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Nancy Grace
California Woman Murders Husband, Takes Kids on Play Date
Aired August 14, 2012 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news tonight, live, upscale gated community, San Diego suburbs. A young stay-at-home mom of three, ages just 8, 6 and 18 months, all three children playing downstairs when they hear a thud upstairs. Mommy then takes all three kids to a spur-of-the-moment play date to a jumpy (ph) house, to a neighbor, to surprise her sister.
Bombshell tonight. After disappearing for hours, Mommy reemerges only when police show up to their two-story dream home to discover the source of that thud that morning. The thud was Daddy, now barricaded in the couple`s bedroom, shot dead and face down on the bedroom floor. Well, so much for that Mommy-and-me play date.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But neighbors say they hadn`t seen them fight.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What was happening in this relationship behind closed doors is very different than what it looked like outside.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If the former real estate broker is convicted of murdering her 39-year-old spouse, she could get half a century or more in state prison.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight, a high-powered computer exec goes for a swim at the beach and drowns, leaving behind a heart-broken wife and children. But tonight, in a stunning twist, is Raymond Roth (ph) alive?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Rescue crews spent days scouring the ocean for any sign of Raymond Roth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dead or alive.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Cleaning out his wife`s bank account.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He emptied out my accounts supposedly (ph) (INAUDIBLE) in the water.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They say Raymond Roth and his son...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The relationship between the two of them was almost like buddy-buddy, not even father-son, but buddy-buddy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But Ivana (ph) Roth says she grew suspicious when she found e-mails on her home computer.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "Hey (ph), number one, I need to get to the bank for cash."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A horrible person, just an abuser in every which way.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He hasn`t come face to face with his family.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She`s just horrified.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us.
Bombshell tonight. Live to an upscale gated community, San Diego suburbs. A young stay-at-home mother of three, the children ages 8, 6 and just 18 months, all three playing downstairs peacefully. They hear a thud upstairs. Mommy then takes all three kids to a spur-of-the-moment play date the neighbor didn`t know about. She goes on to a jumpy (ph) house and then a surprise visit at her own sister`s.
After she then disappears for hours, Mommy reemerges when police show up to their two-story dream house only to discover the source of that thud. It was Daddy, now locked and barricaded into the couple`s bedroom, shot dead, face down on the bedroom floor.
We are live and taking your calls. I want to straight go out to Lynda Martin, morning news anchor with KOGO. So the children hear a thud. Then Mommy takes them out for a long day of Mommy-and-me play date, first I understand to a neighbor for a play date the neighbor didn`t know anything about and couldn`t do. They were kind of sent away. Then to, like, a jumpy house play area, topped off with going to see her sister.
You know, by all accounts, Lynda, this husband was called a "gentle giant." He was a school teacher. He had been a coach of various teams at school. He quit coaching because he wanted to spend more time with his family.
Is that true, Lynda?
LYNDA MARTIN, KOGO RADIO (via telephone): We are hearing that, yes, Nancy, from his family who made a statement. And they were saying that he was spending a lot of time with his kids. And yes, he was called a "gentle giant," apparently about 6-foot-9, according to his former students at Carlsbad High School. But the family said yes, that he really loved his children and that they were so sorry that they were going to not have their dad around.
GRACE: You know, another thing, Lynda, the wife, Julie Harper, the young mom of three -- one is 8, one is 6, one is 18 months -- you know what? She had it pretty good to my understanding.
I mean, let`s take a shot, Dana, of this gorgeous home this woman was living in. She had been a realtor for a while and quit work, to stay home with the children. Two of the children were school age, 6 and 8. They were in school. So she basically all day long would take care of one child and live in this home. The husband paid all the bills, also was heavily involved in raising the children. Then just days before the thud upstairs, she files for divorce.
You know, Lynda Martin, I understand she claims that he was verbally abusive. But according to his family, according to people at school, he was the "gentle giant," that if anyone was abusive in the home, it would not have been him.
MARTIN: Yes, according to her divorce filings, that she said she had verbal abuse, she was shoved and grabbed, but that -- you`re right, that is not all accounts. And others say that he was a very devoted father. And you hear these accounts from his students at the school saying that he was always gentle.
And her defense attorney says, Wait a minute, what happens on the inside of a home is not necessarily what you see on the outside.
GRACE: Well, I know this. I don`t know what else is happening on the inside of that home, but I know he`s dead face down on the bedroom floor.
Out to the lines. Hi, Catherine. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. My question is -- I agree that I think this could be domestic abuse. You go back to the preacher family who his wife shot and killed him because of abuse. And I think what goes on inside a home is totally different (INAUDIBLE) real (ph) world sees from looking in.
And that`s my question. I really feel that this might be a domestic abuse situation and she just felt there was no way out other than to shoot and kill him. As crazy as that sounds, we don`t know what was going on that day in her family.
GRACE: You know, to you, Matt Zarrell, joining us in the field. Matt, I want to talk about whether or not there had ever been any police reports. Had there been any statements by her, who is now, many people believe, to be a killer, the mom of three, Julie Harper, the stay-at-home mom, married to a school teacher.
Had there ever been any police reports filed by her that he was abusive, that he had beaten her or hurt her?
MATT ZARRELL, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER (via telephone): There was no police reports, Nancy, but prosecutors confirm there was one call for verbal disturbance on November 22nd of last year. And Harper`s own attorney says that she had called police last November for help in a domestic altercation. The attorney said police had directed Jason Harper to leave the home until he calmed down, but no indication that there was physical abuse.
GRACE: Back to Lynda Martin, KOGO. What do we know about what was going on inside the home? What do we know about any prior history? I want to talk about that before we get to the dead body. Go ahead.
MARTIN: What we`re hearing from the defense attorney representing her is that the Harper kids told him that the father had been constantly aggressive and loudly screaming at their mother in recent months, and that also, the children had told investigators that she had been sleeping a lot and had been taking a lot of medications and had been crying in the days before.
GRACE: Sleeping a lot, a lot of medications. To Michael Board, WOAI. What can you tell me about her alleged use of Oxycontin?
MICHAEL BOARD, WOAI: Well, yes, Nancy, you`re asking what`s going on inside of this home. I know what`s going on. Julie Harper was stoned out of her mind. Police, according to the police report, found bottles, prescription drug bottles with her name on it for Oxycontin, oxycodone, hydrocodone, Ambien, Valium.
This -- we do know that she was being treated for a form of pain in her joints, some arthritis. But why would you need a whole pharmacy full of drugs to treat arthritis?
GRACE: So you`ve got a father that by all accounts is extremely devoted to his three children. She`s taking care of one child during the day.
What about this excessive weight gain? What about that, Michael Board? Is that because -- let me see that before and after shot, please, Bret (ph). Does that have anything to do with the massive amounts of Oxycontin?
BOARD: Well, you know, I`m not a pharmacist. I don`t know how these drugs work. But I can tell you that if you`re on that many drugs and you`re spending most of your day sleeping, you`re not chasing around a 1- year-old, which keeps you pretty active during the day.
GRACE: OK, you know, Dr. Bethany Marshall, I`m getting all kind of different conflicting reports here. Everyone says he`s a devoted father. He`s working as a school teacher. He gives up coaching. He was trying to make extra money coaching various teams to bring home more money to the home. They`re already living in a dream home. I don`t know how they afforded that, but they`ve got it. They`re not in any financial problems. She`s quit work. She`s staying home with one child. The other two children are in school.
I`m not understanding the scenario. I`m not understanding why she felt she had to shoot him dead.
BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST: Well, there`s only one person who has symptoms in this -- verifiable symptoms, and that`s her, symptoms of prescription drug abuse. And one of the things we know is that opioid abuse does cause paranoid fixations.
Nancy, she may have been extremely personality-disordered, a drug abuser, someone who malingers a pain syndrome in order to get access to drugs. A mother who would take those kinds of medications while caring for a 2-year-old is a mother who is not attached to her baby.
She could have been one of those people who have ragefulness, interpersonal hypersensitivity, everything hurts her feelings and makes her feel deflated, so then she goes on the attack.
And I think what happened is her hatred and paranoid towards him was mounting and mounting. And then at one point, she just went too far. And then she thought, Oh, my God, what did I do? She had to go out, take the kid on these -- kids on these fake play dates so she could think of a story to cover up the crime.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: it`s a sight you dread seeing as a body was rolled out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The mother of three young children fatally shot her husband, Jason, a Carlsbad High School math teacher.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have found a deceased white male adult in his 30s.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They are calling it a homicide.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Julie Harper filed for divorce.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And was trying to get child support from her husband, Jason.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She was upset about her children. She was upset about her health. She was upset about seeing, basically, at this point, her life is in shambles.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s a sight you dread seeing as a body was rolled out and evidence bags were checked in around 8:30.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Harpers` neighbors tell us this is Julie Harper. 10 News has learned the stay-at-home filed for divorce and was trying to get child support from her husband, Jason.
Lieutenant Kelly Cain (ph) of Carlsbad police says the search for her started as a welfare check and took a deadly turn.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls. The children, ages 8, 6 and just 18 months, hear a thud upstairs. Mommy comes down and suddenly takes them on a Mommy-and-me play date day. They go to the neighbors` for an impromptu play date. They go on to a jumpy house play area. They go on to her sister`s home. Then Mommy disappears for a number of hours, only to reemerge when cops come to the scene, their dream home, to find her husband dead upstairs, the so-called "gentle giant" face down, shot dead in the couple`s bedroom.
We are taking your calls. I want to go out to Dr. Bill Manion, medical examiner. Dr. Manion, question. If she`s taking prednisone for some type of joint ailment, whether it`s real or imagined, can prednisone or some type of a cortisone make you swell up? What about Oxycontin and oxycodone? If, like her children says, she`s sleeping all day long, is -- what is that saying to you, Dr. Manion?
DR. BILL MANION, MEDICAL EXAMINER: That`s a sign of depression. And certainly, people on high-dose steroids, their blood glucose is thrown out of whack, their sugar in their blood. It can go real high, it can go real low because of these steroids. And you may feel very good when you have a good rush of sugar. On the other hand, when that sugar crashes, you`re drowsy, you`re sleepy, and then you get depressed. It really can affect your mood long-term.
Now, you mix that with these -- Oxycontin and Ambien and Valium, I mean, you`ve got a whole pharmacy of drugs there that individually can cause problems, and certainly act together to cause even more problems.
That weight gain she has is probably a sign of some type of depression and a need to keep eating to try to give herself some way to feel better, to get sugar or food into her bloodstream.
GRACE: We are taking your calls. I want to go back to Lynda Martin, KOGO. You know, the story that she is painting is very different from what has been painted by friends and co-workers of this guy -- the husband found dead. What do we know about their financial issues? And what was her explanation as to why she shot him?
MARTIN: I don`t know of the explanation of any of that so far. But in terms of their financial situation, what I have heard some reports, is that he was making quite a good salary for a high school math teacher. There was some quote that he was pulling in something like $5,000 a month in his teacher`s salary, and yet she was saying that he was keeping all this money from her. And so far, those are the reports that are coming out, and details on that are still yet to be determined.
GRACE: What do you mean he was keeping money from her?
MARTIN: That`s what she was saying. She was -- in some reports, she was telling investigators that he was hiding money from her, which could be a sign of paranoia. Of course, we`re not sure -- that he was keeping money from her and not allowing her into some accounts.
GRACE: Well, since he was paying all the bills -- he was one paying for this mansion inside this gated community. He was paying for the cars, for everything, she was staying home all day with one child -- what would be wrong with him paying the bills? I`m not understanding where that fits in, Lynda Martin.
The question right now is she is claiming abuse. There`s no sign of any abuse that we can find. There was one verbal confrontation to which police were called. We`re trying to figure out what happened behind these closed doors. Just a few days before the shooting, she files for divorce. But it`s like a real life "War of the Roses" where they stay under one roof. Lynda Martin, go ahead.
MARTIN: Well, you know, I think it will be really telling with what comes out in terms of what the children say since they were there. And you know, they are beginning to speak with investigators about what happened, and we`re hearing little snippets of what happened in terms of when he fell and they heard that thud that you`ve been talking about. But so far, we don`t really know why she did this or what led up to it.
GRACE: OK, well, Michael Board, WOAI? What about grounds of divorce? She files for divorce. He apparently didn`t want a divorce. But they stay under the same roof.
BOARD: You know, it`s very telling that police did not arrest either one of them when they showed up to that house for that domestic abuse call in November.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Julie Harper shot her husband Jason through the heart, then loaded the couple`s three young kids into the family`s minivan and went about her day.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: According to her children, prosecutors say, Julie Harper was sad and cried a lot. She was also taking a lot of prescription drugs.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are taking your calls. Not only this, we find out the bedroom is barricaded so no one can get in. When police get to the home, the whole place is in disarray. It`s cluttered. It`s messy. What is she doing at home all day while he is out working, teaching school and trying to get extra jobs coaching, actually giving one of those extra jobs up to try to spend more time with his three children?
To you, Matt Zarrell. What can you tell me about what became of his wallet? Where was his cell phone? Have they ever been recovered?
ZARRELL: No, Nancy. The cell phone particularly is important because police believe that there was a text message sent from the victim`s cell phone after he was already killed. Apparently, the victim`s brother had called him and left a message at about 10:30 AM that morning. At 11:45 AM that morning, the victim`s cell phone sent a text message back to the brother saying he`s out running errands, "Tell Mom I`ll see her on Friday." But police say he was already dead at that point.
GRACE: OK, that`s putting a whole new light on it. Unleash the lawyers, Kelly Saindon, Anne Bremner, high-profile lawyer out of Seattle, Alex Sanchez, New York.
Alex, here we`ve got her, this woman that wants us to believe she`s a victim of abuse, taking his wallet and his cell phone, and after she shoots him dead in the heart, barricades the bedroom and starts sending out text messages from his phone to throw off police and relatives?
ALEX SANCHEZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, we don`t know that to be an absolute fact. That`s a theory that`s being proposed by...
GRACE: Yes, maybe...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... did it, Alex.
SANCHEZ: But first of all, Nancy, regarding -- regarding this business about public personas -- haven`t we learned that just because somebody has a great public persona, we can learn something very dark about them, like this coach, Jerry Sandusky, all right? So just because he`s known by students and other people in his community...
GRACE: I think you`re right, Alex.
SANCHEZ: ... with (ph) a great person (ph), I have serious questions about that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police trying to find out exactly what happened in this house.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The welfare check took a deadly turn.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have found a deceased male, white male adult.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jason Harper, a geometry teacher and coach.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Known as "the gentle giant."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shot through the heart.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We haven`t recovered the gun that was used in the shooting.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is Julie Harper.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There`s probable cause to believe that she committed the murder.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Harper not only ditched the gun but used her husband`s cell phone to make his family believe he was still alive.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police would not talk about a motive.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That story has yet to be told.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In her statement in support of divorce filed on August 2nd, Julie Harper wrote...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He frequently yells and becomes very aggressive towards me and towards the children.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: But neighbors say they hadn`t seen them fight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What was happening in this relationship behind closed doors is very different than what it looked like outside.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: The former real estate broker is convicted of murdering her 39-year-old spouse, she could get half a century or more in state prison.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: What went wrong? She tells the children downstairs daddy fell. In reality mommy barricades the bedroom and shoots her husband, leaving him there on the floor to die and she leaves to take the children on a full day of mommy and me play dates and fun time.
The reality is, though, to you, Kelly Saindon, former prosecutor, family law attorney, joining us out of Chicago, and the divorce papers she goes to great length to talk about verbal abuse where he yells at her. That`s not going to cut --
KELLY SAINDON, FAMILY LAW ATTORNEY: She does, she`s setting up the defense.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: No, but the thing about it is --
GRACE: Verbal abuse will not cut it for battered woman`s syndrome. Again, I can`t say enough, Kelly. Sticks and stones can break my bones, words can never hurt me. There has to be physical abuse for the battered woman syndrome defense to work.
SAINDON: I don`t know. She believes she`s in fear that self-defense or physical abuse could -- the fear of physical abuse based on his size could be enough. She`s setting this up, she told the kids, daddy fell while he was going through mommy`s stuff. And the thing about it is I am usually on the battered woman`s side. This one is a little more questionable to me.
The idea about barricading the door, that could be her being a good mom so the kids don`t get in and see him dead on the floor.
GRACE: OK, and Kelly, to me, if she didn`t want the children to see him dead on the floor, if she had a justifiable defense she would have kept them downstairs and then called police. Maybe take them over to her sister`s house and called police and say, my husband was beating him, I shot him. Instead of taking him to the (INAUDIBLE) house. All right?
Another thing --
SAINDON: Yes --
GRACE: Instead of disposing of his cell phone and his wallet, as opposed to sending fake text messages on his phone to fake out his relatives, in the divorce papers, I would have expected to see an outline of physical abuse. Because believe me, if she had the bullet, she would have shot him.
In other words, Alex Sanchez, come on, don`t just play defense attorney with me right now, let`s just talk about the truth. I`m not talking about how you could easily persuade a jury, I`m talking about the truth.
Alex Sanchez, in those divorce papers, if she was willing to put in the divorce papers verbal abuse -- you know, a lot of times parents don`t want to put in the divorce papers certain things they don`t want their children to know one day when they go back and they read the papers, all right? But if she was willing to put verbal abuse in the papers, don`t you think, Alex, if there had been physical abuse she would have put that in the divorce papers?
ALEX SANCHEZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I do. But, you know, you say words have very little meaning.
GRACE: I didn`t say that.
SANCHEZ: You know, what the husband six times is telling his wife.
GRACE: I said that`s not going to work with a jury.
SANCHEZ: If a husband is telling his wife at his 6-9, listen, I`m going to kill you, I`m going to put my hands around your neck and choke you until you`re dead. Those might be words but they mean something, Nancy. And I don`t think you know and anybody knows exactly what happens in that room. And I`d like you to tell this audience right now if you can tell us definitively that he was not threatening to kill her in that room.
GRACE: No, I can`t. I can`t.
SANCHEZ: That`s right.
GRACE: In fact, I`m trying to read the tea leaves like everybody else is. But this is what I know, Anne Bremner, I know when you`re a drug addict and you`re on Oxycontin or Oxycodone, your world is distorted, you think things are happening that are not happening, you will do or say anything to get that next hit.
And I know that there were tons of pills there in the home that she hadn`t even consumed yet. That she slept all day, that the house was a wreck, that she was not taking care of the home and the children the way she should have. I know that much. So it makes me wonder about the rest of the story.
Greg -- Greg Kading, hold on. Anne Bremner, let me get your thought on that?
ANNE BREMNER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, how did this happen? How did she get this way? I mean it didn`t happen by accident, something`s happening in her life. So you know, she`s got all these issues going on. She`s depressed, she`s taking drugs, you know, everything`s else, and everything`s clouded, and I agree she probably didn`t put things in about physical abuse but it occurred.
This is all an umbrella on self-defense, potential diminished capacity, and even maybe insanity kind of mental defense. But something led her to this. And she --
GRACE: Boy, you`re cooking up a stew.
BREMNER: And then she had to kill him.
GRACE: Well, what did you just say? Physical abuse, mental abuse, self-defense, mental incapacity, insanity, that`s quite the witch`s brew you`ve got going on there, Anne Bremner.
(CROSSTALK)
BREMNER: That`s right, Nancy.
GRACE: Greg Kading, a former LAPD detective and author of "Murder Rap." Greg, listen to me. I don`t say I`m not siding with her, I`m siding with the truth. I`m trying to determine what the truth is here and I`ve handled a lot of battered women cases for the battered woman. But when I find out there are fake text messages sent, that the cops were not called, that she barricaded him in the bedroom. That she lied all day to neighbors and relatives and people at the Jumpy House that was going on. That is not a battered woman case in my mind.
GREG KADING, FORMER LAPD DETECTIVE, AUTHOR, "MURDER RAP": I certainly agree with you, Nancy, I mean the defense is very weak based on what we know. Obviously they`re going to give that defense to her because it`s all that she has. But everything indicates that this is actually a crime of passion. She probably got into a confrontation, an argument with the husband, she shoots him, freaks out and then tried to decide how to cover it up.
Ultimately she seeks legal advice and the lawyer says hey, I`m going to contact the police and at least lead them to the body. Very compelling.
GRACE: You know what, everyone`s gut reaction is to believe that there was a battered woman`s case going on here. But I want to go below the surface here because I want the truth of what happened. I want to know what happened to Jason Harper.
Everyone, our family album is back, showing your photos. Here are our Salt Lake friends, Grandma Margaret Barr`s family. Judy, Sherry, Vicki and Kimberly, all celebrating Margaret`s 94th birthday this week. Wow.
Share your photos with us, please, at iReport family album. HLNTV.com/Nancysgrace, then click on "Nancy`s Family Album."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Rescue crews spent days scouring the ocean for any sign of Raymond Roth.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Dead or alive?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Cleaning out his wife`s bank account.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The (INAUDIBLE) might help supposedly beeping that this poor man is drowning in the water.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: They say Raymond Roth and his son --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The relationship between the two of them was almost like buddy-buddy. Not even father-son, but buddy-buddy.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: But Ivana Roth says she grew suspicious when she found e-mails on her home computer.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, number one, I need to get to the bank for cash.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A horrible person, just an abuser in every which way.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: He hasn`t come face to face with his family.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s just horrified.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: He goes for a swim at the beach and drowns. But now his wife wonders, is he alive? And there`s more to the story, we are taking your calls, I want to go out to Bonnie Druker on the story.
Bonnie, Raymond Roth, husband, father, goes swimming, he takes off his shoes, his wallet and I believe his Rolex watch, and leaves there on the beach to go for a swim. Never seen again. His wife becomes suspicious. Why would a husband and father just walk out on their life, never to be seen again? How does that happen, Bonnie Druker?
BONNIE DRUKER, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, Nancy, all we can say is money because this guy just vanished off the beach, his son calls 911, Jonathan, 22-year-old kid and says oh, my god, my father is missing, I saw him go into the water up to his chest. Police launch this massive search. Forty people in the water and this guy is nowhere, nowhere, Nancy, to be found.
GRACE: He`s a very successful computer exec, but shortly before this he loses his job. Now many people at first construe that to believe -- to mean that he was depressed, that he had gone into the waters with a rip tide and committed suicide. Others believe he simply went swimming and drowned.
Bethany Marshall, how often do people just walk out on their life never to be seen again? They go to get a loaf of bread and they never come back?
BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST, AUTHOR OF "DEALBREAKERS": Well, rarely. I mean I got three scenarios. This is a man who says he`s going to go to the liquor store to get a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of wine. And never returned home because he hates his wife and children. Or you have someone who`s schizophrenic, or someone who has an amnesiac disorder. I mean those are three scenarios where someone walks out on their life.
I`ve read all the wires, Nancy, this guy does not fit any of those profiles. He`s a computer executive. He is not going to have a mental disorder or a psychiatric disorder. And there was nothing that I read about him, there was some domestic abuse but apparently he was bonded with his son and he`s -- who was still living in the home so there`s no reason for him to just take off and never return.
GRACE: Alex Sanchez, joining out of New York, when you just don`t know in which direction somebody`s gone, you look for a trail, and there is a trail here, a paper trail, a money trail, turns out he triples his life insurance policy just before he goes swimming.
SANCHEZ: You know, Nancy, I`m not understanding something here. According to Bonnie, he`s doing this for money. So he goes out, pretends he`s dead, if he is dead, or if he pretended he`s dead, and is he supposed to, like, become part of the undead and come back and claim the $50,000? That doesn`t make any sense to me.
GRACE: Well, the only theory, the only theory that would work, Kelly Saindon, with that is that he would pop-up somewhere else under a different name.
SANCHEZ: And how would he collect the money?
GRACE: And leave an alternate -- an alternate identity. Through his son, for Pete`s sake. His son.
SANCHEZ: Well, you`re assuming that he`s in cahoots with his son and we don`t know that.
GRACE: Are you Kelly? No, you`re not. Go ahead, Kelly.
SAINDON: I think he is working in cahoots with his son, I think his son knew about it, I think his son probably was coerced to make this lie. He was going to help him cash in. They`re probably going to split the money. And I think dad just didn`t want his life anymore.
GRACE: Right.
SAINDON: I think he just wanted to go somewhere.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Attorney Davis paints a very different picture of Raymond Roth. He says the 47-year-old communications manager was fired and that set off a string of what he calls irrational moves. His attorney says Roth was hit by a car as a child and has had mental health issues ever since.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Crews spent days scouring the ocean.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Roth`s wife believed he had drowned.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I opened the computer and found his e-mails.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Allegedly between father and son.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: In part to collect insurance money. "Do not allow that (EXPLETIVE DELETED) to give the house away."
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: His wife`s saying she`s fearful he might really try to kill her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s a nightmare. It`s just a nightmare.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Prosecutors also say Roth`s 22-year-old son Jonathan conspired with him. He hasn`t come face to face with his family.
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GRACE: Well, I don`t know about that. But everybody, here`s the rest of the story. E-mails have apparently busted the husband who goes missing there in the deep blue sea, his wife thinks he goes swimming and drowned but then she becomes suspicious. Is her husband really alive?
Joining me right now, Bryan Davis. This is the husband Raymond Roth`s lawyer, and Joey Jackson, the defense attorney for his son. His son Jonathan Roth is now accused of helping his own father fake his death and get money. All behind the mom`s back.
According to police she should have been suspicious.
So, bottom line, Bonnie Druker, before I go to the lawyers, what did the e-mails say?
DRUKER: Nancy, it seemed like this was planned out between father and son, Raymond Roth apparently sent the son an e-mail, and said, hey, let me know how this is going. I need to get in touched with you. Also, he gave him a phone number where to call in the state of Florida. So, there is an e-mail trail at this point, Nancy.
GRACE: To Joey Jackson, the defense attorney for Jonathan Roth, I see where your client purportedly writes, don`t let that A-hole give away the house? Who would the A-hole be in this scenario?
JOEY JACKSON, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, I can`t tell you who any A-hole would be, Nancy. I can just tell you that there was quite a relationship between the father and son and it wasn`t a good one and we are going to learn throughout the course of this case about a few things. One thing we will learn about is abuse. Another thing we will learn about is coercion and yet another is manipulation and based upon those things, I think it will become clear the context of the e-mails and why these allegations were leveled against my client and how he got involved to begin with.
GRACE: OK, Joey Jackson, you`ve got a pretty good reputation as a defense attorney throughout your region. And I know that you know the law for coercion. You`ve basically got to have a gun -- a loaded gun at your head, a la Patty Hearst, to say they made me do it.
Brian Davis is with me. He is the attorney for the husband who drowns, Raymond Roth. Brian Davis joining me from Garden City.
You, too, have an excellent reputation as a defense attorney. So, I`m wondering who a jury is going to think is the A-hole in this scenario and I don`t think it`s going to be the unwitting wife and mother waiting at home.
So what about Joey Jackson`s claim, Brian Davis, that your client coerced him and I guess abused him into helping this fake death?
BRIAN DAVID, ATTORNEY FOR RAYMOND ROTH, MAN WHO ALLEGEDLY FAKED HIS OWN DEATH: Well, we don`t see any abuse there. They were described to me by family as being more buddy-buddy than father-son. So I don`t see a claim of duress. And I agree, in New York, for a claim of duress, you almost have to have a gun pointed at his head or holding someone hostage. And that certainly wasn`t the case here.
GRACE: You know, Brian Davis, you may have a pretty good chance, because in this country, in this world, you can disappear. There`s no crime against disappearing. So that won`t be a problem, but trying to fake a death for monetary gain and rip off an insurance company, you know, for get about the angry wife at home, that is a serious crime. What about it, Brian?
DAVIS: Well, Nancy, you know, the angry wife at home, the loss of the job. I heard what your two other commentators said. I think we have a combination here of the first scenario of the person who goes -- you know, to pick up cigarettes at the store and disappears and the second one who does have psychiatric issues.
I mean, there was a car accident when he was very young. He suffered brain damage. And he`s had issues his entire life. And it`s really come to light in the last couple months.
GRACE: Then how did he hold down that nice job as a computer exec?
DAVIS: He held onto it, but there were issues. I mean, remember, how did he lose the job? He got complaints from fellow employees, that`s how he lost the job. Whether they were true or not, I don`t know. I`m not involved in that part of the case.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: A man apparently tries to fake his own death, but gets caught.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Confusion and anger on the part of Ivana Roth who says --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He had increased his life insurance and he had actually withdrawn money from her accounts.
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GRACE: We are taking her calls. He goes for a swim and apparently drowns. Now his attorney, Brian Davis, said that he had mental and emotional problems, that he couldn`t survive, he had brain damage.
Well, this is what I know. I know that he was a high-level computer executive when he apparently faked his own death. I know that just days before, he tripled his insurance policy. I know that his son, represented by Joey Jackson, wrote incriminating e-mails where they colluded together to split the insurance proceeds and that they both now been charged.
I can only wonder how the wife feels about all this, not just her husband trying to fake his own death, according to police, but her own flesh and blood, her son being involved in it, too, e-mails revealing apparently the two talked of her as an A-hole.
You know, when you look at your son growing up over the years or your daughter and then you imagine this scenario, I`m just thinking, Bethany Marshall, of how the mom might feel in all this and they can claim he has all this brain damage all they want to. All I know is he is the one that allegedly had on a Rolex watch that he left on the beach.
He is the one with high-paying job and the fancy house. You know, so he apparently knew enough to attain those things in life, Bethany Marshall.
MARSHALL: Well, what happens when you marry a monster and you give birth to a monster? I mean it`s a double tragedy. The wife is going to have to examine either why she didn`t leave earlier or were there interventions she could make in the son`s life. And in terms of this traumatic brain injury, I mean, the defense is really going to have to take a cold, hard look at what interference this guy really had in his life from this traumatic brain injury because of the job. He got married --
GRACE: Bethany, I disagree.
MARSHALL: He has this son.
GRACE: I think they`re going to have to take a cold, hard look at a guilty plea, all right?
Let`s stop. Hey, and Brian Davis, Joey Jackson, have at it, friends.
Everybody, let`s stop and remember Army Sergeant David Davis, 28, Dalhart, Texas, killed, Afghanistan. Bronze Star, Purple Heart, two Army Achievement medals, loved fishing, his motorcycle, taking his children to Chuck E. Cheese. Leaves behind parents, Bernard and Vicki, brother Roy, widow, Devon, six children.
David Davis, American hero.
Thanks to our guests but especially to you for being with us. Dr. Drew up next.
Everyone, I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp, Eastern. Until then, good night, friend.
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