Dateline NBC - The House on the Hill

Episode Date: March 3, 2020

When Karl Karlsen’s wife, Christina, dies in a catastrophic house fire, he moves to upstate New York. Nearly 20 years later, his oldest son dies in a freak accident, leading police to question if Karl is involved. Andrea Canning reports. Originally aired on NBC on February 28, 2020.

I look up and there's smoke coming out and I'm like what the I'm yelling for the kids and I hear daddy's coming daddy's coming it's terrible dying in a fire and to know it's family and someone you love and care for this is my sister her life was really about giving to others. Nobody should have to go through what our family has gone through. Are you with your son right now? Is he breathing? No. There's a young kid now gone. It just didn't make sense. These thoughts kept coming up. I just think it was an intuition.

I had watched an episode of Dateline, and I, like, had this revelation. I said, well, what if I kind of go undercover? Part of me feels like I'm walking into a booby trap. Oh, my God, I think he did it. Bad luck that they died? What would you call it? You're saying that you are completely, 100% innocent? Yes.

If I told you everything, you wouldn't believe what's happened. If these hills could talk, imagine the stories they'd tell. About the people who came here to California's gold rush country, dreaming of a big break, a last chance, or a way out. The woman at the heart of this story had dreams of her own. This is how they ended.

Her life was really about giving to others, and she didn't care what she sacrificed to do that. That's the person that they'll never forget, what a wonderful, sweet person Chris was. Our story begins with a catastrophic fire in the old mining town of Murphys, California. It was New Year's Day, 1991. It seemed like every firefighter within radio range heard the call. A woman was trapped in a burning house.

That must be a scary feeling when you hear trapped. Yeah, fire is a terrible thing. Rich Wynn was a local business owner and volunteer firefighter, one of many who raced up this treacherous, windy road to reach the fire. My heart was pounding in my chest. I was hyperventilating, I had a feeling of dread. Could you see the smoke? Yeah.

As you're getting closer? We're getting closer. We could see the smoke. We're feeling really anxious. I jumped in my dad's fire chief's vehicle and went to the fire with him. Today, Brian Wilkes is Murphy's fire chief. Back in 1991, he was a 17-year-old fire cadet who thought he was going to be part of a rescue. I want to save this person. You know, it's that instinct that we need to get there. We need to get there as soon as we can.

They arrived to an awful scene. How bad was the fire at this point? It was just consuming the house. You know, we felt the smoke and the heat, you know, even from here. This quiet clearing is where the house was burning. And when we go back behind and the flames are just too intense, you know, we just couldn't get in. We couldn't get close. So we asked the incident commander, what do you want to do? And he said, surround and drown.

That's fire speak for drench the house with water. After 15, 20 minutes, we got the fire knocked down. And then he chose two of us. My partner and I went in. You went inside the house? Yeah, we were asked to find the body. It was scary. And so as we went in, the smoke is still rising.

Water's dripping everywhere. It's a disaster scene. And then I heard a call out. I found her. We just stopped. And we just, you know, we're so defeated, dejected. Her name was Christina Carlson. She was a 30-year-old wife and mother.

Fortunately, maybe miraculously, her husband Carl and three young children had escaped the deadly blaze. They were all being treated in an ambulance by paramedic Pam Geet. The children didn't say much other than Daddy had got them out of the house. Pam says talking to them wasn't easy. They would answer things very briefly. They were not really connected that I felt that they probably were suffering some sort of a psychological shock. Christina's father, Art Alexander, had no idea what happened when he arrived at the scene. I got in the ambulance. I looked around. I said, where's Chris? And they told me one of the kids said she's with God or the angels took her or something like that. And that's when I said to him, she wasn't there.

Art could only imagine the terror of Christina's last moments on Earth. Now he had to break the news to the rest of his family, beginning with her sister, Colette. I got a call from my dad in the afternoon, and he said, he said, I need to tell you something. He said there was a fire out at Chris's house, and he said everyone he said, I need to tell you something. He said, there was a fire out at Chris's house. And he said, everyone got out but Chris. And I said, are you kidding me? And he said, no. Is it almost unbelievable when you hear that? It is. It is because I had just been out at the house. You know, we, I had gone up to my sister's house, I think on December 22nd.

Colette was numb. Everyone was, including the firefighters. I knew her, you know. She used to come into the Pepper and Stick, the ice cream parlor I owned in. With her children? With her three kids, and some of their fondest memories were doing that. And here we couldn't save her. It was awful. When he was leaving the scene that day, young Brian Wilkes remembers he was shaken and sad about the young mother they couldn't save. But he was also grateful the three kids were okay. I very clearly remember today,

a conversation with my dad when we were driving, I think we were driving home from the fire. And he makes the comment, he goes, wow, he goes, that dad was a hero today. But that day was just the beginning of an epic family drama we've been following for years. Now, more than three decades after Christina Carlson's death, the secrets have been revealed about what happened inside the house that once stood here. Disaster strikes again.

He kind of looked out the window and said, oh my God, the barn's on fire. Then, another painful loss. Is he breathing? No. He is not breathing. Okay. No.

Just that numb feeling of, now what do we do? Deadly accidents keep hitting this family. How could that be? Almost 30 years after her death in a fire, Christina Carlson's sister Colette still talks about her capacity for joy. She just had this incredible laugh that you know she laughed very easily and when she started laughing she would just you know the whole room would she was contagious with her laugh. Her husband Carl speaks of her with admiration. When you lose somebody they're beautiful

but she was just there was the she was proud. What do you mean by proud? When she walked she walked with her head with her chin up not that she was just, there was the, she was proud. What do you mean by proud? When she walked, she walked with her head, with her chin up. Not that she was better than you, but she was proud of who she was, what she was, and things like that. Carl's brother Mike adored her too. He'll never forget the day he heard the news. How hard was that for you, knowing how she died? It was terrible. I mean, the concept of dying in a fire has got to be pretty awful.

And to know it's family and someone you love and care for, that's hard. Carl met Christina 10 years earlier in North Dakota, where he was stationed in the Air Force. Christina's first marriage to another airman had just broken up. When do you get the first phone call from Christina saying that she's in love again and it's with Carl? She told me she'd met a guy and she was happy. I think the next phone call she let me know that she was pregnant. And I said, well, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? What are you going to do?

So I said, you can come stay with me. And she said no. She said, we're going to get married. Was she happy? Oh, yeah. Yeah, she was very happy. All right, Carl. Carl left the Air Force in 1985 and decided to move his little family here

to his hometown in Seneca County, New York. By then, they had two kids, Aaron and baby Levi. Drove in an old antique pickup truck from North Dakota. Stand right there, Chris. Mike took to Christina right away. She was small, tiny little girl. She's not very tall at all. A very simple sweetheart of a kid. How did she handle it all, just suddenly being thrust into the Carlson family? I think at first she was a little confused. Trying to just even keep names straight was a challenge, but she was the type of kid that her glass was always half full. Was she a good fit to the Carlson family? Absolutely, yeah. She would give it out as well as take it and laugh on the way.

They were a cute couple. Christina, the little cheerleader from the mountains of California. Carl, the rough and ruddy country boy. They would laugh and joke, and he was this big barrel-chested guy, and my sister, only 4'11". We just connected, and she just was a very... never a bad word to say about anybody. We just connected, and she just was a very friend. Never a bad word to say about anybody.

Carl found work in the local stone quarry, and soon they had another baby, Katie. Christina loved being a mother. She'd be on the floor playing with them or teaching them or instructing them or coddling them. And it wasn't just her kids. It was all of our kids. Look at those two lovely people over there. Christina seemed happy. But Carl wanted more than a life working the quarry. And he didn't see a big future for himself in upstate New York.

Right about then, Christina's father offered a ticket out, a job with a future working in his heating and air conditioning company. And I told him, I said, you know, if you ever need a job, just come on out to California and you'll have a job because you can work with me. So they moved across the country and eventually settled into that ram shackle house at the top of the long winding road. It wasn't much, but it was closer to Colette, and Christina set out to make it special. She was a creative, do-it-yourselfer, and a great seamstress. She went into home decorator mode and started painting and sewing curtains. And every time I'd go up, I'd be like, wow, this looks really good. It sounds like Christina was always trying to make the best out of any situation.

Yes. And she usually succeeded. She'd finished redoing all the bedrooms when the fire came through. Christmas 1990 was the last time Colette saw her sister alive. Just days later, this was all that was left of the home Christina worked so hard on. Her grieving cousins videotaped the smoldering wreckage. In a matter of weeks, the house would be razed, but this video would survive and raise many questions in the years to come. You know, my dad, myself, we were all saying something's not right. You know, something is not right here. I'm yelling for the kids and I hear, Daddy's coming, Daddy's coming.

That tragic day, Carl tells his story, and investigators tell theirs. There was a strong smell of kerosene. In the grim aftermath of Christina's death, Carl Carlson's brother Mike knew how badly he needed help. Did your mind immediately go to those three beautiful children? Immediately, you're thinking, well, I've got a brother in trouble and three little kids, depending on him. How do we help? What do we do? The first thing Mike did was head to California.

Carl was walking around out in the front yard. Just a strange scenario. So we hugged, and I said, I'll help when I can. Tell me what to do. And he was just numb. He was more of a zombie. He just said, I don't know. Everyone was wondering how it all happened. Carl said that all he knew was that the fire started while he was working around the house.

It was New Year's Day. The kids were taking naps. Christina was bathing. I was outside in the garage looking for some stuff to fix a motor in the attic. And then I hear Carl. Then I hear Carl Hoger Carlson get the kids. So I come out of the garage, there's smoke coming out. And I'm like, what the? And now it's coming out underneath the front door. The videos shot by Christina's cousins are the only images that remain. This gaping hole is where Levi's room was and where Carl says he raced first.

Do you hear Levi calling you? No, not a word. So I break the window, and it feels like the sun hit you in the face, a hot, a blast there, whatever, blows me back off the porch, you know. But he says he managed to pull Levi through the window. And just both of us sort of tumble backwards onto the porch. Then he ran around the house to Aaron and Katie's window. How do you rescue your two daughters? Well, I ended up getting to the window, have to jump up every time, jump, grab the screen, try to get my fingers into it,

pull the screen off, do the same thing with the window. And I'm yelling for the kids, and I hear Aaron telling Katie... I hear Aaron telling Katie, Daddy's coming, Daddy's coming. He says six-year-old Aaron helped three-year-old Katie climb up to a dresser under the window. So both girls get a hold of me, we fall back, tumble on the ground, get back up, run them to the truck. But Christina was still in the bathroom. The fire was burning outside her door, and a board was covering the broken bathroom window, her only way out.

Do you hear her screaming? There's no screaming. There's any, nothing. He says he tried to get Christina out of the house but couldn't get inside. He drove the kids to the neighbor's house and called for help. But of course, it was too late. She died of smoke inhalation. How do I explain to my father-in-law, to my mother-in-law, that I didn't save their little girl? Two days after the fire, Mike says his brother was a mess. Did he seem lost? Absolutely. I can remember he, I perceive he was still in the same clothes he had on at the fire.

He still smelled of smoke, looked terrible in an old white t-shirt, hair a little singed. The family helped Carl pull himself together for the memorial service. And then Carl took everyone to a place he often visited with Christina, the giant sequoias at Calaveras Big Trees Park. He just wanted to get away, take a couple hours and get away from reality probably was a good thing for all of us. Then it was time to talk about the future. What are we doing? If we're gonna stay in California,

you need to arrange for an apartment. That's when he said, I just wanna go home. So four days after the fire, Carl packed up his three children and flew back to upstate New York. It was yet another blow for Christina's grieving family. My sister and I had made a commitment to each other that our kids were going to grow up knowing each other.

And then it was stripped in five days. All Christina's father had left of his beloved daughter was this box of charred photos that he rescued from the house. He was hobbled by grief. After her death, I was probably more dead than alive. I didn't pay attention to a lot of things that I should have, but I just muddled through. I didn't care. A few days after Carl left, state fire investigator Carl Kent was asked to examine the scene. It still looked very much like it did when this

video was shot. The first thing he noticed was the smell. There was a strong smell of kerosene in that particular area, and the whole hallway from the master bedroom to the living room was covered with cardboard. There had been a kerosene spill in the house a day or two before the fire. Carl said the pets knocked over a jug of kerosene along the hallway near the bathroom door. The burn patterns indicated the fire also started there. And so the area of origin was right in the area of the utility room and the hallway bathroom area. She wouldn't have been able to escape out the doorway because there was so much fire right in that area.

Had she gotten into the hallway, she would have probably inhaled hot gases from the fire itself and seared her lungs, and she would have perished from that. He wondered if this father had risked his life to save his children, couldn't he have tried harder to save his wife? I think if I was in that position, I would do everything I could to get her out of there.

As far as the DA was concerned, there wasn't enough evidence to prove it was anything other than an accident. But Kent felt differently. This was a fatal fire involving kerosene and a boarded-up window. Kent urged his supervisors to let him interview Carl Carlson in person. And I asked if they would authorize or send me to New York to interview Carl Carlson. And they said that they didn't have the money to do that.

So the fire investigator moved on to other cases. But his gut told him there was a chance he would someday return to this one. At least he hoped so. He had told me that he had lost his wife in a fire and he was a single dad raising three kids on his own. I felt bad for him and the kids and I was drawn to that. A new life and a new wife for Carl Carlson. Then suddenly, a new tragedy, too. He sat upright and kind of looked out the window and said, you know, oh my God, call 911. The Finger Lakes region of upstate New York was Carl Carlson's home.

And now he was back to stay. Here in Seneca County, he would rebuild his life among the farms, the fields, the vineyards. His old friends and family were looking out for him, but Carl still wondered how he'd manage. Coming back home is like, what the hell am I going to do now? I'm not a mom. I'm a dad. She was the homemaker. She was the mother. She bathed the kids. So I don't know nothing about doing braids and things like that. I don't know how to take care. I mean, I know how to take care of kids, but I don't know how to take care of kids. Then all of a sudden I get the education that, oh, I got to do school records. I got to do shots. Was there a lot of concern for Carl having just lost

his wife? Well, I think everybody realized that this poor guy isn't going to do it on his own. He went back to work at the stone quarry for a while and then saw an opportunity at a local glass manufacturing plant that had just opened. And it's like, I don't want to go back to doing six days a week, not with two, three kids, so they let me work five days a week, 10- to 12-hour days. Other people helped out too. It's that kind of place.

And it all seemed to come together for him when he met Cindy Best in 1992. I was into line dancing at the time and that's where I first met him. We talked about different things. You know, he had told me that he had lost his wife in a fire and he was a single dad raising three kids on his own. And his family was into horses, Belgian horses. He told you that on the first night? Yes, yeah. Wow.

Yeah, yeah. That first meeting led to dating and meeting his kids. What did you like most about him? I was very attracted to the fact that he had children. I had been told that I probably would never have children. I always wanted to just be a mom. And I felt bad for him and the kids, and, you know, I was drawn to that. Cindy got an instant family when she married Carl in August of 1993.

They bought the old family farm and house from his parents. And then Cindy got pregnant. The best news of your life. Right. That you were going to have the baby you'd always wanted. Happiest time of my life. Yeah. They named him Alex.

Alex, say hi to the camera. Whose birthday is it today? As Alex grew up, he became close with his half-siblings, Katie, Aaron, and especially Levi, with whom he had a brotherly bond. He was always there for me. We always loved to hang out together. So, I mean, we had a lot of good times hunting, fishing, and just hanging out a lot on the farm, riding horses. The family raised and sold Belgian draft horses. It's fun to ride a Belgian. They're big. Definitely really big horses. But it was fun. Colette and her family would visit from California.

She would tell the kids stories about their mom so they wouldn't forget. My niece asked me, she said one time, she said, well, Aunt Colette, I wish you were my mom. I said, oh, honey, I'm nowhere near as nice as what your mom was. I can't even come close. Do you think you've done a good job of keeping her memory alive with them? Well, I think I have. You know, the fact that I was on the phone with Levi, you know, two, three times a week driving to work.

In the afternoon, I'd be on the phone with Aaron. Katie, whenever I could get her in between her school schedules. So I've been very involved, even though I was involved from a distance. Collette noticed that life wasn't easy for the kids as they hit their teen years. What's the matter, Levi? Especially for Levi. He was struggling in school, acting out. With any kid, you know, you have your issues. But he wasn't bad. And she thought Carl was

tough on Levi. He wasn't following down Carl's path, but how many of us followed down our parents' path? Mike noticed the problems, too. Carl and Levi didn't seem to have the best relationship. No. No. I think Levi bucked the system a little bit. He was a typical teenage boy who knew all the answers. The rift widened, and when Levi was only 17, he left home. Mike watched it happen with a tinge of sadness. Dropped out of school, which didn't help things at all.

He jumped and didn't look where he was jumping to, and so he didn't have a job, and he floated from house to house to different family members. Then, in November of 2002, another disaster inflamed the family tensions. Cindy said it happened as Carl got into bed. He sat upright and kind of looked out the window and said, you know, oh my God, call 911. The barn's on fire. As soon as I left my house, I could see the glow in the sky.

Another deadly fire. Fire trucks are just pulling into the road, down the road, and we just stood there and watched it go. Nothing could be done. What had happened inside that barn? In the fall of 2002, more than 11 years after Christina died in an inferno, the Carlson family was struck again by fire. Middle of the night, and Cindy called. And just as soon as I answered the phone, she said, The barn's on fire. Took off as quick as I could, and as soon as I left the phone, she said, the barn's on fire.

Took off as quick as I could, and as soon as I left my house, I could see the glow in the sky. And as I ran around the side of the barn, a couple of my brothers were there with Carl. And fire trucks are just pulling into the road, down the road, and we just stood there and watched it go. Nothing could be done. It was fully engulfed and going down. What did Carl say to you when you arrived? He mentioned that the horses were still in there. Three Belgian draft horses were killed.

That's tough to hear. Horses dying in a fire is pretty tough to take. Oh, definitely. These were the prized family horses? Yeah. It's sad. It's traumatic knowing what, you know, all they, those horses were going through. You know, they were locked in that barn. They couldn't get out. And did Carl seem upset? Yes and no. I don't think he was overwhelmed with emotion, just, oh, I have one more problem to deal with. It seemed like within 24 hours the bulldozers were on site. Graydoll hauled the horse carcasses away and buried them

right away and the barn was leveled. Within a few days it was all cleaned up and gone. Some family members were upset about the loss of the horses in the old family barn. They couldn't ignore the fact that this was the second catastrophic fire involving Carl. Did Carl have any explanation as to how this fire could have started? He had thought that because there was a radio on, and he thought maybe a spark from the radio had ignited the hay. There was a lot of old hay in there. There was an investigation. Short, albeit. Very short, yep. And the fire chief had ruled it an accident, you know, pretty much right away.

So there wasn't really a reason for you to be suspicious, given that even the fire officials were saying this was an accident. Right. But suspicions continued to bubble around Carl and that barn fire. Some family members weren't convinced it was an accident. Right. But suspicions continued to bubble around Carl and that barn fire. Some family members weren't convinced it was an accident. Levi was one of them. And I had just gotten out of the hospital with a second back surgery. And he come home and he made a, or my wife told me that Levi was there and made a statement that he thought I burnt the barn down or something like that.

So he comes back to the house. And it got ugly. Their argument that night got so heated, father and son came to blows. Levi got in his truck to get away from Carl, and Carl chased after him. I was yelling at Carl, you know, just let him go, you know, leave him alone, let him go. And so they did. Fully on his own, Levi made a major life decision. He got married and soon had two little girls.

And for a while, things seemed to settle down. And, you know, things seemed pretty good for him. But then, you know, they were so young when they got married, and they just ended up going through hard times and decided to get divorced. But Carl says they looked out for Levi. The kid wasn't going to suffer. We had the babies almost every other weekend. So we're still in each other's lives.

He'd come out to the farm, cut firewood. And Levi started to grow up. He got his GED, got steady work, and tried hard to be a good dad. Any old resentments about the past seemed to be fading away. I think he had rounded the corner a little bit and could see some sort of a path and a direction for his life. Got him into the company, and he just flourished. I mean, you can work all the overtime he wanted. He had medical insurance. He's paying now child support. The company was just thrilled with him. Everything clicked.

But November 20, 2008, would change everything. Levi came over that day to do work on an old Chevy pickup of Carl's that he kept in the barn. Carl and Cindy headed off to a relative's funeral. When they returned home four hours later, Cindy thought it was odd that Levi's vehicle was still parked outside the barn. So right then and there, you know, I had an uneasy feeling that, you know, something wasn't right there. Carl went into the barn to check on Levi while Cindy went into the house.

When suddenly... He'd come banging on the window and the door and tell me to call 911. What's going on? The truck fell on my stepson. They were just bringing Levi out on the stretcher and putting him in the ambulance when I got there. Astounding, but true. Yet another loss for Carl and his family.

He was actually like throwing himself up against the wall and he was on the ground. Just trying to grapple with the idea of, wow, this is real. My brothers were all standing around with Carl and just that numb feeling of, now what do we do? Is he breathing? No. He is not breathing. No. He is not breathing. Okay. No.

Carl Carlson had found his son Levi pinned beneath the old pickup truck he'd been working on in the barn. His chest is crushed. His chest is crushed. His chest is crushed? No. He's probably been under here for hours. Carl's brother Mike heard the news and rushed over. They were just bringing

Levi out on the stretcher and putting him in the ambulance when I got there. Levi was taken to the hospital, but the family knew it was hopeless. 17 years after his mother's terrible death, Levi Carlson died at the age of 23. Cindy says Carl came unhinged. He was actually like throwing himself up against the wall and he was on the ground. Again there were so many questions. Mike wanted to know exactly what happened. As we went into the barn to see the truck was jacked in a very precarious dangerous scenario. No blocks under it. A flimsy little jack holding it up. Were you thinking Levi should have known better than this? Absolutely. He knows his way around cars and trucks.

Yeah. Here's a young kid, my nephew, same age as my kids, and now gone. And not knowing any details of what happened, it's just trying to grapple with the idea of, wow, this is real. My brothers were all standing around with Carl, and just that numb feeling of, now what do we do? His wife died in a house fire. His horses were killed in a barn fire. And now his son had been killed in a freak accident. So much tragedy surrounding this one man.

Carl has called himself unlucky. Did you see your husband as unlucky? I did. I did. I felt like it was, he had just one of those guys that had a lot of bad things happen to him. But true to form, Carl pulled himself together. He had read in a magazine article that somebody from New York City was looking for farmers in upstate New York to raise gourmet ducks for restaurants. And it was something that he wanted to get into. I felt like it was a good thing for him. Along the way somewhere somebody had told him that, you know, he was, he could

make a lot of money doing it. Carl got fired up by this new business and began raising thousands of ducks to sell to New York City restaurants. He and Cindy even found themselves starring in an episode of Pitchin' In, a Food Network Canada series. Carl liked being on TV. He did. He liked being in the spotlight.

He liked being recognized. He did. And in your small neck of the woods, that was a big deal. It was a big deal, yeah. I think he had these visions that he was going to be this famous person, rich and famous. Cindy watched her husband's ego swell with all the attention. At the same time, she became deeply unhappy and found herself drinking too much. So what changed? Why did you start to think things didn't necessarily make perfect sense anymore?

I'm not sure. I can't pinpoint one exact thing. I just think it was an intuition. You know, and I would have these feelings or attacks, you know, every few months. She had queasy feelings about the day Levi died and about how he died. Was Carl telling the truth about what happened in the barn? I was telling myself, it's just you, you know, you're being paranoid, you know, and so I would forget about it for a while again. It turns out Mike was uneasy about it too. The events of that terrible day kept playing over and over again in his head. What did Carl say to you after Levi's death? Not a lot. I went to the hospital.

And I was in the room with Levi. And Carl came in the room. And I don't know what I wanted him to say. But he says, how do I explain this? And that was it? Not what I was hoping to hear. Don't know really what I wanted to hear. But it... I didn't see the grieving dad that I thought I should have seen,

that maybe I wanted to see. Mike didn't share his misgivings about Carl with Cindy, but her own fears were growing worse. She even started feeling physically ill. And, you know, I went to the doctors, and, you know, we thought, you know, treated me with pain medications and everything, trying to make it better.

But nothing helped, and her smoldering awful suspicion was evolving into a terrifying conclusion oh my god i think he did it cindy shares her fears with police what were the most useful things she told you. About a $700,000 plus insurance policy. Then, a daring undercover plan. I had actually watched an episode of Dateline and I like had this revelation.

Could Cindy uncover the truth? By the fall of 2011, three years had passed since Levi's death. As Cindy grew apart from Carl, she kept looking back on the events of the day Levi died and wondered, what really happened in that barn? Again, these thoughts kept coming up, kept sinking more into a depression. Cindy confided in friends. They suggested she call a private investigator. That's how she met Steve Brown. She walked in the door, and she looked very frail, physically, emotionally, just sickly weak.

Cindy proceeded to tell me what happened that day in 2008. And she mentioned something about that day that had always nagged at her. Carl said he wanted to check on Levi before they left. Carl was alone in the barn with Levi for a few minutes. Cindy wondered if he had pushed the truck onto his own son. How could that be? How could somebody do something like that? No one wants to believe they could marry a murderer.

Right. But then Cindy told him another thing that made her wonder if Carl had reason to kill Levi. It turns out Carl got a substantial insurance payout on Levi's life. She had later found out that Carl was the beneficiary of the policy, not the girls. So that really concerned her. The policy was for a hefty $400,000. What's

more, there was an additional $300,000 payment because Levi's death occurred by accident. Brown wanted to talk to Carl without revealing that he was working for his wife. I said, well, what if I kind of go undercover and befriend Carl, if you will, as a marketer, a promoter for your duck business? Cindy thought it might work. She arranged the meeting. I came to the farm and sat down at their kitchen table,

introduced myself, and essentially I just said, you know, tell me about your duck business. And Carl started telling his vision, his dream for the duck business, if you will. And he bought it hook, line, and sinker? Yeah, he did. He did. No clue this was a private investigator? Correct, right. Steve Brown began spending time with Carl. One day, Carl showed him his new electric knife for killing ducks. He said, I like the old-fashioned way. And he came up behind me and lifted my neck up and went like this with his hand. He said, messy, very physical.

The look in his eye when he tilted my head back, you know, I kind of stepped away and looked at him and said, we're talking about ducks here and chickens, aren't we? And you just sense just coldness and emptiness. Steve went back and forth about whether he had enough to show police. But in February of 2012, the choice was taken out of his hands. One of the people Cindy had confided in called Detective John Clear of the Seneca County Sheriff's Office, and he called Cindy. How did that go?

The first thing she said was, thank God you called. What were the most useful things she told you? The most useful piece of information was about a $700,000-plus insurance policy that was paid out on Levi Carlson. Detective Clear learned that Carl actually helped Levi sign up for the policy. 17 days later, the fatal accident happens. Carl says he told Levi that if something happened,

he would hang onto the money for Levi's daughters. Detective Clear learned the girls never got a dime. After the death, Carl went on to really spend a lot of money. Oh, yes, yes. The insurance money. What were they spending the money on? There was money really spend a lot of money. Oh, yes, yes. The insurance money. What were they spending the money on? There was money spent on a lot, a whole multitude of things, home improvement, vehicles, a lot of investments were taken out.

Carl spent a lot of money on the duck business. There were some huge payouts on that. As he dug deeper, Detective Clear realized Carl Carlson had collected on a number of insurance policies over the years. In 1986, Carl's new Dodge Charger caught fire. He collected $10,000. The fire that killed the horses and took down the barn paid out nearly $115,000. A lot of insurance payouts for one man.

Yes, most people don't have that many tragedies in their life. And there was more. There was life insurance on both of Levi's daughters. If Cindy died, Carl would gain even more money because they shared assets. Cindy decided she had to get away from him. I was scared that he found out what was going on, and I just decided I couldn't do it anymore. So I ended up calling Alex.

Her son was over at a friend's house. She came and got me, and I came out to the car, and I saw that she had packed all of our suitcases, and our dogs were in the car. And she had told me that there was an investigation going on because they thought my dad had killed my brother. They started living in hotels. Cindy dodged Carl's calls, and so did Alex. She knew police were investigating, but it seemed to be taking so long. So Cindy decided to do something a little more proactive and very risky. I had actually watched an episode of Dateline where this woman was recording her mother.

And I had this revelation and I said, you know, I'm going to start recording conversations with Carl. I thought if I could just get him to confess about the barn fire, that that would show his character. It was a bold move, maybe a crazy one, but Cindy was ready to take the risk. You had undercover officers. We had four in there. This is a potentially dangerous situation you're walking into. I had to convince them that it wasn't a trap. Can Cindy wr ring a confession

out of Carl? Can the police? You don't kill your son. You don't kill anybody for money. Listen, who said anything about money? Cindy Carlson had a plan. She decided to secretly record a conversation with her estranged husband Carl,

wearing a small voice recorder tucked under her bra. She was hoping she could get him to confess to burning down the family barn and killing all their horses. And I just started telling him that I was considering getting back together with him, but that I couldn't even consider it unless he started telling me the truth of things that he did during our marriage that he lied about. And he said to me, it sounds like you want me to say that I had something to do with Levi's death. Well, at that moment, I knew that we skipped right over the barn fire. I might be able to get him to confess about Levi.

She asked him what happened inside the barn the day Levi died. You know, I just kept talking to him. And at one point, he got to where he said that the truck was jacked up. I know I had asked him, so did you push the truck or was it hard to push? And he said, no, it wasn't. Was that a confession? Cindy felt like it was. She took the recording to the police, but it was inaudible. Still, Detective Clear was intrigued and asked her to do it again. At our request, she agreed to be wired up to do a second interview under controlled circumstances.

So Cindy put on the wire and went to meet Carl. This is a potentially dangerous situation you're walking into. Are you scared? I was actually calm because I knew that Carl believed my story of wanting to get back together. Abigail's restaurant near Seneca Falls would be the meeting place. It was mid-November 2012. You had undercover officers in the restaurant? We had four in there. Were they diners? Were they waiters? Diners. The detectives needed Cindy to get Carl to repeat what she said was his confession to Levi's murder.

But when she started grilling him again, Carl became suspicious. Part of me feels like I'm walking into a booby trap. Wow. Yeah, I can imagine you would feel that way. I had to convince him that, you know, it wasn't a trap. Well, yeah, I can imagine you would feel that way. I had to convince him that, you know, it wasn't a trap. I offered for him to check my purse. It worked, and she got him back on the subject of that day in 2008. I asked you if you pushed the truck, and you said yes? No, I didn't push the truck. I said, I had nothing to do. But I said, I took advantage of the situation

once it happened. And that is exactly what I said to him. Carl, you told me that you didn't set it up that way, but when you were in there you saw the opportunity. No, after it had happened then I panicked and saw the opportunity. After it had happened, then I came and saw the opportunity.

This exchange crystallized John Clear's suspicions about Carl Carlson. I felt I understood him to a degree. This is someone who doesn't think like we do. They still had no confession, but detectives believed they had enough to bring him in for questioning. Go ahead and have a seat. It was the moment of truth. If Carl Carlson refused to speak, or if he called in a lawyer, the case could evaporate.

But Carlson wanted to talk. You know, I mean, I worked multiple jobs and stuff like that. I mean, I did. I worked my ass off. I mean, we were talking about his favorite subject, him. Police quickly steered Carl to Levi's death. He repeated what he told police in 2008. He found Levi dead after returning home from the funeral. But then Carl let something slip, a possible motive. That, you know, then we went to the hospital. What do you mean you found him? I found him dead. Okay. The truck was on him.

But then Carl let something slip, a possible motive. You don't kill your son. You don't kill anybody for money. Listen, who said anything about money? What are you talking about? The detectives knew they were on the right track. There's not a conscience to play to. There's not empathy to play to.

What do we play to? What does he have? Well, he has an ego, and it's a big one. So that's the strategy that we shifted to, which is I gave him a lot of sympathy and a lot of attention. We knew that you were in the Air Force. Yeah. What does that have to do with it? Because I respect you for that. Are you proud of the time you spent in the Air Force?

Oh, I am. I loved it. You should be proud of that. And I know that when you were in there, you spent in the military? Oh, I am. I would... You should be. You should be proud of that. And I know that when you were in there, like anybody that does military training, you probably were trained to make life and death decisions. Right. I think you just made one when it came to Levi. I think there was a problem, and you did what you were trained, what you were programmed to do. No, I don't... I wasn't... I don't agree with that. I don't. As the conversation

wore on, New York State Police Investigator Jeff Arnold took a different approach and turned up the heat, taking Carl back to that moment in the barn. Exactly. You don't give him help. You let him be crushed under there. And you get in that car and you drive. And you know, you're unemotional. Driving along four and a half hours and you come back and you say again it's showtime for carl to put on my show my miraculously i'm a liar show and you will run right home oh my god sydney hurry call nine one carl denied it all pushing his buttons wasn't working so clear dialed it back again. He listened as Carl talked about injuries he had suffered, botched surgeries, the pain meds he needed. As the hours ticked by, Clear coaxed and prodded, and Carl Carlson's story began to change.

Version 2 came out where he admitted that Levi was already dead before they left to go to the funeral. I made a decision to walk out on my son and not get him out from underneath the truck. Why? I did it. Now at that point, there's no doubt in my mind what happened here. Then Carlson finally broke. He admitted he didn't just find Levi under the truck. He saw the truck fall.

And he may have even caused it to fall. I opened the truck door because I had to get inside to move the linkage for the truck fall and he may have caused the truck to fall on him. And the inaction of leaving them there. Right. Contributed or whatever. Yeah. Well, come with me. You're under arrest.

I think you knew that was coming. Police charged Carl Carlson with second-degree murder. Mike Carlson certainly had his suspicions, but he was heartsick when he actually got the news. I would never think anybody could do that to a son. I mean, I couldn't see how anybody could do it to a perfect stranger or a wild animal. And in fact, Carl had second thoughts about that confession.

Months later at his arraignment, he pleaded not guilty. The state would have to prove their case against him in court. Nobody should have to go through what our family has gone through, not once, but twice. Soon, there'd be more than just one case against Carl Carlson. We've been waiting just about 24 years now for some closure. A year passed in Seneca County, New York. Carl Carlson, still in pain, he said, hobbled into hearings as his attorney filed motions to suppress evidence, testimony, and that police interview. Most of them failed. And then, on November 6, 2013, one day before his trial was set to begin, a surprise that no one saw coming. Carl Carlson pled guilty to murder in second degree in Seneca County Court,

taking responsibility for the death of his son, Levi. It's called depraved indifference murder. In exchange for that plea, Seneca County D.A., Barry Porsche, said Carlson would be given the minimum sentence, 15 years to life. The plea was a relief for Mike Carlson, who attended every hearing that year and came away convinced his brother was guilty. The acts of betrayal on multiple levels, betraying your family, your son, your community. It was all about Carl, a sociopath that needed to be the center of attention.

Even as the family mourned Levi's death, they saw Carl's conviction as an opportunity to reopen the investigation into the awful tragedy from decades earlier, the death of Christina Carlson. Daughter Erin spoke for the family. We've been waiting just about 24 years now for some closure for things that transpired in California. You know, things that I will never be able to forget, things that my family will never be able to overcome. The Seneca County Sheriff echoed Aaron's words. I want to throw a challenge out to California. You've been sitting back waiting to see what's happened here. Well, now it's happened. Now it's your turn.

Collette had no doubt that a serious investigation into her sister's death was long overdue. I am glad that he pled guilty, but I am not settled at all with where I am. Him pleading guilty only solidifies my beliefs that he killed my sister. How would you sum up your life since 1991 and the roller coaster you've been on? I would say that I feel like I have been living what most people watch on TV. Nobody should have to go through what our family has gone through, not once, but twice. Just imagine what Christina went through in those final moments of her life, screaming for help.

It turns out that while he was working on Levi's case, investigator Jeff Arnold also focused on Christina's. Why did you take such an interest in Christina's death when you're here in New York State? It became personal to me because she's just a great human being who had everything to look for in life. Arnold reached out to investigators in California. Once they heard what he had to say about Levi, they decided to reopen the case into his mother's death. Arnold stayed on the case, too. I don't think any of us as this team of investigators out here in New York have ever seen a case like this before. I know personally I have not.

Arnold spoke to Carl Kent, one of the original California investigators who had retired by this time. I knew it was coming someday. You know, I didn't know when. Remember, back in 1991, Kent's bosses told him not to pursue the case. To the new investigators, he looked like a good source.

So they contacted me to see if I had any recollection of the fire, and I told them, yes, I did. It was a fire that I felt was very suspicious. So suspicious that when he left the California Department of Forestry for the last time, he did something unusual. I had taken two boxes of transcriptions and tapes and put them in my basement in my house for the mere fact that I thought someday somebody, whether it's the kids or somebody else, will come forward with some information, and it might be able to open the case again. Good thing, too, because all the other evidence had been tossed. Yeah, anything that was left in the evidence room was purged, gone.

It wasn't there anymore. So California investigators examined the evidence in Kent's boxes. They talked to surviving witnesses and family members who had doubts about Carl's story, and they reviewed Levi's case. In light of all that, the Calaveras County DA charged Carl Carlson with first-degree murder in August 2014. But Collette knew there was still a long way to go. We need closure. We need to know that this man will be put away for the rest of his life. Collette made sure prosecutors kept their foot on the gas.

When Carlson's extradition from New York seemed to stall, she made phone calls, wrote letters, and used her Facebook page. The process was horrible. You know, we were set back time and time and time again, and it just seemed like every obstacle that could possibly get in front of us was placed in front of us. In 2016, Carl Carlson was finally extradited to Calaveras County, California. He sat there for four more years until his trial began in January of 2020. Jeff Arnold had pushed hard on this case. So when the trial got underway, he headed for California. Carl Carlson should have been held accountable in 1991, and Levi would still be alive.

But he wasn't held accountable then. Let's make sure he's held accountable now. Three decades after his wife Christina died barricaded in a bathroom, Carl would face a jury of his peers. But was it too late? Christina took her last breath trapped in this coffin. Carl Carlson on trial. Prosecutors come on strong. Their main strategy is to just paint this picture of Carl Carlson because in a way he's the only physical evidence that's even left of this fire. It was the strangest of family reunions.

29 years after Christina Carlson's death, her family, including her mother Arlene, gathered in Northern California for the trial of Carl Carlson. For Sister Colette, this was a long time coming. You know, the day that the jury selection actually began was the day we finally believed that this trial was going to happen. The jury saw the video shot by Christina's cousins, and District Attorney Barbara Yook painted a harrowing picture of Christina's last moments in that bathroom,

with fire raging outside the door and the only window boarded up. I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen, that the defendant built Christina a coffin and trapped her in there. She was trapped alone, naked, holding a wash rag, clutching a wash rag to her face. Trapped with only the panic and sheer terror of a mother who cannot reach her children. According to the prosecution, Carl Carlson set the fire to kill his wife and then walked away with hardly a tear. And 17 years later, he killed again.

The prosecution has leaned really heavily into Carlson's prior conviction and Levi's death. Dakota Moreland covered the Carlson case as a reporter for the Calaveras Enterprise. We spoke to her mid-trial. I'm not sure if they could convict him as easily without that, or at all. That's why the prosecution flew New York detective John Clear out to California to make the case that Carl killed Christina for the same reason he killed Levi. It's not unusual when you're building what we call a pattern case to use subsequent acts and prior acts. But if you can show a clear pattern that is way well beyond the boundaries

of chance or pure circumstance, it can help build a case. Clear testified about Carl's confession, and he added an additional detail. During his allocution in court, he actually admits that his son was still alive when he left to go to this funeral, and that he knew that by leaving him there, it would result in his death. The message was clear. Carlson was capable of anything. Following repeated objections from the defense,

the prosecution played most of the New York interrogation, and it turned out that much of it was about the California case. Tom was telling me about a fire with your first wife that concerned him. The jury watched as Jeff Arnold asked Carlson about the boarded-up bathroom window. So when did you boarded that up?

A day before the fire? No, months before. Months before? Months before. But Collette, who saw Christina just before Christmas, testified that Carl must have nailed that board up only days before the fire. It was not boarded only days before the fire.

It was not boarded up when I was there. Carlson also told Arnold he suffered awful injuries as he broke windows to rescue his children, and that the fire was so intense he couldn't save Christina. What happened is when I broke the window, I got hit with a fireball. It took me right in the face. Blew me off the front porch. Burned my eyelids together. Burned the skin off my face.

Burned my mustache. Jurors watched as Arnold finally unloaded. Your wife's in a boarded up little room, and you hear her calling your name from 600 feet away. No, it wasn't calling. It was screaming. Screaming your name. And yet, you're able to get blown off the porch, open your eyes, your son's uninjured, you're able to grab your uninjured son out with this explosion just took place. Without a mark on him, take him out of the house, run around, miraculously save your two daughters, and let your wife perish in this fire. I didn't let her. With no attempt to rip that board off, that plywood board off that house, and get into that bathroom and help her.

I went around. By that time, the fire was all the way around. What am I going to do? I don't recall any treatable injuries. Pam Geet, the paramedic, told the jury Carlson didn't look like someone who had been hit with a fireball. He may have had some small abrasions and very minor burns, but nothing that required any immediate treatment.

He seemed incredibly calm, given the circumstances, but I thought that it was a little odd. A number of witnesses testified to the same thing, that Carl seemed oddly uninjured and unconcerned. There were even gasps in the courtroom when Collette told the jury a story from that terrible day. It was something she told us a few years ago. I was standing in the back hall with Carl, and I said, I want to see my sister. And he goes, you can't. And I said, well, why not? And he looked me square in the eye, and he said, your sister's a crispy critter, which was shocking to me, to say the least. Just with a straight face?

Mm-hmm. The prosecution talked a lot about Carl's alleged callousness. His family members testified they were troubled that he was up for a sightseeing trip right after his wife was killed. They went up to what sounds like Big Trees Park. Do you remember? They talked about the big trees and the stump. And after sightseeing, the defendant said he wanted to go home. He wanted to go to New York. I think that their main strategy is to just paint this picture of Carl Carlson because in a way he's the only physical evidence that's even left of this fire.

This is very much a trial of personality in a lot of ways. The prosecution also put some of the original investigators on the stand, including Ken Buskey, a forensic electrical engineer who specializes in fire causes and origin. I was called by a representative of the insurance company, and they wanted me to look at a trouble light, which was what they thought was a key piece of evidence from the case. Buskey says he went to the scene five weeks after the fire

and says he couldn't find a likely ignition source. The house wiring didn't start it. The washer didn't start it. The dryer didn't start it. The water heater didn't start it. The kerosene heater didn't start it. And the trouble light didn't start it, the water heater didn't start it, the kerosene heater didn't start it, and the trouble light didn't start it because it wasn't on. So Buskey took a look at the kerosene stain. Petz may have knocked over a container of kerosene the day before the fire, but he saw

evidence of a second spill that looked deliberate. There was a very distinct pour of what also appeared to be kerosene in kind of a U-shape going across the bathroom door and then around to the other side toward the laundry room. He testified that it looked like someone had poured that kerosene and then lit it. The edges were very distinct. He told the insurance company about his findings and agents looked into it. But the company ultimately decided to pay the life insurance claim. $200,000. And that's where the alleged motive came in, as District Attorney Barbara Yook reminded the jury.

On December 12th, you got the life insurance. Life insurance on his wife for $200,000. Just three weeks after Carl took out that policy, Christina was dead. This was his plan, the DA said. This was Carlson's deadly M.O. It is time to tell the defendant that life is more important than money.

It is time to tell him that his family members are not a means to an end. I ask that you find the defendant guilty as charged. But Carl Carlson's defense was ready to punch back, and they would have a theme. Where's the evidence? What's a grieving husband supposed to do? Upset, crying. I did, and it's all on record.

The fight is on. They had 28 years to put a case together, and this is what they've come up with. For more than a week, prosecutors had painted Carl Carlson as a cunning killer who deliberately started the fire that killed his wife. But now it was the defense's turn to fight back. Carl's attorneys, Lee Fleming and Richard Esquivel, argued the prosecution's whole case was old. They had 28 years to put a case together, and this is what they've come up with. If anything, they said, the case had eroded over time as evidence was thrown out and witnesses struggled with fading

memories. The same evidence that they rejected in 1991 is what they presented you with today. And it wasn't good enough then. It's not nearly good enough now. Then they attacked Ken Buskey, reminding jurors that he didn't work for any law enforcement agency, but for an insurance company. And they said he didn't even begin investigating until the evidence had literally grown cold. He didn't go to the scene until five weeks later, after the whole house was overhauled, things were taken out. It was an unsecured area. When he got there, it was largely cleaned out. Remember that video Christina's cousins took of the burned-down home?

Well, they took a second one later on. Here's what the house looked like on their original video, and here's how it appeared later after being cleared out. The timeline is murky, but the defense claims Buskey got there after the site was overhauled. This is the bathroom where Christina died. Here it is just after the fire, and here again later on. The bathtub that she was found in has been cleaned out of debris. There are items left there like gloves and things that weren't there before.

You know, when the defense argues that it's a contaminated crime scene, I think that's a pretty good argument, to be honest. Not only that, but since most of the evidence Buskey used in his investigation had been thrown out, they had no way of double-checking his work. The items that he tested, along with all the photographs that he took, were given back to his employer, and they were destroyed, is what I understand.

So there was a lot of what you didn't have in this case that could help you. Yeah, we didn't have any of the evidence that Mr. Buskey had to render his opinion. They reminded jurors that despite Buskey's findings, the insurance company paid Carl. This pristine report that he prepared, it told them everything they needed to know and why Mr. Carlson started that fire. And they said, no, we reject your report and we're paying the claim. With no hard evidence connecting Carl to the fire,

the defense argued the case was completely circumstantial. Like the life insurance policy Carl took out on Christina, Carl told me the same thing his attorney said in court, that accidents do happen, even when insurance is involved. Do you think the timing looks suspicious that you got this insurance policy just a few weeks before she died? We can say it looks suspicious, but it was stated in court that this isn't an uncommon thing to happen. What's not uncommon? To get an insurance policy and then someone dies a few weeks later?

Or a car accident, yes. Carl says he did try to rescue Christina after he got the kids out. I tried saving her by getting the board off the window. Maybe she could get to the window and jump out, which it's only seven feet or whatever to hit the ground. The fire and the smoke pushed me back because I don't have equipment to fight that. As for the allegations that Carl seemed cold and unemotional after Christina died, he says he was upset and showed it.

What's a grieving husband supposed to do? Upset, crying. I did, and it's all on record. It's stated in there. Carl was covered in smoke, Carl was crying, and all that. Carl said the people who saw him crying have since died, so jurors never heard their testimony. Carl didn't testify either.

So jurors heard from him by watching nearly nine hours of that police interrogation where Carl talked about his son Levi's death. I just knew that in my head that all I could do was run. How do you think that damaged your defense specifically by being allowed to see this extra stuff? I think it was highly prejudicial. I think the issue was that you heard Carl, who is a talker, who does like to talk, but you heard him talking about so many different things that were not relevant to this case,

and yet, depending on how you took what he was saying, they could hold it against him. I opened the truck door. Okay. When they did it. Was your biggest concern that the jury will see what he was accused of doing back in New York? And so, hey, why wouldn't he do this too? Absolutely. That was the DA's plan the entire time. That was their, the route they took was to try and show that because this occurred in New York, it means that he did what they accused him of doing back in 1991. The defense told jurors they couldn't draw any conclusions based on Carl's guilty plea and Levi's death. Does Carl Carlson deserve a fair trial? Now, some people would say, well, he admitted to killing his son in New York. He doesn't deserve a fair trial.

And to that, I'd say, if you believe that today, based just on that fact, you have an obligation to let the court know that you can't be fair. Now it was up to the jurors. A verdict from the jury and tough questions for Carl Carlson. You've had two deaths with two life insurance payouts. Bad luck that they died? What would you call it? Coincidence that you... What would you call it?

I want to hear what you have to call it. My interview with Carl Carlson took place near the end of his trial at the Calaveras County Jail, where he'd been held for almost four years. He had declined to take the stand. But it turned out he wanted to talk to us about everything, including the death of his son Levi. Hey. And what he said surprised us, that the whole tearful confession about leaving his son to die underneath a truck was a lie. I let him down. I walked away.

And I lived with that for four years. In a complete turnaround, Carl now says he didn't kill Levi after all, despite his confession to investigators and his guilty plea in court. I know I didn't do it and I can prove it. Did you walk away from your son getting crushed by the truck? No. Levi was alive when I left. So you're saying that you are completely 100% innocent? Yes.

Carl says when he left the farm that day, Levi was fine, busy working on the truck in the barn. But when he returned... So you walk into the barn, you're saying, and you realize that your son... He's crushed underneath the truck. And I reached down and grabbed him by the ankle because I could, you know, to touch his actual skin. And I knew he was dead. The reason he told police he did it, he says, was because he was exhausted and in desperate need of pain medication he was using after surgery. During the nine and a half hour interrogation, I asked 35 times,

please let me have my medicine. I gotta get my medicine. I haven't had my medicine other than early this morning. Can we really get my medicine, please? And they said, oh, you don't need them because they'll make you dizzy and fuzzy. They're the trained experts. So you're saying you admitted to leaving your son to die because you were off your medication? Yes. And because you're getting pulverized for nine and a half hours. Until you're in those shoes, lady, you have no idea. But during the interrogation, detectives repeatedly offered to get Carl a lawyer or let him leave altogether. You do know you're free. I don't want you to make—

No, I'm not going to sit here. They told me, you know, over the right of rights, they've said, look, if you want a lawyer, we can stop. So you know that if you want a lawyer, you can be a lawyer. Instead, he stayed and kept talking. I think any dad who's watching will say, no way am I admitting to that when it involves my own son. Okay, here's a catch. Until you're on that hot seat, that you're looking at life in prison, how many cases have you done where pleas have been found to be untrue? A lot. A lot. Because they put you in a position where if you don't take it, you're going away forever.

What do you say to anyone who's watching this who thinks this is just a bunch of gobbledygook that you're spewing out? Don't believe what comes out of my mouth. Believe what I can prove you on government documents. This is the document he's talking about, the death certificate. It says Levi died at approximately 3 p.m., about three hours after Carl left the house. Carl says it's proof he's innocent. Detective John Clear has his own take on it. The bottom line is those time of deaths are an educated guess at best. There was no autopsy. There was no scientific testing done to determine an actual time of death. He says it's just another ploy Carl's using to make himself

seem like the innocent victim in a string of tragedies. Okay, your wife gets a life insurance policy. You're the beneficiary. She dies in a fire. Your son gets a life insurance policy. You're named the beneficiary. He dies by getting crushed by a truck. Correct. So now you've had two deaths with two life insurance payouts. Bad luck that they died. What would you call it? What would you call it? I want to hear what you have to call it. Well, I think it's, I've had many other things in my life that have, I've had horses die. I've had a barn fire. I mean, I was going to bring that up too. You've had barn fires, horses. I mean, bad luck seems to follow you around. Would you say that you're a victim of bad luck? If I told you everything, you wouldn't believe what's happened

to me. Like the fire that killed Christina, Carl claims he has no idea how it started. Did you pour that kerosene and light it? No. Why would you do that and leave a woman two access points to get out when it could easily pull off the board in the bathroom? She didn't have, obviously, access to get out. She's in the tub. She's got a door, and she has a board on the window. But in fact, she was trapped. According to John Clear, that was Carl's M.O.

You talk about Carl almost that he has a signature of sorts. What do you mean by that? His pattern is to create a hazardous situation, almost like a trap, and then step away and let the trap do its business. Carl does acknowledge that some things in this case just look bad for him, like the way people said he behaved after the fire. Colette claims that you called Christina a crispy critter after that fire. When I got out of the hospital...

Pretty horrible, if it's true. Well, if I did say that, which I don't remember if I did, and I can't believe I would, because that would be the most... That would be just horrifically insensitive. But you think you might have, or you could have? No, I don't know. I don't believe I did. I would just hope that somebody would say, I never said that. You sort of sound like you're not sure. I've said that to other people, but I'm loaded up with volume. Okay. So did I say that a hundred percent? Did I not not say that 100 percent? I can't say that.

Carl's family hasn't stood by him, but there's something he wants them to know. What would you say to your surviving children, Aaron, Katie and Alex? I'm sorry for this, for dragging our lives in this, and that I did not kill your brother. I did not kill Katie and Aaron's mother. And I didn't. But jurors would have the last say about how Christina died. Deliberations lasted two days. And then the verdict came in. We, the jury, find the defendant, Carl Holger Carlson, guilty of murder in the first degree.

Inside the courtroom, Christina's family clung to each other in relief. Her sister Colette was there too. When they read it, it was a good moment. It was a good moment to... It's been a long time waiting for this verdict to come through. Carl Carlson was convicted, ironically, on February 3rd, Levi's birthday. He got a life sentence for Christina's murder. But today, he's back in New York State, serving 15 to life for killing Levi. Today, this is all that's left of the little house on the hill. The remains have settled into this crater.

How does it feel to be back here after all those years? It's very emotional. For firefighter Rich Wynn, the guilty verdict offers some measure of comfort. You know, I feel such sadness and such joy too because finally justice was served. He didn't get away with it. More than three decades after a fire took Christina Carlson's life, her family finally has answers. But even time doesn't heal all wounds. I don't think you can put a time when you would miss someone the most. You can be doing something around the home,

and all of a sudden you have a memory of something that the two of you used to do together. The memories are good. I still have her pictures up around my home, and I'm not going to take those down. And so she's right there in my bedroom with me at all times.