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Crime and Justice With Ashleigh Banfield

Caught on Camera; Beyond Reasonable Doubt; Terrifying Murder; Twisted Double Murder; CNN Heroes

Aired July 06, 2017 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEAN CASAREZ, GUEST HOST (voice-over): The hostility between two feuding neighbors...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (EXPLETIVE DELETED)

CASAREZ: ... ramped up when one pulls out a gun.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I see you got the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) out.

CASAREZ: But both of these guys were packing. Why the neighbor who fired first won`t be charged.

Four children and their father found dead, all stabbed to death.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We don`t know the exact motivations for the crime.

CASAREZ: A fifth child injured.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were all shocked.

CASAREZ: But police say the accused killer...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The suspect we have in custody is the wife/mother.

CASAREZ: ... is the real jaw-dropper.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, she was a good mother.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She began to hack at him and stab him from the back of the seat.

CASAREZ: A teenage girl allegedly stabs an Uber driver to death.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The victim runs to the lobby door and is heard banging and screaming, Help me, help me. I`m going to die.

CASAREZ: Turns out she reportedly stole the murder weapon. Now the victim`s family is suing Walmart.

A family says they finally have justice nearly 10 years after her death. Thomas Randolph (ph) couldn`t escape a guilty verdict in the murder of his

sixth wife and the hitman he hired to kill her.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CASAREZ: Good evening. I`m Jean Casarez, in for Ashleigh Banfield. Thank you so much for joining us. This is PRIMETIME JUSTICE.

You can probably name your neighbors who like to fight or to argue, whether it`s over noise or the lawn or maybe even a fence. Things can get pretty

heated. But a long-running feud in Indiana got violent, with shots being fired, and it was all caught on video. And now police say the man who

opened fire first -- he will not be charged.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELIZABETH CHOI, WISH-TV (voice-over): The video starts with Dean Keller adjusting his side of the fence. Authorities say there`s been an ongoing

dispute between the two over the property line. About 45 seconds later, you see Jeffrey Weigle pull up on a lawn mower. Authorities say he then

shouts insults at Keller.

JEFFREY WEIGLE: Hey (EXPLETIVE DELETED).

(CROSSTALK)

CHOI: You can see Weigle, who rents his portion of the property, adjust the fence. He then shouts more insults, this time meant for Keller`s wife.

WEIGLE: I see you got the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) out.

CHOI: The two sides appear to be taking digs at one another before Weigle takes off on the lawn mower. But just seconds later, he returns. This

time prosecutors say he has a gun. Authorities say he waved it at Keller. Keller then steps to the side and pulls out his own gun.

You can hear at least 10 shots fired, and Weigle drops from the lawn mower. He`d been shot four times in the chest, prosecutors say. And then from the

ground, Weigle fires several more shots. Weigle manages to get up and walks inside his home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: That was Elizabeth Choi from CNN affiliate WISH-TV in Indianapolis.

Brad Cooper is the Johnson County prosecutor. He joins us tonight from Indianapolis. Sir, thank you so much for joining us. This video -- I

mean, it`s amazing that you have it. It really shows things.

Devil`s in the details in all of this, but you have decided that you are not going to charge Dean Keller, who is the one, the neighbor firing the

shots right there, based on self-defense. Just tell me what you saw in that video that makes you decide that this was self-defense on the part of

Dean Keller.

BRAD COOPER, JOHNSON COUNTY PROSECUTOR: Well, Indiana is a state that we call a no-retreat state. So under Indiana law, no one has a duty to

retreat from a situation when these situations come up. Under Indiana law, if a person reasonably believes that he is facing serious bodily injury or

a third person is facing serious bodily injury, they`re allowed to use deadly force to defend themselves.

And in this video, which -- thank heavens we have this video because who knows what the stories would have gone if we did not have the video -- you

can clearly see that Mr. Weigle came up to the fence row, a fence row that he has zero property interest in, started messing with the fence, starting

insulting Mr. Keller next door and insulting Mr. Keller`s wife.

He then leaves the area. And when he sees that Keller is coming back over to see what happened to his fence, he backs up, draws a gun and waves it at

Keller. Keller, upon seeing this gun come out, he then drew his own firearm, and in self-defense fired shots at Weigle. He hit Weigle. Weigle

fired back and did not hit Keller.

[20:05:10]CASAREZ: Right. Now, when he waves the gun -- because the gun is in plain view. You see the gun from the surveillance camera. So

obviously, Dean Keller could see the gun. He doesn`t point it at him, but he waves it. And then he doesn`t drop the gun to the ground, to the grass.

He continues to hold it.

Was that important to you, to show that that gun was still in that man`s hand, and from Keller`s perspective, as a reasonable person, at any moment,

the gun could have fired and killed him?

COOPER: Absolutely. However, the most important part is that Mr. Weigle seemed to be agitated from the beginning. It`s almost like he went down

there to pick a fight with Mr. Keller. And when he came back and you see that gun being drawn, once that deadly weapon is drawn on Mr. Keller, or at

least in his presence, as part of a dispute, there`s a reasonable likelihood that Keller would believe that he was going to be injured or his

wife was going to be injured by that firearm. That`s what...

CASAREZ: Right. Now...

COOPER: Under Indiana law, that`s what gives him the right to use deadly force.

CASAREZ: Now, Weigle was actually shot in the chest four times.

COOPER: Correct.

CASAREZ: He`s in the hospital, critical condition, we understand, clinging to life.

COOPER: Yes.

CASAREZ: But he actually stood up and he walked into the house after he was shot those four times. And he fired his gun, too, but he missed. He

didn`t shoot Dean Keller.

COOPER: Correct. He missed. And if you see that video after he is down on the ground, he is continuing to shoot through the little patch of bushes

that are over there. And you can see where those bullets are going through those bushes and at Keller and at Keller`s house and his wife.

CASAREZ: So why did both men have guns on them? This is next-door neighbors.

COOPER: Because it`s been a 10-year-long, decade-long dispute between the two neighbors.

CASAREZ: And so who`s to fault for that? Because I know there was a 2011 incident, a 2015 incident. The 2011 incident, actually, both men were

arrested on battery charges, we understand.

COOPER: Correct.

CASAREZ: And it was a fight over their dogs?

COOPER: There have been multiple complaints going both directions over the last eight-plus years from dogs, from noise, to -- to threatening with a

knife, to insults hurled at each other. There was one time when they were both arrested and charged with disorderly conduct. That case actually went

to a bench trial, and the judge just really didn`t know what to do because he couldn`t believe either one of them. So he found them both not guilty.

CASAREZ: So I want to ask you about Weigle. He doesn`t own the property, right? Why is he living there? How is he living there?

COOPER: No, he rents from the land owner. He pays $300 a month in rent to rent a room there, and he stays there. He has no property interest in that

fence row. That fence, that little, tiny five-inch piece of fence, has just become the center of their contention, and that`s what they seem to

base their animosity towards each other on, that little piece of fence row.

CASAREZ: So he rents -- this is no way to live, by the way, no way to live at all. So he rents a room from this woman -- and I`m talking about

Weigle, the man you`re seeing right there, who was shot four times, we now know determined to be in self-defense. Where did he get the gun? The

owner of the home says it was her gun.

COOPER: Right. And she also says that he did not have permission to take her gun. So some time that day, when that day began, he went up there and

without permission, in essence, stole her gun, put it in his pocket and then commenced to go down to the fence row, mess with the fence, insult

Keller, insult Keller`s wife, drives away when he sees Keller going up to the fence, comes back and pulls the gun out. It`s almost like he set out

early in the day to do exactly what happened.

CASAREZ: And when he gets out of the hospital, assuming he survives, you may have some charges against him? What would they be?

COOPER: Potentially. Potentially criminal recklessness with a deadly weapon.

CASAREZ: Right. Waving the gun.

COOPER: Because he certainly -- well, waving the gun and bringing a gun into that situation, which should reasonably expect someone to cause

gunfire from a neighbor that you know to be armed.

CASAREZ: Wow. Unbelievable.

COOPER: And I should say that -- I was going to say, I should say that with -- our decision to not charge Keller -- by that, we are -- I do not

mean to condone the behavior of these two men over the last eight to ten years. They both have acted childishly.

[20:10:00]CASAREZ: Unbelievable. I mean, unbelievable! And we do know that Keller`s parents live next door to him. So you`ve got three homes in

a row. You`ve got Keller, you`ve got his parents, he`s got his wife. And then you`ve got Weigle, who doesn`t have any ownership at all.

I don`t understand how the landlord -- why that woman continues to rent the room to him with all this going on because at some point, she`s going to be

charged probably in a civil complaint, probably here and now, right? And just not worth it.

COOPER: Very possible.

CASAREZ: I want to go to our lawyers. Joining us in New York, Caroline Polisi, and from Los Angeles, Austin Dove. Caroline, what do you make of

all this?

CAROLINE POLISI, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, Mr. Cooper is exactly right, Jean. In any self-defense analysis, you`re going to want to look at a

proportionality increase. So the question is whether or not the perceived threat was tantamount, was equal in response to the harm inflicted.

And I think in this instance, you have to look at both a subjective and an objective analysis here. Objectively, the law is on Mr. Keller`s side. If

somebody brandishes a weapon at you from across the lawn and yelling expletives at you, certainly, you`re going to fear for your life.

I think the wrinkle here could be perhaps a subjective analysis here. If you take a look really closely at the video, you`ll see that Mr. Keller is

pretty calm, cool and collected, and that he continues to fire round after round of shots even after the threat seems to be mitigated.

So the question is whether or not the better tactic would have been to retreat in this situation. Now, Mr. Cooper also noted that the law in this

jurisdiction is a stand your ground law, meaning there is no duty to retreat. So I think he`s perfectly right in deciding not to bring charges

here. Mr. Keller had every right to do what he did.

CASAREZ: And you know, Caroline, I had mentioned that the parents actually live next door, his parents.

POLISI: Right.

CASAREZ: They actually spoke out. They have a reaction to this, too. Let`s listen to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JERRY KELLER, FATHER: Even though he perpetrated it, I mean, still, it`s - - you know, it was hard on my son, hard on the family.

JACKIE KELLER, MOTHER: I`m glad he defended himself. I would hate to think that he and his wife were laying out on the ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: And Austin Dove, that`s exactly right because if he actually -- if he didn`t have a gun, Keller, he might be dead tonight.

AUSTIN DOVE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Yes, that`s absolutely true. I mean, this -- you have to look at, as my colleague points out, kind of the subjective

and objective. You`ve got a fireman (ph) there. He`s been trained in how to deal with crises and situations. He`s going into a -- you know, just

basically a neighborly kind of conversation. It looks like Mr. Weigle immediately escalated things by wanting this further banter, you know,

making insulting remarks, and then being the first one to brandish a weapon.

It could have been the case that in just a moment, Weigle could have turned that gun on Keller and Keller would have had a split second to respond. So

if you kind of weigh all that and consider just the circumstances, the state that they`re in, it`s unlikely they could ever make this case, as I`m

sure Mr. Cooper thought about, in front of a jury.

CASAREZ: All right. Want to thank everyone for joining us. It`s just a horrible situation, a lot of lessons to learn from this. But at this

point, self-defense does live, and when you`re presented with a gun that`s being waved in front of your face, you have that right, at least in Indiana

and many other states, to shoot to kill.

All right. A shocking discovery at a suburban Atlanta home, five family members found stabbed to death, four young children and their father. Now

their mother, his wife, this lady -- she`s in custody, and she`s charged with their murders.

And police make a disturbing discovery in their investigation into a woman last seen on her husband`s boat in Lake Erie. He claims he doesn`t know

how she fell off the boat, but police say she was tied up and she was shot in the head.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:18:06]CASAREZ: A horrific story developing tonight in the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia, four children, all under the age of 10 and their father,

found dead in their home. Police say they were stabbed to death. Miraculously, another child, a little girl also stabbed -- she survived the

attack and she`s in the hospital tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CORPORAL MICHELE PIHERA, GWINNETT COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT: When our officers were able to make entry into the home, that`s when they found an

adult male and four children deceased inside. Fortunately, they were able to find one child, an additional child, who was suffering from very serious

injuries, and that child was taken out and taken to a local hospital, where he or she is being treated for their serious injuries.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: As for who did it, police say amazingly, so quickly, they say they didn`t have to look too far. They have charged the children`s mother,

the wife of the adult victim, Isabel Martinez, with five counts of murder. And police, family and neighbors -- they just have one question, and it`s a

simple one, but it`s a serious one -- why?

Tina Douglas is an anchor and reporter for Newsradio 106.7. She joins us tonight from Atlanta. This happened this morning.

TINA DOUGLAS, NEWSRADIO 106.7: Yes.

CASAREZ: It was just before 5:00 AM, 4:47 AM, that police get a 911 call from a home 30 miles away from Atlanta. What do we know was said in that

call, and who do we believe made it?

DOUGLAS: Well, right now, it appears as though the mother made the call. Someone from the home or either the daughter who did survive and is

recovering right now made the call that there was a stabbing reported at the home. And so when officers arrived there, they began to find the

victims in the home.

CASAREZ: And Tina, we have just learned the names. They`ve just been publicly released.

DOUGLAS: Yes.

CASAREZ: So we want to let you know. Martin Romero, 33 years old -- this would be the husband, a very young man -- Axel, 2 years old, Dillan, 4

years old, Dacota, 7 years old and Isabela, 10 years old.

[20:20:12]DOUGLAS: Right.

CASAREZ: Tina, what is the timeline? When was the last time that anyone spoke with a member of that family?

DOUGLAS: That is unclear. A neighbor did report, though, that the family had just returned from a vacation and that Mrs. Martinez had been acting

strangely. They said she was hallucinating and not acting herself. And there was some concern about her behavior, especially recently, within the

last few days.

CASAREZ: You know, Tina, what we`ve learned, "The Atlanta Journal- Constitution" is actually reporting that yesterday, a man at the scene said that he was the brother of the father, who we now know is Martin, and that

he had spoken to his brother at 2:30 in the afternoon yesterday -- 2:30. And then about an hour-and-a-half later, 4:00 o`clock, someone came to the

door. And usually the kids are there. They knock on the door and the kids come out to play. And they knocked and they knocked and they knocked, and

nobody came to that door.

So police are saying that these bodies could have been there, the killing could have been done after 2:30 yesterday afternoon. So we have a timeline

here, Tina, that`s a little uncertain, but she could have been in that home, if she did this, with those bodies for hours.

DOUGLAS: That`s very likely. And right now, investigators are trying to piece all of the puzzle together as to when this started, when it ended,

who made the call, why this happened. And I`m sure they`re trying to get an opportunity to talk with the surviving daughter, who is 9 years old --

her name is Diana Romero -- and find out from her, if they can, when this happened and what may have precipitated it all.

CASAREZ: That`s a really good point. You do have a survivor. You have a surviving victim. One more question. The family had recently moved.

DOUGLAS: Right.

CASAREZ: Outside of Atlanta.

DOUGLAS: Right.

CASAREZ: Where did they move from and why?

DOUGLAS: That is unclear. Neighbors say that they had only lived in the neighborhood three or four months, and from what we understand, Isabella

Martinez lost her father recently and may have become despondent about that. That`s a possibility, as well as to what may have led to the

carnage.

CASAREZ: Caroline Polisi is joining us from New York. She is a defense lawyer. You know, Caroline, when I first started reading this and I saw

that the 911 call was made shortly before 5:00 AM this morning, I thought, OK, I get it. If it was the mother, she had the knife because everybody

was stabbed to death. And so everybody`s sleeping, and she stabs them one by one.

But now it appears as though it may have happened 12 hours earlier. How do you have a home full of people, including an adult male, her husband, and

you stab them one by one and you continue until you have killed them all?

POLISI: Well, the fact is, forensically speaking, this is likely a slam dunk case for the prosecution. They only have one suspect in custody, and

it`s likely they`re focusing in on the mother. So I don`t think they`re going to have any problem, physically speaking, proving beyond a reasonable

doubt that Mrs. Martinez committed these acts.

The question here will be whether or not she`s going to present an insanity defense. I mean, this case just screams insanity defense. If you`re the

prosecution now, you are going to be wanting to dot your I`s and cross your T`s looking into her background to make sure that you can mount a defense

to that defense so that she then can serve time for these crimes, can really be brought to justice for what she did.

CASAREZ: You know, we`ve got a little bit from the police today. They made a statement when the search warrant was being executed at the home.

Let`s listen to this, see what they say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM HOLLANDSWORTH, THE PATH PROJECT: There`s no indication -- I mean, the kids were great. The kids were great and happy and participated in

programs and were going to school, and as far as we know, everything was good.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: And that is Jim Hollandsworth. He was the executive director, still is, of the Path Project. And he knew the children.

You know, Austin Dove, I think it`s pretty interesting how quickly prosecutors have made a conclusion here because there are many scenarios

that I see here. This mother could say that her husband had the knife and her husband murdered their children, and he turned the knife on her and she

was able to get it and kill him. I mean, we really don`t know why they believe the theory is that she did this.

[20:25:00]DOVE: Yes. At that time (INAUDIBLE) so we`re early in the investigation right now. And so often, we want to draw this conclusion

that we`ve got multiple dead people, all of them stabbed really horrifically. And you`ve got a single person, plus one child sort of, you

know, child surviving, but the wife/mother is the one who seems to be without any injury, so everything points toward her.

But we don`t know the conditions in that household. And since there are not many survivors, this could lend itself to a defense. As maybe far-

reaching as it may sound, the wife could argue that, Listen, I had to take the knife away from my husband. At the end, he was one by one going

through stabbing us all, and I had to react in the timeframe that I had. I was able to get the knife from him and stab him. Or maybe he was already

self-injurious in some fashion.

So there`s that defense certainly made available because of the absence of other witnesses. There`s also the possibility of third parties. We don`t

know that yet. It seems like the police are sort of narrowing things down and they want to say, Hey, look, we`ve got this one suspect. They want to

quell the public fear about other suspects at large, but there are other defenses out there.

And as Caroline points out, it`s going to have to be a very thorough inventory of what`s happening mentally within this lady to find out whether

there`s something that really -- something obviously went greatly awry. It`s so contrary to sort of human nature for anyone to kill their own

child, their own husband in this fashion. So it definitely reeks of some other defense, something going on that really went off in her brain.

CASAREZ: And Tina, I want to ask you, do we know the condition of the one child that survived? She was stabbed, too. She`s in a hospital.

DOUGLAS: She`s in the hospital...

CASAREZ: Do we know how she`s doing?

DOUGLAS: She`s in the hospital recovering. The latest information we have is that she is in serious but stable condition at this hour. That was just

over the last few minutes that we got the update. She`s 9 years old. And you know, once we find out what her condition is and what her prognosis is,

I`m sure she can lend some light as to what happened in that house.

CASAREZ: And this poor little girl is all by herself and all alone because her mother...

DOUGLAS: Right.

CASAREZ: ... is not going to be returning any time soon. And talking about the mother, Isabel, where is she tonight? Has she been charged

already?

DOUGLAS: She has been charged with five counts, I believe, of malice and felony murder, along with aggravated assault. So she is in the Gwinnett

County detention center without bond.

CASAREZ: And let us remind everybody this is a death penalty case potential. The prosecutors will give notice in time if they`re going to

seek the death penalty against this woman. Thank you to everybody.

Bill Cosby -- he`s going to face a jury for the second time in the aggravated indecent assault charges, and we now know when. We`ve got the

date. It was set just a bit ago before this show went on the air. The judge has set November 6th as the day the comedian will return to court.

Cosby`s accused of drugging and assaulting Andrea Constand in 2004. A jury could not reach a unanimous decision in his trial last month, and the judge

declared a mistrial. More than 50 women claimed Cosby sexually assaulted them, some as far back as 1965. Bill Cosby has pleaded not guilty to the

current charges, and he says that every single allegation against him is false.

Police -- they have positively identified the remains of a woman found in Lake Erie as 51-year-old Karen Leclair. They say her ankles were tied

together and a second rope was wrapped around her chest and tied to a boat anchor. They also say there was a single gunshot wound to her head.

Leclair was last seen in early June on her husband`s 50-foot yacht on Lake Erie. Christopher Leclair admitted to police that he was having an affair

when his wife disappeared. He is charged with criminal homicide, and he could be sentenced to death if convicted.

In Kansas City, this man, Jayson Newlun, is in jail accused of sexually assaulting a 1-year-old girl that he was baby-sitting. Her parents were

running to the store while the baby napped and asked Newlun to watch her. The child`s mother allegedly caught him in the act, and her husband

attacked him, punching him repeatedly and hitting him with a dresser drawer. Newlun is being held on $250,000 bond and could be sentenced to 10

years in prison if convicted.

In Georgia tonight, the man and woman caught on camera allegedly beating a restaurant owner and her daughter because their food was cold are now

behind bars. We showed you this video of the attack last week, and the owner of the restaurant is thankful they now have been found.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think the main reason it went as viral as it did was when he hit her. I know -- and thank God we had the video because

otherwise, we wouldn`t have been able to find out who they were or track them down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: Police say Nathaniel Eric Smith and Latasha Smith -- they both turned themselves in and they`re facing charges of battery and child

cruelty.

This Sunday, the HLN original series "Beyond Reasonable Doubt" takes a closer look at a 1995 murder mystery in Las Vegas after charred bones and a

skull with five bullet holes were found inside a burnt antique trunk in the Nevada desert.

Investigators had to determine who the victim and who the killer were. And despite the full arsenal of cutting-edge forensic tools at investigators`

fingertips, it was a method first developed in the era of Sherlock Holmes that helped convict the murder.

(START VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Guns and drugs and sex and everything that people really want to sink their teeth into like some Hollywood movie. This case had it

all. We received a call, some fishermen were out at the lake, and they found something that scared them. It was a very typical desert scene

outside of Las Vegas. And there was this charred area where someone had built a campfire is what it appeared.

There were the outlines and the remains of a humpback trunk, an antique- type trunk. And then as we look closer into this pit of burnt debris, we also saw small human remains. Bones, foot bones, finger bones. And 15 feet

away was a perfectly intact human skull. And in fact, we could see bullet holes on the skull.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: Wow. "Beyond Reasonable Doubt: Murder in Vegas" airs Sunday at 8:00 p.m. eastern.

An Uber driver is attacked in his car, stabbed to death with a machete. Now his family is suing Walmart because they say they should have stopped the

suspect from stealing those weapons.

[20:35:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CASAREZ: 34-year-old Grant Nelson, he was doing what millions of Americans do every day, just working really hard to make ends meet, to build a life

for himself, to get ahead. One recent early morning, Nelson was driving for Uber when he picked up 16-year-old Eliza Wasni. He had no idea that she had

just allegedly stolen a knife and a machete from a Walmart store in Skokie, Illinois. Two minutes into the ride, police say she began to hack and stab

him from the backseat.

(START VIDEO CLIP)

MICHELLE CUNNINGHAM, COOK COUNTY ASSISTANT STATE ATTORNEY: She began to hack at him and stab him from the back of the seat. The victim runs to the

lobby door and is heard banging and screaming, help me, help me, I`m going to die.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: Jonah Meadows is the North Shore editor for Patch. He joins us tonight from Chicago. Thank you. Welcome. This is so sad. This girl, all

right, who has now been charged with murder, by the way, Eliza Wasni, she originally takes another Uber to the Walmart, goes in the Walmart, and just

explain to what authorities are saying of what she did when she was in the Walmart.

JONAH MEADOWS, CHICAGO NORTH SHORE EDITOR FOR PATCH: Thanks, Jean. Well, she was seen by both witnesses and allegedly captured on surveillance

cameras stealing and unwrapping a machete and a hunting blade about four inches long and then walking out without being accosted or having any of

the store security ask for a receipt or try to stop her in any way. We are talking here about 3 in the morning.

CASAREZ: And Jonah, I think it`s really important, what you just said is really important, that she took the wrapping off the knife, so she`s just

holding a knife in her hand and she has the machete in the other hand. She paid for the Uber, but she doesn`t pay for this stuff, and she just walks

straight out of Walmart. And I love Walmart. And I know Walmart real well, trust me. And there are people that are positioned near the exit doors of

Walmart to watch people, check their receipts and watch them. They weren`t there? Jonah?

MEADOWS: They were there. Employees of both Allied Security and Monterey Security were contracted by Walmart to watch the door. This is a 24-hour

Walmart. They were the private security who were there before the full-time Walmart loss prevention agents arrive for their morning shift. These are

the private contractors who are there overnight and who allegedly did nothing to stop 16-year-old Ms. Wasni from walking out.

CASAREZ: So Jonah, she picks up Grant Nelson, she calls another Uber, she walks away from Walmart. Grant Nelson, 34 years old, picks her up. Look at

him, look at that picture. And two minutes into the ride, she starts allegedly using the weapons that she had just gotten from Walmart, not paid

for, but sure got it out of the wrapper, and she starts hacking him with the machete and the knife but it`s only on the right side, right, Jonah?

MEADOWS: That`s what prosecutors say in their charges against Ms. Wasni. They say that Nelson got out of the car, but that Wasni tried to steal the

car, at least drive it for a short distance.

CASAREZ: Right. So he gets out. Let`s stop it right there. He`s driving the Uber.

[20:40:00] He is suddenly being stabbed and hit with a machete in his neck, so his neck is just busting open with blood. He stops the car at the condo

complex, he runs out of his Uber, and he starts trying to get help from the condo complex, right?

MEADOWS: That`s right. People in the building heard him screaming for help before police arrived. And when police did arrive, he was able, they say,

to give them a description of the person who stabbed him and he said that it was a girl matching Wasni`s description.

CASAREZ: And meanwhile, she takes the Uber, she tries to drive it as a 16- year-old, doesn`t get too far, then she starts running on foot. Let`s focus back on him again, Grant Nelson, all right. Grant Nelson is lying in the

grass on the side of the condo. Emergency personnel finally arrive. They rush him to the hospital, but he didn`t make it, did he?

MEADOWS: No. He died later that morning.

CASAREZ: Now, his family is suing Walmart. How and why? Civil claim.

MEADOWS: Yeah, they`re suing -- they filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Walmart as well as these private security contractors that I mentioned last

Monday here in Cook County court. And they say that they did not follow their own procedures, Walmart and the contractors, and by allowing Wasni to

walk out without asking for a receipt and they were negligent in their duties.

CASAREZ: Austin Dove, is there any possibility that they will recover under suing Walmart in a civil claim because she got the weapons, unpackaged

them, hold them in her hand allegedly, walks out of Walmart, and does this to Nelson?

AUSTIN DOVE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, it essential would be a tough haul. The reason is this. You got employees there and they also have

responsibilities and limitations on what they can do. They`ve confronted an unusual danger in seeing someone carry off with a large blade, but more

importantly, how does Walmart know that that person`s about to go out and execute people with the simple machete?

It`s an object that can be used for very benign reasons, yard work, other things like that. And that`s fairly common. So it`s not something that`s

really foreseeable for Walmart to be able to say, look, someone is going to take these machetes, which are most often used for legitimate purposes and

then turn this into something that`s going to become a lethal instrument.

CASAREZ: Caroline, I understand the horrificness of being a family member and saying if only Walmart had stopped her.

CAROLINE POLISI, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Right.

CASAREZ: Stopped her from exiting. Does it open the floodgates so everybody and their brother can sue Walmart?

POLISI: No, it absolutely doesn`t. With all due respect, this young lady was not doing yard work at 3:00 a.m. when she walked out of the Walmart

with a huge machete, which by the way she stole, right? So, there are layers upon layers of negligence here that Walmart absolutely should be

held accountable for.

And Mr. Nelson`s family has every right to bring this wrongful death suit. It`s alleging that but for the negligence on the part of Walmart and the

security agencies their family member would still be alive today. I think that`s close enough in time proximity that they absolutely could be held

accountable.

CASAREZ: Wow. It will be interesting, interesting to follow. She of course has been charged with first-degree murder. All right. A twisted double

murder in Las Vegas lands a husband in court accused of killing his sixth wife and the hit man he hired to kill her.

[20:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CASAREZ: A man in Las Vegas says he shot and killed a masked intruder who broke into his home, but he`s the one on trial for murder. Prosecutors say

Thomas Randolph was the mastermind behind the killings claiming he hired a hit man to kill his wife, Sharon, and then shot him to death after he

finished the job. And it didn`t take long, the jury to decide his fate. Eight women and four men deliberated just nine hours over two days before

reaching their decision.

(START VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We, the jury, in the above-entitled case find the defendant, Thomas William Randolph, guilty of conspiracy to commit murder,

guilty of first-degree murder with use of a deadly weapon.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: You heard the jury. Guilty. But one question would remain. Would Thomas Randolph get the death penalty for his crimes? David Ferrara is a

reporter for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He joins us tonight from Las Vegas. This is an amazing case, this one. But, David, I want to just put it

out there. This man was married six times, all right? And it is fact that two of his wives were killed, all right, one with a shot to the head, that

was the second wife.

And this is the sixth wife, was also shot and killed. Two wives died from illness. Don`t have any more information. Two wives are living and said

that he threatened to kill them when they were with him. Of course, he denies all of that. But, David, this is the sixth wife, the last wife. Her

name was Sharon. And what does he say, Thomas Randolph, actually happened to her?

DAVID FERRARA, REPORTER FOR LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL: Well, he says that he dropped her off at home while he was pulling into the garage. She walked

in. She was shot. He walked in.

[20:50:00] He says he saw a shadowy figure, reached in a closet for his gun, bumped into guy in the hallway and then shot him as the guy was

running out of the house, but the police didn`t buy that story at all.

CASAREZ: Right. But it was a masked man and he shot him five times in self- defense because he was in the house, had a gun, and he had just shot his wife. So what did prosecutors -- what was their theory?

FERRARA: Well, the theory is that he set this all up, that he wanted her dead for his life insurance money and he met this man and convinced him to

do the job. And then when he carried out the killing, he didn`t want any witnesses though, he killed the guy himself as he was leaving -- as they

were trying to get out of the house essentially.

CASAREZ: Right. Elimination of a witness. He didn`t trust his own hit man. He thought that he could be implicated so he kills the hit man. Now, the

second wife, he was actually charged with that murder, too? Correct?

FERRARA: That`s correct. He was charged with murder in that case, and then acquitted. His attorneys convinced a jury that she had committed suicide,

but he was also later pled guilty to tampering with a witness in that case, the prosecution`s star witness in the Utah case, for essentially trying to

have him killed, the star witness, who was a guy who said that he wanted his wife in 1986 dead.

CASAREZ: Right. Now, did that Utah case that he was acquitted of but charged with, did that come into this trial as a prior bad act?

FERRARA: Yes. It came in to the guilt phase and the penalty phase here because he was -- because he had pled guilty to the tampering of a witness.

They were allowed to bring that case in during the guilt phase of this trial.

CASAREZ: Caroline Polisi, this is an amazing history of six wives and mysteriously four of the six are dead. Two alive. The jury, we can tell

you, voted unanimously for the death penalty for this man. And so, August 29th, he`ll be formally sentenced to death if the judge agrees with the

jury`s unanimous vote. Your thoughts, Caroline?

POLISI: Well, justice may have been delayed in this case, Jean, but surely it was not denied. This is this man`s M.O., he kills his wives. So, I think

the fact that, you know, he may have gotten away with it the first time, but he certainly hasn`t gotten away with it this time. The jury coming down

really hard here.

We see in capital cases these bifurcated trials, there`s a guilt phase, then a punishment phase. Here a unanimous vote of the jurors decided that

this man deserves the punishment reserved for the worst of the worst in our society and that is the death penalty and he will be brought to justice.

CASAREZ: You know, I want to go back to David Ferrara just for a minute. I want to know a little bit about this man. He lived in Utah, obviously.

That`s where he was charged with killing, murdering his second wife, Nevada. What did he do in life? What was his occupation?

FERRARA: Prosecutors and detectives will tell you that he essentially lived off the proceeds of his dead wives either through life insurance policies

or in the case of his fourth wife, a lawsuit settlement that he had filed against the hospital where she died. He happened to be the only person to

see her, the last person to see her alive in a recovery room at the hospital.

He had shopped around for a doctor and found a guy with some checkered past, got him to do a surgery that she didn`t necessarily need at the time,

and then she died shortly thereafter in recovery.

CASAREZ: Oh, my goodness. It goes on and on and on. And the second wife, you`re right, proceeds $500,000 from insurance, life insurance and he got

that money. So that was enough to live on for a while. All right. Thank you to all of our guests tonight. Before we go, becoming a CNN hero.

It all begins with a nomination. Just taking a few moments to fill out a form. It could turn your hero into a CNN hero and change their life. That`s

what happened for 2013 CNN hero Tawanda Jones. Meet the young woman who nominated her.

(START VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was attending Washington State University. I told one of my professors about the drill team and what it meant to me.

[20:55:00] She told me, like, I think that you should nominate her for CNN heroes.

TAWANDA JONES, CNN HERO: To know that someone in the program nominated me for CNN hero, it means so much more because they were a part of the

struggle, they were a part of those humble beginnings. So that was a tremendous honor. And I wore it with a badge of honor.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: If you know someone in your community who should be a CNN hero, nominate them today at cnnheroes.com. We`ll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CASAREZ: Thank you so much for watching tonight. I`m Jean Casarez. "Beyond Reasonable Doubt: The Atlanta Bombing" begins right now. Goodnight,

everybody.

[21:00:00]

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