Dateline NBC - Audio of a jailhouse sting. A woman's third murder trial in three decades. And the latest on a new texting scam.

Episode Date: February 27, 2025

Listen to this week's episode of the Dateline: True Crime Weekly podcast with Andrea Canning. An officer goes undercover with an alleged killer in the Hollywood hair stylist case. We're listening in. A woman's third murder trial in three decades is underway. This time, she's acting as attorney and defendant — and cross-examining her own children. We've got updates on Karen Read and Adnan Syed, and a verdict in Hawaii. Plus, the latest on a new texting scam targeting drivers. Find out more about the cases covered each week here: www.datelinetruecrimeweekly.com

Hello Jane. Hey, how are you? It's time for the Dateline story meeting at 30 Rockefeller Center. Have we talked about this before? Producers are discussing this week's big stories in True Crime. We actually interviewed the lead detective for a previous story. And we have a husband with a double life. We've got secrets and lies.

The extortion plot at the beginning is really a great red herring. Welcome to Dateline True Crime Weekly. I'm Andrea Canning. It's February 27th and here's what's on our docket. In Kansas, a woman accused of murdering her ex-husband and his longtime girlfriend almost 25 years ago is now on trial and representing herself. Last week, she cross-examined her own children. Watching those kids talk to their mother was a very uncomfortable experience, I will tell you that much.

Other stories on our radar this week. A verdict in Hawaii where the man accused of murdering his wife's ex-lover has been on trial. In Baltimore, a big ruling for convicted killer Adnan Syed, whose story you may know from the podcast, Serial. And we've got an important update in the Karen Reed case. Well, the prosecution and defense both made arguments and, Andrea, things got pretty heated. Plus, Vicky Nguyen, NBC News chief consumer investigative correspondent, has a warning about a new texting scam targeting drivers. They're just hoping that a small percentage of those people

tap on those links and then boom, the hackers have access to your banking accounts. But before all that, we're heading back to a Los Angeles courtroom where the widow of a famous hairstylist is on trial for allegedly plotting his murder. The prosecution's case against Monica Semantilli has entered its fifth week.

The state is painstakingly laying out the evidence it says proves Semantilli and her lover Robert Baker planned the stabbing of her husband Fabio to collect his hefty life insurance policy. They were allegedly helped by a third person whose identity remained a mystery for years. Last week, prosecutors presented the jury with video of Monica and Robert immediately after their arrest. Video, they say, that captured the unraveling of their plan in real time. Were you able to monitor the conversation or anything that happened inside the patrol vehicle live, like as it occurred? Yes.

Dateline producer Chetna Joshi is back to bring us up to speed on the latest in the case. Chetna, thanks for making time for us again. Thank you for having me. Sure. Okay. So the last time we spoke, Chetna, you told us that prosecutors were telling the jury how investigators had zeroed in on Monica and Robert Baker. Recently, prosecutors have focused more on what they say was their suspicious behavior after they were arrested. And a lot of that was actually caught on tape. Monica and Robert were arrested together

and placed in the back of a patrol car. Chetna, what happens in that patrol car? Right, so what's really interesting is they use this ruse on Monica and Baker. They are in Monica's new Mustang, and they get pulled over, and initially the detectives say that they're driving a stolen vehicle and they get them back in the patrol car.

Detectives have rigged up this car. They've put microphones in, really sensitive microphones to pick up whispers. They have a camera in the car so that they can sort of be monitoring from a different area and be watching them live. And so we see them in the car together. So what are they saying to each other?

Monica sounds really upset. She's breathing heavy. She sounds very emotional. Robert Baker starts talking to Monica, he wants to tell her something and you can kind of hear her. She's aware that they might be being recorded so she's like, no, shh, you know, don't talk, don't talk. But Robert Baker continues to talk. Because at some point during this time when they're in the car they find out they're actually being arrested for murder. One of the things that the prosecutors wanted to highlight in that audio is that it's very faint but Monica apparently says somebody must have talked.

I'm sure the defense can spin that in a different direction. Yeah, according to the defense, when Monica says that somebody must have talked, that's about the affair. And so, yeah, the defense does not believe that that has any evidence pointing to her guilt. So in court, Chetna, we also heard audio of Monica in a jail cell. Yeah, so this was some really interesting audio to listen to. It was quite long, but the detectives here are basically using an investigative strategy by which they come to Monica's cell, they give her a little

piece of information, and then they walk away. And inside the cell, her cellmate is another woman that's there, but unbeknownst to Monica, that cellmate is actually an undercover agent. And so she gets, she gets Monica talking and they seem to be having girl talk at some point. They start talking about her marriage and Monica's telling her that she was married to the greatest man of all time. Well, my husband was the man of my life. He was such a good person. At one point, you know, she's asking Monica, is Robert Baker attractive? He must be hot.

Is he hot? Is he sexy? Not really. I'm a sexy person, no. This undercover agent really engages Monica and, um, and kind of gains her, her trust. They've been watching everything you do. Well, I already do that and my kids too. And I, I've been taught because you know, when it's a murder investigation, everyone,

the spouse of the first one would be followed. So I had no problem with them hiding anything. That's nothing wrong with what I'm doing. Even to a certain point, there was a lull in the conversation. And then the undercover agent brings up like asking her about rules for racquetball because she mentions that Robert Baker was the racquetball coach. So she's bringing up like, Oh, can you, you know, can you do this in racquetball? Can you do that in racquetball?

Can a ball hit the ceiling in racquetball? No, sir. in racquetball. And it's sort of interesting to see, you know, how an undercover agent actually works. Yeah. And Monica's just obviously letting her guard down. She is. And at one point, Monica actually admits her affair with Robert and she says, he's not just my lover, he's my confidant, he's my everything. Another interesting moment happens when the detectives, they come back at a later point and they basically tell her that,

look, you and Rob were arrested today. We know that there is a third person, there was another guy there with Robert, when Fabio was killed and he's not here. So I want you to think about that. And what it seems to be is that detectives are sort of suggesting to Monica that that third suspect is not here because he's talking to us. He's cooperating. And of course, we know now that that was a ruse. Remind us who the police believe this man is and how he fits in.

For a long time, they didn't know who the second man was, but police were later able to identify him as Christopher Austin, and they arrested him in October of last year. But inside the cell, the detectives use this ruse on Monica and the undercover agent, totally picks that up and runs with it She's sort of telling Monica like look the first person to talk is usually the one that gets the best deal your kids and yourself, not whoever that guy is, screw him. He did this. Make him responsible

for it. If he brought all this heartache and stuff to your life, screw him because I bet you he's not going to think twice about screwing you over. Christopher Austin, the third person involved in all of this, he has pleaded guilty to second degree murder, will be sentenced on April 30th and he's going to testify. Christopher Austin, the third person involved in all of this, he has pleaded guilty to secondary murder, will be sentenced on April 30th, and he's going to testify. Yes, he is going to testify. We don't know when that is yet, but we are all awaiting for that moment and to see what he's going to say. Okay. Well, you will let us know when this big piece of testimony is coming, and we will

have you back to hear about that, what presumably could be explosive in that courtroom. Thank you, Chetna. Thanks for having me. Coming up, just before opening statements three weeks ago, murder defendant Dana Chandler fired her attorneys and took over her own defense. She's called herself as a witness. In July of 2002, Michael Sisko and his longtime girlfriend Karen Harkness were found shot to death in bed in Topeka, Kansas. Ten years later, a jury convicted Michael's ex-wife, Dana Chandler, on two counts of first-degree murder, and a judge sentenced her to 100 years in prison. Then, in 2018, came a reversal. The Kansas Supreme Court overturned Dana's conviction. A new prosecutor took Dana Chandler to trial again

in the summer of 2022, and that jury didn't return any verdict. Now, Chandler had little reaction when the jury announced they couldn't come to a decision today. So this month, Kansas is trying Dana Chandler for a third time with one major difference. After the jury had been selected, Dana made this head-snapping decision. In a shocking twist this morning, Chandler fired her lawyers and chose to represent herself.

Dateline producer Sergey Ivonin was in the courtroom as the prosecution presented its case last week, calling Dana and Mike's children to the stand. Sergei, thank you for being on the podcast. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. So why don't we start with the prosecution's theory of this case? They haven't wavered much in the last 15 years. Their theory is that Dana had like a 27 hour window

when nobody knew where she was, she spoke to nobody. And they're saying that she filled two five gallon gas tanks in Denver and then drove to Topeka, Kansas. And she didn't stop anywhere, no cameras caught her. She didn't use her credit card. Prosecution said she did that deliberately, not to get any tracks or digital crumbs. What do they believe was Dana's motive?

That Mike and she had a very long and bitter divorce. Mike got the custody, full custody of the kids, and Dana was not happy about it. And then Mike started dating Karen, and they were about to get married. They say that her behavior was getting obsessive. Absolutely. They were describing she would show up in restaurants all of a sudden where Mike and

Karen were having dinner and she'd start walking around them and taking snapshots of them. Or another instance, she was jumping outside on their trampoline, jumping up and down in the middle of the night. And a lot of phone calls? Yes, that she was incessantly calling. You know, there was one point at Karen's house, the phone rang 17 times in 18 minutes. Dana has maintained her innocence from the very beginning. She says she was in Denver that weekend in July, far, far away from where the murder

had occurred. And she and her team argued for years that there's no physical evidence or eyewitnesses to show she's lying or she had anything to do with the murder. But still, she was convicted in 2012, and it was super fast. The jury didn't even think about it for 90 minutes. And they came out and they said, guilty. So why was it overturned?

She appealed and then the Kansas Supreme Court said the evidence was substantial but not overwhelming. They said the prosecutor played a big role in that guilty verdict and she, the prosecutor in fact, was less than truthful. She said that Mike had gotten protection order of abuse from the judge right before he and Dana's divorce. And that was not true. And then the prosecutor said that Dana had found out about Mike's engagement to Karen two days before the murder.

That was also not true. So Dana won her appeal and the county tried her again in 2022. That trial ended in a hung jury, which brings us to the third trial that's underway now. Two of the prosecution's main witnesses are Dana's own children. They were just teenagers when their dad died, right? That's right. Haley was 17 and Dustin was 15. So what did the prosecutors ask them about on the stand this time? There were some exchanges presented that Hailey and her mother Dana, they did on AOL. Remember AOL? I'm dating myself here when we used to chat to each other, sort of like texting. And those were very hard to listen to.

Yeah, this one exchange happened when Dana was telling Hailey she didn't want to communicate with her anymore. Dana brought up an accusation she'd made before that Mike had raped her during their marriage, which Mike's family disputes. The prosecutor read Dana's part in these exchanges and Haley, she read her part. Why don't you ask him why he raped me? I could have taken the divorce,

but no, he had to take it to an extreme. God, stop it! Seriously! Haley you have no idea how deeply rape affects women when it comes to thinking about their attacker. Okay. In my mind he's a monster, a vicious monster. I know you tell me that all the time. And Haley was clearly very uncomfortable in those chats and she kept pleading with her mother,

please stop, stop, stop. And Dana just would not let up. That is so sad. What did the son say on the stand? Dustin, he actually tried to get his mom to confess, right? I know one time he recorded a conversation they had in the car. Exactly, yeah.

After the murders, he tried to get some information out of her that you know, ah. That's absolutely not true. It's not true. I didn't believe it. You didn't believe it. You want to believe it, but it's not true. Okay, so this is, this is awkward then. Dana representing herself, how does she handle her own children on cross-examination? It was quite uncomfortable to be in the courtroom. She would address their kids by their last name

and it was very sort of dry and technical. And the kids were quite visibly uncomfortable and understandably so. It's a very high stress situation. And on top of it, it's your mother who is trying to dig into your testimony and undermine it. So are both children saying on the stand that they think she killed Mike and Karen? I know out of court they've said it.

I'm not sure if that was something that was done pre-trial or discussed in chambers that they cannot say that, but they never once came out and say, she killed my dad. So we're in the defense portion now of the trial. Who is Dana calling to the stand? Well, she called herself last Friday. So how does she, she can't really question herself. So what is she doing, giving a statement on the stand? Yes, yes, exactly that.

Her testimony was to her innocence and that surely there was bitterness in the divorce, but that that does not make her a martyr. Yeah. And she said she was deeply embarrassed, right, about her exchange with her daughter that she'd been drinking to the point of blacking out when she sent those AOL messages. It was a monologue and she's not done yet. Has she even been questioned yet by the prosecution? She's not done yet. No, no.

Got it. Fascinating. Sergey, how much longer do you think this will go for? Dana had previously indicated that she's gonna present a whole battery of witnesses, defense witnesses, and so it looks like the trial will spill into March for sure. Okay well thank you for staying on it. Thank you so much Sergei. Absolutely, thank you for having me. Up next it's Dateline Roundup.

We've got updates in the case of Adnan Syed, the convicted murderer whose story went viral in the podcast Serial. And more on the upcoming retrial of Karen Reed. And in Hawaii, there's been a verdict in the murder trial of the husband accused of killing his wife's ex-lover. Plus, NBC News chief consumer investigative correspondent Vicki Winn is back and she wants you to know about a scam targeting drivers. Welcome back. Joining us for this week's Dateline Roundup is Dateline producer, Sue Simpson. Hey, Sue. Hey, it's great to be back. Joining us for this week's Dateline Roundup is Dateline producer Sue Simpson. Hey, Sue.

Hey, it's great to be back. Yes, and we are back in Dedham, Massachusetts for another Karen Reed update. She is the woman accused of drunkenly backing her SUV into her police officer boyfriend, John O'Keefe, back in 2022 and leaving him to die in the snow. Her trial last summer ended with a hung jury and her retrial is scheduled for April. She has denied having anything to do with his death. Last week the judge in the case stopped a hearing halfway through the day citing grave concerns about the defense's work with crash reconstruction experts in Reed's first trial. That hearing started up again this Tuesday. What did we learn, Sue?

Well, the prosecution and defense both made arguments and, Andrea, things got pretty heated. The defense pushed back on allegations the prosecution made last week, which were that the defense collaborated with two expert witnesses on their testimony and paid them more than $23,000 without disclosing that to the prosecution. Now, the judge has not yet made a decision on whether or not the defense acted inappropriately. And we'll see what she says after more hearings next week. And see one last piece of Karen Reed news, the findings from a federal investigation into the Karen Reed case, which we think has been going on since about April 2023.

Correct. And these federal investigations are always wrapped up in mystery, right? The federal authorities, of course, are not commenting, but we believe they were looking into allegations of corruption in local law enforcement. And those allegations provided the context for the defense argument that Karen Reed was framed by corrupt local law enforcement officials. But it's been widely reported that the investigation is officially over with no charges being filed. Definitely a hit to the defense. We'll stay on top of the Karen Reed case.

Of course, Sue, you will. For our next story, we're off to Baltimore, where there is a big development in a case. True Crime podcast fans will probably recognize Sue. If you've ever listened to the hit podcast, Serial, you know the story of big development in a case true crime podcast fans will probably recognize Sue. If you've ever listened to the hit podcast serial, you know the story of Aadnan Syed. He was convicted in 2000 of murdering his high school ex-girlfriend, Haemin Lee, who was found strangled to death in 1999. But Syed has always maintained his innocence and he and his attorneys have disputed the state's evidence against him.

So there's been some back and forth with his conviction? No, it's been a wild back and forth, a real seesaw. In 2022, his conviction was vacated, but later it was reinstated. And then last August, the Maryland Supreme Court said Syed could have another hearing about vacating his conviction. But all that came to an end this week when the Baltimore City State's attorney withdrew the motion to vacate saying it contains false and misleading statements that undermine the integrity of the judicial process. NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt spoke with the prosecutor about the decision. Our review of the motion to vacate was not whether or not we looked at his guilt as innocence. One of the things that I would say is that we stand behind the jury's verdict.

But the investigation you've done subsequently, none of that changes. Would you bring this case today based on the evidence you have today? Based on the evidence that we have today, yes we would. No doubt. No doubt. So what is next for Syed? Well his chance to have his conviction fully vacated is now gone, but Syed's attorneys filed a motion in December to get his sentence reduced to time served with the period of probation. He's already out of prison, so he'd remain free. There's been no ruling on that yet, but the state's attorney's office says it supports that motion.

Okay. And for our final story, we are off to Honolulu, Hawaii for a big update on a trial we've been following here on the podcast for the past few weeks. Eric Thompson is accused of murdering his wife's acupuncturist ex-lover in 2022. This is his second trial. His first one in 2023 ended with a hung jury. They've been in deliberations, the jurors for days, sue do we have a decision? We finally do. Mr. Thompson, pursuant to the unanimous verdict

of this jury, the court finds you guilty as charged in both counts one and two in this case. On Tuesday, the jury found Eric Thompson guilty of second degree murder and possession of a firearm in connection with the killing of John Tokuhara. Thank you, Sue. So many updates. Appreciate it. Yeah, I love being here.

Thank you, Andrew. For those of you listening in the car right now, our final story is for you. Drivers in the U.S. pay billions of dollars in road tolls each year, but sometimes you might not even know that you've gone through a toll until you get some kind of notice, like a text or an email, that you owe money. But what happens when that notice is a scam? My next guest, NBC News chief consumer investigative correspondent Vicki Nguyen, is here with some safety tips.

Welcome back, Vicki. Thank you so much for having me, Andrea. So why are you worried about this now, Vicki? What's going on? You know, the FBI just issued a warning about this, saying it's actually a scam that has been going on since March of last year. It is alarming because people are getting very legitimate-looking texts on their phones saying,

hey, you have unpaid tolls. You need to click here and pay your overdue bill. Tell us how the scammers pull this off. It's called smishing, which is a riff on phishing. So phishing is when you get an email from a scammer that says, hey, click here, do this or that. Smishing means the scam is coming in through your text. You get a link and they say, click on this link

because you have an unpaid bill, you're gonna get late fees, and there's an urgency to it. What they really want to do is get you to click on the link and get your personal information, your credit card details, your banking information, and download something called malware onto your devices, which is software that is designed to invade your computer or your phone. So never tap on a link that you get. If for some reason you think this could be legitimate, go to your state toll website or call the 800 number that's on your bill, look it up online and go to the site.

Never tap on a foreign link that's sent to you. So Vicki, these scammers, do they know that we use these passes or we use tolls, or are they just casting a wide net to as many cell phone numbers as they can hoping that it resonates with someone? You know, it's unclear how they are targeting the victims, Andrea, but these days on the dark web, a lot of our data is floating out there that's been involved in hacks of major companies, right? And so that means that your personal information is out there to go to the highest bidder.

And a lot of times they are entering this information into some sort of automated system that can just push out a bunch of texts. And they're just hoping that a small percentage of those people tap on those links, and then boom, the hackers have access to your banking accounts and they can rack up a bunch of charges or try to drain your bank account. You know, and in most states, tolls are collected electronically, so you might not know or remember being charged or the rules can change. You know, it's confusing for people.

Exactly. And often there's an amount due, right? It's a number that looks like it could be legitimate. We're often in a hurry. We tap on things before we even think about it. And so my advice is always pause before you click anything. Think to yourself, does this look legit? Just remember, the government, they're all about the snail mail. So anytime you get something that's like a phone call or an email or a text, you should be extra suspicious. So we know what not to do. What should you do if you do get one of these text messages?

Yeah, so if you have clicked on it and you did pay this money, you do want to report it immediately to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center. That website is IC, like Internet Crime, 3, the number 3,.gov. So, IC3.gov. And you can at least file a complaint. I would also advise you to go to your credit card company. Hopefully, they can either stop the payment or reverse the charge and give you a new credit card. And I should say you should probably put a freeze on your credit or maybe sign up for a credit monitoring system because what else did they get

access to in that time in terms of your identity? Good point, good point. So the road toll texting scam it's just a great reminder that these scammers they just continue to create new tactics to get money from people. Absolutely. All right you have the best information, the best tips. Thank you so much as always for being here. Thank you for having me. That's it for this episode of Dateline True Crime Weekly.

If you want to find out more about the cases featured on the podcast, check out our website at datelinetruecrimeweekly.com. And to get ad-free listening for all our podcasts, subscribe to Dateline Premium. Coming up this Friday, Blaine Alexander has her first all-new two-hour dateline since she officially joined the team. In 2016, a young woman's body is found in an abandoned farmhouse, a place known locally as The Haunted House. As fear grips the community, investigators search for answers takes them

from a crime lab to a house of worship. I grabbed the pew and I was like, how? How? How could this be the guy? Watch The Haunted House Confession airing this Friday at 9-8 Central on NBC or stream it starting Saturday on Peacock. And don't forget to check out Keith's new podcast series, Murder in the Moonlight. It's about a double murder in the Great Plains and an investigation that came down to one single shiny clue. Dateline Premium subscribers can binge the entire series and episodes one through four are available for everyone else.

Thanks for listening. Dateline True Crime Weekly is produced by Franny Kelly and Katie Ferguson. Our associate producers are Carson Cummins and Caroline Casey. Our senior producer is Liz Brown-Koroloff. Production and fact checking help by Sara Kadir. Veronica Mazaka is our digital producer.

Rick Kwan is our sound designer. Original music by Jesse McGinty. Bryson Barnes is head of audio production. Paul Ryan is executive producer, and Liz Cole is senior executive producer of Dateline. All right, most productive.