Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Twisted tale: Respected doctor suspected in murder of beautiful DJ wife

Episode Date: January 12, 2018

A New Jersey doctor is facing charges of murdering his wife to cover up an illegal drug ring he allegedly feared would be uncovered by their divorce. Nancy Grace digs into the case against Dr. James Kauffman in the 2012 murder of his wife April Kauffman, who was a popular radio host. Grace's expert panel includes Southern California prosecutor Wendy Patrick, forensic psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Bober, private investigator Vincent Hill, Crime Stories cohost Alan Duke and Crimes Stories contributing reporter Chuck Roberts. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, now online at CrimeOnline.com and on SiriusXM 132. A beloved radio host, an alleged drug ring, a pagan motorcycle gang, and a murder for hire. I feel like I'm living like the worst TV movie that you can't even make up these details and someone would believe it and this is my life. He has a weapon. Drop the gun. Drop the gun. Hey, drop the gun. Drop the gun. Sir. It's so surreal because I've been waiting for this for five years. She's young. She's beautiful. She has a gorgeous daughter, a happy family, an incredible home. It looks like it's out of a magazine. And just to top it all

off, she's one of the most famous radio DJs in a top 10 city as far as media goes. I'm talking about Philadelphia. She's married to a husband, a well-known endocrinologist. I mean, it looks, how could you even write a story, a success story like that? April Kaufman, until she's found dead. We have been on the case from the get-go. Has the case cracked wide open. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. I want to start at the very beginning. Let's break it down and put it back together again. Chuck Roberts, Vincent Hill, Dr. Daniel Bober, and Wendy Patrick with me, along with Alan and Jackie, as always.

First to you, Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter. Let's start with the discovery of April's body. Take me back to that day. Tell me what happened. May 10, 2012, the couple, as you said, had a beautiful home, heated pool outside, a 7,000-square-foot home in Linwood, New Jersey, outside Atlantic City. A handyman found her body on... Hold on.

Whoa, whoa. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. 7,000-square-foot home. Yep. Five... Whoa. Five bedrooms, seven baths, in-ground pool in the back.

It was quite a property. He was doing well. He was a very successful endocrinologist. I think my apartment is like 1,200 square feet, Alan Duke. My apartment is like 1,200 square feet and maybe, maybe 1,400. And that's me, David, and the children. And sometimes I am irritated when I have to get up and run down the hall to try to find one of the children. So, okay, let me take this in.

Did you say 7,000 square feet in a heated pool? Exactly. Not bitter. Not bitter. Okay, go ahead. Go ahead. I'm off the house now. I'm moving on to the body. I'm sorry, that just caught my attention. I couldn't help it, Wendy Patrick, Southern California prosecutor. Don't judge me, okay? You know, it was like when

I was prosecuting still, Wendy, I don't know if this ever happens to you, but I would be working on the weekends. Of course, we had no money in the prosecutor's office. If I had asked the elected DA, then the longest serving DA in the country, 37 years, Louis Slayton, I think it was 37, for money, we wouldn't even know what I was talking about. So I would be going to buy my own poster board and markers and blah, blah, blah on the weekends trying to get my opening and closing statements together. And I would be on the floor working or trying to find witnesses and, you know, crack houses and whore houses and you name it. And I would turn on the Martha Stewart show in the background. Okay. And that's the one she had, Wendy, I don't know if you ever saw this, where she, I think she shot it at her real home.

I wouldn't be surprised. I wouldn't be surprised. And it was just beautiful. And she would make, seemingly make something beautiful out of nothing. And I think it was just like a fantasy, like an escape from what I'm doing. So don't judge me, okay? Let me look into their beautiful home for a moment, okay?

No judging. Back to you. Chuck Roberts, I'm off the 7,000-square-foot home in the heated pool. Now, tell me about the dead body. Handyman found the body and called 911. Handyman. Yes. On May 10th of 2012. This is April Kaufman and found her unresponsive. Don't get mad, Chuck. Don't get mad. Wendy Patrick, as a veteran prosecutor, you immediately look

at who found the body. Oh, absolutely. A handyman with access to the home? Yeah. That's a great point. One, no doubt, that was explored very well between then and now, which is interesting that no charges came against him. So it sounds like he was clean. Yeah. I'm sure that's the first thing police did is hone in on the handyman who finds the dead body.

All right, roberts sorry about that go ahead well he reported that she had uh had cuts on her hand when in fact she'd been shot twice uh and uh they responded obviously and found her with multiple gunshot wait wait wait you're going so fast you're going so fast did you say it's like drinking out of a fire hydrant? Hold on. Multiple gunshot wounds, and she's got cuts on her hands. Vincent Hill, private investigator. Vincent, that screams defensive wounds to me, but I'm not sure. What does it say to you?

Cuts on her hands, but she was shot dead, multiple gunshot wounds. Yeah, Nancy, it can either be defensive wounds or it could have been that the handyman saw blood on her hands that she likely held her gunshot wounds, trying maybe to stop the bleeding. And, you know, a lot of people that aren't trained on crime scenes and trained on these types of injuries could misconceive something for something other than it was. So he may have seen the blood. It could have been defensive wounds or she could have been holding those wounds. Yeah. You know what? You're right. I remember with the body of Travis Alexander and a lot of bodies that I represented, those dead victims in court.

There's so much blood. You can't tell what it is. You don't know if, like they didn't know if Travis Alexander at first had been shot multiple times, stabbed multiple times. There was so much blood covering his body. You can't tell. You have to get the body to the ME's, Medical Examiner's Office, the morgue, the coroner's, for them to clean the body and process the body to determine what really happened.

So let's start right there. You know what I love, Wendy Patrick? I don't know if you feel the same way, but I love playing a 911 call because it takes me and the jury back to that moment. And no matter how many times I listen to a 911 call, very often I will learn something new. It might be very small, but I learned something new. Do you feel the same way, Wendy? Absolutely. And you know, the demeanor and tone of voice you and I have probably both used to gauge the authenticity and the veracity of what's being said on that call. There's just so many vocal cues that there's just no other way to be able to discern. And that really struck me in this case,

listening to the 911 call, is he didn't sound guilty. And even though, as has been pointed out aptly, he may have misperceived and misreported what he saw, he sounded like he was telling the truth. I agree with you. Right. I agree, Wendy Patrick.

I mean, here's the deal. 911 calls, blood spatter, you know, I could talk about that all day. Hey, let's stop. Dr. Daniel Bober, please, forensic psychiatrist joining me, please listen along with me to the 911 call reporting April Kaufman, beautiful mom and popular DJ, dead. 911, where's your emergency? Yes, I have.

My boss is down. She's got a cut on her arm. Okay, where are you, sir? 2 Woodstock Drive, Linwood. 2 Woodstock Drive? Yes, ma'am. Okay, hold on. I'm transferring it to the rest of you up, or do you stay on the line one minute?

Okay. Okay, is that 2 Woodstock? In Linwood? Yes. Okay, actually, he's actually calling me. 911 right now, and my partner's going to call me. Yes, my boss, she's lying on the floor in her bedroom, and she's got a cut on her arm, and she's not answering. Yeah, okay.

Who would stop driving? I'm just letting you know that they've already called 911. So it's interesting to me, to Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, who's joining me again. Thank you, Dr. Bober. Dr. Bober, I find it interesting, relationship-wise, that he refers to her as his boss. That's how he says, my boss. And that tells me a lot about their relationship. That it's not very personal.

Seems sort of cold and sort of all business. I think you're right. I don't know that I would call it cold, but I would agree it's a business relationship. And if the handyman is going to kill April, then you would expect there would have been more of a relationship, some anger or something to cause a murder. Again, to me, that rules out the handyman. So this woman, April Kaufman, is found dead. Found dead, shot in the couple's bedroom with lacerations apparently to her hands and arms. Officers from the Linwood PD respond to the call at Woodstock Drive in Linwood. When they get there, what do they find, Chuck Roberts, exactly? That her body is lying face down in the bedroom, and the medical examiner, as you said, was called,

and apparently she'd been shot twice, although the medical examiner reported multiple gunshot wounds. So twice, apparently, is the final verdict on the number of rounds. And then Kaufman, the husband, Dr. James Kaufman, known to his patients as Dr. Jim, by the way, told police he'd been at work and he denied any involvement at all when he got to the residence. So he had been at work. Right. And, Vincent Hill, there were plenty of people to give him an airtight alibi.

He was, in fact, at work at the time she shot dead. Yeah, but here's the thing, Nancy. You don't have to be at the scene of a murder to be behind the murder, right? Of course, anytime you're looking at a spouse you're probably prime suspect number one so you want to remove yourself from that scene as much as you can so of course this doctor would be away from that scene gun down in her own master bedroom this talk show host who had very widely campaigned for veterans is dead in her upscale Linden home. Now, police start the search, the search for a suspect in the murder of this much-loved

DJ and mom. Again, her husband, Dr. James Kaufman, says his wife was asleep when he leaves for work that morning. He heads to work. You know, you can tell based on rigor, rigor mortis, very often how long a body has been dead. Dr. Daniel Bober, based on rigor, they determined that she was in fact shot after he goes to work. So how do you tell that, Dr. Bober? You're not just a psychiatrist.

You're an MD as well. Nancy, what happens is there are changes in the proteins of the muscles that during after death, because there's no blood, there's no perfusion, there's no oxygen, these proteins break down, which cause the muscles to become stiff, which is how you get rigor mortis. So to put it in regular people talk, Dr. Daniel Bober, you stiffen up. You stiffen up. When your blood stops flowing, oxygen is no longer going to the various parts of your body,

and your body becomes stiff. Now, after a number of hours, the rigor loosens up. But in this instance, they could tell based on lividity. Lividity is where your blood is in your body. In other words, you fall flat on your face. All the blood in your body stops circulating and goes down to the lowest level. Yes, cooling. They could tell from that as well because that takes a certain amount of time to do.

Also, you can tell from the temperature of the body. Once you die, your body immediately starts losing temperature and you essentially become the temperature of the ambient room around you. So there's many ways to tell how long she had been dead and she absolutely was shot after the husband goes to work.

Her bullet-riddled body was found at 1130 a.m. that Thursday by a houseworker who called 911. That's what we know. Now, she was shot multiple times in the bedroom. That's about 12 miles away from one of the gambling capitals of the world, Atlantic City. Our investigation into the brutal murder of wife, mother, veterans advocate, and popular DJ April Kaufman. Why did it have to happen? We couldn't do that without our partners. Our partner LegalZoom is making our program possible. And here's my question to you. What will be your story in 2018?

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Guys, we're diving right back into the murder of April Kaufman, because in the last hours, there's been a very big break in the case. Atlantic City, one of the gambling capitals of the world. And coincidentally, not too far from there, this woman is found dead, multiple gunshot wounds in the master bedroom of her home. So we've established a business relationship between her and the handyman. Her daughter is an adult, well, almost an adult, and she has an alibi for that day. I established that. Daughter, very loving, idolized her mom, not a suspect. We've established the husband left that morning before she was shot based on forensics evidence.

He had an airtight alibi. He was at work seeing patients. So what happens? The case seemingly goes cold. Joining me, Chuck Roberts, Vincent Hill, Dr. Daniel Bober, and Wendy Patrick. Wendy Patrick, Southern California prosecutor. When your case goes cold, what do you do? Well, you've got to warm up the cold case, Nancy.

And the only way to do that is reopen it as if it was just assigned to you. You remember the thrill of getting a great new case and it just happened. It's all over the news. It's difficult to recreate that momentum, but that's what cold case units do is if there's a break, it's assigned to somebody and it's worked up as if it were a fresh case. And that apparently is what happened here, which led to the accumulation of evidence that finally was able to get us the breaks that we needed. Neighbors stated that they witnessed Dr. Kaufman distressed, arriving at the murder scene,

telling them his wife was asleep with a pillow over her face when he went to work early, early that morning. I'm just imagining it all play out in my mind. She's asleep. Dr. Bober, forensic psychiatrist. She's got the pillow over her face. He gets up quietly and leaves the house so he won't wake her up. Let's take a look at him.

He was wanting to leave his practice. He wanted, he had been working for years. They had bought a home in Arizona, and they wanted to relocate. So what does this mean to him that he no longer has a wife? What do you go through when you lose a spouse? Not only lose them, but lose them in a violent manner, and nobody knows what really happened. That's pain compounded.

Nancy, we know that the two most stressful things that could happen to someone in their life is the death of a spouse or the death of a child. And people who experience these events are essentially devastated. You would be incapacitated and you probably would not be able to work, not be able to function for a certain period of time. They are in a state of shock and it takes them a long time to be able to even return to life, which as we know, will never be normal. One person seemed to sure who was the killer. And that is April Kaufman's daughter. From the very beginning, she said she knew. She knew who did it. Joining me is Alan Duke in L.A., Jackie Howard with me here in the studio. Alan, the daughter always claimed she knew what happened. Tell me. Yes. And

in fact, she she filed a civil suit against her stepfather. So her husband, Dr. Kaufman, is not the bio dad of the daughter. No, this is her stepfather. So so there you add that layer of it. But she was always suspicious of him. She was pushing for investigators of the prosecutor to do something for years. And finally, when this new prosecutor came on board, it was right about the same time that she had a law firm ready to file a civil suit against her stepfather, which is now pending. So way before cracking the case, the daughter of April Kaufman files a civil suit. Her name is Kim Pack. From the very beginning, she said, I don't care if he had an alibi. I don't care if my mom somehow was murdered after he left.

He did it. I don't know how he did it, but he did it. And I'm going to prove he did it. That is what the daughter said. And she never, ever stopped. So what was uncovered to Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter? How did it unfold? It really unfolded when she asked James Kaufman for a divorce and he wouldn't give it to her. And the tension grew and grew, and obviously the daughter had to be privy to that.

I mean, her mom was in distress. So I did not know, the world did not know that she, April, wanted a divorce, and Kaufman wouldn't do it. I mean, really, if somebody wants a divorce, why do you want them anyway? Let them go. I know you're hurt. I know you're hurt. I know you're broken in half, but who wants somebody that doesn't want to be with them? For Pete's sake, there's somebody else out there. No offense, you men on the panel, but my mother always said men are like buses. There'll be a new one in 15 minutes. Another one will just come right along i'm not suggesting you're interchangeable alan duke don't get all crazy but i mean if she wants a divorce give her a divorce but he said no he he was quoted as saying he didn't want to give

up half of his financial empire and that's what the divorce you know would would entail division of assets. He didn't want to give up half of his financial empire, half of his assets. Well, Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, there's nothing to make a woman feel wanted than to tell her, well, I would divorce you, but I'd lose half my money. You know, that really warms your heart. Nancy, this is something I see in my patients all the time, especially people who have been married for years. A lot of times they'll stay in relationships that are not healthy or they're not, they don't find fulfilling specifically for that reason, because they don't want to lose the money. And it sounds like sort of an evil motivation to stay, but very often that is the motivator. Well, I tell you, that made me a

little bit suspicious when he didn't want to split his income, but that's pretty common. But what really raised the hair on the back of my neck is when he did not want to hand over a DNA sample. That is what made me suspicious. Listen to this. How do you feel about the prosecutor requesting a DNA sample from James Kaufman? You know, I think that I've been waiting for a very long time for any kind of movement, and I feel like I've been in this by myself. So when I heard, just like the rest of the population, that the news had reported that they were requesting a DNA sample, I was overwhelmed with so many emotions I can't even explain. Just for the fact that this means something maybe to this current prosecutor and that there is forward progression. Like I said to you in the past, I can't pretend to know why or what they're using this for.

They keep their criminal investigation very close to their chest. But it's so surreal because I've been waiting for this for five years. To Wendy Patrick, Southern California prosecutor. Wendy, when people refuse to submit to a lie detector or a DNA test or come in for questioning, immediately, that doesn't make them guilty, but immediately to me, it makes them very suspicious. You know, it certainly does. And it's interesting you chose the examples you did because obviously the lie detector test, although it's not admissible in court, it is an investigative tool that we use.

And sometimes it's precisely for the reason you cite. It's because it's credibility that counts in every single case, no matter who you are. Now, the inability or the unwillingness, whichever it is, to submit to forensics, whether it's DNA, whether it's some other kind of a sample, hair, saliva, however you get it, whether or not you've got a constitutional right to refuse, which of course is always being litigated, the fact that you refuse is often a fact in the case. Sometimes something the jury ends up finding out about that makes you look guilty. So you've got him refusing to give his DNA. He has not been named a suspect or a person of interest. There's no way the police can make him give DNA. If you are a suspect, then a warrant can be obtained and you can be forced to give your DNA. The constitution does not protect you from giving,

for instance, DNA or a writing exemplar or coming to a lineup. You have to do that under the law. Okay. But you can, of course, insist on your right to remain silent. But since he wasn't named a suspect, they couldn't force him to give DNA. Over and over, the daughter continued to claim the stepfather is the killer. Still, nothing would make him hand over DNA or really even cooperate. So what finally happened?

A new DA came in, including a fleet of new investigators. The investigators worked the streets and began to hear rumors about irregularities within Kaufman's clinic. Fantastically profitable clinic. To Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter, what happens then? This case was cold for so long, generated a lot of social media. Facebook page Justice for April Kaufman was started. And really not much happened until a new district attorney came on the scene and decided to really dig into this and assign a lot of prosecutors and resources to solving this crime

and took a hard look at what Dr. Kaufman was up to and later found out that he was involved with sort of a pill mill. Who saw that coming? Not me. This prominent New Jersey doctor in the shadows of Atlantic City gambling capital and an illegal prescription drug ring with a motorcycle gang. Exactly. The Pagan Outlaws, which have their biggest chapter in Philadelphia and just across about 90 miles away. Yeah, Kaufman was at the top, according to prosecutors, of a drug distribution hierarchy. And he did it with the help of the pagan outlaws, and they would send him clients, and he would, for $1,000, write them prescriptions for Percocet or any other kind of

opioid that was on the market, oxycodone, oxycontin, and then the motorcycle gang intermediary would resell it using the gang to others on the street. And that went on for years. In fact, it went on for five years. Police, they get a search warrant. But it didn't go down the way they planned. As a matter of fact, there was a standoff. Dr. Kaufman refused to let police in the door.

In fact, he held himself hostage. Yeah, you heard me right. This prominent doctor, he's rolling in money, holds himself hostage with a gun to his head. Listen to this. No. No. I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No.

I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No.

I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. No. I'm coming for you. out. He's coming out. District 5, District 5, we got one at gunpoint. We have one at gunpoint, Dr. James Kaufman. Put the gun down.

5-11, I have one at gunpoint, Dr. James Kaufman. He has a weapon. Put it down. Drop the gun! Drop the gun! Hey! Drop the gun! Drop the gun!

Sir, can I just have a search warrant? Sir! Drop the gun. Hey, drop the gun. Drop the gun. Sir, drop the gun. Drop the gun. Let's talk. Sir, just drop the gun. Sir, we have a search warrant. We have a search warrant. You're not under arrest. Listen, I don't believe it. Yes, we do. I'm not going to jail for this. Sir, we just have search warrants. That's it. Put the weapon down.

Drop the weapon. Listen, let's talk. I'm going to kill myself. I take it, Alan, do you? He did not make good on his threat and kill himself. No, it was a false threat. So, you know, I've always been fascinated, Wendy Patrick, with people that held themselves hostage. It really came to the forefront when O.J. Simpson took that little ride with his buddy, A.C. Cowlings, and had a gun on himself.

I'm like, I didn't get it. So he held himself hostage, Wendy. Yeah, you buy yourself time that way as you try to decide what to do next. We see this in a lot of different types of cases. But it's another incident where you can count that as consciousness of guilt. And, you know, it's different if you are overcome with grief after having lost a spouse, as we've discussed earlier. It is also different when you have reactions other than holding yourself hostage. There's just not an innocent way in most cases to interpret that type of evidence.

And it always winds its way into the trial. And normally in a fashion that doesn't help the defendant. You know, I'm always suspicious, Vincent Hill, private investigator. What if cops said, okay, go ahead, shoot yourself. We're not going to deal with your kidnappers demands when you're holding yourself hostage. I mean, it's like you put the skids on everything when you put a gun to your head.

Right. I don't think police would definitely say that, Nancy, but I think what they were concerned with, although he did have the gun pointed at himself, if you watch the body cam footage, police kept their guns drawn on him because at any given moment he could have turned that gun around and shot police so i think they handled it the way they should have handled it based on their training and based on what i saw in that video oh yeah of course they did the right thing vincent hill because they could easily turn the gun on innocent people in the clinic or on the cops so long story short you got the husband who has an airtight alibi, who forensically could not have been there at the time of the incident, refusing to give his DNA, clamming up, and then

holding himself hostage when cops want to look in his clinic. Who saw that coming? Not me. But this civil lawsuit filed by the daughter, Kim Pack, threatened to expose everything. A divorce threatened to expose everything. If a forensic accountant had gotten into his business and followed the money trail, they would have found this opioid drug ring in a New York minute. Guys, we're diving right back into the murder of April Kaufman, because in the last hours, there's been a very big break in the case. But I want to switch gears. Everyone is talking about superfoods. I read about it in every magazine.

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To Dr. Daniel Bober, you're the forensic psychiatrist. How does a prominent, rich, educated endocrinologist get hooked up with the pagan outlaw motorcycle gang? Can somebody tell me that, Bober? Nancy, you know what? There's this book called Sharks in Suits, and it talks about how even the most successful people, in fact, some of the most successful people are just antisocial. They're just evil. They are cunning. They don't have remorse. They steal. They lie. They cheat. And very often that's how they become successful. So this story doesn't surprise me so much. It just shows that you really don't know what's going on under the service. And there's a lot of wolves out there in sheep's clothing. If I had had any idea, Wendy Patrick, veteran prosecutor in Southern California,

that this doctor was hooked up with a motorcycle gang, no offense to motorcycle gangs. I've put many of them on the stand as witnesses, and they were very believable. But if I had known he was hooked up with the pagan outlaws, I would immediately try to connect the two in this murder. So, Wendy Patrick, is that how he did it? Yeah, you know, it's so interesting. We've got Dr. Bober talking about one of my favorite books, Snakes in Suits, which is about psychopathy in the workplace. Fascinating.

And we've got the motorcycle gang, which is a stereotype. So you look at the two and think there's got to be some connection beyond what meets the eye. And you wonder if maybe this is what April knew. And for her, of course, justice delayed has not been justice denied. We now have a murder charge. But she knew she could tell whether it's based on these associations or the dynamic she saw behind the scenes that her stepfather didn't need to have been there to have been behind the attack. So his affiliation with the motorcycle gang was definitely a red flag out of the ordinary, something to be explored for sure, and actually did end up coming to fruition and giving us the context that we now find really did play a role in the murder.

To Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter. Chuck Roberts, how did it all go down? Was the doctor connected to a motorcycle gang through the illegal drug ring? Exactly. That's the connection. And apparently that was uncovered as a result of the raid on the doctor's office back in June. He was hooked up with a guy named Ferdinand Augello of the Pagan Outlaws, and then solicited, because he was being threatened by his wife for exposure, a hit on his wife through the Pagan Outlaws. And Augeugello recruited at the end of about an 18 month search an associate of the pagan outlaws, a guy named Frank Mulholland, who police say was the one who entered the home and shot April Kaufman.

Wow. So according to the daughter, Kim Pack, this is how he did it. Why are there six pagan outlaws charged, including two women? Chuck Roberts, what did they have to do with it? Well, one of them, the wife of Augello, who is 15 years younger than her husband, and who was a successful businesswoman herself, was the paymaster. The police say that she was the one who delivered the $20,000 payoff to the hitman Frank Mulholland.

So that's her alleged role in this. The others were just involved in supplying a regular supply of clients to the doctor who would write these phony prescriptions for Percocet and OxyContin and Oxycodone at $1,000 a pop. They supplied him with those customers, basically, and they are part of that same criminal conspiracy. You know, another thing that happened i mean it all goes back in my mind to the love of money not money as the root of all evil the love of money because this guy would not divorce april because he didn't want to give up half his empire

if he had he'd still be in his practice running his drug ring right now, living in his 7,000 square foot mansion with a heated pool. But no, he did not want to split the money. He then, as soon as his wife died greed, his greed, his love of money. So I want you to hear this, the press announcement that so many people had been waiting for. Listen to the Atlantic County prosecutor, Damon G. Tyner. Today, James Kaufman, age 69, and Ferdinand Augello, age 62, were charged with murder in connection with the death of April Kaufman. In addition to racketeering related to the illegal distribution of narcotics through Kaufman's former medical practice. Additionally, Augello was charged with conspiracy to commit the murder of James M. Kaufman.

Upon information and belief known to my office, an individual named Francis Frank Mulholland was paid a sum of money to kill April Kaufman. Almost 18 months after April Kaufman's murder, Frank Mulholland died in October of 2013 by, at the use of Kaufman's medical practice for illegal drug distribution. This relationship ultimately culminated on May 10, 2012, with the murder-for-hire of April Kaufman. Prior to 2011, defendant Kaufman and Ferdinand Augello had a relationship which centered around the medical practice. And in the summer of 2011, James Kaufman solicited Augello to murder his wife. So I want you to hear this. This is Kim Pack, her daughter, speaking after the blockbuster announcement, her stepfather has been charged in her mother's murder.

Listen to the daughter who said earlier, my life was changed forever that day. As you can imagine, today is a very, very difficult day for me. A lot of mixed emotions. As a victim, you know May 10th 2012 forever changed my life. I have been waiting patiently for justice and today I was lucky enough to be granted justice. I do understand that this is going to be a long process and this is by no means over. I do understand that this is going to be a very long process and this is by no means over. I think for the first time today, I can actually breathe. For the past five and a half years, I have felt like I've been holding my breath on a daily basis. I couldn't even begin

to describe to you today the emotions that I feel. I feel like I'm standing before you and I'm shaking. Wendy Patrick, I don't know about you, but I remember I hadn't been at the prosecutor's office too, too long when I got called to the DA's office and I walked in, he was reading the paper. I said, Mr. Slayton, and I wouldn't dare sat down for Pete's sake. I just stood there and he lowered the paper. He goes, yeah, Nancy, I got a case. I need you to put it back together. It got reversed. It's named Hamilton.

Yes, sir. I left. I had no idea. This case occurred many, many years before, before I even entered law school. Two guys gunned down the brother of an Atlanta police officer as he was on his back terrace with his fiancee toasting their engagement. That just happened. And the case was in such disarray, I went to the evidence room. I mean, the case had been tried, won. The people were sentenced and had gone up on appeal three times.

And then it came back down. 14 years had passed. And I could find one x-ray and a hat that said, kiss my bass. That's all the evidence I could find. And that's where I started putting together the case. Okay. Putting together a case that has been languishing is very hard to do, but this prosecutor is doing it, Wendy. That's right. We often say cases, unlike fine wine, do not improve with age, especially when you have all kinds of

evidence from different places that need to be put together. But when we warm up cold cases like we did here, with a fresh set of eyes, with fresh motivation, as we saw from this prosecutor, it often leads to the determination of maybe even additional forensic evidence we didn't know we could obtain back then. Because while cases might not improve, forensics have. And we've mentioned DNA. There are so many different ways that you can take these facts, put them back together. This actually a case that wasn't that old, thankfully, and breathe new life into it to be able to put the facts together as has been done here to provide some justice for the victim's family. I'm looking at the faces of these six pagan outlaws and I guarantee you, I guarantee you,

Wendy Patrick, at least one of them doesn't want to go down for life without parole. And that's going to be the crack, Wendy. You've got six people looking square in the camera at their mugshots. And if it were me, I would start with 35-year-old Tabitha Chapman. She looks weak. The other woman is the wife, the paymaster that Chuck Roberts told me about that would make the $20,000 at a clip deliveries. She ran the money side of this drug ring. No, I would send her to jail for life without parole. But there's six to pick from. There's no way I would let off the people key in her murder.

But if somebody would crack, you only need one. You just need one. Am I right, Wendy? One witness. You're right. And your analysis is right on the money, too. You've got to look at each one individually, their level of culpability, how likely it is they'll cooperate with you, and what they can give you evidence-wise. You know, there's no sense flipping somebody that doesn't have evidence powerful enough to help you make your case.

All you do is you're giving somebody a lighter sentence, but you're not getting anything in return. That's the dance the prosecutor is going to have to do with each of these defense attorneys, is how can they strategize a result? That's a win-win as much as can be expected under the circumstances. I would not take a cheap plea on this bunch. The husband would definitely go down for life without parole. Sadly, there's no death

penalty in New Jersey. That was abolished by the governor in, I guess, 2007. So I guess you can just kill as many people as you want to in New Jersey. You don't have to worry about the electric chair or the needle. I am waiting for justice to unfold. And this is another thing I learned, Wendy, which you may have experienced too. You know, when I first started prosecuting, I thought, I'm going to get the bad guy. I'm going to put him in jail. I'm going to fix this. This is really fairly soon after my fiance's murder.

And somehow by fixing other people's problems, it kind of helped me fix mine. But it was really just a Band-Aid because every time I would get a conviction and a jury would convict, I'd turn around. Nobody was happy, Wendy. This daughter is not going to be happy even if Kaufman is convicted. She doesn't have her mother, Wendy. Yeah, you know, there's a measure of closure that comes with conviction and even with arrest, because she's known for years that he was guilty, is her story. But it doesn't bring them back. And, you know, her emotional words are touching. Our hearts break with her as she recounts how she's been waiting for years. But at the very least, she has the knowledge and the comfort of knowing that he didn't get away with it. And Nancy,

that is part of the healing process, is knowing, as I said earlier, Justice DeLay has not been justice denied for her. It doesn't bring her mom back, but does give her the comfort that her stepfather didn't get away with it. He may have been very comfortable in his practice, made a lot of money. He's certainly not comfortable now in a jail cell. Tell it. Tell it, sister. Here's the thing. Another thing it does, a prosecution, is it makes you know you're not alone, that somebody cared enough to fight for you, to do the right thing, to not give up. And in those moments of despair, loneliness, grief, bereavement, that is a consolation that somebody else cares enough to fight.

I want you to hear Kim Pack, her daughter. I have a lot of mixed emotions inside, but I am going to the police work, to the prosecutor's office, and allow them to do what they need to do without really speaking too much or giving my opinion or interjecting how I really feel. I just want them to do whatever it is in their capacity that they need to do to get this murder solved so that I can get my life back and move on with my life and look up to my mom and just say,

Mom, I did everything I could for you, but now it's time for me to figure out what's next for my life and look up to my mom and just say, Mom, I did everything I could for you. But now it's time for me to figure out what's next for my life. Nancy Grace, Crime Story, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.