Dateline NBC - The Women & Dirty John

Episode Date: September 19, 2021

In one of his most memorable classic episodes, Keith Morrison reports on conman John Meehan, who made national headlines last year after his crimes and their final, deadly culmination were featured in the popular podcast, ‘Dirty John.’ Seven years after her brutal attack, Keith Morrison catches up with Terra Newell to talk about her life, the road to healing, and her advice to survivors of violent crime. After the Verdict is available now only by subscription to Dateline Premium on Apple Podcasts. LINK: https://apple.co/3tkCEfQ

Tonight on Dateline. It was a whirlwind love affair. He was the total package. A doctor, very intelligent. Maybe it was too good to be true. Did he love me or was this all a game? I had lots of suspicions. She thinks his fingernails are dirty and this does not look to her like the hands of an actual doctor.

I started snooping and I found everything. His nickname was Dirty John. The story that became a hit series and podcast. This is Dirty John. It was the number one podcast in the country. Millions of people heard it. Yeah, people were fascinated by it. He had knives, he had camouflage duct tape.

Some people have called it a murder kit. She was in a panic. She said, I saw John. And I said, where? She goes outside in a car. There's no way he gets away with this unless he kills her. A dirty plot turning deadly, but not the way anyone predicted. I've never heard anybody scream like that before. The odds of this ending the way it did, it's almost impossible. I'm Lester Holt and this is Dateline.

Here's Keith Morrison with The Women and Dirty John. In the beginning was desire. Natural human desire for connection, for love. And so she aimed her arrow at that online ocean of intimate strangers. And found him. Newport Beach. I'm watching the police. Fire or paramedics? Hi, I need an ambulance right away and the police.

It was summertime when the awful climax came. A late afternoon, a marmalade sun beating down on the parking lot of a rental apartment complex in Newport Beach, California. That's when they heard it. I'm sure this woman's just screaming. All right. The whole complex must have heard it. Terrified, howling, desperate. Is she okay?

There was a man down there. They could see him. He had a knife. He was stabbing the screaming woman. And nobody was helping her. It really could happen. All right, a knife. He was stabbing the screaming woman. And nobody was helping her. It's really sad. All right, I understand. We have officers on the way. Too late. Too late.

The aliens are doing CPR on somebody. The bloody ending. But the story, the whole terrible tale, is much deeper than that one thing, dreadful though it was. A story Christopher Goffard of the Los Angeles Times spent months unraveling, strand by disturbing strand. It's a story about trust and betrayal, and it's a story about family.

About a woman, two protective daughters, and what those daughters did when the man came into their mother's life before the death in the parking lot. Devil's got the boyfriend, he's got the one who's... Hi, I'm Christopher Goffard, reporter... The story became a podcast produced with the podcast network Wondery, the number one podcast in the country for a time. Voted by Entertainment Weekly, USA Today, and The Guardian as one of the best of 2017.

Downloaded 28 million times in the first year of its release. The Story and the man at the heart of it was called Dirty John. He was very creative. Super manipulative. Charismatic. Handsome. Charming. Intelligent.

He was a nightmare to everybody. But not to her. To Deborah Newell of Orange County, California. The man who presented himself on the dating website, Dr. John Meehan, anesthesiologist, looked very promising. He was the total package. A doctor, very intelligent, family man, loved his kids. Not that attracting men had ever been difficult for Deborah

or any of the women in the family, according to her daughter, Tara. Men kind of flock to them. Really? What is it about the women in your family? Well, they have really great hearts, and they're pretty decent looking. Good women, happy, successful, attractive. I love those bar stools. Deborah owned a thriving interior design firm and a moving company and a silk flowers business.

Had dozens of employees, certainly no money worries. But she was in her 50s, marriage is behind her, and she was looking. Each potential mate carefully vetted by her watchful daughters. We were very judgmental of all the men that she dated. A little too judgmental? Maybe. Me and my sister could go over the top sometimes, just very protective over my mom. But now Debra wanted a romance, just for her, on her terms. I had always done

everything for my children, so I felt like it was me time. And this guy on the website was me time to a T. He's just back from a year in Iraq where he's volunteered with Doctors Without Borders. He was charming, kind of old-fashioned. When he asked her out, he didn't just meet her somewhere or wait in his car. He insisted on coming upstairs to get me. So that's what a gentleman does. Yes. He took her to a fancy place for dinner, and all courtly manners paid the not inconsiderable bill.

On their second date, he arrived in medical scrubs. He'd come straight from an operation, and he was handsome and tall and very fit and very into her. He swept me off my feet, said everything right, took me everywhere that I wanted to go. Did you have that walking on air feeling that you get when you fall in love? A little bit. I fell to go. Did you have that walking on air feeling that you get when you fall in love? A little bit. I fell in love. She called me one day and told me that she met someone amazing and that she really liked this guy. She wanted me to meet him. But true to form, perhaps, Deborah's daughters reacted just as they often did

to a new man in her life, especially Tara's sister. She didn't like him immediately. And I thought, oh, she'll eventually like him. He's a lot of fun. He'll win her over. Deborah rented a house, part of her new start, in a picturesque part of Newport called Balboa Island. And she ran her business with a new lightness. And at night was loved by this

accomplished doctor, this sensitive man. What did he do for you? Everything. From run errands for me to back rub every night. Just would listen to my day. We would take walks every night. He held my hand. I mean, he was everything that you would want. Pinch yourself. You've got it finally. Yeah. Then, just before Thanksgiving, as Tara helped her mother move into the Balboa house...

He started moving his stuff in too. Tara didn't like it. Not a bit. She confronted her mother. I told her it looks fishy. I don't get it. She told me I needed to mind my own business. And he came up behind her. What did he say? He was saying that you're just trying to get your mom all to yourself. And I started screaming back at him. No, John,

that's what you are trying to do. The next day was Thanksgiving, and Deborah, quite fed up, told her suspicious daughters not to bother showing up for dinner. Neither one of you? Neither one of us. What was that like? Really hard. Hard for Deborah, too. But she needed her own life.

She and John asked a counselor for advice. And the counselor suggested that I have rules for the girls. Boundaries. The therapist said, look, you have a right to be happy. This is your relationship. And John's position was, this therapist is absolutely right. So Deborah weighed the options. Listen to her family?

Or embrace what felt like the best thing to come along in years. She chose love for what certainly felt like it. What's the old expression? Till death do us part. When we come back, the bond between mother and daughters, already fraying, might just break thanks to a startling decision by Deborah. I knew my family would be not very happy with me. The daughters fight back by doing some digging into John. She bought these trackers for cars and she put one on my mom's, so she found out where John was going. Las Vegas, Nevada. The great glittering temples to gambling.

Will happily take your money, of course. And perhaps you'll leave the city a little poorer. And if you want to bet your heart in Las Vegas, well, you can put that on the line, too. If you're in a betting mood. And Deborah Newell was. I felt very adored and very loved, and I thought, well, if he's the love of my life, I'm ready. They'd been dating two months when she went to Vegas on business in December 2014. John Meehan went along, and... We went to a courthouse and just got married before a judge.

Like that? Just like that. Married. nobody there but them and their secret. They decided, said Deborah, they wouldn't tell anyone. I knew my family would be not very happy with me.

What did it feel like? Very mixed emotions. A little empty, knowing that they're not on board with this. But that's all on that one side. On the other side, there's this rush of happiness and good feeling, right? Yes. So Deborah's daughters, protective as usual, had no idea that their mother was a newlywed.

The therapist Deborah had seen recommended she keep her relationship separate from her family. But of course, Christmas was coming. And there were very important family traditions, like the one where Tara would have her own special time with the nieces and nephews of her extended family. So they made a deal. John would stay in a different room while Tara had the kids to herself.

She was going to be able to enjoy the kids and he had to sort of stay away. Didn't work out so well. What actually happened? Well, he walked in with all the presents and of course the kids congregate all around him. He went straight up to them. He gave them gifts.

Like being Santa Claus or something. Yeah, I mean that sort of role. Yeah. Did he do it on purpose? Of course, thought Tara. That made me so upset. Tara was very emotional. I thought, just suck it up.

You know, it's Christmas. Have fun. Instead, she felt that that man had come and usurped something. Yes. He had not only stolen their Christmas, thought the daughters, but both of them worried he was stealing their too-trusting mother, taking advantage of her. She just let him drive her car.

But why would he need to? Wasn't he a prosperous doctor? An anesthesiologist? Couldn't he afford a car? Well, there was a reason, Debra told them, that while John was in Iraq working with Doctors Without Borders, he was robbed. His house, his clothes, his cars. He was working with insurance company of getting the claim. So I let him borrow my car. John would get all his money

back soon enough, said Deborah. Didn't wash with terror. Sounded like a shaggy dog tail. At that time, I had lots of suspicions. And that's when she and her sister decided to do some snooping. She bought these trackers for cars, and she went and put one on my mom's Tesla, so she found out where John was going. Where was he going? He was going to multiple doctor's offices. Not so unusual perhaps for an anesthesiologist, but the sisters noticed something. He was there for not that long of time. Not long enough to conduct any medical procedure, so what were those quick visits all about? Seemed more like a man trying to get access to something, like maybe drugs. It was just a hunch. But they went to Deborah with that, said, maybe he's an addict.

And Deborah refused to entertain their wild suspicions. This was more like, stop interfering in my life? Somewhat, yes. But I'd fallen in love. Deborah's daughters were not about to be put off. One of her daughters is particularly suspicious. She doesn't know why he wears surgical scrubs everywhere. It seems to be a costume he's wearing.

She thinks his fingernails are dirty, and this does not look to her like the hands of an actual doctor. And so they started digging, an investigation that would lead halfway across the country to the depths of evil to an appointment with death. Coming up, troubling revelations about John.

They learned that he was not a doctor. Discoveries that were about to go from disturbing to terrifying. I said he's very, very dangerous. When Dateline continues. Tara Newell and Cash, her miniature Australian shepherd, were inseparable. He has unconditional love and he wants to be there no matter what. Tara went to cosmetology school but chose to work with four-legged clients instead as a dog groomer.

What do you like about dogs? I really like that they're innocent. They don't have any evil in them unless they were taught to have evil in them. And Tara was something of a student of evil. She was a fan of the TV show The Walking Dead. Zombies. She had a feeling that evil was lurking in the life of John Meehan.

So did her sister. They knew he was hiding something, said reporter Christopher Goffard, and they were determined to find out what it was. They hired a private investigator to look into his past. Deborah, meanwhile, was in love. The newlyweds had settled into a simple life on Newport's Balboa Island. Deborah, convinced she'd found the perfect man,

even when sometimes things didn't quite make sense. Like the time she picked up the mail and saw a strange return address on a letter to her husband. You opened a letter to him? Yes, I did. I was so curious. And he was irate. That's fraud.

You know, I can't believe you did that. But what had caught her attention was that letter was from an inmate of the Orange County Jail. Did you read the letter? I did. What was in it? It was talking about how lucky he was that he had found love and that his life had turned around.

And I'm thinking, life had turned around. Hmm. Hmm. So I questioned him, and he said that he writes and sends care packages to people in prison. Sounded plausible enough to Deborah, but not to the sisters, especially not once their private investigator

began reporting his findings on John Meehan. They learned that he was not a doctor. He was not an anesthesiologist. John had worked as a nurse anesthetist, but not recently. And he had certainly not been in Iraq with Doctors Without Borders. Instead, just before he met Deborah. They learned that one of his recent addresses was the Orange County Jail.

John was not a sender of care packages. He had been an inmate. And then in March 2015, four months after John moved in with Deborah, the sisters snooped around the Balboa house and jackpot. They found a stash of paperwork John had left there. Legal documents. Police reports. Reports that he stalked other women and that other women had restraining orders on him. John's papers outlined a long criminal history.

Multiple arrests and incarcerations, drug convictions. Alarming stuff. And Deborah was hesitant to believe this stuff. She believed John. Even after her daughters told her what they'd found, Deborah went straight to John. And he said they had the wrong guy. He said, there's going to be allegations that other John Meehans did.

And I thought, well, okay, you've got a point. John said he was a victim of mistaken identity in some cases. And in others, he was framed. And he said, I was set up. And I said, but you lied to me. He goes, because I knew you would never date me if you knew the truth. And I said, you're right, I wouldn't have.

Thing was, John was so sad, seemed so sincerely contrite. He started crying and crying and crying. And he said, please forgive me. I love you so much. I can never live without you. And it was true that he made her feel like she was the only woman in the world. And when they were alone together, she felt truly loved. And I'm thinking, okay, 90% of me doesn't believe him, but there's that 10% that maybe he's right. And I'm going to throw away the person that I fell in love with without trying to work it through. And so she accepted his explanations. And she forgave him.

There's always a reason. Yes. In March 2015, soon after they found that stash of papers, Tara and her sister discovered their mother was married to the guy. That was it. They were fed up, refused after that to speak to her. This is a very big, bad problem in your life. Yeah.

Just how big and how bad, they didn't know yet. But buried in that stash of John's papers was the name of someone who did. A detective way off in Ohio. One of the sisters picked up the phone, called him. What did you think when you got her call? I said, he's very, very dangerous. You need to talk to your mother. You need to have her call me.

I will tell her everything. That is the strange and disturbing tale that begins with her. Coming up, thousands of miles away, this woman also had questions about John. I started snooping, and I found everything. And when she spoke up, that's when things got really scary. Tonya, you enjoy your time left on this earth, okay? Because that's what it's going to come down to. Who was this man who'd stolen Debra's heart, this John Meehan? Tanya Bales had no idea either when he stole her heart decades ago.

He was playful, he was interested, engaging, smiley. It was the late 1980s. Tanya was a young nurse anesthetist in Dayton, Ohio. John was in law school there. Until he met her, that is, and said he had a kind of epiphany. He said, you know, I'm not even sure I'll be happy being an attorney. I think I want to be a nurse anesthetist. And I think my jaw fell to the ground.

Because I thought he was, you know, a second-year law student. attorney. I think I want to be a nurse anesthetist. And I think my jaw fell to the ground because I thought he was, you know, a second year law student. In fact, he wasn't. He'd been kicked out, though he didn't tell her that. All the days of my life. So in her blissful ignorance, she married him in her family's church in 1990. Mr. and Mrs. 1990. And she helped put him through nursing school. They had two daughters before things stopped adding up. And I found out that he was having an affair. Tanya wondered, what else did she not know about her soon-to-be ex-husband? Like, why did he refuse to invite his family to their wedding? Why not let her even meet them? She decided to call his mother. I said, Dolores, this is Tanya. I'm married to your son,

John. And the phone was quiet for a minute. And she said, oh, Tanya, I knew you'd call me someday. Wow. And so then, of course, my heart was racing and my knees were shaking just to make the phone call. And then she just unloaded on me, you know, all the details of trouble in the past. According to his own mother, John had been cheating and stealing and lying for years. Even lied to Tonya about his age, lopped off five years. Oh, and he'd been convicted of cocaine trafficking. She said, you know, is he still using drugs? And I said, what?

So, in something like shock, Tanya became a sleuth. Who was this man? I started snooping, and I found everything under my nose all the time. Evidence of a criminal double life. And something else. A cedar box full of fentanyl and Versed and some other things that aren't controlled substances. She started watching that cedar box.

And things did come and go. So now I thought... It's a stash. It's a stash, yeah. Was he using his position as a nurse to steal drugs? Like getting a ticket to be in the candy store all day long. Right. I mean, it's like putting an alcoholic as a bartender. She told the authorities she had to. It was the law.

He had to be stopped. He was going to hurt patients. And on a dime. He turned on me. He flipped like a switch. Now, the man she once thought she knew turned scary, threatening. She began recording their phone conversations. Listen to me, Tanya. I'm listening. I got a big smile on my face, and you know why? Because it's going to get done.

What's going to get done? You're not making any sense. Well, it don't happen. You will understand when the time comes. And that's all I got to say. When it happens, Tanya, and you see it in your eye, you remember it was me, okay? Remember what, John? Keep that in mind. It was me. Tanya, you enjoy your time left on this earth, okay?

Because that's what it's going to come down to. He was arrested for making threats against Tanya in June 2001, was convicted of menacing, and put on probation. He wasn't the man she thought he was. That's exactly right. There was another version of John. Dennis Lucan was a police detective back then. He investigated the source of those drugs Tanya found in the cedar box. He started at John's house and found a gun.

Illegal because John was on probation. So he was arrested again and sent to jail. When he went to Montgomery County Jail, I called a supervisor. I said, you've got an individual there, John Meehan, and he's going to try to con you out of drugs. He says he already has. He claimed he fell out of the top bunk and he got pain medication. You're dealing with an incorrigible person here. Yes, sir. You're dealing with an addict, a very smart, articulate addict.

Eventually, thanks to Luke and John, did jail time for stealing drugs in Ohio and Michigan. And Tanya felt guilty, wondering if she'd missed warning signs, wondered what else John might have hidden from her. Never thought about the clue way back at the beginning on her wedding video. And the groomsmen who'd had some drinks and have their arms around each other and they're talking about how they met him. We're here to celebrate John... One of the groomsmen said... John Meehan's nickname is Filthy John Meehan. Filthy John over the years became Dirty John,

and the nickname stuck. You found out later on there was a story to that. Yes, he was basically conning little old women out of money for jobs that he didn't do, and also that he had a way with the ladies. Lucan discovered darker secrets as well. John supplied the opioids that killed his own addicted brother. He was alone with his sick father when the old man died rather suddenly. John wasn't charged in those cases, but there were others, said Buchan. And

as the years went on, he developed a certain criminal specialty. He would go on dating websites. He would find women that usually had good financial backing. He always told people he was a doctor. He seemed like an ideal catch, I suppose, for a lot of these women. He was a true con man. He'd take their money, and when they would find out about him, John would threaten them. He would terrorize them. How bad was he?

John was the most dangerous, treacherous, manipulative, deceitful criminal that I'd investigated in four years of law enforcement. Once Tara learned about John's past, she was consumed with worry. I was very distraught at the time. Because this dangerous man was now married to a very successful businesswoman, who happened to be Tara's mother. You can get enough of me. That's a good feeling. It is.

The trickery of love. Yes. Trickery. But something far worse than that was coming soon. Coming up, one of Deborah's daughters is about to make

an ominous discovery. She was in a panic. She said, I saw John. And I said, where? She goes outside in a car. Are this terrified family's worst fears about to come true? When Dateline continues. Deborah Newell had fallen in love with a con man. And when her daughter spoke with a detective who'd been investigating John Behan for years... It says, this guy is bad news. You need to get your mother away from him. Deborah had bought a house near Las Vegas where John could live away from her family.

She split her time between there and Orange County, but the daughters went into rescue mode. One thing they found especially alarming was yet another police report about Dirty John, this one from just two years earlier and much closer to home. The police in Laguna Beach had arrested John Behan for stalking a woman. And they discovered he'd rented an office space in which they found zip ties, cyanide, and two loaded guns.

What did all that say to you? He might be a killer and she has to get out of this. Has to. Has to. John had an explanation, of course, even for that cyanide. He says he has multiple sclerosis and that he kept the capsules around in case he needed to kill himself if it got too painful for him. This time, however, John's story didn't ring true, not even to Deborah. He still continued to treat me incredibly well, but he tried to isolate me from everyone. Especially your family. Especially my family.

And now, chastened and afraid, she reconciled with her daughters and read everything they had uncovered about John Meehan's past. I assume by this time, you didn't feel in love with him anymore. No. What did you feel? Confusion. I thought, how could this man fake it to this degree? Did he love me, or was this all a game? And I realized I was his newest victim.

In April 2016, 16 months after marrying John Meehan, she fled from the home they shared in Vegas back to Orange County, and from a safe distance, she filed for an annulment. And soon discovered, just as Tonya Bales had discovered years before, that John could turn on a dime. He started by trying to ruin her reputation, sent weird, inappropriate emails to her colleagues or clients. Did he send photographs of you to anybody?

He sent nude photos, yeah. That's a nightmare for any woman to be in. Oh, yeah. There were so many things that he did, but one of them, he burnt my car. He took it, stole it, and then set it on fire. Did he threaten you physically? Yes, but not in a direct way.

He would say, boo, I know where you are. It's not going to be for long. The same way he threatened Tanya. Tanya, you enjoy your time left on this earth, okay? Because that's what it's going to come down to. I went into hiding. I bought a dark wig, changed my clothes, got a rental car, stayed in different hotels. I went everywhere that he wouldn't suspect.

How long did that go on? Six months. Wow. Yeah. Now, stories John had told her before she left played over and over in Deborah's worried mind. Disturbing stories. He told similar ones to Tanya years before. played over and over in Deborah's worried mind, disturbing stories. He told similar ones to Tanya years before,

stories about the mafia. If they want to get back at you, say you took money from them or something, they don't kill you. They kill someone you love because then you live in pain the rest of your life, knowing that your actions caused the death of a loved one and now you don't have them. I learned that from him.

And the man Deborah once loved, she now feared. That had to be a very, very strange feeling. Very much, yes. Scared for my life. And not just her own life. I was afraid he would kill my mom. I was also afraid he would kill me or my sister or someone. After all, they'd ruined all his plans.

In the summer of 2016, Deborah began staying in secret with her other daughter, hoping she was safe there. And then, it was the night of August 19th. She came home and she was in a panic. She said, I saw John, I saw John. And I said, where? She goes outside in a car. Watching them?

He was supposed to be in Las Vegas. Why was he back in Orange County? She didn't have to wait long to find out. Someone's been stabbed. Someone's been stabbed. Coming up. The evil that had been gathering for almost two years explodes in broad daylight. He's planned this out. This was a revenge killing.

And the shattering end that would stun even the cops. August 20th, 2016, 5 p.m. A 14-year-old named Skylar Sepulveda was returning home from her junior lifeguard training when she heard a woman screaming out of the parking lot of her Newport Beach apartment building. I've never heard anybody else scream like that before. A lot of people would just dive under the covers and say, I hope that stops. Yeah. Once I found out what was going on, I knew what I had to do. She raced to the parking lot. Her mother called 911. She's like, Mommy, somebody's screaming, somebody's screaming.

And then she saw this guy just raising his hand up and down, up and down. Okay, we have officers on, saw a man and a woman she didn't know. As I was running, I could see everything that was going on, so I saw him actually stab her. That woman being stabbed was Tara, who, with her dog Cash, had just stepped out of her car to find someone waiting. Dirty John. He said, do you remember me? He looked me right in the eyes. There was no pause, no time to think. Tara, sitting here talking about it, was still struggling with what happened, still visibly keeping an emotional distance,

as if it happened to somebody else. He was trying to push me into the car. He actually had the trunk wide open. Trunk. So he wanted you in the trunk of his car? Yes. John was 6'2", a foot taller than Tara. As he pushed her, he began hitting her with a bag, something hard in it. It just felt like I was getting punched over and over again. But it wasn't that. There was a knife in the bag, cutting her, slicing into her. And I put my arm up with my purse above my heart, and I tried to get away from him. And I was screaming. He put his hand over my mouth, and I bit as hard as I could. Cash the dog barked furiously, bit into John's ankle.

I got thrown down onto the ground somehow, and I was just pedal-kicking him, trying to block the knife when he's stabbing me. And I kicked the knife out of his hand, and it landed on my right-hand side. And then, full of adrenaline, she did something astonishing. I picked up the knife, and I started just wailing on him and stabbing him. And I pushed him down.

I stabbed him at the top of his head. And then the last time was in the eyeball. Did you aim for that? I did. That's the zombie kill. That show, The Walking Dead, her education for fighting evil. What did you understand from watching that show about how you deal with zombies? You have to kill them in the head.

Like, you have to kill their brain. The police arrived. Their dash cam video picked up Skyler, the junior lifeguard, leading a very shaken Tara to the curb. Where, still terrified, she called her mother. I think I might have killed him. I'm sorry. I knew this was going to happen. And I thought he was going to try to hurt us.

She said, Mom, I just killed your husband. I'm so sorry. And I'm thinking, what? Deborah raced over there. You could see police cars blocking it off, fire engines. It was crazy. They wouldn't let you in? They said it was a crime scene. John Bean never regained consciousness.

And four days later, Dirty John was dead. Right after the attack, Newport Beach detective Rick Henry found John's killer, Tara, at the hospital, her dog still guarding her. And she told me the whole story? The whole story is a pretty complicated mess. Yes. As doctors treated Tara's wounds, Detective Henry began investigating, and the whole family waited and worried. So what were you afraid of? Well, I didn't know if they would for sure know that it was him attacking her and it was self-defense. So you were afraid that they might charge her with something? Yes. There's a process the law must follow. Careful consideration.

August became September. October, November. Deborah didn't know it, but the detective had discovered something in the trunk of John's car. We found a backpack with numerous other knives inside. We found zip ties. We found duct tape. We found his passport. It took some

organization. It took thinking. He's planned this out. This was a revenge killing. Matt Murphy, an Orange County deputy district attorney at the time, believed the evidence spoke for itself. There's an image of this young woman in the hospital with her dog sitting on her bed. Talk about a picture saying a thousand words. It screams out that this is an innocent woman who came very close to being murdered by a really bad guy and fought bravely and survived. The prosecutor said it was an easy decision. This was self-defense. Case closed.

Did a feeling come with that? A sense of relief that it's, like, finally over. John Meehan's ex-wife, Tanya Bales, was working when she got the news. Do you remember that moment? Oh, yeah. It made me tremble. I was in the middle of the case, and it popped up on the screen as a notification. John was killed.

By the time I took the patient out of the room, I was in tears. Yeah, I wasn't in tears because he died. I was in tears because I had to tell his children. And that made me very sad to have to tell them. It was awful. Her daughters, 16 and 21 at the time, said they regretted not being able to show him how well they turned out in spite of him. And now, Deborah still struggles with guilt. I would have never, ever in my entire life put my kids at fear or put them in danger. That was the last thing on my mind is that he would be going after one of my kids. You feel lucky in a way? Oh, I feel very lucky. I believe Tara saved many lives, saved my life, saved many other victims.

Tara was diagnosed with PTSD. She still has some healing to do, but she returned with us to that parking lot. I don't want to poke and prod too much, but what happens inside your stomach when you're here? I just get a lot of anxiety. I just have flashbacks of me running down the ramp and just like going to the cement. She gamely showed us the spot where she looked death in the eye and struck back. This wasn't an easy thing to do. I'm just taking it all in right now. I think you were a tough cookie, right? Yeah, that's what a lot of people say. I guess so. And Dirty John Behan is an ever more distant memory now, his trail of victims safe from his terror,

thanks to a young woman and a little dog who fought for her life and won. That's all for this edition of Dateline. We'll see you again next Friday at 10, 9 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.