Original subtitles

[Eva Walz] Modelling was definitely a career

that Christina was really passionate about.

For her to be in Playboy, I mean, that's something she'd always wanted to do.

Thousands of women would submit photos every month to be a Cybergirl.

You have to be gorgeous,

and Hef could have seen something really special in Christina.

ButPlayboy models get a lot of unwanted attention from men.

It can be a real problem,

especially if you find yourself around the wrong person.

There had been prior activity related to Christina.

And she did allude to the fact that she thought she may have been drugged.

She heard a man somewhat forcefully telling Christina don't call the police.

This person had told him, perhaps, the most chilling detail in this whole case.

I was in complete shock.

Who becomes a victim like this twice in a couple days?

[Gavin Goschinski] On August 22nd, I was in the Detective Unit

of Lower Merion Township Police Station talking to detectives,

when a call came in about a "check the well-being" At Christina Kraft's residence

at a high-end condo complex in Ardmore.

[Vinny Vella] Ardmore is right outside Philadelphia.

It's in a part of the suburbs generally known to be a very wealthy, affluent area.

It's a close-knit community.

A lot of people walk to places,

a lot of stores, restaurants, bars, things like that.

I wouldn't say it's a high crime area.

[Goschinski] Very wealthy and affluent people who call 911, and call the police

for every... Every matter of issue in their life.

Normally, I wouldn't go on a "check the well-being,"

but I decided to go on this call right away

because I was advised by detectives

that there had been prior activity related to Christina.

A man, named Alex, made the call.

He was worried about his girlfriend, Christina,

because she wasn't answerin' her cell phone,

and he couldn't get into the apartment

because the interior door was locked.

So, they had to force entry into the apartment.

When we got into her room...

We saw blood splatter.

And we saw what clearly was a body on a bed,

with a comforter perfectly placed over top.

We pulled the comforter back...

And it's a badly beaten girl.

There's no question that it was a homicide.

I vividly remember walking in thinking

that it was probably one of the most gruesome scenes that I had seen.

She had a broken nose, there were fractures of both eyes.

She was strangled to death.

The victim of this brutal homicide was Christina Carlin-Kraft.

She was in her mid-30s, she was aPlayboy model.

The victim was found strangled in her condo.

Police made that disturbing discovery on Sibley Avenue in Ardmore.

They were called there to make a welfare check.

You don't hear things like this happening here.

Never really heard of anything more than parking tickets, and jaywalkin', you know?

Hearin' a murder or a strangling like that is just traumatizing.

Christina Carlin-Kraft was the PlayboyCybergirl of the Week on May 4th, 2009.

[Vella] Christina grew up in South Jersey, along the shore.

From an early age, she was very interested in modelling,

and the entertainment industry.

In 2000, Christina graduated from high school in Linwood, New Jersey.

And for a couple years after that,

she worked as a waitress in the South Jersey area,

and in the Borgata in Atlantic City.

In 2003, Christina met Alex, her longtime boyfriend, and future fiance

at the Jersey Shore on Labor Day weekend,

and the two were incredibly close.

He was very supportive of her modelling career.

The two were a couple for 15 years, until the time of her death.

Christina's father had said that she was the light in his life.

That, as his oldest, uh, child, uh, they had a very close relationship.

He valued the time that they spent together.

This is the photo shoot that I actually met Christina at, that we did together.

It was thisMaxim andStuff Magazine three day event.

This event was a model search.

There were girls flown in from around the country, and her and I were chosen

as the Maxim and Stuff Magazine Model Search winners.

We got along great.

She's so sweet, very charismatic, she was a lot of fun,

obviously, very stunningly beautiful.

I remember looking at her, and just thinking,

with her dark hair, and her light blue eyes,

like, she was just the epitome of a... Of a model.

They put her photos in several of the Maxim and Stuffmagazines,

and having that exposure

really helped both of our modelling careers take off.

Modelling was definitely a career that she was really passionate about.

For her to be in Playboy, I mean, that's something she'd always wanted to do.

[Holly Madison] Christina had done some modelling

for Maximand some of those other men's magazines.

And even though those were great, there was something about the Playboybrand

that had a little bit more of a mystique to it,

and seemed a little more special.

On the Playboy.com website, you could join what was called the Cyber Club.

It was a subscription membership, and each week they would showcase

a nude photoshoot of a different woman,

and she would be the Cybergirl of the Week.

APlayboy Cybergirl had an online pictorial.

It was very similar to the Playmate pictorial.

It was a very glamorous, softly lit, nude pictorial,

and there would be a little blurb about the girl.

You have to be gorgeous, but you also have to have

that really, like, fresh-faced, kind of innocent, but kind of sexy look.

It was a big deal to be a Cybergirl,

and it could definitely be a stepping stone to even bigger things.

When the Cybergirl shoot went live in 2009,

I think for Christina, that was probably really exhilarating.

Christina would have been invited out to stay at the mansion,

and do a Playmate test for the magazine.

And after she was selected as Cybergirl,

she would have been invited to all the parties, and would have had access to that world.

To meet Hef personally, that's kind of an extra step,

kind of have to catch his attention.

Hef could have seen something really special in Christina.

Christina didn't become a Playmate, and that was her ultimate goal.

The Playmate selection process is incredibly competitive.

Thousands of women would send in their photos every month

to be considered to be a PlayboyPlaymate,

and from that, only one woman would be chosen each month.

Ultimately, the final decision would be Hef's.

And there's so many reasons that Christina may not have been chosen.

Maybe they already had too many brunettes scheduled that year,

or maybe they were just looking for somebody

with a little bit more of a different story.

She was 26, and unfortunately, in the Playboyworld, that was considered a little old.

If you don't make it to that next step of being a Playmate,

that could be a huge disappointment.

It could have a big effect on your life,

because it's not just a goal you didn't reach,

but it's something that reflects back on your self-image,

and how supposedly attractive you are perceived to be.

And it can really be a hit on your self-esteem.

Christina took modelling jobs here and there when she could,

and, as part of that, she moved to New York City to further her career.

Modelling can be difficult once you've posed for Playboy.

From the outside, it looks like it might be a stepping stone, but once you're there,

you realize a lot of brands don't wanna work with somebody who's posed nude before.

So, I imagine she probably encountered a lot of difficulties

that she maybe wasn't prepared for.

[Walz] When you put yourself out there like that,

those pictures are out there forever.

You have to think long term about your future,

and, you know, your career down the road.

And not that it's negative at all, for some people,

but in some light, it can look negative.

Christina's modelling career didn't take off after her Playboyappearance,

and she was kinda left adrift.

Playboy,as a brand, really has no, you know,

support for women once they're not working for them anymore.

I think they just look at it as,

well, you know, we can't babysit all these women for the rest a their lives.

[Goschinski] Upon realizing that Ms. Kraft had been murdered,

we met with Alex, her fiance, in the hallway.

I told him, "I'm very sorry, but Christina's dead."

He was clearly stricken with grief.

[Michael Vice] When something like this happens,

it's sort of, like, what we say is an "All hands on deck."

I need everybody and anybody that can come in.

Once we were finished with the scene, which took hours,

the next step is we need to talk to anybody.

I had my investigators knocking on every resident's door.

Did they hear anything? Did they see anything?

[Jim Melwert] Murder definitely stands out when it happens in Ardmore,

because, uh, they just don't happen that often, and it's unexpected.

[Vella] I think folks who lived near Christina were worried

that, you know, maybe a killer was going around in the community.

When something like this happens,

I think a lot of people automatically assume the worst and panic.

After we received information that Christina was the victim of this murder,

we tried to find out as much as we could about her and her past.

Uh, just... Just given the... The shocking nature of the crime,

Christina had a very clear online footprint.

And front and center in a lot of the web traffic about Christina

was an article from the New York Post

about an incident that she had had in 2016, in Manhattan.

There was some sort of dispute over paying her tab,

and she got into a physical fight with a bar manager.

She was charged with misdemeanor assault, but ultimately,

the prosecutors in New York dropped the charges against her.

In 2017, she had moved to Ardmore at the suggestion of Alex, her fiance.

He felt it would be a safer environment for her in Ardmore,

not to mention, closer to his parents.

He said he wanted to protect her, and he just felt like she was more safe there,

which is kind of ironic.

He traveled back and forth for work from Ardmore to New York City.

[Vice] It seemed like Alex lived in New York for his job.

He worked during the week, and spent weekends here.

I believe he had a really good job, and it kept him away a good bit.

I think life was a little bit difficult for Christina, though she recently moved.

She came from New York City, and I think she missed Alex,

and her friends, and the excitement of New York City.

So, it was quite a change to move to a sleepy, Philadelphia suburb.

When I first heard about Christina's murder, it was just an absolute shock,

and I just immediately, like, burst out... Bursted into tears.

How did this happen?

You know, she was someone that I wouldn't expect to be in this type of situation.

[Holly Madison] Playboy models get a lot of unwanted attention from men.

It can be a real problem, especially if you find yourself around

the wrong person who just has all the wrong ideas.

Police in the Main Line are searching for a killer

after a model is found dead in her condo.

[Vella] Christina's death drew a lotta media attention,

both from local news outlets in the Philadelphia region, and beyond.

There were tabloid reporters from Europe who wrote about this.

There were tabloid reporters from New York City who came down to write about it.

[Goschinski] I think Christina Kraft's status as aPlayboy model,

the fact that you've got a beautiful woman,

certainly drove press interest in the story.

[reporter] A model was found strangled.

When the victim has been a part of Playboyin any way,

that's the one thing that gets pulled into the headlines.

It automatically draws eyes.

I think the Playboybrand,

when you hear the name you think sex, you think beautiful women.

It's a mainstream brand, but it's also on the fringes, it's a little salacious.

Christina was a whole person, she wasn't just Playboymodel, that was one job she did.

She was more than that.

[Goschinski] Based on my experience,

I knew that I had to treat Alex as a person of interest in the matter.

He called us to the place, he has a long term relationship with her,

he's very concerned about her, and now I've found her beaten in the apartment.

So, I asked him, I said,

"Would you be willing to go back to the police station with our detectives?"

"It's really important you cooperate,

and help our detectives in every way with this."

And he was completely forthcoming, and, uh, agreed to that immediately.

[Vice] We get a statement from Alex, now we have to start getting his story.

Any and all information that we can gather, 'cause you can't rule anything out.

You have to go down every road you possibly can.

Alex says on August 21st, he had to return to New York City for his job.

He stayed there, and he called Christina

early morning on the 22nd, around 2:30 A.M. to say goodnight.

Christina didn't answer though, and Alex called several more times,

but there was no answer from Christina.

Just after 5 A.M. Alex was growing concerned.

And so, he checked the security camera they had at the Philadelphia residence,

and he noticed some unusual activity.

And this is when Alex decided that he should return to Philadelphia.

Alibis would be checked very quickly,

but I think the level of cooperation,

and the sincerity of cooperation, goes a long way.

Detectives are very good at signs of deception,

and people that are playin' a game.

He was very cooperative.

[Vice] The distance, where his location was,

that could he have physically been responsible for this?

I don't think we ever really got there.

Alex was never really thought to be a suspect.

As investigators try to find out more about Christina,

and tracked her movements in the time before her death.

They pretty early on, discovered that she had filed a police report

just a few days earlier, complaining that she had been robbed in her apartment.

The murder happens on August 22nd of 2018,

and on August 18th of 2018,

she woke up and reported a burglary to our police department.

[Vella] She had called Lower Merion Police, and told them

that she had been robbed of some personal items that were pretty valuable,

some designer handbags, and some jewelry, I believe her credit card, as well.

She told the police that she remembered going

to the Center City Philadelphia, and drinking at a hotel in Center City.

When we got there and spoke to Christina about the burglary,

she said that she woke up in a daze,

that she doesn't remember anything, that she just wasn't feeling right,

and she did allude to the fact that she thought she may have been drugged.

[Madison] There's a lot of people who want to take advantage.

I've heard a lotta stories about people, you know, having their drinks drugged,

and not being able to remember, you know,

what happened after a night out.

And it's terrifying, and it can happen to anyone.

[Walz] Christina had just moved to this new city,

she had previously lived in New York City, where all of her friends were.

So, here she is in this new city probably not knowing very many people.

You know, someone took advantage of her vulnerability at that moment.

We got a statement from her, and I remember that she was very, very upset.

This seemed to really impact her.

She felt violated, she, like, made references of not feeling safe.

We told her we were gonna do everything we can.

And my detectives were able to get ahold

of the surveillance video from the condo complex.

Between Christina's statement to them, and the surveillance footage from the building,

investigators were able to deduce that, at some point,

a gentlemen gave Christina a ride back to her building from Philadelphia.

[Melwert] And he ends up fitting her description

of the rideshare driver that she had used that night.

I think it was three something in the morning,

when Christina and the driver arrived back at her apartment,

and she was passed out in the back seat of the car.

So, he took the liberty to take her keys, go into her condo.

It was just before four in the morning...

and he spent over an hour and a half inside,

presumably, burglarizing Christina Kraft's condo.

He came down holding a box full of Christina's personal belongings

that she had later reported stolen.

[Melwert] And then he's seen in the video coming back in with Christina Kraft.

Helping her into the lobby, and he kind of puts her down on the ground,

he steps out again, but then he comes back in, helps her into the elevator.

[Vice] We ended up putting out some pictures,

because there were video, and pictures of the suspect in the lobby.

The man in the video seen going into Christina's apartment

was an African American, um, just wearing, sort of, non-descript clothing.

Police are looking for a man accused of stealing items

from the victim's apartment, just days before her death.

[Vice] Christina did come over to the police station to try to talk to us again.

So, clearly, she was just still really upset, worried.

Kinda lookin' for guidance, "What's gonna happen?

Will I ever get my stuff? Am I safe?"

[Melwert] Investigators look into her credit cards,

and they find that some of her credit cards were used at a nearby convenience store.

They get images, and... And videos from those convenience stores,

and they're able to match them up

with the surveillance video from the apartment.

The investigators were able to recognize the person who used it

as Andre Melton from prior arrests of his.

Andre Melton was considered dangerous by detectives.

Uh, they were concerned about him returnin' to the apartment.

[Goschinski] And they were, uh, there were some urgency to apprehending him.

[Vice] There was a decision

that we were gonna attempt to get a search warrant signed

for who we believed to be

the suspect's residence in Philadelphia.

On the morning of August 22nd,

the day that Christina's body is found,

they get a warrant for Andre Melton's arrest.

They go to his last known address,

and they find the things that were missing from her home,

again, expensive stuff,

you know, jewelry, bags, things like that,

but they can't find him.

He's on the run.

[Goschinski] The detectives are alarmed about

what they've discovered

'cause he had a violent history.

[Vice] We knew he knew

the layout of Christina's apartment,

so it was logical

to think that Andre Melton could be the killer.

He was looked at as a murder suspect

'cause what are the chances.

Who becomes a victim like this twice in, in a couple of days?

Police had no clue where Andre Melton

who was wanted for robbery is.

[Goschinski] There was a community concern

in general about. "Are we still in danger?"

[Vella] Andre Melton lead police

on a little bit of a cat and mouse

as they tried to find him.

[female reporter] Police are dealing with two investigations here.

One, the burglary involving the model, the second, her death.

[Vice] There was so much going on.

We were looking at who committed the homicide,

where are we gonna find Andre Melton.

The two seemed like they may have been connected.

They started thinking, "Well, okay, they came back

or, or something happened."

[Vice] I remember being up for days.

The detectives, none of us had slept.

We had been up because we knew that we had to resolve this,

and then things started to develop.

We started to be able to get some video surveillance

from the condo building itself.

On the night of Christina's murder,

there's clear footage of her exiting her building

and heading towards to Philadelphia.

Hours later,

there is additional footage

of her returning to her building

being escorted by an unidentified man.

The come in, it's shortly after three in the morning,

and they walk in together,

and they get in the elevator, and they go up.

Any time her door opens

the security system alerts

and records the time.

- [device chimes] - [Vice] So at, like, 3.08, door opens,

so they both go inside,

and then there is no other door movements

until almost 10 minutes after five in the morning.

There's about a two hour window.

[Vella] That man who entered the building

is not seen leaving the building,

which lead investigators to believe

that he somehow exited another way.

[Melwert] She's on the second floor,

she has a balcony, she has a slider to the balcony,

and around 5.00 a.m. the, this slider opens.

[device chimes]

[Melwert] The rear balcony isn't that high of the ground,

you could easily, you know, go out and,

and jump off and, you know, get away that way.

[Vice] We know they didn't leave the front door

because we never got a chime, we never got a time stamp.

The balcony door chimed once,

then presumably someone went out.

We had detective on the ground searching, looking for evidence.

And then, some of our detectives found

what looked like it might be a foot stomp in the ground,

which would be easily explain that

somebody jumping off of the balcony.

We knew that Andre Melton

knew the intricacies of her condo.

He had a criminal history,

but I wouldn't say there was anything that would lead us to say,

"It looks like this guy would be a prime candidate to commit a murder"

So from August 22nd through the 25th,

all of our detectives were retracing

every step of Christina's that we could.

They went to Center City

and pulled surveillance camera images

to see if they could figure out where she was.

And from those images

they were able to chart her movements

from her destination when she first came to Philadelphia

all throughout Center City

as she walked down different streets

and around different bars and nightclubs.

At this point, it was a matter of gaining all this footage

and then putting it together to come up with a timeline.

It was very tedious.

When we looked at the video,

I could see Christina with the murder suspect

walking with their arms around one another,

I remember at Broad and 13th

was where they got into ride share,

and that's when the car took them back

to Christina's, to her condo.

[Vella] That unidentified man was not Andre Melton.

So police now had another suspect that they had to locate.

Police will put out a, an alert

basically saying that they were looking

for information about this murder,

and they were asking press to distribute that information

and, and try to drum up tips for them.

If anyone has any information, please contact police.

They'll put out two sets of surveillance image,

one from the night that Andre Melton came back to her apartment,

and the other depicting

the man she was seen entering her apartment with on the night she died.

Investigators didn't know

whether they were related at the time,

so they put both out to the public and said,

"We're looking for information on both of these men,

please contact us."

[Vice] On August 23rd, I get a phone call.

This person identifies himself as Andre Melton.

I was a little surprised that I'm talking to the guy that we were looking for.

And he wanted to make it clear,

he said, "I stole her stuff,

but I'm not going down for murder."

[reporter 1] Hey, Mr. Hef, right here, please.

[reporter 2] Hold that right there, right there.

When Playboy was training Playmates

on how to handle the media,

that was great, but I think there could've also been

some additional training in how to keep yourself safe,

how to handle, maybe, judgement you might face,

you know, going forward in life.

There should've been a seminar for Playboymodels

on how to handle this kinda thing.

Detective Vice was not convinced at all

by his conversation with Melton.

He thought, "Okay, even if

he is not the person who committed the murder,

he was likely involved in some ways."

So this interview did very little

to convince him of Melton's innocence.

[Vella] Early on, there was speculation

that these two gentlemen were connected in some way,

but ultimately,

as investigators learned more about each individual,

they found that that was not the case.

Investigators continued to solicit tips,

one of which came from a gentleman

who was a driver.

Who said that he recognized

the man and the woman in the photo

as somebody that he had actually given a ride to

from Philadelphia to Ardmore on the night of the murder.

[Vice] My detectives interviewed the driver

that had picked up Christina and the suspect that night.

There was nothing that seemed like

anything was forced.

He said that Christina had approached him,

actually flagged him down instead of using the app.

And said that she needed a ride

because there were some people on the street harassing her.

So after some convincing, The driver agreed.

Took Christina and this other man

to their destination in Ardmore.

He said during the ride

they appeared to be very friendly,

very affectionate with each other.

When they arrived in Ardmore

it became apparent that

Christina did not have any money

to give him despite promising him earlier,

"I will pay you in cash for the ride."

She offered him an American Express credit card,

which he had no way of taking.

The man that Christina was with

offer him a $100 cash if you he were to stay

parked outside his building for 10 to 15 minutes

while they went inside.

He exchanged phone numbers with this person,

and the person promised to call him when he was ready.

Twenty minutes went by,

he didn't hear anything from the passenger,

so he simply decided to leave and return toward Philadelphia.

[Sacks] Around 4.00 a.m.,

Christina somehow, in a very charged situation,

was able to contact her cousin.

And although Christina didn't leave a message or speak,

her cousin could hear the background,

and what she heard was a man

forcefully telling Christina, "Don't call the police."

On August 26th,

police got a call from a man

who said that he knew the identity

of the person seen with Christina

in the surveillance footage

that was released in the media.

This was somebody he had been

roommates with in a psychiatric facility in Philadelphia.

[Melwert] So they check out that tip,

and they were able to trace him back

to an incident in Love Park in Center City, Philadelphia.

At one point he followed a woman

into the family court building...

...and started harassing her.

He began causing a scene in the building,

kicking windows, screaming, and yelling.

[Melwert] So he was taken into custody,

and he was put on a 72-hour hold, a psychiatric hold.

[Vella] This person had told him

perhaps the most chilling detail in this whole case.

He said that he had recently strangled a woman

and had bragged about the event

and said that there's no other feeling quite like

feeling somebody's life escape them as you choke them.

[Sacks] Unfortunately, he was admitted as a John Doe,

and so the police weren't able to learn much at all

because he was able to check out

before they were ever able to interview him.

As all this was playing out,

they get a call from a family member

who lives in Philadelphia

and saw the video that police released,

they identified that suspect was Jonathan Harris.

He'd recently been released from prison.

Jonathan Harris

had served a sentence for robbery.

He had just been released on July 15th,

five weeks before Christina's murder.

[Melwert] By the time they identified him as a suspect,

he was already in the wind.

[Vice] On August 28th,

we issued an arrest warrant for Jonathan Harris

or homicide related charges

in the death of Christina Kraft.

[Sacks] The police were concerned,

Harris was considered to be

dangerous and unpredictable.

They were worried that it was only a matter of time before he hurt someone else.

They needed to apprehend him right away.

[Vice] Once we positively identified

Jonathan Harris as the subject,

we had to find him,

so we started doing some searching,

find family members, find friends,

find anybody that we can that can talk to us about

where he may or may not be.

Then at one point detectives spoke to his sister,

and we ultimately learned

that there was a bus ticket that was purchased,

and that Jonathan was on that bus...

...and that he was headed to Pittsburgh.

[Matthew Roth] The Philadelphia investigators

contacted the Pittsburgh Fugitive Task Force,

to let us know that their suspect Jonathan Harris

was on his way to Pittsburgh.

We did all our backgrounds

as far as his criminal history,

as far as photographs, so everyone would know what he looked like.

[female reporter] Police say that 30-year-old Jonathan Harris

had just been released from prison in July.

Harris definitely had significant criminal history,

nothing like homicide in his past,

but forcible felonies as far as robbery,

drug dealing, burglary.

We printed out pictures, made copies,

so everyone was actually carrying a photograph

of the last arrest photo.

Philadelphia told us exactly when the bus would be arriving

from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh,

so we had the team in place,

so that we cut of his avenues of escape.

And we were lying in wait in a trap

for Jonathan Harris to arrive in Pittsburgh.

We had a car out that saw the bus coming into the area,

so we knew the bus was going to arrive,

we were all on communication on radio.

We were ready and waiting

as the bus started to offload passengers.

I was very close to the doors that

the people disembarked the bus from.

He was probably 30 feet away from me when the bus pulled up

and about the third person off the bus.

We let him walk off the bus,

and I'm looking at height and weight and build,

and I'm very certain that this is our guy

as I approached him.

I cornered the suspect Jonathan Harris against the wall,

at the time he realized that I was probably a cop.

I could see his eyes dart left and right,

looking at, possibly trying to get away,

and it was too late at that point.

When I confronted him,

he did give me a fake name,

trying to say that he wasn't Jonathan Harris.

We were pretty sure that he was,

and we did take him into physical custody there.

We contacted Philadelphia's task force

and let them know that we had him in custody.

They immediately sent detectives out

from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh.

[Vella] The detectives from Montgomery County sat in a room with him

and tried to get a statement from him about

what had happened on the night of Christina's murder.

Initially, he told them that he had seen Christina around,

that he recognized her from being in Philadelphia.

Christina was by herself

in Philadelphia in the suburbs.

She missed her friends and the exciting lifestyle of New York City,

so I think she was going out to recapture some of that.

[Walz] I think the reason why she was going out

and grabbing a drink by herself

was she was probably lonely.

She was by herself, when you're by yourself

you're going to get approached.

[Sacks] It started out very friendly by all accounts,

but just hours later,

the evening took a terrible turn.

[Vella] He mentioned that he was pretty high

on the day of the murder.

He had smoked some marijuana,

he had used cocaine,

he had been drinking,

and he also mentioned to using K2,

which is a street name for what is essentially synthetic marijuana.

He says that they met in Center City,

uh, that they were going back to her apartment,

and he had an ounce of cocaine that he was gonna sell her.

She says that she's not gonna pay him for the cocaine,

and he gets angry,

he's scared because he needs this money,

and so he says there was a physical altercation,

at one point she hit him with a wine bottle,

and things got out of hand.

Harris is adamant that he had nothing to do with Christina's death,

that when he left Christina's apartment she was perfectly fine.

But the detectives could see

that there were some inconsistencies with, uh, Harris's story.

They knew that a coroner's examination found that

Christina had no cocaine in her system whatsoever.

They took a little bit of a break,

they gave him some time to think,

and they came back and said,

"Did you tell us the whole truth?"

Police are able to kinda pull some strings on his story,

and it starts to fall apart,

and it doesn't take very long for him to just spill his guts.

He admitted that he'd lied.

He lied about the two of them doing cocaine,

and crucially, he lied when he'd said that

he had nothing to do with her death.

He admitted on the second statement

that he did indeed kill Christina.

Her last breath was, was at his hands.

He even made a comment after he was in custody that,

"Well, she was still breathing when I left."

I don't believe that.

I don't think there's any possibility

that Christina Kraft was breathing when he left.

[Vella] He admitted that after he killed her,

he covered her body with

clothing, with a, an area rug that was in her apartment.

Uh, he admitted to changing into her clothing

because his was covered in blood.

And he admitted to jumping

from her balcony to ground level

to hide himself from the cameras out front of her building.

Harris was charged with first and third degree murder.

[Vella] Andre Melton was arrested in December 2018,

which was several months after

Harris had been taken into custody.

Police had been looking for him for quite some time

and ultimately caught up with him

when he was arrested in Philadelphia

on a minor drug possession.

And they noticed that he had this open warrant

for a robbery in Montgomery County.

Melton was later found guilty

for robbing Christina and was sentenced to state prison.

[Melwert] The murder case went to trial,

and Jonathan Harris pleaded not guilty.

[Vella] There was a lot of evidence in this case.

This was a really air tight investigation by detectives.

It would've been extremely difficult for Harris and his attorney

to insert any doubt into the minds of jurors about

who had killed Christina, how she had been killed.

[Melwert] What Harris was trying to avoid was first degree murder,

which in Pennsylvania carries a mandatory life sentence,

and was trying to argue that this was third degree murder,

which is 20 to 40 years in prison.

[Vella] But the jury found Harris guilty of first degree murder,

and he was sentenced to life in prison.

A Philadelphia man accused of murdering a one-time Playboymodel

has been found guilt on all charges.

[Melwert] At sentencing,

Alexander Ciccotelli, her fiance,

got to address Jonathan Harris,

and, you know, he called him a coward,

that, that he, you know, strangled and choked

a, a, you know, a woman much smaller than him,

and he also said how hurtful and painful this had been for the family.

Alex said, "It wasn't bad enough that you killed my fiancee,

but then you also had to come out with this lie and,

and just slander her,

and, and drag her through the mud

with this line about the cocaine."

She didn't have any cocaine in her system,

they never found any cocaine

or traces of cocaine in her apartment,

and her fiance says as long as he has known her,

she has never used cocaine.

[Vice] She loved modeling,

I think she liked being in front of the, you know, the camera.

Her aunt had mentioned to me

that one of Christina's best moments

was how she was able to work with Playboy.

[Walz] I think Christina had modeled for so many years,

and modeling is a career that

isn't always going to be lifelong,

you have to have

other careers kind of in place

to kind of take over that fulfillment in your life.

I hope moving forward that

Christina is remembered

for the amazing, beautiful girl that she was.

[Madison] She might have thought she was prepared

to handle any situations she was in,

and unfortunately, that went horribly wrong.

I think about Christina a lot.

Her and I were the same age,

had same careers,

and now she's gone.

It's absolutely heart breaking.