Dateline NBC - Behind Door 813

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

After 27-year-old Jonathan Crews dies mysteriously in his Texas apartment, his family takes matters into their own hands in an effort to find answers. Josh Mankiewicz reports.

Tonight, on Dateline. He's dead. He's dead. Did you shout at yourself? Yes. I heard Brenda say, he's dead. And I said, who's dead? She said, it's Jonathan. To see your own child in a casket,

that's a memory I will never be able to get rid of. Do you ever hear him ever talk about having suicidal thoughts? No. That's not something Jonathan would have done. It either had to be suicide or murder. The Chinese delivery guy shows up, and he could hear fighting. She didn't show up at the funeral.

They started telling us, we don't have enough. If there's going to be an answer, you're going to have to find it. It's the last thing we wanted to do. The start of the trial was incredibly tense. The family had a lot riding on this. A verdict has been delivered. It was a really surreal moment.

The thing I really wanted was for Jonathan to be vindicated. I wanted his legacy to be the true legacy. A young life ended. Death by suicide or something darker? Follow along as his family takes an extraordinary step to try to solve the mystery. I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Josh Mankiewicz with Behind Door 813. Super Bowl Sunday 2014. Seahawks, Broncos. Let's go Broncos!

And like millions of Americans, Emily and her boyfriend Jacob were headed to a party. They were hoping to spend time with the best friend Jacob and Emily shared, a guy named Jonathan Cruz. Only that night, Jonathan had other plans. He was supposed to hang out with us, and he was insistent that he wanted to stay at his apartment. Jonathan had just moved into a new apartment here in the city of Capel, just outside Dallas. And he had a long to-do list. Emily texted him during the party. One of the couples that we were there with, they had a couch that they were selling. And I texted Jonathan, you know, pictures of it.

And I was saying, hey, these people are selling a couch. Somebody from my work is also selling one. I'll send you a picture of that in a little bit. She didn't know that not long after the game, a call would come in to 911. On the other end was a voice full of fear. I'm out of here. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. That panicked voice belonged to Brenda Lazaro, a 26-year-old teacher and martial arts instructor. Brenda was Jonathan's girlfriend. They were together at his apartment, wherever that was. What's the name of the apartment? I don't know. I don't know. Please, please. He died. He died. He killed himself. He killed himself. He shot himself? Yes. Brenda said she didn't know the exact address.

Jonathan had just moved in a week earlier. We're trying to get someone there. Oh, my God. Jonathan. Jonathan. Do you have any mail or anything that you can give me the exact address? No, there's nobody here. It's just me.

Oh my God. Did he use a gun or what happened? Yes, he used a gun. I can't see that woman because it's too much of a lot. I'm just pressing on it. The 911 operator asked Brenda to see if a neighbor could give her the address. I want you to go and knock on a door or find a name of something. River Chase apartment.

River Chase? Okay. With that, first responders were on their way. Jonathan's parents, John and Pam Cruz, were home that night with their daughter, Danny, and their other son, Christian. They were just a few miles from Jonathan's new apartment. We had just settled down. It was Super Bowl Sunday, and Danny and I had taped a TV show that we watched every Sunday, and we had just turned it on when her phone rang. It was Brenda. It was hard to understand her. She was just screaming the whole time, and I heard her say, he's dead. And I said, who's dead?

And she said, it's Jonathan. And then my parents started, like, who, what's going on? And so she walked to the end of my room, and she said, Brenda said Jonathan shot himself. And John made just this horrible noise and jumped out of the bed. I don't know how he did this, but he was in clothes and running down the hallway

in less than 30 seconds. I thought, if I get there, I can, whatever it is, I can fix it. Capel police arrived at 11.40 p.m. It was chaotic. There were police everywhere. There were several emergency vehicles. It was crazy.

This is what body cameras recorded as officers reached the door of Jonathan's apartment and spoke with Brenda. Where's he at? He's inside. Okay, just stay out here, okay? He's underneath us. All right, okay, another officer's coming, okay? 213, I'm going to make entry. The first officer entered the apartment and smelled gunpowder.

Is he dead? Send him to the fire department. Is he dead? No, you're talking to him. You're talking to him? Paramedics were on the scene, but it was already too late. Really? Is he dead? Yes, ma'am.

Oh, my God, no. No. Officers found Jonathan Cruz lying in his bed with a gunshot wound to his chest. He was 27 years old. I remember walking up to the police officer. What's going on? What's your name, sir? John. And I remember, because I just didn't believe it, I asked him three times,

is he okay? And he told me three times he was gone. Unfortunately, uh... No. Oh, no. You want to sit down with her? No, I want to see him. The last thing on my mind at that point was what happened. I mean, just trying to absorb the idea that he was not longer with us

was about all my brain and emotions could deal with. Moments after John and Danny arrived at the apartment came Jonathan's mom, Pam. When do you see each other and what do you say? Gosh. You know, honestly, it's kind of a blur. I remember us all hugging at one point. John just kept trying to get to Jonathan. Just wanted to see him.

Yeah. And I knew I couldn't see him. Not how you want to, you know. When you have your kids, you always think of them as these little newborn babies, you know. And you just always look back and that, you know, when you have your kids, you always think of these little newborn babies, you know. And you just always look back and that, you know, couldn't see my baby with a hole blown through him. At this point, the only story this family had heard boiled down to three simple words. Jonathan shot himself.

And that simple story raised a lot of complicated questions. Could this really be suicide? Or maybe something else altogether? I concluded that Brenda must be wrong. There must have been an intruder in the house that shot Jonathan. It was just after midnight, and a years-long search for answers was just getting started. The family of Jonathan Cruz returned to their home in the small hours of the morning,

reeling from the news of his apparent suicide. What were you thinking? Really not much of anything. I think I was just kind of in shock and I didn't really know what to do or what to think. We're out of our minds at that point. Like there's no rationality at all. Yeah. I was taken ambient and ambient asleep. Jonathan's close friend Emily woke up that morning after the Super Bowl with a bad feeling. She'd gotten a strange text from Jonathan after the game. I plugged my phone in and a text message popped up and it was from Jonathan. It said, I want to die, period. You ever hear him

say anything like that before? No. Emily says when she first saw the text, she didn't take it literally. She thought maybe Jonathan was having a bad night or being dramatic. Now it was morning and she hadn't heard from him again. I think I tried to call his phone and he didn't answer. And I looked at Jacob and said, you don't think something happened, right? Like this is just so weird. Emily decided to drive over to Jonathan's. Before she could get there, the family called Jacob with the horrible news. And then I got a phone call from Jacob and all that I could make out that he was saying was Jonathan is dead and he's been shot. I'm pissed. I'm confused. Like, I don't, like, how did he get shot? I don't even know where he got

shot. One thing he and everyone close to Jonathan did know, Jonathan was a gun enthusiast and kept several firearms at his place. How many guns did he have? Probably a half dozen, maybe. I didn't really like the guns. I'd shoot with him. He was the one that first taught me to shoot. Police determined the gun that killed Jonathan was indeed one of his own. Guns had been a part of his family's life for generations. Now, the entire family was in pieces. I show up at their house, and, you know, his family's just in a daze.

For those early, numb moments of grief, all anyone could think of was Jonathan. Such a young life, lost. We're a very close family, but he was kind of the ringleader for everything that happened. He seemed to greet every day with an excitement for what was going to happen. He was the one that always brought the party, you know? I met him in eighth or ninth grade. I kind of fell into the nerdy group, and when Jonathan came in,

he was tall, handsome, and pretty athletic. He was the cool guy. Yeah, he was the cool guy for a while, and then he kind of became friends with my group. The best friends went on to be roommates at Baylor University, where Jonathan majored in history. After college, he wanted to save for grad school. So Jonathan, a snappy dresser who loved colorful neckties, worked as a manager in the men's department at Dillard's.

That's where he met Emily. We had very similar personalities. We would always kind of joke that I was like the female version of him. And at what point you guys very briefly went out? So we went on one date. He asked me to go out to like dinner and drinks one night. I looked at him and go, you know, this would never work, right? And he goes, yeah, I know. We're pretty much the same person. It would be weird for me to date myself. And that was it. And after that, you guys were friends?

Yes, really good friends. Such good friends that Jonathan later played matchmaker. Me, Jacob, and Jonathan had gone out to drinks one night, and Jacob left and went to the bathroom. And I looked at Jonathan, and I go, I think I like your friend. He goes, OK, I'm cool with that. I'll help you. And then that night, I think we kind of conspired together.

Yeah, he conspired against me. That's actually not against you. That's for you. Yeah, right? You're married now. Along with his tight circle of friends, much of Jonathan's life started to revolve around this place, Wu Yi Shaolin, a martial arts school in a Capel strip mall. And it became a family affair. Jonathan, Pam, and Danny all took classes there and practiced Kung Fu. There were a lot of social events. You know, people hung out a lot. There were,

you know, friendships and cliques made within schools. It was there Danny first met Brenda Lazaro. She was originally from Mexico and a part-time instructor at the martial arts school. You thought of Brenda as your best friend? Yes. She was one of the leaders in the school, and I actually said to Jonathan sometime, you know, this girl Brenda seems like a nice girl. Maybe you would be interested in her.

Jonathan was interested. He came to me and said, I know she's your best friend. Would you mind? And I did, in fact, mind. My one stipulation was don't ruin my friendship with her. Like, don't come between us or anything like that. And he promised he wouldn't do that? Promise. Jonathan and Brenda began dating in November 2013. Sparks very quickly turned to fire, and Brenda told friends she thought Jonathan

was the one. How was Jonathan as a boyfriend, from what you could tell? Very giving. Very giving. Very full throttle, I would say. You know, he was a person that immersed himself fully into relationships. Brenda seemed to be no exception if she and Jonathan weren't together. They were constantly texting. Jonathan told his mom the relationship had become pretty intense. He said Brenda had gone through a rough childhood, that she had trust issues, and could be kind of insecure. And so I said, why don't you give her a chance to see what it's like to be with a nice person? Because when she sees how loyal and wonderful you are, she'll start to be a little more secure. Three months into that whirlwind of a romance, Jonathan decided to move out of his parents' house and get his own apartment.

Brenda helped him pick that place out. I believe she went with him looking for some places, yes. And she was there. she helped him move, she dimmed over and borrowed some cleaning supplies and cleaned everything out. To his mom and dad, Jonathan seemed to be embarking on his next chapter. He had a new job, a new girlfriend, a new apartment.

And so, as they sat, crushed, at the family home, the idea of suicide just didn't make sense. I made a mental note of every area of his life. Everything was going so well in his life. And so I concluded that Brenda must be wrong. There must have been an intruder in the house that shot Jonathan. And she came in and found him that way and made an assumption. Let me ask you this, which is not pleasant. At any time,

Jonathan ever expressed any thoughts about taking his own life or hurting himself? No. Was he depressed? No. Possible that he was depressed or sad or miserable in some way, and you missed it? No. I actually think that Jonathan was in one of the best places that he'd ever been in in his life. What happened in Jonathan's apartment that night? The only witness to this tragedy had a story to tell. And then I just heard She shot the gun. Have a seat. On the night Jonathan Cruz died,

Capell Police spoke with the only other person who was there, his girlfriend, Brenda Lazaro. Okay. She was sitting on some stairs in the back of the apartment outside, and there was a police officer speaking to her, and I walked up, asked what happened, and he basically said, go away. Hey, sir, if you wouldn't mind,

just let me talk to her for a minute, and then you can talk to her a second. Brenda began describing what happened that night at Jonathan's apartment. Oh, I get some Chinese food if you order. Chinese from here in town? Yeah. Did they deliver? Yeah.

Brenda said they ate, watched TV in bed, and talked. They were having a serious conversation about their relationship. She said at some points it became emotional. He told me he loved me, and I told him that I loved him too. And then he told me he was going to show me. We were not talking for a long time. We would always stay quiet. He was in the bed, and I was at the edge of the bed.

We were just there. We didn't do anything. And then he just told me that he was going to show me that he loved me. And he asked me... What did he say? Say how he said it, okay? He just said, baby, I love you and I'm going to show you that I love you. And then he asked me to cover my ears, and I didn't see anything. I didn't know that he had a gun or anything. So you didn't know he had a gun in the house? You've never seen it before? I didn't know he had guns in the house. I didn't know that he had a gun with him.

Where were you when all this happened? I was by the edge of the bed sitting down on the floor. Okay, and then what happened? He told you to cover your ears, right? Yeah. Okay, what happened? He asked me a few times to cover my ears and I didn't want to do it. I told him, no, why?

He just, trust me, just cover your ears. And then I didn't say anything. So, no intruder, as Jonathan's mom had wondered. Brenda told police she was right there when Jonathan shot himself. Brenda. Brenda. Police asked her to come with them to the station. We'll get you in there and get you something to drink. I know that's going to make you feel better, but at least try to make you a little more comfortable. You think I'll be all right with you?

In the back of the police car, Brenda sobbed. She was still crying inside the interview room. It took about 20 minutes before she was calm enough to talk. I need to know a little bit about you so I can make sure that you're going to be okay. We need to know who to call. We need to know if there's family that you have. And then Brenda told police the story again. He said he loved you a lot. And then I heard it coming. By the time she finished, it was early morning. Later that day, she went to stay with the Cruz family. You know, I remember taking her face in my hands and looking at her and saying,

this wasn't your fault. I thought, I need to help her so that she's not ruined for the rest of her life. Brenda didn't say much to Jonathan's parents about what had happened that night. She did talk with her close friend, his sister Dani. I asked her what happened, and she said that they were having a conversation. Not a fight. She said that I think they'd had a fight earlier that day, but she said that it was calm. They were just having a conversation. And then he said, I'm going to prove how much I love you.

And then pulled out a gun and shot himself and he fell back onto the bed. Danny thought Brenda's story sounded strange. Who shoots themselves to prove their love for someone else? You thought this was an accident? I figured that must be what it must be an accident. Jonathan's dad was hoping police could provide some clarity. I'm sure they asked me things like, was he depressed and those kinds of things. Although the thing that stands out is them trying to impress upon me.

Basically, don't think this was a suicide. Whatever the outcome is, don't believe that's what happened. That was their big message to you? That was their big message. So it's almost like they're trying to make you feel better. Well, I assume they had some reason for that statement. Like, it wasn't just to make me feel better, that there were facts that supported that. The gun's magazine was found not in the gun, but in a drawer.

The weapon, a Sig Sauer 9mm, can hold a bullet in its chamber even without the magazine. So maybe Jonathan didn't know the gun was loaded. What we heard, or what I heard at least, was, at the very least, this was some sort of an accident. The family had no clear answers one way or the other as they braced for jonathan's funeral to see your own child in a casket is i mean that's the memory i will never be able to get rid of it was awful to see like

like his parents having to kind of like just like greet people like next to a casket of their kid. This is one of the toughest things I've ever done. It just kind of was a blur. I remember talking. And that's about it. So many people who love Jonathan paid their respects. Except for one. Brenda wasn't there. She'd been texting me asking if she could wear jeans and asking the address.

And so when she just didn't show up, I was like, that's so weird. The family had saved her a seat up front with them. And her absence sparked a new fear. People were concerned about her. We were afraid, you know, maybe she'd done something to herself or maybe something had happened to her. The questions were piling up, and some of the potential answers didn't make sense. Gun safety was something he took very seriously.

Took very seriously. Very seriously. Jonathan Cruz's family believed he never would have shot himself, at least not on purpose. And yet the more they thought about it, the idea of an accident didn't fit either. Jonathan's grandfather had taught him and his brother all about guns from childhood. He was teaching them about how to shoot, gun safety, all that from the time that they were pretty young. So gun safety would not have been something new to Jonathan. No, quite the opposite. He was very, very, very, very careful with his guns. I went hunting with him, and he was always very careful about where the muzzle was pointed,

if it was loaded or unloaded, depending on what he was doing. He had more formal firearms training as he got older and shot competitively. Here he is on home video at a shooting range outside of town. Jonathan's parents believed there had to be another explanation. Maybe Brenda could help them understand. So where was she? It turned out Danny heard from her after the funeral. Brenda was alive and well.

And then she was like, well, I just couldn't do it. I'm too upset. Danny could not understand why she didn't show up. You were upset that she wasn't there. I mean, I thought it was a really awful thing to do. As they exchanged messages on Facebook, things got tense. Brenda told Danny she was bothered by how the service had been planned. She was very upset that their relationship was

not the focal point of the funeral. Their relationship? Their relationship. She wanted the world to know about their love and how important it was to him. Even though they'd been together like three months and he'd been with your family his entire life. Exactly. She thinks it should be about her. Yeah. When they started dating, Jonathan promised to keep his relationship with Brenda from affecting Danny's friendship with Brenda.

Danny says she now realizes that was wishful thinking. Once Jonathan and Brenda were a couple, Danny started to see a side of Brenda

she didn't like. So, what'd you observe? A lot of weirdness. Stuff you hadn't seen before? No. Like what? So, what'd you observe? A lot of weirdness. Stuff you hadn't seen before? No. Like what? So, before they even officially started dating, he and I made plans to hang out on a Saturday.

He kept getting text messages. And he was like, hey, so Brenda's really upset with me because she texted me this morning and wanted to spend the day together, but I'm not going to cancel plans that I've already made with you to hang out with her. And she was complaining that he wasn't making her a priority in his life. And they're like, what, three days old at that point? I was like, priority? You just met her. What do you mean? Another example. A few weeks into the relationship, the Cruz family took a vacation to Europe. Everyone on that trip remembers Jonathan texting Brenda nonstop.

They had only been going out a very short period of time. Yes. But he spent a lot of time texting with her to where we had to ask him, you know, put it down when we're together, put it down when we're at dinner. You know, she can wait for you to come back. After they returned, Danny says it wasn't long before Brenda's jealousy arrived like the new sheriff in town. Suddenly, there were rules in this relationship, and Jonathan's new job was to follow them. At one point, he wished a happy birthday to a female friend on Facebook that he hadn't spoken to in years. And she freaked out about it and wanted him to get rid of all of his female friends on Facebook.

Ridiculous or reasonable? People can disagree on that. Then, after Jonathan's funeral, this. We wanted to change his Facebook page to a memorial page, and we couldn't access the Facebook. She thought Brenda might have Jonathan's passwords. I asked for them, and she was like, we have to promise, you know, we made the decision that he was going to remove all of his ex-girlfriends, and so you have to promise me, because it's his wishes, that you won't add them back. She's still thinking about that after he's dead? Yes.

That was like her one stipulation for giving us the passwords is his ex-girlfriends cannot be re-added to his Facebook. So you went along with that. Yeah. We agreed. We did what we had to do to get our access. So while Jonathan's family was frustrated with Brenda, his close friends were just plain skeptical about her story.

What do you mean, like, cover yours? I'm going to show you how much I love you. That's dumb. He wouldn't talk like that. No. Also, like, who does that? That's not something Jonathan would have done. That's a weird story.

So was it a made-up story? Who does that? That's not something Jonathan would have done. That's a weird story. So was it a made-up story? Could this be the opening act of a cover-up? Maybe something darker led up to the night Jonathan Cruz died. Finally, I said, Jonathan, you know it's not going to get better because, like, it's just escalating at this point. Despite being one of Jonathan's best friends, Emily didn't know his girlfriend Brenda all that well. Even so, she had a unique window into their relationship. Early on, Jonathan asked Emily and Jacob on a double date so they could meet Brenda. We both gave him a really big hug like we normally do when we see him.

They say Brenda was quiet during the whole meal. So you're trying to draw her out a little bit. Right. And nothing. Yeah. Nothing. Later, I think he had texted me and said like, oh, she's not feeling good. So in my brain, I thought, okay, that's why she's quiet. I don't, I don't talk a lot when I'm sick. Now fast forward a couple of months to the day of Jonathan's death. The three friends met for brunch. Jonathan started to get some text messages and seemed distracted by his phone. And then he started the conversation by saying, so Brenda has a problem with you. And I remember being very caught off guard because I was like, wait, what?

Why? And he said, you know, she was really upset when you and I went to dinner that like I hugged you. And I'm like, why was she upset that I hugged you? That doesn't make any sense. Especially since I was dating his best friend. Jonathan tried to explain. He mentioned Brenda's difficult upbringing in Mexico. He said that she'd been through a lot of traumatic things.

And one of those being that her uncle was murdered in front of her by the cartel. And so, you know, her family had to flee Mexico and they weren't allowed to go back. So it made her hard to trust people. Then Jonathan's phone rang. It was Brenda. And she wanted to talk to Emily. When I took the phone, she literally was like screaming at me. What did she specifically say to you?

She was telling me that I was a disrespectful little girl for hugging her man and that I needed to stay away from him and keep my hands off of him. I said to her, I'm sorry if it bothers you that I hugged him, but he's my friend. I greet everyone that way. I'm not going to not hug him because that bothers you. I'm not interested in him. It's never been like that. I've never even kissed him. And that didn't calm her down? No. She said afterwards, let me talk to my man. And I said, absolutely. And I handed Jonathan the phone. And did you say, your crazy girlfriend wants to talk to you? To be honest, I was a little bit overwhelmed.

I handed him the phone and got up from the table and went to the bathroom and immediately started crying. When Emily returned to the table, Jonathan tried to apologize. He just kept on apologizing all over himself. I said, like, I know that you like her, like you're in a relationship with her. I don't want you to have to choose between your girlfriend and me. I just, like, right now, I don't want to be around her. Emily didn't know it at the time, but Brenda's issues with her

had been a sticking point in the relationship since that first dinner. And in part because of that, Jonathan had been thinking about ending the relationship. A day earlier, he'd sent his sister, Dani, a text laying out his options. Fight it and try to make it better, which won't happen. Two, choose Brenda. In other words, give up Emily. Three, refuse to give up either and see if Brenda ends it. Four, end it with Brenda now. And he decides out of those four choices to end it. Yes. He said it's going to happen soon. He goes, you know, I'm really sorry. You know, I know this is a lot of drama and I know it has probably affected your relationship with her and a breakup might ruin it further. And I'm

really sorry because that was my one thing that I promised you. Now at brunch, after hearing Brenda lose it about Emily, he told his friends what he was thinking. Jonathan, make it clear during that conversation, that was going to be the end of his relationship with Brenda? Very clear. He said several times that he was going to pack up all of her things and that he was absolutely done. This is less than 24 hours from the end of Jonathan's life. Right. Driving in the car back to his apartment, you know, everybody was just kind of quiet. And he all of a sudden got really tense and goes, oh my gosh, there's her car. And Jacob was like, Emily, we're just going to go.

I don't want you to talk to her. I was like, of course I'm not going to talk to her. Like, she's a black belt in like Kung Fu or whatever. She would beat me up. Then the next morning, she heard Jonathan had been shot. Emily's gut told her something wasn't right. It was a feeling she could not shake. I thought, you know, that she had done something to him.

I knew Jonathan. I knew that he wouldn't have done this. So then what about that text Emily received from Jonathan after the Super Bowl? I want to die. Yeah. Did he talk that way? No. No, Jonathan, when he got stressed out, you know, when I used to live with him and what I know about him, he'd just go sleep. Him texting just that one little thing would have made sense. He would have said nothing at all, or he would have called her. Emily and Jacob turned it over and over in their minds. You now do not believe Jonathan sent that text.

No. No. You think that's Brenda after he dies? Absolutely. A hundred percent. The raging jealousy. That unhinged phone call. Did those point to murder?

That was how Emily and Jacob saw it. Now, would police agree? If we needed to take your DNA, do you have a problem with us doing that? It wasn't long after Jonathan Cruz died that his best friend Emily reached out to his brother. She wanted to share her suspicions about Brenda. He said, please don't talk to my parents about this right now. They have enough going on. They cannot handle it. So a week and a half went by before Emily, Jacob, and another close friend sat down in the family living room. One of them said, should we show her? And I said, no, you're showing me now. And so they showed me this text message that said, I want to die. And I said, Jonathan didn't write that.

And they said, we know. We know he would never write that. So who did? Pam already knew about Brenda's jealous streak, but says she was stunned at how on the last day of Jonathan's life, Brenda demonstrated so much fury towards Emily. I knew there was a problem with Emily, but I didn't realize it was that ongoing. What would your advice have been if he had mentioned that to you? Run. Yes, that would have been enough for me to know that was unreasonable jealousy. By far, Emily and Jacob's biggest revelation was Jonathan's plan to break up with Brenda on the very day he was shot. You were unaware of that until that moment. I had been. Yeah, I was.

The first time I'd heard any of that, that was pretty much the game changer. This was the moment Jonathan's parents became convinced it was Brenda who had shot their son. It's not uncommon for families of people who have taken their own lives to not want to admit that they missed some of the signs. Right.

And so they start looking for someone or something else to blame. That's not what's going on here. No. No. Absolutely not. The signs you blame yourself for missing are all about Brenda. Absolutely. Danny also blamed herself. The woman she now suspected of being her brother's

killer had been her best friend. That has to be a terrible feeling. Definitely makes me question my ability to read people. I mean, I trusted this person. The family's suspicions were actually just catching up with what some investigators suspected from the get-go. Police already knew about the tension over Emily. They heard about it from Brenda that night. I just don't even know what I'm talking about. Right away, Brenda told this police officer she and Jonathan had been arguing about Emily. Is this her friend, an ex-girlfriend? What? Friend. Okay. Girlfriend. She gave more details to a sergeant at the police station,

including her take on that phone call with Emily. I was upset when Jonathan stopped taking her calls after that. So she said she went to find him at his apartment. That was late afternoon, Brenda said. They argued, but it was brief. And everything was fine as they got ready for dinner. Brenda did not mention anything to police about a breakup. She did say they'd been talking about moving in together. And she worried Jonathan was getting cold feet.

She said even though things were calm as they ordered dinner, Jonathan later mentioned Emily's name again, leading to another quarrel. That's when she said Jonathan told her to cover her ears. And then came the gunshot. I stood up right away. And then I saw blood on the sheets. And he was just dead. Was that the whole story? Or had the stress and jealousy boiled over into violence? I need you to be as honest with me as you can.

Alright? Did you shoot him? No. Are you sure? I am sure. So when we do our investigation, is it going to show that he shot himself? Yes. If we needed to take your DNA, do you have a problem with us doing that? No. The sergeant and another officer swabbed Brenda's hands for blood and a gunshot residue test. They also took her sweatshirt to test for blood spatter. It was all packed up for the lab marked Rush. Emily says when she went to talk with police, they told her, watch your back.

When I was giving them my password to log into the Facebook, they had said to me, you need to not ever tag or post where you are right now because you seem to be somebody that upsets her. Weeks passed, then months. The local medical examiner was finishing up the autopsy report. He was having trouble making sense of exactly what happened. If you've watched enough Dateline, you probably know a death certificate has two important boxes to check. First is the cause of death. In this case, pretty obvious, a gunshot wound. And just as important, a medical examiner has to determine the manner of death. Was this accident, suicide, or homicide? And in this case, the ME couldn't reach a conclusion,

so Jonathan's death went down as undetermined. Then, nearly a year after the shooting, Jonathan's parents learned there was a new team assigned to their son's case. They said, the original people who investigated this are no longer on the case. You've got basically a new team on the file. We've been looking at it very closely. And they began to make noises about making arrests. The thing I remember them saying right off the bat when we got in there was, give us about six weeks and we think that we'll have some good news for you. That is why what happened next came as a shock and led them to this woman.

You won't sugarcoat this for people. No, not at all. A year after Jonathan's death, new investigators were on the case. His parents expected Brenda to be charged at any moment with his killing. Then came unexpected news. The family says detectives told them an arrest was not going to happen anytime soon. I'm pretty sure you said what changed. You made us think that there was going to be an arrest for murder. And what's new now?

We started getting a lot of, I can't really talk about it. Here's their memory of what police did say. When they started telling us we can't get her, we don't have enough, they said that this is the kind of crime she'll be likely to repeat, and we'll get her the next time. We'll get her the next time? To that effect. Your son is like the free space in the middle of bingo. Yes.

You get one, but then after that, what did you think when you heard that? I was appalled. I bet they wouldn't say that if they thought the next person was going to be their son. Brenda hired a lawyer who told police she wouldn't be talking. And in July 2015, Jonathan's case was marked inactive. I think the last thing they said to us was, live your lives. Great advice. Thank you. That's easier said than done, isn't it? Yes. Yeah.

The last thing they were going to do was stop trying to get answers for Jonathan. Jonathan's father is an attorney. He reached out to Tom Shaw, a colleague he battled in court. Tom works with his son, Taylor. I felt sorry for him because they were two broken people at that point. I could see a broken family that was looking for an explanation. They talked about filing a wrongful death lawsuit against Brenda and decided to bring on a private investigator. Why did you recommend Sheila Wysocki? I was fascinated by her story.

That was a story I covered on Dateline back in 2012. Sheila was a suburban mom who became a PI just to help solve her college roommate's cold case murder. She did it in part by getting on the phone to the police department. She did that more than 700 times. You fought pretty hard to find out who killed her. I did. I did. Now here we were again, more than a decade later. I'm tempted to say that you don't look like a PI, except that I think that the fact that I don't think that means that you probably do look like an extremely effective PI. I can get through doors because I look like everybody's mom. If I knock, I'm either lost,

runs through your mind, or there's something you want to know why this older lady's knocking at your door. And suddenly there you are and you're asking questions. Absolutely. Sheila works with another PI, Danielle Birch, and agreed to help Jonathan's parents on one condition. They said it was called in as a suicide, and I told him if I take the case that if it's suicide, I stop. We're done. I mean, you won't sugarcoat this for people. No, not at all. Probably a little too forthcoming. If you believe it's murder and it's suicide, you're not going to like me. I was scared of her because she was just very curt.

And she said, I'm going to look at this from every angle. And if I find out your son killed himself, I'm going to tell you. Can you live with that? And I said yes. Sheila started by asking Jonathan's friends and co-workers about his mental health. Once again, no one said he seemed suicidal or even depressed. We pulled his records from the doctor. Nothing. We went to the insurance company he was covered under and looked to see if there was a psychiatrist, psychologist, or whatever. A year earlier, he'd been prescribed the anti-anxiety medication Xanax, but told his family he only took one pill and never refilled the prescription. Any evidence that he was under psychiatric care or was on any kind of antidepressants?

There was no evidence. As Sheila worked, the family filed their civil lawsuit against Brenda, seeking more than a million dollars in damages and asking for a jury trial. Sheila managed to get her hands on part of the police case file, and this detail caught Sheila's attention. Remember how investigators found the magazine of the gun that killed Jonathan in a drawer? Well, that drawer also held his neckties. And one thing Sheila knew about Jonathan was that he cared about how he looked and dressed. Jonathan is a Thai person. He's very meticulous about his clothes and having a greasy magazine in his Thai drawer doesn't make sense. Had someone else put it there and could that someone be Brenda?

As she tracked down witnesses, Sheila found someone police had never spoken with. It's the delivery man who brought Jonathan and Brenda Chinese food on that final night. He recalled a verbal argument so intense he could hear it from the hallway. The Chinese delivery guy shows up and he knocks on the door and he has to continuously knock on the door because they're fighting behind the door. He couldn't get their attention. Can he hear them fighting? He could hear fighting, but not the words. Sheila also located a witness who'd already been interviewed by police,

a neighbor of Jonathan's, who said she'd heard what sounded like a gunshot just before 11 p.m. Here she is in a videotaped deposition recorded for the lawsuit. I sat up. I just thought to myself, was that a gunshot? Couldn't be in this area. It's a nice area. So I just laid back down.

Remember how in her call to 911, Brenda said she didn't know the address? I want you to go and knock on a door or find a name of something. Jonathan's neighbor says she heard a knock on her door. What was the time gap, if you can remember? Was it right away that you heard the knock on the door? It wasn't right away. It seems like it might have been maybe 20 minutes. Okay. In her interview with police, the neighbor guessed it could have been as long as 45 minutes.

Why the time gap? Tom Shaw has his suspicions. She was stalling to wait for him to die. You think she waited like a half hour to call 911? Yes. So that he would be dead? Yes. Sheila, too, is skeptical of the whole didn't know the address element of Brenda's story. She thinks that may also have been a stalling tactic.

She helped Jonathan pick out the location. It's across the street from Kung Fu, and she has a hard time telling him where she was. But if you believe Brenda, she just saw her boyfriend kill himself, and she's hysterical, and she's a little overwrought, as somebody might be in that situation. So maybe she isn't functioning the way that you would expect or you would hope. True. Or she just shot him, and she's panicked a little bit

and trying to figure out how she's going to get out of this. This is his brand-new apartment. That she helped pick out. Okay, but it's possible he's only been there a week that maybe she doesn't know the address. Okay, I'll give you that. I'll give you that. There was more in the case file that raised red flags for Sheila. The trajectory of the bullet that killed Jonathan seemed to be telling a story, one that didn't make any sense. And the story is that Jonathan shot himself like this?

Each day without their son was unbearable for Pam and John Cruz. Some moments were worse than others. Jonathan loved Christmas. He loved holidays. And so Christmas music was just an assault. And we had a few times where we just couldn't keep it together. As the civil case moved forward, Private Eye Sheila Wysocki kept revisiting one detail, the location of Jonathan's wound. Traditionally, when men kill themselves with a gun, they shoot themselves in the head.

Especially somebody who's well-educated as Jonathan on guns. So Jonathan was trained in gun safety and did competitions. So if he's going to kill himself over a girl or anybody, he's going to know how to put a gun to his mouth or his head and get it over with. She also got a look at the results of those gunshot residue tests conducted by law enforcement. Jonathan had GSR on his right hand. And Brenda? The lab detected residue on both her hands and the front of her sweatshirt. That seemed odd to Sheila, since Brenda described being at the foot of the bed when the shooting happened. Are you at the bottom of the bed? Yes, you can get gunpowder on you, but it's something to look at as an investigator.

In 2018, Sheila assembled a team of private investigators and forensic experts. We spent probably eight to ten hours on Jonathan's bed with the trajectory of the bullet to see, does it work? Does it not? Sheila says they knew the exact path the bullet took through Jonathan's body based on the autopsy, and law enforcement later determined the gun was fired at close range. The GSR tests told them Jonathan must have held the gun with his right hand. So to them, that meant there was only one way Jonathan could have shot himself. This is an exact replica of the gun. It is. And the story is that Jonathan shot himself like this? Yes. Why would anybody use this grip? Why would anybody shoot themselves in such an incredibly awkward way? Nobody would.

To Sheila and the family, the evidence was clear. Jonathan did not kill himself. As their wrongful death lawsuit worked its way through the courts, they didn't give up on the idea of criminal charges. The first time I heard about it was when his parents asked if they could come and talk to me. Mike Snipes joined the Dallas District Attorney's Office as a prosecutor in 2017,

about three years after Jonathan's death. After the Cruz family reached out, Snipes was asked to look into Jonathan's case. It's a circumstantial evidence case, but in my mind, a very, very good one. Snipes says one stumbling block in criminal prosecutions can be what's written on the medical examiner's report. So if the coroner says cause of death is undetermined and you go in with a murder case, like that's kind of your reasonable doubt right there. Even the coroner can't make up their mind.

It conceivably could be. And it makes it a lot harder. Yes. Difficult, he says, but not impossible. What I thought was that the story that she gave to the police and it was the prevailing story that it was suicide was physically impossible. Leaving it, only one other person could have done it, and that was the suspect. So that was kind of my holy grail on this. Snipes says he wanted police to keep investigating and suggested steps investigators could take to bring the case closer

to a criminal prosecution. I was wanting the case to go to the grand jury. I just had some more things I wanted the Coppell Police Department to do, and that just never happened. But what, you were overruled? No, I wasn't overruled, but you want to have the police department decide that they want to file the case with the DA's office, and they never reached that point. Snipes left the DA's office at the end of 2018, and the criminal investigation went nowhere. The civil case continued, along with Sheila's investigation. She'd found dozens of witnesses,

including someone from Brenda's past. She just held some scissors in her hand and said, I'm going to go see your mom. That was one time. And that's the time that I called the police on her. Jonathan's best friend Emily told anyone who'd listen about his life, about his death, and about the girlfriend she suspected of killing him. There was a girl that had just recently started working at my company. As we were building a rapport and a friendship, she knew a lot about what had been happening. She asked me to see what the girl looked like.

So I took my phone and I handed it to her and I left the room and went to the bathroom. And when I came back in, I will never forget it. Her face was pretty much white. The co-worker knew all about Brenda. She was friends with the man Brenda dated before meeting Jonathan. And that ex had some stories. I contacted the police and said like, hi, I have this person, you guys should talk to him. According to police records, a detective visited Brenda's ex, but he wasn't home. So the detective left a business card

and another at the man's mother's home. My understanding was they tried to contact him, he wasn't available, and there was no follow-up. Which, in fairness, this is the police. And if they really want to speak with somebody about an ongoing investigation, they can make that happen. Sheila successfully tracked him down. So did we.

His name is Matthew Kirk, and he might be the most interesting man in Irving, Texas. I have an insurance business. I paint, I do ballet, I practice martial arts, and I lost 65 pounds since 2019. The martial arts part of that is what connected him to Brenda. So I met Brenda in Northlake College. I met her in our Kung Fu class we were taking together. It was taken first semester. Brenda was, she was a good girl. And she was a caring person.

She was a very hard worker. She worked out hard. She's very intelligent. She's a very passionate person. Matthew says he fell hard for Brenda. She was with me seven days a week. There were a few days in a year where we did not see each other.

But otherwise, you were together all the time. Yeah, yeah. She really liked hanging out with me. I'm a fun person, so I don't blame her. The relationship started off so well. And then... Relationship with Brenda was, you know, as any other relationship, it was ups and downs.

Tell me about the downs. The downs was she was a bit jealous, especially around like maybe with my sister-in-law, or she did not like me being in an elevator with another girl alone too long. Just as we heard from those around Jonathan, Brenda's ex says her jealousy was a constant thing. You ever give her a reason to feel so jealous? I was a good-looking guy at the time, you know. You're a good-looking guy now. Yeah, but actually I was uglier than I was.

I had hair and I was chubbier. But at that time, I didn't give her much reason to be jealous. But I mean, did you cheat on her? I never cheated on her. So what was the source of that jealousy? Insecurity. She's a very insecure person. Sometimes it's not just love that's blind. Sometimes jealousy is too. Matthew said Brenda became enraged when he planned to visit his sister-in-law at the hospital after she gave birth. The day that my sister-in-law had her baby, she did not want me to be there. Brenda didn't want you to be there?

No, no. She really, really didn't want me to be there. And there was one point where she was crying, really upset. She broke a mirror in the bathroom, used mirror shards to cut her wrists. When I was not in the bathroom, she had the door shut, and then she left. And then I went to go see my baby. She used the shards to cut her wrists

because you wanted to go be with your sister-in-law when she had her baby? Right. Yeah, she had a lot of demons inside her. He says one fight with Brenda was so scary he called police. That was when Matthew was trying to end it with her. I think I was trying to break up with her at one point. And she grabbed some scissors and she says, I'm going to go see her mom.

And I was like, what are you talking about? She got in her car and started driving to my mom's home. Matthew says he got into his car, hoping to make it to his mom's house first, and on the way, called police. Hey, my girlfriend is getting a little bit upset. Can y'all go take care of this? And so they got to her home and took her to the hospital.

If you hadn't intervened, if you hadn't called the cops, what do you think would have happened? Oh, my mom's a very sweet lady. Probably my mom would have sweet-talked her, made her feel better, and all that. Also, my mom's second degree black belt in Taekwondo, so. After four years together, Matthew and Brenda broke up. He says he didn't think about her much until months later, when he got a call from Brenda and she wanted to meet up. He says he didn't think about her much until months later when he got a call from Brenda and she wanted to meet up. It was the day after Jonathan Cruz died. She said, hey, I need help. And I said, sure. And she's like, will you do anything for me? And I was like,

like, what's going on? She said, I need you to do me a favor. I was like, um, what's going on she said i need you to do me a favor i was like um what's a favor and she says i want you to kill me i was like no i'm not gonna do that and she says you okay then can you give me a gun i want to kill myself and i was like no i'm not gonna give you a gun, and he put the gun up to his head and shot himself in the head. Wait, wait, wait. One second. In the head? Oh, yeah, yeah. She said that.

No question she said in the head. Right. That was a new version of events. The attorneys thought Matthew's stories were important enough to include in the civil case, which finally went to trial in September 2022. A jury was about to hear and see what Jonathan's family believes Brenda Lazaro had created a new life. She was married now now with two kids. And according to her defense attorney, Andrew G., she was being tormented by a grieving family that would never be satisfied. I think that the thing that's important to remember about Brenda is that she's experienced

a tremendous loss here as well. This was someone that was very close to her that died tragically in front of her. When the wrongful death trial began in September 2022, Brenda was there in the courtroom with her new family. Her husband was there the entire time, as well as her in-laws. Reporter Nahid Rajwani Darcy covered the trial for the news outlet Axios. The start of the trial was incredibly tense. You could tell John and Pam and the rest of the family had a lot, you know, riding on this. And I can imagine it was a big day for Brenda as well, right? If she truly is innocent, this is a big way for her to prove that innocence. This case, though, was in civil court, where juries don't decide guilt or innocence, just blame, legal liability. And the burden of proof is lower than beyond a reasonable doubt.

How hard is it to prove a murder in a civil case? The burden of proof's different. In a civil case, it's more likely than not. So, just a little more likely that she did it. In a criminal case, it's beyond a reasonable doubt, which the DA will tell you is a very high burden that they have compared to the burden that civil lawyers like us have. This is a big deal.

This is an important case. If jurors found Brenda responsible, Tom Shaw asked them to award the family more than $90 million. The Cruz family knew Brenda did not have anywhere near that amount of money, and they didn't care. This was about answers. And in civil court, money is the closest you get to justice. After you've heard all the evidence, you'll be able to do what no criminal jury ever had a chance to do, to bring justice to Jonathan's life, to bring justice to those from whom he was taken. Jonathan's family described to the jury what they'd lost when Jonathan died. He wanted to get married someday. He wanted to have grandkids.

And we were certainly looking forward to that. Can you describe to the jury what the last eight and a half years has been like? It took a huge part of my heart and just threw it away. Shaw and his son set out to show the jury all the reasons they believed Jonathan could not have died by his own hand. First and foremost was their analysis of the bullet trajectory as it traveled through Jonathan's body. To them, it meant Jonathan would have had to reach at an odd angle to shoot himself. He would have had to have been a contortionist in order to take that shot and to pull the trigger.

Because this particular weapon, the Sig Sauer, has a real hard pull on the trigger. I thought that was the most compelling evidence in the case was that. Not spattered, no. And the plaintiff's expert witness said it was all the more unlikely because Jonathan had a shoulder injury. This former Houston police detective testified about Jonathan visiting a doctor in the days before his death. My expert opinion, Jonathan Cruz could not contort his shoulder across his body in that such manner in order to maneuver the weapon, in order to make the shot into his own chest without pushing through a bizarre amount of pain. When he could have just stood up, put the weapon to his head, in his mouth, under his chin, or squarely into his heart. The family's attorneys told the jury about those gunshot residue tests,

showing Brenda had GSR on her sweatshirt and both her hands. And they argued that while Jonathan had no motive to kill himself, Brenda did have a motive. Jonathan was about to break up with her. Emily testified to how angry Brenda had been on the day of Jonathan's death. I spoke to her on the phone on the day he was killed. The attorneys played the recorded deposition of Matthew Kirk. He recounted those stories about how Brenda's jealous streaks sometimes verged on violence. She just held some scissors in her hand and said, I'm going to go see your mom.

I am trying to forget that girl. She almost ruined my life. Attorneys for the Cruz family said Brenda told different versions of the shooting story to different people. In some, she was in the room when the gun went off. In others, she said she was in a different room. Danny testified to what Brenda told her. She was in the doorway facing him. They were just having a conversation. The attorneys deposed several of Brenda's martial arts school friends, who also heard conflicting accounts. That she went to the bathroom, and when she came out, he was already shot. Well, she said he shot himself in the head.

Is it possible, do you think, that that's the stress, the misery of that moment of being present when somebody you love kills themselves that maybe distorted her memory or made it harder for her to think clearly. I believe that when you're part of a traumatic moment, you don't forget the smell, the environment. Those things never leave you. Is Brenda somebody who is an exception to the rule of that traumatic moment and doesn't remember it? I don't know. But I believe that you don't tell different stories to five different people. So if Jonathan didn't shoot himself, then what did happen? In court, the family attorneys presented their story of that night. They believe Jonathan went to bed and while he was sleeping, Brenda used his phone to send that I want to die text message to Emily. She was so obsessed with Emily.

Who did she send that text to? That last text that went to Emily. Because she was saying to Emily, I can't have him, you can't have him. To illustrate what they think happened next, the family's lawyer showed the jury an animation. It was created by Sheila and her team,

based on their analysis of the bullet trajectory and on police reports about the evidence at the scene. It depicts Brenda approaching Jonathan while he lies in bed and then shooting him as he wakes up. The animation matches all the evidence that we showed in trial and that one we did because it is important for a jury to visually see what happened. So many accusations against her. So what would Brenda Lazaro have to say? Isn't it true that your motive for shooting Jonathan was the oldest motive in the book? Jealousy. suicide was not how they were investigating brenda lazaro sat and listened to every witness

he's not gonna then kill himself evidence will show that jonathan cruz is a victim of a homicide every bit of testimony that the Cruz family lawyers used I thought she was kind of odd or a little bit strange. to blame her for Jonathan's death. Her husband was by her side the majority of the time. There were moments when, if there was a difficult day in trial, they embraced each other for long periods of time. You could see that she needed support,

and she turned to her husband or in-laws for that. Her attorney, Andrew Gee, spoke for her. Give me a little thumbnail of Brenda Lazaro. Who is she? Brenda is a mother of two children. She's a great mom and a great wife, and she really just got caught up in some really difficult circumstances. What's going on over here? In court, he attacked the plaintiff's case piece by piece. What has happened to the family? Clearly traumatic. But that doesn't prove the allegation.

That doesn't prove what they're saying is true. First, the notion that Brenda told different versions of the story to different friends. This lawsuit for tens of years... Her attorney said it was the friends' memories that were wrong, not Brenda's stories. Has anybody ever told somebody something important and repeated that to multiple people? Are they all going to say the same thing that you said exactly? Probably not. What about two years later? Probably less likely. And there were other parts of those depositions in which her friends and family said

lovely things about Brenda. How would you describe Brenda? Somebody I trust, somebody I can count on. She was always just a good, great person. You know, I always looked up to her as an older sister. And, you know, she was very kind and respectful. Is she a jealous type? No. Not at all? No. Did you ever consider that?

Brenda's ex, Matthew Kirk, had all those crazy stories to share. I don't know. But not even he described Brenda as a killer. Would you consider her to be capable of that? I don't know. Is it conceivable to you that Brenda was so angry at Jonathan for breaking up with her that she lost her temper, lost her grip, grabbed a gun, and shot him? No, because we broke up probably two or three times in that relationship, and she never tried to kill me.

Did you have a gun in the house? Yeah. And she never tried to grab a gun or anything like that. I never even see her even try to do anything like that. Her ex-boyfriend, Matt, definitely describes Brenda as being controlling, jealous, kind of obsessive. But even he says he didn't think Brenda would kill anybody. You know, everybody hopes they don't know someone who could pull a trigger and shoot someone.

It may be hopefulness. Brenda's attorney says Jonathan could have shot himself at that angle even with a shoulder injury. It wasn't that big of a deal. He moved his apartment the week prior or so with that same injury, apparently with no problems. Gee also mentioned an incident from when Jonathan was in college. He fired a gun recklessly after drinking, suggesting he wasn't always careful around firearms. And the attorney said there was no motive for Brenda to shoot Jonathan. It's not even clear he was really breaking up with her.

If you're going to break up with someone, you don't order dinner for two at 8 o'clock at night and have them spend the night. That just doesn't make any sense. So you don't think Jonathan wanted to break up with her? Or you just don't think there's enough evidence there of that? I think that's total speculation. And her attorney says there was zero evidence that Brenda was the one who sent that text message to Emily. I think it's likely that he sent it because it was from an iPhone that was locked and it needed a passcode. And according to everybody

who knows Jonathan, he gave her his passcodes. Again, that's just absolute speculation. There's no evidence to suggest that Brenda sent that text. As for Brenda waiting to call 911, he said the neighbor's memory was unreliable. She'd been in bed when she heard the gunshot. So I just laid back down. And there was this. If you listen to that 911 call, and you listen carefully, you can hear Jonathan Cruz moaning on that tape. So he was alive during that 911 call, and you listen carefully, you can hear Jonathan Cruz moaning on that tape. So he was alive during that 911 call.

Here's the moment Brenda's attorney is talking about. Which is the name of the apartment? I don't know. I don't know. Please, please, don't. Please tell me what to do. What the Cruz family really wanted to hear was what Brenda had to say. The plaintiff's attorney called her to the stand. Ms. Lazaro, isn't it true that you shot Pam's son, Jonathan Cruz? I respectfully invoke my privilege against self-incrimination.

She took the fifth, again and again. That didn't stop the Cruz family attorney from asking her question after question. How many times did Brenda say, I take the fifth? About 130, 140 times. Brenda's attorney says it's unfair to read anything into that. All lawyers will tell a client that is subject to criminal prosecution, especially a murder, in a state that carries a death penalty, to take the fifth. It would be legal malpractice to advise someone to do anything different. Brenda may have said little on the stand, but her attorney said the facts of the case spoke for her. Despite their suspicions, police never arrested Brenda, and the M.E. never ruled Jonathan's death a homicide.

You also won't see any evidence that Brenda was ever arrested, charged, prosecuted, or convicted. I'm not sure that you'll see any evidence that indicates there's an ongoing police investigation. In the end, her attorney echoed one of the theories that had floated around the police department, that Jonathan didn't know there was a bullet in the chamber, and this was all a tragic mistake. I believe this was an accident. The case went to the jury. What would the answer be?

All rise. Word came quickly. After less than three hours of deliberation, the jury had a verdict. As they waited to hear it, Jonathan's parents and siblings hugged each other tightly. All rise. It was a really surreal moment because it's the thing that we'd been waiting for for so long. A verdict has been delivered. It is a unanimous verdict. The jury found Brenda Lazaro responsible

for shooting and killing Jonathan Cruz. John, it's $8 million. John, it's $8 million. Pam, it's $16 million. Then the judge rattled off some staggering numbers, the jury's calculation of what Brenda owed the family. John, it's $24 million, and Pam, it's $48 million. For their suffering and for their son's life. And they come back with an award of $206 million.

Yes. Which is money that Brenda Lazaro doesn't have and is never going to have. No. But that's a victory. It's an incredible victory because the parents were told for the first time that their son didn't take his own life.

I underestimated how important this was to my daughter, to Jonathan's friends, even to my wife. Even though it's not a criminal trial? Even though it's not a criminal trial. The thing I really wanted was for Jonathan to be vindicated. You know, he's not here to speak for himself. He didn't kill himself. We strongly believe that she killed him. We spoke with jury foreman Eddie Brown. He told us jurors pretty much agreed Brenda was the shooter before they even took their first vote. The biggest thing that led us to our decision was the trajectory of the bullet. Every one of us in the jury attempted to recreate the angle of what the bullet would have went through where he had held the gun. And

whether it was an accident on his part or not, it seemed extremely unlikely. We couldn't recreate it. And as for that lower standard of proof in a civil trial, the foreman told us many jurors thought the evidence was so strong against Brenda. They believed she was responsible beyond a reasonable doubt. Could you have voted to lock up Brenda instead of a financial award? Yes. You wouldn't have had any problem with that? No, not at all. Did anyone wonder why this was in civil court and not criminal court? Yes. We were kind of curious why the DA wasn't moving forward with the criminal case. Jonathan's parents hoped a win in civil court might lead to criminal charges.

That did not happen. Five months after the civil verdict, the Dallas District Attorney invited them to a meeting and said there was insufficient evidence to proceed. They made a presentation that suggested that the video that we had made was incorrect and that we'd misrepresented the facts to the jury. We asked the DA's office what facts they were talking about. They said, unlike what's shown in the animation, they couldn't draw a reliable conclusion about the bullet trajectory based on the evidence.

That's because when police went looking for where the bullet trajectory based on the evidence. That's because when police went looking for where the bullet ended up, they took apart Jonathan's bed, and the DA thinks the bullet could have rolled around in the process. We wanted to know what else police did or didn't do. They declined to answer our questions, so we requested their case file and obtained some records that neither side in the civil trial ever saw first what's missing there's no photo of the gun near jonathan's body he already didn't get moved he went in here before i got near

he did yeah he moved it all i don't know where he put it. That's right. The first officer on scene picked up the gun and moved it from the bedroom to the kitchen, disturbing a key piece of evidence. And, according to records we examined, there was something else police did not have. Fingerprints. They waited six months to test the gun for them. By that time, it had been sent to a lab and swabbed for DNA, possibly wiping away usable prints. The crime lab did find unknown DNA on the gun along with Jonathan's, except there's no record of police getting a DNA sample from Brenda to

compare it to. If we needed to take your DNA, do you have a problem with us doing that? No. An envelope labeled DNA sample from Brenda was sent to the lab, but it turned out to be a swab of Jonathan's blood off her hands. I know this is hard, okay, but I have to ask these questions, all right? That night, Brenda was questioned by police for more than two hours. The story she told police was consistent. I was asking her some questions to try to catch her in a lie or something, and everything's matching up. Even so, her story still raised a lot of questions.

But you see how this doesn't make any sense, right? It did not make sense to me at all. To this day, former prosecutor Mike Snipes thinks police could have done more. And he says he was willing to take a case against Brenda Lazaro before a jury in criminal court. Was this disappointing? It was. I mean, look, if you're right, there's a murderer walking around out there, free. That's right.

Brenda's attorney says the fact Brenda was never charged is the whole point. She wasn't charged because she's innocent of any crime. She's been hounded now for nine years over this, and she would really like to put this experience behind her and move forward. Pam and John say they will never give up fighting for answers about their son's death. And they also want people to remember how he lived. Their big-hearted, goofy son. The doting big brother and best friend who brought laughter into all their lives

and loved every minute of it. He was something else, wasn't he? Never stopped moving. He was something else, wasn't he? Never stopped moving. He was so excited about life. And he never lost that. Just the joy of every day. That's all for this edition of Dateline. We'll see you again Sunday at 7, 6 Central.

And of course, I'll see you each weeknight for NBC Nightly News. I'm Lester Holt for all of us at NBC News. Good night.