48 Hours - A Campus Mystery Unraveled
Episode Date: January 11, 2026In early September 2005, 17-year-old Taylor Behl, a Virginia Commonwealth University freshman, disappeared from the Richmond campus. A police investigation eventually uncovered her association with Be...n Fawley, a 38-year-old man who confessed to having sex with Taylor. “48 Hours" correspondent Erin Moriarty reports. This classic "48 Hours" episode last aired on 7/7/2007. Watch all-new episodes of “48 Hours” on Saturdays, and stream on demand on Paramount+. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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Taylor was a very self-confidence, beautiful person.
She just saw all the good and everyone.
She was never really negative to just make sure that you felt comfortable
and that you knew you were loved.
My name is Glenys Keeo and I'm Taylor Beale's best friend.
In the fall of 2005, Taylor was very excited about going
to Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.
I did worry.
She hadn't even turned 18 yet.
18 yet.
And I'm Janet Pelliserra, and I'm Taylor's mother.
I kissed her goodbye, and she got in her car.
And off she went.
She didn't call me that night, which is weird to me.
I was scared.
You know, why isn't she turning up?
Did she run away?
In the initial stages when she was first reported missing,
we didn't have a whole lot to go on.
My name is John Vanuti.
I'm a captain with the Richmond Police Department.
We know that she left the dormitory.
And basically she's gone, her car's gone.
The mystery deepens, a missing Virginia Commonwealth freshman.
17-year-old Taylor Beale seems to have dropped off the face of the earth.
Where would she go? Who would she go with?
She wouldn't skip school. It's the second week of school.
We actually wanted to find out what she did, where she went, who she hung around with,
who her friends were.
One day we were, like, talking, and she was like, I have a secret to tell you.
There was this man, and he showed her like,
and he's showing a lot of attention to me.
I mean, I know it's wrong, but don't tell anyone.
He was a wolf in sheep's clothing.
There was no way to know.
My name is Aaron Craville.
I was a student when Taylor disappeared.
I think that she was just a normal college girl
and got mixed up with the wrong person.
Taylorville is just an interesting girl.
On one hand, you've got this very bright, very,
very bubbly, very personable college student.
And then on the other hand, you have this young lady
that is very amorous and very flirtatious towards older men.
They were saying that Taylor was very into bondage.
I knew that she was not into this weird, creepy sex.
She never would have done any of that.
That wasn't who she was.
About 30 days into the investigation,
Aaron Crable gave us some really significant information
that would wind up busting the case wide open.
This is Taylor.
This is my friend, and I will do what I can.
Searching for secrets.
For 17-year-old Taylor Beale of Vienna, Virginia was sipping cappuccino and listening to live music at her favorite neighborhood coffee shop.
But on Labor Day 2005, having spent the long weekend at home,
All Taylor wanted was to get back to her freshman year of college.
She was so excited.
She had met tons of people and she liked her roommate and her sweetmates.
Virginia Commonwealth University, known as VCU, was only two hours away in Richmond, but
too far away for Taylor's mother, Janet Pellissara.
I was having migraine headaches, panic attacks, just knowing that she wasn't going to be
around. This is the first picture of the two of us. Taylor is Janet's only child.
It was the happiest day in my life and I just squished her every chance I got.
The two were inseparable. When we would go shopping, it was nothing for us to hold hands,
even as a teenager or lock arms or arms around each other. And she had no problem with that.
She was a very kind girl. She was always
concerned about other people.
Matt Beal, Taylor's dad, and Janet divorced when Taylor was almost two.
But they shared a profound love for their daughter.
She didn't have a wide circle of friends, but those that really knew Taylor really liked her.
When I'd say the name Taylor Beale, what first comes to mind?
Her smile, actually.
Taylor's best friend, Glenys Keough.
She would always stand up for her friends and you could turn to her for anything.
Like she would always be there.
So on that Labor Day weekend, no one wanted to see Taylor leave as she headed back to VCU.
And the last memory is giving her a hug and a kiss.
Telling her I loved her.
A few hours later, Taylor arrived here in Richmond at her college dorm.
unpacked, chatted with a few friends, and then called both of her parents to let them know
she was okay. But later that night, Taylor Beale disappeared.
She came in, picked up her keys, and left. And she said she would be back in three hours.
Those were the last words Taylor said to her roommate, Emma Ellsworth. When did you really
become worried about her? The next night, when we realized she had to be.
hadn't been back for a day. Her books were still there. She hadn't gone to any of her classes,
which was odd. Emma notified the VCU campus police who told Janet that both her daughter
and her car were missing. I paced around the house thinking, okay, do I panic? Did you try calling
her on her cell phone? Yes, no answer. VCU police questioned friends and acquaintances. Could Taylor have
simply wandered off.
She was a teenage girl, but she was still a responsible teenage girl.
Taylor's VCU friend, Erin Crable.
She wasn't the kind of person who would just go,
hey, that motorcycle guy looks cool.
I'm going to go drive off down the block with him.
A desperate mother turned to the press to get the story out.
The search for Taylor went nationwide.
Police in Richmond, Virginia, say there's still no sign of a college
freshman.
Somebody had to have seen her. Someone had to have seen her car.
Hope became less and less.
I kept telling everyone around me, you know, it's going to be okay.
She's going to come back alive.
Ten days after Taylor's disappearance, VCU turned the case over to the Richmond Police.
Chief Rodney Monroe organized a task force made up of university, state, and federal investigators.
Task force was mainly created just so that we can handle the volume of information that had to have.
of information that had to be processed.
Let me hit you back.
Richmond Police Captain John Veneutie.
Everyone had one objective and that was for the task force to find Taylor Beale.
Investigator Les Lozier of the Virginia Attorney General's Office feared the worst.
We had no cell phone activity. We had no charge card activity.
None of those things that would show that she's out and about.
Where do you start? You start with your victim.
Everyone your victim knows.
Every place your victim's been, and that's what was our starting point.
Then Folly was one of the last people to have seen Taylor the night she disappeared.
What happened when Taylor came over?
Well, she was upset because she had been dumped online by her official boyfriend.
But when police interviewed the boyfriend, Jacob Cunningham, they learned that he and Taylor had dinner that night and had made up.
We were on good terms. We left holding hands.
Richmond Police Detective Jason Hudson.
Once you talk to Jacob, he's a very nice young man.
We narrowed his timeline to where we felt comfortable
excluding him from any person of interest.
After dinner, Taylor told Jacob she was planning on going skateboarding.
Could you find anybody? She had made plans to go skateboarding.
Not for that night.
Not for that night.
This is the last sighting of Taylor, the night she disappeared.
Captured on campus surveillance video at 10.24 p.m.
This video represents the last time that we know for certain that Taylor was alive.
Twelve excruciating days pass.
And finally, a break.
Taylor's car is found on a quiet residential street, not far from campus.
Did that give you hope?
Yes, it did give me hope.
That she was still alive.
At least we found the car.
Now maybe in that vicinity we may find.
vicinity we may find Taylor.
Good boy. Work hard.
Detective showed us how the bloodhound they called in.
Good boy.
Picked up a scent around the car.
That scent led them to a home five blocks away.
Where did that scent ultimately take you?
It took us to Jesse Schultz.
So who's Jesse Schultz?
Jesse Schultz was pretty much an average young guy.
He wasn't affiliated or enrolled in VCU, but I guess he would go down to the VCU area to meet girls.
Let me ask you something, Jesse.
Do you know Taylor Beale?
Almost two agonizing weeks had passed since the disappearance of Janet Pellasara's 17-year-old daughter, Taylor.
Did someone have her in their basement?
Was she being held hostage?
Whoever has her, just let her walk away.
Just let her go.
Task force members, Les Lozier, Jason Hudson, and John Vanuti worked around the clock searching for clues.
The momentum was just, I mean, it was incredible.
And how would you describe that momentum?
Like a runaway train.
A train coming straight at, 23-year-old Jesse Schultz.
Why would the police who are looking for Taylor Beale come to you?
It had to have stemmed from the dog.
I mean, that's the only way.
Good boy.
A bloodhound led police from Taylor Beale's car to Schultz's relative's house.
Investigators searched the house but came up empty until they asked one last question.
On leaving, they asked Martin Uncle who was the last person to visit here.
They're like, probably our nephew, Jesse.
So detectives brought Jesse in, questioning him for several hours.
Later, they asked him to take a polygraph.
And how did he do on that polygraph?
The results from the polygraph indicated deception.
Frankly, I told him they were effing crazy.
Did you know Taylor Beale?
No.
Had you ever met Taylor Beale?
Not to my knowledge, no.
As days passed, Jesse Schultz's story began to ring true.
true.
Do I think Jesse had anything to do with Taylor's disappearance?
No.
As for the scent, picked up by the Bloodhound?
To this day, it still remains a big question mark.
Just as Jesse Schultz was being cleared, police were taking another look at Ben Folly,
one of the last people to have seen Taylor before she disappeared.
First sticker was on the original bumper.
The original bumper is not there anymore, but the original stickers were the Team GT stickers.
T stickers.
Then Folly was known around campus for his colorful hair and his equally colorful van.
A van so distinctive it was featured on local television.
I've seen it all over Richmond and I think it's very interesting.
I do that to almost all my vehicles.
I've had a 66 Dodge Dark that was...
Folly had been a suspect almost from the very beginning.
His story had lots of holes in it.
He left a gigantic gap in the timeline.
We knew he was affiliated with...
with Taylor so he was he was a good suspect.
Folly first met Taylor in February 2005
when she and her father Matt visited colleges
and checked out the VCU campus. A very different looking Folly
talked with us about the encounter. What was your first impression of Taylor?
A very beautiful very attractive young lady with her dad at the door.
Taylor planned on staying over with a friend
already enrolled at the university.
Folly was the friend's roommate.
We had a lot in common.
We had very similar opinions about things.
We spent the entire time talking about everything.
Taylor's dad Matt spoke with Folly
before leaving Taylor for the night.
Did you have hesitation leaving Taylor with really a stranger?
No, because Taylor was comfortable.
comfortable. He was very friendly, very personal. You know, dressed a little differently,
but appropriately for what you would think you would see on a college campus. What Matt didn't know
was that Ben Folly was no longer a student at VCU. Even more alarming, Folly was 37 years old.
How old did you think he was? Mid-20s at best. And he didn't volunteer that he was much older than that.
No, not at all.
Back home, while still in high school, Taylor continued communicating with Folly by email.
And when she visited the campus again, this time on her own, she again saw Folly.
She liked the fact that I respected her opinion and that I didn't treat her like a child.
Folly, an amateur photographer, took this series of pictures during one of Taylor's visits.
Mostly it was just him shying her with attention.
She never thought of him seriously.
It was never I want to date him.
It was more like intriguing.
But at one point, Taylor shared with her best friend,
Glennis Keough, that she and Folly had been intimate.
It was a one-night thing.
She didn't regret it, but she didn't want to do it again.
Erin Crable, another of Taylor's VCU friends,
understands how Taylor could be drawn to Folly.
The 24-year-old once dated him.
What attracted you to him?
you to him.
You were the only person in the world.
All of his attention was on you.
And he had all these crazy stories.
He would steal cars and break the law, but he was reformed.
He was your bad boy.
He was the ex-bad boy.
But Aaron ended her relationship with Folly almost as soon as it began.
He became very jealous.
And then the thing that caused me to end it was
he broke into my apartment in the middle of the night.
With what Aaron says were evil intentions.
What was actually in Ben's hands?
What did Ben have?
Mace and a hammer.
I felt like I don't know what this man is capable of.
Neither did task force detectives who continued questioning folly about Taylor's disappearance.
As they delved deeper into his past, they discovered a disturbing pattern.
We found that there were other young girls who had been in contact with him over the years
and had been assaulted or had been threatened or felt threatened by him.
In fact, Folly was convicted of assaulting one former girlfriend in 2003.
At that point in time, for all of us, you know, Folly's starting to look like he's the guy.
But the task force needed evidence linking Ben Folly to Taylor's disappearance.
Under questioning, the only thing Folly would admit to was having sex with Taylor.
But Taylor was a minor, and that violation gave detectives what they needed to search Folley's apartment.
What they found here disturbed even the most experienced investigators.
A massive amount of child pornography.
And when you say child pornography, how graphic was?
Extremely graphic.
These are images, movie images of children as young as three and four being breached.
brutally raped.
None of the pornography that was in that apartment was mine.
Folly claimed it had been left behind by the previous tenant.
Still, possessing child pornography is a felony.
Open the door, Ben!
The police immediately arrested him.
That was the vehicle that was used to put Ben Fawley in jail so that we would have the time to find Taylor and eventually put all the pieces together.
together.
But the search of Folly's computers
yielded an unusual
clue that led investigators
to an unlikely crime
solver.
Whoa, I just got chills.
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Ben Folly, now 38, was in jail under arrest for the child pornography police had found
on one of his six computers.
That was really only in the beginning.
For Detective Jeffrey Dean, revelations about Folly began with the sheer volume of data
he'd stored away.
It was just an amazing amount of material.
One computer had, I believe, five hard drives in it.
In an endless variety of random photos, abandoned buildings,
secluded locations, maps and weapons, the truly bizarre,
along with photos of Taylor, investigators sensed a jigsaw puzzle of evidence.
The job is to put the puzzle together.
Ben Folly was now a prime suspect in the disappearance of Taylor Beale,
and police were looking for someone who could link the talented student
to the temperamental college dropout.
Aaron Crable would be that someone.
Taylor's missing, and I know Ben, and I know Taylor, and I want to talk about it.
Erin, as a one-time girlfriend of Follies, soon figured out
just what the police were beginning to conclude.
I realized they were looking for someone who was dead. They weren't looking for live Taylor anymore
And then they started showing me photographs that had been pulled off his computer and they said do you recognize
This one the one that you've got in your hands? So when they showed you this and it says home sweet home? What was your reaction when you saw this picture?
I said oh, that's right next to my parents house and how did the detectives react when you said that?
They said oh, I just got chills and I
got goosebumps and she said, that place is going to be important.
We need to go there.
After Erin Crable told two VCU cops how she had once taken Ben Folly to this house
in the photo, it was pure police instinct that led them to rural Virginia's Matthews County,
90 miles from Virginia Commonwealth University.
Still, Aaron wasn't sure what, if anything, police would find.
I'm thinking, God, I feel so bad.
I'm wasting their time.
They could be doing other things.
They could be doing something important.
It was a month since Taylor Beale had disappeared.
Aaron Crable led the way.
First officer said, do you smell something?
I said, yeah.
It smelled like the end of something.
The officer saw her before I did.
He said, we found someone.
A shallow grave and with, you know, remains strewn about.
That's pretty much that, that's what it was.
I didn't want to believe that it was her.
I didn't want to think that she was gone
because I knew that if she was dead,
that Ben had killed her.
It was not just the news of her daughter's death
that hit Janet Pellasara so hard.
so hard, but how Taylor died.
For him to leave her in a shallow grave, a ravine,
to be eaten by animals, by insects,
she was a skeleton.
That's what was left to my baby because of him.
I didn't murder anybody, but you know, that's what everyone expects.
what everyone expects me to say.
That's what Ben Folly told the police.
In a rambling statement, he adamantly denied killing Taylor Beale.
But he did admit he was with Taylor the night she died.
It's not like we were hiding.
But that would be virtually the only part of his story.
My concept of time is a little wax.
That would be clear?
No, that was something else.
Or straightforward.
I was very drunk and very high and I don't know why Taylor died.
Folly claims that everything about that evening was consensual.
She asked me to wait for her. I waited for her.
Starting with his picking up Taylor at her college dorm.
Police discovered Folly on the college security videotape
waiting just outside Taylor's dorm at 1021 p.m.
Minutes later is when the same camera captures Taylor leaving.
Folly says they ended up at his apartment.
He started drinking, and she started egging him on.
How much had you been drinking?
It was a bit.
Narcotics?
Yeah.
A daring teenager out for a thrill.
That's how Ben Folly tells the tale.
And he adds, there was much more that Taylor Beale wanted to do.
So they drove her car out towards Madeline.
Matthews County and started to play a different, far deadlier game.
She wanted to try an activity.
What kind of activity?
She was calling it drunk monkey, I think, was the term.
Ultimately, this is how 38-year-old petty thief Ben Folly claims
17-year-old college freshman Taylor Beale died at her own game,
a sex game known as erotic asphyxia.
It's where you pass out during sex.
And she's the one who came up with this idea?
I had never heard of it before.
You had never heard of erotic affixia.
Never.
We only have your word for this.
I'm aware of that.
We only have your word for this.
And I'm aware of that.
And what are you saying that Taylor wanted you to do that night?
She wanted to pass out during sex.
For what purpose?
The ultimate orgasm.
So Folly claims.
at her urging during sex in the back seat of her car,
he tried various ways to restrict Taylor Beale's breathing.
She wanted me to put a bag over her head.
Is that what you did?
We tried that several times.
What do you do with it then?
I held it over her nose and her mouth.
For how long?
I don't know.
And what happened?
At first I thought she was laughing
because we fell off the seat.
We'd fallen off the seat several times this night.
I thought everything was fine and dandy.
Was she talking to you?
But she was passed out, and that's what she wanted.
Then he claims, unable to wake Taylor up, he froze into a stone cold panic.
Why didn't you call for help?
I thought about it.
Did you try calling?
9-1-1-1?
I thought about it.
And why didn't you?
Because by the time I tried to wake her up, what was running through my head was
I'm in some serious
here. I mean, you might
have been able to save her. I might have.
I don't know.
And no one ever will.
Because Ben Folly then claims
he panicked again
that he drove the body of Taylor Beale
back to Richmond,
left her in her car,
went to sleep,
and then a day later
returned to Matthews County,
dug a shallow grave,
and left the once
vibrant girl
by the side of her.
of the road.
By the time her body was discovered, a month later,
it was impossible to tell exactly how Taylor Beale died.
You thought you could get away with it?
I thought I could, yeah.
Ben Folly was charged with first degree murder,
but he may not be the only one who was on trial.
It's almost like you're dealing with two different people
when you talk about Taylor Beale.
One day after what should have been
celebration of Taylor Beale's 18th birthday.
Family and friends were instead mourning Taylor's death.
The service was beautiful and touching, short and sweet,
just like Taylor's life.
On that wet, gray October day,
Janet Pellissarra was filled with grief
and rage for the man believed to have murdered her daughter.
My prayer is
for the courts see fit to give him the death penalty so he may continue his downward spiral
into the depths of hell. But Ben Folly claims that Taylor's death was an accident, the result of a sex
game that went horribly wrong. I definitely did not murder Taylor. Am I the direct cause of
her death I very well could be but am I guilty of murder no prosecutors Jack Gill
and Chris Bullard disagree and this predator descends upon her selects her picks her
out and kills her you know he says the Taylor Beale's death was an accident I
mean isn't it possible it was it's possible a meteor landed on Taylor Beale is it
probable no the evidence shows that Mr.
Foley killed her.
The prosecution's theory?
Folly took Taylor for a drive to a secluded area to have sex.
When Taylor rejected him, an angry Folly strangled her.
It's unlikely to the point of being almost impossible that she was interested in anything
to do with sex or kinky sex with this guy.
Prosecutors point out that in Folly's own statement to police, he admits he flipped
out and told Taylor to shut up.
He says he thinks he put his hand over her mouth and told her to shut up.
That's, I'm angry.
Taylor and I were not mad at each other.
She was not rejecting me.
She was not telling me it was over.
There was nothing for there to be over between us.
Prosecutors also say folly duct tape Taylor's wrists,
not as part of a sex act, but to restrain her.
There was duct tape on the
cuff on the outside of the jacket. Now that's not erotic asphyxiation, bondage, or any
kind of sex and any of the textbooks that I've looked at have. What is that to you? That's
not consensual. Her hands, according to your own statement, were tied behind her back.
I know at one point they were. Isn't that more consistent with an abduction than a sexual?
I did not abduct Taylor. It was two people consenting.
In his statement recorded by police, Folly insists the duct tape was simply part of the game.
She wanted to feel like I was kidnapping her, make her feel like she was being kidnapped, tie her up.
And she said, really tie her up.
Do you think the jury is going to believe that this 17-year-old girl came up with this idea?
I think if people are honest, you don't realize what people are doing until a tragedy like this.
happens. She's a sweet young college girl who was experimenting with sex and
who knows what else and unfortunately it led to her death. Attorneys Chris Collins
and Bill Johnson are defending Ben Folly. How would Taylor Beale have any kind of
knowledge about this bondage or any of these sexual practices? Folly showed her. He
had a computer that was filled with pictures of
young ladies involved in various bondage poses.
And at trial, the defense plans to show that Taylor wasn't a naive college freshman.
Taylor was very aware that these models were involved in the bondage industry.
I think that may have perked her fascination.
It sounds as if in order to save Ben Folly from a long time in prison, you're going to really have to put the blame on Taylor Beale, the victim here.
Not going to put any blame on her, no.
But we're certainly going to incorporate her activity.
And I think that's fair.
Not according to Taylor's best friend and confidant,
Glinnis Keough says the defense theory is simply ridiculous.
I know for a fact that Taylor would have never done that.
She would have never been into bondage.
She was not a sexually experienced person.
Did she ever talk about being interested in bondage?
No, never.
According to a 17-year-old standard, she was approved.
In fact, prosecutor Chris Bullard says he was unable to find any evidence, other than Ben Folley's word, that Taylor had any interest in bondage and risky sex acts.
There's no computer evidence to show that she was visiting websites about erotic asphyxiation.
We're confident that that was not what she was into.
What's more, prosecutors say they can prove that Ben Folley is lying about how Taylor died that night.
by reenacting Folly's story.
Richmond Police showed us what they learned.
I'm Officer Sarah Powell.
I was portraying Taylor Bueel.
Jason McClong with the Richmond Police Department
and I portrayed Ben Fawley.
The two young Richmond police officers
are the same size as Taylor and Folly,
and the car an exact replica.
We did it as accurately as possible
as it was told to me by Ben Folly.
Detective Jason Hudson read from Folly's own statement
as a script.
I was half-fawley.
half on the seat, her head was against the door,
and she was bent sideways.
And this is Folly's voice.
I was looking at the side of her.
Her front was facing the front of the car.
She was on top of me.
Her bottom was right on.
Her hips were right on top of me.
And I remember hooking my arm and her arm.
And grabbing her by the hip and pulling her up under the seat.
Is that hard?
Yeah, pretty hard.
The obvious takeaways, say the officers.
Someone could not get any kind of enjoyment out of this.
Well, I've only been here a few minutes and already half of my body is completely numb.
So I know that any teenage girl wouldn't settle for this too long.
As for Detective Hudson.
Well, it tells you it didn't happen the way that he said it did.
But will this be enough to prove that Folly intended to kill Taylor?
Or, as the defense is counting on, will 12-12
jurors have their own doubts about the victim herself.
A rural jurors expect men to act like gentlemen and they expect young women to
act like ladies. That mindset we believe certainly played into our favor.
And Matthews County is as rural and conservative as it gets.
Jan, you're on 1140 WRVA. It was almost like she was asking for it.
The quiet conservative community of Matthews County, Virginia was bracing for a
sensational trial in the death of Taylor Beale.
For Matthews County, it's huge.
It has no peer.
God knows how many people are going to be there for the trial.
It's a real, real, real, real big event.
Everyone seemed to know about the 17-year-old college
freshman abandoned by the side of a country road.
To think that she was discarded in the woods the same way that you might
throw a piece of paper out of your car window.
It makes me sick.
Janet fears the trial will force her to confront the horror
of what happened to her child.
What scares you the most about this trial coming up?
Hearing lies, but mostly is being exposed to the photos
of Taylor in that ravine.
I don't want to see those pictures.
The trial seems set to begin, when suddenly defense attorneys learned about a startling statement made by Ben Folly from behind bars.
Even from the isolation of his cell, Folly managed to do what he had done all his life.
I am king at putting my foot in my mouth.
In a flip jailhouse conversation with an officer, Folly described his previous statement to police.
as nothing more than a cynical strategy to beat the system.
Leaving the impression his story about erotic asphyxia
was completely made up.
It put his lawyers in a very awkward position.
He went back to his cell and immediately said
to one of the deputies,
it's a big chess game and I just made a huge move.
Let's see what they do.
That's pretty devastating stuff.
And then there was this jail.
House letter penned to an ex-girlfriend.
I can't quote it verbatim, but it simply said that I am the reason why Taylor is dead.
I deserve to be imprisoned.
Prosecutor Chris Buller plans to use that letter against him in court.
People are right.
Something is wrong with me.
All the thoughts of death and killing in my head, and now it's true, I've killed.
The letter, coupled with his description of the proceedings against him as nothing more than a chess game, left Ben Folly with few options.
All rise.
He knew he was in a box.
I'm advised there's an agreement in this case?
That's correct, Judge.
Trapped by his own boastful words, Ben Folly could only manage a whisper as he agreed to a plea deal.
deal. Mr. Fawley, your plea is guilty, is that correct? Yes. Was it your decision?
Yeah. Say it again? You're going to need to speak up. Yes. The deal, second-degree murder,
and the child pornography charges dropped, instead of life in prison, 30 years, which Folley's
lawyers thought was a pretty good deal for him. If this is a big chance,
game did you win or lose it's pretty close to a tie I think I agree I think
things could have gone far worse for mr. Folly I think he may have come out a
little bit better into the stick all things considered mr. Folley before
sentence is formally pronounced is there anything you would like to say no but
Taylor's mother Janet had something to say to her daughter's killer
Later the trial, once he was put away, I thought there would be some relief.
But it hasn't really made a difference.
It's something that you think of every single day of your life.
You really miss her, don't you Matt?
It's just very, very heartbreaking and sad to have to keep going on without her.
without her.
But Janet Pellasara has vowed to keep going.
She's written a book, Love You More.
And this is what she left me when she went off to school.
It says, I love you more.
That special little phrase she and Taylor always
ended their conversations with.
It's about her, about what he took from her.
She was so excited about the future, the list of things
that she wanted to do and who she wanted to be.
And she would have succeeded.
She would have been all those things.
