Original subtitles

See, I was going up north on Friday,

and I saw headlights

when I was about, well, maybe a quarter or halfway down our driveway.

You saw headlights on that road down there?

Yeah, that's what I told the detectives, too, and stuff.

The investigators.

OK.

And he thought I was full of shit.

- Correct. - Thursday.

- Excuse me. - Sure.

After we filed our petition, we got a call from a witness.

He said, "I've been bothered about something for a long time,

and I felt like I should call you."

So, I called him back and he said, "I grew up in Manitowoc.

I was in Barb Janda's class at school.

Uh, worked there for many years,

knew a lot of the Manitowoc city police."

Um, and he said, "I was a truck driver,

and on November 3rd, I was driving on 147,

and I saw Teresa Halbach's car."

This is two days before they find the car on the Avery property.

He said, "I noticed it.

I looked over, and it was nose-in, it was pointed west,

it was a teal green color, and it was a RAV."

So, then he said, "The next day, on the 4th,

I stop in Mishicot at the Cenex station."

He said, "I walk up to the door of the gas station,

and on the right window,

there's a poster, and it's got a picture

that looks like a high school picture

of Teresa Halbach,

and under it, it's got the vehicle I had seen down there by that tree."

And he said, "So, I went inside, got whatever I was getting,

and in walks a Manitowoc officer.

And I said to him, 'See that vehicle there?

It's right down the road.'"

So, I thought, well, that's pretty big news

because there's no police report about it written up.

So, this is another huge, huge Brady violation.

Then the witness said, "I'm watching Making a Murderer."

Back in January, I watched "Making of a Murderer."

And I watched the sheriff's deputy call in a license plate number.

Were you looking at these plates when you called them in?

No, sir.

He said, "I just started shaking."

And he said, "I realized that was the guy that I had told about her car."

This witness said, "I was so rattled by it,

I sent two texts to...

Scott Tadych,

because I knew him.

And I said,

'I just watched Making a Murderer.

I just watched it,

and I told that officer

that I had just seen the car.

You need to get Brendan's attorneys

to call me.'"

He didn't hear a word from Scott.

So, then he sends another message back,

and Scott says, "I'm not feeling so good. I'll get back to you," or something.

Nothing ever came about it, so...

give me a call back,

and I would like to talk to you in person.

Thank you very much. Bye.

So, I went up there with my investigator.

We got the witness to come in from Michigan.

We went to that property,

and we realized, which he didn't realize,

that Scott Tadych's trailer

was three tenths of a mile from that spot, on the other side of the road.

So, that's interesting, that it was that close to the property.

Then we did more research,

and we got the deed for the house

that was close to where the car was ditched.

And guess who bought the house fairly soon after the murder?

Scott Tadych, who married Brendan Dassey's mother.

So, they're residing right close to where the car was ditched.

It was the fire that I remembered most of that day.

Let's back up just a little bit.

Could you tell the jury what you did that afternoon, please?

That morning, I was up at my mother's. She had surgery.

And then I left her and went to the woods hunting.

I went to my trailer, then I went to the woods hunting.

About what time was it that you got out into the woods?

About three o'clock.

On your way to deer hunting...

that would be just before 3:00 p.m...

did you observe anybody on the roadway?

Yes, I did. I saw Bobby Dassey on Highway 147.

I was going west and he was going east.

What's the speed limit?

- Speed limit on 147? - Yeah.

Fifty-five. Fifty-five.

Fifty-five. Alright.

So, you pass each other, and...

you're later able to tell the police that Bobby was going deer hunting.

Yes.

- How did you know that? - How did I know that?

It's because Bobby Dassey was going to the trailer where I lived

to hunt behind it.

So, let me understand.

He's gonna hunt deer right behind your trailer?

Yes.

But you don't hunt deer right behind your trailer.

Occasionally, yes.

So, you figured, since you saw him driving east on Highway 147,

he must be going hunting?

Yes.

Anybody else see you going west on 147 to go hunting, so far as you know?

Bobby Dassey.

We're gonna figure out whether what we've got here

is a murder that was committed by one or two people,

let's say, hypothetically, Bobby Dassey and Scott Tadych.

A car moved a couple of times and ditched close to Scott's house.

Then we've got another bit of illegality going on

where the police find the car

and decide to move it onto the Avery property.

That's the way the killers benefited

from the cops wanting to frame Steven Avery

instead of wanting to solve it.

And, really, that it's Colborn is amazing to me.

Unbelievable.

- You've gone over Exhibit 138. - Yes, sir.

It describes you receiving a telephone call in 1994 or 1995

from someone who identified himself as a detective, correct?

Yes.

The detective indicated that there was a person in custody

who had made a statement about a Manitowoc County offense, correct?

- Yes. - OK.

And what that person in custody had said

was that he had committed an assault in Manitowoc County

and someone else was in jail for it.

- Correct? - Yes, sir.

And that much you're pretty sure of?

Let's go to Steven Avery's civil rights case.

Colborn getting the call about them having evidence,

favorable evidence, exculpatory evidence,

that Steven was not the rapist.

What did they do with that evidence?

They concealed it by not writing a report.

What do we have now in our murder case with Teresa Halbach?

We have, once again, Andy Colborn...

having a conversation with an independent witness

who has absolutely no reason to lie...

and not writing up a report

that this witness is telling him Teresa Halbach's car

is right down the road on 147

by the East Twin River Bridge.

Why was that not written up in a report?

Because if it had been,

Steven Avery could never have been convicted of Teresa Halbach's murder.

So, it's a huge, huge event

having a Brady violation like this.

And isn't it ironic? It's the same cop.

Manitowoc County Sheriff's Department. This is Lynn.

- Lynn. - Hi, Andy.

Can you run Sam-William-Henry-five-eighty-two?

Um, OK, it shows that she's a missing person,

and it lists to Teresa Halbach.

OK.

That's what you're looking for, Andy?

- '99 Toyota? - Yep.

- OK, thank you. - You're so welcome. Bye-bye.

So, what we believe happened

is Colborn gets that information from our witness on the 4th,

and he's calling in that license plate number.

Then we discover,

on Ryan Hillegas' phone records on November 4th,

there are a series of calls that are made to him with no caller ID.

Which, in talking to the phone company,

they thought it was most likely law enforcement.

They're every couple of minutes, and there's 22 of them.

And they end right around 7:25,

which is when Chuck Avery calls Steven Avery

and says that he sees headlights down in the pit behind his house.

We think what happened is that Ryan Hillegas is there,

possibly with law enforcement...

when the car is moved,

and he's dropping calls as they're trying to direct him.

Because that's what happened to us in the quarry, the calls would drop.

They had to have probable cause to get on the property.

So, it's clear it's all contrived to have Ryan Hillegas involved

and knowing where the car is,

and letting Pam Sturm know where the car is,

and then, bingo, when they've got the car, they've got probably cause.

Then they've got all those search warrants,

and they can go into Steven's residence six, seven times,

the garage, all of that.

It just opened the whole thing up.

Hey, um, kind of a change of plans here.

OK.

The boss has got something he wants us to do.

OK.

He wants us to go back over and re-interview Avery again.

And the search party is out there,

and he wants us to ask them if they would allow us

to have the search party come on the property

and go through the junkyard.

OK.

If it's OK with you, we'll meet you over at your sheriff's department.

OK.

- If you don't mind helping us. - That's fine. Stop over.

I came upon this car that had all these branches on the top of it

and leaning against it,

and there was an old hood of a car leaning up against it,

and it was kind of blueish-green.

And I thought, "This is really strange. This is really strange."

And it looked like a little SUV like I was looking for,

a RAV4 Toyota SUV.

And I went around to the back of the vehicle,

and, again, there were branches leaning up against it,

and I noticed that it said "RAV4."

Well, my heart started going, you know?

"Oh, my goodness. Maybe this is it."

- Because... - Let me stop you right there, Pam.

Sorry.

Did you attempt to verify the identification of this vehicle?

Yes.

And how was that done?

My daughter Nikole brought her cell phone along,

and we...

I should back up.

Ryan gave us a direct line to Sheriff Pagel

in case we found something.

Denny specifically addresses

establishing opportunity

if you can establish

that someone planted evidence.

So, at this point, Mr. Hillegas is still on our list.

Investigator Fassbender documented in a police report

that Kelly Pitzen, Teresa's best friend,

told him that Ryan Hillegas had Teresa's day planner

when they all met at Teresa's residence on November 3rd.

So, we started looking at Teresa's day planner.

It's got some writing on it that caught our attention.

So, we've got Teresa's new phone records,

and we notice that Denise Coakley has talked to Teresa

at around 11:30 on the 31st

and said, "I'd like to set up an appointment with you

on Tuesday, November the 1st at noon."

And Denise said, "When I talked to Teresa,

she said, 'Oh, I'm driving. Let me pull over and jot this down.'"

So, Teresa pulls over,

and she jots down "Denise, noon" on November 1st. OK?

So, she's in her car.

Then we discover that Steve Speckman calls Teresa

just about an hour after Denise's call, OK?

So, it's around 12:45.

And he tells her that he's got a couple of vehicles

he wants her to photograph.

So, Teresa jots down "Steve" and "Sheboygan,"

and then the vehicles and his phone number,

and he confirms that she's driving in her car.

It's now a quarter to one, OK?

And so, just reconstructing the time frames

in which she arrived at her next appointments,

there isn't time for her to have gone all the way back to her house

with the day planner, left it at her house,

and then left again.

It's... The schedule's too tight for her to arrive at Schmitz.

Scott Bloedorn said that he found the day planner

at Teresa Halbach's residence

and that it was from the Outlook program on the computer.

And it was, before Teresa wrote on it when she was out on the road

talking to Denise Coakley and Speckman,

and drove to Schmitz.

So, she's at the Schmitz house,

and then she goes to the Zipperers', and then she goes on to the Averys'.

Her day planner is in the car with her

because she never goes back home.

There isn't time.

So, how does Ryan Hillegas

get this piece of paper,

unless he has access to Teresa's car after she's been to the Averys'?

So, if you talk about a Denny link to the crime,

when you've got a document that you can show

was in the victim's car at the time of the murder

and is in the possession of a witness,

that's about as good a link as you could get to the crime.

That's why he won't talk to us. We've been back to his place twice, OK?

He's not gonna talk because he's involved,

most likely, in moving the car.

And obstruction.

How much room can I get and when?

Right now? 884 is available until 11:00.

Oh, that's good.

And you want 884?

Yes, then I'll come back... What do you think, at 11:00?

At 11:00, I would give you 836 all the way until 2:30.

Perfect.

I will prepare for this argument the same way I prepared for the last one:

a lot of research, a lot of studying, and a lot of practice rounds,

including practice rounds that we've arranged

with our students acting as the judges,

and practice rounds that we've arranged

with national experts in these areas of the law

acting as judges.

And we are seeking the guidance of lawyers

who are very experienced in the 7th Circuit,

including former clerks of the 7th Circuit,

to get as close of a sense of the mindset of the judges

that Laura is going to face.

It's the closest thing you can get to a Supreme Court argument,

in the sense that there are nine Supreme Court justices.

And here there will be seven 7th Circuit judges.

So, as someone who is arguing before the en banc panel,

it's more challenging.

You know, you have to rotate your head more from left to right,

and you have to field questions from a larger group of justices.

In preparing for the argument, it's also harder to do

because you have to try to read and understand the decisions

of each one of these judges

and anticipate the kinds of questions that they may ask.

We all understand that the role of an appeals court is to get it right,

and if it gets it wrong,

then it will be fixed down the road in the system.

That's the belief that we all have in the system.

If some court gets it wrong,

another court is gonna come along and set it right.

And that's the shocking thing about AEDPA.

Federal courts can only grant relief

if a state court was unreasonably wrong,

was so wrong that no other judge,

no other fair-minded judge, could possibly agree with the state court.

That's an incredibly high bar.

Brendan deserves justice,

and he didn't get it in the state courts of Wisconsin.

I hope we're able to deliver justice to him.

Because if we're not, and I don't want to think this...

I won't be alive when Brendan gets out of prison.

It's very unlikely I'll be alive when Brendan gets out of prison.

If I am, I'll be in my late eighties,

and, um, I don't want to think about that.

We need to get to four votes

to keep Judge Duffin's opinion in place.

And the question is...

can we win the hearts and minds of enough other judges

in order to prevail?

Oral argument is waived

if the court has no questions after reading your brief.

So, if you've got oral arguments,

there are really serious questions that the court wants answered.

The key to winning any case is your grasp of the facts.

And that's what will shift a judge to your position,

if it was something they just did not realize.

And a lot of attorneys, you know,

they get so bogged down in the case law.

That's not where the challenge is.

The challenge is how you present the story.

We were here in February when both sides argued to the three-judge panel

which eventually denied the State's request

to reverse Brendan Dassey's overturned conviction.

Now, much like back in February,

both sides will be given a set amount of time, 30 minutes,

to argue their case.

There is no timeline, however, on when a decision will be made.

For now, we're live in Chicago.

Emily Metasic, Action 2 News.

Directions to 55 East Monroe, Chicago.

It's an hour and ten minutes. Twenty-two miles.

Wow.

Crazy.

You know, I wish Brendan could be here.

It would be nice if they brought him down.

Yeah.

Then the judges could actually see...

see him and, you know, judge by himself, you know?

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals

will hear arguments starting at ten o'clock this morning.

Their decision could mean freedom for Brendan Dassey.

So, how far do we gotta go yet?

We must be getting close to Downtown now.

Seven miles.

Thirty-four minutes.

We're more than halfway there. That's good.

Well, is there a highway to jump on right here or something?

No.

Brendan's gonna get out before we get to court.

Yeah.

He's gonna beat us home. How about that?

He probably would.

We're about to go inside and check out the proceedings.

We've been following the Brendan Dassey case for forever.

I've been covering it for about a year now.

I remember being down in Portage,

waiting to see if Dassey got out of prison.

He didn't. The State appealed. And that has led us to here.

We are now ready to hear our case for this morning.

Uh, good morning, and may it please the court.

Brendan Dassey confessed because his guilt became unbearable.

What he and Avery did to Teresa was horrific.

What happened to Teresa was certainly horrific.

No one questions the terrible nature of this murder. How could you?

But whether Mr. Dassey was responsible for it

or whether he just went after the fire was lit

is a serious question.

Absolutely.

The investigators just nudged the confession out of Dassey.

- They didn't nudge. Really? - Oh, my.

Absolutely. They took numerous precautions to protect...

What was Mr. Dassey's IQ?

Uh, his most recent IQ test was 83 or 81 at trial.

And he was 16 when he was being questioned by the officers?

That's right. He was 16 years old.

The Court of Appeals mentioned Dassey's age,

they mentioned Dassey's mental capabilities,

they quoted the test...

Well, if it's true that a state court analysis

can be that cursory

or, you know, give no reason at all with just mentioning his age...

It was basing its finding on the trial court's opinion,

and the trial court was much more thorough.

It went through all of the relevant factors thoroughly.

So, this idea that it failed to actually consider the totality of the circumstances

is outlandish, quite frankly.

No, it's not outlandish at all.

Most people who commit murder,

dismemberment, and destruction of the corpse

don't think they're just gonna go back to school

and turn in their sixth-period project.

Uh, most people, if they saw what Dassey saw,

wouldn't have participated.

Well, but I'm just saying, doesn't that tell you

that he is just a person who doesn't get it?

I think those statements show, at most,

that Dassey doesn't understand how awful it is

to rape and murder someone.

Can you give me a fact

that they did not feed him?

I think the most telling examples are his memories of Teresa.

He remembers her screaming, "Help me,"

and how she looked, naked and chained up to the bed.

But they feed him that.

That's not something that...

They didn't feed him the fact that she was handcuffed to the bed.

But there's no evidence that she was, either. There's no...

They found handcuffs in the bedroom.

But they didn't...

Does that mean... Does that lead to this?

The question of whether there was enough evidence

is a question for the jury.

Habeas is not a license for federal courts to play backup jury.

When we try to evaluate if it was voluntary,

we can look at the corroborating circumstances around it, can't we?

I don't think you can, no.

The Supreme Court has consistently said

that reliability is a question for the jury.

It's not something you consider on voluntariness.

I want to go back to the memories of Teresa that I was mentioning,

because I think that's one of the primary evidences

that his confession was voluntary, the way he volunteered those details.

He remembered her desperately trying to move away

as Avery came at her with a knife.

He remembers her breathing after Avery stabbed her in the stomach,

and that she's still struggling to breathe after he cut her throat.

And he remembered the awful smell as her body burned.

None of those memories were suggested to him.

They were very raw and they were very real,

and Dassey needed to get them out.

Another main piece of evidence that shows the voluntariness

is the way he resisted the officers numerous times...

He's guessing.

I mean, you see this as resistance.

I see this as him, sort of, casting about.

You see these long delays. He's all over the map.

And you can pick a sentence here and a sentence there

and knit together a confession, but it's not what really happened.

- True. He changes some details... - Changes important details.

But that's exactly what you would expect for a traumatic memory like this...

It's also what you expect from somebody who was trying to say

what the officers want to hear.

The investigators made my skin crawl watching this video,

this lulling behavior that they conveyed which was so dishonest.

So dishonest.

There was some minor deception, to be sure, but the case...

- Major deception. - No, I don't think it was major.

A lot of the things that the investigators said were true.

So, their statements, "We'll go to bat for you," for example.

They did, in fact, go to bat for him.

If he had stuck with his story and testified against Avery,

I suspect they would have.

That's exactly right.

So, Ms. Nirider,

of course, your big issue is AEDPA deference.

Even if there's a lot

that looks like any rational person might have said this was a limited person,

the state courts found otherwise.

What do we do about that?

It did, Your Honor, and may it please the court.

Deference, by definition, does not preclude relief.

That is what we know from the Supreme Court.

Relief is reserved for cases where the application of clearly established law

has been unreasonably misapplied in the state courts,

and that's precisely what we see here.

Would you say that the police here used tactics

"so offensive to a civilized system of justice

that they must be condemned

under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment"?

- I would, Your Honor. - And what are those?

Those tactics include issuing a promise of leniency to Brendan Dassey.

There was no promise of leniency.

- Not when judged... - Vague assurances at best.

Not when judged by the standard of an adult.

Even with an intellectually challenged 16-year-old,

there has to be a concrete promise, fraudulent promise, of leniency

for it to bear on the voluntariness of the confession.

- Miller... - Vague assurances are not enough.

We accept that he has a lower IQ. That's it?

Anybody that has an IQ of that level can't be questioned the way he was?

Certainly not, Your Honor. This is a unique fact case...

This was not an aggressive questioning.

It is a case of psychological coercion.

There was a promise of leniency...

In fact, there's case law that says they can bluff.

They can bluff, Your Honor.

But they cannot so distort his rational will that he was incapable...

That's because of his IQ?

And his impairments and his disabilities and his age.

Yes, Your Honor.

And the fact that he is 95 percent more suggestible

than the population.

I think this is a totality point that you're making.

The Supreme Court has told us

not to get too, if you will, "siloed" in our thinking about this,

if Brendan is of lower intelligence, or that he's this or he's that.

He's a package.

So, Miss Nirider, if we were to affirm

the grant of habeas relief in this case,

which you've described as unique,

what practical advice would you give to police

about what is and is not permissible

in interrogating a high school boy who's not very quick?

Taking this case as an example,

these interrogators had at least some reason to believe he might be limited.

He wasn't able to spell "agent" or "detective"...

So, what should they do?

So, what should they do?

- What can they do to solve the crime? - Given that...

They may still question him. There's no doubt about that.

Can they bluff?

They may, as long as it doesn't overbear his will.

They should never say things like, "I'm a cop, but I'm not right now."

You're creating new law now.

There is no case that says that, and we're here on 2254 review.

A federal court cannot create new law on habeas review.

And that's what you're asking for in this case.

It's just flatly impermissible under all the Supreme Court's precedents.

Your Honor, I am not asking for the creation of new law.

I am asking for this court to apply decades-old law.

You're identifying criteria and things that the cops cannot do.

There is no case that says they cannot do those things.

I am not asking...

You're asking us to use this case to establish

that new benchmark for investigators

in interrogating juveniles.

There is no case law to support that.

Under established law, under 2254, you must lose.

The motive of the police was to get a second, uh, killer?

I'm sorry, Your Honor?

What was the motive of the police in doing this?

To get a second killer?

Your Honor, the test does not direct us...

No, I know that's not the test. That's the question I'm asking you.

The record doesn't speak to the motive of the police in this case.

- You're arguing their motive. - I am not, Your Honor.

In fact, the district court here, in granting relief,

pointed out that the police may well have simply failed to appreciate

the way in which their words landed on Brendan Dassey.

But it does not preclude relief under the principles of Miller versus Fenton.

So, they needed two, uh... killers?

No, Your Honor. They needed the truth.

But the problem with this interrogation

is that the way in which they pressured and pursued Brendan Dassey

was in direct contravention of the seeking of the truth.

When were the shell casings found?

In November of 2005.

Hmm.

In the garage?

In the garage, Your Honor.

I think you're about to run out of time. If you would like to wrap up...

Alright, if there are no further questions,

I would ask this court to affirm the district court's grant of habeas relief.

Alright, thank you very much.

Mr. Berg?

We're on habeas here.

This is now the sixth time that a court has reviewed this case in a decade.

And a number of them have found that there's a real problem with this.

You've got the district court, magistrate judge,

and you've got the panel in this case.

So, I don't know that this is a slam dunk.

In all of the filings, in all of the opinions,

you will not find a single case, not one,

not from the Supreme Court, not from a federal court,

not from a state court, not on de novo review,

not on habeas review,

you will not find one case finding a confession involuntary

in circumstances similar to this.

Courts have consistently held that minor lies about what they know

is not coercive.

They've held that vague assurances are not coercive.

Fatherly manner is not coercive.

All of that may be true, but the question is the recipient.

If I were to say things to my four-year-old grandson,

you know, he's not gonna understand it the way you would,

or at least I hope that maybe you've moved a bit beyond.

You say things to an adult

that are not the same as you would say things to a younger person.

Absolutely.

Alright, I see your yellow,

and now your red piece of paper,

so if you'd like to wrap up in one sentence, you may do so.

The whole point of AEDPA

is to prevent the second-guessing of juries and state courts a decade later.

The district court and the panel majority did exactly that.

Please reverse.

Here's what's going on.

So, a lot of cameras, a lot of interest in this case.

I think I heard the language "made my skin crawl"

from one of the judges today in looking at that video.

Um, talk about that.

I've seen the videos, and what makes my skin crawl

is knowing the things that happened to Teresa Halbach,

um, not...

not that this young man is uncomfortable talking about it and reliving it.

Teresa's family relives this every day.

Spell your first and last name and pronounce it.

Brad Schimel. S-C-H-I-M-E-L.

- Thank you. - Thank you.

- Thank you. - Alright.

Thank you.

Brad, can I get an interview?

I don't know if you did them. I was outside. So, if...

We did, yeah.

- Did you? - We did.

- We just did our... - I can do it as we go.

We just did our press gaggle already.

May I get one quick comment? I'm from Green Bay.

- Yeah. - I want to do like...

- Let's get across the street. - Yeah, a balance...

- We can do it like this. - Perfect.

It doesn't matter to me.

But, yeah, I just wanted to kind of know, um,

the proceedings that kind of came out of there today

and what you thought of it, Brad.

The question here in this case

is not for this court to decide whether Brendan Dassey is innocent.

The question here is really a federalism question.

Under United States statutes,

how much authority does the federal court have

to go in and substitute its judgment for the determination of the jury

and the trial court judges and the state appellate courts?

If you look at what the unique facts were

that the prosecution relied on,

it was a script of what Teresa was supposedly saying and doing

in the bedroom.

And the forensic evidence refutes that Teresa was ever in the bedroom.

There is no proof she was raped.

There's no proof anything happened in the bedroom.

There's really... We know there's no proof anything happened in the garage.

She wasn't shot in the garage.

Even when the judge asked, "Well, there were shell casings,"

the response is, "Well, Judge, this was on a 40-acre salvage yard,

and there were casings all over the place

because these people were hunting, shooting rabbits,

shooting gophers and all of that.

I could tell, when he asked that question,

he's thinking, "Well, that shooting must have occurred in the garage."

Because in his garage, on the north side of Chicago,

there's no shell casings.

But, see, you have to tell him that,

because he's thinking,

"Oh, there must have been a shooting in the garage."

It's that misperception,

and it's the opportunity to correct those things.

And so, I think if the defense had a better grasp

of the facts of the forensic evidence,

that would have been very powerful.

And when the one judge said, "Why do we need two killers in this?"

the answer to that isn't to avert and not answer it.

The answer is, "I'll tell you why, Judge.

The reason wasn't to have two killers for the fun of it.

The reason was to take down Steven Avery.

They needed someone else to corroborate

what the forensic evidence refuted."

Just knowing all that, being able to refute it all,

it's like there's this big tidal wave coming towards you,

and you have to be able to knock out the whole thing.

You've got to have an impenetrable wall up

where you can just deflect everything they come up with.

Everything has to be answered.

And when you leave an oral argument

and you have not answered on a confession why those are not unique facts,

you're in trouble.

Did you find some?

You're really getting gray.

Tell me about it.

No, I don't need to tell you, because so am I.

I think we gotta pick up those pills tomorrow for that.

You didn't pick them up today?

No, we couldn't.

- Why? - I don't know.

If I would have known that,

I would have picked them up today after work.

And you're slacking again.

- Who is? - You are.

I don't do that. The other ones all do that.

You're slacking on papers.

And I don't want a blue one, Mom.

I'm gonna quit.

Then I'll quit.

We'll have half a head curly.

Yeah.

Loosen that one, just a notch.

Mother, I'm not gonna get done.

Better?

- Have you got a deadline again? - No.

If you keep telling me to loosen it...

Well, it hurts.

I've got too small of a spot right here.

Can you move in a little bit?

Alright, I'll get up and you push the chair.

I want to be a full family.

Not a partial family.

I want us all to be together.

My parents are getting old.

And I know it's gonna come sooner or later,

and I want them both out before that even happens.

These years are going by fast.

Chuckie, I think, is 63 years old already.

OK.

OK, get out of the way.

So, that makes me an old fart.

I wanted the boys to succeed.

But when I'm gone, I don't think they will be doing it.

Want it there, or where's it gonna go?

Because it's a dirty job.

- Hang on! - Right there.

I want to go through what I think is the most important evidence in the case,

which is the sequencing of who was doing what

when Teresa came on the property.

And so, what I want to do is I want to reconstruct

that whole sequence of events

to determine if Bobby Dassey

actually left the property within a minute or two of Teresa

and followed her when she turned left

and met up with his soon-to-be stepfather, Scott Tadych,

and they are somehow involved in the murder.

And so, I want to do that sequence

and see, um, if I can make that fit on the timeline.

So, I think that's...

It's highly likely that that was the sequence of what happened.

Assuming the Dawn Pliszka phone call happened at 2:27,

which I believe that it did,

Teresa arrived at 147 and Avery Road around 2:31.

One of the things that I learned, being out there,

is the property is so huge compared to what most people think.

You have to go at least a quarter of a mile down Avery Road

even to get to Mr. And Mrs. Avery's residence.

Then you take a right turn and you go down another long road,

probably not quite a quarter of a mile, to Steven's trailer

and where Barb's trailer was immediately east of it.

We think that she arrives on the Avery property at 2:35.

Steven is starting to initiate a call to her

and hangs up without it connecting

because he looks out his window and he sees her.

So, what Steven has consistently said in his interviews and police reports

is that when Teresa arrived,

she never comes to the trailer.

He walks out to her car.

She gives him the document, he gives her the money,

and she drives off.

So, the money, and then the information for the car. Perfect.

You gave her 40 bucks, she gave you an Auto Trader magazine.

- Yeah. - OK, and then she...

Oh, she went to the car and got me that.

Now, you said you were inside your home when she pulled up.

Yeah.

OK. And the contact you had with her

only lasted for how many minutes?

- Bye. - Within five minutes.

Then, after you're done and she gives you the book, where do you go to?

I go back in the house.

OK. And how long are you there for?

Probably, I don't know...

Drop off the book.

- Then I walked over by Barbara. - By where?

- By Barbara, my sister. - OK.

To see if Bobby was home, but he was already gone.

He had just left.

She leaves, you put the Auto Trader magazine in your house.

- Yeah, and I went over there. - You walked right over?

Well, he was gone. He just left.

- Bobby? - Yeah.

- Did you see him leave? - No.

- He was already gone. - Yes, he just left.

- Did he drive somewhere... - Yeah.

Yeah, he took his Blazer.

- Do you know where he went? - No.

OK, let's go back to the van.

- Good. How are you? - Good.

So, the money, and then information for the car.

- VIN. - Perfect.

How do you get from the van

where she's taking the picture to her vehicle for the book?

- Walk. - You ask her for a book?

No, she said, "I got the book in the truck."

So, then you follow her towards the truck.

Yeah.

What happens next?

Well, she opened the door. She got in.

Then she reached over.

- She sit down? - Yeah.

- She reaches to get the book? - Yeah. The passenger side.

- She just hands it out to you? - Yeah.

Does she get back out of the truck again?

No. No.

- Then she leaves. - Yeah.

Is Bobby home then or no?

Yeah, Bobby's home.

OK. And does he come out or anything?

Or does he see you leave or see her leave?

You'd have to ask him.

- You know he's home. - Yeah. He's home then.

- When she leaves, he's home. - Yeah.

And just when I walked in the house

and come back, and he was gone.

So, just in that moment of you saying good-bye to Teresa,

going into your house with the paper and coming back,

you notice that he's gone.

While she's giving you that thing, he's still there.

- Yeah. - OK.

Within, I don't know, that second.

He probably... At the same time, almost.

OK, so, by the time that it took you to walk

from her vehicle to your place and drop off that thing,

and then to walk right back outside?

- Yeah. He's gone. - He's gone. OK.

He looks and he sees that Bobby's truck isn't there.

And then he looks out to the road, and Teresa's making a left turn on 147.

She was actually exiting the Avery property

at around 2:38.

What he didn't realize, and we didn't realize,

was that Bobby's actually about...

probably about 150 yards behind Teresa.

But Bobby is in the part of the road that dips down,

where you can't even see the top of his truck.

Steven goes back in the trailer.

Bobby was probably only 30 seconds behind her.

So, we wanted to see how long it would take him to catch up with her

if she was just driving normal speed and he was going over the speed limit.

Could he catch her before they got to Q Road?

And he did.

And he could also see that she made a left turn.

Right at 2:41,

that's the last call where her cell phone is active.

That call is right before she would have gotten to Kuss Road.

She's distracted.

She forwards the call and she pulls over.

And that's where we think she stopped to talk,

most likely, to Bobby Dassey about doing a hustle shot.

If this is somebody you've had contact with,

done a hustle shot with,

they wave you down, you know?

You're on Kuss Road.

So, why is Bobby Dassey lying?

Why does Bobby Dassey have all of this deviant porn on his computer?

Why are we able to recreate that and catch up with her in 30 seconds?

Why do we end up right by Kuss Road,

where they suspect she was buried temporarily?

Why is there blood on the rear cargo door if she wasn't ambushed?

So, those are just the normal questions that you would ask.