Crime Weekly - S2 Ep91: Connie Dabate: The Fitbit Tell-All (Part 3)

Episode Date: September 16, 2022

It was December 23rd, 2015, the morning before Christmas Eve, and most residents of Ellington Connecticut were getting their last minute holiday tasks completed before the season went into full swing. Richard and Connie Dabate got their two young sons on the school bus and then got ready to do their own thing for the day.  By 8:30 AM Richard was headed to his job as a computer network administrator in Bloomfield, and Connie was getting dressed for her spin class at the local YMCA. It was a normal weekday morning, like any other, but within just a few hours, tragedy would descend on the quiet, upscale neighborhood that the Dabate family called home. By 10AM, 39 year old Connie Dabate had been shot twice and was lying dead in her basement, and her husband Rick was found by first responders tied to a metal folding chair. He claimed a masked intruder had attacked him and then murdered his wife, and for months the community mourned the loss of Connie. Everyone wanted to know who could have done such a terrible thing to a young mother, a woman who didn’t have an enemy in the world. There was very little information coming from law enforcement; all they said was that the community had nothing to fear, but people still had a lot of questions. It would be over a year before anyone would have answers, however, and during that time a case was built on following the money, the secrets and the electronic paper trail which would lead to the shocking conclusion and the answer to who could have done something so terrible to Connie Dabate and her family. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod Ads: Go to dailyharvest.com/crimeweekly to get up to forty dollars off your first box! That’s dailyharvest.com/crimeweekly for up to forty dollars off your first box!  Right now, BÉIS is offering our listeners 15% off your first purchase by visiting beistravel.com/crimeweekly  Head over to Outschool/com/crimeweekly and use code crimeweekly to learn more and save fifteen dollars on your child’s first class.  Claim your SPECIAL OFFER for MagellanTV here: https://try.magellantv.com/crimeweekly. Start your free trial TODAY so you can watch Murdered On Honeymoon about newlywed Anni Dewani who was kidnapped and murdered on her honeymoon, and all of MagellanTV’s other exclusive true crime content: https://www.magellantv.com/video/murdered-on-honeymoon

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek Levasseur. So today we are diving into the third and final part of the Rick and Connie debate case. And before we do, though, I want to mention that we talked a little bit. Was it the first episode or the second part? It was the second part, right? Of what? Talking about what?

About like your pajama pants, your Superman pajama pants. That was, I think, the second part because we, yeah, I wore the t-shirt. And so Derek said, if we get 10,000 likes on this video on YouTube, then I'll wear the pajama pants and I'll show you guys what they look like. And I think he said that because he didn't think we were going to get 10,000 likes, but we absolutely did. And he posted this. So he says to me when we get on here to record, he's like, did you see I posted the picture? And I'm like, no, I didn't.

And he's like, oh, yeah. And I said, oh, on your Instagram or on crime weekly. And he said both. So then like 10, 20 minutes goes by and I'm looking and I'm like, Derek, you didn't post this on Instagram. And he's like, I put it in my story. And I said, that's cheap. That is real cheap. But you know what guys don't worry. Cause I screenshotted it and I'm going to put it in our community page on YouTube so that everybody can see it. You would do that. I grossly underestimated you guys. I was, when we were coming up with a number, I was coming up with a number. It was spur of the moment. I just looked at our last couple of videos quick and they were all under 10K.

So I'm like, great. But we've hit 10K before. Just it's further back. I just didn't get there. So I grossly underestimated what you guys were willing to do to see me in my pajama pants and you hit 10K or it was already at 11k in one day so i definitely screwed that up but i'm a man of my word and i uh took the photo i rolled out of bed took the photo mirror selfie there it is in all its glory it's up there for you we'll throw it up right now you can see it there it is and i

threw on the t-shirt too so i'm matching matching. And yeah, those are my Superman PJs. And go ahead and enjoy making myself look like a fool. Enjoy, because by the time you hear this, it won't be there anymore because he posted it in his story and it'll disappear. That's right. That's why I've got to put it up on the community page, you know, for all of the listeners who aren't following us on Instagram yet. But if you're not following Crime Weekly on Instagram, you definitely should, because who knows when Derek's pajama pants are going to make an appearance again.

Well, the next thing we do, it's got to be you actually, not me. It's got to be something you have to do. I just sold my soul. So now we have to come up with something that you got to do. And we got to make it like I was saying on my story, it's got to be like 50K likes. It's got to be something crazy.

Nobody's going to do that though, because they know I'll do anything do 25 man i'll do anything you ain't got to give me no likes i'll do anything i'm cheap man i'm cheap you're you're far more discerning than i am no comment all right so just a quick recap before we dive into this week's episode because i thought last week's was a really fascinating uh part of case. We talked a lot about forensics. We don't always get that in every case. Some of them are unsolved and some of them just not a lot of public information out there about it. But I really do think knowing that, and again, stop me if I'm wrong on anything, because as far as the forensics are concerned, but we have an unknown DNA on the gun itself. That's a big question, right? We have, and I always got a little confused with this. We have DNA from Rick

on the firearm and DNA from Connie on the firearm, but also DNA from another unknown individual who was not matched to any DNA profile in the system, then we have no fingerprints on the gun. And that was like the question that was brought up, right? That's the big thing that, and I get that right, fingerprints versus DNA, what we had, what we didn't have. Yeah. It basically felt like there was a bunch of DNA all over everything, but no fingerprints on anything. Right. And then the second part of this was the ballistics. Well, there was three parts. There was the blood spatter, which I think was kind of self-explanatory. It implicated Rick even more. It doesn't take a lot of research to figure out what we have,

low velocity blood spatter, things like that. But the thing that we really talked about that I thought about a lot over this last week, and I have a theory. I'm going to save it till the end, but I feel pretty confident about it to be completely honest, was the three shots. We had the shot that went into the floor of the first floor. We have the shot to the stomach and then a shot to the back of the head. And we were going over some different scenarios. I had threw some ideas out there. Seems like there might be some truth there.

I think with everything we know from the forensics coupled with what you're going to go over tonight, we can probably come to some reasonable assumptions that would make sense based on the evidence we have. So that's kind of what we covered last week. If you didn't listen to that episode yet or watch it yet, please watch that first because just taking a quick look at the electronic timeline that Stephanie's going to go over tonight, knowing the forensics first will help tie this all together. Absolutely. I agree. And we talked a little bit about who knew there was issues in the marriage.

It seemed like some people, mainly Rick's friends, were like, oh yeah, there was some issues. But everybody who knew Connie, her family, her friends said we didn't really know anything was wrong and Connie didn't talk about, you know, getting a divorce or having issues. But although Connie's friends and family had no idea there was issues in her marriage to Rick debate, it did seem that Rick was being very vocal about their marital issues to the people that he was speaking to. Detectives interviewed several friends of Rick's who gave some insight into not only what Rick was saying

in the weeks and months leading up to his wife's murder, but also what he was doing. The electronic evidence would also give some context into what kind of person Rick DeBate was and where his priorities lay. On January 11, 2016, detectives talked to a friend who had known Rick since junior high. This friend claimed that Rick and Connie were having problems and Rick had told them in March of 2015 that they were going to counseling. This friend had seen Rick and Connie together several times and during those visits, the friend saw no sign of marital issues, describing them as a normal and good family. This friend did not know that Rick was having an affair, but they did describe him as having a temper, being very energetic, and being someone who would

spout off at the mouth if he was upset. Another friend of Rick's who had known him since junior high told detectives that Rick and Connie didn't have the happiest marriage because Rick was very laid back and Connie had a type A personality, which meant Rick didn't get a lot of time to himself to relax. This friend also claimed that in June of 2015, Rick had confided in them and said he was thinking about getting a divorce. Rick also told this person that he'd been having an affair with Sarah and that she was 10 weeks pregnant. Rick said he did have feelings for Sarah, but he also loved his kids and he was so worried that Connie was going to find out about him and Sarah and then divorce him. Another friend of Rick's had visited Rick at his home after Connie's death and Rick had gone over the events of December 23rd

with him. So Rick has this friend over after Connie died, and Rick's sort of talking about what happened in the house when Jack the intruder came in and was chasing them around the house and all the stuff that happened in the basement. But then Rick had also told this friend that he'd been having an affair with Sarah and Sarah was pregnant. Rick said that Connie had known about the baby and they were all going to co-parent together and Connie was also having an affair with someone else. Now, this friend also happened to know that besides Sarah, Rick was fooling around with some girls from the Electric Blue Strip Club. But once again, according to Rick, whenever he talked to his friends, everything was great. And if it wasn't great, it was because of Connie. Connie was in a mood or Connie was being too hard on him. Connie was the factor

of why their marriage wasn't working out. If you were Rick DeBate's friend, you would know that he was married. You would know he was having an affair. You would know his girlfriend was pregnant. And you would think that everyone involved in the situation was completely happy with how things had turned out, basically. You know, the way Rick was kind of being pretty straightforward about, you know, we're having some marital problems, me and Connie, but I love her. And if she would just stop being like so uptight about money and stuff like that we'd be fine and i have a girlfriend sarah and she's pregnant and connie knows about sarah and we're all having a baby together and everyone in rick's circle of friends would have been like yeah

this is just absolutely the way things are happening because that's what rick was saying yeah and you and that's important to bring that up again because as far as recapping last week we did start to hit on the why. We know the means and opportunity. We really went deep on that with the forensics. But there's also motive here when we think about, was this a spontaneous act or was it a premeditated murder? And when you start to dive into what Rick was doing outside the home, well, then you can start to understand why he would feel he may have to do this and why he's trying to do it when he's trying to do it i think at this point sarah was what about seven months

pregnant yeah she's doing february so the clock was ticking you know sarah's expecting him to leave connie and and be with her especially after the baby's born so he's running out of time here and and and that's probably why he decided to do this when he did. I think he liked having both situations, but he realized that the lies he was telling to both women, they were going to catch up to radar or she was starting to get very suspicious, because, I mean, you can live a double life, but for how long? Right. You know, it sounded like he was and we're going to read some of these texts in a minute, but it sounded like Rick was sort of like spending nights with Sarah. Sometimes it kind of sounded like, you know, they were texting a lot, talking a lot. How long before your wife notices that something's going on, right? And she's going to start getting suspicious. And we talked last episode about how one of Connie's family members had said that Connie knew about Rick and Sarah, that they were friends and that, you know, she was always a little bit uncomfortable with their closeness. Yeah, I agree with you. I was waiting for something where there was, with all the evidence we have in this case, especially the notes app where Connie's basically using it as a journal. I would expect to see some, a journal entry or some type of notes somewhere to say, I believe my husband's cheating on me

or something. And it doesn't seem up to this point, unless we haven't gotten there yet, there's going to be any clear evidence that's indisputable that says, Hey, Connie definitely knew you were having an affair. And it's clear from the way she's talking about it or writing about it that she was not OK with it. But so far, unfortunately, we have none of that. I don't think there is any clear evidence. And even right up to, you know, the day she died, she was sort of speaking to him as far as we can tell electronically, social media and text and stuff in in a in a nice sort of way, like things were okay with them. However, this could have been a conversation that they had a week or two weeks prior where she had found out or she suspected something and he was like, yeah, you know what? It is happening or

yeah, you know, she was flirting with me, but it's over. I'm not doing it anymore. I'm completely focused on you. But he also knew, you know, now that she's caught the scent of it, my life's not going to be easy anymore because she's going to be on top of me now. I won't be able to spend the night away and I won't be able to like be on my phone in secret at all hours of the night. She's going to be paying more attention now that she's suspicious. No, I completely agree. He knew it absolutely could have happened. And I would think she would have mentioned something to one of her friends, but I didn't know Connie personally. So she might've been someone who just compartmentalized things and maybe didn't want to tell others

because it was embarrassing for her, you know? So I could see that as well. Yeah. Cause we already know she was having, you know, second thoughts and wondering, should I be married to this person? But all her friends and family said she never brought it up. She never, they never never even anything was wrong So she definitely seemed to be the kind of person maybe she wanted to keep that to herself

And although Rick was mentioning divorce here and there he also made sure to let everyone know that he was working hard To repair things with Connie because at the end of the day he did have feelings for another woman Sarah But he also loved his kids and wanted to keep his family together The only person he wasn't telling this narrative to was his girlfriend, Sarah, who was convinced that a divorce between Rick and Connie was right around the corner and that she and Rick and their child would live happily ever after. Six days before Connie was murdered, Rick and Sarah were texting about their plans, their future, and their child. On December 17th, Sarah texted Rick, asking, quote,

so what would you like to do tonight on your sleepover? End quote. Rick responded, pillow fight? The next day, Sarah texted Rick, quote, thanks for coming over yesterday and staying. I liked having you here and curling up with you. I could get used to that. I hope you were able to sleep a little. End quote. Rick responded just a few minutes later, saying, quote, Sorry to wake you up at 1.15. I went into work and got in around 5, so I just passed out on my parents' couch. Now I'm headed back to Ellington with the boys. I enjoyed being over there as well. It was nice and relaxing." A few hours later, around 10 a.m., Sarah texted Rick not to be alarmed, but she was going to her OB at 11 for a stress test, saying, quote, we are fine. The kid just hasn't been as active as it usually is, and this is the normal procedure for that.

Babies change their routines, and I'm sure it's fine, end quote. But Rick didn't respond to this text for several hours, and when he did, he said, you know, are you okay? And, you know, get some rest, basically. He said, sorry, you know, I was busy. I was caught up. Are you okay? Get some rest. Sarah responded saying, quote, it's okay.

I figured you were tied up. We're fine. Doctor was glad I came in, but all is well. So not to be a pain in the ass, but do you think you're going to be able to come next week end quote uh so we've we've got you know some key things here she is putting a little pressure on him even if she doesn't realize it because she's like hey you just spent the night well like you're gonna be able to come next week too so she's already planning for the night and i don't blame her for this because she thinks this is a relationship and she wants some investment of time

but he's got a lot on his plate because he's juggling two families and this reminds me so much of scott peterson with amber remember when he went to her house that first like uh that first night it was christmas and he watched her and her daughter decorate the christmas tree and then they fell asleep on the couch together and then the next day amber was like oh it's so nice and he was like i loved it it's so peaceful being in your arms this is so very very similar when you're smiling but you know exactly what i mean right i know i just like when you use your uh your accents and you do it to me all the time too what you're like you're like mimic me and like all of a sudden i have like a completely like high pitched or very low like Eeyore sounding voice. Depending on the moon you're in.

I'm like, that's what I sound like. But you're you're great at it. You just you just transition into it so fluently. Just no problem. Great at just making you sound like Eeyore or too high pitched. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Whatever you're feeling that day changes. You know, because Scott was being a little baby bitch boy. He got a little bit of a high pitched accent there. But you remember, it's like kind of, you know, gross because we know at that point Scott had Lacey at home, a pregnant Lacey, right? And we know that Rick has Connie and his two sons at home. And it's just very, like, you know, uncomfortable to watch. No, it really is. So everything seems to be fine between Sarah and Rick. You know, she seems to be very understanding and all of that. But this shifts a little bit on December 19th and 20th, three days before Connie's murder, when Sarah sent Rick a series of text messages. And they said, quote, Why did you surprise Connie with a trip to Vermont without the kids? And why didn't you warn me? What are you doing, Rick? Are you playing me? Rick responded, quote, What you're reading on Facebook last night was not anything that actually happened.

I will call you later to explain. My uncle that passed away, that's the town. The family needed somebody to go out there and pick up some things at the house. The new owner found some personal items. I dropped the kids at my parents, and it gave Connie and I a chance to work out some items regarding the divorce. She's also not ready to be public on Facebook about. This is certainly nothing romantic. We have a lot to work out, and she was gone all week.

Can't discuss things with the kids nearby. I did get a little depressed last night, so I had to have a couple of drinks to get through. But I was just depressed about being at my uncle's house, not about getting a divorce. A lot has gotten done if you have time after work tomorrow. I can swing by the house and talk, end quote. So Sarah explained to Rick that she hadn't seen anything on Facebook. I think she wanted him to know she wasn't like stalking him or Connie on Facebook. And she says like, you know, you're not a friend of mine on Facebook anymore. Connie's not a friend of mine on Facebook anymore. But a friend of Sarah's had actually brought it to Sarah's attention that Connie had posted that she was going on a surprise trip to Vermont with Rick and without the kids.

And Sarah had told her friend that Connie always made everything seem like it was sunshine and rainbows and that Rick and Connie were trying to keep things cordial for the kids over Christmas. Sarah texted, quote, I have no right to be jealous or angry or hurt. I don't. I shouldn't make you have to explain. I just wish you had warned me. It was more jarring than I expected. To think you were taking Connie away for the weekend? I understand what you're doing. Thank you for explaining it to me. And you shouldn't have to clear every last minute thing by me or explain this to me. That's not how it should be. It was just a very big surprise to be asked why you would surprise And then Rick continues the lie. Because Sarah saying everything is fine, you know, and he doesn't have to explain everything, that's not acceptable. And he feels like he has to continue explaining. So maybe she was being passive aggressive and he knew that, or maybe he's just

got a guilty conscience and he feels like he wouldn't believe his bullshit. So he's got to elaborate and make a more dramatic and like detailed story that she would believe. So he texts Sarah saying, quote, it actually makes more sense than it appears. You see, Connie has a book or something on divorce in the modern times, and we've been going through exercises to get through certain emotional steps. One of the exercises is to actually post something that you normally would when marriage was good on social media, then delete it. It's supposed to be something about putting the past in the past and moving on. I'll explain more when I actually have time to give you

a call, but I'm very optimistic about the next week and a half for real, end quote. So this is ridiculous. He's just like, that's the biggest, stupidest lie I've ever heard. Like, oh, the whole thing, you have to post something on Facebook as if your marriage is good and then delete it to let go and have closure. Like I would have if I was Sarah, I'm believing him way more before he said that. Well, I mean, I agree. But at the same time, he did write for real. So once he said that, I'm like, OK, it's got to be real then. He seems like the guy, right? To say for real. That was serious. Oh, OK. OK. So he's it's for real. Got it. Literally. So Rick and Sarah go back and

forth telling each other how great the other is and how impressively they're navigating difficult situations with compassion and understanding. Literally, like Sarah's like, Rick, you're doing so much. Don't you worry about this. You have so much on your plate. I don't want to be anything else. And he's like, No, Sarah, it is you who's being so understanding and amazing. I can't believe I'm lucky enough to be with somebody who's so intelligent and understanding and compassionate. And she's like, no, Rick, it is you. And I'm like, oh, my God, what is wrong with these people? I can't like they deserve each other. Honestly, sorry, Sarah. I know you're still out there, but there's no way like you should have been building him up to that point when you knew for a fact he had a family at home. You know, he got you pregnant while he was married. And then he's literally taking his wife to Vermont for a trip that she says is like this romantic trip on Facebook. But you believe him. That is just a marriage counseling trick to like leave the past in the past. And then you tell him how amazing he is and how strong and brave he is.

Like, come on. On December 21st, Rick texted Sarah to see how she was feeling that day. And Sarah responded that the baby was moving a lot that morning and she hoped that Rick could still be naughty and make it over that night. Now, Rick responded that he would love to be naughty, but he needed to spend some time with his dad that night. The next day on December 22nd, the day before Connie was murdered, Rick texted Sarah, quote, I miss how comfortable you both make me feel. I've had so much to do this week. I'm not prepared for Christmas, and I had no idea how much stuff is going on. I have not exactly been firing on all cylinders, but I feel recharged after

spending time with you, end quote. So we're going to take a quick break and we'll be right back. So I actually misspoke before break because there was one other person that Rick DeBate wasn't being upfront with about his feelings, and that person was his wife, Connie. Facebook records for the time period of May 2015, when Sarah found out she was pregnant, to January of 2016 show that Connie was having multiple conversations with family, friends, and her husband. In her private messages, Connie never once said the word divorce. There was no mention of Sarah and her pregnancy.

In fact, Connie's conversations with her husband Rick on Facebook were warm, friendly, and affectionate. And on November 20th, Rick had told Sarah that he and Connie were on the same page about getting a divorce. But the very next day, Connie sent Rick a picture of her in a skimpy nightgown with the message, I'm ready for you, big boy. Two days after this, Rick told Sarah that Connie knew about their affair and she knew that Sarah was pregnant with Rick's child. So seeing this kind of laid out, you can see that he's like living this double life. It's not as if he and his wife are on bad terms and he's like sleeping on the couch and they're not speaking to each other. She thinks, Connie thinks that they're doing great.

She's sending him pictures of her in like lingerie telling him she's ready for him. And he's doing it at that point, going over to Sarah and being like, yep, Connie is so ready for big boy to get a divorce from her, you know? And it's very like, it doesn't make any sense. He's truly living a double life.

Him and Connie were fine, it seemed. Yeah, that's right. There's no doubt about it. They weren't going through the steps of divorce. There was no book that they were researching and kind of following along. It was a big farce. I think he honestly, I think he was trying to figure out how he was going to navigate the situation.

There might have even been times where he was like, can I work this out where I can stay with Connie and Sarah's going to be okay with it, or I can be with Sarah and Connie's going to be okay with it. I really do think this wasn't the plan all along. He was trying to appease both women to a certain degree. And maybe in his mind, he thought, maybe I can do this where I'm somewhat transparent and they're basically both okay with the idea of me dating them both. And I think we got to the point we are today because he realized that wasn't going to be the case. That wasn't going to be acceptable. And that's when he started to plan Connie's murder. So I do think the reason he was trying to make Connie happy or lying to her was because he genuinely was hoping there was a world where

Connie would eventually be okay with this. And obviously that wasn't going to be the case. I don't know. Cause he didn't tell her about Sarah at all. You know, it just seems like he's leading her down the garden path and she has no idea what's happening. So I don't know. I definitely think he planned this for a while, but you're probably right. When Sarah got pregnant, he was probably like, well, I got nine months to figure this shit out, you know, and he probably thought that was a long time at the beginning. And then he realized that that time went really quickly. And in the all of a sudden he was kind of facing like a wall. And what do you do? But because think about it. Why? Why? Yeah, I can see being nice to her. I can see being flirtatious and text messages and Facebook messages or whatever. But why are you taking her to Vermont, you know, a couple of weeks, three weeks, whatever it was before? If you know that you're going to murder her at the end of the month, is it to create this this farce for everybody else possibly like to show all he would never kill his wife a month before that they were on a trip to vermont together because they're so in love so it could be that simple right he was doing it so that on social media it appeared to everyone

looking and watching that they were they were on good terms but i do think there's a part of him that genuinely wanted to just do it because he wanted to go with her i do think that he was trying to appease both women i'm sure he was still having sex with Connie. If she's sending photos like that, yeah, they're definitely still having sex. So it's one of those situations where it might sound crazy to you and I, but I think he kind of liked having multiple women. And if it were up to him, he probably would have continued doing this, but the walls were starting to close in on him. And the biggest wall was the baby that was on the way. Yeah. I mean, what if Sarah had found picture that connie sent him she would have been like what is this rick and he's like oh listen the marriage book the divorce book it says like you have to send a picture that you would

have sent when things were great and you were you know having sex so and then you gotta delete the picture oh that that would have been pretty good actually when you said that i'm like that's a pretty good okay if he's going that route go with it i was going to even go for more further than that and say listen part of this divorce is you don't want to leave the relationship feeling like you didn't fulfill whatever needs you had left so part of it is have as much sex as you can just get it all out of your system and and i'm not even enjoying it but again i'm doing it for you and i sarah because i don't ever want to be with you and think about sex with connie again so i for you i'm going to have sex with her five times a day if I have to, because I want to make this work between you and I.

Can I get it out of my system? I could have gone somewhere with that. I'm not going to say there was a joke there. There was a joke there. Of course there was. You set me up good, Steph, but I can't, I'm not going to take the, I'm not taking the bait. That's what a good team member does.

Sets you up for the jokes that you don't take because you're afraid. Yeah. I don't want to offend people. That's okay. I can't, I'm not going to take the, I'm not taking the bait. That's what a good team member does. Sets you up for the jokes that you don't take because you're afraid. Yeah. I don't want to offend people. That's okay. I don't know. We gotta, we gotta find the tolerance of the audience. We have to find the grace of the audience, but for real, he probably would have said something exactly like you just said, you know, and she probably would have been like, Rick, you were so brave. You're so, thank you for doing that for me, Rick. You're so brave. You're so outstanding. What a man. What a man. What a mighty good man. Okay. So, yeah.

Let's keep going. So in Sarah's Facebook messages, she was telling her whole love story to at least two friends. She said that she and Rick had been in love since they were 14 years old. The first time they'd slept together was after Rick and Connie had gotten married but before they had children. She said they didn't have sex again until her divorce in the summer of 2014, and Rick had been promising to file for divorce from Connie in February as a Valentine's Day present to Sarah. Oh, why do women accept so little from men? Why? Anyways, according to Sarah, Rick would tell his wife that he was working late, but instead he was meeting with her. Now, according to Rick, he and his wife had not been intimate for over a year, and he no longer found Connie to be attractive.

Sarah also sent her friend a picture of flowers that Rick had sent her. The card with the flowers said, quote, thinking of you from Superman, end quote. But according to Sarah, Rick was really stressed out about the impending divorce, not because he didn't want it, but because he was worried what everyone would think and what would happen with his kids. Sarah sent a message saying, quote, Rick can't focus on one day at a time because he's worried about his parents, his kids. What will happen if the boys can't stay in Ellington? What if Connie goes off the rails? He's going to lose so many friends. He never thought he'd be the kind of person who would

have people hate him. He feels people will hate him. If his parents reject him for this, where will he live? He's going to be broke. What if Connie doesn't keep working? His family, the four of them, will never be the same. He doesn't know what the future holds for him, his kids, our kid, us. That's the tip of the iceberg. End quote. And therein lies the partial motive. Half of the reason why detectives and prosecutors believe that Rick had killed his wife instead of divorcing her. Basically, he was worried what people would think. He was worried his parents would say, like, you know, this is screwed up, son, that you were married to a wonderful, beautiful woman,

and you had two wonderful, beautiful children, and you had a perfect life, and you went and threw it all away to get some random girl that you knew from middle school pregnant, and we disown you, and we're going to take Connie's side on this. And he was worried that his friends, and, you know, many of them being his're going to take Connie's side on this. And he was worried that his friends and, you know, many of them being his friends as well as Connie's friends would also take Connie's side and he'd be like a leper. I think there's some truth to that. And I can see here where we're going with the next section, but that's one half of it. We know what the other half is going to be. It's going to be, and you're going to get into that. But yeah, he,

and I also think he wants people to leave this situation feeling sorry for him having sympathy for him um being more attentive to his needs going forward because he's the victim here and so there were multiple reasons why if this were the situation it would be a lot better for him than if he had gotten a divorce and then it's later found out that he had gotten a girl pregnant. People are going to be able to do the math. They're going to see when the kid was born and, you know,

go back nine months and realize that at the time when she got pregnant, Sarah got pregnant, Connie was still alive. Not only was she still alive, they were still together. So this was a way around that to some extent, although it's still probably were to raise some eyebrows to most people who have half a brain. So here's what I'm thinking, OK? Here's because I thought about it. I'd like

to think what people what the hell people are thinking, because they don't make sense to us. But there has to be some thought process there. And he doesn't seem like a complete moron. So I'm thinking that him and Sarah are dating and he's thinking like me and Connie can get a divorce and I can still make myself look like the good guy if I just make Connie look like an asshole to everybody. So he's going to go and make Connie seem like the difficult one. And he's like, if we get a divorce, like, yeah, people will be upset and hurt, but at least they'll still think like I tried my best and it was her. But then Sarah gets pregnant, right? Unexpected. And he's like, oh, shit, there's no way I come out of this looking like the good guy now, right?

So he's going to kill his wife. Now, at least if Sarah has this baby and he starts raising this baby, he can convince Sarah that it's a good idea to act like this is somebody else's child who like left her and abandoned her. And Rick is just stepping in being the good guy because now Rick will say, like, Sarah, if you say this is my child, people are going to think I killed my I killed my wife man like they're going to think that I killed my wife because I got you pregnant we can't have that like scandal hanging over us so let's just go with this narrative it's better we can be together we can have everything we always wanted but during the time before Sarah was pregnant Rick thought he could still get a divorce and still come out looking like the good guy as soon as she was pregnant he knew there was only one way he'd look like the good guy. And that was for Connie to be dead. And then he would, you know, have to convince Sarah that in order to make him look less guilty, she's got to pretend

this kid's somebody else's. That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, I don't think you're wrong. I don't think you're wrong. I think the child definitely complicated things and threw a monkey wrench in Rick's plans. I don't think if she was pregnant, I think he stays with Connie for years to come. I think it just keeps on going the way it's going because it's working out for him. He's having sex with Sarah. He's living at home with his kids, having sex with Connie as well. This is a great situation for him. But yeah, unfortunately for him, Sarah gets pregnant and now all of a sudden there's a ticker going off in his head where he knows it's, you know, he has to make a decision soon or he's going to get exposed on all fronts. And it does seem like he did have actual feelings for Sarah. It wasn't just sex. So when

forced to choose, he made a choice, but he made a choice that was self-serving. Yeah. He made a choice that was going to ultimately benefit him and nobody else. Yeah. But he's now, you know, with Sarah being, having a baby, he's like legally tied to her. You know, she can come after him for child support, stuff like that. If it's just her, he can break it off anytime. What's she going to do? You know, she could tell his wife. Yes, exactly. What else is she going to do? She's got him now and he knows that. So, yeah. But obviously, I think that that's the first half of the motive, like coming out looking like the good guy in every situation, no matter what that situation is, the other half would be a motive that's as old as time and that is money. But before we dive into that, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back.

So we know that Rick was good at spending money, even though he didn't make as much as Connie and he wasn't good at saving money. And a search warrant for Rick's financial records showed he had access to six debit cards and one credit card, all of which were found in his wallet after the wallet had allegedly been taken by Jack the Intruder and dropped in the yard. Most of the accounts had both Rick and Connie's name on them, and the statements went to their house at 7 Birchview Drive in Ellington, Connecticut. However, one Capital One credit card was just in Rick's name, and those statements went to a P.O. Box in Ellington that Connie had not been aware of.

Using this account, Rick had been a naughty boy who was up to no good. There was also a Bank of America account in only Rick's name, with the statements being mailed to that P.O. box. Using this account, Rick spent almost $1,500 between April and November of 2015 at the Electric Blue Strip Club in Toland, Connecticut. A text message from one of Rick's friends on November 3rd, 2015 said, quote, you finishing up a lappy at the Blue, end quote. And that sort of explains a $350 charge around that day from the Electric Blue strip club, even though on the credit card statement, it says the Electric Blue Cafe, because I think they do that so that your wife doesn't know it's a strip club, but yet it still is. And Rick also used his secret accounts to book rooms at the Motel 6 in Vernon, Connecticut twice in December of 2012 and once in April of 2015.

And those were rooms for himself and for his girlfriend, Sarah. And as always, in cases where one spouse dies and one is left alive, the detectives followed the money and they found out that at the time of her death, Connie DeBate had about $77,000 in her bank accounts and much more in retirement funds. But over the next 16 months, Rick emptied her bank accounts, he cashed in multiple retirement accounts, and was also on the verge of selling a home that he and Connie had owned in Vernon on Talcott Road. Rick DeBate took $70,292 from Connie's bank accounts. He took hundreds of thousands of dollars from her 401k and drained at least one Fidelity account worth $100,000. We have no idea what he did with that money, but by the time Rick was done, Connie had

$6.42 to her name. And within five days of her death, Rick was trying to get protective life insurance to pay him Connie's $495,000 life insurance policy, of which he was the sole beneficiary. Now keep in mind, they both had life insurance policies, okay? And obviously, they're the beneficiary on each other's life insurance policies. Rick had stopped paying on his life insurance policy like a couple years back, so it lapsed. It wasn't even active anymore. So if he had died, she wouldn't have gotten shit. But she's the responsible one, and she's continuing to pay on her life insurance policy, so he stands to get $500,000 when she dies. And listen, I've said this a million times before,

do not be worth more to somebody dead than you are alive. That's something I think that some marriages, they take out these massive life insurance policies on each other. And I am not trusting anybody that much where if I die, you become a millionaire. No, no, no. Yeah, no, it's a lot of money. And're and just to be clear i think i'm following you but all the spending

most of it that you just discussed was all after her death so once she was no longer in the picture and unable to keep account of where money was going because she seems like she was really up on her finances um he just started spending like crazy. Yeah, but even before. Hundreds of thousands of dollars. So remember she said something like. Yeah, he had the separate account where he was. He takes money from accounts that aren't his. So he was always kind of doing that.

But when she died, he went ham. He drained it. Right. And I'd be willing to guess that he's probably making ATM withdrawals, things like that. And he always has an excuse for it. And that's where she's seeing this frivolous spending. And what he's probably doing is making these withdrawals and saying it's for like video games or whatever the hell he spends his money on but in reality it's probably going to pay that capital

one card that she's unaware of right because you don't have the money to pay it so he she knows what he's probably has direct deposit so she's seeing his checks come in so he has to find other ways to hide the money that he's spending by taking it from the account creating this fictitious explanation as to why he needed that money and that's why she's looking at it going you needed to spend money on what you buy a bunch of stupid shit and in reality he's just paying off his other credit card where all the shit that he shouldn't be doing that's what he's doing it on that credit card yeah she's like rick how many superman costumes do you need man this is like the third one this exactly exactly exactly no there's definitely more to it and it makes more sense now

because we talked about the sports channels and stuff on episode one and i was like oh it seems like if he wanted to but there was probably a lot of weird things or unnecessary things that he was buying and this sports channel thing that she brought up was just kind of the tip of the iceberg. It's like, yeah, Connie has no problem. You have the sports channel. It's the comic book store, the memorabilia, the Superman dolls, which by the way, it's an action figure, not a doll. That's one of those things where that would be okay. But in totality, all the stuff he was spending added up to a lot of money. What I think Connie didn't know is he wasn't really buying a lot of those things. He was using it to supplement his income on the other card that she was unaware of Yeah, obviously cuz I was what he paid those, you know, those debts on those cards

Yeah, can't can't have it coming out as an automatic withdrawal on the main account. So he's got to pay them manually He's got to go to the bank make the payments probably a wire transfer something like that Depending on how smart he is He's got to pay with cash because anything else would electronically, it seems like Connie was really, she was up on it. So he had to kind of go through some hoops to make sure the money just kind of disappeared into thin air. You see it go out of the account, again, probably ATM withdrawals. All you're seeing is how much was withdrawn. And then she's inquiring about it and he has excuses for it, but there's really no paper trail. So she's just saying you're spending a

lot of money and he was just not on the things she thought he was spending money on most likely she would have been more upset if she knew what he was actually spending money on but uh yeah and if if she knew he had these secret accounts right because she's trying to keep track and keep him on track with the accounts that they have together and now he's got these two secret accounts that she doesn't even know about. And in a letter that he wrote to the life insurance company after Connie died, Rake said, quote, I've included what I hope is all the correct information to process my wife's claim.

I'm trying to process this as fast as possible for expense purposes. Please let me know if you need anything else from me. End quote. So he's basically saying like, I need, it's not even a week after she's dead five days he's trying to get this four hundred ninety five thousand dollars which to me is disgusting and he's trying to make it seem like expenses for her death like her funeral and things

like that um but of course you know protective life insurance they denied rick's claim after the police informed them he was a suspect in the murder of his wife. And it's really sad because after her murder, an FBI forensic examiner had managed to locate emails that Connie had written to herself months before where she talked about wanting a divorce from her husband. And Connie said she was sad to have to write these kinds of emails, but she felt that both she and Rick knew that the love was gone. But she still wanted him to move on, find love, and be happy. And she was hoping that she herself could find someone who would love and respect her. It's very sad because if he had asked her for a divorce, she probably would have said, yeah. And she was very fair about it, unlike his selfish ass, because she was a responsible person.

She talked about how they could fix up their house. And after paying the mortgage, she expected a profit of $180,000 that she and Rick could divide evenly. Connie also spoke about the rental property they owned. And she said, you know, we'll keep that. We'll keep renting it out, splitting those profits. And then after the divorce, we can sell it and make another profit of $140,000, which we can then split evenly as well. So she's not going gonna leave him high and dry she's not like screw him he sucks i want to take everything i can from him i may i want to make sure to leave him broken unhappy and i hope he never finds love she's like here's money you know that we can split so you can start your new life i hope you find love i hope you're happy i also

want to find somebody who's going to be good to me and we can go our separate ways. And that's probably what he would have wanted to, except he would have come out looking like the asshole because he got some other girl pregnant. Yeah, I think everything you said, I echo it. I know we talked about the two aspects of why he decided to murder Connie. I do think there may have been a small part of it that was how it would appear to others. I think the major component was this right here. Rick knew that she was the breadwinner. He knew the type of vices he had and how much money he was spending.

And as he was doing the math, realizing if he did it the right way, if they got divorced, he was not only going to have to pay child support for his two sons, but he was also now going to have to provide for Sarah and their child as well. And when he's doing the math, he's realizing financially he's not going to be able to do it. So the only way to exit this situation and come out good financially is to take all the money. Because there probably were conversations or just from his knowledge of Connie where he realized she'll probably split everything with me 50 50 but that wasn't enough it's greed he wanted all of it and he realized that not if she was no longer around not only would he get all the money but he could also file a claim for her life insurance which as you brought

up earlier if you know how much is potential there to get even more incentive to carry this out. So I do think this was the major factor. He wanted to exit the situation, but still be able to support his habits. And ultimately Connie was the ATM. He was using her to, to pay for the things that he enjoyed. And without her, he would have been started from ground ground zero, but also now having to provide for a third child Which uh would have not worked out very well for him So I do think this is the major reason why he decided to go this route He doesn't sound like the type of person who would have cared too much

He would have just lied and tried to manipulate people into believing that he was the good person in the divorce and that he had to leave because she was just unbearable, but the money, when they separate, you know, the cash cow's gone. And he knew that and he wasn't going to allow that to happen. That is terrible. Like, it's literally just like you said, it's greed. It's like, instead of, hey, maybe I should get a better job where I make more money and be a man and take care of my children and take care of myself and take care of like, you know, my new girlfriend. It's like, hmm, how can I get the most from this

person that I've been sucking on for the last like decade? And then how can I just like end her life so that, you know, I get everything, everything. And think about it just from what you've been telling me about Connie. She seems very intelligent and she would have taken him to the cleaners with receipts and backing. I mean, she would have hired a lawyer, obviously, but she would have smoked him. And that man would have been paying out his ass when she got done with him because he could have left. But as soon as she would have realized why he was leaving, she would have had no mercy and she would have left him with nothing. And rightfully so. So that's what I was thinking too.

Like if it hadn't been for the baby, she was being fair. But as soon as she found out he got somebody pregnant when he's married to her, she's like, okay, I was gonna be fair, but now. She gonna cook him. She gonna cook him. Rick's gonna be living out of a box, you know? And he knew that and he realized,

I gotta remove her from the equation because she's way too intelligent for me she's gonna make me look like an idiot and maybe Sarah doesn't even want to be with me at that point because the life we're living right now or the life I'm portraying we're living isn't going to be the situation if Connie gets her way and Connie's gonna get her way so I do think this was the major reason behind it he realized as he's planning out options, there was no story he could tell that was going to involve him ultimately ending up with living the same lifestyle he was living currently with Connie, unless Connie was not there to claim half the money. And unfortunately for her, I do think from what you've said,

that life insurance policy coupled with the assets they had coupled with the money in the bank accounts. These are all reasons he decided to do what he decided to do. And can you imagine, right? Like if it goes to divorce court. Now, Sarah finds out that the whole time Rick was telling her he wasn't intimate with Connie and they were going through a divorce and figuring out how to do it. He's been getting sexy pictures from her and still sleeping in the same bed as her and still, you know, acting as man and wife. And now Sarah's pissed and now he is nobody. And even probably his parents at that point, like Sarah said, would be like, you can't live here, man. You don't have to go home,

but you can't stay here. Right. Another great point. Another great point. I always say it's not a secret if more than one person knows. Well, Rick and Connie knew what was going on in their household. They're having sex. It seems like they're working things out. They're still in a, as far as Connie knows, in a good relationship and they had their ups and downs, but it's good. And if they had gotten divorced, Connie would have exposed all that. Well, how do you quote unquote shut Connie up? Well, if Connie's no longer around, she can't discredit or disprove what you've been telling sarah the whole time so the way you do is by severing that other person that can expose you and then your story is the only story it's sad to say it but that's that's i'm sure these are things that came across as his mind oh yeah i'm sure like i'm

saying like it seems to us like why would you this? But there's a thought process there. And I really like to try to understand what that thought process was, because then you can get a better understanding of people around you in your own life and interpersonal relationships, too. Like, it really helps to kind of figure out what this person is thinking when they make this decision. And I think we nailed it there. Yep. Image, controlling the narrative, and money. Or should I say greed? Because he was going to get money, just not as much as he wanted.

Well, Rick DeBate was arrested in April of 2017. He posted a $1 million bail and he was released until the trial, which would not happen for another four years because originally he was represented by an attorney, Hubert Santos. But Santos sadly passed away in June of 2021. So at first the trial was pushed back because of COVID and then Santos died. So, you know, Rick had to go to trial with two different attorneys, Michael Fitzpatrick and Trent Lalima. Rick DeBate was facing charges of murder, evidence tampering, and delivering a false statement. Now, Rick's attorney immediately moved to dismiss certain evidence in trial, such as, you know, another long-term affair that Rick had been taking part in.

And apparently that was suppressed because I didn't get any information about it. Connie to other people or statements from people who knew Connie speculating on Connie and her belief, like people saying, you know, we can't imagine Connie shooting a gun because she hates guns. And, you know, if Connie and Rick were getting a divorce or if Connie knew that Rick was having an affair and that his girlfriend was pregnant, she would have said something to us. So those kinds of statements the lawyers wanted, you know, removed because they said it was just like speculation and nobody could say for sure if Connie would actually shoot a gun under certain circumstances or if she actually would be okay with Rick getting some other girl pregnant and things like that. And to be fair, that makes sense. It's all speculative. They can't say definitively that that's what she would have done. That's what

they believe. And as far as anything that may Connie have have may have relayed to them it's hearsay so the oh connie told me this well you're not connie so that's hard to get in there as well lawyers are always going to uh object to that and say listen how do we know that she's not here to to to confirm that what she's what you said what you said she said to you is accurate? So more than likely, the judge is going to sustain that objection. Yeah, I think it gives some context, some texture to Connie. But legally, you know, can it stand? No.

But also, I think it's I couldn't tell you one woman I know who'd be like, yeah, I'm totally OK, honey. If you go out, get a girlfriend, get her pregnant. And you know what? If she has the baby, we'll all raise it together. I've been wanting another baby anyways. This way I get to keep my body intact. Yeah, do it. Not one woman. I know not one woman who would be completely OK with that or OK at all with it. So I think that's more like less speculation and more like, duh. No, I mean, it is common sense and I agree with you, but there are women out there that, you know, we don't have to go into that, you know, dive into those weeds, but there are women

out there who, whether it's a celebrity husband, an athlete or something who knows that their husband is sleeping with other women and they have rules in place where it's like, hey, if I don't see no evil, hear no evil. Not approving it, not saying it's okay. But to your point, yeah, most of the time they wouldn't. But there are women, for some reason or another, they're okay with it. And so without Connie being here to say definitively- What do you mean for some reason or another? You know what the reason is. We're talking about athletes who have money. Rick DeBate ain't got no money.

Rick DeBate brings nothing to the table. Okay. He's Superman. He's not. He's a loser. He's a loser. He made no money. He spent all their money.

He's an irresponsible child. Yeah, no, he's a loser. His Superman love is the least of his problems all right so like yeah i guess so yeah put that put that qualifier on it yeah in those cases usually the man the man has something that the woman wants so there's like this transactional element to it where she's living in a you know 10 million dollar mansion so she's willing to look the other way rick doesn't have any of those attributes he He's not doing any of those things where Connie would say. He's not a high value man as the alpha male community would call him. Yeah. I thought you were going to start quoting, what's his name there? The high value man.

Andrew Tate. Andrew Tate. Thank you. He's not a high value man as Andrew Tate would call him. In fact, Rick DeBate probably be in prison right now, like justice for Andrew Tate. Yeah, he probably would. Let's take our last break really quickly and we'll be right back. So a lot of the case that the prosecution had built was based on electronic records, such as cell phone and email timelines, and also Connie's Fitbit, which she'd been wearing at the time of her murder.

But the prosecution also had some clear ideas about what Rick had done, and they believed that he had been heavily inspired by the 2007 home invasion and triple murder in Cheshire, Connecticut. The father of the family, Dr. William Petit, had been forced to take money out of the bank. He was then hit in the head with a bat and tied up, and his wife Jennifer and their two daughters, 17-year-old Haley and 11-year-old Michaela, were killed, and the house was set on fire, but Dr. Petit was able to escape. State's attorney, Matthew Godansky, would ask Rick DeBate during the trial if he'd been trying to create the events that had happened in Cheshire since the case was well known and is considered to be one of the most horrific crimes in Connecticut

history. So obviously Rick would be aware of it. So that is a case where Rick, you know, was kind of describing something that already happened. A man's in the house, somebody comes in, makes this man give him the money, he ties him up up kills his wife and daughters sets the house on fire but the man who's tied up is able to escape and get out of the house it kind of had already happened so rick was thinking like oh it's not too far-fetched people in connecticut will already remember this happening and they'll believe that it could happen again i could see it was there any did we find information that there were he was researching this case? No. Well, that would have been interesting, huh? Yeah. But I mean, like it's a well-known case. We, we have the gist of it. Like I didn't research the case, you know, after

reading about it, I'm not familiar with this case, but I could tell you the gist, you know, guy comes in guy, you know, dad, dad of the house gets tied up. The women of the house are murdered. Guy sets the house on fire, but the father of the house are murdered. Guy sets the house on fire. But the father of the house is able to escape. That's all he needed to know. The prosecution basically laid out all the ways that Rick's story didn't add up. And then they proposed to the jury that Rick was very concerned with the way people viewed him. He wanted to divorce his wife.

He wanted to start a new life with his girlfriend. But he didn't want to be the guy who left his wife and two kids to be with a woman he'd already gotten pregnant. He would rather be the sad widower who had moved on with his life despite the tragic loss of his beloved wife. And the fact that Connie's death would leave him with a windfall of money, that didn't hurt either. On May 10, 2022, Rick DeBate was found guilty of all three charges, and a big reason the jury was so convinced was because they had been presented with an electronic timeline that showed Rick DeBate had lied about almost everything. On the final day of the state's case, an FBI forensic examiner testified that he'd found no evidence that Rick DeBate had even left his home on the morning of

Connie's murder. This statement was based on GPS data from Rick's cell phone, which consistently placed him in the area of 7 Birchview Drive between 8 a.m. and 10.30 a.m. on December 23, 2015. So Rick had not left the house and started driving to work at all. And when he'd sent the email to his boss letting him know that he was going to be late because he had to turn around and check on the alarm. Remember, he said he was like on the side of the road, but computer records showed he was once again at home. And all the records show that both Connie and Rick were home, basically hanging out and doing normal things after Connie got back from the YMCA. So Connie hadn't walked in on a burglary, and Rick wasn't fighting with Jack the intruder in the master bedroom. Cell phone records show that Connie made a phone call from home at 9.18 a.m., she shared a video on Facebook at 9.42 a.m., and she sent a Facebook message at 9.46 a.m., although she never did read the return message, which arrived at 9.50 a.m. During the same time period and going forward, Rick DeBate was playing music on his

cell phone the whole time from 9.04 a.m. to 10.18 a.m. The music most likely stopped at this point at 10.18 because that's when Rick called 911. And data from Connie's Fitbit, it showed that she was moving around for an hour after Rick claimed she'd been shot by an intruder and she was walking casually, not running the way someone would if they were being pursued. So let's go over that electronic timeline and see if we can get a better idea of what happened that morning from this timeline, because the two people that were there that could tell us Connie's dead and Rick will never tell the truth. So let's see if we can piece it together ourselves. All right, so a couple things to lay out before we get started. They have a security system, and the security system has these sensors on the doors. So there's a security sensor on the basement door. There's a security

sensor on the door that leads from the house into the garage. There's also a security sensor that lets you know when the garage door itself is opened, and there's a security sensor on the sliding glass patio door, which leads out into the backyard. So I have a very similar setup. I have security sensors on all of my doors, and I'm sure like Derek probably hears sometimes when he's on the phone with me, if someone opens the door, it goes bing, bing, and there's like a log of when all of those doors open and if they're left open and sometimes how long they're left open so that's that's the first thing our timeline here seems to start very early that morning even though rick said he woke up at like 5 30 a.m he seems to have woken up much earlier because the first activity is 4 15 a.m and and that's when Rick logged on to his personal email. He logs on to his

personal email again at 4.20 a.m., and then at 5.30 a.m., Rick claims he woke up. So maybe that's just when he got out of bed. At this point, Connie's still going to be in bed. Now at 5.47 a.m., the second floor motion sensor registered motion as the family gets ready. So everybody's leaving their bedrooms on the second floor. At 5.50 a.m., Rick logs into his email again. At 6.06 a.m., the first floor entry hall alarm motion sensor and kitchen sensor registers motion and remain active while the family gets ready. So now the people have come from upstairs to the downstairs. That's why the motion sensors on the first floor are going off. At 6.07 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen opens and stays open for 20 seconds. At 6.12 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. So we see this a lot in the timeline too. Sometimes the door will stay open and then it doesn't close right away. When

you hear that it opens and closes in less than 20 seconds, that's usually a sign of somebody going out and then closing the door behind them. Yep. Now at 6.13 a.m., the door to the basement opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 6.15 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 6.16 a.m., the basement door opens, and it remains open until 6.17 a.m. when it closes. At 6.19 a.m., Rick logged into his personal email. At 6.19 a.m. as well, the basement door opens again. At 6.21 a.m., Rick checked his personal email on his Surface. That's the tablet he said, well, not the tablet, the laptop he said he had left behind and he had to go back for. At 6.22 a.m., Rick checked his work email on his Surface.

At 6.56 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen opened and closed in less than 20 seconds. At 6.56 a.m., the basement door closes. At 6.56 a.m., the basement door opens. Now, Connie's basically asleep and in bed through all of this. So Rick's downstairs with the kids, probably getting them breakfast. This is what I'm thinking. But he's doing something. He's going outside a lot and he's going down in the basement a lot and he's like logging in to his email a lot as well. At 708 a.m., Connie used her phone to talk to friends and to send Facebook messages while still in bed. At 7.12 a.m., the basement door closes. At 7.15 a.m.,

Rick said Connie woke up. At 7.23 a.m., Connie's on Facebook at her house. At 7.31 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen door opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 7.34 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen door opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 7.34 a.m., Connie sends a message to friends, including Rick, talking about upcoming dinner plans. This was a potluck. It was basically a group message, and Connie said, Hey, I can't cook, but let me know what you want me to, like, bring, because I'll pick, like, you know, to-go food up, and I'll bring that, so just let me know what you guys want. She was joking around. At 7.43 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen into the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds.

7.46 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen into the garage opens and closes again in less than 20 seconds. 7.52 a.m. is the first activity on Connie's Fitbit. So this means she's getting up, she's moving around. From this time until 8.05 a.m., the records show both movements in steps and distance consistently with small breaks of inactivity. At 7.57 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.03 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.03 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen opens and stays open for at

least 20 seconds. At 8.03 a.m., again, that same time, the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. And at 8.04 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen closes. So it was open for roughly a minute. 8.04 a.m., the sliding door in the kitchen closes. It was open for roughly a minute. 8.04 a.m., the basement door contact opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.06 a.m., Rick signs into Facebook. At 8.06 a.m., at that same time, Connie is stationary, according to her Fitbit, and she's looking at pictures on her phone. At 8.07 a.m., Rick texted his mother asking if he had left his kids' coats at her house. At 8.08 a.m., Rick sent his mother asking if he had left his kids' coats at her house. At 8.08 a.m., Rick sent a text to another friend to see if he'd left the kids' coats at their house.

At 8.09 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. And at 8.10 a.m., the basement door opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.12 a.m., two things happen. Rick's mom texts back saying she doesn't have the coats, and the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage opens. And then from 8.06 to 8.12, Connie's Fitbit showed her a stationary. She wasn't moving. But between 8.13 to 8.34 a.m., Connie's Fitbit does show movement. So that's probably Connie getting ready to go to her spin class. Now, between 8.15 and 8.20 a.m., Rick's seen by neighbors at the end of the driveway putting his kids on the bus, after which the neighbor saw him backing his car up to his house

and parking. So Rick didn't leave and start driving to work. Now, at 8.23 a.m., the garage door leading from the kitchen to the garage closes. That's probably Rick going back in to the house after dropping the kids off on the bus. At 8.28 a.m., the basement door opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. Between 8.26 and 8.42 a.m., Rick logs into his Facebook, his calendar, and his personal email. At 8.31am, the basement door opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.37am, Rick was doing a Google search for long-lasting tattoo ideas. The word tattoo was spelled incorrectly, so he repeated the search with the word tattoo spelled correctly. At 8.38am, Rick was on a website called Odd Stuff Magazine. And then at 8.39 a.m., someone logs onto the Alarm website, so the home security system website, using Rick's logins.

At 8.41 a.m., Rick logged onto his email using his Surface. At 8.42 a.m., Rick reads an article on the Star Wars movie. And at 8.43 a.m., the garage door opened and closed. So I believe this was probably Connie leaving to go to the gym because between 8.43 and 8.45 a.m., Connie's Fitbit showed movement. And then as soon as she leaves at 8.45 a.m., the basement door opens and closes within 20 seconds. At 8.46, the sliding door in the kitchen opens and closes in less than 20 seconds. At 8.46, the Fitbit shows nine minutes of inactivity. This is consistent with the drive from Connie's house to the YMCA. So she's on her way to the YMCA.

But Rick's still doing stuff at the house. At 8.47 a.m., the garage door opened and closed. And then at 8.47 a.m., he armed the alarm system to stay mode. And he used the key fob on his key chain. The stay mode arms the exterior door sensors but disables the interior motion sensors from activating the alarm. This is Rick saying he set the alarm when he left. But if you were leaving, you wouldn't activate the alarm in stay mode. You would activate it in away mode because that makes

the motion sensors in your house stay on. That way, if somebody breaks in through possibly a window that you don't have a sensor on, because you can't have a sensor on all the windows, it would be ridiculously expensive. The house inside is going to sense movement, but you told it you were gone. You and your family are gone. So the house inside is going to know that any movement while you're gone is somebody who's not supposed to be there and it's going to sound the alarm. But Rick claims he set the alarm and he set it to stay. Now, this was the only time the alarm had been armed to stay mode. And it was the only time the alarm was armed in the month of December besides the weekend of 12-5 when Connie and Rick had been in New Hampshire and the weekend of 12-19 when they were in Vermont. So they never set their alarm,

basically. Like, this alarm was rarely ever used. It had never been used in stay mode, which is ridiculous. Like, why have an alarm if you're not going to use it? Especially with all of these motion sensors and stuff. This is crazy. Also, at the same time, Rick logs into the alarm system website using his email and the username and attempts to disarm the system, but it doesn't work. The basement doors opened and then closed. So he set it to stay with his key fob as if he was like away from the house, but he's still inside the house because there's movement inside the house. At 8.49, Rick reads a message from a friend saying she found his kids' coats. And at 8.50 a.m., Rick successfully disarms the alarm on the website.

So the alarm is then, so he does something weird. He disarms it and then he arms it. And the last door to open and close before the system was armed was the basement door. So not a door leading into or out of the house, if that makes sense. Usually if you'd arm your alarm, the last door that would be opening and closing would be one that let out of the house because you weren't there. So you were arming your alarm, but he was still inside. Do we know if there are motion sensors in the basement? Because it looks like he armed the house, but ran down to the basement before it activated. Because it's

usually like a one minute window where when you activate it, you have time to get out of the house before the motion sensors kick on. Is that what I'm reading here where he arms the system, but he's in the basement at the time when he activates it? So there's no motion sensors in the basement, but because we have the door, the door sensor, which lets you know when it's open and closed. Yeah. It looks like he went downstairs and then he was in the basement when he was playing with the alarm, arming it, disarming it, et cetera. Right. Yeah. Knowing that he wouldn't trigger that system because he's inside. Exactly. Knowing that there's no motion sensors there. There are on the first floor and the second floor, but not in the basement. So they're not going to sense motion, but you're still down

there. And the last door to open before you armed the alarm was the basement door, not the door leading to outside the house, which he probably didn't think that anybody was going to look at that. Yeah, no, he definitely, you can tell by all the searches you're doing. And I know we got more to go. He wasn't thinking about this alarm system and how significant it would be at a later date. I will say just side note, why no motion sensor in the basement?

That wouldn't make sense to me, but that's completely irrelevant to this story. Is it irrelevant to the story? Because he set up the to me, but that's completely irrelevant to this story. Is it irrelevant to the story? Cause he set up the alarm system after all that stuff was happening to their vehicle. Maybe purposely there's no motion sensor in the alarm. I mean, that's a point, but usually this,

the, the company has like a standard practice in which, how, where they play certain. So unless he like intentionally asked them, Hey, I don't want one in there because of whatever reason they usually would put one in that room because again someone could be hiding in the basement

after you out you know arm the system and walking around in the basement waiting for you to get home but anyways that's so we have um we had a security system a pretty badass one come in and they did the same they're like we would put these down here but they're more like obviously we have motion sensors in our basement and on the the windows too, because those windows are like, you know, it's easy to get into those windows. So we have alarms everywhere. But they will also say to you, like, it's more expensive. So Rick could have said, oh, I'd rather have them on the first and second floor because I don't see why you'd even want them on this. I'd rather have them in the basement than the second floor, to be honest but um that's probably what he had asked because if you look at it the bulkhead door which goes outside there's no motion sensor or like alarm thing on that either so it looks kind of like he planned to have that basement be almost like a dark area either already cheapened out or both cheapened out yeah probably both i mean it's not like he was paying for it anyways so true true so at 8 53 a.m connie arrived at the ymca between 8 55 a.m and 9 0 8 a.m there's movement registered on connie's fitbit because

she's walking into the ymca etc etc and at 8 59 a.m the alarm is disarmed using rick's key fob so in my opinion he's in the basement he armed the alarm with his laptop and everything. And then he used his key fob to disarm it, making it look like he drove away from the house. He set the alarm and then he came home, right, to get his like what his laptop. And he disarmed it using his key fob. But he's hiding in the basement like a little troll while this is happening. What an idiot. He totally you're 100 percent right.

First off. He totally forgot that there was a sensor on that basement door. He 100% forgot that there was a sensor. So they didn't have motion sensors in the basement, but they probably purposely put a motion sensor or I should say one of those plates on that basement door to kind of counteract that. So if someone was in the basement, it would trigger it as soon as they came up the stairs. But he probably only remembered sensors being installed on all the exterior windows and doors, forgetting that they had put one on the basement door.

What an idiot. Yeah, that's 100% what happened. You're right. And to avoid all of this, all he had to do was open the basement door at any point during that morning, which he did a million times, but then leave it open, leave it open, and then walk down and don't close it again. You know, that's all he would have had to have done

to get around that. But during the nine minutes that the alarm was armed, any movement inside the residence or opening of doors with sensors would have alerted the alarm. So in order for the intruder to have been in the house when Rick saw him, like if Rick left and set the alarm, right, Jack would have set the alarm off when he was in, right, Jack would have set the alarm off when he was in the house. Jack would have set the alarm off if he broke into the house. He would have set the alarm off if he'd already been inside the house when, you know, Rick and Connie and the boys left. Any scenario where Jack's in that house, he would have set the alarm off just by moving. And side note, side note here, let's for the sake of this conversation, just say that there was a malfunction with the system, which again, it would have showed. Jack enters the house nine minutes, within nine minutes of Rick leaving. That's what happens here. He arms the system, leaves at 8.50, and by 8.59, Jack's already in the house. That's fast. Jack's got to be standing outside somewhere very close. So as soon as he pulls away, he's breaking in.

Not impossible, highly unlikely. And if he came to the basement, which Rick kind of tried to set up, you would have seen that door open and close from the basement. Right. While, you know, that nine minutes while Rick's away. A hundred percent. But I'm saying even if that system wasn't working for some reason, which we have a whole log showing the system was working properly. But just for the sake of just thinking outside the box, the intruder who decided to go into the house must have been hiding in a bush right outside the house to get in that fast in that small

window where Rick wasn't in the house to hear him breaking in. It's crazy. It doesn't make any sense. And at 8.59 a.m., right when he like disarms the alarm using his key fob, he also logged on to Facebook on his Surface. So he's not setting a pot of coffee on. He's not doing all this. He's logging on to Facebook because I think he's like literally sitting in the basement like a freaking troll on his laptop. So at 9 a.m. And that's what I think he was doing, honestly, like before all the basement doors opening and closing. He's like bringing his freaking laptop down down there he's probably bringing like his coffee down there because he's like i'm gonna be here for like 15 minutes i better have something fun to do he definitely you know like what a dumb ass and so then at 9 00 a.m the basement door opens and closes it's him leaving the freaking basement because it's the first door to open and close after the alarm is disarmed not the door leading from outside of the house into the house dumb Dumbass. So then at 9.01 a.m., the garage door opens and closes. So I think he's just trying to be like, oh, I'm opening the door and coming in the house. And that's what I'm saying. He clearly, it's not funny. He clearly

forgot about the sensor on that basement door. There's no doubt about it because he would have done something to, that's why he's taking the time to open the garage door and close it again, because he's thinking that when they run the logs, that's the only sensor that's going to be triggered. He's forgetting about the basement door, all this planning. He totally forgot. Cause I will say the sensors, a lot of people who are watching or listening to this probably have similar systems. They are made to kind of blend in to some degree. So if you're not looking for them, you can easily forget they're there. I definitely have forgotten mine. They're made to kind of blend in with the trim. So the sensor for this one is probably on the

interior of the basement where it's up in like the top right or left-hand corner. So unless you're coming up the stairs and you see it there. No, it's on the door jam. Like, I don't know if that's it. You know, like this is the door. Can you see my hand? Yes. And then this is the part where the door closes. It's on that part where the door closes and it blends in. Correct. Right. On the trim. But what I'm saying is it's probably on the interior where you don't see it from the kitchen. Oh, you definitely don't see it. Yeah. So you're seeing, because they don't want it to look ugly. So when he's planning this whole big thing out, all his strategy, all his planning planning he forgets that there's a sensor on the basement door that's going to trigger every time he uses it how he could have mine makes a noise

an annoying noise every time even the basement one you can take that you can take that off he did that because yeah yeah i i have a lot of them up because i have a smaller home and it's like i don't want to hear every time we open the sliding door for the dogs to let them go out to go to the bathroom so we can turn it off oh yeah you can turn off the chime you can have it so the chime is off and ours has the ability to say uh you know kitchen door open kitchen door closed you know if we did that in my house it would just be going away so kitchen door open like that yeah you nailed it yeah hey This doesn't work out. Voice over work for you for the security company. You hit it here first, guys.

If you hear Stephanie Harlow telling you when your windows and doors are open or closed, credit me. So, yeah, it's so it just I'm not trying to make light of the situation, but to think that he went through all this planning and honestly, the real thing so far is her fitbit which he didn't plan for clearly and this basement door sensor is his demise but anyways it's fascinating stuff welcome to your secured house please stay inside with your hands inside the vehicle at all times i don't know where to go no either they just said it you know me i can said it. You know me. I can't help it. It comes out. So at 9.04 a.m., an email was sent to Rick's boss from his iPhone, like we said, from his house, not from the side of the road. He never left.

At 9.08 a.m., Connie leaves the YMCA. And once again, her Fitbit shows no movement until 9.18 a.m. because she's driving home. But at 9.17 a.m rick goes back on facebook at 9 18 a.m rick goes on the ymca website and downloads the group exercise schedule so this would have been right around the time that rick claimed connie was running down into the basement and being chased by jack and like i said they didn't put this trial on uh on the internet you couldn't see it. I couldn't see anything that was said. But there is one article I found where the prosecutor, he has Rick on the stand. And he's like, what, Rick?

When Connie was running down the stairs away from the intruder, did you yell down to her and say, hey, can you download the YMCA schedule for me? So it was pretty funny during the trial that he was just kind of showing how ludicrous this is because this is when Rick is saying that Connie's walking home. He said it was around like 9.15. Connie got home. Jack runs downstairs, blah, blah, blah. So at 9.20 a.m., Rick goes on Facebook. Keep in mind, this is all after Jack the intruder is inside. This is happening. At 9.22 a.m., Rick goes on the Facebook sites for ESPN and the New York Giants. 9.23 a.m., the garage door opens. This is Connie getting home. At 9.23 a.m., the door from the garage leading into the kitchen opens. At 9.28 a.m., the basement door opens. At 9.34 a.m., the garage door closes. At 9.34 a.m. as well, the second floor motion sensor

registers the last movement on that floor. At 9.35 a.m., the front door opens. This is the last door to open prior to the panic alarm. At 9.40 a.m., Connie shared a video on Facebook. At 9.46 a.m., Connie sent a message on Facebook from her home. Between 9.47 and 9.48 a.m., there's Fitbit movement. And between 9.49 and 10.01 a.m., there is no Fitbit movement. But then from 10.02 to 10.03 a.m., Connie's moving again. At 10.04 a.m., her Fitbit is stationary. And at 10.05 a.m., there is movement on the Fitbit. That last movement was recorded at that point and the metabolic equivalent per minute recorded by the sensors of the Fitbit device registered motion which indicated various states of movement with minimal physical activity

on that morning of 12.23. After 10.10 a.mm no movement was registered but there's minor movement recorded at 3 37 p.m and more substantial movements recorded on 12 24 from 2 26 to 2 28 a.m which is coinciding with the body survey conducted by edmcs and detectives so most likely the 3 37 p.m movement was when they were first checking her pulse to see if she was alive, cause of death, things like that. And then they have to move her when they take her to the morgue. So we probably believe that your last, what actually happened was she died most likely between right around that 10.05 a.m. Between 10.03 and 10.05 a.m. is when she was shot. Now from 9.18 to 10.18 a.m., Connie's Fitbit recorded that she walked a distance of 1,217 feet.

The total distance that Connie would walk to get from her car to the basement would be no more than 125 feet. So basically what they're saying here is like she got home and at that point, as soon as she walked in, Rick says he yelled down at her. There's someone in the house, run. And at that point she runs down to the basement. This is her only activity from walking into the house until she gets shot. She's running into the basement, but obviously that didn't happen. She came home. She was on Facebook. She was walking around the house. She was probably maybe even interacting with Rick, even though I'm pretty sure that dude was hiding in the basement the whole time she was there because you don't see the basement door opening and closing anymore. floor motion sensor activated consistent with the state police clearing the house. At 11.01 a.m., motion sensors in the kitchen of the front entry were idle, and this was consistent with Rick

being transported to the hospital and nobody being in the house any longer. So looking at that timeline, what are you thinking? Are you thinking, like, what are you putting together with it? So I have a few thoughts running through my head, and I just, I guess we don't know for certain, but it sounds like from what we've been listening to the basement door open and shuts at nine o'clock right after the alarm is disabled. And you don't see that basement door reopen or open again until nine 28. And at this point, Connie's already back in the house. Do you believe, do you believe that this whole time that Connie's home, Rick is in the basement the entire time? Well, he comes up, if we're thinking that the basement door is opening, unless that's her opening the basement door, yelling down and saying

like, Rick, are you down there? Because she sees his car. So what I think possibly could have happened is she comes home, she walks around, and then she sees that his car's there, but she doesn't see him anywhere in the house. So she opens the basement door. She's like, Rick, are you down there? And he yells and he's like, yeah, I'm down here. And then she's like, OK. So she goes and closes the garage door because, you know, she didn't do it when she first came in. And she goes upstairs and she's on her phone and stuff.

And then we see the front door open. This is the last door to open prior to the panic alarm so I almost think that Rick was in the basement and he left the basement through the bulkhead which isn't alarm activated and then walked into the house through the front door maybe to make it look like you know somebody was coming in or he was coming home even though it doesn't really make sense with his timeline. So I'm not sure what that could be. But it's either him coming up at 9.28 a.m. or her yelling down to him and saying, hey, are you down there? And if it's the 9.35 a.m., that's him coming in through the front door because he left through the bulkhead. Maybe that's when he dropped his

wallet in the yard, you know, to make it look like Jack the intruder had run away and taken his wallet. Who knows? But I do think all the opening doors of the basement all morning was him like setting up that basement because he knew he was going to be down there for like a minute. And maybe that's when he was getting the burned stuff and burning the papers and getting the tools and stuff like that. Maybe that's when all of that happened. Because if we look at this, right?

Connie, her Fitbit starts moving pretty shortly before he calls 9-1-1 Okay, so he's not gonna have time to you know Get the tool and the zip ties and do the chair thing and all of that He's not gonna have time to do all that Between when he kills her and when he calls 9-1-1 All he's gonna have time to do is like crawl upstairs, use that like blood trail thing, you know, make it look like he's flopping around like a dolphin out of water, getting his phone and his key fob and stuff. There's not a lot of time between when she stops moving and when he calls 911. So I think he was literally setting the stage that

whole time with the basement door opening and closing all morning. That's what I think he was doing. Yeah, I definitely think he was setting up. Okay, so here's my best guess, just based on the times. I see him going down to the basement at nine o'clock. Connie gets home. She sees the car already. So she's assuming he's home. She might even not care that he's home. She's kind of doing her thing. She goes, she's on Facebook. She's doing whatever she's on. She's upstairs as the motion sensor registers. As I'm looking at it now, nine 34, that's how her purse gets upstairs, by the way, she's up there. So that explains the purse. That's why it's upstairs. She's up doing her thing, maybe changing out of her work. She was still in a workout clothes when she was found,

but I definitely think she dropped her purse there. Yeah. Drops her purse. She's on her, she's on her phone doing her thing. I think Rick comes up from the basement at 928. He comes up from the basement. He knows what he's about to do. So he starts to do things. He starts to make sure the garage door is shut. He might even look out the front door real quick, make sure there's nobody outside talking on their phones or the mailman's in the area or UPS guy, whatever. Just takes a a quick look outside make sure no one's around shuts the door okay she comes downstairs or whatever point you can see she's on her Facebook she's she's sending messages at 9 46 so I think he's upstairs the basement door is still open

and they're they're both aware that they're there there's Fitbit movement all that good stuff at some point it might have even been right when he came upstairs, he might've said, hey, listen, we're going to have to get somebody over here. There's a leak downstairs or whatever's down there. I don't know if washer and dryers are down there, whatever it may be. There's a reason he tells her, I want you to come downstairs and look at this at some point. Or even like it's Christmas is right around the corner. Like, oh my God, you have to see what I got the kids for Christmas. Oh my God, they're going to love it. Like come downstairs right now. You got to see this. You're going to be so surprised. And so she's running down. It's exciting. It's Christmas. He's finally taking initiative and doing something

and then continue. Possibly it's possible. Cause I think he comes upstairs up the stairs to be like, I'm working on something down there. And there's no sense of urgency to go back down. Cause they don't, there's still movement in that, you know, well, this Fitbit movement, at least until what do we got here? Nine, we got till 10 o'clock, right? And then it's stationary for a second. And then there's a little bit of movement again. So she's probably upstairs quarter of 10. They go downstairs and then we have what goes on downstairs. I have some theories about what happens as they're going down the stairs as they're what, what ultimately happened based on our conversation last week, do we get into that now? Or what do you want to do? Do you want to wait? Is there

anything else? Or do we just dive right into that and kind of, I think we might be at that point. Well, yeah, I think we are at that point. Yeah, let's do it. Okay. Okay. So we had a long conversation last week. We were talking a lot about, and it was speculative. It's still speculative about what actually transpired. So it seems like this was obviously premeditated. And I think for the most part, it went according to plan, but there was something that occurred that he wasn't necessarily expecting. And I'm glad we went over this electronic timeline because it kind of confirms what I was thinking, not completely, but kind of.

He was unaware if the class was going to take place or not. She went to go do her thing. She went to go to the YMCA and he had questioned apparently whether there was a class or not, but he wasn't exactly sure. So he thought he had a certain amount of time to finish setting up. Well, she comes home unexpectedly before he's done. That's why he's still in the basement setting up when she comes home. And we know he wasn't that sure because of what you told us. He was on the YMCA, the YWCA website, looking at the schedules even late in the game to see, does it say anything about the classes being canceled or whatever it may be. So he wasn't sure. He thought she was going to be there for a while, but she comes home sooner than expected. So he finishes setting up. He comes

up the stairs, does not shut the door. However, he gets her downstairs. He gets her to come down the stairs. There's no sense of urgency. I don't think he comes up the stairs and he's holding her at gunpoint because she goes on Facebook, all these things. But for whatever reason, he gets her to go downstairs. And this is what I wanted to talk about because I was looking up some articles and I hope I'm saying this person's name right. Allison Jindal, you might know it better than me. This is the person who testified in court. She's the one who processed the gunshot residue for the state. And in looking this up as she's testifying, she's talking about it. She's specifically talking about gunshot residue. And this is something that I think might shed some light for us on what occurred downstairs

in the basement. So just to kind of go over it one more time with GSR, it's basically a plume of smoke that sometimes you can't even see after a gun is fired. And it's usually behind the gun. So the way they described it in the article was actually pretty good. It's like two chalk erasers, you know, being slapped together. You see that plume and then it dissipates. The same thing happens with gunshot residue.

There's three elements to it. Those elements vaporize into the air. And as they cool down, they fall and settle on surfaces. And that's how they end up on your chest, on your wrist, on your hands after you fire a firearm. And although it can be cleaned off, it is difficult to get it all. It's microscopic. You can't even see it. It's very hard to clean yourself from it entirely without really like sanitizing yourself. And he didn't have that window of opportunity.

So there's three categories when gunshot residue is detected and they use based on these three elements that are found in gunshot residue. So just to go off of it, the three categories are when one element is found, it's categorized as commonly associated with gunshot residue. When there's two elements of the three elements found, it's consistent with GSR. And the final one, when all three elements are found, is characteristic of GSR. And again, you said it before, but those three elements are barium, lead, and antimony. So that's how they categorize the concentration of GSR that's found on the person when they're deciding whether or not it's GSR. So in this particular case, this is what they said in court. On Rick's right hand, there was the characteristic of GSR.

So all three elements found on his hand. On the left rear pocket, there was characteristic of GSR. So again, the strongest level of GSR that can be found is found on his hand and on his back pocket, which is him. Obviously, after shooting the gun, touching his back pocket, you can have GSR transferred onto the back. Then on his right shirt sleeve again, he's right handed, by the way. I looked it up on his right shirt sleeve.

It's consistent with GSR. So you have two of the three elements that were found. So still pretty significant, but a little less. And it makes you wonder why, why not all three elements right there? And then finally on his chest area, which you see this a lot with GSR, it was consistent with GSR as well. So not all three, but two. And this is a lot of time where we catch people, they clean their hands, they clean whatever, but they forget to change their shirt and they're covered in GSR on the shirt. Now for Connie, and this is something we talked about a lot. On her hands, you had the characteristic of GSR. So all three elements of GSR found on her

hands, which means, and this is right from Jangel, she was in very close proximity to the gun when it was fired, or she touched something that was in very close proximity to the gun when it was fired, or she touched something that was in very close proximity to the gun when it was fired. So this is what I believe most likely happened. They come down to the basement, and at some point, I believe that Rick already has the gun in his possession. So when they get down the stairs, there's maybe a short conversation, maybe an explanation, whatever. But he has the gun in his hand and Connie knows something is about to happen. And they're in very close proximity to each other.

And like most people would normally do when he points the gun at Connie, she reaches for it. There's a little bit of a struggle there. She has one hand on the barrel in the cylinder, which is why you have that transmission of DNA from her hand to the barrel of the gun. And I believe that she probably takes her other hand and puts it on top of Rick's hand to kind of try to remove the gun from his hand. And that's why you have a less of a concentration all over his right hand because her hand was on top of it. So as they're fighting over the gun, the gun accidentally just discharged or he tries to fire it. And that's the round. That's the

bullet that's found in the floor of the first floor, but the ceiling joist of the basement. So that's the struggle. Unfortunately, Rick gains control of the gun and he fires the first round into her stomach. That wouldn't completely incapacitate her immediately it's gonna it's gonna stun her but at that point your natural reaction if you're shot is to try to escape to try to run away and that's what she does she tries to run away and as she is he fires the second round into the back of her head as she's running away um that's terrible hate the fact that that appears to be the way the forensics are lying up. But I will say there is something for me personally that I'm happy to hear that she fought. She didn't just

beg for her life. She tried to take the matter into her own hands and she didn't just ask for forgiveness or say, please don't do this. She fought with him. And I don't know if I'm right. There may be detectives that are watching this right now that work this case that have more information than i do that could discredit it because of something they know but based on the dna and the for the ballistics and the gsr results when we start to talk about those puzzle pieces and we were like a little trying to figure out how how it all makes sense how'd the bullet get into the ceiling and i had given a theory on that this makes much more sense as to why in that close proximity he would miss her completely and hit the ceiling joist this is the only explanation there was a fight for that gun and that would explain why there was such a strong concentration of gsr on her hands when she was

eventually found what do you i't told you this beforehand. What do you, what's your thoughts on, I talked a lot there, but what's your thoughts on it? I think that's pretty accurate. I mean, in the arrest, the arrest affidavit, it did say that they thought the, the shot to her head had happened first because of, but it doesn't make sense for her to be shot in the back of the head. And then in, in the front of her stomach, I think that it would't make sense for her to be shot in the back of the head and then in the front of her stomach. I think that it would make more sense the way you had laid it out. For sure. It makes

a lot more sense. And now, you know, when I'm talking back of the head, I'm thinking it's hit the brain. I mean, I guess there's a possibility it's skimmed her head or something and it might have not have incapacitated her. But I thought about the idea of her getting shot in the back of the head and then spinning around. This makes much more sense to me. This just makes much more sense to me. It would explain a lot of the things that I was confused about. And I think it's the most likely scenario. And I do think the only information I would love to have, and maybe they have it, and we talked about this before we started recording recording is this Fitbit. And I know that all these health trackers track your heart rate, and there's no mention of heart rate here, but I'd be interested to see if they had her heart

rate during this time, which I would assume they do. If there was an elevation in her heart rate before there was no more movement on the Fitbit itself. I don't think the 2015 Fitbit did track heart rate, actually. That sucks. How do you have a Fitbit in 2015 doesn't track your heart rate? Because then it was just like a step tracker. That's what it was about, like getting your steps in, getting 10,000 steps a day, 10,000 steps a day. The Fitbit, it was a couple models later that had the heart rate tracker. And then that's when I got mine because I was like, oh, this is legit. I need this. Yeah. You're probably right. That sucks.

But how interesting would it be if she had a heart rate tracker? And let's say around- You could see when they started arguing. You could see when the altercation went down. Right. Let's say her resting heart rate is, I don't know, what's a normal resting heart rate? 60? 70? Is that normal? I mean, she was an athletic woman, so yeah, it would be pretty low. And then all of a sudden it skyrockets to 100, 120 for a minute or two before the Fitbit stops moving. Would your heart elevate if you had a gun being pointed at you, if you're arguing or if you're fighting over something? Yeah. Yeah, it would. So that's kind of where I'm at on it. And again, this is just coming from knowing the story, researching the investigation with you. So there may be elements that I'm missing that would discredit my theory, but that is the one that makes the most sense to me. realized she'd been betrayed and she realized that like i thought i loved this man and he's ending my life i'll never see my kids again like i'm not going to get to celebrate christmas with

my sons who are my life that's what it means to me and i hate him so hate him and uh this doesn't make it any better but i almost don't know and this may be a good thing for some of you out there watching this as far as like trying to rationalize and trying to find something in it because there's nothing here spoiler Cause there's nothing here, spoiler alert, there's nothing here to be happy about, but I don't know if she had a lot of time to think about what was going on. I think she saw it. She saw the gun and she reacted. She started fighting him for it. And in the middle of that struggle, the gun goes off. He regains control. He shoots her in the stomach. She tries to run away. And hopefully it was over before any

of that, where she's sitting there thinking about what's about to happen. I hope she just instantly reacted, fought this scumbag and unfortunately lost the fight, but didn't go out without putting up a fight first. Hopefully. But we do know that on August 18th, 2022, Rick DeB debate was sentenced to 65 years in prison which is basically a life sentence for him because I think he's he's 40 now by the time he got sentenced but his attorneys have already stated their intention to appeal which is ludicrous Rick's girlfriend Sarah gave birth to his daughter in 2016 and reportedly the two had been raising the child together

since 2019, Sarah claimed she had no intention of blowing up Rick and Connie's marriage, and Rick had never discussed killing Connie with her, nor had he ever admitted to committing the murder himself, which I 100 million percent agree. I don't think Sarah had any clue that Rick was planning this, and I definitely don't think he would have admitted to her that he did after, because it seems to me this is one of those things where if he says the lie enough, he'll start to believe his own lie, because he will never admit to having done this. The fact that he's even going to appeal is just so disrespectful to Connie and her family. Rick's

attorneys say that the DNA of an unidentified male was found in six different locations in the crime scene, including the upstairs closet door, the safe and the handle of the gun used to kill Connie. So they say that this small, stupid detail justifies and explains Rick's story. But to me, touch DNA, man, it's a tricky thing. There could be the DNA of an unidentified male from, you know, like maybe Rick's buddy,

who he was with a couple of nights ago for a beer and the guy slapped Rick on the back and then Rick took his jacket off and it rubbed on the closet door before he hung it up. Like there's a million reasons that DNA could be there. And I still don't see any other piece of evidence that supports there was ever, ever, ever an intruder because Rick never left the house, which we've clearly seen laid out. So there's no possible way. They can appeal till the cows come home. I don't see any jury or any judge in existence that's going to give Rick and his lawyers the time of day again. But that's just my opinion. No, you're right. And this isn't to call out all defense attorneys. They have a job

to do. But this is what they do in these cases where it's a slam dunk case. There's a mountain of evidence that shows he's responsible for this murder. And there's this one thing, this one red herring that the defense attorney is going to hang their hat on because it's the one thing, because let's be honest, all they have to do is create reasonable doubt. And they're hoping that this one thing creates enough reasonable doubt in the heads of the jury members that they decide not to convict him. But unfortunately for him and his team, there's too much evidence. As you just said, there's just too much evidence. And this evidence, this particular thing, the DNA, can be explained if they were able to find the person. It may be a friend or family member who had been in the home before. He may have showed them the gun. They just haven't found them. And by the way, if Rick knows who that

person could be, you think he's going to tell anybody? No. Of course not. He wants it to remain unidentified. So he's never going to tell you who it was because he knows who probably touched that safe. He's not going to tell you. So really sad case. Glad to see this idiot didn't get away with it. And I agree with you. He's not going anywhere. He's going to serve the rest of his life in prison. And rightfully so. I feel really bad for Connie's family. I feel really bad for the children. Yeah. I feel bad for Sarah as well. I don't think she was in on this. I don't think she had any part of it. Sucks that she's now in on this story. she definitely wasn't doing all the right things

but for the wrong guy yeah fell for the wrong guy and nobody wins here and just glad to see that rick uh is where he needs to be at minimum in connecticut i don't think there's a death penalty in connecticut um so it is what it is it's a sad story all the way around it sucks to cover these stories but it's one of those things where there are there is information you can take from it and for this case it's you know make sure your house is secured make sure you have all this stuff that you know look for these signs they do happen and i don't think connie could have done anything differently to be honest with you some cases it's obvious i think she was doing the right thing she was married she believed rick as much as he is a he was a pretty good liar in some ways not others so it could

happen to any one of us and connie's no exception it could happen to any one of us and it's just a sad reminder of the type of people that walk this this earth but unfortunately probably won't be the last time we hear a story like but i will say be careful about these like life insurance policies with marriages like if your marriage is not tight if your marriage is not completely open and transparent i mean she was saying he wouldn't let her he wouldn't give her his email password stuff like that if your marriage is not transparent do not let this man or woman take an insurance policy out on your life that's uh that's that's always a bad sign and for someone like sarah you know girl i'm sure you might be listening to this one day you deserve better and have always deserved better than Rick

Debate. Every woman in this earth deserves better than Rick Debate and Scott Peterson and the likes of those kind of guys. So just move on. Don't get involved with men who are married who keep telling you like, yeah, I'm going to get divorced any day now. I'm going to get divorced any day now. It's either never going to happen or if it does, it's not something you want anyway. So just move on with that, especially if he's a loser and can't save his money and dresses up in Superman costumes. Again, leave Superman out of it. I'm just doing it now to bother you. I will say this.

We joked about the Superman thing earlier, but I do want to say thank you because the fact that you guys took the time, we can, we can have that many people engaged in something for us. It's a joke. Obviously it's Superman pajamas. Ain't that serious. But the fact that you guys are that dedicated to it, that you can in one day put 10,000, 11,000 likes on a video, which obviously helps out the channel, helps us grow. It means a lot to us. So thank you for for that if you're not already you know subscribed notifications on make sure you do that you'll be updated on the next video if you're listening on audio and you have an opportunity we'd really

appreciate if you leave a review again it really helps us and ask Stephanie said make sure you're following us on social media sometimes we post things they are not on here it's crime Weekly Pod on Twitter and Instagram. And our coffee company, Criminal Coffee, is Drink Criminal Coffee on Instagram, Drink Criminal on Twitter. We're going to actually get off this episode right now, change clothes and record another episode because Stephanie's going on vacation soon. But we will have an announcement in the near future about Criminal Coffee. We're at the point where the Criminal Coffee fund has exceeded $3,000. Stephanie and I aren't completely happy with that.

So we have some announcements coming for that as well. So keep your recommendations coming. Everyone be safe out there and we will see you with a new case next week. Bye. you you you you you you you you you