Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Greedy husband kills rich wife over $4M will; blames death on 9-year-old daughter [Prosecutor]

Episode Date: January 28, 2019

Accused wife-killer Rod Covlin was motivated by "pure, unadulterated greed," according to the prosecutor in the New York man's murder trial, Shele Danishefsky's body was found dead in her bathroom on New Years Eve 10 years ago. Nancy Grace digs into the case with psychologist & lawyer Dr. Brian Russell -- host of Investigation Discovery's "Fatal Vows" series, former detective Steven Lampley, North Carolina family & divorce lawyer Kathleen Murphy, and Crime Stories reporter Robyn Walensky -- author of "Beautiful Life?: The CSI Behind the Casey Anthony Trial & My Observations." Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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I would much rather have that than yet another plastic baby doll or, God forbid, a toy gun. Just what I don't want. Join the Justice Nation. Crimestopshere.com Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Their then nine-year-old daughter found her mom dead in their apartment on New Year's Day. Cops initially believed that Dana Shefsky had fallen into the tub, fatally striking her head, and she was buried without an autopsy because of her Orthodox Jewish faith. But after Dana Shefsski's family became suspicious,

they agreed to have her body exhumed and the medical examiner found foul play in April of 2010. Shelly Daniszewski found dead in her multi-million dollar New York apartment. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. But after she was buried, it was determined foul play was involved. What led her family to be suspicious? Joining me now, Dr. Brian Russell, psychologist and lawyer, host of Investigation Discoveries hit series Fatal Vows. Renowned detective Stephen Lampley, North Carolina family and divorce lawyer Kathleen Murphy, and joining me right now, Crime Stories investigative reporter and author of Beautiful Life, the CSI behind the Casey Anthony trial, Robin Walensky. First, I want to hear,

Robin, about Shelly and how her body was found. Well, Nancy, unfortunately, this woman was found face down in the bathtub in her very expensive Upper West Side New York City apartment by her young nine-year-old daughter at the time. On New Year's Eve, 7 o'clock in the morning, she finds her mommy lying there dead. Now, the little girl at that time is nine years old and she finds mommy dead in the bathtub. Now this is what I'm trying to determine. When police came in what did it look like? How did they believe that she had been killed? To me she's a Reese

Witherspoon look-alike. She's just beautiful. Beautiful woman. She had a kind of a slash around the back of her head, around the back of her neck. And for some reason, they thought that she slipped and fell in the tub and ended up face down. You know, what's interesting is the only visible injury on Shelly's body was a cut to the back of her head. And as Robin Walensky is telling us, she was found face down. Now, how does that happen? If you think through her falling in the bathtub. Oh, gosh, this is bringing back memories of Michael Peterson's third wife, Kathleen Savio, found dead. Excuse me.

Thank you for that. There's so many Petersons I've got to keep straight. Drew Peterson, wife found dead. Excuse me. Thank you for that. There's so many Petersons I've got to keep straight. Drew Peterson, wife, found dead Kathleen Savio in a dry bathtub. And they said that was an accident too, until she was exhumed. So this woman has only one visible injury to her body. It's a cut on the back of her head. And as Robin is telling us correctly, she was faced down. Now her family, extremely religious, protested against an autopsy and they believed that it was too invasive. So the real cause of her death went undetermined and it was just accepted that she slipped in the tub. To Kathleen Murphy, North Carolina family and divorce lawyer,

Kathleen, I don't understand how she hits her head in the back enough to cut it and then she ends up face down. I believe that she was murdered and that's how that happened. And I don't

think that we have Joe Scott Morgan on today the forensic investigator but clearly that was a murdered woman just like Kathleen Peterson was murdered to Robin Walensky crimeonline.com investigative reporter and author of Beautiful Life Robin so six years, and all that time, Shelley's death had been deemed an accident until Kovlin, the husband, was recorded by his then-mistress. Explain. That's right.

Well, he has girlfriends, allegedly many girlfriends, but one of them decides to record him. And he's trying to dream up an entire plot on how to get his deceased ex-wife's money. And he's trying to frame his little daughter, just like he tried to frame her six years earlier and say that she was the killer, now he's trying to frame her with a note that she's admitting in her own words, allegedly, that she killed her mommy. Oh, you know what? This is the depth. This is the depth of evil. To Stephen Lampley, renowned detective, here's the kicker.

You always look at the husband the boyfriend the lover the ex first but at the time the little girl the daughter finds mommy dead in the bathtub the husband is not around they didn't live together although they lived in the same building the same apartment building they were divorcing he was out taking a walk at the time she was found. He was nowhere near the scene. What, if anything, does that mean to you, Steve? Well, I can't imagine any person leaving a mother for a 9-year-old girl to find, Nancy. Obviously, he did that on purpose, and he wanted to distance himself.

So he goes away on a walk. So when I'm guessing that he knew she was going to find her mom at this certain time. So he goes away and she finds her and he's not anywhere around. So he thinks he has an alibi. That's my opinion on what happened. To Dr. Brian Russell, psychologist, lawyer, host of Investigation Discovery's hit series, Fatal Vows, I want to talk about the daughter finding her mother's dead body. Because later, years later, there was wild speculation that the daughter was actually responsible. Years later, as we know now, Shelly Daniszewski was exhumed. And we find out that the real cause of death is that she had a broken bone in her neck.

And the nine-year-old daughter could have done it if she had pushed the mom in the bathtub. So let's talk first about the impact finding your mother dead would have on a nine year old little girl. Well, one of the things that we talk about sadly often on Fatal Vows is the incredible, I mean, it's hard for most people listening to imagine the callousness that you'd have to have to murder your spouse in the first place, obviously. But when you compound that and think about the callousness that you'd have to have as a parent

to murder your spouse and let your kid be the one to find them and have that carry that moment in their mind for the rest of their lives. So for six years, his wife, Shelly's, death was deemed an accident until his then-mistress, his girlfriend, got him on tape. And you know, it must have taken a lot for her to decide, you know what, I need to tape this because I don't want to be a part of this. So it must have been mentioned many times before for her to finally go, I'm going to get a tape recorder ready.

I'm going to tape it when he talks about it again. She tapes him hatching up a plot to marry his little girl off so he would be able to control her inheritance from her mother. And what he was hoping is that by getting her married off, she would no longer be considered a minor. And because of that technicality, he could get access to all his wife's money. And this is what I can't get over. To Kathleen Murphy, you're a family and divorce lawyer. He was so intent. Why don't he get a job and make money like everybody else has to, he decided and planned and arranged to pay a teen boy $10,000 to go through the marriage with his daughter so he could get her declared no longer a minor

and get the mom's money. There are generally people that come through the system, the court system and drugs and alcohol. And very, very frequently, I see people coming through the court systems and they have these mental health disorders like narcissism and borderline personality disorder. This person doesn't think like a normal person, Nancy. This person was a narcissist, a controlling person who wanted the money. And the way that he proceeded in this process was just to kill her and manipulate their child. Clearly. Guys, I want to take one brief moment and thank our partners making today's program possible. It's a blink. Two very different instant replays. Instant replays

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with Alexa. Let Blink help watch your home while you're watching the big game. Save 20% on indoor and outdoor systems and add-on cameras now through Monday, February 4th, 9 p.m. Pacific. Visit BlinkProtect.com slash defense. That's BlinkProtect.com slash defense. And I thank you, Blink, for being our partner. The past few years have been brutally painful and gut-wrenching in many respects. And it's been a difficult time for all the parties concerned, all the family members. We've had these feelings of inexorable loss for our beloved Shelly and her passing has left a gaping loss in each of our lives from which we're still suffering and continue to suffer almost six years after she passed you are hearing from our friends at dailymail.com that was Shelly

Daniszewski's brother-in-law talking about the pain and the suffering and the horrible time they've endured since Shelly was killed. And remember, for six years, she had been buried there in her grave. Everyone assumed it was an accident until something very, very unusual happened. Her husband, Rod Kovlin, remember they were divorcing at the time. He lived in the building, but in a different apartment. He was gone at the time her body was discovered until years later. He tries to orchestrate a plan to marry off. His earlier was nine years old, but marry off his now teen daughter. So the courts would determine she was no longer a minor, even arranging to pay a teen boy $10,000 to marry her so he, the husband, could get his

hands on the wife's millions. I mean, I mean, if you take this in, if you believe he had anything to do with this, you would believe he's willing to marry off his teen girl so he could get the money. And if he would do that, what else would he do? Would he commit murder? Straight back out to Robin Walensky,ky crime online.com investigative reporter joining us you know that day when his girlfriend recorded him trying to marry off the little girl anna so he could get the money it takes me back to another another plot of his where apparently he breaks into her computer, the little girl's computer. And what do police find there? Well, they find a note, Nancy, that he's writing allegedly in the voice of the little girl admitting that, oh, I killed my mother and I'm so sorry.

And I've been living with this pain for all these years. And he tries to be her and concocts this note. I mean, this guy was obsessed with the four million dollars that his estranged wife was worth. She was the breadwinner in the family. He? He's doing what? He's playing professional backgammon games and she's down on Wall Street working her butt off trying to earn money paying for this very lovely apartment. Wait a minute, wait a minute. So she's working her rear end off on Wall Street, which ain't easy. It's not easy. So she's going down there in the pit to work every day, and the husband declares he's a professional backgammon player. You know, Brian Russell, Dr. Brian Russell, host of I.D.'s Fatal Vows, you know what it reminds me of? I will never forget when I was prosecuting in inner city, I befriended the office manager of the district attorney's office. Her office was right beside mine.

And we would talk and talk and talk. Well, it turned out her sister, I thought they looked awfully alike, was her twin. And she ran the indictment division, the records room for the DA's office. Well, her husband, the sisters, quit his job and decided to hunt for pirate treasure professionally. And I remember the first time I heard that I was standing in the DA's office hall. And these were two of the nicest, loveliest, most hardworking women I have ever known in my life. And I had never heard anything like that. I mean, I was used to my father getting up at the break of dawn, going to work on the railroad, even when he had chest pains.

And my mother being gone by the time I got up, long gone to go work. And I had never heard of anybody just quitting their job to go look for pirate treasure. This is real, Dr. Brian Russell. That sounds like what this guy did. Hey, guess what, honey? I'm quitting my job, and I'm going to play badgammon over my cold, dead body. How did your friend, how did the woman, the attorney, feel about that, the husband going off and hunting for pirate treasure?

Well, actually, she supported him for a really long time. And then finally, at some point, you know, they divorced. Well, of course. And that's the funny thing about all this talk you hear in society today about how, you know, women should feel, you know, empowered by being the higher breadwinner in the family and they should be masculinity, the idea that a guy should be the breadwinner for the family and provide for the family and everything is some kind of toxic, outdated, archaic idea and all this stuff.

OK, I've never rarely in my career as a psychologist, have I met a woman who really wanted a guy who could not bring home at least as much bacon as she could. And so there's this whole idea that you ought to be happy supporting a guy and not being there to raise, you know, to be, you know, your kid's primary, you know, caregiver, have a primary role in raising your own children. That is the farce. That's the fallacy. And I think most people know it. Most women know it. And so the lesson in this, Nancy, is that, you know, for the women out there listening to us, if your husband is feeding you some of this BS and telling you that he's going to go pursue his dreams of being a pro golfer or a treasure hunter or a backgammon player or whatever, you got to really rethink.

If you don't have any kids with that guy yet, I recommend you not make any because you're going to be wanting to run for the hills eventually. Run, run for the hills as if you had seen a monster. Kathleen Murphy, a family and divorce lawyer out of North Carolina. She's no stranger to the courtroom. Kathleen, you know what? Now, I don't, I don't, I disagree with Dr. Bryan in one way. I would expect, what I would expect of my husband, Kathleen, is to get out there and work a job. If I'm leaving every morning to go work and I'm leaving my children to go work, then I expect him to do the same thing. I mean, even my twins at age four, they ran in to say, mommy, daddy's lounging on the sofa. He's lounging. Because I would always, when I would be like cleaning up or doing the laundry, I go, Oh, David, I'm so glad to

see you're lounging and watching TV. Of course, he'd been working all day long. But you know, I think he should do a double shift just like me. So the twins couldn't wait to tell me Daddy was lounging. I went in there and found him working on his computer with the TV going. But long story short, oh, no, no, no. L-A-Z-Y is the scourge. It's the worst. Can you imagine a man telling you he's going to play backgammon for a living? Not an option.

It's not an option. And listen, Nancy, I'm laughing because my husband's a firefighter. So he works approximately 10 days a month. Do you know I'm blowing up his phone on the days that he's home? Because we don't do lazy in our household. And we just don't do lazy. So if you're not at the fire station, even though you just did a 24-hour shift, you're working. You're darn right.

You're taking the Christmas lights down. Oh, my stars. I was just about to tell you that the other morning, I was out there at 6 o'clock in the morning taking the reindeer down that had a horrible blinking problem, I might add, that never blinked correctly. It was, anyway, that's a whole nother can of worms. And I tell my 12 year old son, I tell him, I say, we don't do lazy in this household. Look at dad.

Look at dad. Look how hard he works. You darn right. And that's what I say. The children say, where's dad? I'm like, he's been gone since 5 a.m. this morning. He's out of town making a living. So long story short, right there, that that's the problem right there. When she finds out her husband's going to play back of town making a living. So long story short, right there, that's the problem

right there. When she finds out her husband's going to play backgammon for a living. Hi, Nancy Grace here. Have you ever Googled yourself, your neighbors, somebody at work, a crush? 57% of Americans admit to keeping an eye on their own online reputation. 46% admit to using the internet to look up somebody from their past. But Google and Facebook, the tip of the iceberg when it comes to finding personal information. There's an innovative new website called Truthfinder. It's now revealing the full scoop on millions of Americans. Truthfinder can search through hundreds of millions of public records in a matter of

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right away to start searching. Truthfinder.com forward slash Nancy. Truthfinder.com forward slash Nancy. Find the truth. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Did a stock trader turned backgammon player actually try and frame his nine-year-old daughter for his wife's death and did he try to marry her off a few years later paying a teen boy from mexico ten thousand dollars or planning to pay him ten thousand dollars to marry little anna so she would be deemed no longer a minor so daddy could get control of the $4 million estate left behind by his former wife, Shelley Daniszewski.

Those are the allegations. I want to go back to Robin Walensky regarding him trying to frame their nine-year-old daughter by pinning a fake confession. What did the confession say that we know of? Nancy, Kovlin knows the cops are on to him, so he tries to pin the crime on his nine-year-old daughter. He actually gets on her computer, pretending to be her, and says in this totally bogus letter, all of these years I've been so incredibly afraid and guilty about the night my mom died.

I lied. She just didn't slip. That day we got into a fight about her dating. I got mad, so I pushed her, but it couldn't have been that hard, explanation point. That letter goes on to say, I didn't mean to hurt her, I swear, but she fell and I heard a terrible noise and the water started turning red and I tried to pull her head up, but she remained still. Okay, do you really think those are the words of a nine-year-old little girl to crack detective Stephen Lampley what a little girl nine years old right but she fell and I heard a terrible noise and the water started turning red and I tried to pull her head up but she remained

still who would say she remained still as a nine-year-old little girl. And why would she write that on her Apple computer, Steve Lampley? Sounds like adult writing to me. You're right, Nancy, it is. Of course, obviously, Coughlin wrote it as he's tried to take the heat off of him from everything else he's done. You're correct. The words are suspect right off the bat, especially the ending of the letter that she supposedly wrote. Yeah, she remains still. Hey, I got another

question for you, Steve Lampley. You know about behavioral evidence, behavioral evidence, often called circumstantial evidence or evidence of routine. Now, evidence of routine became a centerpiece in the case of Adnan Syed, which also was the focus of a hit podcast, Serial. Syed convicted in the murder of his girlfriend. Now, there, he always had a routine. He would stay at school. He would go to sports practice practice and he would wait till his

dad picked him up and then we'd go home or go home and meet with his dad. Okay. On the day of the girlfriend's death, he left school. He wandered over to a public library. He spent time there. He did all sorts of things other than his daily routine that he did every single day. That was contrary to his routine. Now, let's talk about this case with Shelly Daniszewski dead in the bathtub. Husband, Rod Covland, he decides to go for a walk at 4 a.m. That was not his normal routine. And catch this this the morning of the walk when he left the apartment building where he lived it really was interesting because for the first time ever he offered the doorman a cup of coffee he offered the doorman a cup of coffee at 4 a.m. Now you may think, wow, what a nice guy. But the doorman says

that this was the guy who scarcely ever even acknowledged his existence. He never said one word to the doorman ever. And this morning of all mornings, he strikes up a conversation and actually offers to go out and bring the doorman back a cup of coffee. Now, that may not be a big deal to you, but Stephen Lampley, to me, oh, I'd have a field day with that in court. A field day. Well, Nancy, there's a couple of things. He went out for a walk. He did change his routine.

He went out for a walk. Well, I'm going to assume that he wanted to try to distance himself from her death a little bit and be gone when the horseman, the daughter found him. And he wants to make it known that he was not there. So he buys the doorman a cup of coffee. See me. Here I am right here. I'm not upstairs. I'm not around my soon to be ex-wife. I'm here having coffee with you. And then also when you look back at the, for instance, I think it's the Scott Peterson case, where it seems that a lot of times when a spouse kills, especially, for instance, a male, will kill his female spouse, that he wants to clean. He wants to clean the apartment, or he wants to clean the house.

Yes, he suddenly becomes a neatnik. He becomes a neatnik. You know who that reminds me of? Hey, Robin Walensky, remember us covering the Jodi Arias trial where suddenly her fiance, well, her ex-boyfriend, they were no longer in dating. Travis Alexander, he had washed all the sheets everything was clean as a pin except whoopsie Aries's cell phone was in the sheets and it showed shots of his dead body on the cell phone and like Steve Lampley is saying when Scott Peterson when Lacey went missing he suddenly decided he had to do all the laundry and get out the bleach and mop. You know, I applaud all men who want to help with the housework, but why is it always so often in connection with your wife's death and disappearance?

Yeah, all of a sudden, every man is cleaning up the house. It's incredible to me. I just want to make one point, Nancy, about the doorman. I used to live in New York City, and I had a doorman. And let me tell you, the doormen in New York City are like family members. They know your routine. They know everything about you. They know when you come, when you go, if you address them, if you get them milk and cookies at 11 o'clock at night because they sit there 24 hours a day. So the fact that this doorman said that he's never engaged with Rod and then magically he's buying him a cup of coffee, that is extremely odd

behavior. And I'm telling you, if you want to know something about someone in a New York City apartment, Ask the doorman. That's right. That's right. Ask the doorman. And he went out of his way to be seen and to be noticed.

Now, think about it. The little girl, now on her computer, is apparently in her writing, in her talk, that she killed her mother after an argument. But that didn't wash. Take a listen to this. Stunned. That's how Rod Coughlin's attorney says his client is feeling right now. That after six years, the father of two just moments ago faced a judge here in lower Manhattan

and was officially charged with second-degree murder. Nacoblan did enter a not guilty plea and at this hour is being held without bail. Now, back in December of 2009, authorities maintain he killed his wife, Shelly. The couple's then nine-year-old daughter found her mom's body facedown in the bathtub of Shelly's Upper West Side apartment.

They have two kids together, and at the the time the pair was going through a bitter divorce and custody battle. He lived in a separate apartment down the hall. Now for religious reasons, Shelley's was buried the next day. Initially her death was ruled an accident that she slipped and fell in the bathroom. Months later the victim's family had her body exhumed and authorities then ruled the death a homicide by strangulation. Well, yesterday morning, police arrested Kavlan in Scarsdale at a Metro North station.

His attorney says his client was on his way to visit his kids who now live with his parents. In the back of his mind, he did not know this day was going to come. It was right from the beginning. He said he did not commit the crime and people should understand right from the beginning, he said he did not commit the crime. And people should understand right from the beginning, he cooperated with the police, with investigators. He spoke to them for hours on end. So yes, he's stunned because based on the cooperation, based on what he told them, based on the lack of credible evidence, he never thought it would result in him being formally charged with murder. Rod Kovlin was living in a quiet neighborhood here in Westchester, would often take Metro North here to Scarsdale to visit his two kids who now live with his parents. But after six long years, his world was just turned upside down and he never saw it coming.

Mr. Kovlin is stunned. He's stunned by what has happened. After six years of truly believing he was free and clear, living in his home in New Rochelle, convinced he was not a suspect in the death of his wife, Shelly. Today, Rod Kovlin seemed dazed as he sat in a courtroom now charged with second degree murder. Shelly's sister, Eve, also listened

as the man who was once part of their family entered a not guilty plea. In the back of his mind, he did not know this day was going to come. It was right from the beginning. He said he did not commit the crime. The 42-year-old's house of cards came crashing down here at the Metro North Station in Scarsdale yesterday morning. Coughlin stepped off a train and was cuffed. Back in 2009, at the time of Shelly's death, the pair lived in separate apartments in this building on West 68th Street. They were going through a bitter divorce. But on New Year's Eve, the couple's then nine-year-old daughter found her mom dead in a bathtub.

You are hearing from our friends at ABC7 in New York. So after six long years, the tide has turned and it only really turned after the defendant, Rod Collin, the husband of Shelly Danishevsky, tried to gain control of Shelly's $4 million that she had worked so hard to save while he played backgammon. And it all really erupted when he tried to blame his daughter, Anna, and when he tried to marry her off to a teen boy from Mexico, trying to pay him $10,000 to marry Anna so she would be deemed no longer a minor.

That's when it all changed. To Robin Walensky, Crime Stories investigative reporter and author of Beautiful Life, the CSI, behind the Casey Anthony trial, that really wasn't the extent of it, the full extent. And I don't know if this is appropriate for a jury to hear because it touches on other crimes not the the murder of Shelly Daniszewski his wife but is it true that this guy this husband Rod called the backgammon master tried to he hatched a plan to kill his own parents.

And not only that, tried to convince the little girl, his daughter Anna, to accuse her grandfather, his father, of molesting her. This guy is so sick. He keeps dreaming up plot after plot after plot, all with the intent, Nancy, of getting his hands on the money. So he wants the little girl to say that her grandfather is molesting her. And he kind of tells her a way to get into all of that, that it would be real, that if a medical examiner looked at her, they would say, hmm, well, you're really young. And it looks like you've been having intercourse. To put it in a nutshell, he allegedly tried to explain to his daughter how to break her own hymen and appear that she had been molested. So, I mean, aside from trying to get his daughter to level completely untrue claims against his own dad, which reminds me of the Casey Anthony trial,

that's not unheard of. I mean, Kathleen Murphy, you're the family and divorce lawyer. You've certainly heard of parents trying to force their children to fabricate false claims. Unfortunately, Nancy, I feel very confident that I have one of those situations right now. And you have to look at the facts before those claims are made. The facts surrounding what's going on in that at the facts before those claims are made the facts surrounding what's going on in that family's life before those claims are are made and and look to see whether there's a motive a motive to get leverage in a case i see that and and that's not to discount believe the children but if these events are going on and there are other circumstances, such as him attempting to write this letter that shows that the child didn't write the letter. letter and then having her fabricate a statement made by the grandmother or a statement from or a

statement about the grandfather you have to look at what's going on in court what's going on with the family around it what's yeah and potential motives to dr brian russell psychologist lawyer host of id's fatal vows that is the worst trying to drag your child into it and force them to fabricate claims of a molestation by his own dad. And I'm guessing, Dr. Bryan, that if he had used her computer to make up a false confession that she killed her own mom at age nine, he probably had this written out somewhere. Possibly. Possibly, possibly. I think the overriding point for me is you've got a guy here who was willing to throw his wife under the bus, literally, so that he could, you know, play around, play games instead of working and see other women and still benefit

from her money. And then he's willing to throw his daughter under the bus when suspicion turns to him as maybe being a murderer and also to gain access to whatever money was left to the daughter by the mom. I think that was really the strategy to get the money. I don't really understand this thing about the marriage. Usually when a kid gets married is when they do get access. When they become independent and they reach a certain age, they get married, something like that, is when they do get access, when they become independent and they reach a certain age, they get married, something like that. That is when they do get access to the money. And until then, when they're a minor is when the surviving parent controls it. So I don't really understand

that part. But then here he is willing to throw his own parents under the bus, either by killing literally or by having the granddaughter accuse them of, accuse the grandfather of molestation. So this guy is a textbook illustration of what is at the core, the personality trait at the core of a sociopath, and that is entitlement. I am entitled to do whatever I need to do to get what I want and everybody else be damned. I want to talk about the forensic Steve Lampley, because if they can show this little girl did not write her so-called confession on her Apple computer, then you got to figure out who did. How forensically can you prove she did not write it?

Well, it's going to take, when I was doing undercover online catching pedophiles. A lot of this information is going to come from the forensics people who deal with the digital data. They will go in there and analyze the date, the time that the entry was made. Now, there'll probably be a linguistics person, I would imagine, at some point that would look, as we talked about earlier, that would look at the wording of that note as well. The trial of the so-called bathtub killer is going on right now. Straight out to CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter Robin Walensky. What's the very latest? Nancy, Rod Kovlin led into the courtroom in handcuffs. He's dressed in a light gray suit, striped shirt, and striped tie. Kavlan on trial in Manhattan for murdering his wife, Shelly, who was killed back on December 31st of 2009. This happening in her upscale

Upper West Side apartment in New York City. Now, on the first day of the murder trial, prosecutors laying out their case, saying that Rod staged his estranged wife's death to make it look like an accidental drowning in her bathtub. Prosecutors believe Rod, a Taekwondo expert, snapped her neck. They say he played professional backgammon while his then-wife worked a high-powered job down on Wall Street. And then he plotted for months to inherit her money, millions of dollars, 5.2 million to be exact. And then, on the day before Shelley was to write him out of her will, she's found dead by their young daughter on New Year's Eve. Now, this case was unsolved for a period of time.

And this is because an autopsy was never done because the family is Orthodox Jewish and doesn't believe in it. But Shelly's parents grew suspicious, Nancy. They had a change of heart, agreeing to have her body exhumed. And then the M.E., the medical examiner, determining that Shelly was strangled and had a broken bone in her neck. Defense attorney Robert Gottlieb telling jurors that the broken bone from Shelly slipping and falling in the tub. And he claims police botched this investigation. We wait as justice unfolds.

Will the murder of Shelly Daniszewski be vindicated? Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.