Dateline NBC - The Note

Episode Date: November 28, 2023

When an Illinois high schooler vanishes, her mother finds a note saying she ran away. But a grisly discovery made years later changes the course of the investigation. Andrea Canning reports.

Tonight on Dateline Thursday. What's that like as a mom not knowing where your daughter is? It's hell. You don't see the nightmares I see every night. Where do I go from here? How do I exist in a world without my daughter? A note was found that she was leaving. Are you thinking that Megan ran away?

Yes, that was the number one option. It wasn't like Megan to just up and disappear. She was hiding things. She was more secretive. This love triangle, this is where things kind of blow up. Yeah. Very intense high school drama. The text messages that I read, it really

was some sort of control game. It certainly seemed something horrible had happened. We just need someone to tell us the truth. The FBI approached me, and they asked me if I would be comfortable wearing a wire. Like, what happened that night? Why is there blood in your car? The color just drained out of my face. This is scary. Very scary. It's like looking in the eyes of evil.

A phone in the bedroom. A note left behind. Can a mother's intuition help solve this mystery? I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Andrea Canning with The Note. I was a young mom. And I was 19 when she was born. And while I wouldn't recommend that for everybody, I did enjoy the fact that we had a closeness,

and I think part of it was because of that. There's nothing quite like the relationship between mother and daughter. Beautiful, but also complicated. I'm a firm believer you should be a parent, not your child's friend, but just having that closeness was very important. A closeness that would be threatened by secrets and by a teenage love bordering on obsession. As they say, love is blind. It's hard to make someone see something else

when they're really into somebody. Exactly. The tiny city of Fairfield, Illinois, is where single mother Kathy Jo Hutchcraft chose to raise her daughter Megan. It was just amazing that we got along. She liked the things I liked. I liked the things she liked. Megan was tight with her mom, and she also had lots of close friends. Holden August was one of them. She was bubbly and warm.

I mean, very energetic. She had a lot of energy. Anytime you were with Megan, it was constant laughter. Like, she was just always cracking jokes. Joking, or singing, says girlfriend Gemma Loss. She loved to sing and play her ukulele. She was amazing, and she had a musical talent that she did not get from her mother. Megan's love of music led her to high school glee club, and that led her to another love, a love that had a name, Brody Merbarger. He was hot. Like, he was an attractive guy. He was funny. He was smarter than a majority of the

people in the room at all times. And he had, like, cut blonde hair. It was one of those things, you could understand why someone would fall for Brody. At 17 years old, Brody was two years older than Megan. Kyle Ellis was his best friend. He was extremely musically talented. He did math team. He sounds like an all-American kid. Yeah, yeah, he kind of was. Just one problem.

Megan's mom thought that her 15-year-old daughter was too young to date. And I had this rule, like, we're not going to have a boyfriend. You can be friends. We're not going to have this boyfriend thing going on until you're 16. That was my preference. You don't need a boyfriend. We don't need to put a label on it. We all know I have teenage daughters. It's not easy telling teenage daughters what to do or what not to do. Exactly. And then it was July 3rd, 2014, a Friday night. Kathy Jo was helping a friend settle into a new place. Megan came along to help.

She was acting silly. She was stood on her hands, put her legs up on the wall and was twerking against the wall, whatever you want to call that. Just, I mean, goofy Megan stuff. Around nine, Megan said she had a stomach ache, so Kathy Jo took her home to rest and went back to the friend's house. She returned home a couple of hours later.

As soon as I walked in the door, the first thing I did was turn on my computer at the time because I was playing Candy Crush. Decided I was hungry, so I came into the kitchen, and I was just going to heat up some ramen noodles. And this is about what time? This would have been probably about 11.35. So it's getting late. Yeah, definitely.

And I was just standing at the stove and watching the pot, waiting for it to boil, and I just got this heavy feeling of fear all of a sudden. So I went up to check on Megan. I looked in her room and I couldn't see her. So immediately I turned the light on. She was supposed to be asleep. That was what she told me. She was going to bed. And she wasn't in her bed. And I looked all over the upstairs and I immediately started to come down the stairs to check the rest of the house. Megan didn't answer her phone or texts. Kathy Jo called her mother in a panic, and they decided to report Megan missing right away.

I arrived at the sheriff's department, and I just said I needed to talk to an officer. My daughter was missing, and I was in tears, upset. I explained to him, you know, my daughter is missing, and I need to find my daughter. The officer told her not to worry. Teenagers often disappear and then turn up. Kathy Jo and her mother headed home and started making calls. Her mom had called me, I think it was like 1 o'clock in the morning, and she told me that Megan was missing and wanted to know if she was with me and she wasn't. Kathy Jo decided to search her daughter's room looking for clues, anything.

When I pulled back her blankets, I saw this the cell phone. Her phone? Her phone. This phone had no phone case. It was just upside down and it looked different because I'm used to seeing, I'm used to seeing purple or pink or something flashy, and I picked it up, pushed the button, and it said, Hola, hello, as if it was a brand new phone. Yeah, that's like factory settings. Megan's iPhone had been wiped clean. Your heart must have just sank in that moment. Yeah, I told my mom I don't know what to do,

and she said, well, I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going to go pray. They went into the TV room down the hall, got on their knees. Then it was Kathy Jo's mother who saw it first. And my mom knelt down on the seat and she handed me an envelope that said, Mom.

And when I opened up the envelope, there was a note. A mysterious note and a dramatic story that would come to define the search for missing Megan. It's very intense high school drama. This is a high school love triangle. In the early morning hours of July 4th, Kathy Jo was beyond worried looking for her daughter Megan Nichols. Then, there it was.

The note. What did the note say? It said, Mom, I love you, but I'm never going to be happy here. Oh my gosh. Don't come looking for me, because why spend a lifetime looking for someone who doesn't want to be found? That's like a, just such a punch in the stomach, a blow. This is scary. Very scary.

Kathy Jo rushed back to talk to the police. Keith Colclasure was the chief of the small department back in 2014, and still is today. What is protocol when you're dealing with a teenager and there's a note in a room saying she's left? We still enter her as missing in the state database in case any other officer runs across her. And we begin our search. Police began talking to Megan's friends and family. I can't do something stupid on the spot.

They heard about her bubbly personality, her love of music, church, and of course, the big thing in her young life, Brody Merbarger. Did she talk to you about it? Yes. What kinds of things would she tell you? Oh, anything.

I mean, it was Brody 24-7. Anything that he had done or said, it was pretty much reported to me. Mom's rule about no boyfriends until 16 was testing the close mother-daughter relationship. Holden remembers the night when Brody turned from a friend to Megan's boyfriend. It was at the school's homecoming dance, and Brody was there with his girlfriend at the time, Kendra. Megan's date was a boy from church camp. The teenage drama was in overdrive. The FCHS homecoming dance is notorious for being incredibly raunchy.

Like dirty dancing. Yeah, exactly. So it wasn't just like, oh, Brody and Megan are dancing together, you know, and Kendra's here. It is that Brody and Megan are dancing, like, you know, grinding on one another on the dance floor kind of thing. Wow. You know, and that's one of those things you're like, oh, this isn't good. Megan and Brody ditched their dates and stayed on the dance floor together.

Brody's girlfriend, Kendra, was crying in the bleachers, and Megan's friend from church just left alone. It's very intense high school drama. This is a high school love triangle. Yeah, exactly. It was a high school love triangle. And someone's gonna get hurt. Exactly. That someone seemed to be Kendra. In the days after the dance, Megan and Brody were inseparable. It seemed to go from zero to a hundred very quickly. Then, just a few months later, Brody was back with Kendra. But he kept Megan in the picture, too. And what the whole school could see, Megan apparently couldn't.

Did Brody kind of want his cake and eat it, too? Yeah, I would say even beyond that is he thought he could. He had convinced two girls in such a small classroom that both of them were his girlfriend and his favorite, and they never once thought to fact check with the other one or, you know, even talk. I do remember telling her, you know, I don't approve. How did she respond? She obviously listened to what I had to say, but it wasn't going to stop her from doing what she wanted to do. Not even close. Even though Megan thought they were still a couple, that spring Brody took Kendra to prom. Kathy Jo, who by now was aware that Megan and Brody had been more than friends, could see how confused

and heartbroken her daughter was. Brody's mom had recently passed away, and Kathy Jo thought he was using that to justify jumping back and forth between the two girls. And she's like, I didn't want to tell you this because I know you'll be mad, but he's taking Kendra to prom because that's what his mom would have wanted him to do. And that's when I said, are you freaking kidding me? He's still telling you these lies, and you're believing them. And that is when I said, okay, put my foot down. We are done with Brody.

Kathy Jo told Megan to stop any contact with Brody. No texting, no hanging out, nothing. A short time after she laid down the law, there was a knock at the door. It was Brody. He said, look, you are way too controlling. You're concerning me, and I think you need to be on medication. That's what Brody was telling me. That's overstepping for a teenager. I said, excuse me. He goes, yeah, you can't be controlling her decisions. I said, she's 15 years old. As her mother, I can tell her that she can't date you. That's my right and my responsibility as her mother.

And he said, do you know that she tells me every fight you ever have? And I said, well, it was really none of your business and you need to leave my house. And he goes, I'm not going anywhere because I don't want you tearing into her and I said you need to get out of my house right now and he finally did but he did it very slowly like he wanted to make sure that I knew that he was in control once Kathy Jo put her foot down about Brody friends saw a change in Megan you just knew she was not herself when you have this bubbly, outgoing girl become, you know, a shell of herself. She was hiding things more. She was more secretive, I guess. She was angry, too, I would say.

Kathy Jo saw it, too. Megan dropped out of Glee Club and banned. I just cried because it's like, she's not my child anymore. She would tell me anything. I trusted her with everything. She trusted me. We had an amazing connection. All that drama had happened as school was ending for the summer. Now it was July 4th weekend and Megan was missing, considered a runaway. What's that like as a mom not knowing where your daughter is?

It's hell. I can't describe it as daughter is? It's hell. I can't describe it as anything else. It's hell. That night, the police couldn't get a hold of Brody, so they reached out to his father, who was an Illinois State Police trooper and had once been partners with Chief Colclasure. We left a message with the father to have him call us when he saw Brody and said he would. And we were waiting on that phone call.

But Kathy Jo wasn't about to sit around waiting. She would go looking for answers herself. And pretty soon, there was a new clue. What did this image of Megan mean? When 15-year-old Megan Nichols disappeared overnight, her mother wanted to talk to her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Brody Merbarger. After a sleepless night, she and Megan's grandmother drove over to his house, and there he was, right outside. We pulled into his driveway, and he was washing his car.

It was like 7.30 in the morning. And when he looked over and realized who we were, he rolled his eyes at us, walked over, and shut the water off, and then he walked up to the driver's side where my mom was. What did he say? My mom said, where's my granddaughter? He goes, I don't know. And she goes, well, I think you do. And he said, all I know is she didn't want to live with Kathy anymore. She went to go live with her dad.

Her dad? He hadn't been in Megan's life or her mom's since Megan was a baby. He lived hundreds of miles away in Oklahoma. But about a year earlier, when Megan was 13, they had reconnected. She told me later he had kind of apologized for not being there in her life. And she said, listen, I'm doing fine. You know, I'm a Christian. I've been saved. I'm going to forgive you. So was it possible that the teenager, so angry at her mother over Brody,

had decided living with her dad was a better option? Did you buy that? Did you think maybe? She'd only just met him. Yeah. It was a lead the police needed to check out. Officer spoke with him on the phone. And had he seen her? No.

Did he know anything? Had he heard from her? No. A dead end. But police quickly had a new lead. Kathy Jo reported that $200 was missing from the family's two bank accounts. Police pulled the video from the bank's cameras. We see her enter the bank and talk to a teller. Then we see her go to the drive-up ATM and withdraw money.

And then we checked a second bank, which is a couple blocks from the first one, and we see her ride her bicycle alone to and from that bank. You have a note saying she's leaving. You have her phone is left behind and wiped clean, and you have her visiting two different banks. Are you thinking that Megan ran away? Yes, that was the number one option. Police believe they were looking for a girl who did not want to be found.

And like Megan's mom, they had a hunch that her teenage crush, Brody, may know something that could help. Brody was an academically and musically gifted teen. He'd never been in trouble with the law. He just graduated from high school and was getting ready to start college in the fall. Once his dad, the state trooper, told him police wanted to talk, Brody went down to the station. What did Brody say his relationship was with Megan?

Just friends. Not sexual, not anything like that, just... Just a friendship level. Brody said he wasn't surprised that Megan was gone. He admitted that he knew that Megan had... That she wanted to run away. That she wanted to run away. He just said that she had been talking about it.

Brody told police that the night Megan went missing, he was at his girlfriend Kendra's house. He said that her mom was blowing up his phone. By calling his phone, he decided to look for Megan. Correct. He said he drove around for hours looking, then stopped back at Kendra's house before going home at around 5 in the morning. Is he cooperative? Mm-hmm. And what does he say to the officer?

I just basically didn't know where she was. Brody left, but investigators continued digging. Since Megan's phone was wiped clean, they searched her computer and found text messages from her last iPhone backup. Turned out, Megan and Brody texted a lot, something like 150 times a day. When they pored over their 7,000 messages, it was clear Brody had not been totally honest with police about their relationship.

Text messages revealed something different where they had been active sexually. The texts also showed that not only did Brody know about Megan's plan to run away, he had also talked about going with her. Possibility of them running away together, like they were making a plan. Police asked Brody to come back for another chat. How do you handle Brody now and the situation now that you realize that he wasn't being totally up front with you? I just keep calling him out on inconsistencies, try and get more information. And then he provides a little more, a little more,

a little more. Brody now admitted to the chief that yes, he had talked to Megan about running away together, but he had no intention of going through with it. In fact, just the opposite. Instead of running away, he said he'd always come up with an excuse, not to, you know, I can't do it yet. I don't have my credit card yet. He would try to prolong her staying here. He was trying to get her to stay in Fairfield. Yeah. Brody's story seemed to confirm that Megan was in fact a runaway, out there somewhere, trying not to be found. At this time, I was treating him as a witness.

Megan didn't turn up the next day or the next. What's Brody saying now about Megan's disappearance? Does he talk about it? Is he concerned? When he talks about it, it's mostly in the context of how he's being treated in Fairfield. Megan's friends weren't shy about the fact that they thought Brody knew more than he was saying. He felt like he was being harassed, or at least that's what he told me.

Authorities have labeled her a runaway. Kathy Jo talked to reporters. Megan's case was featured in Dateline's online series, Missing in America. And she tried to reach Megan directly on social media. Megan, this video has been put together to let you know that it's okay to come home. As time wore on, Kathy Jo tried to stay hopeful, but it wasn't easy. She thought about how upset Megan had been in the weeks before she disappeared, and her mind went to a dark place. She was very depressed that she didn't have Brody in her life.

So it crossed your mind that... It did cross my mind. Maybe she took her own life. It did cross my mind. Where was Megan? A discovery close to home was about to answer that question. What exactly did you see? Weeks turned to months and Kathy Jo still had no news about her daughter.

She sought solace in her faith. We had prayer circles in my house every night for a very long time. People in Fairfield tried to help however they could. We had tremendous community support. You saw Megan's face everywhere. The town came together, this outflowing of support to try to get Megan home. But Megan was still missing after a year. Then another. Her friends got ready to graduate from high school, still with no answers.

You knew Megan better than almost anyone. Was she bold enough to just disappear like that with very little money, no phone? For her to have left without anyone was the most worrying part. I think she was bold enough. Did you think that something bad had happened to her? Not at first, but eventually, yes. I didn't really have confidence that she could have successfully run away and started a new life at the age of 15, right? Like, that idea is just so absurd to me.

Megan's 18th birthday came and went, and with it dimmed Kathy Jo's hope of ever seeing her daughter again. I stayed hopeful for a very long time. But once she was officially an adult and she still had contacted nobody, I knew she wasn't coming home. By then, local and state investigators had asked for help from the FBI. They asked us, is there any way possible that we could start to take a more active role? Special Agent Ray Hart started to work the case. And then, a year later, something big happened. It was a frigid but sunny winter day

when Carl Vaughn went out to look for firewood on this farm near Fairfield. What did you see? Well, I seen something shining there in the sun. It was bright. I was coming from that way. And I just stopped and walked over there. And then I realized it was a skull poking out of the blanket. Did you think it was a human skull? Oh, yeah, I knew it was. It wasn't no trouble to see that. What goes through your mind when you make a discovery like that? Well, I just knew they were looking for Megan, you know. So Megan popped into your head the moment you saw the bones?

Yeah, the bones, yeah. Kathy Jo, who wanted answers for so long, now shuddered at the sight of Agent Ray Hart and his partner at her door. And they said, hi, Kathy. And, of course, I dropped my water. I'm fumbling all over myself. And I just looked at him. I said, you're here to ruin my day, aren't you?

He said, the remains that were found, it was Megan. How did you learn the news that Megan's remains had been found? Yeah, my mom had called me and told me. I mean, it was a hard day. Megan's manner of death was yet to be determined, but since her body had been found buried, it was ruled a homicide. Agent Hart was going through the files with fresh eyes, looking for leads. My initial thought at that point was it was going to be really difficult to move any investigation

forward as an FBI investigator without looking into Brody Marburger. While the local police had treated Brody like a witness, the Illinois State Police also worked the case. And FBI Agent Hart saw that those investigators had leaned much harder on Brody than the hometown officers. More than a year after Megan disappeared, state agents searched his car. They found a brownish stain that looked suspicious,

but tests came back negative for blood. Were you going to run away with her? And the state investigators brought Brody in for questioning, twice. So the first thing we had to do is go back and listen to those interviews, see if there's little nuggets that we can utilize. Would you say you and Megan were ever sexually active with each other? Do you want me to be honest? Yes.

Okay. Well, is this where your honesty started? No, I'm just kidding. Yes, I'm not going to yes. Okay. Well, is this where your honesty started? No, I'm just kidding. Yes, I'm not going to lie. Okay. In one of those interviews, Brody added a new detail. He admitted that 24 hours before Megan went missing,

he'd snuck into her bedroom while her mom was sleeping. You helped her pack. Mm-hmm. And then my understanding is you spent the night. Mm-hmm. Okay. And was this like your guys' final farewell, goodbye? Brody again explained how the next night when Megan disappeared, he went out looking for her, a story investigators found perplexing. Why are you responsible for her. I don't know. For who? Megan.

Why are you responsible for Megan? I don't know. I feel like I helped her through a lot of stuff. What's more, Brody said that while he was out searching, he didn't have his cell phone. He left it at his girlfriend's house. And if that sounded suspicious, well, Brody had an answer for that too.

When pressed, he admitted he wasn't really looking for Megan. He now claimed that driving around for hours was actually all part of a plan. What was the plan? I was going to drive around while she did whatever she was going to do. This was a new and bizarre story. Brody said he was intentionally trying to get police to look at him, playing decoy, giving Megan a chance to slip away. He now said she was going to be picked up by someone in a car. She was trying to get picked up by an unknown male or female. Brody never asked for a lawyer, and in his next police interview,

investigators pressed hard, and Brody pushed back. Tell us where she's at, Brody. I don't know. There's no way that that is true. You're just going to sit here and accuse me of it. I'm just going to sit here and not say anything. I didn't do anything, okay? Where's she at? I don't know. What direction did she go? I already told you where I thought she went. And where was that? Down south. To Agent Hart, it was a lot of smoke, and what he needed was fire. Then, something else in the file

caught his attention, a tiny detail that would turn out to be huge. You were about to make a major discovery in this case. Yes. And he was also going to get some help from an unlikely ally.

They asked me if I would be comfortable wearing a wire. In the years following Megan's disappearance, Brody Merbarger moved out of state and was studying geology at the University of Southern Indiana. He shared an apartment with his best friend, Kyle. Were you happy to have your best friend as a roommate? Yeah, he was a good roommate. Kyle remained fiercely loyal to his friend, despite the rumors that persisted back home. I mean, I would really, like, passionately defend him

and say there was no way it was him. Why were you so sure? Because he was my best friend. Yeah, Brody was like a brother to me. Neither Kyle nor Brody had any inkling that Megan's murder investigation was picking up steam. And as Special Agent Ray Hart read through a mountain of documents, one detail stood out to him.

One of the investigators for Illinois State Police actually wrote a very good report detailing that Mr. Marburger got really fidgety and was very nervous when he saw the state police starting to look into the trunk of his car. Remember, Kathy Jo saw Brody washing his car when she went looking for him that first morning. And later, investigators found a stain in the trunk that looked suspicious, but tested negative for blood. I thought maybe there was a potential that we could do a more thorough forensic search of that vehicle. Brody had totaled his Dodge in an accident a year earlier,

but the agent caught a lucky break. The wrecked car was fixed up and had a new owner. I was cautiously optimistic that we would find something. And they did. Turns out the original test was a false negative. It was human blood in the trunk. And once agents removed the lining, Luminal revealed even more of it. What happened when you compared the DNA samples of the blood and Megan? The lab report indicated that was indeed Megan Nichols' DNA. This is your connection now, your solid connection to Brody.

Yes, ma'am. It was big. But instead of arresting Brody, they wanted to confront him with the new evidence, see if he would crack. How surprised was he that he's in college now and the FBI shows up on campus? He was extremely uncomfortable, very nervous. After a phone call with his dad, Brody declined to talk and told the agents to contact a lawyer for the family. Then, Agent Hart had an idea of someone else to talk to, the best friend

and roommate, Kyle. On a picnic table outside of Brody and Kyle's apartment complex, the FBI laid it all out. They told me that they had DNA. This kind of like very hard, at least from my perspective, hard to kind of argue with evidence. And the only thing I was thinking, like, the whole time they were talking was, oh, s***. And they had a big ask. They wanted Kyle to help them bring Brody down. They asked me to cooperate further with what they were doing, and I said, no, that's still my best friend. A week later, a change of heart gave Agent Heart an opening. I receive an email from Kyle. It says, I've been thinking about what you told me. I don't think there's any doubt that he did this. Will you come talk to me again? Are you starting to think my best friend could be a killer? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they asked me if I would be comfortable

wearing a wire and going in and talking with him about, about Megan and the whole situation. That's a big deal. Yeah, yeah. You're asking a lot. Absolutely. Kyle packed up his things and moved out. A month later, he went back to the apartment complex to talk to Brody. How are you feeling as you walk through the door, knowing that you are wearing a wire?

Definitely pretty nervous. Yeah, it was not an easy situation by any means. What's new with you? Well, I moved. Kyle got right to it, asking about the night Megan disappeared. Brody, have I ever just asked you what happened that night? Like, did you see Megan? Can you, how did? Yeah, okay, so I saw her whenever I dropped my iPod off. That was it.

That was it, okay. I had a pretty solid way of handling the whole situation with her, but she left before I could tell her mom. You were going to tell her mom? You were going to tell her mom? I was going to tell her mom as soon as she turned 16. But she was planning on running away. Okay. And I didn't get that chance.

Federal agents coached Kyle on what to say, and now he confronted Brody with what he'd learned from the FBI. Your old car. Okay. And in the trunk of your car, they've taken a lot of different samples, and there's blood in the back of your car, and it's Megan's blood. Why is her blood in your car? That's a good question. I would like to know that, too. You don't know how her blood got there?

No. Why'd you leave your phone at Kendra's? I honestly don't know how her blood got there? No. Why'd you leave your phone at Kendra's? I honestly don't know. Brody then seemed to anticipate his friend's next question. I didn't do it. That's what you're asking. You did not kill Megan? I did not kill Megan.

Brody didn't give up any new information, but agents weren't giving up. They asked Kyle to meet with his friend again. This time, Brody seemed more than a little wary. He says to me, are you wearing a wire? Like right into my ear. Oh my gosh. Yeah, so I do think he was maybe suspicious. Well, yeah, he's saying that. What did you say to him? No.

Do you think he bought it? No. I think at that point he knew what was going on. Still, when the agents listened, they thought they heard something revealing. One of his statements, I truly believe, is his version of a confession. That makes me think that somebody with anger issues found out about something, strangled her. He starts to theorize, and Brody says, well, maybe someone with anger issues hears something they don't like and gets mad and strangles her. Which could fit. Which fits.

Because forensic experts believed strangulation or suffocation was how Megan died, a detail only the killer would know. Investigators took all the evidence they had gathered, the blood, the changing stories, the secret recordings, and presented it to a grand jury. In October of 2020, six years after Megan disappeared, police arrested Brody Merbarger as he walked into work. Was that in a lot of bad, bad moments?

Was that a good one? It's hard to describe. It's just like the scab just keeps getting ripped open. I remember saying, what? What are you talking about? You know, it's surreal. It was out of the blue because there had been this idea that the case was dead, the case was dead, the case was dead.

You know, that was what the public thought of it was. But the arrest was only the first step. Prosecutors knew there were still unanswered questions and a defendant who had an explanation for everything. I couldn't believe what he was saying. more than six years had passed since teenager megan nichols vanished on july 4th weekend and in october 2022 her high school boyfriend brody merbarger went on trial for her murder you chose not to sit through the trial i don't't want to. You don't see the nightmares I see every night. The last thing I need is the details of everything he did to my little girl.

Prosecutors Michael Folligario and Myra Yell Clark spent months poring over those details. We knew his activity and his suspicious behavior around the time that Megan disappeared was extremely strong circumstantial evidence. The case they presented to the jury included the story of Megan and Brody's high school romance told by, what else, their text messages. It's almost like Brody was playing a game with Megan. He would distance himself and as soon as Megan stopped texting him, he would just text her and just try to get her reinterested in him. It really was some sort of control game with him. Those text messages exposed another dynamic at play. Brody driving a wedge between Megan and her mother, Kathy Jo. Some of the text messages that I read where he was talking about Kathy to Megan

were just some of the worst things I've ever read. Megan's mom was keeping him from gaining control over Megan. And so I think his hatred of Kathy also, like, was incorporated into his motive. Prosecutors then turned to what Brody said he was doing the night Megan disappeared. He has no explanation for where he was that night. Then, of course, his changing stories.

I was going to drive around while she did whatever she was going to do. And then they presented their own theory of what took place on the night Megan disappeared. They believed there was a fight over the plans to run away. She had gone to the ATM. She was packed. She was ready to go. So when Brody ends up backing out,

you can see how she would overreact, be upset, and be emotional. But why kill her, though? I think it goes back to his control. It had come to a point where he completely had lost control and reacted aggressively. And they played for the jury that tape, Brody talking to his best friend, theorizing that Megan was strangled by someone in a fit of rage. Prosecutors argued that somebody was Brody. His former friend Kyle was called to testify about the secret recordings.

I kind of felt like I was there to confront him. I felt betrayed by the situation, that he had lied to me and lied to everyone for so long. Then, what prosecutors said was solid proof. Megan's blood in Brody's car. This was really a cornerstone of your case. It was definitely our biggest piece of evidence that we were able to present. When it came time to present a defense, Brody himself took the stand to explain the state's key blood evidence.

He testified to an incident where he had sex with Megan in his car. Brody testified that Megan had her period during that sexual encounter, and he said a t-shirt with her blood on it ended up in the trunk of his car. Prosecutors were skeptical, to say the least. I couldn't believe what he was saying. During cross-examination, the prosecution pressed Brody to explain why, if true, he had kept that sexual encounter a secret for more than six years. He said he was embarrassed about what had happened. After a two-week trial, the jurors weighed all the evidence and were back with their verdict in two hours. And the verdict was?

Guilty. What was that like for you when you heard that guilty verdict being read? It was definitely a relief, but in a lot of ways, I didn't feel as good as I thought I would feel. It really didn't make anything better, I guess. Kathy Jo, who had avoided the trial, spoke directly to Brody at his sentencing. The last thing I said to him, and I made him look at me, I called him, I called his name, and I'm like, Brody. And he finally looked up at me, and I said,

I do not wish you well, and I hope I never have to see your face again. Brody Merbarger was sentenced to 50 years in prison for the first-degree murder of Megan Nichols. His defense attorney has filed an appeal. But the sentencing only closed one chapter for Kathy Jo. Where do I go from here? How do I exist in a world without my daughter? I need to figure out, you know, what God's plan is for me, because I know He has one. I may be running from it, but I know He has one.

When the trial was finally over, the family had a celebration of life, honoring Megan. It was difficult for me, but at the same time, that was the only thing in all this time that was focused about Megan, about her life, and was positive. You know, I would want people to remember Megan for her personality, the warmth that you felt when you were with her, the smile that she would give, this aura of joy that you could feel around her. That must have brought you comfort knowing how much Megan was loved.

Yes, it did. And she touched a lot of people. And not only in her life, but her story has touched a lot of people since then. That's all for this edition of Dateline. We'll see you again Friday at 9, 8 central. And of course, I'll see you each weeknight for NBC Nightly News. I'm Lester Holt. For all of us at NBC News, good night.