Snapped: Women Who Murder - Brandy Stutzman

Episode Date: May 14, 2023

The murder of a U.S. airman leads Las Vegas investigators down a twisted path to one woman's offbeat oasis and ties to an unusual fan club.Season 26 Episode 12Originally aired: November 10, 2019Watch full episodes of Snapped for FREE on the Oxygen app: https://oxygentv.app.link/WatchSnappedPodSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hi, I'm Lindsay Graham, the host of Wondries Podcast American Scandal. Our newest series looks at the story of OxyContin, a popular painkiller that helps spur an epidemic of addiction and drug abuse, in which prompted a broad campaign to hold the pharmaceutical industry accountable. Listen to American Scandal on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts. She was a soldier's wife holding down the fort at home. When you are married to the love of your life and that person is deployed for months out of time,

it's hard to maintain a relationship. She got lonely, but she put on a good outside appearance. He was the breadwinner of the house, sending quite a bit of money back. Until a horrific act brought everything crashing down. Do we know what happened to him? I don't know if she's further blood everywhere. Neighbors actually reported hearing a male screaming at about two in a morning.

His left ring finger was sliced off a clean cut with a knife. The search for a killer leads detectives to an unusual fan club. Everybody that's staying in the house is somehow involved with jugglers. And a twisted plot emerges. Somebody comes into the house wearing a mask. He's there to do no good.

He's not there to scare him. You go back to who's the house wearing a mask. He's there to do no good. He's not there to scare him. You go back to who's the mastermind of this. This is evil at its best. November 7, 2010, North Las Vegas, Nevada, a quiet neighborhood just a few miles from the Vegas Strip. There's a real world in Vegas where real people live and work. Way away from the Strip, so you don't have all the hassle of being around there. Not a high crime rate. It's not one of our known crime rate areas.

There's a lot of military that live out there. But the peaceful side of Vegas is about to receive a jolt. Just after 130 in the afternoon, Nicole Pritchard hears a frantic ringing at her front door. It's her 31-year-old neighbor, Brandy Stutzman. My daughter answered the front door. She said, Mom, it's B. And I said, OK, tell her, meet me around the garage, and I open my garage.

The garage door rises, and Nicole gets the shock of her life. I realized when I looked down and she had blood on her shirt, she had said, Jo's gone. And I said, Jo's gone where? Where did he go? Brandy tells Nicole that her husband, 32-year-old Joe Stutzman, is dead. Initially, I was in a panic. I said, did you call 911? She said, no. I called 911. Hi.

My neighbor just came here. She lived across the street. And she said her husband has passed away. Do we know what happened to him? I don't know. She said there's blood everywhere. OK, is there any way I can talk to her? Yeah, hold on, hold on.

OK, Brandy, what happened? I don't know. OK, did you just get home? Yes. OK, did he seem like he's unconscious? No, he's cold. He's cold, dear. She me called. She's called. She mealed behind my car and started rocking back and forth,

crying on the phone with 911. Within minutes Las Vegas homicide detectives are on the scene. There was multiple officers. They cordoned off the street. They would let you enter out. The victim is found supine or laying face up in the kitchen area, and he's just soaked in blood. He had some quite serious injuries

that we could see just from on top of him. There's quite a bit of blood, severe wounds to his upper arms and chest. I don't know how he's killed, so I don't know if he's been shot or stabbed, but something is causing him to bleed profusely. I mean, the biggest question is going through your head was, who would have done this, who would want to do this? What's going on?

Born in Altoona, Pennsylvania in 1977, Joe Stutzman always had his sights set on life outside the small town. Altoon is somewhat depressed area for his jobs go. At some point he decided to join the military. After making it through high school, he joined the Air Force. First time I met Joe, it was on deployment overseas. He was very opinionated. He was very loud.

And he kind of would make smart allocations remarks to me. He both had the same kind of humor, stuff like that. I think originally he signed up for six years. He was a crew chief in the Air Force for the stealth bombers. I was pretty proud of that. Joe's military career came at a price. Frequent deployments cost him his high school sweetheart,

Michelle. Michelle and Joe were her first loves. He joined the military. Got stationed somewhere. They lost contact. He was in high school when he dated her. It broke his heart. He was really pretty tender-hearted back then.

In 2002, the Air Force posted Joe to Nellis Air Force Base near Las Vegas, Nevada. Eager to get over Michelle, Joe took full advantage of Vegas Nightlife. I can tell you living in Vegas with the temptations and the party atmosphere. It's definitely a lot of fun. The handsome 24-year-old Airman caught the eye of an attractive brunette named Brandi Northleet. Joe Brandi met at a nightclub dancing, going out, you know, hop at bars, baby. Unlike Joe, Brandi was a vagus native.

She was born and raised in a middle-class family. Her parents, they'd separate it, and ultimately got divorced. Brandi's mother won custody, but struggled to properly raise Brandy. Her mother made some mistakes. Brandy was taking from one place to another and really didn't have a good home life, you know, wasn't provided for all the time. No stability.

A few years later, Brandy's father remarried and had a son named Aaron. She cared a lot about her brother, just as she did. Everyone else in her family. But when she was 18 years old, Brandy's beloved half-brother suddenly died when he was just a toddler. Though tragic, this hardship helped shape who Brandy was as a person. She loved to always help. Anything you needed. You needed a stick of butter, she'd have it.

There wasn't anything that she wouldn't do to help. She's very, very kind. By the time Brandy met Joe Stutzman, she had grown into a selfless and caring woman, something Joe found attractive. She was funny, very outspoken. He's always happy, always has smile on his face. Joe and Brandi were happy together.

They would come over to my house and spend time with my family. And we would have barbecues. On June 14, 2003, the couple married. They got married and she found some stability, and it was great. But just 10 days after the wedding, Jo left for a year-long deployment to Korea.

When you are married to the love of your life, and that person is deployed for a once out of time, it's hard to maintain a relationship. It is. I commend all of our service members, but it's hard to do that. I think Brandy got lonely. I think she got lonely, but she put on a good outside appearance. In 2004, Joe returned from his deployment, and by August 2005, the couple welcomed a son. They named him Aaron, after Brandy's brother who died when she was a teen.

Having a child to support, rekindled Joe's commitment to his career. He wanted everything for Aaron. That's why he did those appointments, why he worked so hard. It's family. A lot of us do this for Aaron. That's why he did those supplements, is why he worked so hard. It's family. A lot of us do this for family. To have a better life for him. Joe eventually left the Air Force for a higher-paying job in the private sector overseas.

He almost tripled his salary overnight by taking on this job with an independent contractor. Joe Stussman was making very good money by working in Afghanistan and Iraq in war zones. He got his top secret security clearance which made him pretty valuable. The money was good, but the new job also meant more time away from his family. By the fall of 2010, the couple couldn't ignore the toll the time apart took on their marriage. She wasn't there emotionally. He was trying to be there emotionally.

And Brandy was depressed. Joe being gone so long, and stuff like that, he started noticing that different trends and different attitudes and Brandy during that time period. He goes, I just don't know what to do. I don't know how to handle it. I want my marriage to work. Can you pray for me?

You know, I mean, he was always want me to pray for him. Which we did. Unfortunately, those prayers would never be answered. On the afternoon of November 7th, homicide investigators begin inspecting Joe's bloody body on the couple's kitchen floor. When you get a little closer, you can see that there was many cuts and stab wounds on his body. Yeah, very deep lacerations to his upper arm and shoulders, where he'd been cut apparently. It looked like to the bone. It was gruesome.

Whoever did this, this was somebody that wanted this man dead. When a knife is used, it's personal. Every time you plunge that knife into a living breathing body, it's a very personal way to inflict a violent death on somebody. Coming up, police hear stories of a turbulent marriage. It was just crazy, and the fights kept getting louder and louder. And detectives shift their focus to a suspicious group of teenagers

who have ties to a notorious music fan club. Many of the jugalos are considered street gang members. Just after 130 p.m. on November 7, 2010, Las Vegas homicide detectives have responded to a 9-1-1 call from Randy Stutzman. Stutzman walked into the home and saw her husband dead, blood surrounding his body. There was quite an extensive area, maybe five or six feet in diameter, where there was blood all around. Blood evidence leads investigators outside of the Stutzman home. The crime scene was a bloody mess for lack of better term.

There's blood on the South Gate, but estuary and gate into the backyard of the house that it appeared that the killing scene was the backyard. There was some trees and some rock landscaping. There was blood all over the rocks on the patio, on the wall next to the door. And then the sliding glass door is open. There's a window adjacent to the door that's also open.

The obvious conclusion is that there was a struggle, and he retreated inside, and that's where he perished. Joe Stutzman probably confronted the perpetrator near the back entrance, sliding glass door, and a fight was brought out into the backyard. Until Joe was saptideth and was managed to crawl himself back into the kitchen.

Did Joe unknowingly provoke his would-be killer? As detectives continue to process the scene, two details eliminate the possibility that this was a robbery gone wrong. His left ring finger was sliced off a clean cut with a knife. When you get up close, and you see that Joe Stutzman had had his wedding ring finger severed, and it was missing, that we had this wasn't a burler. This indicated there was something else going on. The police searched everywhere.

They looked everywhere in the toilets, They looked everywhere in the toilets, they looked everywhere in the backyard, throughout the neighborhood. That finger was never found. There are prints. There are fingerprints, palm prints, and none of them have any rich better. It indicates that the killer is wearing gloves.

So it also indicates that the killer has come prepared. Gloves or not, a knife attack this brutal will likely mark both killer and victim. Blood is very slippery. If you get blood on the knife, your hands are going to go forward on it. You're going to get caught. No question. Detectives hope that canvassing the area will yield clues. Detectives were going to go to the adjacent neighbors. You can't do this kind of killing quietly.

So it's going to make a lot of noise, especially if it's in the backyard. Neighbors tell police that there are always loud noises coming from the Stutzman home. Things have become very contentious between the two of them. It was just crazy. And the fights kept getting louder and louder.

I could hear him at my house. I could hear him at night. According to neighbors, when Joe was away, things got even worse. That's when the Stutzman home became a party house. There was kids in and out constantly all hours of the night. It was intimidating. It was a flat house.

Brandy lives there with her five-year-old child. We're hearing from multiple sources at this point that Brandy has multiple teenage males that are staying or coming to the house every day. People are worried for the safety of the five-year-old. She would let them take her husband's truck and drive and go to the store or run errands, go to school. They would stay up all night and sleep all day.

They all had to leave when she came home. Relieved neighbors say that Brandy hadn't hosted a party They all had to leave when she came home. Relieved neighbors say that Brandi hadn't hosted a party since Joe returned home about three weeks ago from Afghanistan. But one nearby resident says that the previous night at the Stutzman House was anything but peaceful. We had a woman that lived in the area where Brandi lived and she saw her the night before. She hears banging and yelling,

so she raises her garage door. She sits in the garage, and she can see Brandi at the front door banging on the door, yelling for Joe. Joe finally answers the door after a long period of time, and then Brandy goes in. Shortly after, the neighbors saw Brandy leave. They had a discussion for hour, where long that took, and then she was gone.

A few hours later, there was more commotion. One of the neighbors actually reported hearing noise or what sounded to them like a scream, a male screaming at about two in the morning. Back at the crime scene, detectives ask Brandi for an explanation. She tells them she and her son spent the night at the house of one of her teenage friends. She chose to stay at Sean's home. She had an extra room and apparently his parents were

OK with Brandi staying there. And so that's why she was not at the house. Sean was just another kid that Brandi hung out with over the house when Joe wasn't there. Brandi says her neighbor must have spotted her at the house when she briefly returned to get supplies for the overnight. She had left Shant House to go over and meet with Joe because Joe had diapers and she needed those.

Brandy tells detectives that the next day, she returned home to have a heart to heart with Joe. The purpose for her going over there is to try to reconcile the relationship getting back together and going back to the point where everyone lived like husband and wife and raised their son together. Instead, she found her husband stabbed to death.

Brandy was hysterical after discovering Joe's body. She picks up his head and she holds his head and then she realizes that he's deceased. When detectives question Brandy about her crew She holds his head and then she realizes that he's deceased. When detectives question Brandy about her crew of teenage boys, she appears to be forthcoming with information. Brandy was very candid with law enforcement related to her involvement with this group of young people.

Brandy says that the group of teens call themselves Juggalos, and are obsessive fans of the band in St. Clown Posse. The Juggalos and the Juggalettes, they follow the in St. Clown Posse, which is a rock music group or rap group in St. Clown Posse. It's basically two white rappers saying about, you know, really outlandish stuff.

One of the fans of the Insane Clown Posse sent me the lyrics to one of the songs, which talks about cutting the finger off of somebody. As detectives dig deeper, they find that most fanatical jugalos try to model their lives after insane clown posse's lyrics. Many of the jugalos are considered street gang members. So that was a bit of a twist for us.

So we are looking at the group to stay with Brandi even more seriously at this point. Brandi reluctantly admits that one of the jugalos had been upset by her recent marital troubles, 19-year-old Jeremiah Maryweather. She basically told the police, the last person that could have been there or had some dispute with Joe was Jeremiah.

He has a protective type personality. He's large, six-foot- five, 280-pound, big guy. Could take care of himself. Is it possible he took it upon himself and went and killed Joe? It was at that point that the police started focusing their attention on Jeremiah. MUSIC

Coming up, detectives tracked down Jeremiah. He said she was a victim of domestic violence. Coming up, detectives track down Jeremiah. He said she was a victim of domestic violence. And the portrait of Brandy's life with the Juggalos comes into focus. She enabled them into creating more refuge for their drug and alcohol abuse. The hardest true crime story to report on is your own.

I'm Tiffany Reese, host of the podcast Something was Wrong. For 15 seasons, I've always aimed to validate and amplify the voices of those who have survived abuse and crime. But for season 16, I'm opening up for the first time about my own experiences as an abuse survivor and a murder co-victim. With the help of trusted friends, we'll unpack my journey to becoming a victim advocate by examining my past. From the emotional and physical abuse I endured at the hands of my parents and the bullying

I received from my classmates to the murder of my brother and the securities fraud my father was convicted of, I'm covering it all and even learning more about myself through this process. This is obviously a very personal journey for me, but I believe that this will play a part in my healing, helping me to process the trauma that I endured. Follow something was wrong wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen early and add free on the Amazon music or Wondery app. You can listen early and add free on the Amazon music or Wondery app.

Police investigating the brutal slaying of 32-year-old Joe Stutsman now have a suspect. According to Joe's estranged wife, 31-year-old Brandy Stutsman, a local team named Jeremiah Maryweather had recently grown extremely protective of her. Brandy tells the police who could have done this. Was that 19-year-old boy, Jeremiah? Detectives track Jeremiah down at Sean's house. The same place Brandy spent the night before Joe was killed. When we started talking to Jeremiah, he kind of expressed his relationship with Brandy as being more like a brother and sister,

you know, that they were really good friends, and just spent a lot of time together. Jeremiah tells investigators that he was home all night, and his physical appearance suggests he may be telling the truth. Based on the extent of the wounds that we saw at the scene, Angio, you would have expected to find the person who inflicted those wounds to have some sort of injury on them, and Jeremiah didn't have any of those.

He had no injuries to that nature, did not appear that he had been in a fight. When detectives question others in the Juggalo gang, they learned that life with big sister Brandi was a young man's dream come true. She basically turned her marital home into a flat house. These teenage boys would come into her home, hang out all day, from all hours of the day to the flat house. These teenage boys would come into her home, hang out all day, from all hours of the day

to the night hours. They would listen to their music. They would talk about their relationships with Brandi. Brandi, she liked to be referred to as a B or sister B. She basically opened her door to her home for these teenage boys. She would have alcohol at their disposal. She enabled them into creating more refuge

for their drug and alcohol abuse. He got to understand for a teenage boy to see a woman who's in her early 30s and has money and has a house. That's intoxicating to a young man. But when detectives reach out to Brandy's friends and family, they learn the seeds of her bizarre relationship

with the teens were sewn in her own troubled youth. Her mother was having a hard time keeping jobs, especially living in Vegas, odd hours and everything. You'd be very demanding and stuff like that. So that's where she abandoned Brandy to her grandmother. The grandmother, you know, took her in and kept her, but at the same time, you know, there

were a lot of other factors that didn't help out Brandy's, you know, upbringing. Though Brandy eventually landed under the care of her father, the instability at a young age was hard on her. Friends say Brandy finally began to feel like she belonged to a family when her little brother Aaron was born, but his death reopened her emotional wound. Her brother was like, too, when he passed away.

She missed her baby brother. Befriending and supporting the Juggalo crew many years later, was Brandy's way of putting the tragic past behind her. She was able to spend time and engage in conversation and activities. Her brother's sister nature with people that would have been roughly his age. a brother's sister nature with people that would have been roughly his age. Friends tell detectives, it was only because of Joe's hard work

that Brandy was able to sustain her partying lifestyle. Joe was the bread winner of the house and making good money, sending quite a bit of money back to her and she's using that money to support her little gathering at the house. However, friends say no amount of money could make up for Brandy's disturbing claims

about her marriage. She said she was a victim of domestic violence. And that she was emotionally abused and physically abused by Joe. She said Joe's become abusive. He's using drugs. They can't be around each other. They all believe that Joe's the bad guy.

Joe's the primary physical aggressor in the fights that they've had, and that all the misery that she's going through in her life is because of Joe. Detectives find numerous domestic dispute calls from the Stutzman home, but the complaints tell a different story than the one they've heard from Brandy's friends. We have true evidence of documentation

that she was the abuser. We have two situations that were reported to the police where 911 was called and officers came to the scene to investigate Brandy for abusing Joe. Brandi had been arrested a couple of times for domestic violence involving Joe, most recently two days prior to the murder, where she rammed his car, and so she went to jail for that.

On November 8, Brandi Stutzman arrives at the station for a formal interview. She admits to losing her temper with Joe, but sticks by her story that they were fighting to make their marriage work. She is trying to work it out with Joe. She goes over there, they have a very nice conversation. They decide to meet as a family the following day to work out their relationship and be back together again. But when detectives turn up the heat,

Brandy begins to crack. Brandy then changes because the pressure, homicide detectives, that's what we do. We pressure you. Brandy admits that on the night of the murder, she vented about the problems in her marriage while hanging out with the juggalos at Sean's house. She says Jeremiah didn't react well to them.

He got angry. He leaves in the truck. She says I thought he was going home to where his mom lived. She finally admits that she's awakened at Sean's house by Jeremiah, about 4 o'clock in the morning. Brandy stated that Jeremiah came back and that he had blood on him on his clothes

and both surrepte pants. He admits to her that he had gone over and he had a confrontation with Joe and that he had stabbed him and that he was dead. He said, I just plan to talk to him. And he got out of hand. He came out with a knife, forced me, I had to stab him. She's hoping that it's not true that Joe's okay,

that Jeremiah's mistaken. She doesn't call 911. She goes to bed, goes to sleep. The next day, she doesn't want to go over there because she's worried, so she waits till the afternoon. Brandy tells detectives, she finally worked up the nerve to go home. That's when she discovered the body.

She said she had nothing to do with this. This was not her fault. I did not put this in motion. It was Jeremiah. Jeremiah was the one who did it. Detectives immediately bring Jeremiah in for questioning. There was going to be a lot more to this. So we were going to dig even deeper.

And we did. Coming up, details emerge about a vicious crime of passion. Somebody comes into the house wearing a mask. He's there to do no good. He's not there to scare. And a new motive comes to light. A lot of money was disappearing from his account. A lot of money was disappearing from his account. A lot of money.

Las Vegas detectives sit face-to-face with Jeremiah Maryweather, the 19-year-old boy accused by Brandy Stutzman of stabbing her husband Joe to death. Jeremiah sits down in an interview room with Detective O'Kelly. They go through the entire scenario gun again. Jeremiah is holding on to the first story. Detectives don't let up. Hey, you're being completely fingered here for what happened. Brandy's throwing you under the bus.

So you need to know this is what she's saying. Finally, Jeremiah admits that he went to Joe's house that night around 2 a.m. He explains that he had gone over to confront Joe about how he was treating Brandy. He just wanted to scare him, he wanted to confront him. He goes to the door to talk to Joe. Joe comes out with a knife.

At least, Jeremiah know other option. He pulls his knife and they get into a fight. He basically disarmed Joe by giving him the first blow. And once Joe got that fatal blow, where one of his main arteries was severed, he was bleeding to death. Jeremiah said it wasn't a murder, it was self-defense.

He laid it all on himself. He's cornered. Nobody else was involved. It was all him. Jeremiah vehemently did nigh's one more thing. He says that he doesn't cut Joe's finger off, but at one point, Joe is during the fight, is showing out my hand, my hand, my hand.

It's not the only question Jeremiah's self-defense story leaves unanswered. The problem being is he goes there wearing gloves. We know he's wearing gloves, and then Jeremiah say, well, I had my hoodie up, and I tightened it all down, so he couldn't see my face very well. Well, why are you doing that if you went there to talk to him?

So none of it makes any sense. When police pressed Jeremiah for more details, he eventually cracks. Jeremiah finally gave up this information about a powerboat. The police looked at that boat and they started searching and sure enough on the neat one of the couches they found a bag. Once the bag gets back to the criminalistik's lab, then it's carefully opened up because we're still looking at the potential for fingerprints. They take things out one at a time.

So we had a black pair of jeans. There was a long sleeve shirt. There were a couple of pair of gloves. An unexpected item retrieved from the bag deals the last blow to Jeremiah's self-defense claim. There was a Jason Golly mask, a black one. It was inside the bag. It was a Jason Goldie mask, a black one that was inside the bag. It was a hockey mask.

And so it covered his face completely. Somebody comes into the house wearing a mask. He's there to do no good. He's not there to scare. A final revelation solves the riddle of why Jeremiah had no marks on his hands. One of the most significant things about the contents of the bag was the knife. Now finally being able to see the knife. Being able to see the length of the blade, and in particular, the finger holes that were on the handle,

that completely explained why Jeremiah didn't have any injuries on himself. This is first of a remurder at his best because it shows that there was a plan. There was always a plan. It almost seemed like it was a little too planned out, which makes you wonder that he'd do this on his own. Detectives revisit Brandy and Joe's friends and learn that whatever money Joe sent or brought home was never enough

She's always constantly begging him for money even though he was giving his entire paycheck to her At one point towards the end I think he was making well over two hundred thousand dollars in sending all of it to Brandy We talked about it and he said a lot of it to Brandy. We talked about it and he said a lot of money was disappearing from his account. A lot of money. I mean, we can account for, you know, buying food, diapers and stuff like that for the family,

but when it's thousands of dollars at a time, you know, it was pretty, you know, outstanding. Like, what's going on? Discovering that Brandy and the jugalos were blowing the money he sent home was the last straw for Joe. The week that he died, he had already met with local attorney here. She had prepared his divorce petition. He came in, he signed it.

It was ready to be filed when he was murdered. That's when it came out that Joe had moved on. He came back in contact with one of his old girlfriends from his high school days, Michelle. When things started to fall apart with Brandi, Joe made contact with Michelle, and they had re-entered each other's lives and started making plans for a future.

Joe loved Michelle a lot. He was very happy when they started rekindling because of the disarray going on in his home. He was very happy. Friends say that news hit Brandy hard. Quite frankly, Joe came clean and told her exactly what was going on and why he had started this relationship with Michelle.

Well, Brandy became unglued. She became violent. She became absolutely toxic towards Joe. To the point where Joe's safety was concerned to many of his friends. If Joe left Brandy for good, her free ride would be over. She would have lost everything that she had. Here's somebody who's uneducated, note working skills whatsoever,

now with the fear of knowing that she may be a divorced woman in a very near future with no source of income, and the lifestyle that she had grown accustomed to, that is hanging out with teenagers and doing drugs and alcohol, may become to an end. The final straw for Brandy was Joe was on his way out the door

and she was going to lose her financial support. And possibly the custody of her son. That was the final straw. However, detectives discover that there was an upside for Brandy if Joe died. He had a life insurance policy. It was worth approximately $213,000 to Brandy if Joe's dead. So she gets all the property.

She gets $213,000 in cash, and she gets the child. Detectives now have many more questions for Brandy Stutzman. You go back to who's the mastermind of this? Who needs Joe dead? It's all Brandy. Brandy's the center of everything. I call her up and I said, could you come in and help us with the investigation of Joe's death?

She said, sure. Confronted with new evidence, Brandy changes her story again. She indicated that there were several plans that were devised, not by her, but by Jarmaya and the others. One was that they were just going to go in there and scare him and prop him up a little bit. The second one was that they were going to break into the house, make it look like a burglary.

She didn't think it was going to happen that it was just talk. Detectives are not buying it. At the conclusion of her second interview with law enforcement, she was placed in the custody and arrested. Prosecutors charge Brandi and Jeremiah with felony murder. But even with a murder weapon in evidence, they worry that a jury won't connect the dots between Joe, his wife, and his killer.

We had our murderer. The person that caused the death of Joe St his wife, and his killer. We had our murderer. The person that caused the death of Joe Stotsman was in Kasa, but it still didn't make any sense to us. There were things that just didn't add up. Why would Jeremiah do it instead of Bri and E? Coming up, prosecutors paint a brutal picture for the jury. You can see where he's clutching the walls, and the door, Joe Stetsman died horrifically,

in a very slow, painful death. And the question of guilt is front and center. There is no evidence of a formal plan. What else do you need? He killed him. Brandy had nothing to do with it. Clark County Nevada prosecutors hope to prove that in 2010, 31-year-old Brandy Stutzman and 19-year-old Jeremiah Maryweather conspired to kill Brandy's husband, 32-year-old Joe Stutzman for his life insurance. If they succeed, Brandy could pay the ultimate price.

She was potentially facing the death penalty. Even though she may not have been the person who actually plunged that knife into Joe's body, she set it in motion. She knew about it, and she planned it, and she was part of this conspiracy. At trial in January 2017, Brandy's defense goes on the attack. Jeremiah, they say, acted alone.

The Defences' argument was he has already confessed what else do you need? He killed him. Brandy had nothing to do with it. While she was the beneficiary of a nominal amount of life insurance, the reality of this situation is she would have obtained a lot more money from Joe if he would have remained alive.

There was no evidence that anyone helped him go to and from the crime scene. There was no evidence of a formal plan. I didn't think that she was going to be convicted. I thought Jeremiah was going to have to take the whole fall for her terrible choices. Prosecutors call a key witness to the stand. I struck a deal with Jeremiah, and you agreed to be a witness for the state.

Jeremiah tells the jury that Brandy was more than just a big sister figure. He actually used the term playing house, and he referred to it as a family unit. He enjoyed being part of that family unit while Joe Stutz was away. But Jeremiah insists under oath that it was Brandy who urged him to kill on the evening of November 6, 2010.

The night of the murder before Joe got killed, Brandy was actually, according to Jeremiah, fixing his hair, braiding his hair, and telling him how much this would mean to her. If he did this for her, he was going to save her family. He clearly wasn't loved with her, thought the world of her always doing things for her, cooking for her, taking care of her son. And that played such a powerful manipulation into Purgier Jeremiah's head.

Prossacuters say when Brandi went to the Stutzman home at 1130 that same night, it wasn't to get diapers. She went to dose Joe with sleeping pills. Brandi went over to the house that night to see what condition Joe was in. He's fallen asleep while they were talking. So now she's able to go back to Jeremiah and go, now's the time, because he's not easy to be out of it. Jeremiah returned to the house, wearing gloves and a hockey mask.

Despite the pills, Joe fought back hard, but it was too late. He was on his feet. He hit the ground outside. He got back on his feet. You could see where he's clutching the walls. And the door, he's on his feet. He makes it inside. He hits the island.

He goes back down. There was a lot of stabbing and a lot of cutting gun. Joe's that's been died horrifically. It was extremely severe. As a reporter, you're sitting in the courtroom. You put up the pictures of this man's body, and it was gruesome. It was very disturbing to look at.

On February 2nd, the jury reaches a verdict. The jury came back where I'd're quickly finding her guilty of murder in the first degree. The judge sentences Brandy to life. Brandy Stutzman will never step out of a prison wall for the rest of her natural life. I was relieved that they found her guilty. She was the main factor in this.

The death of her guilty. She was the mean factor in this, the death of her husband. A question that neither the defense nor the prosecution can answer remains. What happened to Joe's missing ring finger? I absolutely, to this day, believe that Jeremiah took the finger to Brandy and said it's finished. She knew exactly how to pick the individuals that she needed to do her dirty deed. She would focus her attention by manipulating these young kids, impressionable teenagers. This is evil at its best. For Joe's friends and family,

there's one thing that gives them peace. We just need to remember Joe for what he's done, how he affected other people's lives, and how happy he made people around him, and how, you know, he had been such a good friend to me and to everyone else. I won him to be remembered for the benefit that he did for the Air Force and the guys

over in Afghanistan. Because he wanted to make a difference in life, he was kind and loving. And I think most people that knew him would have tested that. Jerem Maya Maryweather was sentenced to 21 years to life and is serving his life sentence at Love Lock Correctional Center in Nevada. Randy's father has custody of Brandy and Joe's son, Aaron.

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