Dateline NBC - Down the Rabbit Hole

Episode Date: October 15, 2024

A 16-year-old calls 911 to report a break-in at her family’s home. When police arrive, they discover her mother has been murdered, launching an investigation that featured a false confession and revealed a dangerous romance. Keith Morrison reports.Listen to Keith Morrison and Josh Mankiewicz as they go behind the scenes of the making of this episode in ‘Talking Dateline’: https://link.chtbl.com/tdl_downtherabbithole

Tonight on Date Live. I just kept hearing her scream over and over again and I didn't know what to do. I get a call from my sister. She said someone broke into the house and I think mom's hurt. This was a brutal, cold-blooded killing. It's no secret that my dad and my mom had been arguing.

How did it come off? It seemed like he should have been more upset. She was having an affair with a co-worker so we had to check him out. I said, Carrie, who killed my mom? She said, I think it was Zane. Who was Zane? He's my stalker. I'm scared he's gonna hurt me. Someone's framing me. Framing you? Yes. I saw there was a confession. A lot of the things didn't make sense. They created this bubble around the two of them. It was void of reality. You telling me the truth?

Yes. Do I look like a bad kid? No. I'm a good kid. They were playing out a Lifetime movie. How do you get your head around this thing like that? You don't. I wonder, how is it that I didn't see it?

It was a murder that seemed simple to solve. There was a witness, even a confession. So why was the mystery growing by the minute? I'm Lester Holt and this is Dateline. Here's Keith Morrison with Down the Rabbit Hole. They were young and foolish and drawn to their phones like moths to a flame. God, I swear I love you. I love you too. So much to talk about. So much to plan.

I just want to live my life the way I want to live it. They, together, created this dramatic world. I worry about you, Conn. You're on my mind all day. Wanting to feel that love so badly, you'd do anything to keep it. You know how it happens. So did Shakespeare. Young lovers caught up in their overheated dramas so fierce, so intense, so dangerous. Stop blaming yourself for it. Things happen for a reason.

But all anyone knew when this drama began was contained in a different kind of phone call. Okay ma'am, what's your name? Carrie Murphy. It was the middle of the night, middle of July, in Umbo, Texas, just outside of Houston. The tearful 16-year-old girl was pleading with 911 to send help. Somebody was in her house and was attacking her mother. So right away they sent Deputy Constable Fred Hooper over there. but did they break in or did they just come in? They broke in. So right away, they sent Deputy Constable Fred Hooper over there, and about all he knew was that a panicky teenager had told 911 her mother was being attacked.

My heart's pumping, not knowing what to expect, and still thinking that the suspects could possibly be on scene. By then, a second deputy had arrived, and he and Hooper prepared to confront what was possibly an on scene. By then a second deputy had arrived, and he and Hooper prepared to confront what was possibly an ongoing crime. You must have, you know, gone in with your guns drawn and the whole thing, huh? Correct. We started at the side gate.

Small house, fenced backyard. They passed a trampoline, a swing set, and a pile of bricks. And on the way going to the back door, we noticed that there were two windows that were broken. We got to the back door, it was open, so we made entry into the house. Straight in front was the kitchen, and as you walked into the back door to the right there was the living room. And then a door to the main bedroom and there she was lying on a water bed. She was covered in blood. Was she still alive? Did she have some vital signs? She did not appear to be alive. Could you see any obvious wounds besides all this blood? She had

lacerations that we could see. Her name was Mary Ann Murphy. She was the mother of the girl who called 911. Deputy Hooper cautiously moved through the house, looking for the intruder. Only person in the home was the mother. So if there was anybody there, they were long gone? Yes.

By then, the victim's daughter, her name was Carrie, had called her older brother. Scott Murphy was 21 years old, working overnights at the airport doing electrical repairs. And all she said was, someone broke into the house and I think mom's hurt. I dropped everything in my hand, every tool. I dropped it and I made my way home. On the way there, Scott called their dad, Don, who was also working nights. When I got to my parents' street

and there was 15 to 20 cop cars outside, that's when I knew something was bad. So you arrived, got out of the car, what happened? I was very loud, very boisterous. Where's my mom? Where's my sister? Scott couldn't see that Carey was huddled up in Deputy Hooper's car. And an officer advised me to step away from the house. They wouldn't let me in.

So I began to get aggressive and get very hands-on with the officer. He was hysterical, which I understood because if it was me, I probably would have felt the same way. At that point, I was then cuffed and put in the back of a car. And at the time, I was very angry. I remember being in the back of the cop car, kicking the door,

trying to kick windows, trying to get out of my handcuffs. What was going through your mind with all this going on? All I'm thinking is, why won't they let me see her? Why won't they let me go to her? Did it dawn on you at some point there was probably a reason for that? When my dad showed up and my dad looked at me and he just put his finger up and he mouthed the words stop, wait. And so I mean I may have been in my 20s but my dad said stop, stop.

Scott's father had a talk with the officer and and in a matter of minutes, Scott was let go. So I went up to my dad, and my dad, my dad was a very hard man. He was loving, and he was a committed father, but his love was, was tough. And my dad looked at me and he said, do you have your big boy pants on? I said, yes, sir. And he looked at me and he shook his head and he said, she didn't make it.

I mean, your mom didn't make it. And I looked at my dad and I just kind of glared at him. And I looked at him and I said, dad, I'll kill him. And he said, son, there are some things you don't say out loud. Scott had no idea who killed his mother, and his lust for revenge wouldn't do much good. Scott had some things to learn about pain and loyalty

and betrayal before the killer was revealed. Quite a bomb that went off in that family. Yep. Or a virus that infected everyone. You can't change the way that God does his way. Do they give you nightmares? You could call it a nightmare. Or love, if you wish, the kind that curdles into something else altogether.

The street was a jumble of lights and cars and curious neighbors when Detective Juan Viramontes of the Harris County Sheriff arrived. Who was the first person you talked to and what did you hear? The first officer that I spoke with was the first responding officer. Let them know what had taken place. Did they see or talk to Carey at all? No, at that point Carey was still in my patrol vehicle. Carey, the victim's daughter, Deputy Hooper had talked to her about what happened in the house

and he briefed Detective Viramontes. She heard a male's voice that was telling her mother to shut up. And then she ran out of the house and tried to get some help from anybody that would be outside. Inside, at the scene of the killing, an interesting bit of evidence. We discovered a gun lamb by the mother's head underneath the pillow. It was Mary Ann's own handgun, a semi-automatic. She didn't get a chance to use it, obviously. No sir, not from what we can tell, no. Must have been asleep when she was attacked, couldn't get to the gun in time.

Your mom was pretty handy with the gun, wasn't she? She was. It normally sat on a leather case on the headboard. And when the police found it, it was on the bed, on the actual mattress, which means at some point it had been touched. Yeah. And knowing my mom, she would have went for it.

And if she hadn't been asleep, if she hadn't also been deaf in one ear and thus caught by surprise, she'd have taken any attacker down, figured Scott, because it was hard to get the best of Mary Ann Murphy. She was strong, a strong woman, strong values, and she stuck to him and she made us stick to them as well. Heather Tucker grew up with Mary Ann's daughter, Carrie. She had known Mary Ann her whole life. You spent a lot of time at her house. Yes. Tell me about that.

Mary Ann was funny. She was sarcastic. She was comfortable around Carrie's friends. When Heather came to the house, it wasn't Miss Murphy. It wasn't anything like that. It was, hey, Mom. She treated us well, but she would also kind of like talk back to us. I remember we introduced one of our new friends to her for the first time,

and we warned him that Marianne was deaf in one year. He's like, oh, okay. And so he walks up and he very loudly is like, hi, ma'am. Nice to meet you. She said, damn it, boy, I'm deaf, not stupid. Oh, Miss Mary Ann. Okay, where do I start? Katie was another childhood friend of Carrie's.

She liked Mary Ann the minute she met her. I remember walking in through their garage and she just had such like joy. Like I just remember thinking, oh my god, like she looks nice. She was always doing things for Carrie and buying her things and taking her to and from wherever Carrie needed to go. She had what I would call sometimes the Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde effect. She could, you know, be getting on to you about, you did something wrong,

you didn't do the dishes right. The phone would ring and she'd just, hello? And just be the sweetest person on the phone. And then she'd hang up and be right back to getting on you. But when it came to her kids, when it came to her family, period, all she wanted was for us to thrive. Was she the boss in that household? I considered her the boss. I think anybody would consider her family period, all she wanted was for us to thrive. Was she the boss in that household? I considered her the boss.

I think anybody would consider her the boss except for maybe Don, her husband. They were so different, mom and dad. Very different careers, too. Mary Ann worked for the Department of Public Safety. Don was a machinist. My mom grew up very country, very strict. Her dad was a cop, ex-military, so he had a very strict regiment. My dad on the other hand was the proverbial, you know, from the wrong side of the tracks. Fast cars, loud cars,

street racing, fighting. They didn't make a lot of money, but the Murphys did okay. Scott got a kick out of his mom, respected his father, and doted on his They didn't make a lot of money, but the Murphys did okay. Scott got a kick out of his mom, respected his father, and doted on his little sister. I changed her diapers as a baby. I painted her fingernails red, white, and blue for Fourth of July. I was the first one to teach her how to braid her hair. And now he could see that his baby sister, still only 16 years old, had been through a terrible ordeal.

Terrified, hiding in her room, running to the neighbors. Police needed to get what information they could from their fragile witness. One of the things I wanted to do, of course, is transport her to the homicide office and conduct an interview in a more appropriate setting. Detectives strapped in for a long night.

I kept screaming my mom's name. I was like, Mom, Mom, Mom, please answer me, answer me. As their young witness told her terrible story. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom.

I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm going to the bathroom. tough for anybody. And this young somebody had just lost her mother. You want some water? They did what they could to make her comfortable. They would need her to figure out what happened to her mother. You need to use the restroom before we start. You're okay? Okay. As far as that goes. She wouldn't be able to tell them a lot. She didn't see much, she said. But she heard a lot.

And she'd help if she could, tired as she was. We brought you here just to talk to you, you know, try to get some information about what happened at home. Right. It was the sound of her mother screaming, she said. It woke her to an intruder in the house. My mom was screaming stop stop help me help me help me stop and I got scared. She says she got up and got a knife that she had in her in her room and waited a

few minutes. You were in your room and your mom was in her bedroom? Right. Okay. And I just heard like a man's voice go, Shut up, shut up. And I got scared. I didn't know if I should run out. I didn't have a phone on me. I couldn't call 911 right then. I just didn't know what to do. And I froze and I heard like footsteps like running

and like hard footsteps running running and I'm sorry. I walked out of my room and I kept screaming my mom's name. I was like, Mom, Mom, Mom, please answer me, answer me. And she didn't say anything. She waits a few more minutes and then she runs out the house. And as she's running out the house, she mentions the paper that she saw outside as she's running out the house she mentions the paper that she saw outside as she was running. And I slipped on this piece of paper in the yard so I picked it up and then I ran to a

neighbor's house. On that piece of paper was Mary Ann's address and a list of hours when she would be at home. Weirdly there was another note, right on the dining table. Deputy Hooper saw it first. The note stated, good luck in court without your mom. The killer added the B word. Carrie said she didn't see that note.

She was in such a rush to get out. But she told detectives something that seemed to explain its meaning. And he was speeding. She told them she was supposed to be in traffic court in just a few hours. She'd been in a car accident with a man a few weeks before. He hit me in the back and then I did a 180 and then he hit me in the front. He got mad because when he opened the door he was like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but it's your fault.

But they gave you a ticket for a round-site light change? Yes, sir. But Kerry said that wasn't the end of it. Something strange happened with that same man only a few hours before the murder. She was at a restaurant with her mother and some family friends. And I had noticed this man staring at my table. I looked back 20 minutes later and he was still staring.

Later she said she realized that was the man from the accident. And this person that was there, you said it looked like the guy that she had an accident with? Yes. She was at home later that night when another odd thing happened and this gave her the creeps. And I was doing scrapbooking like yeah and I noticed like I kept seeing the same headlights. The same headlights had passed like three times in the past five minutes. I got kind of suspicious so I started watching out of the kitchen window. She said she told her mother

about it but Marianne didn't do anything. She said she told her mother about it, but Marianne didn't do anything. She said she called her brother, too. She said a blue truck that was driving around the block over and over and over again. So I left my house a little early to go to work, and I went by my parents' house. So I just kind of sat out in the driveway. And I waited for, I want

to say, 15 to 20 minutes. He didn't see anything wrong, so he headed to work, sure as he could be that things were okay. Though they were anything but. And now this case seemed to be pointing in a specific direction. And the question,, Carrie, the real target? Do you have any enemies? No. No. I'm a very nice person. You've had any problems with anybody

other than this person in the accident? No. And do you have a picture of him? Or do you have that paperwork there at your house? Yes, it's in a blue folder on the table. A stranger with a grudge? It wouldn't be the first time someone killed out of misguided rage. But this investigation was just getting started, so detectives would also be looking at someone who was not a stranger. It's no secret that my dad and my mom have been arguing.

Katie remembers how she heard the awful news. She was at work when a former teacher called to say Mrs. Murphy had died. And so then hung up the phone, I called my mom and we go directly to Carrie's house. And I knock on the door and I'm like saying her name, I'm like Carrie, I wait, no answer. And then I was walking back to the car and a reporter stopped me and they were like, Carrie, I wait, no answer. And then I was walking back to the car and a reporter stopped me and they were like, do you know Carrie? Are you friends with Carrie?

A reporter. Katie's first clue that something was seriously wrong, that Mrs. Murphy didn't just die. Katie also didn't realize that Carrie was still talking to Detective Iramantes and other detectives. Had been since the wee hours. She had told them about the man from the car accident, the sheer terror she felt that night, and the awful things she witnessed.

I just kept hearing her scream over and over again. Detective Viramontes analyzed the crime scene in the hours after the murder. He explained to us what he saw that night as he walked from room to room there in the dark. He began at the back door where Kerry said the intruders had broken in. The first thing I was looking for

was to see if there was any forced entry into the house. There was no signs of damage, no signs of forced entry. It looks kind of like the way it looks now. Another thing I noticed was the window broken. Both panes on the window were broken. There was some glass inside the residence and there was also glass outside. There was a brick here on the kitchen floor,

which it didn't make sense because most of the glass would have been contained to the inside of the house, not outside. It looked like someone threw a brick through the windows twice. And then he noticed that note on the dining table. Was handwritten and it said something to the effect that good luck in court without your mom bitch.

Strange. A killer taking time to leave a note and one so incriminating. There was items on the floor. It appeared that somebody had just swept everything off the kitchen counter and it was just laying here in this area here. He got to the bedroom where Mary Ann was killed. It appeared that she had been stabbed multiple times, over 50 times at least. Even though she was covered in blood, the blood was contained to the body and a little bit on the bed. No bloody footprints or handprints anywhere else in the house, so somebody had done something to contain the blood.

The veteran detective just knew the house was telling him something. So the fact that there was no signs of forced entry, there was more glass outside the residence than inside. So that led me to believe that this was a staged scene, that someone was trying to make it seem like either it was a home invasion or a burglary gone wrong. But who would do that? Maybe an outsider, sure.

Somebody with a deadby grudge, but... Anytime that there's a female, a mother, or a wife that killed at the residence, we start looking at people that live with her. Like the husband, Carrie's friends at her dad was kind of scary. He was like rough around the edges, pretty strict. Like I remember the perception, the way Carrie talked about her dad, was like, should I be afraid of him?

Don wasn't necessarily friendly. He wouldn't go out of his way to start a conversation with me. We definitely minded him. Everybody minded him. How did he get on with Mary Ann? I never really saw them interact much, just because at that point,

when I was hanging around, he was working nights, so he'd be sleeping or he would just be sitting in his chair trying to relax. It didn't take long for investigators to learn that Mary Ann and Don were sleeping separately. There was more than a little tension in that relationship. He had been having some trouble with alcohol, right? He had.

My dad had been, he had been struggling with some alcohol addiction. For a long time? It had always been an issue growing up, but over the past probably year and a half, it had been a pretty regular thing for him to put down a few, and then sometimes more than a few. Well, how'd your mom feel about that? Oh, my mother was less than happy about that. She wasn't a drinker.

So to her, if you have more than two drinks, you're drunk. Of course. And once, you know, two became four and four became eight, eight became 16, that's when the, this is not going to happen. And she was very, very vocal about that. — Deputy Hooper talked to Don the night of the killing. — When you first saw him, what did he look like?

How did he come off? What were you thinking? — I guess you could say he was more calm. Under the circumstances of the situation, it seemed like he should have been more upset, but he wasn't. Don Murphy would speak with detectives, submit to fingerprinting, and answer questions concerning his whereabouts around the time of the murder. But as far as detectives knew, their best and only witness was a tearful 16-year-old girl whose story was about to change. I don't know.

You need to put it out there, Karen. I'm scared he's going to hurt me. In the long, difficult hours after his mother's murder, Scott Murphy understood the detectives were just doing their jobs. I mean, they fingerprinted me, they fingerprinted my dad. It's no secret that my dad and my mom had been arguing, so it made sense. Scott remembers, well after they left the sheriff's office, how his tough-as-nails father seemed lost. My dad just by himself, he picked up a piece of sidewalk chalk and he just started to write on the ground by himself and in just big, big letters. It said, I'm sorry. What was Don Murphy sorry for? Did it seem to you that it was in the realm of

possibility that he had something to do with this? Never. My dad doted on my mother. He loved her from the day that he met her and I don't care how mad she got at him or how mad she made him. He was never going to hurt her. And now that she was gone, Scott saw his father falling apart. I mean, he started to tear up and he looked me in the eyes and he said, I can fix a lot of things, but I can't fix this. Nobody could fix it, but detectives hoped Kerry could make sense of it.

They were still talking to her the morning after the murder, still wanting to know how did the killer get in the house. They came in through the front door or the back door? Back door. Okay, but did they break in or did they just come in? They broke in. Did you notice if they kicked their door in or if they probably kicked the door open? No, I didn't pay that much attention.

By then, the detectives knew the back door was intact. How do you think they got in? Whoever got in the house? I don't know. Well, you said there was glass breaking. Right, there was, yeah. But the killer, they explained, didn't get in through that broken window either. There's no way for somebody to reach me and unlock the back door.

There's not? No, there's not. I didn't make any sense. No, it doesn't. Before you heard your mom screaming for help, did you hear any glass breaking? No. No, my radio was turned up. But the neighbors heard the glass break,

and it was right before they saw Carey. One of the neighbors said that they heard glass breakage. And within 15 seconds, they see Carey walking out from the backyard. Now that did not compute. The investigators' questions were getting more pointed. They heard the glass breaking. And they heard the second glass break.

There was two windows broke? Yes. And within seconds, they see you come out of the backyard. No. Yes. And within seconds, they see you come out of the backyard. Hello. The neighbors were high on weed, she said. They must be mistaken. The girl was kind of a puzzle. Even right after the killing, as she was waiting in the backseat of Fred Hooper's patrol car. She just seemed a little too calm for someone whose mother had just been attacked. Any more detail?

Well, she asked, am I going to have to go to court while she was in the backseat? And I thought that was strange. Strange that she was still concerned about traffic court for that car accident when her mother had just been murdered. But then Deputy Hooper already knew there was something fundamentally wrong with Kerry's story, and known from the moment he found Mary Ann's body. The mom was laying there covered in blood,

and the blood had started to dry. And went in the house and saw your mom. And now in the interview room with the sun rising, detectives listened with growing skepticism as Kerry tried to explain why it took so long to call 911. He was in the kitchen for a long time. Like, I heard him wrestling with, like, papers and stuff in the kitchen.

Stranger isn't gonna spend all the time if he killed your mom and then just lulled a gag around in the kitchen. A stranger isn't going to spend all their time if he killed your mom and then just lulled a gag around in the kitchen. They pushed her on the question about the blood. There's too much of her blood that's already dried. And if... I really don't want to hear this. I'm sorry.

Well, that's where we're having the problem in is that time frame that if you heard her screaming and you ran out and within minutes the police are there, it's obvious that she had been there for some time, not just minutes. I'm really not understanding. I'm sorry. I'm really not understanding. What are sorry. I'm really not understanding. What are you not understanding? Like what y'all are trying to say? Are y'all trying to say I killed my mom? I'm trying to say that you have some more information that you're not telling me. No sir, I do not. I do not. I told the cops and y'all everything I know. I'm...

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. car wreck who killed her mother. It was someone she knew.

I do know. You need to put it out there, Kier. I'm scared he's gonna hurt me. Who is he, Kier? His name is Zane. What's his name? Zane. Zane? Who was Zane? He's my stalker. Zane was a kid from the neighborhood that she didn't care for him and she believed that he had broken into the house and killed her mom. Twenty-year-old Zane Ahmed used to go to Carey's High School, but he dropped out in the eleventh grade. Carey said she'd known him a little over three years, and that he had become obsessed with her. He got mad when I told him I wouldn't go out with him. And he's been told to stay away from my house and he just keeps coming back.

So there it was, a new story about Zane and another guy who was masked. They were the killers and they threatened to kill her too. And he held a knife up to my throat and he's like you tell anybody I kill you and he backed me up against the house and he had his hands starting from here going across like this and the knife was in his hand over here and I was standing like this and The guy when he was like, I'll do something else to review something else he ran the knife down my chest and to my stomach and down my leg and he was like you better make this look like a robbery and put the note in my hand and He closed my hand and he was like don't you say

and then he grabbed the bricks and he threw them through the window. Maybe that explained why the neighbors heard the glass shatter just moments before they spotted Kerry leaving the house. If this guy Zane was truly dangerous, Kerry's fear and lies made sense. Still, detectives had to know, was he a killer or an accomplice? You didn't let them in, you didn't give them a key? No. What happened inside the little house in Humboldt, Texas on that dark summer night? Detectives were learning this much. Carrie had lied about an unknown intruder and then she blamed a kid named Zane.

So is this new story true? One thing they were learning, Carrie and her mom were not getting along. Do you have your cell phone with you right now? No, I do not. Okay, forward. Is it back at home or where does it end? I don't know, I'm grounded, my mom had it.

Carrie would tell me stories about them fighting all the time. I had already known, like, I'm grounded, my mom had it. Carrie would tell me stories about them fighting all the time. I had already known like Carrie was grounded for something or like that her mom yelled at her for something. Maybe a polygraph would lead to the real story. Her father signed off on it, so Carrie took the test. But in the end, it wasn't helpful. Not to Carrie anyway.

The results suggested she was not being truthful. Carrie, you want some more water? Yes, please. So they started again. You're giving us already two versions, okay? I'm just so scared. Well, tell me what happened. Did she do any more than one version of the Zane story or was it pretty consistent?

No, no, she changed that story as well. My mom's screaming my name. Her new story contains some added elements. She remembered she actually saw the attack and tried to help her mother. I grabbed my knife and I ran in her room and this guy grabbed me. Which guy? The guy that I didn't recognize and Zane and my mom, he was struggling and biting her and kept pushing her down.

Well that's a big change from the earlier story. Exactly. She was like, that's enough, that's enough. As they let her talk, her story shifted, grew to tales like beanstalks. Carrie, look at me. How did they open the door? They picked the lock. You didn't let them in? You didn't give them a key? No.

In fact, the more she talked, the more sure they were that Carrie Murphy was guilty of something. If she didn't kill her mother, it seemed like she must have helped, somehow. You can't even come up with a lie that quick. A different detective took the chair and played bad cop. Listen to me, you need to stop your lies. Stop your lies. You were there when your mom was screaming for her life as she was stabbed multiple times.

I saw what y'all or you did to your mother. I didn't do that. Don't tell me that. And then the detectives asked a question that opened the door just to crack. How do you think your mom is reacting right now to you? Mad? Why would she be mad at you? Because it didn't help as much as I could have.

Because you didn't want to? Part of me didn't. You didn't want to? Part of me didn't. Part of me didn't. Part of me didn't. Were you generally mad at your mom about something? Yes. What were you mad about your mom? The fact that she tried to control my life. And everything I did she called me stupid or dumb or told me I wasn't good enough.

And then one more story came out. She was guilty of something, of making a terrible mistake. I let them in because they said they were going to bang on the wall and scare her and then run out. They didn't tell me their full plan. She did let Zane and another guy in the house, but he was supposed to frighten her mother, not kill her. She had only asked him to go in there and scare her.

I see. And then he got carried away. He got carried away. You tell me is that the tree? Yes, that's what I've been holding back. I killed my mom. I let him in. Yes, that's what I've been holding back. I killed my mom. I let him in. I didn't know he was gonna do that though. After something like nine hours of talking to Carrie,

the detectives called her father and brother and told them, come and get her. Wow, why'd you let her go home at that stage? With the juveniles, they are dealt differently. I was only going to get a statement from her that we were treating her as a witness. When Scott and his dad arrived at the sheriff's office, Scott sensed that something was up. There was a reason detectives had kept Kerry as long as they did. We picked her up and we got in the car and we all just kind of sat there and I looked in the rear view mirror and I said, Kerry, who killed my mom? And she looked at me with tears in her eyes and

she said, I think it was Zane. That makes sense to you? It made sense. Kerry left out the part where she let Zane in the house. But even so, Zane seemed like a viable suspect to Scott. I had heard my sister talk about him. I had heard a couple of her friends talk about him. And like, it was all in passing. He was creepy, he was strange, he was weird.

And at one point I was told that he was stalking my sister. Okay. Who told you that? My sister actually. That night U.S. Marshals armed with an arrest warrant went looking for Zane. They found him and when they did they came across a whole new mystery. Zane himself. Someone's framing me. Framing you?

Yes. A lot of the things he said didn't make sense. It wouldn't be long before investigators found themselves heading down a kind of rabbit hole. The bunny phone. The bunny phone. The bunny phone. The car was silent as Scott and Kerry and their dad drove away from the sheriff's office. They took Kerry to a friend's house. Soon after that, Heather pulled up and found Kerry outside.

I got out and I ran to her and I hugged her and we just cried there in the middle of the street. Did she tell you what happened? She told me that she had been taken down to the station and that the police had asked her questions. And she said that she felt as if the police were trying to make it seem like she did it. What was that like for you to hear? I was angered.

I was upset. I thought, that's so unfair. Why would they do that to Kerry? Did she say anything about Zayn at that point? She did tell me that it was Zayn. They were able to get a warrant for his arrest just based on what Kerry provided. A violent Defenders Task Force led by U.S. Marshals

found 20-year-old Zayn Ahmed at home, put him in cuffs, and brought him to the Sheriff's office. Hey, you know who Carrie is? Yes sir. Well, I mean, what's y'all's relationship? I thought we was friends, you know, and I'm just kind of curious, what did I do? I have not done nothing to her. When was the last time you seen her?

Seen her? Since, like, what? Like, I ran into her the long, like, way back. She said you came by her house last night. I was at home all night last night. I didn't go anywhere. I was at home. I had never been to Carrie's house. I'm telling you the truth, sir, I haven't been to her house.

He denied everything, said he didn't know where she lived. So he certainly wasn't stalking her, although he did admit he had a short-term memory problem. So is it possible that your short-term memory thing is you had gone to Carrie's house for some point in time and just don't remember. No. That's not even possible. Because I don't know where Carrie lives in the first place. The detectives got to the point. Do you know Carrie's mom? No. Do you know what happened to her? No. You don't know that she got killed? No, sir. What do you know about that? Nothing. He said he didn't know what we got killed? No, sir. What do you know about that? Nothing.

He said he didn't know what we were talking about, that he was at home playing a video game. Guitar Hero. He said he was playing with his nieces and nephews. Someone's framing me. Framing you? Yes. So Carey's just making this all up? Yes. And you don'taming you? Yes. So, Keir is just making this all up? Yes.

And you don't know why? No. After hours of denials, detectives had a thought. He was asked if he would submit to a polygraph. He agreed to that. Odd how some investigations can just turn on a dime. This one certainly did. He was told that he had done poorly on the exam,

so he was eventually taken back to the interview room. He had the right to remain silent. Could they have seen this coming? Who knows? But right then, Zane confessed to the murder of Mary Ann Murphy. He basically just said that yes, he did it. He went in there and then he stabbed Miss Murphy. His story began just like the one Carey told. She contacted me and said, hey, do you do me a favor? I'm like, yeah, what's up?

She's like, can you scare my mom, I'm like, yeah, what's up? She's like, can you scare my mom? I'm like, yeah, sure. Did she say why she wanted her mom scared? No, sir. And so I got ready. I had my ward black, all black. I had a hoodie over my face so no one could see me. I had a weapon on me, but I wasn't going to use it.

I was just going to scare her mom. His friend drove him to Kerry's house before 9 p.m. he said. I knocked out her window. Okay and did she come outside? She saw me from the window and then she opened the door. He said he went to Mary Ann's bedroom. She jumped out of bed and then as she really yelled like screamed jumped out. I just got frightened. My heart was beating real fast and I accidentally stabbed her. I don't remember how many times I stabbed her. What about where, Ann? I know one in the stomach with the rose. It's like one on the stomach. Gonna take one on the arm and one in the back. So what'd they charge him with?

They charged him with murder. Now they had to decide what to do with the girl. The teenager who was angry with her mother. 24 hours later they were calling back. They said we need y'all to with her mother. 24 hours later they were calling back. They said, we need you to bring her in. So very angry. MUSIC Teenagers. Not so unusual for a 16-year-old to act out against a parent, but this teenager seemed

to have turned on her mother in the worst possible way. What happened, exactly? Carrie told detectives so many tall tales it was hard to keep them straight. First she said a stranger did it. Then she said Zane did it because he was obsessed with her. And then she said she asked Zane to come to the house to scare her mother, but for reasons even Zane couldn't explain, he went on a killing frenzy.

So they weren't done with Carrie. Not yet. Who was this girl? I've known Carrie as long as I've been aware. What was she like in your recollection as a little kid? She had a strong personality. She was possessive even at a very young age. But she was my friend and I loved her like a sister. I met Carrie in sixth grade. I was new to the school and I met her in choir.

By the time they got to high school, Carrie was struggling to fit in. Our school demographic was majority black and Hispanic and because she was so tall and rosy red cheeks, she stood out naturally. So did she feel like comfortable in her skin? Once Carrie started really growing and getting taller and just changing in general, she definitely started to get a little more self-conscious about her appearance.

She started wearing a little more makeup, dressing differently, just trying things out to see what stuck. Trying to fit in probably as much as anything. Right. Was she accepted? For the most part, yes. At home and for a long time, Dari and her mom seemed to be close.

She was a mama's girl. If my mom went to the store, my sister was going with her. But in the teenage years, things changed. She started doing what she wanted, when she wanted. Once it became to the point where my sister was acting out and sneaking out of the house, that's when it became a hard stop. And she pulled the classic, you live in my house, you live by my rules.

Now Marianne was dead, and investigators asked Kerry to come back down to the station for another round of questions. But Kerry? She had other ideas. And she says she wanted to retract everything that she said. That everything that she said was a lie, that she had nothing to do with it. Never asked Zane to scare her mother, never let him into the house. All Zane, every single bit of it. Yes, and that's when she lawyered up. When she asked for a lawyer

they officially charged her with the murder of her mother. How do you get your head around this thing like that? You don't. You watch this little girl grow up. She had a purple room with pink and green pinstripes. Her and my mom were supposed to go clothes shopping the next day for, you know, school. Scott wanted to believe his sister. We realized she's telling multiple stories. I was trying to find the truth in the multiple stories. Anna Emmons was also searching for the truth.

She was the chief prosecutor assigned to juvenile cases, and in this case, she had a confession from the apparent killer. That changing story from Kerry and some serious doubts. I saw there was a confession from an adult male, and I was worried about it. What was wrong with it? A lot of the things he said didn't make sense. Like, for example, how he got into the house. Front door to back door. Front.

Okay. And so you came in the front? Yes, sir. But Kerry said the killers came in through the back door. And the location of the murder. Zane got that wrong, too. We went upstairs. We went to go see where her mom is. She said she was sleeping.

He said he went up a flight of stairs and that this is a one-story house. If you had just simply been inside the house at the time of the murder, you would know. And you would know what you did to your victim. I stabbed her four times. She was stabbed over 70 times. Quite a difference, yeah. Quite a difference. As she reviewed the seven hour interrogation,

she could hear Zane zigging and zagging. I'm going to start over everything right now. After confessing to the murder, he suggested he wasn't there at all. This is what really happened and this is coming from my heart and everything. Sunday morning, I was at home until 3 o'clock in the morning. Okay, you're losing me. What time did you go over to Carrie's house then? I didn't go to Carrie's house. My brother, my dad, everybody in my family can tell you I was at home all day that Sunday.

I didn't go anywhere. And this is the truth. I'm just scared right now. Really scared. I'm trying to do my best here. You can't say I didn't do it and I did do it. I just want to go home. But no one was letting him go home, especially when minutes later he was back to saying he did kill Carrie's mom. Do you really remember how many times and where

you stabbed her? You just don't want to tell me? I don't remember how many times and where you stabbed her? You just don't want to tell me. I don't remember how many times I stabbed her. I had great concerns with it being an actual confession. The prosecutor had another important question, and it had to do with motive. Zane didn't really have one. But as investigators started poking around

in their victim's life, well, what do you know? A secret emerged. Something about an affair? Had she ever told you if her husband knew about her seeing you? What a mess. One kid, this guy Zane, actually confessed to killing Mary Ann Murphy. But he couldn't get his facts right. The other, the daughter Carrie, cast about like a kid fishing for a good story.

And neither one made any sense. What a puzzle that one was. Yes, it was. And, you know, we have to just keep working at it. Detective Sidney Miller joined the widening investigation. I actually joined in and searching for witnesses and you know talk to people so we can figure out what happened here. With Kerry and Zane locked up, investigators took a closer look at the victim's life. At Marianne's phone contacts, for example. And what a surprise. She was having an affair with a co-worker.

An affair? Was that something you felt you needed to look into? Of course. They found the boyfriend at work. Has she ever been to your house? Yes. She's had my parents seen me, but I work here. Okay. Sometimes on Saturday she dropped by from bring me a soda They also spent time together on the phone.

Would y'all's texts being sexual in nature more likely? Should be more like wouldn't you know? No, the majority of our texts were sexual in nature. And now quite quite unexpectedly, there was a potential love triangle in the middle of their murder investigation. Had she ever told you if her husband knew

about her seeing you? As far as the boyfriend knew, husband Don didn't have a clue about Marianne's secret life. She was spending a lot of time away from the house because she didn't want to be home when he was there, because she didn't want to see the drama. They checked out the boyfriend's alibi. It was solid. The husband's too. Detectives crossed both men off their list. Apparently this marital drama

had nothing to do with Marianne's murder. Apparently this marital drama had nothing to do with Mary Ann's murder. I couldn't be mad. My dad was not giving her the attention and the affection that she deserved sometimes, and so it made sense to look elsewhere. By then, the new investigators were looking for more witnesses. One was a girl they heard about from Carrie's father. Talk to Rebecca, he said, Carrie's very good friend. When Carrie started to become friends with Rebecca,

I remember I got warning from someone and they were like, oh, your friend's talking to Rebecca? And I'm like, yeah, like they're friends. And they were like, oh, okay. Well, be careful. Why careful? Well, for starters, Rebecca Keller was four years older than Carrie.

They got to know each other in choir. Carrie was a 15-year-old freshman. Rebecca was a 19-year-old senior. And no other way to put it, they fell in love, caught fire really. Rebecca was her first love. The intensity of that first love at that age is well intense. I mean you hit the nail on the head there. Carrie and Rebecca were so enmeshed and so desperate, if you will, for like love. And when they found that within each other, they clung to it.

They wanted to protect it. But Mary Ann did not approve. I don't think Mary Ann cared that, like, they were, like, lesbians or whatnot. Like, I think the age gap was the problem. She did not trust someone who was 18, 19 years old and actively dating a 15, 16-year-old. They argued a lot over Rebecca.

And Kerry was changing. She was a bubbly person. And then out of nowhere, it got dark. The eye makeup got darker. Her personality got dark. Maryann tried to stop it, banned Rebecca from the house, took away Kerry's phone. Didn't work.

They had been caught in the shower together when Rebecca was not even supposed to be in the house. And that was a problem. Then there was the day when Rebecca came over and refused to leave and Marianne called the police. And the officer who responded was none other than Deputy Constable Fred Hooper. The mother explained that she didn't want the girlfriend there and I took her to jail. What was the charge? Just trespassing?

Just trespassing, yes. So detectives knew about Rebecca from the start, but they didn't chase her down because they had that confession from Zane. I'm going to be talking to Rebecca. Now, about a week into the investigation, Rebecca got a visit from law enforcement. They found her at home, talked to her in their car. Okay, now Rebecca, you are friends with, you know, Carrie Murphy.

Yes. She was a fourth carman. You've been friends since school? Yes. She talked about how they were in a dating relationship. It kind of skipped over into a relationship. Yeah. And how she had gotten in trouble and that she was not supposed to be around her anymore. She admitted that yes, she had dated Carrie, But all that talk about desperate love? Nah, just another teen fling in the rearview mirror. She said she barely even spoke to Carrie anymore,

and hadn't since a month before the murder. anymore and hadn't since a month before the murder. So you hadn't talked to her since June? Since that. Though Rebecca did remember seeing the awful news about the murder. I was in shock, no. You know, I used to talk to that lady every concert that we had at school. But with her trying to stop you from going away, I mean, was she just... She was trying to protect me, keep me out of trouble, and to keep Carrie out of trouble.

So you don't have any idea why this happened? No sir, I don't. And you tell them the truth in what you're telling? Yes. Do I look like a bad kid? No. I'm a good kid. Good kid? Too bad Marianne had taken Kerry's phone away weeks before the murder.

It might have backed up Rebecca's story. Or knocked it down. Too late for that now. And then? Well, well. Guess what turned up? Kerry had a second phone. A burner phone.

A burner phone. Now why would Carrie need a burner phone? If you had to pick one key to unlock the whole miserable business, well, then maybe it was the phone. The bunny phone. Remember when her mother was murdered, Carrie ran to a neighbor's house to call 911. They saw her with a phone in her hand, and they asked her, why, you know, why, how come you're not using your phone?

You have a phone. And she told one of them that it was a phone that her mom didn't know about. A burner phone. A burner phone. The kids called it the bunny phone because bunny was everyone's nickname for the person who provided it, Rebecca Keller. Detectives started

tracking it down a few weeks into the investigation. And you know they're like you know where is it? I have it. Can we have it? Absolutely you can have it and yeah I just handed it over. And the records for that bunny phone were a revelation. For one thing, the Carrie Rebecca love affair wasn't over. It was as intense as ever. The bunny phone revealed they talked constantly. So now, Rebecca, Bunny, had some explaining to do. You're not in custody. You haven't been charged with anything. Okay, I just want to get a statement from you.

And this time they brought her in. Well, the only reason why I got that phone is because we're both in the same groups. And just like her girlfriend had done over and over, once she was caught in a lie, Rebecca started changing her story. Just like her girlfriend had done over and over, once she was caught in a lie, Rebecca started changing her story. In the second interview, we confronted her about having this communication and she openly admitted, yeah, I lied about it. She admitted that she and Carrie still talked.

A lot. And there was one call of particular interest to the investigators. A nearly three minute call around 1 a.m. the night of the murder. She's like, something bad has happened and I really need you right now. I was like, okay, what happened? Tell me what happened. She's like, my mom has been killed. I was like, by who? She's like, I don't know. I'm really scared. Okay. I was like, okay, well, you need to call the cops. She's like, okay, okay, okay. But that was it. All she knew. Rebecca said she had no idea what happened at Kerry's house that night because she was working at Joe's crab shack.

So naturally. We go to the crab shack, we talk to the manager. He tells us that no, Rebecca didn't work there. She'd been fired two months earlier. Did she not think they would check? The lie landed Rebecca back at the sheriff's office for round three. Although we've gone over this story, there's been some majority of it that you've told lies about.

With her alibi up in smoke, Rebecca told yet another new story. It all started, she said, because Carrie hated, really hated her mother. She started saying, I hate my mom, I wish my mom was dead. I kept telling her, why? Why? It's your mom. Carrie complained about her mother for weeks, said Rebecca, until... She started telling me, I'm on plan, I've been planning this plan for three months and I was like, what plan?

She's like, I'm not going to get you involved, I'm not going to get you involved. Her plan was to wait until her mom fell asleep. She was going to go in there with some knife. She told me, she's like, yeah, I want to stab my mom 28 times. I was like, no, I don't want to hear this. I'm hanging up and I hung up on her. And then came the evening of the murder. Carrie texted Rebecca on the bunny phone. It was happening. She started saying, yeah, I'm gonna tell my brother

that this guy, there's this random car going by. Again, Rebecca said she begged Carrie to keep her out of it. I want to go to college. I want to get a good paying job. I was like, I'm not talking to you about this anymore. I'm done with it. Around 1 a.m., Rebecca said, Carrie called one more time.

And she's like, I just did it. And I was like, did what? She's like, I just killed my mom. I mean, this was a turning point in the case. She started telling me, like, how she did it. She's like, I stabbed my mom 17 times. I slit her throat. According to Rebecca, this is all Carrie. I told her, I was like, you need to, like, call the cops

and tell them that you did do it. And she's like, no, no, no, I want to cover it up. I'm going to cover up. She's pointing a finger and pinning it all on Carrie. Kind of a big deal, ratting out her girlfriend Carrie like that. So the detectives asked, just to be sure, would Rebecca sit for a polygraph? And she said, yes.

And she passed. I mean, she passed with flying colors. She showed no deception. The truth, finally? Maybe. But then, a young man named Martin Juarez, a kid with a car and a nagging memory, offered a fascinating story of his own, about a certain event that very night in Humboldt, Texas. He said that when she got to the car, she had been running, and she's just telling him to go, go, go, go, go.

Run bunny, run. There he was, waiting in his car in the dark. Waiting and waiting on the night of the murder. Martin Juarez later told detectives he thought he was doing his friend Rebecca a simple favor, dropping her off near Carrie's place. And Rebecca told him, hey, I'll just be here about 20 minutes and then I'll be right back. He said an hour had passed and he hadn't heard from her. And when she finally did return?

She looked exhausted when she was running. I couldn't really tell if she had anything on her. And he said that when she got to the car, she looked like she was out of breath, and she's just telling him to go, go, go, go, go. Of all the young friends detectives tracked down after the murder, Martin Juarez was maybe the most informative. Yes, he took Rebecca to Kerry's neighborhood that night, but there was more.

A few weeks after the murder, he found Rebecca here in this park, and he confronted her about that night. And it was right here, he told detectives, that Rebecca broke down and confessed to the murder. She came up and told me the truth, that she had did it, that she had two blades, that she went into her mom's room and took one knife and stabbed her. Rebecca was there, and she was the killer? He had a right to remain silent. Rebecca was there and she was the killer?

He had a right to remain silent. Now she was under arrest and backed into a corner. Yes, she said she was there that night. She loved Kerry so much, she allowed herself to be drawn into Kerry's plan to kill Mary Ann and cover up the crime. But love only takes you so far. Rebecca insisted it was Carrie who did the stabbing. I heard her mom saying stop stop and she was screaming she's like okay you can stop stabbing me now and then nothing.

And then five minutes later Carrie comes out with a bloody knife and bloody gloves. And I got the trash bag ready. I told her to strip down and she stripped and she put all of her clothes in there. That bit made sense to the detectives. They had been wondering how the killer contained the blood so effectively. Rebecca also explained the note, that lame effort to point the finger at the guy in the car accident. I was supposed to write the note with my different handwriting than hers. Anyway said Rebecca when they cleaned themselves up. she asked me to get rid of the bag. So I took it to the school and dropped it in the garbage can, the dumpsters.

That would explain the dried blood on Mary Ann's body. Rebecca left, but Carrie stayed behind and continued to clean up for hours before she called 911. And Zane? His name is Zane. What's his name? Zane. Well, that was Carrie's backup lie, improvising right on the spot when she realized the story about the accident wasn't landing the way she'd hoped it would. Did Carrie ever tell you that she was going to try to blame us on Zane? No, I didn't have any knowledge about that. Yep, she said all of it was Carrie's doing.

And she, Rebecca, was simply the supportive girlfriend. But that wasn't going to keep her out of jail. In the state of Texas, you know, if you aid a sister, someone in a crime like that, then you would be charged with the same murder. So Rebecca was charged with murder, locked up at the Harris County Jail. Zane's family said all along he was no killer. They gave the prosecutor video of Zane playing guitar hero with his family the night Mary Anne was murdered.

So what did you do about Zane in the end? Well, after we looked into it and got the evidence, we were comfortable with moving forward with dismissing his case. We asked Zane why he confessed that night. He told us he was terrified. He didn't know what else to do. He also said he didn't stalk Carrie. He wasn't obsessed with her. He didn't even like her. Not in that way. This was a brutal cold-blooded killing.

Prosecutor Anna Emmons had seen enough. She knew this case belonged in adult court. And if someone's going to go to that length to harm their mother and be part of that, that's a danger to the community. Ergo, they become an adult. Yes, and she was certified to go to the adult system. The judge in the case agreed to set bail for Kerry. Scott cobbled together the money and picked her up.

He also made room for her in his home. She was, after all, his little sister, and in a way the only family he had left. By the time she was certified as an adult, my dad had experienced some extreme mental decline. Oh, boy. And at this point, I was on my own. My mom died in July of 2012 and by December of 2012

my dad was talking to Christmas trees. He was, you know, having conversations with shadows. And his short-term memory was just declining. And I was 21. I didn't know what to do. Of course, he asked Kerry what happened, and she repeated the old story about Zane. And Scott knew that wasn't true. It had to be Rebecca.

They arrested Rebecca for a reason. So it was Rebecca. Not your sister, but Rebecca, the girlfriend. Right. It had to be her. It couldn't be my sister. She's my sister. She wouldn't kill her mom. And if he had any nagging doubts about that, Scott packed them away. All he could do now was take care of his little sister and keep her safe and prepare for the trial.

If I went Christmas shopping, she went with me. If I had little money to burn, it was probably going to her. All the while, Carrie's friends watched her behavior with something like disgust. She seemed to be enjoying herself maybe too much. It seemed as if she was fine and like nothing like never happened. Like that she didn't lose her mom.

Or that she wasn't just in jail. She was moving on with her life. Nobody seemed worried. Nobody was crying in that sense. at least not that I saw. It was just shenanigans, lots of shenanigans. Oh, but something else was going on too. Secret, but not secret. Scott paid Carrie's bail, but no one paid Rebecca's.

So while Carrie was partying on the outside, Rebecca was confined to a harsh gray world behind bars. Separated for good? Why no, not at all. This is a call from an inmate at Harris County Jail. When I get out, we'll talk about everything. About the case, about what really happened that night, everything you want to talk about. So much to talk about. So much to plan. The question at the heart of it was, of course, why? Why would Carrie turn on her mother in such a horrific way? To be with her girlfriend, yes, but had to be more than that.

And sure enough. Did you believe that we and Carrie got her phone taken away from her? That her mom was gonna find something on that phone and try to file on you? Yes. There it was, the twisted rationale that triggered the murder. I mean there would have been proof of sending nudes to a minor.

At that point she would have had proof of statutory rape. Mary Ann could have had Rebecca charged with a serious crime. Sex with a minor. So according to Rebecca, Carrie did it, committed matricide for her. Together, they created this dramatic world, this backstory, this us against the world. Greg Holton was the prosecutor. First impression you get as a prosecutor

is you see their mugshot. There is Kerry, steely-eyed, almost smirking, but Rebecca, while older, looked lost, red-eyed, scared. Even though she was 20 years old, she looks about 15 and it takes a minute to figure out the dynamic between the two of them. Did you say you saw her as a follower, saw Rebecca as a follower? I think that's right. I think, in many ways, Kerry called the shots in their dynamic.

But easy case? Maybe not. There were issues. Like what? Like the false confession. That's a big one. It's kind of incomprehensible, and juries have trouble believing that.

Exactly. A good defense attorney would run with that, and legally it didn't matter, but wouldn't juries want to know which girl wielded the knife? Weren't they actually pointing fingers at each other along the way a lot? They would pledge their allegiance to each other and then talk to the police and say,

I didn't do it, but I know who did. So who finally told the real story? Why they did, on the, they couldn't help themselves. There was a no-contact order issued, and the first thing they did is break that no-contact order. And they spoke on the phone for almost 14 months. They were playing out a Lifetime movie. Baby.

That's me. I love you. I love you too. No, you didn't say it like you mean it. Baby, just say, I love you. I love you too. No, you didn't say it like you mean it. I love you too. There was Carrie, tucked away in her warm, cozy life on the outside.

And Rebecca... You may start the conversation now. ...making the best of her hard, grey reality behind bars. God, I swear I love you. I love you too. now making the best of her hard gray reality behind bars. They talked about their longing for the past as they planned for the future. I started picturing like the day I moved out and like moving with you and s***. Already picturing that huh, Beth? Carrie had lots of stories about life on the outside. We're talking about homecoming. Oh.

Well why can't I be included in the conversation? Sometimes Rebecca sounded needy. Carrie annoyed. Seriously? What? What seriously what man? I've been trying to call you all damn day. What did we talk about earlier? Don't blow my phone up. And I'm sorry that I'm so busy that I can't talk to you all the time.

Law enforcement was listening. Yeah. So there was no urgency. Yeah, sure. To stop them from talking if they wanted to incriminate themselves. Sometimes they seemed disconnected from what they had done. Things happen for a reason, but you can't change the way that God does his way. They created this bubble around the two of them that was void of reality. It was void of empathy and ultimately it was void of morality.

Between April 2013 and April 2014, they talked more than 800 times. At all that time, law enforcement was listening for anything that could erase that pesky thing called reasonable doubt. For months they seemed to play the game, avoided incriminating themselves. I just don't know how I'm going to react when we go in the house. I love you. But you're going to need to stop talking. Why? Because this isn't exactly, you know...

Why not? And then, it happened. They were talking, again, about going back to the scene of the crime. Rebecca and Kerry are talking about when they get out and they're going back to the house. And there's this question of it will be hard for Rebecca to go back there and to cope with it. And Kerry tells her in some form or fashion, get over it. We've got to deal with it. Carrie tells her in some form or fashion get over it we got to deal with it and Rebecca says you can see what I saw actually I did in person actually I did what do you mean good was it in my room the whole time. What do you mean? Was in my room the whole time.

Then where were you the entire time? The doorway. The doorway of what? Mom's room. No you weren't, because you weren't there. I didn't see you. We won't talk about that. Oh my God, babe.

That's kind of you, so I thought I told you to stay in your room. I thought, but I'm part, Grave. That's kind of useful. I thought I told you to stay in your room. I'm sorry, but I'm hard headed. This sounded like the real story at last. Rebecca held the knife. Kerry stood by in silent approval. It was a significant jail call to put the knife in one of their hands. Greg Houlton played the tapes for Scott.

And Scott abandoned all hope that his sister might not be the monster he feared. I could see everything for what it was. And at this point, I'm ready to accept that this was my sister. Scott urged Carrie to take a plea. And, I mean, she fought me on it. She fought me. So I just, I gave her the facts.

And in the end, she took the deal. Rebecca pleaded too, and when she did, she still said it was Carrie who wielded the deal. Rebecca pleaded too, and when she did, she still said it was Carrie who wielded the knife. Not that it mattered. She got 60 years. She also told Dateline she was manipulated by drugs and by Carrie. Carrie is serving 30 years. How often do you talk to her now?

How often do you see her? I only see my sister when I feel it necessary, when there's been an important moment in the family. Their father remains in a residential care facility. His brain's broken. He thinks my mom's still alive. What about you, Scott? How was your life?

I won't lie to you. For a very long time, I didn't think I was going to bounce back. I got pretty low. But now, now I am lucky enough to have a wonderful life. I'm married to a wonderful life. I'm married to a beautiful woman. I have two amazing kids. My family is my world. I don't take it for granted.

I know how quickly it can be taken away. Hang on to that, for sure. If no one minds, there is one thing that I want to bring up. Yeah. Since my mom was killed. There's been a lot of focus on what happened that night. And it's terrible.

It's tragic. Sure. But that's not the whole story. 21 years before that, there was nothing but a lifetime of good memories. You know, pancake breakfast on Sunday, building playhouse with dad. There was a happy life in that house.

She was a mom. She was a wife. She was a daughter. And she was loved her entire life. That's what defines my mom. Not the night that she was killed. And that's all for this edition of Dateline. Check out our Talking Dateline podcast.

Keith Morrison and Josh Mankiewicz will go behind the scenes of tonight's episode, available Wednesday in the Dateline feed wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you again next Friday at 9, 8 Central. I'm Lester Holt, for all of us at NBC News. Good night.