Evil Lives Here SS15 Episode 8
Evil Lives Here SS15 Episode 8
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:03 Talking about the night that everything happened,
00:08 sometimes it feels like it happened so long ago.
00:12 911 emergency.
00:13 Can you please fire or medical?
00:16 And sometimes it feels like it happened to somebody else.
00:20 [SCREAMING]
00:26 But most days it feels like it just happened yesterday.
00:30 Someone, somebody, please.
00:33 Help us.
00:35 Real evil absolutely exists.
00:39 The worst kind of evil is when it comes from somebody
00:43 you thought you could trust.
00:47 So you're asking me if I think that William is evil.
00:57 I think he's the definition of it.
01:13 I had sustained eight gunshot wounds from an AK-47.
01:18 The areas in which I was shot was two in the right leg,
01:22 upper thigh, two in the left leg, also upper thigh,
01:28 one in the groin area, one in my left arm, upper left arm,
01:38 one in my chest, and one in my right hand.
01:44 I don't think he anticipated that I would survive.
01:52 The loss lives in you like a scream you can't scream.
01:58 All the time.
02:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:04 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:07 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:11 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:14 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:44 I don't need to look at that.
02:45 I've seen that photo enough times
02:51 to where it's ingrained and burned in my memory.
02:55 I think a lot of people might look at the photo
03:00 and say like, oh, yeah, how do you not know that guy's crazy?
03:02 He looks crazy.
03:04 Like, yeah, he's acting crazy.
03:07 That's what he wants you to see.
03:10 That's all part of the manipulation
03:15 that he got very good at.
03:18 It's worked for him in the past.
03:20 It absolutely has worked on me.
03:24 He seemed like he had plans in life and things that he wanted
03:31 and things that he wanted to achieve.
03:34 It paints a picture.
03:36 And I think that was something that he was always
03:39 really good at was showing you what you wanted to see
03:43 and not necessarily who he really was.
03:46 I hate him so much I don't ever want to admit that I cared.
03:53 So I don't like talking about it.
03:54 I don't like acknowledging that there was ever
03:58 a moment in my life that I wanted to be with him.
04:01 [MUSIC PLAYING]
04:04 So back in 2003, I was living in Las Vegas.
04:23 And I was in my early 20s and pursuing a career in tattooing.
04:31 Things were starting to go in a direction
04:34 where I was really starting to make it on my own.
04:37 My roommate at the time had met William out at a party
04:41 and had invited him back to our apartment.
04:46 My initial impression of him when my roommate introduced me
04:49 to him was that he was very good looking.
04:53 It's nice to meet you.
04:54 You too.
04:57 I think a lot of what kind of spurred my interest in him
05:01 in the beginning was, you know, we--
05:03 it did really feel like we had a lot in common.
05:06 He was actually quite artistically talented as well.
05:10 So there was a lot of things to talk about that were familiar
05:14 and easy to talk about.
05:17 I learned really quickly that he was in the Navy.
05:20 He was in Las Vegas visiting family while he was on leave.
05:24 We had a conversation about his application to join the Navy.
05:29 There was a question on the application form that asked,
05:32 why do you want to join the Navy?
05:33 He told me that he wrote, because I want to kill people.
05:37 And he turned that application back over to the recruiter.
05:46 And the recruiter read his answer
05:48 and, you know, kind of looked at him and said,
05:51 well, you joined the wrong branch.
05:53 He kind of played it off like it was a joke.
05:55 Like, well, I didn't know what else to say.
05:57 It seemed funny to him.
06:01 Back then, I just kind of laughed it off,
06:03 despite the fact that it was kind of uncomfortable to hear.
06:08 It didn't feel particularly funny to me.
06:11 But, you know, looking back on it now,
06:14 I know it wasn't a joke.
06:16 I think he meant it.
06:17 I know he meant it.
06:18 I think he meant it.
06:19 I know he meant it.
06:20 I don't think I was necessarily thinking about, you know,
06:42 the real meat of what comes with a marriage.
06:48 When you're 20-something years old, you know,
06:51 I think you've got it in your head
06:53 that I've got complete control of my life.
06:56 I was very naive.
06:59 I was excited that, you know, I had the opportunity
07:02 to see him more often and build this relationship, you know.
07:07 You know, I said, yes.
07:09 I mean, what's the worst that could happen?
07:12 [MUSIC PLAYING]
07:16 It was only really a few weeks, you know,
07:22 after I had gone out and visited him in Jacksonville
07:27 that he calls me up.
07:28 And he was like, hey, I'm on my way back to Vegas.
07:33 I got discharged.
07:34 I was like, well, how did that happen?
07:41 And he said, I told him that I was hallucinating
07:45 and that I had spiders crawling on my arms.
07:48 So I grabbed a razor blade and I cut up my arms, you know,
07:50 so that they would think I was crazy.
07:52 And I remember being, like, shocked,
08:01 like, just absolutely shocked that he
08:04 was able to so effortlessly deceive the military.
08:11 I'll see you soon.
08:13 I think he knew what sounded crazy.
08:19 I think he knew if I play at this character,
08:22 it's so off the wall.
08:23 People are going to think I'm out of my mind.
08:28 And I found out, you know, that it was a routine
08:34 that he was very good at.
08:36 He lied as easily as he told the truth, which
08:39 made him very believable.
08:43 Looking back on all of it now, these extremes
08:47 that he went to, to get out of his commitment to the military
08:50 and to come back and be with me, it's a huge warning sign,
08:55 that degree of obsession.
08:57 [MUSIC PLAYING]
09:00 As soon as he got back, I mean, we
09:09 were just thrown into chaos with his behavior.
09:15 It was literally that very night, you know,
09:17 he got arrested for his first DUI.
09:23 All of a sudden, we're having to help him out of the situation
09:28 that he's put himself in.
09:30 Now he needs to get out of jail.
09:33 You just got back, and now I feel
09:39 like this immense sense of responsibility
09:42 to take care of you, to babysit you.
09:49 And now he's likely not going to have means to travel,
09:53 you know, even to and from work.
09:56 In my head, I kind of convinced myself
09:58 that it might be hard for a couple of months,
09:59 but, you know, eventually he'll get the swing of things.
10:04 We'll find some way of making it work out.
10:07 Come on.
10:09 Let's get you home.
10:09 I hoped that there was some part of him that
10:15 was somewhat capable of being the person that I had originally
10:20 met that seemed so well put together
10:24 and with a lot going for him.
10:27 I think I really desperately wanted other people to see
10:37 what whatever it was that I saw in the beginning.
10:41 [MUSIC PLAYING]
10:44 So one evening, I come home, you know, from work,
10:57 and, you know, I'm made aware of the fact that at some point,
11:03 he had decided that it would be a good idea
11:05 to try and break into an apartment at the complex.
11:10 And he somehow obtained and used a chainsaw
11:19 to try and cut down the door.
11:20 I don't even know how somebody gets it into their head
11:27 that they're--
11:30 maybe that they're going to break in somewhere,
11:32 but to do so with a chainsaw?
11:34 After the arrest, the charges were officially
11:43 malicious destruction of property.
11:47 When he got out and we finally had the opportunity
11:50 to actually talk about what happened,
11:53 it was the same excuse that I had heard like a million times.
11:56 I was [BLEEP] up.
11:58 I was high.
11:59 I was drunk.
12:01 That is not an excuse.
12:03 He was very good at convincing me of that,
12:05 like that it wasn't his fault because he was drunk
12:09 or he was on drugs or because he couldn't remember.
12:14 I needed to be more understanding or empathetic.
12:19 As ridiculous and stupid as the whole scenario was
12:27 and as foreboding as it ended up being,
12:31 I had no reason to think that any kind of incident involving
12:40 a chainsaw was ever going to happen again.
12:54 At the time, I had a cat.
12:57 So on the last trip back to our old apartment,
13:02 my sister had gone back to pick up Monkey, my cat.
13:06 And we went in and she didn't come out.
13:12 And so we're looking around for her and we don't see her.
13:14 And slowly we're starting to realize her stuff isn't here,
13:17 like her litter box, her cat bowl, her toys.
13:22 And we decided, well, we're going
13:23 to make some flyers really quick.
13:25 We'll put them up around the apartment complex.
13:29 We never got a phone call.
13:30 We never heard anything.
13:32 When my cat went missing, it was devastating.
13:38 I loved that cat very much.
13:40 She was-- she was my first best friend when I moved out here.
13:53 Sometime later, in the course of yet another massive argument
14:00 that he and I were in the middle of--
14:02 There's so much wrong in here.
14:05 --in the exchange of saying hurtful, awful things
14:08 to each other, he fires at me.
14:12 I took your cat out into the desert and I shot her.
14:15 And then I went and I grabbed all of her things
14:17 and I threw it in the dumpster.
14:22 And, you know, in the moment, I really
14:26 thought, like, what an awful thing to say to me.
14:29 I didn't believe it.
14:31 Why would you say something like that to me?
14:34 You are sick.
14:35 Like, I really thought that he was
14:39 trying to say something to me that was so cruel and mean
14:43 that he knew would just absolutely break my heart.
14:46 Instead of focusing on, wait, did--
14:51 did you really do this?
14:52 I didn't really become convinced that this
15:02 is what happened to the cat until after everything
15:05 happened.
15:07 That was the sign.
15:08 That moment was a sign that, you know,
15:11 that I had missed of exactly how cruel and heartless
15:15 and monstrous he really was.
15:18 So one evening, I was--
15:27 I was in bed.
15:28 I believe it was around midnight or so.
15:31 And, you know, William had come home
15:34 and pretty much walked straight into the house up the stairs
15:38 and crawled directly into bed.
15:42 And I don't think it was more than really a few moments
15:45 later that I hear a knock at the door.
15:50 So I get up and answer the door.
15:52 And, you know, I'm face to face with a police officer.
15:56 I knew immediately that that officer was-- was there for him.
16:03 They were investigating a break-in at a couple of townhouses
16:09 down from ours.
16:11 He had tried to break into the house
16:13 by shattering the glass door.
16:15 The woman who lived there was, you know,
16:20 a young lady, like, living by herself.
16:22 And I believe she had managed to call the police.
16:24 And that had ultimately scared him off.
16:29 So obviously, they-- they wanted to speak to him.
16:34 He said that he was drunk.
16:39 And he didn't remember what house was ours.
16:43 And he thought it was locked.
16:45 So he just broke the back glass door.
16:49 And I remember thinking, that's ridiculous.
16:54 It never made any sense to me.
16:55 He didn't come home drunk.
17:04 He kind of came into the house almost like running into high.
17:10 And they arrested him and took him right then and there.
17:17 But I knew he was lying.
17:23 But I wasn't there.
17:25 I couldn't prove otherwise.
17:27 I just knew that it wasn't the truth.
17:31 I believe that he knew exactly what he was doing.
17:35 And he went there for a purpose.
17:36 What that purpose was, I couldn't say.
17:40 But I guarantee that it was--
17:45 it was nothing good and likely could have been a lot worse.
17:49 Once I knew that he had been arrested again, I--
17:58 you know, I was done.
17:59 I was-- I was over it.
18:02 It was never going to change.
18:04 I didn't know how long it was going to take.
18:06 But my real intentions were to start
18:10 to prepare myself to leave.
18:12 I started spending more time with my co-workers.
18:26 And during that time, I had met Jonathan Lestel,
18:33 whom we called Kane.
18:36 We all had so much in common with him.
18:38 You know, he grew up kind of a misfit kid
18:42 the same way we all did.
18:44 He loved Halloween.
18:46 Obviously, it's my favorite holiday.
18:50 And before very long, we definitely
18:54 got very personal about the state of our marriages.
18:59 He was very unhappy in his marriage, as was I.
19:03 His situation in his marriage was quite different.
19:06 He did have a young son.
19:09 I would try and be a friend and give him advice.
19:13 And, you know, he would do the same for me.
19:17 At some point, I remember thinking something was up.
19:20 He was a little quiet.
19:23 He looked at me and said, I have something I got to tell you,
19:26 and I don't know how to say it.
19:29 I said, well, if you--
19:32 if you're having a hard time saying it, like,
19:34 we can text it.
19:35 So I texted him.
19:42 And he said, I don't know how to say it.
19:45 So picked up his phone and sent me a text.
19:49 And I picked up my phone, and the text I got from him said,
19:59 I'm in love with you.
20:00 And I remember taking a moment, looking at him and telling him,
20:13 I'm in love with you, too.
20:14 He kind of looked at me with real seriousness and said,
20:24 what are we going to do?
20:28 And we decided together that we knew
20:32 that we needed to tell our significant others that we no
20:38 longer wanted to be in the marriage.
20:40 And that we weren't going to move forward
20:43 with anything between the two of us until we had done so.
20:48 I was going through, like, 100 different scenarios
21:03 and 100 different sentences.
21:05 And I was like, I don't know what to do.
21:06 I don't know what to do.
21:07 I was going through 100 different scenarios
21:09 and 100 different sentences to try and start the conversation.
21:14 As I'm sitting there, he took me completely by surprise
21:20 and turned to me and said, I have something
21:24 that I want to talk to you about.
21:26 And he said to me, you know, I felt for a really long time
21:34 the spark of our marriage has been dwindling.
21:37 I have to say, I am really unhappy.
21:40 And I don't think this is working.
21:47 And I remember nodding my head and saying, OK, I feel the same.
21:51 And at the exact moment that I'm sitting there thinking,
21:55 like, I want out, how do I tell him I want out?
21:58 He tells me he wants out.
22:00 Give me a few days to get my stuff out of the house.
22:03 And it's all yours.
22:06 Our ultimate breakup was just-- it was so easy.
22:13 It was really more of a perfect scenario
22:18 than I could have hoped for.
22:21 And I really had no reason to think
22:23 that he wasn't being sincere.
22:24 [MUSIC PLAYING]
22:28 This is a photo of Kane, which was my favorite photo, in fact.
22:44 He was an amazing friend and an incredible person
22:48 just all around, very gifted, artistic, adventurous,
22:55 talented, very talented.
22:58 People talk about, you know, fairy tale love stories.
23:01 We really were living that.
23:04 Maybe that's why everything was so magical throughout our time
23:08 together, because it was nothing like what I knew.
23:13 It was like I'd known him all my life.
23:16 [MUSIC PLAYING]
23:19 In July of 2008, we found out we were expecting.
23:39 As happy as we were to find out that we were pregnant,
23:44 we were also very nervous, because the reality set in
23:49 was only going to be a matter of a couple of months,
23:53 maybe, before I started to show.
23:56 Not long after finding out, I got a call from William.
24:00 And I picked up the phone, and I said, hello.
24:07 And he said, are you pregnant?
24:11 And I said, yes.
24:12 [MUSIC PLAYING]
24:16 Almost right away, he started harassing and being aggressive
24:23 and just cruel over the phone.
24:28 I will destroy him and everything you build.
24:33 I think one of the things that hurt the absolute worst
24:35 was that it was all he can do to keep from coming down
24:41 and shooting me in the stomach.
24:42 I was very shocked.
24:46 I didn't expect him to really lash out the way that he did.
24:54 You will regret this.
24:55 I really kind of resolved myself to the idea
25:02 that he's just saying these hurtful things to be hurtful.
25:09 I never thought for a second that he was being literal.
25:11 This is a photo of Kane and me.
25:24 This was our first Halloween together.
25:27 We were in the best place.
25:30 We both actually wanted to go as Freddy Krueger.
25:34 Kane had just gotten his divorce granted.
25:40 Everything was moving forward exactly
25:42 how we had intended it to.
25:46 The next step was to start the process for my divorce.
25:52 I was definitely starting to show here.
25:56 This photo was taken just maybe just over 48 hours
26:02 before our whole world changed.
26:06 I had no idea there weren't going to be
26:11 any more photos after this.
26:12 Shortly before Halloween, I get a call from William.
26:22 [PHONE RINGING]
26:25 And it was a very friendly phone call.
26:32 Hey, how are you doing?
26:34 I just wanted to call and wish you a happy Halloween.
26:39 I don't recall being particularly concerned
26:43 with the fact that he was really asking a lot of questions.
26:49 Everything he needed to know to do what he did,
26:55 the information that he needed, he got out of that phone call.
27:01 By the Halloween weekend, I was 18 weeks along.
27:11 The baby had started kicking and had started moving.
27:16 After having dinner and winding down with a movie,
27:18 we decided to go to bed.
27:22 And a few seconds later, we started
27:24 to hear what sounded like power tools in the hallway
27:29 outside of our apartment.
27:31 So we jumped out of bed and went to go investigate.
27:41 We saw a chainsaw coming through the door.
27:48 I remember him telling me to call 911.
27:50 911, emergency.
27:52 Can you please fire or medical?
27:54 And Kane yelled out, who the [BLEEP] is there?
28:00 I didn't know what to do.
28:02 And he came towards me and--
28:21 and as the bullet started coming into our apartment,
28:29 he tried to push me out of the way.
28:35 As I was falling back, I just remember
28:47 feeling like I was being punched all over my body.
28:50 [GUNSHOTS]
28:53 Before hitting the ground.
28:54 The bullet fire just kept coming.
29:04 And then-- and then it was so quiet.
29:16 And I remember laying there with my head to the side
29:28 and smelling what smelled like fireworks.
29:35 Like-- like two dozen fireworks had just
29:41 been let off in our apartment.
29:46 I remember feeling very warm and very tired.
29:57 And I-- I just wanted to close my eyes
30:00 and I wanted to fall asleep.
30:01 Ma'am?
30:06 [GROANING]
30:09 Are you there?
30:12 Hello, ma'am?
30:14 Help.
30:15 Ma'am, I need an address.
30:17 Please give me an address.
30:20 And I realized that I--
30:23 that I had--
30:25 I had called 911 and I didn't know where my phone was.
30:30 But I was--
30:32 I was still on the line.
30:33 Somebody was still on the line.
30:35 So it was all I could do to try calling back out to her,
30:41 letting her know that I was there.
30:44 South Eastern Avenue.
30:46 What, ma'am?
30:48 And she stayed on the phone with me
30:53 until I could hear the sirens making
30:55 their way to our apartment.
30:59 And I remember the paramedics coming in.
31:03 And-- and the whole time, all I could think was, uh--
31:07 they're here.
31:12 Somebody's here.
31:13 We're going to be OK.
31:15 It's OK.
31:16 We're going to be OK.
31:17 And I remember a detective said that witnesses had seen
31:29 a red Honda Civic leaving the parking lot.
31:35 And I knew--
31:36 I knew right then and there.
31:38 I said, like, my God.
31:41 So it's my ex-husband.
31:45 I think I woke up the next morning
32:01 and there was a nurse there.
32:04 And I-- I said, wait, you have to tell me where--
32:15 where my fiance is.
32:20 You would have come in with me.
32:30 And she said, uh-- she said, baby, nobody came up with you.
32:40 It's just you.
32:56 And I knew that meant that Keanu was dead.
33:01 I said, well, then you-- you have to get the doctor
33:07 because I'm pregnant.
33:08 We need to check on the baby.
33:13 I named him Shadow.
33:26 This is the first and only series of sonograms
33:30 that we--
33:32 we got of-- of Shadow.
33:36 I was-- was so excited to bring these photos home and show him
33:41 like I--
33:43 we can actually see the baby.
33:47 I think we were really super proud of what--
33:55 of what we were going to have together.
33:56 The doctor, she was like, don't--
34:11 don't try to get up.
34:12 Don't move.
34:14 I know now that she knew that the baby hadn't made it.
34:23 But I think, um, it was really all she could do for me to--
34:29 to nod her head and-- and bring in the ultrasound machine
34:33 and--
34:34 and show me that it was there.
34:43 But there was no heartbeat.
34:48 And, uh-- just like that, I lost my whole family.
34:56 William murdered my child.
35:00 Waking up to finding out that he was dead,
35:15 uh, to finding out that you were more alone than you've
35:24 ever been in your entire life, I don't think
35:32 that feeling ever really leaves.
35:34 Once they felt that I was healed enough,
35:38 I was going to have to go into a maternity ward.
35:41 And they were going to have to induce labor.
35:43 And--
35:44 So the doctor, um, came in and, uh, told me to start pushing.
36:00 And, uh, it was very quick.
36:03 So when the baby came out, uh, they, uh--
36:11 you know, they let-- they let me hold him.
36:13 And I, uh--
36:20 I remember holding him and, um, you know,
36:27 rolling his little hand between my fingers.
36:29 He was truly perfect.
36:35 And, um, you know, he was-- he was a-- he was a baby.
36:41 And then as soon as I had him, they were taking him away.
36:48 Because he was evidence.
36:54 Our baby was evidence.
37:04 And that was-- that was the last time I got to see him.
37:07 After that, it wasn't over.
37:16 And, uh, I struggle with how to say this.
37:21 But, um, I-- I--
37:24 I pushed out a bullet.
37:25 And I can still feel the exact moment of the metal
37:33 rolling against my thigh.
37:35 That was the bullet that--
37:37 that ultimately killed our child.
37:39 They had charged him with attempted murder, felony
37:53 battery with a deadly weapon, murder, and murder
37:59 of an unborn quick child.
38:02 [MUSIC PLAYING]
38:05 I learned from the detectives what had happened.
38:07 He had obviously come to our home, uh,
38:11 in the middle of our-- of the night.
38:14 And, um, had-- as-- as we knew, um,
38:21 had attempted to, uh, saw through the door
38:24 with the chainsaw.
38:29 Our door handle to--
38:31 to the apartment was-- was shot off.
38:33 And he was firing through the hole of the door handle
38:38 into the apartment, really just, uh,
38:42 just spraying the apartment.
38:45 Everybody agrees that the-- the catalyst was finding
38:48 out that I was pregnant.
38:49 I truly believe that he left there that night thinking
38:55 that he had killed all of us.
38:59 I don't think he anticipated that I would survive
39:04 and that I would be alive to point the finger.
39:08 There is no execution date.
39:27 Until that time, it's-- it's never going to be over.
39:30 And until that time, there's always
39:33 going to be a huge part of me that-- that is angry
39:38 and-- and-- and afraid.
39:39 I don't think that I will ever really have a moment of peace
39:45 with this until I know that he is not breathing
39:48 the same air that I breathe.
39:51 To this day, there's still a lot of lingering scars.
39:54 Some of them are quite visible, and some of them are invisible.
40:02 So you're asking me if I think that William is evil.
40:12 I think he's the definition of it.
40:18 [MUSIC PLAYING]
40:21 My-- my life today, I--
40:30 I can say with all sincerity is--
40:32 it's really beautiful.
40:34 I'm-- I really am very lucky to be where I'm at today,
40:40 to meet somebody that I love, and to be
40:46 married with a family.
40:47 He took everything from me.
40:55 But I got a lot of it back.
41:00 Different, but I'm really happy to be so fortunate, truly.
41:08 [MUSIC PLAYING]
41:11 That's the eyes of evil right there.
41:15 He murdered the two people in the world
41:17 that trusted him the most.
41:19 Knowing that if I'd said something,
41:21 maybe they still would be here.
41:23 That was really hard.
41:26 [SIGHS]
41:27 It was tough.
41:29 (engine revving)