Original subtitles

Hay Township is a remote area.

We have quite a few cabins that are seasonal.

It was a requirement for Cindy

to live in the middle of nowhere.

And she liked that about being in the cabin.

It was just the two of them up there.

It's a very isolated area.

Nobody would see a thing or hear a thing.

There was a freshly dug hole. There was a can of gas.

So in my mind, his intention would have been

to kill her, burn her, bury her, and try to obliterate

or destroy any evidence.

She was not going to die in the cabin.

She was not going to let that be the end of her story.

On Saturday the 19th, I was in the area patrolling...

when Central Dispatch contacted me by radio by radio

and advised that a woman had been shot in the head

two times.

They said the person that shot the victim, Cynthia Hartman,

was currently driving around.

And he was in a silver-in-color trailblazer.

We located the suspect traveling down the road.

That's when I initiated a traffic stop.

My sister, Cindy, was

like, fearless.

You just, you could not stop her.

She was a fun person to be around.

She was excited.

She would never say no to anything, you know?

Let's go canoeing. All right, what day?

She was always adventurous.

I'm the oldest.

Tricia is the next.

She is two years younger than me.

Cindy would be next.

She is three years younger than Tricia.

and then Darcy is the baby.

Growing up wasn't easy for any of us, that's for sure.

It was always a fear of violence.

We had food, we had a roof.

But it was not a good childhood.

She met her husband through a friend, and they hit it

off, and then they ended up getting married,

and she got pregnant young.

Cindy had three children. Her boys were her whole world.

Cindy was her kids' hero. Cindy was...

...a great mom.

Cindy was 33, and her three boys were in school,

and she decided to go to college.

And her husband didn't want her to go to college.

Her relationship with her husband was tenuous.

He wasn't encouraging her to follow her dream.

She said he was being too controlling.

So she decided to leave her husband,

because it wasn't working.

Her kids were staying with their dad at the time.

She was trying to actively get a good future going for her

and for her kids.

Things were starting to turn around, starting to look up.

Cindy seemed very happy.

She was in school studying to be a mortician.

In October 2012, she told me she met a man named

Shaun Cleary.

She needed help with math, and Shaun was her math tutor.

He seemed really friendly and kind, and she wanted to

pursue a relationship with him.

She just seemed to really care about him.

He had taken a lot of interest in her hobbies and stuff

and things that she did.

He said he was in the Army for four years.

I was in the Army.

I was like, cool, you should ask him what job

he had or where he was.

Apparently, they hit it off, and were spending

a lot of time together.

Cynthia had been staying with Shaun Cleary for a couple months

at his dad's cabin in Hay Township.

Hay Township is a remote area.

We have several lakes and rivers.

There are quite a few cabins that are seasonal.

The winters are quite cold here, and the vast majority of

the time in the winter, those cabins are vacant.

That area is surrounded by miles of forest.

There's not a lot of close neighbors around the cabin.

Cynthia loved living in the woods.

She loved living in northern Michigan at the cabin.

She loved being outdoors, the quiet.

It was a requirement for Cindy

to live in the middle of nowhere.

She would say, "I don't want to live where I can hear traffic.

"I don't want to live where there's people coming in

and out of the building next to me."

And I knew she liked that about just being in the cabin.

It was just the two of them up there.

As she started getting closer to him, she started feeling

like she was giving more information than he was.

It was a one-sided relationship,

and I think she realized

whatever it is, something's off.

She wasn't sure about continuing to date him.

That morning, Shaun Cleary left for work around 3:45

in the morning. He was a sawmill operator.

They were texting back and forth about whether

they were going to continue this relationship.

Shaun Cleary texted that she should probably get back

together with her husband.

She was definitely distraught over this argument.

She just wanted to clear her mind and figure out what

she was going to do.

She already was going to her friend's house to babysit,

so she decided to stay there a few days.

She started to pack all her belongings into her vehicle

without telling Shaun.

But he came back early.

Instead of going to his place of employment, he returned back

to the cabin to speak to Cynthia.

Shaun Cleary observed all her stuff she had packed in

her vehicle, which upset him.

He convinced her when she was trying to leave, to stay.

They go inside the cabin.

He said, "I want to give you a letter that I wrote that

"expresses how I feel

you know, about you and about us."

And she's always willing to listen.

He said, "Can you go back in the bedroom?"

When Shaun Cleary came walking into the bedroom, instead of

having a letter in his hand,

he had a rifle.

Shaun said to Cynthia, "Nobody leaves me."

When Shaun pointed the gun at her, just the sheer

fear that she must have been going through, the disbelief.

Had never done anything like this to her before.

They'd have arguments, just like any couple would

have an argument.

But they never got violent, never physical.

Cynthia had no idea of his past.

She didn't realize how much danger she was in.

She didn't know about Penny Doane.

Shaun Cleary was 19 years old at the time.

He and Penny Doane had been dating for two years and were

engaged for about a year.

But in her mind, things weren't working out.

She wasn't happy.

The relationship was failing,

and Penny was honest with Shaun about that.

October 8, 2000, it was a Sunday morning.

They'd been arguing, and Penny told Shaun that

it was over.

Shaun was crying,

and he was very upset about the breakup.

He wanted to go for a walk with her and discuss the matter.

And of course, she wanted to appease him.

She believed she owes him at least a conversation.

Shaun told Penny, "If I can't have you, nobody will have you."

Shaun snaps

and attacks Penny.

He stabbed her in the chest.

There's a shed that's back in the woods,

and he locks her inside the shed.

This was kind of a sustained assault, a sustained captivity.

This occurred over hours.

Penny really believed she was going to die.

Eventually she thought she heard a truck leaving,

thinking it might be Shaun leaving.

She seized that opportunity.

She mustered what little strength she had left,

and she was able to get out.

It's a miracle that she survived.

After I arrived on the scene,

I recall there was a freshly dug hole next to the shed.

There was a can of gas that I remember seeing.

So in my mind, from what I saw, his intention would have been

to kill her, burn her, bury her, and try to obliterate

or destroy any evidence.

Those things kind of burn into your memory.

They're kind of seared in your mind, just like the name,

like Shaun Cleary.

He met Cynthia a year after he got out of prison.

He was lying about just being in the military.

He was really in jail during that period.

For most people, you would think that would give

them an opportunity to reflect, possibly get rehabilitated,

but not Shaun.

He came back out and just settled right back into what

he'd done before.

Picked another girl, another relationship,

and when things didn't go his way, he turned to violence.

With Penny, he did tell her that if he had had a gun,

it would have been much easier.

It would appear that he did take his own advice and obtain

a gun to use for the next situation he ran into with

a woman that wanted to break up with him.

After she was shot, Cynthia thought she had died.

And it came to her almost as like a realization that she was

getting onto her feet.

She didn't have a chance with him having a gun

to be able to defend herself.

He pulled the trigger and shot her again in the head.

Amazingly, she was still alive, and it kind of stunned her.

She's in shock. She's upset.

She's trying to get away.

Some people give up.

Cynthia Hartman didn't give up.

But Shaun is larger.

He's stronger. She's injured.

Shaun pressed the gun against her forehead

while she just sat there, begging.

She was bleeding from her head.

It was running down her face into her eyes.

Cynthia told Shaun that she needed to go

to the hospital.

She was afraid that she was going to die from

the gunshot wounds.

Shaun did not take her to the hospital.

Instead, he said, "Put your hands together

as if you're praying."

That's when he duct taped her two hands together.

She was begging him and pleading for her life.

And then he kept telling her to be quiet

and stop talking, stop talking.

And she continued,

even though he was threatening her with a gun.

It's not like a neighborhood or in the suburbs where there's

house after house after house.

Unless you're right there at that property, you might not

hear somebody scream.

And you might not think that much of it if you did.

When Cynthia tried to scream, Shaun began to wrap duct tape

around her head,

starting at the top and working the way down.

So not only is she shot, not only is she bleeding,

not only is she scared beyond belief, but now he's

potentially going to cut off her air supply by wrapping

her head up in duct tape.

Cindy thought that Shaun was trying to suffocate her.

She thought she would suffocate to death.

And immediately, of course, you try and clear the duct tape

off, but her hands were duct taped together,

so that didn't work.

And she could barely take in any air.

She realized that she had to calm her breathing down in

order to survive this.

Once she stopped struggling, he removed the tape from

her face, at least her mouth, where she could breathe.

And then she said, "I bet you'll be quiet now."

If you continue to scream, Cynthia, at least in her mind,

would believe she's committing her own death sentence.

So she stopped.

Shawn left most of the tape on her face, just where she could

breathe but could barely see.

It was hard to distinguish between hours and days.

But it was quite a long time where she just laid on

the floor quietly while Shaun paced through the residence.

She thought she would die from bleeding out.

I can only imagine it felt like you want it to end,

but you don't want to die.

And those are conflicting thoughts when someone's

got you captive.

After a while, Shawn Cleary returned

with some kind of capsules.

Once Shawn walked away, she didn't swallow any of

the capsules because she was unsure what they were.

She spit them out, but some of them actually stuck to the duct

tape that was on her face.

When Shawn returned, he observed the pills that were

attached to the duct tape and asked why

she didn't take it.

Cynthia basically told him that he gave her too many,

that she was unable to swallow.

That upset him, that she did not

take the medication that he gave her.

She laid there for several more hours, just in the darkness,

waiting, trying to figure out what is going on.

Cindy was stronger than Shaun, internally.

Had a lot more willpower, a lot more drive.

And I think that that was part of it, is just thinking this is

up to me to get out, to still be alive, to beat him.

Cindy was in survival mode, just thinking,

how do I get back to my boys?

She was not going to die there in the cabin.

She was not going to let him kill her and be the end

of her story.

Eventually, Shaun Cleary comes in the room,

picks her up, says, "Time to go for a ride."

She had no idea where he was taking her

or what was going on.

They drove only a short distance, and she could discern

kind of where they were.

He said, "Get out of the car," and she's trying to hop

down a hill.

She's falling down.

She realized that due to the incline, she was going

towards the river.

As he is leading her down from the roadway, down

closer to the water, he said, "This all has to end."

And at some point, she decides, I'm not going to

go like a lamb to slaughter.

She's already been assaulted.

She's already been shot, not once, but twice.

But now he's trying to drown her.

That's when she decided to just stop and drop all her weight.

After a few minutes, Shaun said, "You must have a guardian angel

because I'm unable to kill you."

He still loved her. In his own way, he loved her.

It's hard to understand that, but that's the only thing that

makes any sense,

especially if he'd plan to throw her in the water,

because it's a very isolated area.

Nobody would see a thing or hear a thing.

I think that's when it changed in her head, and she's like,

oh, my life is still in my hands.

And she's planning to do something about it.

Cynthia Hartman is able to at least temporarily stall

his plan to kill her, and they end up back

at the cabin.

That point in time, his attitude did change.

Shaun still kept her bound, at her ankles and her wrists.

But he did remove the tape from her face.

She ends up building rapport, sort of winning him

over every now and then.

He started to take care of her.

He was allowing her to eat or drink at this point in time.

And then he would also provide her with Tylenol.

Shaun tried to tend to her wounds and help

clean her up.

She was shot with a .22 short.

So normally, people would use that to shoot like a squirrel

or a rabbit or some small mammal,

which is probably why she didn't die.

And then in other times, his demeanor and disposition

would change to frightening.

It seems as though his anger waxes and wanes, like he can

almost be nice and then he's not,

just very unstable.

That must have been very tormenting for her.

And this goes on not just for minutes or hours, but this goes

on for days.

At different points in time, she would take the rifle

and put it on her body and say, "Do you want me to

"shoot you there?

How about here? How about here?"

These aren't idle threats. She already knows he's violent.

She already knows the trauma that's been done to her.

At any point, her life could end.

I'm sure that would play through your mind

over and over. This is how I'm going to die.

Is anybody going to find me?

Are they going to know how I died?

We had no idea anything was going on.

I hadn't heard from her in a little while.

And I texted her, and I said, "Hey, are you doing OK?

What's going on? I haven't heard from you."

She texted back, and she said, "Yeah, I'm fine."

But it just seemed a little weird because she didn't

elaborate, and she wouldn't reply to any more texts.

And it turned out that that was him.

That was Shaun replying with her phone to my text message.

The way he was manipulating, making her believe at any

moment that she was going to die,

and then prolonging that, it's like if you ever

watched a cat

with a mouse or a shrew, they'll catch it.

The mouse is not likely to escape, but the cat won't

kill it. It'll bat it.

It'll play with it. It'll taunt it.

It'll let it crawl a little ways.

Then it'll drag it back. Shaun is like that cat.

He's just taunting her, keeping her alive,

controlling the situation.

She had to have kept a cool head.

She didn't ever test him.

She always just pleaded and begged.

And I think that's what filled his ego enough to

keep her alive.

She knew what she had to do because of

our abusive childhood. She's been trained

to deal with a person that one minute is very loving and kind,

and the next minute will beat you into submission.

Cindy used those childhood experiences

in order to stay alive.

Shaun Cleary grabbed the gun and placed the barrel against

his chest and ordered Cynthia Hartman to pull the trigger.

Cynthia was scared.

She didn't know if the gun was loaded.

She was afraid this was a trick.

I mean, it didn't kill her, so who's to say

it would kill him?

And she refused to pull the trigger.

At this point, she realized, like, he's either

too much of a coward to do what he wanted to do, or this is

just going to keep going.

Nobody's going to come and save her.

It's not a movie.

She was the one that was going to have to pull through this.

She was the one that was going to have to save herself.

At that point, he's already done so many horrible things.

She's already desperate.

She knew that if she was not going to escape this residence,

he was eventually going to kill her.

He's going to go in to take a shower.

She pleads with him, "Please don't tape my hands up."

So he doesn't restrain her as much as he had before.

She had angled her foot just slightly to where when he taped

her ankles, there was enough gap for her to slide

her foot out.

He threatened her and said, "Don't get rabbit

in your blood," to try to convince her not to run.

And he took the gun with him when he went to the shower.

After five days of torture, it was her moment to get out.

She waited until she heard the shower curtain close

and the water turn on.

She knows as soon as she starts to unlock that deadbolt,

it's going to make that click.

And Shaun's probably gonna hear it.

But at this point, she doesn't have a choice.

She ran out and never looked back.

She runs outside, and she can hear Shaun coming.

There's not a large population in that geographic area during

that time of the year. She has no idea

if somebody will notice her, somebody will help her.

She was good at hiding, especially out in the woods.

She ran to a neighbor's barefoot, and she saw something

that had a tarp over it.

Cynthia Hartman was terrified that Shaun Cleary

was going to find her.

She didn't know if Shaun had the rifle with him.

She just stayed quiet,

and she played the waiting game.

It was just a nightmare, a living nightmare.

And this is far from over.

While Cynthia Hartman was hiding at that neighbor's

house, she could hear two gentlemen talking

inside the cabin,

but she was afraid to make contact with them.

She didn't feel safe at the moment.

Eventually, she could hear Shaun Cleary's car leave

the dirt road that they lived on,

and she knew he was driving the other way.

Cynthia Hartman then made contact with the gentleman that

lives at that residence.

He was able to call 911 to get her some help.

I was about a mile and a half away when the initial

call came in.

Within two or three minutes, I was able to locate

the suspect vehicle and identify the driver as

Shaun Michael Cleary.

Shaun Cleary initially denied all allegations.

And then while I was trying to figure out exactly what was

happening, radio traffic from my 911 dispatcher came in.

He overheard the radio communications,

and he immediately bowed his head.

And then one of the other police officers approached me

during my interview and told me that Cynthia Hartman identified

Shaun Cleary as the person responsible for shooting her.

At that time, Shaun was placed in the back of a patrol car

and taken to jail.

At that point, I began aiding Sergeant Townsend

and securing the scene.

Inside the cabin, I observed there was some blood spatter

on the wall that would be consistent with Ms. Hartman's

statement that she was shot.

We also recovered some pieces of duct tape

that would have presumably been used to restrain Ms. Hartman.

Once we had Shaun Cleary in custody, Cynthia was able to go

to the hospital.

She did have to have further medical treatment.

The bullets were removed.

At least the majority was removed.

Some of the fragments remain in her skull.

Cynthia was quite distraught at the hospital.

She was not sure what was even happening to her.

The next day, I sat down and interviewed Shaun Cleary in

reference to the allegations.

During the interview, I noticed the complete lack of empathy.

I'm not sure why Shaun came clean,

I don't think it's because he felt bad.

I think he just knew that he was caught.

In January of 2014, Shaun Cleary pled "no contest"

to assault with attempt to commit murder.

Cynthia Hartman was able to write down

quite a great impact statement.

She read it at the sentencing.

Cynthia talked about the ways that those days in the cabin

changed her entire life.

Everything from when she could see her own sons to how

she took care of herself.

She had health issues and she had PTSD.

Shaun Cleary was sentenced to between 30 and 65 years,

and he was 32 at the time.

He turned to Cynthia before he left the court and said,

"I'll see you soon."

It's just absolutely sinister.

And all this time,

Shaun is writing her letters from

jail or prison,

and contacting her.

They were crazy ramblings.

He'd go from, "It's not your fault" to,

"I can't believe you made me do that."

And then back to, "It's not even my fault."

It was just someone grasping at straws.

She just wasn't the same person after that.

She was so scared.

I don't think she ever made it out of the cabin.

The fearlessness was gone. The bravery...

was gone.

She was on several different drugs for the pain, and she was

on different antidepressants.

I felt really helpless for her.

It was like everything was against her.

I got a call from my mom, and she could barely get

the words out, said that Cindy's dead.

And I remember feeling completely crushed by

the grief, like it was so difficult that I thought it

could kill me.

The coroner's report was that she died from a lethal mixture

of prescription medications.

I don't necessarily know that it was an accident.

Part of me hopes and wishes and wants it to be an accident,

but part of me knows

that she was tired.

A human can only fight for so long.

100% Shaun Cleary killed my sister.

He didn't kill her physically, he killed her spirit.

And then four years later, she died.

I will make sure that he spends his entire life in prison.

There will be no doubt.

I think he's a very dangerous man that should never see

the light of day on the outside.

He has something wrong with him in his brain that makes him

pure evil.

He took my sister away.

He took my best friend.

She was witty.

She was fun, but mostly I just really miss her.

Every day I think about her.

It was just my sister, you know?

I couldn't believe it for years.

It still doesn't feel right.

I'm very proud of her,

but I just wish she were here to tell her that.