Dateline NBC - Mystery at Payson Canyon

Episode Date: September 13, 2023

In this Dateline classic, Kay Mortensen, a brilliant retired professor, a man who was prepared for just about anything finds himself in the most unimaginable situation. Keith Morrison reports. Originally aired on NBC on June 28, 2013.

Tonight on Dateline. It happens on TV. It doesn't happen to your family, to your brother, but it does. No one thought it could happen to him. He was a tough guy, prepared for anything. He always would say, if anyone tries to break in here, I'll kill them. Instead, he was killed. Stabbed in his own home.

You sure your dad's close to the touch? His son and daughter-in-law stumbled into a terrifying scene. That's when I saw the gun. They said, we're going to have to kill you now. A strange story that only got stranger. They had purple gloves on. And they had blue fuzzy gloves. Something isn't right here. Could he have killed his own father? What really happened in that house? I did not do this. Then a witness came forward and changed everything.

In this bizarre story, the strangest thing of all was the truth. He planned for any scenario except for the one that happened to him. I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Keith Morrison with Mystery at Payson Canyon. There are people on this glorious sun-kissed planet of ours who get up each morning to the miracle of being alive and worry. Not that there aren't things to worry about, of course, whether we can do anything about them or not. But some people worry a very great deal indeed and do try to be prepared for whatever.

And one of those prepared people was a brilliant retired university professor named Kay Mortensen, whose sister was a woman named Fern. I said, well, Kay, what would happen if I'm not prepared and I'm hungrier, my kids are hungrier? Can we come to your house? And no, I'll probably just shoot you. You know, so interestingly, he wouldn't have, but he was definitely willing to protect what he had. Oh, yes, he certainly was. And sure enough, one night. 911, what's the address of your emergency? But we're getting ahead of ourselves. What happened that night was a long time coming. It was long before that, when Kay became a survivalist, with attitude.

You knew exactly what he thought about everything. And even though he knew what he was saying was going to be outrageous and not accepted, he would say it anyway. He had a black belt in karate. He owned scores of firearms, kept guns in just about every room of the house, and in all of his cars. A fully stocked concrete bunker

outside his home in Payson, Utah. He had food, he had everything there, you know, water, waiting to go to the bathroom, magazines, books to read. Kay was very clear about it with his wife, Darla. And he'd say, this is where you and I are going to end up because there's going to be a nuclear war. And I'd say, I don't want to live if everybody else is dying. So, oh, he was a true patriot, and he worried about

things and wanted to be prepared for the civil war that was going to erupt, and so he was a little over the top. Darla wasn't thrilled about it, but she accepted him and his radical views. After all, they were still kind of in their honeymoon phase. It was all kind of surreal. I think we both felt like we were back being teenagers again. So, because we both, you know, hadn't really had love for quite a few years. They'd found each other late in life, after both had raised families. Kay had three adult children by then, one of whom, his eldest, Roger, stayed close.

He was my best friend. We did everything together. Mind you, Roger was not at all like Kay. For one thing, he'd suffered a brain injury in an accident years ago, so unlike Kay, he couldn't work much, lived on disability. But he liked to hang out with his dad. We lived less than a mile apart because we did enjoy spending so much time together. If I ever needed help, he'd be there in a minute to help me. Although, said Roger's wife Pam, it wasn't always easy. That's just the way Kay

was wired. Roger's dad was a very strong-willed person. It was his way or the highway. So Roger learned early to shy away from confrontation with his father. If he said something that Roger maybe disagreed or wanted to do it a different way, Roger would leave, he would come back, and everything would be good again. Not at all how it was with his new love, Darla. When she was around, they said, Kay's tough hide melted. We knew then that he really loved her and that he was willing to compromise

and do some things so that he could make her happy also. Did it seem to kind of soften him up a little bit? Yes, it did. A lot. So Kay and Darla got married. Married couple. And they were as happy as either one of them had ever been. He'd say, what else do we need to do? We're retired. We have plenty of money. We'll just have fun.

Kay was a rich man. Made most of his money buying gold at $2.50 an ounce, said Darla. He just had the foresight. He'd always, he was, you know, the dollar bill's not going to be worth anything. He put his money into a trust so that Roger and his other children would inherit everything once he was gone. Heaven knows he wasn't spending it. Worth millions, but... He was very frugal, very frugal. And I just, I used to say to him, you know, like, he just, I said, when is it you're going to spend your money? You know, what are you waiting for? It's okay.

He promised Darla he'd travel with her, see the world. But he made sure his bunker was stocked and he kept his guns close to hand, just in case. And then it was November 16, 2009. Darla was away watching her granddaughters. Kay was alone at his house in Payson. 911, what's the address of your emergency? It was evening when the call came in. I have help on the way, but I just need to get some information. Are you sure that he's dead? Darla was on her way home. Her cell phone chirped.

It was a neighbor. And he just says, well, something terrible's happened up Pace and Canyon. He says, I think it's at your house. Darla's mind flashed decay and his guns. And I thought, oh my gosh, he's probably shot somebody, an invader or something. She phoned a family friend named Chris Andrus. I said, something's going on. I'm alone. I just, I need to be with somebody.

Can you come down and be with me? Chris rushed to meet Darla at the foot of the canyon. Police had blocked off the road that led to Kay and Darla's house. And now Darla and Chris thought exactly the same thing. Kay probably shot someone. Turned out Kay never got the chance. Are you sure your dad's cold to the touch? His son makes an agonizing discovery and stumbles right into a murder scene. They said, you're in the wrong place, wrong time.

Everyone knew that Kay Mortensen was always prepared. Surrounded himself with a veritable arsenal of firearms. Just a tough old bird who could defend himself against just about anything. He always would say, if anyone tries to break in here, I'll kill them. But life, no matter how well we prepare, is full of rude surprises. As it was for Kay Mortensen, it was November 16, 2009, just before Thanksgiving. Hi, this is, we have the police on the way to help you there. Are you sure your dad's, your dad's cold to the touch?

Kay did not shoot some intruder, as he'd long promised he was prepared to do. No, somebody killed him without firing a shot. Yes, please go to the safe corner. And the man on the phone reporting the crime? Roger Mortensen, Kay's eldest son. I sliced his throat. It wasn't long before Kay's wife, Darla, had made it to the mouth of the canyon and was led to the command post that had been set up just down the hill from their home. That's where they gave her the news. Your life just comes tumbling down. You know, you have it all planned out. You think,

you know, what it's going to be, and then everything's gone. Kay caught off guard. Not Kay, thought Darla. Impossible. But that seemed to be just what happened. At least, that's what Roger and Pam told the police, and later us. And a very strange story it was, that began, they said, when Pam received a pie at work as a gift. We knew how much he loved that pecan pie, and we decided as soon as she got home from work to take him that pie. So they said they went to his house, intending to drop off the pie and then leave. But when they got there, they said, there was an unfamiliar car in the driveway. Pam said she knocked on the door, and a young man answered.

I said, is Kay here? He said, he is. He's upstairs. I said, we're just here to drop off a pie. And they said, go ahead in. I got to about the landing. When I was asked to come back down, I heard the door shut. And when I turned around, that's when I saw the gun. What was it like to see that? It was a shock.

As soon as we turned around and saw the gun, another guy started walking down the stairs also. He had in his hand a wad of zip ties. They turned to us and said, you're here at the wrong place, wrong time. Pulled out your hands. The intruders zip-tied their wrists, forced them down on the living room floor, then zip-tied their ankles. After we were tied up, they said that, well, I'm sorry, but you've seen our faces. We're going to have to kill you now.

Pam, quaking in terror, she said, looked up at a picture of Jesus that was hanging on the living room wall. I kept thinking, Heavenly Father, if you really love me and care for me, please make us get through this. And it calmed me to keep looking at that picture of christ and to be able to help roger stay calm that really had an impact on you it did

oh why it just brought me comfort it brought me peace to know that even if they killed you to know that the my heavenly father loves me and that he would do the right thing for me both men left the room they said and then roger began praying aloud he was in mid-sentence he said when the men walked back in and something quite amazing happened when my wife nudged me and she says okay okay, be quiet, they're back. And one of them says, no, that's okay. Keep praying. Go ahead. And they both folded their arms in front of them

and bowed their heads and listened to me as I continued this entire prayer. How weird is that? When I got done with the prayer, we both sat down and their demeanor changed at that point. One of them looked at us and says, well, we've decided we're not going to kill you.

We've decided that we're going to tell you a story that you need to relay to the police. What was that story that the intruders told them to say? The three black men with ski masks invaded the house. Three, not two, as they actually were. Black, not white, as they actually were. Black, not white as they actually were. And then, said Roger, they took his driver's license, told him they'd know if he or Pam ever told the truth, and if that happened, they'd hunt him down and they'd kill him.

And then the two men left. Roger and Pam waited a while, got out of the zip ties, and Roger ran upstairs while Pam dialed 911 and was on the phone with the operator when Roger found his father in the upstairs bathroom. And I saw my father kneeling over the bathtub. His feet were tied and his head was down in the bathtub. Inconceivable. Tough, resilient, armed to the teeth Kay. Murdered with his own kitchen knife? What a story. Sergeant Eric Knudsen of the Utah County Sheriff's Office was assigned as one of the lead detectives.

He was sitting in the office when, from up at the house, the first officer to talk to Pam and Roger called him. He said, you know, something isn't right here. It seems, from his perception, that maybe some things were staged or some things were just not what he would think would be normal for a crime as heinous or as vicious as this. Something about that bizarre

story didn't sit right. He just couldn't put his finger on it Not yet, anyway Coming up Problem was that bizarre story got weirder by the minute They had purple gloves on And they had blue fuzzy gloves Really?

When Dateline continues. The death of Kay Mortensen was horrific, humiliating, helpless to defend himself inside his own sacred fortress. The killer had bent him over his own bathtub, slashed his throat several times, stabbed his neck. All those guns and not a single one fired. It seemed so personal. Sergeant Eric Knudsen of the Utah County Sheriff's Office got a briefing from the first officer at the scene, who turned on his audio recorder when he met Kay's son, Roger, and Roger's wife, Pam. Roger had found the body and was already suggesting possible killers. He told me he had an appointment for lunch at noon with a guy named Mike Kipp, discussing $25,000 worth of guns. Mike Kipp? Mike was Kay's former student. Roger and Pam identify him real quick.

They say, he's involved. He owes my dad money. He's the one who did this. Roger told detectives that Kay was holding a collection of Mike's weapons, about 30 of them, mostly pistols and rifles, and some shotguns. Kay put the guns in his bunker. Roger thought there might be a grudge involved. When detectives went to look for the guns,

they were gone. So we pull in Michael Kipp that night, too. We interview him, and we can get his alibi. It's quick. Nothing suspicious about it, it turned out. Mike had not a thing to do with Kay's murder. He simply needed money, and Kay agreed to buy his guns. By now, tips were coming in.

And this female said, it's the Baker boys. She said, the Baker boys did this. The Baker boys were brothers who, fairly or not, had developed a reputation as the town's troublemakers. Detectives found them. They had solid alibis. Then, the next day, another tip. A woman who implicated her own husband. He came home last night, the time frame before the homicide.

He grabbed a bunch of stuff, including a knife, and he's been looking for guns. So I know he's involved. But the woman's husband was eventually eliminated as a suspect. Detectives hoped maybe the stolen guns would lead them to Kay's killer. And we recovered a lot of firearms that were stolen, just again, unlinked. And that just highlighted another aspect of the mystery. Kay, remember, collected firearms at close to a hundred valuable guns locked up at his house.

Yet the thieves just stole the cheaper ones from the bunker. Pretty bizarre robbery to take those guns and not take the far more valuable collection that Kay had. Agreed. In fact, the inside of Kay's house was pristine, untouched. No sign anybody had stolen anything. If this was a home invasion, it was an odd one. But by then, truth be told, detectives were already homing in on the two people who admitted they were there the whole time. Kay's son, Roger, and his wife, Pam.

You sure that he's dead? Starting with that 911 call, they made something odd about it. Didn't sound how I would think that a phone call should be made to 911 after discovering your father had just been killed with the throat cut and zip-tied in the bathtub. Roger and Pam, said the detectives,

appeared to be unemotional, uncaring, even callous. Even though they claimed that gunmen stood over them, kept them hostage for almost two hours, at first, Pam couldn't seem to describe the men. The guy that had the gun, what did he look like? Was he a white guy, black guy, Hispanic? I don't know. She seemed uncertain even about the number of gunmen.

How many were there? How many guys were there? There could have been three. But listen to what happened next. Roger took the phone and changed the story. Were they white, black, Hispanic? Two white. Three white males. Two white males.

Two white males. Roger explained the reason for all the apparent confusion, that if they ever revealed what their captors looked like, they'd be hunted down and killed. Did you buy that? Not really. I didn't. They didn't appear fearful. They were saying it. They weren't really acting fearful.

Anyway, why would vicious killers not have killed them, too? Night of the murder, Knutson interviewed them. My name's Eric Knutson, by the way. I'm Pamela. Did they seem nervous or agitated? Not really nervous or agitated, just kind of unemotional. Even at times cold toward the victim, Roger's father. He's a contender's old fart, and he said his mouth to everybody.

And as they told their stories, detectives started noticing subtle differences. And they had blue fuzzy gloves. They looked like women's winter driving gloves or something. The fuzzy kind. They had, I know they had purple gloves on. Purple, you know, your medical gloves. Lots of details on which they didn't agree.

So Sergeant Knutson decided to employ a well-known police interview technique. He got tough, accusing. Quite frankly, I think the story's a bunch of crap. I think the story's a bunch of crap that you and Roger have come up with. Okay? Sorry, you don't believe me, but... I'm trying to. Does it sound too rehearsed?

Yeah. Okay. I want them to say, I had nothing to do with this. Detective, you're crazy. I had nothing to do with this. That's what I wanted to hear, and it never came out. But listen to what did come out. Is your husband capable of killing somebody?

How do you get drinking? I wouldn't hope. I mean, I wouldn't think he is. I wouldn't think that he's capable of killing his father. A search of Roger and Pam's home showed they appeared to be in financial trouble. Detectives found collection notices and unsent mortgage coupons, suggesting at least that they were behind in their house payments. I know we're in a lot of debt, but we, I, personally,

would not have my father-in-law killed for his money. And yet, as Roger told the detective, I'm not sole beneficiary, but I get a big share of my dad's millions, too. Within days of the murder, Pam and Roger agreed to go back to the house with detectives for a videotape retelling of their intruder's story.

At the front door, my wife was holding a pie right here. Did that provide you any useful information? It provided useful information from our standpoint as far as more circumstantial evidence that they're not being 100% truthful. Once again, detectives heard foggy memories. She either knocked on the door or rang the doorbell. I believe she knocked on the door. They heard dialogue that sounded like a bad crime movie. He pointed at us and said, you're here at the wrong time. Put out your hands.

But then there was that same strange lack of emotion when Roger described what should have been the worst moment of his life. I left. I came back downstairs, and my wife was talking at the time to 911 dispatch, and I said, he is dead. Roger and Pam took a polygraph test. And what do you know? Roger was found to be deceptive. And Pam was jumpy. The operator couldn't complete the test.

But still, Roger and Pam swore up and down they had nothing to do with it. They were victims themselves. Truth be told, the police needed some real evidence. And out of the blue, something arrived. And that new evidence? Something else that was strange. Someone saw the killing in a dream. So I have a photo line I've drawn up up and then she puts her finger on it. She puts it right on Roger's face. Within days of Kay Mortensen's murder, members of his family began hearing deeply troubling reports from the Utah

County Sheriff's Office. The investigation was leading sure as can be, detectives told them, to Kay's own son, Roger, and Roger's wife, Pam. Darla said she couldn't believe it at first. I was just adamant that they couldn't have done it. I was their biggest defender. But then detectives asked her to listen to Roger and Pam's recorded statements. And she, too, started to wonder. They told lies, and then it just put more suspicion on them. Gradually, her conviction grew. Same for Kay's sister, Fern.

I could buy the fact that they were thinking of Roger's involvement. There were just too many things about Roger and Pam's story that didn't make any sense to Fern. And there was something else, too. A possible witness. Remember that woman who suspected her husband was involved? The police found them here in Salt Lake City at a drug binge with some friends. They were high on meth.

And one of the people there, a woman named Cammie Bills, told the detectives she had a story to tell. How about a dream she'd had? She describes in what she calls a dream, seeing somebody get killed. She describes being outside of a room. She describes a female off to her left crying in hysterics. And she describes three or four males in the bathroom. And she says there's one male who I think is related to the female that's on the floor screaming. Now remember, the woman was on methamphetamine, reporting not what she saw, but what she dreamed she saw.

Still, you never know till you ask. So I have a photo line I've drawn up, and she stares at it, and she puts her head down, and she puts her finger on it. She puts it right on Roger's face. The next day, detectives took Cammie to Kay's house, showed her the crime scene, and again, she named Roger. I can't really see Roger. Just arms, he's holding Kay. You don't hear a story like that and say, well, that's a piece of crap, and go on from there. No, not when she gives that amount of detail.

Suspicion of Roger and Pam was hardening by the minute. Detectives got the rest of the Mortensen family informed of developments. What did this do to you? Man, it just, it threw me for a loop. When Pam and Roger attended Kay's funeral, the tension was thick. It was very difficult to be there because everybody wanted to know what happened that night. But they couldn't say anything, said Pam. Detectives told them not to.

And my sister came up to me at one point and says, tell me what really happened. And I told her, I'm sorry, I cannot talk about this. Shortly after Roger and Pam took the polygraph test and were told about the dismal results, they hired a lawyer. Few in the Mortensen family could understand why they would do a thing like that, if they were innocent, that is. I tried to say, what would I do if I was in their situation? I would do everything I could to help get these people that had caused such horror in their lives and murdered Kay. On the advice of their attorneys, Roger and Pam stopped talking, and the lopsided rift in the Mortensen family widened from mistrust to anger to outright accusation. Chris Andrus, the woman Darla

called the night of the murder, was one of very few people who continued to support Roger and Pam. They were left to hang out and dry. How did you feel about that? Oh, I was so angry. I was just so, so angry. I couldn't believe that you could love somebody and do that to them. Even if I thought Roger had done it, I would not have abandoned him. And they did? Oh, absolutely, they did. Not only did they abandon him, they crucified him. Months dragged by, Roger and Pam were headline news in Utah.

But in the absence of definitive physical evidence linking them to Kay's murder, they remained free. Day by day, they went about their business as if their lives were still quite normal. Then on July 28, 2010, Utah County Prosecutor Tim Taylor took a dramatic step to break the logjam. He presented the case against Roger and Pam to a grand jury. So why call the grand jury? Why not just charge them? We thought the grand jury was a great tool to force them to come in to talk. It was a secret proceeding.

No defendants, no defense attorney, only prosecutors, police, some members of the Mortensen family, even some of Pam's co-workers. All in front of 16 jurors, whose job was to decide whether or not they should charge Roger and Pam with Kay's murder. And, in just over an hour, the jury decided to indict. So what did that say to you? Well, there jury decided to indict. So what did that say to you? Well, there was enough to proceed. It sort of reinforced what you were already thinking. It did.

And that same day, eight months after Kay Mortensen was found dead in his home, Roger and Pam were deposited in the county jail. Chris Andrus, the family friend who still believed they were innocent, went to Roger's sister. I said, Julie, we need some money to hire an attorney for Roger.

We think Pam's family can come up with money for Pam, but we've got to get him a separate attorney. Can you help me? There's millions of dollars in the trust. She told me her words were not one red penny will be spent on his defense. Julie told us she did not use those specific words, but she said the family was advised by their attorney not to use Kay's money to pay for Roger's defense, which meant that Roger, who stood to inherit a big chunk of his dad's millions, would have to rely on a public defender.

Were he and Pam diabolical killers as detectives and their own family had come to believe? Of course, we and everybody else just had to know. Coming up, Roger and Pam face questions from Dateline. As the interrogations continued, your stories didn't stay the same, according to the police at least. Much of Utah County, along with Roger's own family and many of their one-time friends, joined the lineup arrayed against Roger and Pam Mortensen as they sat in jail, charged with murdering Roger's father, Kay, and they waited for their day in court.

The evidence against them? Their strange demeanor, their alleged financial troubles. Roger's failed polygraph. But mostly, according to detectives, the bizarre and ever-changing story they told about the night of the murder. What was the truth? We asked the only people who knew for sure, starting at the beginning, with that strange 911 call. Who held you hostage? I don't know.

Our viewers hear that 911 call, and they're like, wait a minute, something's wrong there. That doesn't, you know, people scream on 911 calls. They're crazed. And I think I was in a lot of shock, too. And I don't know the real reason why I was, I could stay as calm as I can. But I just, that's just my personality and that's the type of person I am. And although she didn't sound like it, she was terrified, she said. Their captors had just threatened to kill them if they told the truth.

And so when the 911 operator asked me how many were there, I was totally confused what to say. Do I tell the truth, which is what I wanted to do? Roger said he knew exactly what he had to do when he discovered his father in the bathtub. And I hollered down to her while she was still on the phone, tell them the exact truth. We are going to get these guys. But Pam said she still couldn't spit it out. I was kind of staggering through what was going on. Well, there was two, maybe there was three, because I didn't know. I was terrified for my life, still. And I didn't know what I should have said.

What about their police interrogations, when their stories didn't match? I thought their gloves were one color. I thought their gloves were one color. She thought their gloves were another color. Other than that, our stories were basically the same. They both cooperated fully, said Roger, kept talking for days, even as police brought up one accusation after another. There was an inheritance involved. Yes.

And you talked about that with the police? I may have. I'm not sure. Well, according to them, you talked about it. And it provided one of the classic motivations that children have for killing their parents. Cops run into it all the time, right? They say they do. And that's clearly what they were thinking when they talked to you. Yes. Did they make that clear? They they were thinking when they talked to you. Yes. Did they make that

clear? They didn't make very much clear to us. They just said that we were not being cooperative with them, even though from the very beginning we told them everything that happened. They just didn't believe it. They didn't believe that two people would kill one person and leave two more alive. Perhaps. But what about Roger and Pam's apparent financial troubles? We were not having any financial problems. If we were having financial problems, my father would be glad to help us. We had that type of relationship. They were certainly not debt-free, they said, but didn't amount to a whole lot. And as for the pile of unsent mortgage coupons, they simply started paying online, they said, like everybody else. And as for that failed polygraph test,

Roger said he should never have been asked to take it. Remember, he's on disability because years ago he had a serious accident that left him with a brain injury, which caused, among other things, short-term memory loss and confusion, the sort of thing that would make a polygraph result quite useless. I said, how could I have felt I did not do this? So, was he lying? Or did police have it all wrong?

They didn't know how to proceed. They could not find fingerprints because the people had gloves on. They didn't find a gun because they took it with them. They didn't know what to do, and so being confused, they went after the easiest subjects they could find. It was us. The days piled up. A month, two months, four months in jail, waiting for their day in court.

A day for which Roger's lawyer maybe wasn't quite so eager as they were. We had a case that I believed in. We had a case that I thought we could defend. At the end of the day, I was scared. And no one was prepared when one cold winter day in the Utah County Sheriff's Office, the phone rang. Coming up, the unexpected call, the truth revealed. A surprising ending you won't believe. Summer turned into winter again. The family marked the grim anniversary of Kay Mortensen's murder. As Kay's son Roger and his daughter-in-law Pam

cooled their heels in jail awaiting trial, all the while maintaining their innocence. Pam said she was offered a deal if she turned state's evidence against Roger. If you just tell them what they want to hear, then you could go home. But for me, I was not going to lie just so that I could be a free person.

Roger's public defender, Anthony Howell, believed his client was innocent. I was looking for that piece of evidence that would be, ah, that's the thing I can't explain. There just was nothing. But here was the rub. Howell knew juries. And as trial approached, he was deeply unsettled.

I was worried he was going to be convicted regardless of what I tried to do. Why? Because this is the kind of case I was worried he was going to be convicted regardless of what I tried to do. Why? Because this is the kind of case where a jury would be worried that if they didn't convict, that they would be letting a murderer go free. But Howell didn't get the opportunity to defend his client in court. The reason was that phone call to the Utah County Sheriff's Office,

a call from a woman named Rachel Bingham. And here's what she had to say. I've just been blocking it out like it didn't happen. And I just watched the news and these people are going to go to jail, prison, probably life sentence. What she had been blocking out was a bombshell. Her ex-husband, Martin Bond, told her he and a friend named Benjamin Rettig went to Kay's house to steal his guns. Bond, she said, told her everything. He said that they took him to the bathroom and bent him over the tub. And cut his throat.

And then... He said right after that they heard the doorbell ring, and it was the two. The two were Roger and Pam, and we know the rest of the story. Rachel Bingham kept the secret for months until finally her conscience won out. And she told the police one more thing, how the crooks got the drop on Kay Mortensen. It turned out that Martin's dad and Kay were old friends. Kay had known Martin as a kid,

which is why Kay, armed against intruders, welcomed him in and turned his back to his killers. He had planned for any worst-case scenario to happen, except for the one that happened to him. In that, there are so many ironies, aren't there? There are so many ironies, yeah. The biggest, perhaps? Roger and Pam's crazy story about armed intruders

was true all along, though Sergeant Knutson still had trouble believing it. I can pick up the case, and I can read through it, and I can read through it, and I can see discrepancy after discrepancy. I can see, but can you see where maybe that ain't enough? Yeah. And as for treating as possible evidence the dream sequence of a girl on meth? This is evidence?

Well, it's more circumstantial evidence. It's a lead. You'd even call that circumstantial evidence? I think it's definitely something we follow up with. Saying she had a dream. It's a good dream. And it's pretty close. And in the end, the prosecutor

admitted he and the detectives got it wrong. Based upon the new physical evidence that we have located, we anticipate dismissing the charges against Roger and Pam Mortensen tomorrow. Roger and Pam were finally freed. Those four and a half months seemed like four and a half thousand years. I felt like I was in there forever. Pam got a standing ovation from an unlikely crowd. As I was walking out of that big dorm area, there was 90 women clapping and cheering for me they knew I was innocent and for me having the situation that I that I've we dealt with with Roger's family turning against

us friends turning against us to have that support of those people that people would consider criminals to have them cheer and and yell and scream was a very emotional thing for me. Pam wanted the prosecutor to issue a public apology. That would help make up for what all this has cost them, she said. We offered the prosecutor this forum. Am I sorry? Yeah, I am. I have no problem with saying that I made a mistake. We didn't try to defraud anyone. We didn't try to lie. We didn't try to fabricate anything.

But we made a mistake. Pam and Roger filed a lawsuit arguing that the prosecutors and detectives lied to the grand jury. But just a few months later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that grand jury witnesses and prosecutors were immune from civil litigation. So the judge dismissed their case. So let me understand this. The police come to your house,

you're arrested, your names are dragged through the mud. Then somebody gets the right guy and they say, well, bye, see you later. Exactly. As in so many cases, Bond and Rettig ended up blaming each other. Rettig took a deal, got 25 to life.

Bond went to trial, was convicted, and is doing life without parole. The star prosecution witness? Rachel Bingham. And if she hadn't come forward, would two innocent people be in prison today? It's going to chase you for a while. A little, but I can put it behind me. The case is closed out. What I'm happy about, for me personally, is the family has closure.

But do they? It isn't just Kay's murder they must learn to live with, but also the wreckage strewn for God knows how long through the family story. I had emotions of happiness and relief, but still there's some regret that I didn't support Roger and Pam from the beginning. It changes your perspective on the world. It really does. And, by the way, said Roger and Pam, a little piece of advice.

If anything happens and there's anything dealing with law enforcement, you don't say a word and you get an attorney. As for Darla, who'd finally found the love of her life, what was there to say? That moment of sunshine snatched away, huh? Yep. You just take what life brings you,

and it's not always what you'd expected. When you're a young girl, you have all your dreams of what your life's going to be, and somehow it just doesn't quite work out that way. That's all for now. I'm Lester Holt. Thanks for joining us. doesn't quite work out that way. That's all for now. I'm Lester Holt. Thanks for joining us.