48 Hours - Who Shot the Tech Exec?

Episode Date: April 3, 2022

A tech exec and cannabis entrepreneur’s kidnapping is caught on surveillance video. "48 Hours" contributor Tracy Smith reports.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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ConstantContact.ca Tushar was in the prime of his life. Very brilliant, relaxed, but highly motivated. He owned a web design company, AtreNet. He was well-known in the tech community. He was worth millions. His house was in an area known as Pleasure Point. Very high-end, affluent surfing community. Just steps away from one of the most popular surf breaks in Santa Cruz. He loved the ocean.

He just loved surfing. And he taught himself how to surf. Santa Cruz is known for the beaches and the marijuana. He was dabbling in the cannabis industry as well. Rachel was his love interest and also his business partner. We meshed really well. She came from the cannabis industry. He took that knowledge and ran with it.

Everybody who wanted to make money had their hands in it. Everyone who had money dabbled in it. The California marijuana industry was changing. There's black market, gray market, white market. This is an IT guy who had a relationship with a cannabis girl. He was a gunslinger at the top of his mountain. So what happened to Tushar Atre?

Tushar Atre happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. The KPI X5 News at 7 begins right now with a tech executive kidnapped. At about 9 30 p.m. on September 30th, 2019, Tushar Atre came home, went to bed. At about 3 o'clock a.m., he was awoken by the intruders. So his house is right down here? Yeah, right down there by that fence. When the deputies arrived, they found blood outside in front of the house. This is exactly where the pool of blood would have been.

No sign of any forced entry, not ransacked in any way. Our victim was last seen getting into a white SUV BMW. Tushar's girlfriend, Rachel, owned the white BMW. The car was gone and Mr. Atre was gone. And where, they had no idea. You wonder what happened on Pleasure Point Drive that night. Why was a tech executive in Silicon Valley targeted? Where are you, Tushar? What happened? Продолжение следует... In the hours after Tushar Atre went missing on October 1st, 2019, his tight-knit Pleasure Point community was on edge. We started knocking on his neighbors' doors. Everyone was spooked. Neighbors say this type of crime is... Reporter Maria Sid Medina covered the story for the Bay Area's local CBS

station, KPIX. You could really see the fear in people's eyes when you talk to them. Who would target the 50-year-old tech exec turned cannabis entrepreneur? And would they be back for anyone else? The crime scene provided few clues. You've got a missing businessman, a pool of blood, missing car. What are you thinking? What I would be thinking is that this is a very unusual case and potentially a very, very serious felony has just occurred. Steve Sircone is a former California police chief and a 48 Hours consultant who's reviewed the case. Was there anyone else in the house at the time when he was kidnapped?

There were several people in the house. Among them, one of Tushar's employees, who heard a commotion around 3 a.m. One witness hears three different voices, and one of them is Tushar's's and the other are two unidentified males. Attorney Mary Fulginiti is a former federal prosecutor and also a 48 Hours consultant. He has Tushar screaming at times. He heard the suspects tell him to get on the ground. Put your hands behind your back.

Where is the safe and what's the combination? Tushar pleading with them, how can we make this right? Tushar knew these guys. It seems like he knew these guys. The employee in Tushar's house called 911 at 3.34 a.m., half an hour after the attackers had driven off with Tushar in a white BMW belonging to his girlfriend, Rachel Emerly. So Rachel's BMW is missing. Where's Rachel? Apparently, Rachel was back east in Massachusetts when this happened. Rachel says she learned about Tushar's kidnapping when investigators called her. I was trying to piece together what this all meant over the phone.

I was just there. What do you mean? He didn't seem like he was in danger. Investigators learned Rachel wasn't just Tushar's girlfriend. She was also his partner in the cannabis business, which they'd started together after they met in 2017. They asked me straight away, where's the pot farm? The pot farm was 60 acres of open land nestled in the Santa Cruz Mountains, known as the Summit property, where Tushar could legally grow cannabis for research. He was planning to manufacture medicinal cannabis products who would kidnap him you know who would take this guy Claire Machado to shars right hand in his

cannabis business learned the news about the disappearance from Rachel I called his phone I said wherever you are we'll find. I had such hope. I held on to that for hours and hours. Around 9.30 that morning, six hours after Santa Cruz Sheriff's deputies had responded to the 911 call from Tushar's Pleasure Point address, investigators located the white BMW 14 miles away at his Summit property. There was blood on the outside and inside of the vehicle. And 20 to 30 yards away, they found the bloody body of Tushar Atre. Face down and his hands were handcuffed in the back with flex ties. An apparent gunshot wound to the back of the head.

He'd been stabbed multiple times. And nearby, they also found five shell casings from a.223 rifle. That's an assault rifle. Did it look like an inside job? That's what I'm sure was running through the investigators' minds. How would they know where to go? They found him at his house, brought him up to his secondary property. So they knew Mr. Atre.

Nothing about the kidnapping or the murder indicated this was a random act, says Sir Cohn. It had to have been someone close to him. It appears that it was definitely someone close to him. Rachel was on her way to catch a flight back to Santa Cruz when she got the news that Tushar was dead. Worst phone call of my life. When you're in your car, you can just scream. But detectives had more questions for Rachel as soon as she got to Santa Cruz.

Pretty standard to talk to the girlfriend. Oh, absolutely. I think they wanted to know, are you happy with this person? It was complicated. It's definitely hard to be in a relationship and run a business together. For the past six months, Rachel and Tushar had been living on opposite coasts,

while Rachel says she was working on expanding their medicinal cannabis business. They were focused on getting the Food and Drug Administration to approve their cannabis product. We'd gotten it to the point where we felt like this is the product we were trying to make. We'd gotten it to the point where we felt like this is the product we were trying to make. The couple had met two years earlier while she was renting one of his many Santa Cruz properties. He came in and asked, do you want to go surfing? And beginner's luck caught a wave. And he was like, yeah, yeah, brr, brr, amazing, you're amazing.

And Tushar was intrigued by Rachel's background in the world of cannabis, where her expertise was in agriculture and business development. It just seemed natural that he would pick my brain about my industry. They ultimately moved in together into his multi-million dollar waterfront house. And Rachel says she invested her entire inheritance, about $300,000, in their new cannabis venture. Tushar helped me through my mom passing. When you see that side of somebody, you can be sure they love you. But mixing love and business came with some risks. Rachel's contributions to the enterprise weren't documented on paper, and that, says Claire, became a source of friction in the relationship. She didn't have anything to show the level of investment, and he acknowledged that with me.

And, Claire says, having informal agreements wasn't unusual for Tushar. He played hard and fast and wasn't unusual for Tushar. He played hard and fast and wasn't really good at documenting it in writing. Still, Claire and Rachel say Tushar was working on adding Rachel's name to the business and that things were going well. Tushar always had the intentions for us to have written agreements. He was very kind to me in business. Rachel was still in love with him. She wasn't that pissed off. She wanted to work it out with him. Now both women were trying

to figure out why anyone would want Tushar dead. Everyone loved Tushar. Most everyone loved Tushar. Rachel had expressed to me that Tushar was receiving threatening phone calls. This was a whodunit from the start. There were not immediate suspects. You got a sense that investigators did not have any leads in this case. But there was one lead. This grainy surveillance video of three figures approaching Tushar's home. Tushar's home. National Park. They have to alert the military and when they do, the NCIS gets involved. From CBS Studios and CBS News, this is 48 Hours NCIS. Listen to 48 Hours NCIS ad-free starting October 29th on Amazon Music. Have you ever wondered who created that bottle of sriracha that's living in

your fridge? Or why nearly every house in America has at least one game of Monopoly. Introducing The Best Idea Yet, a brand new podcast from Wondery and T-Boy about the surprising origin stories of the products you're obsessed with and the bold risk takers who brought them to life. Like, did you know that Super Mario, the best-selling video game character of all time, only exists because Nintendo couldn't get the rights to Popeye? Or Jack, that the idea for the McDonald's Happy Meal first came from a mom in Guatemala? From Pez dispensers to Levi's 501s to Air Jordans, discover the surprising stories of the most viral products. Plus, we guarantee that after listening, you're going to dominate your next dinner party.

So follow The Best Idea Yet on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to The Best Idea Yet early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. It's just the best idea yet. What set the tone about this story is that there were a lot of rumors. We had to sift what was truth and what was rumor. While investigators weren't naming any suspects in Tushar's case, rumors persisted about Rachel. That was our first question. Was Rachel connected to his murder? I feel the most sorry for Rachel.

She's had to grieve as well as defend herself. Investigators did not say what connection, if any, the suspects had with Autre. They did say, however, that his girlfriend is not a suspect. So it was easy to rule her out pretty early on. I think so. I love you, honey. If anything, she loses more with him being deceased than she does with him being alive. loses more with him being deceased than she does with him being alive. You got the sense that investigators did not have any idea who his killers were. So three weeks later, investigators announced that there would be a $25,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.

But as the weeks turned into months, and after several appeals by Sheriff Jim Hart for the public's help, my detectives are working hard to solve this case, the investigation seemed to stall. There was a desperate plea to the public to find these killers. In mid-November, nearly a month and a half after Tushar was murdered, the sheriff's office raised the reward to $150,000. And this time, they asked for help in identifying three suspects seen in this eerie surveillance video as they approached Tushar's house moments before the attack. It was the first time that we ever heard investigators had any sort of evidence from that scene.

that we ever heard investigators had any sort of evidence from that scene. One of the three shadowy figures, investigators say, is carrying an assault rifle. What kind of criminals walk through a residential neighborhood with an assault rifle in plain sight? Yeah, not real wise. At any moment, they could have been spotted. You felt goosebumps because you knew what was going to happen next. goosebumps because you knew what was going to happen next. But the video didn't generate any new leads, deepening the mystery around the murder, Tushar, his business dealings, and the people who worked for him. Reporter Maria Sid Medina dug deeper into his background.

Tushar had a different side to him, a darker side. I started to search online after his neighbor said that he had made enemies connected to his business dealings. There were accusations from Tushar's investors that he was dealing in the cannabis black market, though Claire insists he was doing everything by the book. though Claire insists he was doing everything by the book. He wasn't a gang-related, mafia-related, drug lord kind of a guy. Even if Tushar wasn't a mob boss, he had quite a reputation as a bad boss, and not just in the cannabis business, according to online reviews by ex-employees. I discovered on Glassdoor.com his company, AtreNet. One employee wrote,

the CEO, Tushar Atre, doesn't value anyone but himself. Another wrote, total abusive nightmare, the worst employment experience of my life. You've been warned. Run away now. Even friends told investigators the charismatic businessman enjoyed being confrontational. He challenged his employees to try to always do their best. And even though that was tough, I appreciated that about him a lot. But not everyone

appreciated it. He had a lot of people apparently in his past that had it out for him. People that had rammed into his vehicle. People that had taken his property and destroyed it. A lot of it had to do with money. Money that was not paid. Investigators learned Tushar was notorious for withholding people's pay. When he did it to Claire, she quit. He came and found me and hired me back.

And at that point, he was a lot nicer to me. Claire says she was helping him change his management style. He wanted loyalty. And you might get loyalty through fear, but not the same kind of loyalty that you get through love. I believe he learned that in the end, and he was trying to make a number of things right. He would come up with these challenges for himself, and he said, I'm on day 13, no yelling.

And he said, I'm on day 13. No yelling. As the list of Tushar's disgruntled employees and associates grew, so did the potential suspects. From investors who'd poured over $4 million into his cannabis company but were unhappy with the way Tushar was managing the funds, to a subcontractor with whom he'd had a heated argument the night of the murder. Santa Cruz Sheriff's detectives would have to talk to them all. As investigators started digging and talking to people, were there any names that kept coming up? Two of the names that kept popping up were Stephen Lindsay and Caleb Charters, who didn't work for him very long. Because they had a beef with him?

They had a significant beef with him over a payment. This is Caleb Charters, 19, and Stephen Lindsay, 21, seen here working on Tushar's Summit property in August of 2019, just a couple months before Tushar's murder. What did employees say about them? They said that they were not very happy with Mr. Atre. Apparently, he'd made them do push-ups in front of other people, which, if that were the case, they were most likely humiliated.

Tushar actually made them do push-ups as, like, a punishment? Yeah, and then ultimately doesn't pay them. After they received the check, the check had been canceled. In December 2019, Santa Cruz Sheriff's detectives traveled to Las Vegas, where Caleb Charters and Stephen Lindsay had moved to question them. During that interview, Lindsay did say he wanted to get into a fight with this guy. He wanted the money that Chouchard owed him, and he actually tried to get into a physical altercation, and he told the police this. He finally paid them again, but this time he paid them only partially.

Lindsay was shown the grainy surveillance video of the three suspects and denied knowing them. Both men said they hadn't even been back to Santa Cruz since they stopped working for Tushar in late August. Did they make it sound like, oh, the beef was all over? Yeah, they said they had settled it and they were not going to work for him anymore. Detectives left Las Vegas without arrests. And by January 29, 2020, the sheriff increased the reward again to $200,000. Someone out there knows something about this case, and we hope that the information that we're releasing today jogs their memory. Investigators also shared the kidnappers' suspected route from Tushar's home to the

property. It seemed that they were desperate for any clues from the public. seemed that they were desperate for any clues from the public. But what police weren't sharing with the public was additional surveillance video that captured what happened on Pleasure Point Drive that night. Tushar did put up a fight, and at some point he was able to get away from his kidnappers. In the Pacific Ocean, halfway between Peru and New Zealand, lies a tiny volcanic island. It's a little-known British territory called Pitcairn, and it harboured a deep, dark scandal.

There wouldn't be a girl on Pitcairn once they reached the age of 10 that would still have heard it. It just happens to all of us. I'm journalist Luke Jones, and for almost two years, I've been investigating a shocking story that has left deep scars on generations of women and girls from Pitcairn. When there's nobody watching, nobody going to report it, people will get away with what they can get away with. In the Pitcairn Trials, I'll be uncovering a story of abuse

and the fight for justice that has brought a unique, lonely Pacific island to the brink of extinction. Listen to the Pitcairn Trials exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Did you know that the movie Candyman was partly inspired by an actual murder? Listen to Candyman, the true story behind the bathroom mirror murder, early and ad-free on Wondery Plus and the Wondery app. While investigators had only released to the public a small portion of the surveillance video showing those shadowy figures approaching Tushar's home. There was a lot more video from that night they were analyzing

for clues. As you'll see here, Mr. Atre breaks from the driveway and he runs. He's pursued by one of the suspects. He tackles him right here. And as you can see, there's a struggle. A few moments after his attackers leave him, Tushar somehow finds the strength to pull himself up and make one more dash for freedom, until one of the suspects stops him again. Moments later, the BMW appears, and Tushar is pushed into the front seat before the car speeds away. For months, investigators analyzed this video and footage from other cameras near the crime scene and along the route to the Summit property where Tushar's body was found. Finally, more than seven months later, arrests.

Finally, more than seven months later, arrests. Breaking news out of Santa Cruz County where investigators just announced they've made several arrests in the kidnapping and murder of a tech CEO. On May 19th, 2020, the Santa Cruz Sheriff's Office had four suspects in custody. I've been in this job for 32 years. I can tell you there is compelling evidence against these four people. We have the right people. 23-year-old Joshua Camps, 22-year-old Curtis Charters, 22-year-old Stephen Lindsay, and 19-year-old Caleb Charters. That's right, the same Stephen Lindsay and Caleb Charters who had worked for Tushar and admitted they once had a bitter pay dispute with him. Remember, detectives had interviewed the pair just two months after the murder. Their names had come up early, and then as we went through the investigation,

we gathered more and more information on this group. Suspects Curtis and Caleb Charters were brothers, and Lindsay was their brother-in-law. Joshua Camps was a friend. These were four young guys. All four suspects charged with murder, kidnapping, and robbery. None of them had a criminal history. In fact, Stephen Lindsay and Caleb Charters were members of the Army Reserves. At the time of the arrest, Lindsay, who goes by Nick, was attending a city college in Los Angeles,

along with Curtis, where they were producing student videos. Caleb was in Michigan, and Josh Camps was about to get married. But if Lindsay and Charters were on Santa Cruz Sheriff's radar back in December, why had it taken another five months to arrest them? When you look at the evidence that we had on October 1st and October 2nd, we had a murder scene, we had a home invasion kidnapping scene in Pleasure Point, and we had a really grainy video. That was it. But at a preliminary hearing in October 2021, prosecutors would set out to prove those shadowy figures in the grainy surveillance video were their suspects.

Cameras were not allowed at the proceedings. The state had to convince a judge that they had enough evidence to try Stephen Lindsay, Joshua Camps, and Caleb and Curtis Charters for robbing, kidnapping, and ultimately murdering Tushar Atre. The Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office laid out their months-long, meticulous investigation, piece by piece. I think the evidence here is very compelling. In the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office, the investigators did an amazing job. How important was digital evidence in this case?

Digital evidence may make this case. Early on, detectives had identified this blue sedan. It was seen on several surveillance cameras on October 1st, 2019, heading to Tushar's home before the abduction, and then minutes later, heading towards the Summit property. That piece seemed to fall into place when they learned Josh Camps owned a blue Camry. And sure enough, when they showed up to arrest him... The blue Camry was also there. The car that got them to Santa Cruz. Correct. Believing they had the suspect's ride parked in his driveway, investigators also had a search warrant for the rest of Camp's house, not knowing just how much clearer the picture was about to become. What did investigators find when they searched Josh Camp's house?

Yeah, they found a lot of firearms. They found some flex cuffs, and they had the same manufacture date that were on the wrists of Mr. Atre. Did any of these guns match the murder weapon? They did not. Even though Camps didn't have the murder weapon, investigators say he did have ammunition that matched the spent rounds found near Tushar's body. And prosecutors revealed investigators had also found other forensic evidence. What we learned from the preliminary hearing is that there were two prints, palm prints of Curtis' charters that were found on the BMW. And that's it?

That's all the forensic evidence that was introduced at the preliminary hearing. Placing Curtis in the BMW was a start, but needing more, investigators turned to the suspect's cell phones. They didn't find any data for Stephen Lindsay for the night of the murder. Why don't we have Stephen Lindsay's cell phone data? Yeah, so the investigators found out that Stephen Lindsay, his phone had been shut off from 27th of September until October 5th. So that's about eight days.

And I don't know anybody in their early 20s that would have their cell phone off for eight days. When detectives talked to Lindsay in Las Vegas back in December 2019, he told them he was home the night of the murder. But in this group text from that night, Lindsay's wife suggests she didn't know where he was. She was texting Stephen, her husband, and her two brothers, Caleb and Curtis, for hours, wondering where they were. She was texting Stephen, her husband, and her two brothers, Caleb and Curtis, for hours, wondering where they were. That shows the three of them were likely together because she is reaching out to all of them together. Investigators hoped cell tower data for Caleb and Curtis' charters, as well as Josh Camp's, would help connect the dots.

They were able to plot their locations on a map, providing the routes each device took. And there it was. So this is the surveillance camera showing the Camry going towards Mr. Atre's house at Pleasure Point Drive. Then, at around 2.48 a.m., their phones ping off a tower covering Tushar's neighborhood, at exactly the point those figures were caught on camera emerging from the alley heading towards Tushar's house.

That was critical. That actually puts these individuals, or at least their phones, in the right location, in the right place, to be able to start to corroborate this video that really shows a large chunk of the crime. At the same time, Caleb Charter's phone and the blue sedan are seen traveling away from Tushar's house toward the Summit property. So now we're in a different location. This is on the way up to Summit? Yeah, now the detectives have placed Caleb's phone on the way to the Summit,

right here off of Highway 17 in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Followed 17 minutes later by Curtis Charters and Joshua Camp's phones and the white BMW carrying the stabbed and gravely injured Tushar. What do we see here? So now you have all three cell phones of the suspects placed in an area around the Summit property. That's pretty clear. At 336, 335, 336 in the morning on the day of the murder. The cell phone data bolstered the investigation theory that Caleb Charters had dropped off his co-defendants and waited for them at the Summit property.

And that Curtis Charters and Joshua Camps had participated in the kidnapping at Pleasure Point Drive. But there was no direct evidence placing Lindsay at either crime scene. There's no eyewitnesses. There's no fingerprints. There's no DNA. There's no physical evidence linking him to the crime. But investigators believe that video showed what Stephen Lindsay had done. He had a really bright flame. I don't know why anybody would want to dull that. Tushar's flame might still be burning brightly,

if not for a chance encounter less than two months before his murder that had led Stephen Lindsay and Caleb Charters directly to the successful CEO's waterfront doorstep. He had the dream beach house. He was a surfer. He was driving a Porsche. Anybody looking at that lifestyle who didn't have it could be easily jealous of it. lifestyle, who didn't have it, could be easily jealous of it. Tushar had hired Lindsay and Charters after one of them made a telemarketing call to one of Tushar's associates. And it was very random. And they came up to Santa Cruz and he let them into his home. That's when former police chief Steve Sircone says they got a glimpse of Tushar's lavish

lifestyle. They got close enough to him to learn a lot about his operation, about his wealth. And in Tushar Atre, the suspects had found a perfect target. He actually gave them a tour of his home? Yeah, he showed them where his bedroom was. The bedroom was where Tushar kept his safe. And in it, say investigators, more than $80,000 in cash. This is very unusual and very risky. What does that say about Tushar Atre?

I think Tushar was pretty naive at times. Was that safe one of the reasons they targeted Tushar that night? This is the alleyway that they came down. If the idea was to rob the millionaire, the plan had gone horribly awry. At the preliminary hearing, the prosecution would lay out their case, playing that shocking surveillance video. Investigators say the three shadowy figures walking toward Tushar's home that night were Stephen Lindsay, Curtis Charters, and Joshua Camps, seen here, they say, carrying an assault rifle. Cameras had been rolling from the moment they entered Tushar's neighborhood on Pleasure Point Drive.

Down this way. So the first camera that captures them is right over there. Right, right. What happens next is chilling and may maybe difficult to watch for some viewers. Right here is 70 yards from there to there. Mr. Atre is going to sprint from his driveway. He's going to run down Pleasure Point as fast as he can go with his hands tied behind his back, and he gets tackled.

Who's that? That right there is Stephen Lindsay. This is a brutal, brutal attack. According to the investigators, Lindsay is the first to attack Tushar. And if you watch the suspect's hands, it looks like he's stabbing him repeatedly with a poking motion. Then you start to see a little bit of a dark substance, which later they were able to determine was blood. Next, say investigators, comes Josh Camps. You see Josh Camps running, handing something to Stephen Lindsay. Stephen

Lindsay runs back to the house. What do you think was handed off between Stephen and Josh? If I had to guess, I would say keys to the white BMW. Seconds later, investigators say, after Lindsay runs back toward the house, the BMW headlights come on as Camps continues the attack. Camps then holds him down and now he looks like he's stabbing him directly, viciously. Jabbing him and jabbing him. And then Steve and Lindsay comes driving a vehicle, which we end up learning was the white BMW. As the glistening pool of blood gets bigger, the BMW pulls up. Now, watch what Mr. Ruttry does. This is in a survival mode right here. In really good shape. He gets up, he's handcuffed. Pool of blood there, and he runs.

Wounded and bleeding, Tushar attempts to get away a second time. But, investigators say, Curtis goes after him. And this is Curtis. This is Curtis, yep, running after him. Tushar was fighting for his life. Yeah, I'm sure that he was doing everything he could to get away from these guys. They go after him with the vehicle this time and then Curtis is the one that ultimately grabs him and puts him in the car, and then they all drive away. About six hours later, Tushar's body would be found 14 miles away at his Summit property,

riddled with stab wounds and a fatal gunshot wound to the head. At the time of the arrests, Santa Cruz County Sheriff's investigators announced that Tushar's kidnapping and murder was a robbery gone wrong. These people wanted monetary gain and took advantage of the situation. But the brutality of the case

suggested there may be more to the motive. This was a very, very curious case. A lot of it doesn't make a lot of sense. If this was a robbery, why chase him, tackle him, and take him away? This is truly just a civil robbery, and all you care about is the money in the house and nothing else. Once he runs away, you let him go. You grab the money, then you get out of Dodge. But, as investigators would later learn, what set in motion the attack that night was anything but simple. This is about more than just money.

It's definitely about more than money. What do you think was the motive in this case? Go inside the case at 48hours.com. Hot shot Australian attorney Nicola Gaba was born into legal royalty. Her specialty? Representing some of the city's most infamous gangland criminals. However, while Nicola held the underworld's darkest secrets, the most dangerous secret was her own. She's going to all the major groups within Melbourne's underworld, and she's informing on them all. I'm Marsha Clark, host of the new podcast, Informants Lawyer X. In my long

career in criminal justice as a prosecutor and defense attorney, I've seen some crazy cases, and this one belongs right at the top of the list. She was addicted to the game she had created. She just didn't know how to stop. Now, through dramatic interviews and access, I'll reveal the truth behind one of the world's most shocking legal scandals. Listen to Informant's Lawyer X exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. And listen to more Exhibit C true crime shows early and ad-free right now. I think about him every day. I'm just trying to rebuild my life

and be there for Tushar's memory. The harrowing surveillance video of Tushar Atre fighting for his life gave investigators compelling evidence, a record of what happened in the street. But what happened off camera? The biggest questions, who shot Tushar and why? The answers may come from Caleb Charters, Curtis Charters, and Josh Camps. They started talking the day they were arrested, but Stephen Lindsay never said a word.

What was Caleb's role in this? His role, he admitted, was to drop them off, and he went up to the Summit property. Caleb Charters' admission he was the driver matches his cell data and that surveillance video of the blue car heading in the direction of the Summit property. With their ride 14 miles away, Steve Sircone suggests the group

had planned to steal a car all along. That they knew they could take that BMW. That they knew that they could take that BMW. Caleb Charter's interview provided investigators his version of how the robbery was supposed to play out. Caleb's interview actually talks about the plan. And he has two plans, a plan A and a plan B. He said plan A, they didn't expect Tushar to be there. Plan A involved using the front door code to Tushar's house that Caleb said he remembered after working for him months earlier

and collecting all money and valuables they could find. While Plan B, if Tushar was there, involved forcing their way into his bedroom safe. The one investigators later found held over $80,000 in cash. Caleb Charters also revealed how they'd opened that safe. The muscle was Josh Camp's. Josh came armed with a weapon. Why? Well, according to Caleb, well, to scare him in case he was there, just to scare him so that he could open the safe. Tushar was home. And Curtis Charters admits he restrained him.

He admits he takes responsibility for, you know, putting the flex cuffs on him and gagging him. But once they took Tushar up to the Summit property, Caleb and Curtis Charters made it clear shooting Tushar was never part of the plan. In his interview, Josh Camps initially tried to pin the shooting of the plan. In his interview, Josh Camps initially tried to pin the shooting on the others.

It's very apparent that Josh, at the beginning and for quite a while, kept lying to them. Josh then decreased his lying and eventually he started to fess up. He makes what amounts to the most damning admission of them all. He ultimately admits to shooting Chouchard and to killing him.

And he ultimately tells investigators where the weapon is. Correct. But he says there was a reason he pulled the trigger, an act of mercy. He says it was a mercy killing, though. He doesn't say it was an intentional killing. It was one that, you know, they did because they thought he was going to die because he was bleeding so heavily.

A mercy killing is not a defense to murder. And, you know, he still pointed the gun at his head and he killed him. And at the prelim, the lawyers for Caleb Charters, Curtis Charters, and Stephen Lindsay jumped on that statement. They argued that their clients never meant to harm Tushar during the robbery, that it all went horribly wrong when Tushar tried to run away,

and that Joshua Camps acted alone. But Mary Fulginiti says even with Camps admitting to being the shooter, the other defendants aren't off the hook. They're charged with what they call felony murder, which means that if a murder is committed during the commission of a felony, and here we have a couple of them, we've got robbery and kidnapping, then under certain circumstances, all of those involved can also be held responsible for the murder. And that's critical here. And Curtis Charters shared with investigators

that this might have been more than a robbery from the start. What he did say was that he did think that Stephen Lindsay wanted to kill Tushar and that he thought Stephen Lindsay had a vendetta. When we talk about motive, does this story of Tushar humiliating Stephen Lindsay and Caleb Charters point to motive? Yes, definitely. Fulginiti speculates it goes back to Tushar making enemies of the two former military men.

With regard to Lindsay, he was pretty upset with the way Tushar treated him. regard to Lindsay, he was pretty upset with the way Truchard treated him. When you look at the military, respect is a very large component of how they lead their lives. Truchard humiliated them. He made them do push-ups. He paid them and then he withdrew the payment. He's feeding into that disrespect and mistreatment. At the end of the preliminary hearing, the judge decided all four suspects should face trial on all counts. 48 Hours reached out to their attorneys. They declined to comment. All four suspects have pleaded not guilty. If convicted, they could face a maximum sentence of life in prison. They didn't get the 80 grand in the safe. Based on their statements, they got a few thousand dollars that they found in the house, a camera and a guitar, for allegedly taking a man's life.

People are looking forward to this trial starting, and they want to see justice served, especially Tushar's friends. Justice, whatever that might look like, will never be enough. You love me. I loved him. To make up for all Tushar Atre had left to give. Give it. His charisma was infectious. It's insane. It's not meant to be understood. An entrepreneur and an adventurer with so many mountain trails left to climb, waves still to surf,

and melodies yet to strum on his guitar. No! No! on his guitar. I miss him too. An airline manager gunned down. Broad daylight, seven shots, one person killed. His wife restrained. Knocks her down, takes the time to pull out duct tape and wrap her wrists. Was a puppet master pulling the strings? That's a hit.

48 Hours, Saturday on CBS. If you like this podcast, you can listen ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a quick survey at wondery.com slash survey.