Original subtitles

This is the story of a young woman...

See.

...who loves her family.

Lindsey was always around, and I knew that I could

count on her.

But not herself.

She struggled with her weight.

But as she finds love...

This meant a lot to see that he really cared for her.

...and starts to love herself...

You could see her self esteem just getting higher and higher.

...there are deadly consequences.

I had no idea what I was gonna find.

It's September 1985.

Steve pilkington and his wife, Debbie, are overjoyed.

Wrapped tightly in a bundle of blankets

is a wonderful new arrival,

their firstborn daughter, Lindsey.

She was 7 pounds and 6 ounces.

Lindsey was the first grandchild and first

great-grandchild,

and the whole family showed up.

They were all there waiting.

In hairnet and medical scrubs is proud father, Steve.

I'm tired, man.

It was a family affair for sure.

Yeah, everybody was there. Everybody was happy.

And, my granddad was there videotaping everything.

But with children comes responsibilities.

Things change obviously right away, you know.

Now you're a parent

wonderin' how we're gonna make ends meet.

In their hometown of heber Springs, Arkansas,

job prospects are limited.

To support his new family,

Steve decides to join the military

in 1987, after completing basic training,

the young family moves to California.

You know, you couldn't get any farther away from home.

This would be the first of many moves

for the pilkingtons.

Movin' around a lot was not the easiest, always.

When you become a military spouse,

a military brat,

as they say, you kinda...

You get into that role.

It's 1990, and four-year-old Lindsey now has

a one-year-old sister, karista.

Whoa!

Despite these heartwarming home videos

of the two little girls...

-Hi! - At first,

Lindsey's reaction to her new sibling is a little cold.

Come on, get over here.

She did not like me.

It was that stereotypical,

she was that firstborn child, and I was that younger child.

She was very, you know, bossy.

We would fight all the time.

They always had to keep US separated.

We were horrible.

Yeah! Hey!

Over time, the girls become closer, and the camera is

always recording,

usually with dad, Steve, at the controls.

Lindsey loves her little sister,

and she clearly also loves the camera.

Lindsey would dance around a lot.

She loved to be silly.

She loved to play.

Everywhere Lindsey goes,

karista follows.

She was my big sister.

And yeah, I always wanted to play with her and,

you know, she took up rollerblading,

so I wanted to Rollerblade,

or she learned how to ride a bike,

so I wanted to learn how to ride a bike.

In 1994, the pilkington family

moves to Germany.

It's not an easy way to grow up, bouncing

from house to house, and even country to country...

...but nine-year-old Lindsey becomes

an expert at forging new relationships.

Yeah.

Lindsey was always more mature, I think, for her age,

always friendly to people, always got along with others.

You know, never had any trouble at making friends.

Despite the upheavals in family life,

Lindsey also does well in her studies.

She did really great in school, never any problems in school.

She was always "a" student.

Throughout her high school years,

there's one thing Lindsey constantly battles with.

She struggled with her weight.

I think she got to the point where she's just like,

"I can't do anything about it,

so I'm just gonna be whatever I'm gonna be."

By 2003, the pilkington family have moved

again to Columbia, south Carolina.

Lindsey is all grown up and looking to pursue a career.

It's in 2008, while working in a local bank,

that her whole world turns upside down.

One afternoon, a young locksmith named Jason Lee

walks in.

Lindsey was working at the bank,

and he comes in to work on the vault.

Lindsey and Jason strike up a conversation

and agree to go on a date.

It's not long before the young

couple falls head over heels in love.

They were very active.

Lindsey was always one to go, go, go,

and he was the same way,

so that -- I think that's where they kinda got along very well.

Jason fit into the family.

He helped me.

If something came up wrong with my car, I could call him.

I knew he would come.

I really liked him.

Very nice, very funny guy.

We actually got along really well.

Before long, Lindsey and Jason

are inseparable,

so what happens next is no surprise.

Jason actually came to me and asked, um,

if this would be something that she would like to do.

And he was gonna go out on a boat to

go see the dolphins and then gonna propose to her then

at sunset.

And I told him, I said, "that is perfect.

That's all Lindsey."

Jason pops the question,

and Lindsey's answer, an emphatic yes.

I was excited for him to be my brother-in-law.

It would be nice.

On September 25, 2010,

the family gathers in south Carolina

for Jason and Lindsey's wedding.

Jason, he was already crying

and, you know, just being happy.

We were all looking up there thinking, wow, this is really

something, you know. What a guy, you know,

he's up there cryin' already before she even gets to him.

Jason blubbered like a baby. It was --

he caught so much crap for that -- after all that.

As soon as she started walking down the aisle,

he just started crying wholeheartedly.

Yeah, it just meant a lot to see that

he really cared for her and things were gonna be good.

As they perform their first dance

as husband and wife,

it's clear that Jason and Lindsey Lee are soulmates.

A happy couple who seem to have their whole lives

ahead of them.

Jason and Lindsey Lee are celebrating their

love for each other with family and friends.

As with all good weddings, the best man takes

this opportunity to make fun of the accident-prone groom.

But behind the smiles,

Lindsey's family is dealing with heartbreak.

Just before the wedding, my parents had separated.

Lindsey did not take the separation very well at all.

It was extremely stressful during wedding time.

When the wedding came,

it might have been the first time

I had seen him since our divorce.

You know, with situation that we were in,

it was -- it was tough,

on US all, you know, to be there.

Kind of strained,

but way get through it.

Despite the sadness, the newlyweds don't let it

affect the happiest day of their lives.

Jason and Lindsey slip effortlessly into married life.

By 2012, Jason is thriving as a locksmith,

and Lindsey has landed

her dream job 20 minutes away in the Lexington county

sheriff's I.T. Department.

She's a popular coworker, and, as always,

quickly makes friends.

She was always happy.

She was a talker.

She would talk.

Doesn't matter who you were,

she would talk to you.

Her personality is --

the only thing I can describe is infectious.

She wanted to -- to be involved with you.

She wanted to know you.

I tend to be a pessimist,

but Lindsey would pull the good out of you.

So we went from being work

partners to being very close friends.

Lindsey has found her niche.

Kids aren't on her radar, and Jason's fine with that.

For the happy couple, life is sweet.

It's clear that neither Jason nor Lindsey are

the domestic type.

If you talked to Jason, Lindsey was the laziest person

on earth, she never did anything.

Well, if you talked to Lindsey,

Jason was lazy and didn't do anything.

They both liked to spend money,

but sometimes they overspent.

They would go to movies, they would go shopping,

they would go out to eat a lot.

A lot of it was spent on food.

As money worries creep in,

Lindsey also starts to gain weight,

and she begins to lose some of her usual bubbly confidence.

As her weight Rose, her self esteem

had gone down.

There was this brightness around

Lindsey that just kind of dimmed.

By 2014, four years into their marriage,

Lindsey and Jason are in a rut.

Jason decides it's time to make a change.

And that's how, in February,

he finds himself walking into gold's gym.

Jason has caught the exercise bug.

What's more, he wants to share his newfound hobby with Lindsey.

Lindsey didn't really, at first, want to go

just 'cause she didn't want to do it.

I think the motivation wasn't there.

Lindsey and Jason are desperate to

reignite the spark in their relationship.

She wanted to feel better about herself for

her and her marriage.

Finally, in early 2015, Lindsey agrees

to accompany Jason to a training session.

It's here she meets Jason's new fitness guru,

Graham hockley.

Graham, he was your, British muscular karate dude.

Um, he was kind of confident about his self.

He knew what he was saying and what he wanted, put it that way.

He didn't beat around the bush.

She kinda got mad at him

'cause he was motivating her to do and pushing her,

and she didn't like that 'cause Lindsey doesn't like

to be pushed.

Graham talks with Lindsey about her life,

career, and her goals,

and not just about fitness.

She started seeing results, then it became more of a,

"okay, this guy's helping me out, so let's, you know,

give him more credit."

Graham introduces the couple to martial arts.

He said, "I have these judo classes,

why don't you come to the judo classes, you know, and stuff?"

So Lindsey and Jason started the judo classes.

With Graham's encouragement,

Lindsey finds herself sticking to a judo training schedule.

At first, I think Lindsey did it for Jason, um,

because of her self esteem being so low.

But then her determination, she got very determined, um,

and started doing it for herself.

Lindsey discovers she really enjoys

going to classes with Jason.

They're like, "okay, this is something

we can do together. We can get fit."

The sparring sessions prove to be a way for her

to get out all her daily stress and frustrations.

Amazingly, she put her mind to it, and there was nothin'

that girl, if she put her mind to,

she couldn't do.

For the first time in months,

the couple are back on cloud nine.

Their relationship got better with the working out.

As Lindsey's training schedule intensifies,

there's a radical transformation.

She was in the morning at the gym,

go to work, after work, she'd be at the judo place

working out as well,

and the weight started coming off

quicker and quicker and quicker.

At that point, I was married, and I didn't see her as often.

So when I would see her, I was just like, "wow!"

After a year of hard work, Lindsey is like

a whole new person.

The gym features her success story as part of their

before and after.

She wound up losing over 100 pounds.

She would call me so excited.

"I -- I'm in size 12!"

You know, or -- and then, "I'm in size 8!"

She wouldn't miss a beat.

She wouldn't get off track.

You couldn't convince her to eat or drink anything

that wasn't on her diet.

She was -- she was focused.

Lindsey Lee has become Graham hockley's protege,

and she begins to enter local competitions.

That's her in the blue, executing an impressive

take down.

She could throw people that were twice her size.

She would even tell me,

'cause her and Jason would pit against each other.

I mean, she was even doing males when she should have been

doing females, but she would --

she would fight the guys, too.

Graham films her victory from the sidelines,

proud of the progress she's made.

You could see her demeanor,

you know, the self confidence, the...

Self esteem just getting higher and higher.

It was -- you know, she was coming into her own.

Lindsey's conquered her insecurities.

Now she's a strong, resilient fighter.

When Lindsey and Jason go out together,

he can't help but notice the admiring glances

she's starting to get from others.

But too much change...

Can be a dangerous thing.

In just over a year, Lindsey Lee has lost

over 100 pounds.

Husband Jason loves the change in Lindsey,

and he's changed, too.

Now he wants kids,

but Lindsey's not on the same page.

They thought they wanted the same kind of things.

She said,

"am I a bad person 'cause I don't want children?"

And I said, "absolutely not."

There's nothing that says you have

to get married and have 2.5 children,

you know, and a dog and a white picket fence.

Jason struggles to accept his wife's feelings.

The thorny issue of children begins to overshadow

the marriage.

I guess there was some bumps in road with that.

Between excelling at the sheriff's

department's I.T. Office and her judo classes,

Lindsey's confidence is soaring.

Lindsey went from a shyer female who was a little nervous

about her looks and how she

was to a self-confident woman who was, like,

"I've got this, and I've got it taken care of."

She spends more time training with Graham.

Lindsey thinks of him as more than just an instructor.

He's her mentor, a confidant, and a friend.

Graham, he eventually

became just like part of the family.

He would come to Thanksgiving and Christmas

and barbecues and things like that.

Meanwhile, Jason's going the other way.

His training sessions tail off.

Eventually, he stops showing up

to classes altogether.

Lindsey said,

"we started this journey together, and he wanted to stop

the journey, and I wanted to continue to go."

Jason's becoming suspicious of

Lindsey's relationship with Graham.

Jason did not like Lindsey

and Graham's relationship.

He always suspected something was going on.

"She's cheating on me with him," you know.

He didn't understand that a man and a woman

could be friends.

Things come to a head in April 2016,

just six years after their dream wedding.

Jason told me that Lindsey had come in and just said,

"Jason, I'm done. I'm finished.

I want a divorce."

Jason was upset.

He couldn't believe what was going on.

I received a call from her, and she

asked me if she could stay with me.

And I said, "of course."

I have always told both my children,

"if I'm 110 and I have a house, you got a place to stay."

In the months that follow,

Jason and Lindsey do their best to keep things amicable.

For a fresh start, Jason accepts

a job two hours away in Greenville county.

Then Lindsey gets an unexpected call.

He calls and is like, "I don't want the house.

You can have the house. I'm movin'."

He tells Lindsey he's moving to

an apartment closer to his new job.

She didn't want the house.

She just wanted out of it and she would go do her own thing.

So when she moved back in, you know,

she decided she wanted to fix it up and sell it.

Jason agrees and offers to help Lindsey

fix the bathroom.

And Jason's got some big news.

There was a picture of another woman on his Facebook page.

And it wasn't even a picture.

It was a -- if I recall, it was kind of a silhouette,

but it mentioned the fact that he was already in another

relationship with another woman.

Lindsey's a bit surprised, but everyone's happy

to hear he's getting on with his life.

It was a relief to know that, hey, good,

this guy's gonna, you know, move on and find someone else

and let her do her own thing.

By early march 2017, Jason and Lindsey agree

to finalize their divorce the following month.

They've made a clean break.

March 14, 2017.

Lindsey's colleagues at the Lexington county sheriff's

department are surprised to see her desk empty.

Lindsey was one of the very first

people who would come in to the office,

and it's because of her workout regime at that point,

and so when she wasn't there, it was extremely odd.

I, texted or called Lindsey to --

to try to get her to answer me.

Lindsey's friend and colleague,

Shannon, is on patrol in the area.

They told me that, Lindsey hadn't shown up for work

and she's not answering her phone,

if I can go check on her, because I was only

ten minutes down the road from her house.

"Sure!"

So I get in my patrol vehicle, and I go to the house,

went up to the front door,

knocked on the front door. No answer.

So I went to go head to the back door.

But Lindsey doesn't answer.

It's almost instinct.

I knew something was wrong.

I've never seen Lindsey this happy before.

31-year-old Lindsey Lee hasn't turned up for work.

Her friend, Shannon lovell, is outside her home.

I saw the back door was splintered,

like somebody had broke in.

Soon as I saw that, I called or backup.

When his partner arrives,

they enter the house.

I had no idea what I was gonna find.

Soon as I pushed in the door,

I heard water running.

The officers make their way upstairs

And enter the bathroom.

Inside, a shower curtain obscures the bathtub.

When my partner pulled back the curtain...

...there was Lindsey,

laid in the bathtub, coffin-style.

Looked like somebody had laid her there.

The cause of death is clear.

She's bled out from a large incision across her neck.

Both of US were in shock because we see a colleague

and a friend laying here, murdered.

There's no way Lexington county

sheriff's department can objectively investigate this.

We reached out to the state law enforcement division

and said, "hey, this is one of ours.

Do you mind getting officers involved?"

And so they did.

I couldn't be the best detective for her.

I couldn't help.

And that's hard.

While state law enforcement heads

to the crime scene,

local officers are tasked with informing Lindsey's family.

You just find out your child's gone.

I screamed, I'm crying, and i'm not gettin' it.

Yay!

My boss called me up to his office...

And said somethin' had happened to, Lindsey.

I just couldn't wrap my head around what happened

and why, you know?

Although investigators learn Lindsey was on good terms

with her soon-to-be ex-husband,

they still need to eliminate him from their inquiries.

They quickly track him down.

He's two hours away at his locksmith store

in Greenville county.

Jason is surprised to see them.

He asks them, "what's wrong?"

They say, "Lindsey is dead,"

and Jason is crying and asking, "what happened to her?"

Once he's composed himself,

he agrees to come to the station.

Jason tells the police that he suffered a foot injury at work.

He took some pain pills and was knocked out,

and he didn't wake up until the following morning.

He tells investigators that when he woke up,

his car was gone.

He assumed it had been repossessed.

Jason had no way to get to Lindsey's house

two hours away in the window when she was killed.

When detectives ask for a DNA swab,

Jason consents.

Back at the crime scene...

Investigators are combing for evidence.

There were grocery bags everywhere.

It really looked like there had been a struggle.

Under some of the bags

and under some of the spilled groceries were these

really tiny dime-sized pieces of blue latex.

The scraps of latex look like the kind

used in surgical gloves.

While the scraps are sent for DNA testing,

investigators establish Lindsey's last movements.

According to her schedule,

she had a training session yesterday evening.

The last person believed to see Lindsey Lee alive

is Graham hockley, so police want to talk to him.

Where is he?

As investigators try to track down Graham hockley,

the forensic pathologist examines Lindsey's body.

In addition to the fatal cut across the neck,

the evidence shows that

Lindsey sustained other serious injuries.

There were some abrasions and bruises linear across the neck.

She was probably

strangled to the point of unconsciousness,

placed in the bathtub where she was found,

and then the incised wound across the neck occurred.

There was a fight.

There were some what we call defense wounds.

She had her hand up trying to stop the knife.

It looked like a, um...

A vicious attack, um,

maybe attack out of anger.

It was just over the top.

The highly personal nature of the attack

suggests to police that Lindsey may have known

her killer.

Police are able to finally make contact

with Graham hockley.

All he can tell them is that, as usual,

she attended his class the night before.

Graham says he then went home alone.

Investigators must establish if Lindsey left

the gym alone or with Graham hockley.

They re-examine the evidence collected at

the crime scene and focus on a Walmart receipt.

They look at the timestamp.

She was at Walmart half an hour

before she arrived home and was killed.

Investigators pull the surveillance footage...

And watch Lindsey's last moments alive.

It's been 48 hours since

Lindsey Lee was found brutally murdered...

In her home in west Columbia, south Carolina.

Walmart surveillance footage shows Lindsey shopping

the evening she was killed.

She's not being followed.

She doesn't seem concerned.

She doesn't seem agitated.

She's just going about her day.

The footage proves Lindsey

left her judo session alone.

What's more, investigators can verify

her trainer was at home the night of the murder.

Graham hockley is ruled out as a suspect in Lindsey's murder.

Investigators believe someone must have been lying

in wait for Lindsey to arrive home.

They now refocus their attention

on Lindsey's estranged husband, Jason Lee.

Jason's banking accounts reveal his credit cards are

maxed out,

and he's having serious money problems.

He was gonna be evicted.

His car was being repossessed.

He owed Lindsey Lee about $1300 before

the divorce was set to be finalized.

It appears Jason Lee had a motive to kill

his estranged wife.

Investigators hunt for evidence that undermine

his claim of being at his home the night of the murder.

One day after Lindsey's body is found,

a patrol officer reports a strange encounter in a Walmart

parking lot.

A man matching Jason's description argued with him

over why the officer was near his car.

The officer also remember something else about the man.

They notice a big scratch on his cheek.

Investigators run the plates...

...and it's Jason's car.

The same car Jason told police had vanished from his home.

Investigators pull surveillance

cameras overlooking

the Walmart parking lot.

At 5:15 A.M.

Just hours before Lindsey's body is discovered,

Jason's car pulls into the lot.

A figure matching Jason's build exits the vehicle.

We see a man walk across numerous businesses'

parking lots in the direction of his apartment.

Then 50 minutes later, cameras capture more activity.

Jason Lee's work truck pulls up right

next to his personal car on surveillance video...

...and he sits in it for about four minutes.

Police believe that he was moving something in

between cars.

Police consider this could be the moment Jason was

moving the murder weapon from his car to his Van.

Cameras inside Walmart also captured Jason shopping.

The footage proves that Jason Lee was not asleep as

he claimed,

and his car was not missing. He'd moved it himself.

It's enough for investigators to execute

a search warrant on Jason's apartment.

They found blue latex gloves,

a package of them, in his backpack at his apartment.

The same type of blue latex

found amongst the groceries at the crime scene.

Then, the most damning evidence of all.

The DNA results are back, and it shows

Jason Lee's DNA is found on all of

those blue latex pieces found inside Lindsey Lee's foyer.

For investigators, it seals the deal.

I found out that Jason had

been arrested about five o'clock Friday morning.

We did not see this coming.

We didn't know that it would be him.

On march 17th,

three days after Lindsey's body is found,

Jason Lee is charged with first-degree murder.

He pleads not guilty.

The prosecution built this case that Jason Lee was

so bitter that he just could not let her go.

So as their impending divorce was coming,

it was two weeks away when she was killed.

At his trial in 2019,

prosecutors lay out what they believe happened that night.

He broke into her house,

made it look like it was random,

and he hid in the dark until she got home.

Jason wore gloves to make sure he left no trace.

She came through that front door,

and with all those groceries in hand, he attacked her.

She fought for her life,

but Jason overpowered Lindsey.

He injured her on the foyer.

He got her into this bathroom...

And he cut her throat, and he left her there to die.

But Jason hadn't noticed the pieces of his gloves

that fell to the floor and sealed his fate.

Nine years ago, the wedding officiant spoke of all

the things Jason's hands would provide for his wife, Lindsey.

In the end, those hands were

used to carry out Lindsey's murder.

The jury finds Jason Lee guilty of first-degree murder,

and he is sentenced to life in prison.

Still, to this day,

Jason maintains his innocence.

Look at the camera!

For her family, a life without Lindsey

is unbearable.

People tend to think that just because

some time has gone by that everything's okay.

It's not okay.

It's never gonna be okay.

The reality is I will never see my firstborn again,

alive on this earth,

and it was brutally, brutally taken from me.

And I have to live with that.

There's a -- there's this void that's just --

it's not there, you know.

That brightness is gone.

The brightness is gone.

Without Lindsey, it's, it's tough every day.

See.

And then, walk into our bedroom,

we have a cabinet there with some pictures.

There's a picture of me and Lindsey and her sister.

That was some of the last pictures we took together.

I just think about her every day and miss her.

You just, always wonder why things happen.

We'll find that out one day.