Cold Case Files - I SURVIVED: I See A Mountain of Snow Bearing Down On Us

Episode Date: August 10, 2024

Tricia and Linae are abducted by two armed gunman after both parents and their grandmother were shot by the assailants. Jason and two friend are caught in an avalanche while out snowmobiling. Mary is held hostage by an ex employee whom she had to let go after he developed and unhealthy infatuation with her.  Progressive: Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Quince: Go to Quince.com/survive for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Rosetta Stone: Don’t put off learning that language - there’s no better time than RIGHT NOW to get started! For a very limited time, I Survived listeners can get Rosetta Stone’s Lifetime Membership for 50% off! Visit rosettastone.com/survived 

This program contains subject matter that may be disturbing to some listeners. Listener discretion is advised. The man that had my sister with the gun behind his back told the other one with the ski mask, now shoot him. Real people. I see this mountain of snow bearing down on us, and I know that it's an avalanche. Who faced death. He holds a gun to my head and he says,

you are going to die today for what you've done to me. And live to tell how. It's like your life's a movie almost. It's like you're watching a horror movie. This is I Survived. It's December 1990 in Oakley, Utah. 20-year-old Linnaeus' family spend vacations at their remote cabin in the mountains. It was my mom's favorite place on earth to be. She loved getting away from Texas and being able to be in a snow-covered white Christmas.

And that was our family dream. We looked forward to that every year to get to be able to spend our Christmas vacation together in the mountains with our family. My grams and I started on our snowmobile journey up to the cabin. to be able to spend our Christmas vacation together in the mountains with our family. My grams and I started on our snowmobile journey up to the cabin, my mom following behind us. As we got up to the cabin, my hands were freezing. So I jumped off, asked mom to hurry and open the cabin. I needed to go run my hands under some water. I made my way up the stairs, opened the door,

and I saw a flash of gray move behind the refrigerator. The next thing I knew there was a man pointing a revolver at me saying, get in here, get in here. A second man comes out with thick glasses behind the bedroom pointing another big black gun at me. They both immediately started asking me who was with me. I said my mother and my handicapped grandmother. Immediately after mom and grams were brought into the cabin, mom said to them what what are you here for? What do you want? My mother just began to have a conversation and the man immediately started to fire at her. I can remember

her grabbing it across her chest and saying I've been shot. I see my mom go down and then seconds after that, I look over to my shoulder and see my grandmother fall after her head had been blown off. And then it was dead silence. I couldn't understand what was happening. I was in a state of shock. You just can't even fathom that it's like your life's a movie,

almost. It's like you're watching a horror movie. One of the men physically went and threw up in the bathroom because he said there was so much blood. I started to pray out loud for it to stop. And the man with the fuzzy hair told me to shut up. I stopped praying that it wouldn't work. He was a devil worshiper.

The man with the thick glasses took me back to the back bedroom and tied me, put duct tape, a sock in my mouth, duct tape around my mouth, and duct taped my wrists and ankles together. And they were in a state of kind of confusion. They weren't kind of sure what to do. They were talking about having to get the bodies out of the cabin,

wanted, you know, to destroy, start to put the cabin on fire so they could destroy all their evidence. The men planned to escape, taking Linnaeus as a hostage. Linnaeus feared for the lives of her father and 16-year-old sister who were on their way to the cabin. Immediately as we got to the garage, the noise of the snowmobiles started to make its way up the driveway. Immediately as we got to the garage, this noise of the snowmobile started to make its way up the driveway. The man in the gray sweatshirt grabbed me around the neck and put his gun to my back and held me tight as waited for my dad and sister to come in the door. The other man ordered them in at gunpoint

to come into the garage. I observed my dad and my sister coming in, and my sister, eyes big, just looking at me like, what, you know, what's going on? We saw the one guy with his arm around my sister's neck and a gun to her back and the other one that jumped out with a ski mask had a gun drawn on us. Be quiet, be quiet. And they obviously were flustered and been surprised and didn't know what was going on. And my dad says, what do you guys need? What do you guys need? And I said, you want money, dad, give them money.

Yeah, yeah, we want money. And slowly my dad unzipped a snow vest and reached into his billfold and threw it on the ground. As soon as he did that, the one guy said, I'll shoot him. And the one with the ski mask drew the hammer back and aimed and clearly was having a hard time doing it. So the other one had my sister pulled his gun out and aimed at him, fired twice and it misfired. The third one went off

and hit my dad. My dad fell. My sister and I ran to each other. I held her tight and I said, Lene, she just stayed silent. I said, Linnea, Mom? She shook her head. Graham shook her head. I said, are they both dead? She shook her head, yes. I just held her tight and I said, it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay.

And at that moment, a feeling to survive kicked in, almost like an animal instinct. Something I'd never experienced and don't ever want to experience again. And right then our minds came together and we knew we had to come up with a plan. So Linnae and I immediately started doing what they told us to do. The sisters helped one gunman to load the snowmobiles. The other gunman used gasoline to torch the cabin and the bodies. They left the burning cabin for

the four-mile ride to the road. I remember having, on the snowmobile ride, thinking, okay, my dad is dead, my mother's dead, my grandma's gone, I'm the oldest in the family, and now I have this huge responsibility to take care of my little sister. As we were driving, I was in front, and my sister was behind me, and I thought, all I have to do is go fast and turn

and throw this guy into a tree. And then I remembered, I can't do this. I can't leave my sister. As they neared the road, they saw their Uncle Randy on the trail. I recognized his vehicle. I remember just feeling, Linnea, you just got to be quiet. Don't make, you know,

you can't scream out. I just felt just not to make known that we knew him, that he was family. I was fearful that they would kill him. So we passed Randy and just kind of gave him a very basic wave, a nod, if we would, with anyone to be courteous, passed through and crossed the road to get to the other side where the sheds were and where the car was. So we began loading up and immediately Lynnae and I just looked at each other we knew we had a hurry. We had a hurry because if these guys knew that my Uncle Randy was there and we knew him then they would probably kill him as well. When we were in the car, when we began speaking with these men, it wasn't an objective to

make friends with them. It was to be casual, get them to be comfortable and get information out of them so they're not freaking out and making decisions that we can't anticipate. It was a very quick thought process of what do we need to do to survive? What do we need to do to understand the What do we need to do to understand the situation so we can get out of it? As they speed away from the sheds, Trisha came up with a plan.

We've got to stop this car. We've got to stop proceeding because my uncle just saw us. At some point, he's going to clue in that those girls went somewhere they shouldn't have gone. So we've got to slow down the situation. So immediately I say, I have to go to the restroom. I have to go to the restroom. And as we're driving down, they said, okay,

but if you do anything, anything funny at all, consider your sister dead. We pulled up to the gas station and the driver said, no, this doesn't look right. I don't feel comfortable. This doesn't look right. So we continued down the road to go to the next town, to the next gas station.

As we're in between the two towns, a cop started coming by us and passing us. The driver immediately began to freak out. There's a cop, there's a cop, there's a cop, man. The one on the back said, calm down, cool off man, it was just a cop, relax. He continued to proceed. The cop turns around, he noticed the rearview mirror, turns around, he's turning around, he's turning around and he's like, where are you speeding, you idiot, where are you speeding? And he's going and the cop starts chasing him around. He's turning around, he's turning around, and he's like, were you speeding, you idiot? Were you speeding? And he's going and the cop starts chasing him. As he starts chasing him and moving quicker, another cop started proceeding towards us.

At that point, both men knew something's going on. He gunned it, stepped on the pedal, and started to go very, very fast. They started to drive extremely fast, and at that point I ducked and hid under my coat. I looked over at the speedometer. We were going well over 100 miles an hour on this little road. And blowing through this town, he's honking his horn, his fast can flying, and there's cops behind us with sirens. And we drive, and we eventually come to a turn.

The roads are slick. It's wintertime. He slides and hits the side of this other gas station. Quickly, all the cops surround the car and draw down on us. He reaches and grabs a gun and goes, Get back, get back. And I'll shoot him. I got hostage. Get back. And so the cops, you know, move their cars back and he pulls back and proceeds to go down this dugway, this ravine. And he's going way too fast, loses control of the car and hits the side of this dugway and a car pops up and slides down the guardrail and goes

backwards and I remember thinking oh my gosh we're gonna go off a cliff. When we went back at first we went like this and all of a sudden it was like a ride in a roller coaster, went backwards and that car was like this. I remember seeing nothing but sky. In the moment that the car was falling and I was crouched down, you know, hiding from my life, I just remember feeling scared and cold and just, I can imagine that we were gonna roll and we just waiting for any moment to be dead in the car. As we're going down, eventually,

it just seemed like forever we were going down and then boom, crash. Right after the car crashed and there was a quick amount of silence just for a few seconds, I heard the one man in the gray sweatshirt turn around to the guy in the back and say, okay, this is our time to die now. It's almost like they had made a pact that if they were going to get caught because they had talked about they never wanted to go back to prison again that they had made a pact that they would end it in suicide so the man driving turned it and pointed the gun to the man in the backseat he immediately grabbed the gun out of his hand physically and opened

the door and started firing at the police I'd immediately reached back and grabbed my sister's hand we I said, duck, duck, Lene. We held each other's hand tight, both of us ducked down. As we're hearing the one in the back shoot up, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot with the gun, we hear gunfire come back, bullets are hitting the side of the car, going into the leather seats behind us and just piercing it. The guy in the back seat opens the door and uses the door as a shield. And so he's up pointing above,

firing at the police all up above. At the next point, we hear a shattering of the glass. And then they ended up running out of bullets. I remember them saying, crap, we're out of ammunition. The guns are empty. I had been ducking down and looking up and then seeing a man come to me at gunpoint. And I remember saying, no. I thought for an instant

that I was going to be shot. It seemed like it was just minutes that they realized, oh goodness, you know, these are the girls. When the girls were rescued, they had to walk by their captors. I just remember walking by saying, these men just killed my family. They murdered my mom and Grams and my dad. Shoot them. I remember saying, just shoot them now. I was screaming it. It's almost like at that point is when my voice came back.

I was out of that state of shock, and I realized what had actually gone on. These men are in handcuffs, and I was hopeful that the policemen would kill them. It seemed quite out of my character to be able to wish death on another human being. I think it was just an initial normal human reaction to if you've just watched your mother murdered, your grandma's head blown off, then your father killed right before your eyes.

And that's what I understood. The girls were taken to the police station where Uncle Randy was waiting for them. In the hallway, my uncle was standing and embraced him in a great big hug. And he just said to me, sweetie, your dad's alive. And I just remember feeling so happy and ecstatic that my dad was still alive.

Randy shows up and tells us that my dad was still alive and we think he's going to pull through of just, wow, I'm the luckiest girl in the world to still have a dad. My daddy was still there. After being doused with gasoline, their father had played dead until the killers left. He had gotten up and went inside to find my mother and grandmother. Well, these two men had caught the cabin on fire. So immediately my father caught on fire and he ran to the shower

and tore off a snowsuit and tried to get the fire off. And so he was left with jeans and a t-shirt. He jumped on the one snowmobile that was there and went as fast as he could down that canyon. I remember my dad telling me, all that was on my mind is I have to get my girls. I have to get my girls. Their father was flown to the hospital after he and Uncle Randy raised the alarm.

We weren't able to see our dad until the following day. Had bandages all around his head, but just such a sigh of relief that I knew it was my dad. I saw his beautiful blue eyes and instantly just a huge sense of relief and running and embracing him and him just hugging and saying,

it's all going to be okay. The girl's father, Rolf, recovered from his injuries. Vaughn Lester Taylor pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced to death. Edward Stephen Delly was convicted of second-degree murder and given a life sentence. I survived because I have a purpose. I have a lot to give and a lot to share. I survived to be able to share a relationship with my sister.

We survived because our instinct told us to. And instinct to survive simply kicked in as soon as those guys shot my dad. And Lenay and I ran to each other. Instinct to survive kicked in. There was no reason why a beautiful life here or there. It was simply an instinct to survive and we're going to do whatever it took to survive. I just knew that that wasn't any other

option. Survivors is who we are. Survivors is who we are today. Survivors are who we choose to continue to be. Shifting my wardrobe from summer to fall is always a challenge. As a busy mom, I'm tempted to just grab new clothes from the big box stores while I'm running errands, but lately I'm just not feeling it. This season, I decided I was going to focus only on timeless, quality clothing I can wear for years. That's why I am so thrilled to have found Quince. Quince offers luxury quality clothing, home goods, jewelry, and more that doesn't blow your budget. How do they do it?

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so it's simple to choose the rate and coverages you like. Press play on comparing auto rates. Quote at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Comparison rates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. It's February 2007 in Big Belt Mountains, Montana. Best friends Jason, Brett, and Chris are on their first good snowmobile trip of the winter. The winter of 2007 was not a good snowmobile season. The snow was minimal. We like to have lots of snow as snowmobilers and lots of big fluffy snow.

And 2007 was not that year. We still went every weekend, but we just didn't have really good conditions. This particular day, the night before it, it snowed a lot, and it was only the three of us. The three of us were experienced riders, and it took experienced riders to get to this bowl. After two hours traveling, we finally get to our spot that we wanna be in snowmobile, and the one that we've been after for years. It's this hundred acres, untree, steep cliff area that snowmobilers love to be

in. Snowmobiling is going up and trying to get as high as you can. That's what we're doing in this particular bowl. It's steep and you're not gonna make it to the top. It's just you're not going to. It's vertical at the top. The competition here is to see how high you can get on this mountainside and that's how we outdo each other. This particular time Brett got stuck on his high mark. I went up there to help him get unstuck. I did the same thing. I pulled out right below him, got stuck, and as soon as I jump off my snowmobile I look up at him and I see him take two big lunges towards me,

like something's not right. Then he falls down on his belly and I know definitely something isn't right. It immediately draws my attention up the hill and I see this mountain of snow bearing down on us and I know that it's an avalanche. I feel ice chunks and snow covering me up. As the snow is covering me I can see the daylight fading and the deeper that I get into the avalanche and into the snow. And as I move down the hill I can feel myself moving throughout the snowpack. I can see daylight showing through. I know I'm close to the surface and then it'll get dark and it'll be dark for a little bit and then pretty quick I can see daylight again. I know I'm close to the surface and then it'll get dark. And it'll be dark for a little bit and then pretty quick I can see daylight again.

I know I'm close to the surface and then it'll be dark again and I know I'm getting a little bit deeper. And all this, my helmet was ripped off. You know, there's not much air in my lungs at this point in time. I'm trying to swim like the experts say you're supposed to do. This stuff is hard to swim in. It's solid and you just, you can't move in it.

I feel my snowmobile tumble over the top of me, cartwheeled over the back of my leg. But really, I didn't even feel the pain at that point in time. It was just all happening so fast. I've heard that, you know, you can help yourself stay alive a little bit longer by creating that air pocket. So I'm just bringing my hands up to create that air pocket

and everything stops moving. And then I can't move. I'm just bringing my hands up to create that air pocket, and everything stops moving. And then I can't move. I'm just solid. I'm in there. I mean, literally, I'm up on my way to my face, and it's just like I was frozen in this snow. I can't move. So the avalanche stops moving, and miraculously, my head's sticking out of the snow. I yell for Chris and Brett. Chris, Brett, you know, just yelling for them, saying their names.

Are you guys okay? We were just in avalanche, you know, expecting those guys to be able to talk, communicate a little bit. But there was nothing. There was none of that. They couldn't hear. They were buried. And then I began to worry. They got all three of us. I was not the only one in this thing. We're in big trouble. That's the point at which I start trying to get myself out of this thing. I start moving my shoulders a little bit as best I could and freeing up my arms and as I free up my arms I can get my arms out and then I can I pull myself out of this snow and it was it was hard. It was it was tough to get out of there. I stand up and take a look at this huge field of debris.

And it's just, it takes your breath away at how much damage and destruction that this thing has done on the area. And I happen to be alive through all of that. It takes a minute for that to soak in. It's a pretty sickening feeling when you first come out of the snow and realize your two best friends are buried and they're relying on you.

It's all on you. Your decisions I'm making right now are life and death. And I'm going to have to live with them for the rest of my life. Probably since the avalanche hit us maybe three minutes before I was out, had my shovel out, and I didn't mess around. I knew what I had to do.

As soon as that shovel hit that snow and just kind of went tink, I knew I was in trouble because I wasn't, I couldn't hardly penetrate that snow. It's big chunks, ice. This stuff's hard. So I dug around a little bit there, tried to figure out what I was going to do. I didn't, in 10 acres, I had no idea if I was, you know, I could be two or three feet off and miss him completely. I had to make a decision

then. And it was a tough one because I knew these guys were relying on me. I needed to take a look around the debris field to see if there was any indicator of them anywhere. The debris field was too large to search on foot. Jason realized he needed his snowmobile to look for his friends and started to dig it out. The whole time I'm thinking, am I wasting my time here? I should be digging for one of these guys, you know, two or three or four minutes under the snow. Are these guys going to, you know, you know, they're dying right now. I spent half an hour digging my snowmobile out, turned it over, and started it right up. It was pretty banged up.

After running around the debris field looking for an indicator of where maybe Chris or Brett are, I'm not finding anything. I don't see any gloves. I don't see anything, anything that I was hoping to find sticking out to point me in any sort of a direction as to where they might be. Unable to find his friends, Jason decided to go for help.

I looked back at the debris field and told my friends that I was sorry for not getting them out, not doing what they needed me to do at that particular moment. They needed me to dig them out, and I couldn't do it. As I left, I told them that I was sorry and that I'd get help. It's a 10-mile trek back out of here with a banged up leg and a big snowmobile and a lot of deep snow.

This is gonna be a lot of work. On my way out, my mindset was rescue. And that's how I had to do it all, the whole day. I kept my mind framed that these guys are okay. They're just unresponsive right now. I knew that I had a really tough incline to get to the top of before I could start my descent down to the truck and I knew that if I got stuck I was by myself and it was a big deal to get these

things unstuck by yourself. I got stuck on the incline coming back out uphill only probably a quarter of a mile from the avalanche field. And that was the tough thing to deal with mentally. I was in this urgent state and my snowmobile stuck. I can't get out. And I got to spend all this time digging this thing out. Jason forced himself to stop and eat to gather his strength. So I got my snowmobile out, and I did not mess around. I didn't care what I hit. I didn't care if I ran over rocks. I didn't care if I ran over trees.

I didn't, all that went out. I was not getting stuck again. I could not get stuck again. And it was just, it was full throttle to the top of the hill. Now that I'm to the top, I can make it back out of here. I get to the bottom of the hill, start out down the road, and my snowmobile dies. It's dead, it's done.

And now I have to walk out with a banged up leg. I know that I'm a long ways away from the truck still, and my leg and ankle now are really hurting. I walk the two miles, and as I finally get to the parking lot, I realize there are a couple families there. I hobble up, my snowmobile pants are shredded. I'm dragging my leg.

My helmet's gone. I probably look like I'm in pretty rough shape. And they come over to me. I talk to them about what just happened, and we call. I use their phone to call 911. I had hopes all the way through the night that they were still alive, that they were just knocked unconscious, that they couldn't respond. Finally, they came in and said that they found one of them.

And, of course, my family was there, and they told my family first. And my family didn't want to tell me. But I knew as soon as they told my family I could tell, that they found Brett, that he was gone. They found Brett between where I came out of the snow and where my snowmobile was. So that means I walked over the top of him. Numerous times.

But I had no way to know. And Chris was so far away from anything that I would have never found him. Jason still snowmobiles, but never without carrying an avalanche beacon. I survived because I wouldn't give up on my friends. I had a tremendous hope that my friends were still alive and that the rescuers would be able to save them. School starts again next week, and I'm so excited for my daughter to show off the Spanish she's learned over the summer using Rosetta Stone. Rosetta Stone is the most trusted language

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crimes. It made news throughout the entire region that these two people had been shot while they slept in such a safe community. To give a new perspective on the devastation crimes can cause. It was shocking for something like this to happen in our little town. Featuring cases from quiet towns to bustling cities and interviewing the people closest to the case. My first thought was that it's an unusual location for us to have a homicide. Listen to the true crime podcast, city confidential and step beyond the yellow tape to learn just how far a crime can reach.

There are certain cases in the history of Boston that I think sort of define the city. I think this is one of them. New episodes of the city confidential podcast are available every Thursday. Available wherever you get your podcasts. It's March 1996 in Concord, California. Mary hires Giselle to help in the family embroidery business. She becomes uncomfortable when he starts showing an interest in her. Even though I felt uncomfortable around him,

I had spent a lot of time training him, and I saw a lot of potential if we could work around this little issue he had going on. So I wanted to keep him. I felt like it was a little high school crush. I didn't know, you know, why he was doing this, but I felt like I had control. Within a couple of months after he gave me the flower and the poem and the cassette tape for Mother's Day, I

just, I thought, no I'm not calling him for work anymore. You know, I can't put up with this. He would continue to call me. He called me at home. He wanted me to meet him with the kids, with my kids, which were at the time just two and three, at a park, because he wanted to see me. And I said, no, absolutely not. I was married, and I was not interested in anybody else. Three or more months passed, and it was minimal contact from him.

And then he called me three times one morning at work, and each time I hung up on him. The last time he called, he said, what about that baby you promised me? And I thought to myself, oh my gosh, this guy has really lost it. He, I mean, how bizarre. I, there was, why would he think that? And I was, I was afraid at that point. So we put a phone block on the phone so he couldn't call me at work anymore.

Mary got a restraining order, but then no one could find Giselle to serve it to him. Soon after the order expired, Giselle turned up at Mary's office again. I said, you know, I have a restraining order on my desk. All I have to do is go get it signed again, and then we will track you down. I said, you have to leave me alone. You can't keep doing this to me. Almost four months went by, and I didn't hear anything from him.

So I thought, good. So we took the phone block off the phone. Two weeks later, he came into the store and into the room where I was. And I had my back to the door. And he comes up and he grabs me by the back of the neck. And he says, I got to talk to you. And I had no idea who it was.

So I jumped out of my chair and saw who it was. And he pulls a gun out of his pants. When I saw that gun, I mean part of me was total panic. You know, I need to get out of here, but I think part of me, I really thought I can control this. I, you know, I can somehow get out of this. I wasn't sure what was gonna happen, but I, you know, I don't know. I wasn't in total panic.

I mean, I know I wanted to get out of there, but I really, at the time, I really didn't think that he was gonna pull the trigger right then. I didn't know what to do, so I made eye contact with this other, one other male employee that we have, and he and I dashed through the door. He was going to, you know, call 911, obviously, and I was just trying to get away. So we were out the door, and, you know, several feet,

you know, maybe 10 feet or so away from this door, and sure enough, Giselle was right on my tail, and he knocks me down and drags me right across the sidewalk, up the step back into the building and there I laid on the floor right in this in this walkway and people were scattering and you know calling 911 going into their desk and he holds a gun to my head and he says you are going to die today for what you've done to me I I said, what have I done?

And you know, but when you're on the floor looking into a gun and a crazy man, you know, you don't say a whole lot. You just kind of, I mean, you ask a question. If you don't get an answer, you don't insist, because you never know what they're going to do. He finally pulls me to my feet, and he grabs me by the arm, and he takes me back to where he had a backpack, back where all this had started.

And he gets another gun out of his backpack. And I thought, oh my gosh, two guns now. This is not good. My mother was yelling at him to leave, to get out of the building, and he said, say goodbye to your daughter, and he made her leave, made her leave the building. All I knew is that I wanted to keep peace. Here I was with a man with two guns, and you know, what else could I do? If I make him mad, if I yell at him, if I try to run, then I'll, you know, he's going to shoot me.

When we were in the room, he sat there and told me story after story about things that I had promised him, including giving him a son. I was going to leave my husband. He had in his mind that I was going to totally change his life. And because I kept refusing to do so, he had no choice but to come and do me harm. I wasn't sure what he was gonna do. All I knew is I had two guns pointing at my head the whole time

while he was telling me these stories. They were, you know, fantasies of a crazy man. It was his reality, but it wasn't my reality. My reality was that I was being held hostage with two guns. The building was now surrounded by the police. The phone rings, and he let me pick it up. And on the other end was a hostage negotiator. The negotiator wanted to talk to Giselle,

and he wouldn't talk with them. He would allow me to answer the phone and talk with them, but he would not talk with them. And he wanted control of how long I talked, and of course, of what I said. All I can think of is my kids at home. And I just knew that I needed to see them again. I needed to stay alive.

I can't, I can't let this guy do anything to me. He's come into my space, and he's trying to ruin my life. I haven't done anything to him. I gave him a job, and I haven't done anything. So all I can hang on to is that I've got my kids at home, and I have to see him again. This had been going on for four hours,

being held at gunpoint, listening to stories, feeling like I was part of a nightmare that just wouldn't end. And all of a sudden he says, "'I want you to take me out.'" I said, "'You mean out the door?' And he said, "'No, with a gun.'" He says, "'You have damaged me to this point. You may as well finish me off.

I said, I can't do that. I mean, I can't, I can't kill anybody. I can't, I've never held a gun. I, no, no. I said, you just go out there. They'll take care of you. And he says, no, you are going to do this to me. He would have me stand up. He'd put the gun in my hand, he'd wrap his hand around my hand, and then hold it to his head. And then I'd say, no, no, I can't do it, I can't do it. We went through this whole scenario a couple of more times, and I kept saying, no, I can't do it, I can't do it, I cannot pull a trigger. And he said, you know, and he made it more and more obvious that if I don't do it, I can't do it, I cannot pull a trigger. And he said, you know, and he made it more and more obvious

that if I don't, then he was gonna kill us both. He knelt down on the floor and I stood next to him, facing away from him. I didn't wanna see. He put the gun in my hand and wrapped his hand around mine and put it to his head. I don't know. I don't know what happened. But the trigger was pulled.

I heard the gun go off and I dropped it and ran. I never saw what happened after that. I ran through the building, waving my arms so that the SWAT team that was outside would know that it was me. The SWAT team went in and found him dead on the floor. The police also found a terrified employee who had been hiding in the room the whole time. She confirmed that Mary had no choice but to pull the trigger. I survived because I needed to get home to my kids. I needed to still be their mother. And I also survived because I was able to stay calm and not make him any madder than what he already was. And I did what I had to do to get out of the situation.