the happiest moments in my life.

But it was just a brief moment.

I was so unprepared
for what was to come.

♪♪

-On October 28, 2013,

the trial of Judith Hawkey
begins in Defiance County.

-We had to get the jury
not to see a 20-year-old male,

but to see a 10-year-old child.

-When I testified,

I actually didn't look at Judith
a single time.

I was actually still
pretty scared of her.

But I just wanted justice
for my dad,

and I wanted her
to be held accountable.

-Judith,
seeing her in that courtroom,

there just was no emotion.

She just seemed very,
very cold to me.

I think she probably thought
that she would --

She would beat this.

-After 10 days of trial,

the case is put
into the hands of the jury.

-So after hearing
all the evidence,

the jury came back...

and found Judith guilty.

-She was convicted

on aggravated homicide
and child abuse.

-She was sentenced to life
without parole,

and I think that was
well deserved.

-The vindication
that Corey got that day,

it brought just a little bit of
peace, a little bit of closure,

because the truth was
finally out.

-For one of the first times
in my life,

I felt safe

and I knew she wouldn't ever be
able to do anything to me again.

That feeling didn't last
very long, but just a few years.

-Nearly six years later,
in April of 2019,

Judith Hawkey is awarded
a new trial on appeal.

-Retrying a case is difficult.

We looked at the pros and cons

and elected to have her plead
out to involuntary manslaughter.

She was sentenced to what
ended up being a 10-year term.

-When I was told that,
I felt betrayed.

I never had a scenario
in my mind

where it would ever
be overturned or retried.

-Judith was eventually
released from prison in 2023.

She now lives in northwest Ohio.

-In all that,
she only served 10 years.

10 years.

And Corey got a sentence
of life.

-The day that
she was gonna be released,

Corey told me,
"I'm gonna be moving away."

And to me, I was like,
"How heartbreaking.

He's leaving his life here
with his friends and family

because she's out
and living as a free person

and she shouldn't be."

It just seems so unfair.

♪♪

-In the beginning,
it was very scary.

Just constantly looking over
my shoulder,

but I've gotten used to knowing

that I can't ever let
my guard down.

But to my knowledge, she has
not tried to reach out to me.

♪♪

Not a day goes by
that I don't miss my dad.

Every single day
before I fall asleep,

I say something to him
after my prayer

and that'll -- that'll
probably never change.

I have learned
to forgive myself.

Ever so much,

I still hold myself
somewhat accountable

for not being able
to tell her no.

But that's why I continue
to share my story,

in the hopes
that maybe someone else

who's going through it can find
the strength to come forward.

I just wanted to be known that
no matter how badly you think

you can't get out of it...

you can.