True Crime with Kimbyr - PART 1 Online Date Ends In Murder - The Horrifying Case of Samantha Lezark | True Crime Stories

Episode Date: January 2, 2026

In True Crime with Kimbyr, Kimbyrleigha unpacks the chilling story of Samantha Lezark, whose seemingly ordinary online date ended in tragedy. From the first messages to the shocking final moments, this case exposes the danger lurking behind digital connections. True Crime with Kimbyr examines the motives, warning signs, and devastating consequences that turned a hopeful night into a horrifying murder. Through compassionate storytelling and detailed investigation, Kimbyrleigha highlights the human impact behind the headlines, asking the haunting question: how could someone so ordinary become entangled in such a dark and deadly encounter? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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but as they say, don't believe everything you see on the internet. Hi everyone, welcome back to my channel. My name is Kimberlea. If you've never been here before, nice to finally meet you. I'd like to introduce you to Samantha Joe. Butler. Samantha was born on May 13th, 1974 to Joe and Sharon Butler in Warwicka, Oklahoma. Samantha was the oldest of three children. She had two brothers, Joe Butler Jr. and Lance. Considering Samantha was the only girl, she had a very close relationship with her mom. They were best friends. Samantha was definitely a mama's girl. She did everything with her mom. They just had this unbreakable bond. And as Samantha grew up, that bond only got stronger.

Sharon was Samantha's confidant, her support system, and her biggest fan. Samantha was a very happy child. She loved to dance and to sing, and she was always flashing her big, toothy smile. Her laugh was contagious, and she grew up to be a very kind and loving young woman who was loved by all of her friends and family and her animals, because she loved animals, especially kittens and cats. And maybe you could say she was kind of obsessive. with cats, everything was about cats. She was known to treat her cats better than she treated herself.

She considered them her children. A lot of us do that. I consider my dogs kind of like my children, but I still treat them like dogs. Growing up, Samantha was very responsible. She actually helped her mom with her little baby brother, Lance, and she practically raised him. She would help her mom take care of him so that her mom could work, and she learned how to do everything. She was like a mini-mommie. She learned how to cook and wash clothes. She absolutely loved caring for children. and she loved caring for the elderly as well she just really enjoyed being of service to others and this may have been due to her upbringing she was from a small town called tarrell oklahoma it's a very very small town the population was under 400 people back in the year 2000

tarrell is a farming town it's close to the texas oklahoma boundary line but it is super small this is a tiny little area when i looked on the map the only thing that came up was a casino a mini mart and a public school. But as I zoomed in a little closer, it's hard to look like a town, but still a very small town. Everything just fit into this tiny square. Now I'm not going to say just because you come from a small town that you're sheltered. But as you can see, there's only a couple churches, a post office, a cafe, and we're looking at this on Google Maps in 2022. So it's easy to say there wasn't much to do in this small town. Samantha's family was religious and she was raised the same. They attended church on a regular basis and she was raised in that religious upbringing. If you're from this area,

please correct me if I'm wrong, but when I looked, there was only one school. One. One school from kindergarten all the way up through high school. Terrell Public School. There it is. That's the name of it. I don't think I've ever talked about a town of this small in one of my videos. This is a town that Samantha grew up in. This is all she knew. This right here is literally the street that the school is on. You can see what it looks like right there, and it's almost like a dirt road. It doesn't even look paved. Samantha spent a lot of her time around her family. She wasn't really interested in boys and dating until she met the love of her life in high school.

His name, John Lazark. They met in 1988 when Samantha was just 14 years old, and he was a senior, so it was a little bit older than she was. There are some people who go on a lot of dates. They get into a bunch of different relationships, kind of play with. the field and maybe they don't even get married until their late 30s or later. And there's nothing wrong with that. But then there's people like Samantha who just fall in love and fall hard and never want to let that person go. Her and John were high school sweethearts. They were inseparable. She loved John more than anything. Maybe even more than her cats, but I'm not

sure about that. Samantha really didn't start out having much of a rebellious attitude. However, it could be seen that way because she wanted to get married to John. She thought he was the one and John felt the same way. It's tough because they know nothing else. I know how powerful emotions can be, especially after puberty. And this love can feel real. And it is real. But adults usually know it could end.

And her parents only wanted the best for her. So they didn't exactly agree. They thought that she and John were a little too young. She was only 20 years old. But Samantha was going to have it her way. Nothing could stop her and John. They were in love. and she told her mother she was never going to stop loving him no matter what.

So they end up getting married on May 10th, 1994. Samantha Butler became Samantha Lizark. And it was a very happy time. Soon after marriage, the couple wanted a place of their own, of course they did. And to see what life was like outside of their little town. So they decide to move to Wichita Falls, Texas. It was far enough to feel like they were on their own, but close enough that Samantha could still see her mom anytime. she wanted. It was about a 40-minute drive, like a straight shot right from one place to the other.

So they moved into a decent size, two-story home and had four bedrooms, two bathrooms. But you could get a lot for your money there. And I looked at this house. It's located at 1651 Huff Street, Wichita Falls, Texas. It's close to 2,000 square feet, and it's cute. It did need some work, but it has a nice porch out front with a swing, hardwood floors, nice-sized bedrooms, a fireplace, and a really large lot, about 8,500 square feet. So they move in, they're happily married, and over the years, Samantha really grew into herself. She knew who she was, what she wanted, and she wasn't afraid to show it. She loved reading books, music, rock music, TV shows, and tattoos.

Her mom thought the tattoos were Samantha's vice, and her mom certainly didn't like them, but she would never admit that to Samantha because she loved everything about her daughter. even if she didn't particularly like it. The mother-daughter pair loved festivals. They would actually still attend festivals together, and this one in the picture I'm showing you looks like it could be a Renaissance festival. They look adorable with the flower crowns and the little dresses. And like I said, they were very close.

Even after she moved away, Samantha kept in touch with her mom on a daily basis. It was actually their morning routine. As soon as they woke up, one of them would call the other and they would talk on the phone or they would even put their webcams on and start their day on video with each other. Samantha also found a job as a cashier at a local Albertsons, and this is a grocery store chain. This might sound funny to some of us, but the town she lived in was a close-knit community, and she was very well known at the grocery store that she worked at, so much so that there were customers who would specifically go to Albertsons on the day she was working

an only request to check out in Samantha's checkout line. It was because she was so friendly and caring and helpful. She just had that personality that drew people to her. If you were in a bad mood, she knew how to cheer you up. I love people like that because I can get in a mood. I'm introverted, so it takes a lot. You've got to get me out of my shell. I bet she could be the person to do that. Samantha made friends very quickly, and two of her closest friends were Terry Perez and Lisa Prine. They all worked together at Albertsons, and she considered Lisa her best friend. They would hang out all the time. Samantha was a lot of fun.

She was a free spirit, and that's something that matched Lisa's personality. They liked to dress pretty uniquely. They would put outfits together, and it was based on what they liked. They didn't care if other people didn't like it. They had the black lipstick, the fishnets, the rocker kind of vibe, and Samantha was very confident. She didn't mind if people hated on her choices, whether it was her outfits or her hair. tattoos Samantha wore them proudly. Her tattoos were very special to her. She had fairies on her arms and then she had one in her chest with a heart. She reminds me of a cute fairy because of her

cute little fairy hairstyle right here. And the tattoo on her chest with the heart and the fairy was for John. It said always in my heart. I'm wondering, do you have any tattoos? I love listening to the meaning behind people's tattoos. Tattoo tours of people's body are such cool videos. So let me know about yours below if you have one. This one right here is very meaningful to me. Most of my tattoos are meaningful. I got this one to represent what I do on this channel. It is a planchette from a Ouichi board. But the most meaningful tattoo I have is this one right here that says actually my boyfriend John has the matching one and we got them together. So just like Samantha, we all have something very deep and meaningful that we want to show on the outside. Samantha's husband John went to school to

specialize in appliance repair after high school, specifically repairing refrigerators, and eventually he got a job in that industry. Before that, he was a mechanic, and unfortunately, he hurt his back pretty severely. He was underneath a car working on it, and the car literally fell on top of his body. And he ended up having a major back injury because of this, so he would undergo treatments for years to come. And that was something that Samantha was always supportive of, as caring as she was. She did what she could to make him feel as comfortable as possible after this injury. Things seemed like they were going well for the couple, and toward the end of 2001, a close friend of Samantha's was in need, and it's Samantha's nature to help. Christy had been Samantha's best

friend for years. She was always there to lend an ear when Christy was dealing with things, and now Christy was dealing with a breakup of her marriage. So one night, she comes to Samantha's doorstep crying. And Samantha had more than enough room in her house. She had four bedrooms. So she welcomed Christy inside and she gave her place to stay. Of course she did and a shoulder to cry on. Well, one day when Samantha came home, she noticed someone else was giving Christy a shoulder to cry on, maybe more. And I really hate these things. I really do. But Samantha got out of work early that afternoon and her husband John and her BFF Christy they weren't expecting her to come home.

When she walked in, they were sitting on the couch, and John's arm was around her best friend, Christy, and his other hand was on her thigh. It just makes me so upset, especially considering how deep Samantha's love for John is. Samantha may have been a little naive at first. She didn't think that either one of them could do anything like that to her. She called her mom, and she told her what she witnessed.

She was in denial at first. She just said to her mom Sharon, well, I walked in and they kind of looked surprised, but she just kept telling her mom, there's no way that they would do that to me. This is my best friend and my husband. I love him more than anything. Well, after Samantha and Sharon had that talk, Samantha decided to confront John. They knew each other so well. They had been together for 13 years at this time and married for eight. It's true. Samantha had noticed that Christy and John were closer than she was comfortable with for quite some time. But I guess she just let it go because she didn't want that to be true. But when she asked him, are you cheating on me? He finally admitted it. And not only that, John has the audacity to tell Samantha that he's in love with Christy. And I can't even begin to imagine because I think cheating is one of the worst things that someone can do to you. It is such a deep betrayal, especially when you are married. Samantha was in unimaginable pain and she turned right to her mom for support. Sharon could not believe it. How devastating was this? You lose your best friend,

the person that you would go to for everything, a person that you built memories with, someone that she can't easily replace and then also the love of her life? She loses both of them at once. Not only that, John decides to move out, which is a good thing, but he moves in with Christy because now Christy is his new girlfriend. Samantha is left all alone in this big house that she made eight years of memories in with her husband. All of this was happening in the summer of 2002. And what happened after this was just absolutely devastating, especially to those who love Samantha so much. Samantha couldn't get over it. She didn't want to live anymore because her life revolved around the man that she thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with.

The people that were close to her had never experienced someone in so much emotional pain. The first couple months that all of this was going down, she didn't see John that much. And in those months, she did a lot of drinking. She spent a lot of time alone and she was in a very unhealthy place mentally. But it got worse because when you're in this vulnerable state of mind, you can be taken advantage of by a person who just hurt you. Even though John had been moved out and seemingly moved on, they were still officially married. They were not divorced yet. They were just merely separated. So that gave John the ability to walk in and out of Samantha's life any time he wanted to. If he got in a little argument or a little tiff with

Christy guess where he would go to Samantha's and Samantha would invite him in with open arms because that's the type of person she was and she might have thought in the back of her mind they could have had a chance to get back together we won't know exactly what that entailed but John could have given her reasons to believe that to get what he wanted so now Samantha was the mistress Samantha's the girl on the side while he's having a relationship with her best friend this back and forth It was wearing on Samantha. And unfortunately, one night she ended up in the hospital because she drank too much and she took pills.

Luckily, she was rushed to the hospital in time and her stomach was pumped and they were able to save her life. After losing Christy as a friend, Lisa and Terry became closer and closer with Samantha. They would keep an eye on her. I could imagine how worried they would be, how scared they would be about their friend, knowing what happened. Lisa was really protective over Samantha. She wanted the best for her friend. She knew that Samantha really deserved the best. She wanted her to be happy. And after a while, Samantha being a resilient person, things started to change for the better. There are stages of heartbreak and grief. Just like the stages of grief for losing someone when they pass away, those same stages are present when we lose someone to something like an affair. You have to go through those different stages. And on the other side of those stages, many people find a new life. Even a new awakening.

Being alone and having time to heal can actually build a person up. They can eventually be happier alone and realize maybe it wasn't meant to be. That was what was happening to Samantha. She had this new found freedom. It was good. It was good for her and her soul and her mental health. and she was spending a lot more time with her friends and her cats. She was even trying to be open to the possibility that she could love again.

I don't know if you can relate, but I can. I've been through that phase of losing someone thinking, you're not ever going to be able to go on. And then learning, you can love again. You can find true love, even more than you had before, with someone better. And everyone around Samantha was really happy for her. They were supportive of her getting out there and possibly dating again. And that's exactly what she planned to do.

It was the early 2000s. I don't know if you can remember back to everything that was going on at that time. If you're my age, you probably do remember the late 90s, the early 2000s. It was a pivotal time in my life. One new thing that emerged in the late 90s were chat rooms. Do you remember America Online? AOL? It was basically the only social media back that.

or at least one of the biggest. It grew to 70 million users in 1999. One of the ways that people used to talk was through a messaging service called AOL Instant Messenger, also known as AIM. Just think of it as DMs or like Facebook messaging. It's instant and in the moment.

So if you're both online at the same time, it'll show that and you'll see each other's messages coming in like texts. But there weren't profiles. It didn't have anything like that. However, you did have a username. So if you wanted to, let's say, chat with someone you knew, one of your friends after school, you could just give them your username, your aim name.

Yep. And they could type it in and start a chat with you. Since I know I have viewers of all ages and I love nostalgia, I'm going to explain this for one second because it is pivotal that you understand chat rooms and what Samantha was doing to understand the devastating circumstances surrounding Samantha's death. This is what a chat room listing would look like back in the day. Over here on the left, it says created by people. These are the different rooms, if you will. So you would pick one that interests you. You could do food, friends, games, etc.

You can see all the lists right here. On the upper right-hand side, it says chat with people like you. And then it names things like piercings, tattoos, Elvis sightings, Britney fans. This is a real screenshot of, AOL back then. America Online knew who you were and what you liked. So they would try to match you with people like you. This is how you would start an instant message with someone. You would meet them in the chat room first if you weren't already friends with them. And again, there were no pictures. It's just your name. That's it. No one could really tell who you were, which can be a good thing.

But a lot of times, it's a very bad and dangerous thing. Once you find a chat room of interest, you would join. You know, I watch my daughter play Roblox and they are all chatting and this little chat box comes up and has their username. That reminds me so much of chat rooms from back in the day. This is kind of what it looks like here on my screen. You just have people chatting and they're just kind of responding to one another. They're talking about whatever the topic is. As you're having these conversations, naturally one or two or many might develop into something more like a friendship. And when that happens, you can move your conversation to a private message, which is where instant messenger would come in. And once you do that, the chat looks like this between you and the

other person. Believe it or not, I used to be in chat rooms when I was 12. And looking back, it wasn't really that safe. I don't even know who I was talking to. You, you don't know who you're talking to. You could potentially email them a picture, but a lot of times I don't even remember caring what somebody looked like. It was very liberating knowing that you could just be yourself and if you connected with someone on more of a personality level, it boosted your confidence because they liked you for you. Going back to Samantha, she was 28 years old at the time. She wasn't a child. And with all the free time that she had without John around, she started to spend a lot of time in chat rooms. Samantha's username was Meow Mix 28 because she loved cats and she was 20.

years old. Samantha liked to spend time on Yahoo Messenger, which is pretty much the exact same thing I just explained. It's like AOM from AOL. It's just a different service. Being online really seemed to make Samantha happy. It was helping her get over the pending divorce with John because that was currently going on. She's trying to get it finalized. So following the summer months, when you're getting more into the fall season like we are now and into the holidays, a lot of people experience seasonal depression. They go through a time where, I don't know, they don't have anyone close to them during the holidays and everybody else is celebrating. It's a time where you want to share with someone. And this was around the time that Samantha started to use

the chat rooms and messenger more and more. Lisa had noticed a change and it was a positive one in Samantha. So of course, she asked her, is there someone new in your life? What's going on? And that's when Samantha told her about the chat rooms. This was a new thing back then, guys. Not a lot of people were doing this. Lisa was just listening and trying to understand the appeal. Samantha, on the other hand, couldn't stop talking about it. She was telling her all about her username, how she was starting to meet guys.

And Lisa was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. When you say you're meeting guys, you're meeting them online, but you're not meeting them in person, right? You're not letting people come over to your house. people don't know where you live, right? Well, from Lisa's tone, Samantha could tell that she wasn't thrilled. And if this were the case, Samantha figured she probably had to lie. Because Samantha was meeting people in person. She knew her friends were very protective over her because of what happened just a few months ago with the incident that sent her to the hospital and for other reasons as well. They cared about her. I think any of us would think meeting someone anonymously that you don't know.

You don't even know what they look like. And meeting them in person is pretty risky. Yeah, you don't realize how risky it really is. Even nowadays. Even though we can see people. But at least we can verify their identity, talk to them over FaceTime. It's still a risk because you're meeting a stranger. And coming from a small town, just going through a divorce,

with the man she thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with. I think it was exhilarating because that's what her friend said. They said they didn't want to burst her bubble. They could tell she was excited. But at the same time, they were a little concerned. However, it seemed like everything was going just fine because eventually she did tell Lisa and her mom and others that she was indeed going out on dates in real life with men that she met online.

This was going on for a few months now. And most of the time, the dates were short-lived. Maybe she would go to dinner, catch a movie. Maybe they would go over to each other's houses and hang out. But then it was done. Her friends weren't meeting these men. They were just hearing about them. There were some people who saw these men.

Her neighbors. Because again, this was a close-knit community church going in other people's business all the time. Mm-hmm. I guess you could say Samantha was a little bit more on the wild side compared to some of her neighbors in the area. So they definitely took note of the revolving door of men. They were kind of going in and out. The houses were pretty close together.

You can see right here in the neighborhood. It's not hard to know what your neighbor is doing. You can see them coming and going. And they can be a little judgmental. You know how that goes. The question is, are Samantha's neighbors really being judgmental? Or are they being observant? We know that Samantha's coworkers were being observant

because a lot of her coworkers were also close friends. it wasn't hard for them to observe something on the morning of January 6, 2003. You thought this was your run club era. Turns out, it was more of a thinking about run club era. The good news? Someone's marathon training is about to start. Sell your workout gear on Deepop. Just snap a few photos and we'll take care of the rest.

They get their race day fit and you get a payout for trying. Someone on Deepop wants what you've got. Start selling now. Deepop, where taste recognizes taste. Samantha didn't show up to work on time, and her friends got concerned. I told you, they know what happened just a few months ago when she ended up in the hospital.

Everyone knew her business, that she was going through a divorce, and that her husband cheated on her with her best friend. She wasn't in the best state of mind. She was dating random men from chat rooms, the Albertsons, the grandparents, worked at was only six minutes away from Samantha's house. There wasn't really any reason for her to be late. It was very unusual. About 15 or 20 minutes go by and Terry volunteers to go over Samantha's to check on her. Terry's husband had just dropped her off at work, so she called him back

and she says, hey, come pick me back up. We need to drive over Samantha's. So the two of them get to Samantha's house, 1651 Huff Street in Wichita Falls. They park the car and they walk up her porch steps. They get to the screen door and they open it and knock. They didn't get an answer. They decided to check and see if the door was unlocked and it was. So they let themselves inside. Terry and her husband John make their way through the front door and into the living room looking for Samantha and calling her name. They couldn't find her so they went upstairs. As soon as Terry entered one of the upstairs bedrooms, she saw something. and we can tell when something doesn't look right.

We don't have to look long. It only takes a second to realize that something is not natural, that it's not normal, that something's wrong. And from Terry's vantage point, she could see her friend Samantha lying on the floor in a very awkward position. But what really stood out was the blood, the bright red blood against the cream-colored carpet

in Samantha's bedroom. There was no question in Terry and John's minds. Samantha was deceased. Terry immediately calls 911 and at approximately 9.55 a.m. officers of the Wichita Falls Police Department were dispatched to Samantha's residence. Upon their arrival, officers made contact with Terry and John Perez. Terry immediately let them know that she was a co-worker of Samantha's and her husband John and her had just stumbled upon her body. It was in an upstairs bedroom. One of the first officers on scene happened to be a rookie cop, and his name was Officer White.

All he was told was that somebody found a body, so everyone in the department rushes over. The first thing that the officers notice is that Terry and John looked very upset. They were distraught. They were shocked. Officers had their weapons drawn, and they went through the house room, room clearing it, making sure there were no perpetrators, no criminals, nobody dangerous inside

that could harm them. They're making their way upstairs where they were told that Samantha's body could be found. Officer White had never seen a deceased female before. He had never been involved in a case like this, especially something so violent. This was his first time, and it was shocking. It's something that stays with you whether or not you are a rookie. But I think that you will understand the magnitude when I explain what he saw upon entering and encountering Samantha's body. There was no question that this was a homicide.

The next step is to establish a crime scene. This is when officers will put up the crime scene tape all around the premises and wait for forensics to arrive. Then the case will be handed over to the detectives and forensic technicians who will be walking through the scene, collecting evidence, and trying to determine what happened to Samantha. Detective Tony Fox of the Wichita Falls Police Department was assigned as the lead investigator on Samantha's case. No matter how seasoned you are as a detective or an investigator or even a forensic technician, nothing prepares you for this. We're human beings.

when you see another human being lifeless, just taken away, no longer a person because they're a shell of who they once were without that personality shining through, you know that this is someone's daughter. Could be someone's sister, somebody's mother. You have no idea. You can try to be as strong as possible, but you're still human. It's difficult for everyone that was working on this case to see Samantha in the shape that she was in. So this is the scene that Detective Fox walked into. And I'm going to be as detailed as possible so I can give you the best description of everything Detective Fox saw when he walked into that room. But first I should note that the detectives did a sweep of the first floor of Samantha's house before they went upstairs.

And one of the most important things investigators need to do is take pictures of everything the way they saw it. and as you can see, I'm going to show you some pictures. Nothing looked amiss in the living room. You can see a couch. There is a bunch of pillows on top of it. Nothing really looks out of place. There's a blanket on the floor maybe. That's what it looks like here.

Nothing is knocked over. It doesn't look like any struggle happened here in this area. Then moving further into the living room, you can see one is Samantha's little cats on the table. I got sad when I saw that picture because I know how much she loved her cats. There are a pair of shoes to the left. And actually what looks like a bowl of Halloween candy. Do you see that sitting on the coffee table? This looks like an ottoman may be covered in a green blanket with some stars on it,

followed by her brick fireplace. Nothing amiss here. It looks like everything is very organized. She's got a lot of figurines, memorabilia, photos up on the wall, and it looks like she's got some stuffed animals on the top of her entertainment console. And a cat tree to the right as well. Officers didn't find any force entry on the doors of Samantha's home or the windows. Nothing looked like it had been pried open.

The kitchen was clean and organized. Dishes were done. I also noticed a People Magazine or some kind of gossip magazine there on the kitchen. I just took note of it because I used to read those all the time. The downstairs bathroom off the kitchen looked organized and nothing out of the ordinary there. The stairs themselves didn't have any blood on them. It didn't look like anything happened in the downstairs area, moving up the stairs. but it's when they come to that upstairs bedroom where Samantha was found.

They realize that the struggle was contained in that bedroom. And that was going to be their main focus. Right before entering the bedroom, there looks to be a pair of shoes as well as a spray bottle with water inside or a substance that's clear and looks like water. And you can also see Samantha's glasses. In the corner, it looks like there could be another pair of shoes that are black, other shoes. See in the corner of this picture here, but I can't tell for sure. Just about a foot and a half from where their shoes are is Samantha's head. In parallel to that is her hand, and it's outstretched

and bent. And then there's a pool of blood. She was lying on her side with her head facing the opening of the door and her legs outstretched forward. Her legs were spread apart in a V-shape. She was wearing a t-shirt and jeans and white socks. There appeared to be blood smears and black grease on the pant legs of her jeans. Her shirt was either a crop top or it had been pulled up, whether within the struggle or when she fell to her final resting place. So her entire midrift was showing from about the bottom of her breasts all the way down past her navel, going down a little bit above the hip area. and then her jeans covered the rest of her body from the waist all the way down to her ankles, and then she was wearing white socks.

The pool of blood began at the top of Samantha's head. It was in the back, and it went all the way down, down near her midrift. She was laying on her right side, and the left side of her upper back was against the bottom portion of the bed frame. So she was lying with her right shoulder down on the floor. part of her body propped up against the bed frame and her waist was twisted to the left. Her legs were sprawled out like I said in this really awkward V shape because she was twisted. She wasn't flat against the floor. However, the right side of her head was flat to the floor.

Her hair was short at the time and it was matted to her head because of the blood. In the back of her head is where the blood was coming from. This was not a small pool like I said. it's a pretty extensive area of the carpet, all the way behind her head a few inches back, if not a few feet under the bed, down her back towards her midrift. Her right arm was in an L shape, so it was kind of like that, and her head was parallel to it like this. Her left arm was bent over her waist and just hanging over her body. It looked as though the mattress of the bed had been pushed so that it wasn't even and

matching up with a box spring underneath. And this was probably due to the struggle that ensued. That's about the only thing that looks out of place besides some smaller items around the room. One thing I did take note of was that Samantha had a lot of sneakers, a lot of sketchers sneakers throughout her entire house. Hardly any of them looked like they had been completely worn. This might have been due to Christmas presents that she could have received since Christmas was just a couple weeks before this happened. And she stood all day as a cashier, so wouldn't be out of the ordinary that people would gift her comfortable. shoes. Walking further into the room and closer to Samantha, it is evident that there is some kind of

ligature around her neck. And upon closer inspection, detectives realize this is a coaxial cable. You may or may not be familiar with what these are. I'm going to show you on the screen because I'm pretty sure most of you know. This is exactly what the one around Samantha's neck looked like. It was either white or beige, some kind of cream color, and it had two gold or copper-looking metal ends. Plain and simple, these are electrical cables. They have an inner and an outer portion. They consist of a copper core wire and it's wrapped in insulation and then covered with woven copper and then on top is an outer plastic sheath. They can be used as telephone lines, broadband internet cables, they can be used for high speed internet connections, any kind of data transmission, cable television, radio

transmission, that kind of thing. I think you might recognize the end of these cables where they usually connect with other connectors. They're very thick cables. They're strong. They're not something that can be easily broken. And the cable was long enough to be wrapped multiple times around Samantha's neck very tightly. From what the detectives could see, it looked like it had been wrapped three or four times. And then it was tied in the front at the base of her throat in a square knot. And this is a very specific kind of knot you tie in rope. It consists of of using two loose ends that are tied together in a very secure manner. After the knot is tied, it leaves the end sticking out from either side. And there are a couple of specific places

that individuals can learn to use square knots or that they would be useful. I grew up living on a sailboat and I definitely had to learn a square knot, although we called it a reef knot. Another place would be in the military or Boy Scouts, survival training. It's sometimes referred to as a Hercules knot. It's very strong and it got its name at least 4,000 years ago when sailors would use it to tie down sails on their ships in strong winds. No pun intended, but using a knot like this in Samantha's circumstances is completely going overboard. It's excessive and it was done almost for effect for a show or a symbol and not for effectiveness. Clearly Samantha wasn't going to be able to go anywhere in the condition that she was in because clearly she had been struck in the back

of the head. Detectives are pretty sure they know what was used to strike Samantha. As crime scene technicians were able to move Samantha to get a full understanding of the extent of her injuries, they were able to see that the injury to her head was very severe and on the floor right next to her left leg was a fire extinguisher. Now this isn't a full-size fire extinguisher that you would see in like a building or anything like that. It was a smaller one that you might find in an apartment or a home underneath the sink. And when they inspected it, the fire extinguisher had blood and hair on it. And it also seemed to have fingerprints in blood. Compared to a crime that consists of maybe a firearm, something that, you know, could be done easily and quickly.

This took time. This is personal. This was a crime where the perpetrator had to stand face to face with Samantha. When they were tying that knot, it was in the front of her. There was also defensive wounds to Samantha's hands, so her hands were hit, possibly with the same item that was used to hit her on the back of the head. Upon further inspection, there were blood droplets that were still wet on the bed spread. On top of the bed, which was made and did not look like it was slept in, was something that caught Detective's eye. It's stood out. It definitely looked like it was out of place. It also looked like it had been placed there on the bed after Samantha was killed. Or at least after the blood droplets had fallen to the

bed spread. It was a small gold laser pointer keychain. As you can see from this photo, it is actually laying on top of a blood droplet, but it doesn't appear to have any blood on it, which is very strange. There were no other significant pieces of evidence in this room. However, they did take pictures of the floor around Samantha's body, which included several pair of shoes, slippers, stuffed animals, as well as her closet, which consisted of clothing and a number of sketcher shoe boxes with several new pairs of shoes inside. The crime scene technicians go ahead and fingerprint the TV cable that's wrapped around Samantha's neck, the fire extinguisher, and other places around the bedroom, along with collecting blood samples for analysis. Another significant

portion of the house where investigators spent a lot of their time collecting evidence was at Samantha's computer desk. It was evident that she spent a lot of time in this area. They even take the computer in for forensic analysis. And now detectives need to step outside of Samantha's house and into her neighborhood to canvas the area and find out if anyone close by saw anything. Meanwhile, Samantha's father was notified and Samantha's mom was on her way to work. Sharon had just barely gotten in the door to her office when Joe called her to tell her to come home quick. He bluntly told her that someone had killed Samantha. Sharon went into complete shock.

As advanced as our minds are as human beings, even the human mind can't comprehend something so shocking. She didn't understand the words that she was hearing. Why would anyone want to hurt her daughter? How could it be real? Samantha's mom was never able to come to terms with what happened because a huge piece of her was taken away. She was never the same. I watched a clip of her mom talking about this moment and I can tell you, I don't know what she was like before, but there was just an emptiness about Sharon. Something's missing.

It's almost like the reason for Sharon to live isn't there anymore. She knew that she just wasn't there to protect her daughter. in those last moments, Samantha was alone. And sometimes as a parent, you can't help but feel like you failed, even though this is not Sharon's fault. Someone else who loved and cared about Samantha also got the news. Poor Lisa. And she had to put two and two together herself because she gets a phone call from a friend.

And all he said was turn on the news. And when Lisa did, she saw Samantha's house on the screen and the yellow tape around it. and she too went into shock. She fell to the floor. She was numb. She could not believe what was going on. Why would anyone want to do something like this?

She hadn't even figured out what happened yet, but she knew from the headlines she knew. She had just spoken to Samantha the night before, so she just couldn't comprehend how quickly something like this could occur. You already know Samantha's other close friend, Terry. She was the one who found her. She provides a statement to the police, not only about everything that happened when she entered the premises,

but since Terry worked with Samantha, she knew things about her personal life. She told police everything we already know about her husband, John, how they met, what had happened in their marriage, how it fell apart, the attempt on her life, everything. But she also tells them something we don't know. As much as Samantha kind of wanted John out of her life at this point, there was something that was keeping him in her life.

life, something that caused them to get into a major argument just two weeks earlier. Samantha was trying to tie up some loose ends when it came to everything in their relationship because she was trying to move forward in the process of their whole divorce unfolding. She was taking John off of her health insurance. And as I mentioned to you before, John, he suffered that severe accident when the car fell on top of him. The medical bills were thousands of dollars. John could not afford them without really good health insurance, which Samantha had. But Samantha didn't think it was fair that he was still receiving benefits when his actions

destroyed their marriage. Well, this did not go over well with John. He was irate. He was furious. Enraged maybe because according to Samantha, she told her friends that he was yelling in her face saying that he's screwed. He told Samantha, there is no way that I'm going to afford those benefits. And during that argument, Samantha told her friends that he said something to the effect of,

I'm going to take everything away from you. This definitely raised a red flag. This is a volatile relationship. Clearly, John doesn't have a problem hurting Samantha emotionally. So could he have hurt her physically? They have to bring him in for questioning. Meanwhile, they're spreading out to begin to interview Samantha's neighbors. I feel like a broken record because I say it every single time, but it's a part of these investigations. You're going to have to have the person who is the closest to the victim come in for questioning, and they're usually the number one prime focus in the beginning of these investigations until otherwise noted. Investigators are looking for anything, for everything, actually. They're watching his body language, the tone of his voice,

the way that he's reacting to certain questions, and his physical appearance. When John comes in, They're asking him questions. But one of the most vital questions was in regard to what happened in their relationship. He explained that they got separated July 4th, 2002, but that their relationship was fine. They got along. Detectives press him about the health insurance and he says, yeah, you know what? We got into somewhat of a disagreement, but we figured it out. She wasn't going to take me off of the health insurance.

And he was adamant that he never yelled at her. He didn't threaten her in any way. like her friend said that she said he did. Maybe she blew it out of proportion. But as he's telling this, the detectives, they look down at his hands, and they notice that he's got some small cuts, and that was concerning.

They say, hey, John, what's going on with your hands? How did you get those little scratches? And he says, oh, these, I was trying to plug something in behind a table, and my knuckles, they hit the wall, and the skin kind of just scraped off. That's how he said,

he got those injuries. I'm going to show it to you on the screen. Here they are. But on top of all that, he gives an alibi. He says that on January 5th, the night of the murder, he was with his girlfriend, Christy. Remember Christy? The one that basically had an affair right in front of Samantha's face in her own home, the one that he's now living with. Christy becomes his alibi witness. And I was in there thinking, what if this was some kind of plan? If you were so in love, would you possibly lie for your lover? Of course. There are people that have done that. If you haven't watched the video about Wendy Trebaga, I will put it in the description box. Please watch it after this. I'll put in the cards too and at the end of this video. Love can make you do some crazy things. So all of this

is looking very suspicious to detectives. You got this man who cheats. He's now living with the girlfriend that he cheated with. He's got cuts on his hands. The friends say that he threatened Samantha because she was going to take him off the health insurance. And he's not. He's not. He's not. He's not. He's was going to cost him thousands of dollars. Having your new girlfriend as your alibi witness saying that you guys were just home together that night is not really good. It's not a concrete alibi. So they ask him for his DNA and he gives it to them. At this point, as in a lot of other investigations, they can't sit there and waste their time on one individual. They have so many other places that they need to look, people they need to talk to. And they can't hold him right now.

They don't have anything for that. So they got to to let him go. However, before he walks out of the station, detectives want to know, can he think of anyone that would want to kill his estranged wife? And the next thing he says, kind of sounds like he's saying it out of jealousy or animosity, because even in this moment where he just found out that the woman that at least he used to love is deceased, he says, you know what? I told her she needed to stop messing around with those guys online. It's dangerous. It's real risky. She could get tangled up with some dangerous people. Investigators kind of want to know more about this, but John doesn't really have any details. He just says, listen, she said she was seeing people

meeting them from online and that was that. Investigators have a lot they need to check out. His alibi, the DNA, and they need to confirm whether it was true. Was Samantha involved with people online? They also think maybe John is just trying to take the attention off of him, since more than one person has pointed their fingers saying that he could have wanted to hurt Samantha. Terry's husband John Perez was in agreement about Terry's statement, and he confirmed that Terry was a good friend of Samantha's, that she knew a lot about Samantha's personal life. And in regard to John, he says, I'm just the husband of one of Samantha's very good friends. But he had been there all along hearing everything that was going on in Samantha's life, so he confirmed

that all of those things had happened and that everything that Terry said happened when they got to the premises was also correct.