48 Hours - Heartbreak in Williamsport

Episode Date: January 15, 2025

Dr. Richard Illes, a successful heart surgeon, and his wife, Miriam, a stay-at-home mother to their young son, were a prominent couple in their small community of Williamsport, PA. Then, on Jan. 15, 1999, Miriam was fatally shot as she stood in front of her kitchen window. Because Miriam had filed for divorce from her husband, investigators believed Dr. Illes was responsible. “48 Hours" correspondent Susan Spencer reports. This classic "48 Hours" episode last aired on 1/8/2005. Watch all-new episodes of “48 Hours” on Saturdays, and stream on demand on Paramount+.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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with iGaming Ontario. Music Music It was a typical winter night. Cold. Had several inches of snow on the ground from a fresh snowfall the day before. My name is Trooper William Holmes. I was one of the investigators in the Miriam Ellis Homicide.

This particular investigation was probably a little more involved than most of the cases we do. The killer entered this pipe from the other side of the roadway. The rifle that the killer used was altered to fit to a homemade silencer. We had no way of knowing how long he spent here before he had the opportunity to take the shot. A kitchen window was the only window in the residence that did not have the drapes drawn,

and he waited for Miriam to walk in front of the window. There was one shot fired that killed the victim. As he was leaving the scene, he threw the silencer over the fence into the tennis court and left quickly in this direction. He got in his car and took off. My name is Corporal John McDermott. This was probably the longest and most complex case that I've ever been involved in. When I went into the residence, our prime scene people were in the process of photographing evidence.

She was laying on the floor. There was a cordless telephone near her hand. Dr. Rose arrived on the scene. He was told that Mrs. Ellis had been found deceased in the residence. The police asked me who could have hated Miriam. It amazed everybody around the area that somebody who was the wife of a doctor would end up dead. A shot in the dark. a 48-Hours Mystery. Williamsport, Pennsylvania. A small picturesque town

known around the country for the Little League World Series and not much else. Which makes Williamsport a pretty pleasant place to be a cop. We probably average one or two homicides a year somewhere in that area. But into any cop's life, even in Sleepy Williamsport, can come a case so absorbing, became a part of your life, so complex, so difficult, it's just seemed like you never stopped thinking about it, never. It becomes all-consuming. You go home with it every night.

Probably be better off for you to get down that side. Pennsylvania State Trooper William Holmes and Corporal John McDermott... Oh yeah, you could go right down here. ...spent four years trying to solve the murder of 47-year-old Miriam Illes, a woman seemingly without an enemy in the world. You have a picture of Miriam Illes on your bulletin board in your office. It's been there a long time.

Why do you have that there? As a remembrance, basically don't forget. You get personally involved in it. Miriam and her husband, heart surgeon Richard Illes, were once one of Williamsport's most prominent couples. We both came from humble backgrounds. We lived well, don't get me wrong, but we didn't live extravagantly.

What was your impression of their life in Williamsport? Picture perfect to me. Yeah, and always, always on the go. Yeah. They lived, as Dr. Illes's sisters well remember, in a spectacular mansion on a hill. And he was happy? Oh yeah.

He was. You were married in 1991? Yes. Those were pretty happy days? Oh yes, absolutely. We were very prominent and we were embraced by the community very nicely, I think. I was compensated probably more than I was worth, but everything was wonderful here in Williamsport for us.

Dr. Illes had known since childhood that he would be a surgeon. Our mother was very sick and he decided, I think at that point, that he was going to be a great doctor and help people to save lives. And around the area, people are alive today, thanks to Dr. Illes. People like Fred Sortman. Kept me alive. I would be dead by now if it wasn't for him.

He was a hell of a doctor. One of the best. And Tom Tamberelli. I think he saved my father's life. I don't think there's any doubt about that. You know, I love heart surgery. It's challenging, and you save people's lives every day and you're in the middle of very exciting,

very challenging cases all the time. While a resident at St. Louis Medical Center in the early 90s, Dr. Illes met Miriam, who was a surgical assistant. I loved her immediately and I said to him, this is a keeper. That's what I told him. She's a keeper.

What was it about her that made you feel that way? Oh, she's just warm, loving, just everything you'd want a sister-in-law to be. A few years after they married, the Illises had a son, Richie, and moved here to Williamsport, where Miriam worked side by side with her husband in the operating room, running the heart-lung machine. She also was very active in the community volunteering at church at the

symphony by all accounts an exuberant dynamic personality who had no trouble making friends. Mariam just had this ability to capture you and really help you to understand why you should enjoy life. Friends Dottie Bailey and Karen Young say Miriam was very down to earth despite the money and the status. He was making a million dollars. They were one of the wealthiest people in Williamsport. She wasn't the rich doctor's wife?

No. She was not. Miriam drove a green van. Miriam went to the dollar store. You wouldn't think, wow, that's a doctor's wife. In 1996, when Richie was two, Mariam became a stay-at-home mom, quit her job, and never looked back. Her life revolved around family, and her son was her family, and she did everything with him and for him.

God gave us a healthy, beautiful, intelligent child. We were blessed. She was a wonderful mother. I couldn't have hoped for anyone better than her to take care of my son. But Miriam's friends, who say they rarely saw Dr. Illes, had the impression that he was becoming increasingly distant and demanding. Miriam was controlled by her husband. And the marriage, says Leslie Smith, seemed under serious strain. He wanted his dinner at a certain time, he wanted his house,

you know, perfect and if she didn't please him, she paid a price. Her friends say that Dr. Illes' emotional distance made Miriam miserable. In the winter of 1998, she hired a divorce lawyer, Stephen Hurwitz, although she seemed not to really want a divorce. My sense was that she was very much in love with Rich. So I think her initial thought was that I want to do what I can to save my marriage. At the same time, Miriam was growing suspicious.

She had the feeling that her husband was having an affair to save my marriage. At the same time, Miriam was growing suspicious. She had the feeling that her husband was having an affair because she's really highly suspected that something was going on. I don't think Miriam was worried about money. And she and her lawyer soon discovered her suspicions were well founded. The ironic part about it is the person he was involved with was his assistant, who Miriam had in fact hired. Wow, that's sort of a body blow, isn't it?

It was a real blow to Mariam. Catherine Swoyer was Dr. Illes' new assistant. We work so close together and so intimately in very life-threatening situations, and you develop a bond. Their relationship became a scandal at Williamsport Hospital. I remember he came to me in the locker room and he says,

you know, I'm going to tell you something, it's very private. Katie and I have been seeing each other. Heart surgeon Enche Zama was Dr. Illes' partner. And so I says, really? And he says, yeah. So I said, wow, you know, you got to be careful. Don't let too many people know this. But Dr. Illes didn't seem to care who knew. I had a pretty perfect life there for a little while, you know.

I had a girlfriend who I loved and we had a great time. I had a beautiful son who was being taken care of by his mother, who was the best mother in the world. There's no doubt about that. Everyone will tell you that. And I had my freedom. The marriage apparently over, Miriam moved out and took five-year-old Richie with her.

She went from a very secure, together, professional woman to insecure, looking over her back, not sure who her friends were, who her friends weren't. Friends of hers have said that she would have reconciled in a nanosecond, but that you were not interested. I wasn't interested in the beginning, but as time went on, the thoughts occurred in my mind. You don't talk about them, of course, because your girlfriend that you're having a relationship with certainly isn't going to appreciate those thoughts.

This was kind of a mess, wasn't it? It was kind of a mess, wasn't it? It was kind of a mess, yes. A mess neither had a chance to clean up. On the night of January 15, 1999, Miriam Ellis would die. Miriam, it's Susan. Where are you? He was hip-hop's biggest mogul the man who redefined fame

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Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery+. UFO lands in Suffolk and that's official, said the News of thedy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery+. UFO lands in Suffolk and that's official, said the News of the World. But what really happened across two nights in December 1980 when US servicemen saw mysterious lights in the forest near RAF Woodbridge and claimed to have had a close encounter with an actual craft? Encounters, a new podcast available exclusively on Wondery+, takes a deep dive into one of the most famous and still unresolved UFO encounters to ever take place in the UK. Featuring shocking testimony from first-hand witnesses, hosts, journalist, podcaster and UFO researcher Andy McGillin, that's me, and producer Elle Scott take us back to the nights in question and

examine all of the evidence and conflicting theories about take us back to the nights in question and examine all of the evidence and conflicting theories about what was encountered in the middle of a snowy Suffolk forest 40 years ago. Are we alone? Encounters is a podcast which is going to find out. Listen to Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or in Apple podcasts. No one knows what Miriam Illes's life might have held that final weekend. Friends who tried to reach her Saturday tried in vain. Dr. Illes's sisters, Romaine and Sue, had spoken to the doctor. Come here Rudy. What a treat. Dr. Illes' sisters Romaine and Sue had spoken to her only the night before.

That was the first time I talked to her. That was Friday night apparently, the night that someone killed her. Miriam was pleased, Sue says, that Dr. Illes' girlfriend wasn't going to be around for a few days. She says, you know, maybe this is good because she's away and perhaps he's gonna see this is not what he wants. He wants to be back with his family. In their call, Miriam said five-year-old Richie had just left with his father, the two planning to drive down for a weekend visit

with Illes's sisters, who live some three hours south of Williamsport. I picked up Richie an hour late. It was a snowy, icy day. She was a little upset because he was late, saying, you know, he doesn't think I have a life. When on Sunday, Miriam failed to show up to teach Sunday school, worried neighbors checked the house, looked through the kitchen window, and horrified at what they saw called police.

Trooper William Holmes. We had to kick the door in to get into the residence. Miriam was lying on the kitchen floor. There was a cordless phone very close to her as she laid on the floor. She had been shot once through the heart. Within hours of the discovery of his wife's body, Dr. Illes arrived to drop off his son after their weekend out of town. Two policemen came out and I said, what's going on? Is there a robbery here or a burglary?

And they said no. He had no clue, he says, that anything had happened. I said, well, what's going on? And they said, your wife is dead. I said, oh my God, I got emotional. And I said, did she have a heart attack or a stroke? And they said, no, she was shot. The police remember it slightly differently.

Certainly one of his first questions was what evidence was found. And how did you take that? It was interesting to us at that point, that he would ask that question. From here, it's the third house up. But investigators were too busy to think much of it then, because in fact, they were awash in evidence. You can see there's the bullet hole through the glass. Found behind the house, a cigarette butt.

He came up the bank here. What appeared to be a homemade silencer for a rifle. These are the tracks that are leading up to where the shooting took place. And footprints in the snow. The best footprint we've got is right here. Gigantic footprints from a size 14 basketball shoe. But what would turn out to be one of the best clues

was the phone found next to Miriam's body. Records showed her last call Friday evening. She'd been talking to a friend in Montana and the friend distinctly remembered being puzzled when their call abruptly ended. It was exactly 10.37 p.m. I mean, this would make a perfect episode of CSI. District Attorney Michael Dindja says that without that call,

investigators never could have pinpointed the exact time of death. It's my belief that the killer didn't know she was on the phone and was one of the fatal mistakes in this case on the killer's behalf. But knowing when the shot was fired did not tell police who fired it. The initial working theory, a sniper with a daring plan. On the night of the murder, to get to Miriam's residence, the killer came down this embankment through this pipe,

so as not to be seen from the road. Proceeded through the pipe underneath the street. And once he got out of the pipe, he continued in this stream bed towards the rear of the victim's house. He would have came out of the creek bank here. After walking along the back of the tennis court, he would have came down over the bank, crossing the small stream, taking up a position next to this tree, approximately 73 feet to the rear of the victim's house, in which you can see there's a clear view of the kitchen

window. And at that time, he would have fired one shot, pushed directly through the window, and pierced his heart hard. Somebody wanted to marry him dead very badly and took great pains to accomplish that. And that someone, investigators began to think, was none other than Dr. Illes. Oh, I was a suspect absolutely from day one.

On the second day after her murder, there were rumors throughout the town that the district attorney was saying, I know that Dr. Illes did this and I'm going to nail him. Why would I do it? I mean, I didn't have a motive. In fact, investigators saw an excellent motive. I think money had a lot to do with it. The couple hadn't yet begun to split up property. But already a judge had ordered Illes to pay Miriam a whopping $13,000 a month in support. He insists that given his income, that was no big deal.

There's plenty of money to go around. My lifestyle wasn't cramped. He was going to lose in this divorce. He had already't crammed. He was going to lose in this divorce. He had already lost some money. He was going to lose some more. He may lose custody of his son. He didn't like that? No.

All apart, the DA thinks of a much bigger motive. This is a guy that spent his life as a heart surgeon. He was always in control. In this separation, he had lost control of Miriam and of his finances. When the divorce issue became public knowledge, he did not hesitate to express his abhorrence toward his wife. At the hospital, Dr. Zama says, the situation was downright embarrassing.

What exactly was he saying? He would often refer to us as a bitch. How the bitch was making his life miserable. I think that these are great gross exaggerations and some of it's taken out of context. Sure, did I call her names once in a while? Absolutely. And Miriam, you know, blasted me a number of times. It's just what normal people go through when they're getting divorced.

She said, I am afraid for my life. Miriam's friend, Leslie Smith, says there was nothing normal about it. Richard told her that he was going to kill her if she got any money and that he would kill her if she took Richie. And she just looked at me and she said, he means it. But did he really do it? Where was Dr. Illes at exactly 10 37 p.m. that Friday night. Music Music

Music His years as a hunter have taught District Attorney Michael Dindjas a valuable lesson. Having the quarry in sight doesn't necessarily mean it's time to act. You don't just go out and arrest somebody because you think they did it. You have to build a case. You have to build it piece by piece, step by step. Sometimes it takes days. Sometimes it takes years.

And you have to be patient. You gotta wait. But investigators didn't wait to probe Dr. Illes' alibi. He told them he'd been on the road when Miriam was killed, that after picking up Richie at 5, he left for his sister's house downstate around 9.30. Why didn't he leave at 5 o'clock? If you're going to make a trip for several hours with a five-year-old, travel in daylight. He says the roads were bad.

That's just not true. The storm that occurred, occurred the day before. Okay, let's go. Nevertheless, investigators videotaped and timed the route under good and bad weather conditions. Two minutes, 48 seconds. Key was a stop at McDonald's, 35 miles from the crime scene. McDonald's, 2312. Witnesses saw Dr. Illes there, but were vague as to when.

And his story changed. The numbers just don't seem to add up as far as the distance he traveled and the time that it would have taken him to travel. The first time we had talked to him, it was 11 o'clock, after he knew that we knew the time of death being 1037, then he put himself here at 1030. At 1124, cell phone records show Dr. Illes called his sister. He told her the roads were so bad,

he was stopping for the night. And hotel records have him checking in around 1 a.m., some 90 miles from Williamsport. So what is wrong with his account of how he was spending those critical hours? What's wrong with his account is the fact that he was murdering his wife during that time period. One person may know the truth for sure. Richie emerges as

your best alibi witness and yet it took almost two years in fact for him to be interviewed. What was the problem there? The problem there was he was afraid of the police. When Dr. Illes finally did let Richie talk, the boy had little to say and D D.A. Dindjus thinks he knows why. Dr. Illes, because of his position, it would have been easy for him to get access to narcotics or any kind of drug that could be used to put a five-year-old to sleep. But speculation isn't evidence, and the evidence

wasn't adding up to much. Police sent the cigarette butt and three hairs found in the silencer for DNA analysis. But ironically, one of the earliest real leads came from Miriam Illes herself. As do many people during a divorce, she'd made a video inventory of household possessions. Police took special note of Dr. Illes' workshop. He had drill presses, he had saws, he had grinding material, he had all the types of woodworking equipment that would have been necessary to construct this particular silencer. You know a lot about guns, right?

I mean, you have the equipment where you conceivably could have made this silencer. Oh, yeah, I could have made, but I would have made a silencer that was good. That silencer that they found is very amateurish. But armed with a search warrant, police found traces of material to make even an amateurish silencer. We took PVC, acoustical tile, wire, glues, foams. All we knew was they looked similar to the stuff in the silencer.

Police also took their own pictures in Dr. Illes' house, even down to what was on his nightstand. It was a book entitled, they write their own sentences, the FBI handwriting analysis book. We thought it was unusual that he would have that. So we photographed it. Strange book for a doctor, but then this case was strange.

And it got a lot stranger when the anonymous letters began. The first to Illes's attorney proclaimed that the writer, not Dr. Illes, had killed Miriam because she was a racist. It was signed, soldier of equality, soldier of God, soldier of death. This anonymous letter shows up, says, I shot Miriam. I made it look like Dr. Illes did it.

It's postmarked four days after Dr. Illes finds out what we took from his house. It's a huge coincidence. Especially since it was written just as the book on Dr. Illes' nightstand had recommended. It says in there, if you're gonna write an anonymous letter, it should be done in pencil. Unlike ink, you can't track pencil,

and you write in block printing, so it can't be tied to your other type of writing. In May of 1999, four months after the murder, a second letter arrived. This time, the author talked about himself. He puts in there he has advanced degrees, he's fluent in many different languages, that he's gonna be leaving the area soon. And lo and behold, who does this describe? This describes Dr. Illes's

partner, Dr. Zama. You're smiling. Yes. I wasn't smiling then. I was shocked. Did you look at Dr. Zama as a potential suspect? Dr. Zama had an ironclad alibi, had absolutely no motive, and in fact was an extremely good friend of Miriam's. What do you make of these anonymous letters that arrived? I think that it's probably just some nut. No, not a nut, police thought, but someone who was methodically leaving false clues.

In fact, the last anonymous letter arrived with yet another hair stuck in the envelope flap. Search warrants had allowed the police to get a sample of Dr. Illes's DNA, and by now, they had a lot to compare it to. The DNA sample from the cigarette doesn't match the hair in the silencer. None of the hairs in the silencer match each other, and the hair in the anonymous letter comes from somebody else. So we've got five sources of people that supposedly were involved in this crime, and none of them

are Dr. Ellis. It led us to the conclusion that there was clearly a planting of evidence. Then in June of 1999, frustrated investigators finally got a break. I was down here looking for minnows. Fisherman Matt McKay was walking some 40 feet from a road just off the route Dr. Illes drove that night. Well, I didn't notice the gun at first. I had tripped over it and thought it was driftwood.

But I looked down and driftwood doesn't have a scope, so I took a second look and it looked like a rifle. A loaded rifle with a sawed-off barrel and stock. When we went back to the silencer that had been left at the scene, when you slide the silencer over this gun, it not only fits, it locks on. There's no doubt this is the murder weapon. A rare Savage 23D rifle, its serial number obliterated. A gun last sold in 1949, before records even were kept.

The question for us all along was, did Dr. Ellis ever receive a Savage Model 23D? Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America. Shame! Shame! Shame! But when a social media-fueled fight over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudine Gay is now gone. We've exposed the DEI regime and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On the

Media. To listen, subscribe to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts. Megan Stoner was a young, passionate Republican and a self-proclaimed advocate for mental health. But behind her public persona lurked a master of deception. I'm Tiffany Reis, host of Something Was Wrong. In Season 22, we're diving into the twisted world of a con artist who's been allegedly scamming and making false claims for over a decade. From the U.S. to Canada, Megan Stoner has left a trail of devastation for her victims.

But after a brief period of incarceration, she's now back out on the streets. And although she's free now, we're actively working with law enforcement to further justice for the victims of her alleged crimes. This isn't just another true crime story. It's a wake-up call about trust, deception, and the power of community to fight back. Follow Something Was Wrong on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Something Was Wrong Season 22 ad- free right now by joining Wondery Plus. After the biggest break in the case,

the discovery of the murder weapon in this creek bed, investigators needed to tie the Savage 23D rifle to Dr. Richard Illes, who it turns out had a long history with guns. It just came with the family. His sisters say that Dr. Illes always was an avid hunter. It was just the family sport. As far back as I can remember, always hunters, always.

Our father hunted, our uncles. Everybody. But by fall of 1999, D.A. Michael Dengis was sure that Dr. Illes had used his hunting skills to shoot his wife. Dr. Illes was a hunter all his life and it was a very good shot. Nearly a year later, while casually looking at photos with Dr. Ilyas' relatives, investigators were shocked to stumble on this picture of Ilyas' late godfather, Joe Kowalski. A photo of a very young Joe Kowalski holding a groundhog in one hand, a bold action rifle in the other hand.

A rifle that looked just like the murder weapon. When I saw that photograph, I knew that we definitely had the right guy. Two months later, in the same woods where the rifle was found, police discovered size 14 basketball shoes, same size as the footprints at the crime scene. This killer chose to discard the murder weapon in the shoes a quarter mile from the route that Dr. Illes says he took south that night.

It's a huge coincidence, a huge piece of evidence here. But still, the DA felt not enough evidence to charge Dr. Illes, who was busy building a new life. Six months after Miriam's murder, he married his girlfriend, Catherine. Then in November 2000, he hit the road. You moved around quite a bit. I moved a couple times. First stop, Laredo, Texas.

For a job as a heart surgeon in a hospital, a stone's throw from the Mexican border. If I was on the run, I wouldn't be in the United States. I'd be in South Mexico in a villa somewhere. But I didn't want to give the impression to anybody that I was guilty of anything. But the job didn't work out, and Dr. Illes next moved to Spokane, Washington, joined by his new wife and son. He applied for a job at a heart surgery practice there. This happens to be what would have been Dr. Ellis's office. Administrator Kathy Austin.

How did he strike you personally? As a dedicated physician. But then Kathy got a mysterious, anonymous package stuffed with newspaper articles about the murder and a letter warning anyone to think twice about hiring Dr. Illes. I realized that everywhere he went that packet followed. Ultimately Dr. Illes was turned down for the job. What was his reaction? He was angry. Not at me, but the system that was out to get him. In time, his

new wife divorced him and the once prominent heart surgeon seemed to drop from sight, only to resurface in the Spokane newspaper and with a completely new career. You were practicing cosmetic surgery? Yes, I was actually. That was another major interest of mine and I had some training in it. He was offering a fairly good deal on some of these procedures. Yeah, he advertised in our paper his great rates. But reporter Carla Johnson started hearing complaints from patients unhappy with Dr. Ilus's work. They had no idea that this guy didn't have board certification with the American Board of Plastic Surgeons. They were shocked.

And in short order, Carla too got the anonymous package. There was a suspicion that maybe some of Miriam's family was tracking him and just letting people know in a friendly way what was going on, but I don't know that for sure. [♪upbeat music playing in background with background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving by and background noise of car driving of the Pennsylvania investigators, Is this cocaine your final destination? Yes ma'am. who in December 2002, four years after Miriam's murder, finally decided they had enough evidence to make the arrest. Forty-eight hours flew Holmes and McDermott to Spokane to retrace their steps. Four years of work, you want it to be there

when he's finally taken into custody. We just want to make sure we've got him covered in the affidavit here. The plan, worked out with Spokane detective Mark Henderson, was for plainclothes detectives to quietly nab Dr. Illes at his office. What exactly did you expect? Well what we expected was everything to go perfect. And it didn't. Because while Holmes and McDermott waited nervously at the sheriff's department, Illes threw a curve. Well, that day he changed the plan, took off, went the opposite direction of the freeway

and weren't able to follow him. Undercover officer Doug Marski. I was thinking that these guys from Pennsylvania are going to think that we're idiots. Luckily, Illes soon was spotted again. We're heading down the freeway, probably between 80 and 90 miles an hour. He's in a hurry. To their chagrin, Dr. Illes headed right

into the heart of downtown, where he suddenly pulled over. Just as he's getting ready to step out, we grab and pull him out. He goes, what's this about? I remember saying to him, you know what this is about. There's some guys from Pennsylvania that want to talk to you. I asked him if he remembered me, said he did.

And I told him the reason we were here was that he was under arrest for the murder of Mary Millis. After four long years, Dr. Illis's cat and mouse game with Holmes and McDermott finally was over. But when it came to the evidence, Dr. Illes wasn't giving an inch. Anything that they could twist, distort, or contort into looking like it implicated me, they did. You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't believe in ghosts?

I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. explained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years.

I've taken people along with me into the shadows, uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness, and inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music,

or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. casts. Nearly four years after Miriam Illes' death, Dr. Illes was back in Williamsport, charged with her murder. I do not think that he thought in a million years that he was not going to get away with this. Miriam's friends were elated. I do not think that he thought in a million years that he was not going to get away with this. Mariam's friends were elated. Describe what your feelings were when you realized this.

Yes. Same thing, yes. You felt like, thank goodness, all this hard work, that something is coming out of it. Dr. Illes' sisters weren't surprised at the arrest. Everything that you read, or I read, never really mentioned anyone else but him. The papers, the internet, they just kept it going. I'm smart enough that I would know in advance that I would be targeted if something like this happened to her, why would I do it?

At trial, District Attorney Michael Dinges argued that Dr. Illes did it to avoid a messy, drawn-out divorce, in which he might well lose both his fortune and his son. There were a lot of statements that were made by Miriam to people around her that Dr. Ellis had threatened her life on several occasions. The DA presented a mountain of circumstantial evidence. Is there one thing in this case that says he did it? No, there's not one thing.

There's hundreds of things that say he did it. I think he has one hell of imagination, and he has nothing to do except grasp at straws and make the evidence fit who he wants to convict. Simple as that. In fact, Dr. Iles says, the evidence clearly points to someone else. The murderer had size 14 shoes. I wear a size 9 and a half. They found DNA on a cigarette, but that only the killer could have left there.

Do you think that some of this evidence for one reason or another was planted? If you're the murderer, you don't want to leave a silencer behind that has evidence. You don't want to leave evidence in letters that can be traced to you. I'm enough of a scientist to know that. Well, unless all the stuff that you leave is red herring that points to someone else, then you certainly do want to leave it. I don't think so. I think it's far better to have no evidence than to have evidence that is puzzling.

And what about the murder weapon, believed to be the very one in this old Illis family photo? So what? It was 50 years ago. I never saw that gun. But explaining away the state's last blockbuster piece of evidence was more difficult. When police searched Illis' Spokane home, they found a manuscript on his computer. When we found out that he wrote a book titled Heart Shot Murder of the Doctor's Wife, we were amazed.

The plot involved the murder of a doctor's wife by a stalker. The bullet ripped through the heart of the heart surgeon's wife. But the characters had the same names as those in the real murder investigation. He thought he got away with the perfect crime, and this was almost his way to put in our face, that hey, you couldn't get me and I'm even going to write a book about it. It's a confession. It's a confession. The killer fell in almost orgasmic catharsis. After all, to him, killing was better than sex.

Why would you write a book from the perspective of the killer? Wouldn't that just focus more attention on you? I thought it would generate more interest and more widespread knowledge of the actual facts of the case, which were not being disseminated by the police. That was my motive. And you didn't kill Miriam? Of course not, and I have no idea who did. Dr. Illes never took the stand.

After a five-week trial... I think he's an evil, diabolical killer. the jury began its deliberations. Then, after two and a half days, Do you think you'll leave a free man today? I don't know. Depends on what the jury decides. Obviously it's in their hands and in God's hands. The jury finds Dr. Illes is guilty of murder in the first degree.

I just looked at my brother and I thought, oh my God, how could they do this to you? For the investigators, it's justice five years in the making. We got the right guy. It took a long time, but it was done. It was done correctly. And there's no doubt in your mind that you got the right guy? We know we have the right guy. Dr. Illes never wrote the final chapter in his book.

In the real world, a judge wrote it for him. Life in prison. Her life is destroyed, and the son's life is destroyed, life in prison. Her life is destroyed and the son's life is destroyed and his life is destroyed as well. So really nobody wins. You know, Dr. Ellis was a brilliant guy, there's no doubt about it. He's smarter than me, he's probably smarter than any of the individual police officers. But he's not smarter than any of the individual police officers, but he's not smarter than all of us together.