True Crime with Kimbyr - Part 2: Halloween Bloodbath: Two Murders, One Night of Terror!

Episode Date: November 12, 2025

In part two of True Crime with Kimbyr, Kimbyrleigha takes us deeper into the haunting aftermath of the Halloween night murders. As detectives arrive at the blood-soaked scene, the search begins for the monster who shattered a small town’s sense of safety. What clues did he leave behind and why did he strike with such brutality? From shocking forensic discoveries to a suspect hiding in plain sight, Kimbyr unravels every twist of this chilling investigation. As the truth comes to light, one question lingers: how do you ever feel safe again when evil was already inside? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 911 call was questionable. Personally, I don't think we can blame someone for wanting to get into their car, physically leave a house where they just saw two of their friends dead. She was terrified. She relayed to the dispatcher, oh my God, they're dying. I don't know what's going on. There's blood everywhere, and my roommate is gurgling. She also said that she didn't know what to do,

and she got in her car and left. That she just saw the perpetrator jumping out of the window, and she explained, She was downstairs sleeping, and they were upstairs. And all of a sudden, she heard her roommate starting to scream. And the dispatcher doesn't have all the information. She's kind of asking her random questions. Like, who's bleeding?

She's like, I don't know. My roommate. I don't know if one's alive or if they're both in there. It was a very frantic moment for Lauren. You have to take in your surroundings within seconds. But the dispatcher was a little shocked that Lauren left her friends. especially since she said one was still alive. But she explained, I'm sorry.

I did not want to sit around there. And finally, the dispatcher was like, okay, you don't need to go back inside, but you do need to pull over towards the house and wait for officers. And she did. I think the confusing part was that when she was asked what she saw,

she said, I didn't see anybody. But then she told the dispatcher, she thought the killer was on foot. So the dispatcher was like, wait a minute, I thought you said you didn't see anyone. She's like, well, the window was open. I saw a guy jumping out. So that's when the dispatcher was like, I asked you if you saw somebody. You said no.

And Lauren explained, what I'm saying is, I can't tell you if it's a guy or a girl. It was a figure running down the stairs and jumping out the front window. Own it all. Pay off your home. Travel for life. Drive a Ferrari. In celebration of the world premiere of the Monopoly Big Board Buckslot machine by Aristocrat Gaming,

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Please gamble responsibly. Monopoly is a trademark of Hasbro. Hasbro is not a sponsor of this promotion. But Lauren was thoroughly interviewed. was in the very early morning hours of November 1st right after those officers arrived. She was devastated. She was in shock. She just lost two of her friends.

But everyone was asking the same question. If she could think of anyone who would want to hurt either of these women, and her mind did naturally go to the fact that Leslie had been dating around and bringing guys to their house. They even got into an argument about that same fact. But actually, Lauren mentioned that age. was the one that was dating Christian, who lived only a block away,

and that they fought a lot. Well, that piqued detective's interest immediately. And by 7 a.m., they were banging on Christian's door. He still lived at home with his parents. And when directed to his bedroom, with no information given other than they were looking for him, nine officers were banging and telling him to get up and get outside. Christian answered the door.

He'd just been awoken, police are standing there. He's shocked. They ask him about weapons. He points to a knife in the corner. It's collecting dust. It's not anything that's been used or covered in blood, but they collect it.

And then they collect his clothing and bed sheets. And he's completely cooperative. He wants to know right away what is going on. But they don't give him much information. All they say is, do you know Adrian? And he says, yes, why? They let him know that somebody broke into their house the night before. and they're looking for information.

And of course, the first thing he asks is, is everyone okay? The officer said there has been some injuries. But again, they were very vague. Christian starts getting really concerned. He's like, where's my girlfriend? Did somebody attack her? Can I speak to her?

Was she violated? He used the R word that YouTube doesn't like. But he wanted to know what kind of injuries are we talking about? He was asking a million questions. And I already told you with these kind of notifications, they're blunt. They finally let Christian know that his girlfriend was dead.

He was hysterically crying. Totally reasonable response, hearing that someone you love is no longer alive. He was interviewed for a good three hours, and he broke down everything. How he met Adrian, the last time that he had seen her. He was also honest with the police. He told them, we did not have a perfect relationship. We had our arguments. We were on and off.

And that he wasn't ready to commit. and that her friends thought she could do much better than him. It was well known that they had some toxicity going on. But of course, he swore he did not hurt her. He did say that Adrian tried to make him jealous, or that's what it seemed like. She would go out on their off times and rub it in his face that she met other guys, maybe trying to get him to step it up in their relationship. He tells them that the last time you saw Adrian was on Halloween.

But the day before, they also hung out, and they had such a nice time together. She had texted him that she missed him while he was at work. He's a bartender. He had plans afterward when he got off at 4 a.m., but instead he dropped everything he was doing and he drove over and hung out with Adrian at his house. He said they cuddled, they watched a movie, and they stayed up all night just talking and being close

and they didn't go to sleep until late morning around 8 a.m. On Halloween morning. Later that same day, Halloween night around 9.30 p.m., Adrian walked over to his house just to say hello. He said she stayed for about an hour, and the last time she texted him was later that night when she told him she wished that every day they spent together could be like the last one they just had.

That's really sad. But he swore he was never violent with her. They had plans for the future. She was his best friend. After this, he can sense providing a blood sample and fingerprints. They take notes on his timeline, and they also get his alibi. By Wednesday, the police had confirmed, though, that the DNA they collected from the blinds

and the outside of the house was from the killer, and that he was a male. And I really do think that that's to be expected with both what Lauren had described, the zip ties being there, plus the strength it would take to hurt two women. Most of the blood belonged to Leslie and Adrian,

but the killer had indeed been injured and left his DNA behind. This was crucial, not just to find the killer, but to alert the public. So a press conference was set up telling the public and the residents in town to be on the lookout for someone with maybe unusual cuts on their hands or their body, a fresh open wound that could not be explained. But there was a problem. Right away, the DNA was run through CODIS. And even though this is a database of 4 million offenders, there was no match for the killer's DNA in the system.

This led to another theory that this was a serial killer who came into town with a cell. simple motive just to kill. And maybe the house was targeted. Maybe he was waiting. He came through town. He saw the two women at that house alone, handing out candy. And he took the opportunity. And he just left town. Maybe they would never find him.

However, there's one good thing. The DNA from the blood outside matched the DNA from the skin cells that were taken from the zip ties on the rubber band. That's a very porous material. So most likely, the killer sweat. got on there, and it matched the DNA from the cigarette butts. So this was a connection. To detectives, this meant the killer had been standing outside,

watching the house from the street, perhaps had jumped that fence, broken one of their cigarettes that fell to the ground, tried the sliding glass door, it was locked. So he went back to the front to try the window. It still didn't give them a who, but as the word spread and more people connected to the victims found out about this heartbreaking news,

they were all thinking hard about who could want to harm them. Leslie's friends Vanessa and Katie, who were just in town visiting about two weeks before this, they'd gone out with her, and she'd been talking to a guy at a bar. She was also there with a guy she was seeing, and he wasn't happy. So, of course, friends gave detectives that name.

They were making a list of men that they needed to get DNA samples from, and that was their mission. They were going to swab as many cheeks as possible and match the DNA. A DNA sweep. Detectors were pulling all the phone records from the women in the house and looking at who they were speaking to last.

And Leslie's friends from back home were also doing their own research and they pinpoint one person that they had always had a bad feeling about. So did Leslie. I mentioned him in the beginning. He was the most recent long-term ex-boyfriend's dad. Remember him? Lee Sr., the lawyer, the one that made. made Leslie uncomfortable?

Well, his apparent obsession wasn't in the past. Leslie had confided in her friends that he was calling her on a regular basis, not leaving her alone, and she was too nice to say anything. Who does that? He seemed like a creepy old man, a creepy old married man, who was also the father of her ex-boyfriend, that wouldn't take no for an answer. Plus, detectives looked.

Sure enough, he had been talking to Leslie on Halloween night. When her friends found out, they thought that was too much of a coincidence. He called her not once, but twice that night. So that information gave Leslie's friends chills. It was their first lead. But he lived all the way in South Carolina. Detectives decided to pay him a visit. And of course, he was not going to do a full interview.

He was an attorney after all, so he had the right to remain silent. I mean, all of us do. But he did agree to give them his DNA, which did not match the DNA found at the scene and he said, you know what? It's just a very unfortunate coincidence that I called Leslie that night, but he had nothing to do with what happened to her and he didn't have ill intent according to him. He was ruled out and one by one,

they ruled men out, a handyman that had been there on Halloween, guys that Leslie had been seeing, and still, there were even more theories to explore, like the supposed Italian connection. Because all three roommates had Italian last names. So some people speculated maybe it was a mob hit from Leslie working at the Coppola winery. Well, that didn't go anywhere. The whole place was interviewed and everyone was heartbroken at Leslie's passing. So that was another dead end. Then suspicions turned to Leslie's own father, Lenny Mazara. Now, this man was actually serving two consecutive life sentences in prison for

a conspiracy to commit murder. This happened back in the 80s. He had been in since Leslie was only two years old. Until this day, he had maintained that he was innocent, but the fact was that her dad was in prison for a violent crime. So it really did seem like there could be some kind of connection there. Did someone maybe have a vendetta? Well, it was looked into. Poor Leslie didn't even know her father until she was about 20 years old.

And she had gone to see him over the years a few times before she moved to California because he was in Florida. But she had not seen him, or written to him since. And he was torn apart when he got the news that she had been murdered. They found no connections to her killing, but at least they were being thorough.

Neighbors were even telling police how they were terrified since their children had gone to that house for trick-or-treating on Halloween. One woman who lived right next door said she was traumatized and now she wanted to move out of that neighborhood. Others recalled how the roommates had gone out of their way to make these special little treat bags that were given out to all the kids that came

to their door. Another resident said she brought her two-year-old there and saw the girls in sweatshirts and jeans just having a good time laughing and handing out candy. Everything was normal. Then she added, their home is laid out like ours, where you have to walk through the house to get to the stairwell. Whoever did this, it seems, would have had to be very intent. That's what this neighbor said. And the police knew that they had to connect someone to this crime and fast. They were talking to more friends, and this time on Adrian's side. Her best friend Lily was shocked and devastated over losing her friend. When she got word that her best friend had died,

she thought it must have been something like a traffic accident, but not murder that never crossed her mind. When they told her, it's much, much worse than an accident. The details were so horrifying. And all she wanted was justice. She said that knowing who did this wasn't going to change much for them because they'd already lost their friends. There was no bringing them back,

but it was important, and she was angry. She couldn't understand how anyone could do something like this. But another part of her, she admitted, was afraid, afraid to have a face and a name to put all of the blame on because that made it more real. It's true, because you would know the face of a monster. But Lily turned her anger and sadness into action, trying just like everyone else to help figure out who the killer was.

She helped detectives put together what Adrienne's week looked like before she was killed, whether she said anything that sounded like a deviation in plans, who she trusted with things like maybe a house key, or who was familiar with the layout of her home or who her roommates were, and whether her car ever stayed anywhere overnight, other than her house or maybe Christians. It was a lot, and this woman was grieving, but she answered all of their questions, and she had one of her own, one that made her feel guilty. She wondered if she hadn't deviated from her plans, if Adrian would still be alive. And that's because she, just like her best friend, still hadn't been sure if the man in her life was the one.

She had broken off her engagement to Eric back in March. Why that mattered was because had she not gotten cold feet and gone through with their wedding, it was originally scheduled for November 1st. Adrian was going to be a bridesmaid and she would have been in Hawaii that night. The night she was killed. It was just terrible irony, but I could see how a best friend could feel really bad about the decision.

But you couldn't dwell on that. Soon, it was time to lay both Adrian and Leslie to rest. Another heartbreaking moment for everyone in their lives. It had only been a week. Everything was still so fresh, and their killer was still on the loose. Tuesday, November 9th, Adrian and Sonia was laid to rest in Calistoga, California,

and there was a viewing from her count. ask it before the burial. Lily was there. She looked at her friend, not the way that she usually looked, especially wearing a turtleneck. And Lily said that Adrian hated turtlenecks. Just absolutely hated them, would never wear one,

but that she obviously had to. And I think we know why. Lily noticed things like a lot of bruising on Adrian, and it looked to her like she had fought really hard. There were a lot of cuts on her hands, which couldn't even be. covered up with makeup. Lully was completely distraught. She was crying. She had to be held up by friends. And many took to the podium in the chapel to speak. But not Arlene, Adrian's mom. She was too

broken. The same day, another mother, Leslie's, was actually picking out her daughter's final outfit. I can't even imagine. I just cannot. Kathy was purposeful. She remembered her daughter's own words that you should always have a navy blue suit. So that is what Kathy bought. And that did make me really sad. When I was reading a book about this case, Kathy also mentioned how the salesperson didn't know that she was buying the last outfit her daughter would ever wear.

So there she was telling Kathy to hold on to the receipt in case she needed to exchange it or return it. And that was just another blow. And I think it's a moment that we don't know happens in these cases. We don't think about them. But Leslie was laid to rest in a mausoleum back in her hometown. of Anderson, South Carolina, where over 300 of her friends and family members

came to say their goodbyes. Her mom said she was so grateful that she got to be Leslie's mother for 26 years and that it was truly a gift. By the next week, the community had come together to raise $100,000 for reward for any information that would lead to the killer's arrest. And that's huge.

10,000, 20,000, I've even seen 50, but 100,000,000, was extraordinary and these were donations and they came in just one day but truth be told this was a very tourist area and that's how they sustained their community there and they needed the killer to be caught because it was bad for business so a lot of this money came from local businesses but nevertheless it was an incentive for someone to talk but no one did there just weren't any elites now lily and if you have leslie and adrian's friends set up a candlelight vigil on November 14th to raise even more awareness

and to remember these two young women and about 100 people came out that night. Lily spoke out. She was hoping that someone would come forward and she said to the crowd, somebody must have seen something. Somebody out there knows something because if this kind of thing can't happen,

somebody would have to notice a friend of theirs acting strange or have bruises or something. It's a violent crime. It doesn't seem like Somebody could walk away from it and be fine. She said that she hoped Adrienne had fought so hard that she hurt the killer. She wanted the public to say something if they saw something.

When no one knew was that the detectives suspected the killer's right hand had been cut. And that's because it was the right side of the stairwell wall that was marked with his blood, something that was not released to the public. A right handprint. So he most likely was right handprint. Someone needed to be looking at their male friends or acquaintances and looking at their right hands. But still, there were no breaks in this case. But that didn't stop the media from running with their stories. Leslie's mother was quoted saying that the media's intrusion was horrible.

The coverage of Leslie's story was sensational, vulgar, and diminished her in every way. Those are her words. Just a former beauty queen. That's what she was reduced to. The pretty girl. I guess it sounded more compelling than to describing Adrian, who was the assistant engineer at the sanitation department, it just didn't have the same appeal. This is exactly why I do try my best

to talk about the victims to honor their lives, and I try to tell you everything that I can find about who they were. Someone left a comment recently that said, that my videos are just long eulogies where I make victims look perfect. I disagree. It's not the time or the place, in my opinion,

to pick apart a different deceased person's flaws, but where appropriate, I do talk about imperfect victims. We're all flawed. But I think a murder victim has suffered enough and that the least we can do is honor their memory with the best moments of their life and not the darkest. Leslie's mom also said that the worst part of not knowing exactly what happened to her daughter in those last moments is that she made them up in her mind, imagining her suffering. And her therapist even told her that Leslie only died one time, but that Kathy was reliving it again and again.

But unlike Adrian's mother and the police, Leslie's mom did not think that her daughter was the target. And I mean, that's probably a very hard thing to think about. It's almost like her daughter was the reason that someone else was dead type of thing, but she said that it was just as likely that someone was interested or obsessed with Adrian. Time was ticking by and shifting blame or targets

wasn't going to solve this case. The holiday season came and went, and so did what would have been Adrian's 27th birthday. It was really hard not having a killer behind bars. But then there was some positive news, something that kind of paused everyone's grief for just a moment. A wedding announcement.

Since Adrian's murderer, Lily had done a lot of thinking. She was reevaluating what was important in her life. And she and Eric had been through this tragedy together, and their relationship had grown a lot stronger. They leaned on one another. Eric consoled her. He comforted her, and he stood by her side in her darkest moments of grieving for her best friend. So the couple finally decided it was time to make it official. The invitations went out for their February wedding at a local Episcopal church. Eric was deeply religious. He had been since childhood,

and Lily would even read scriptures with him on some of their first hangouts back in high school. So it was fitting. What Lily was trying hard to fit in was a way to make things special for Adrian. And she thought about Adrian's mom, Arlene. She really wanted to include her in their wedding in a place where her daughter would have been if she had not lost her life. She was Lily's best friend, and Arlene was honored. She'd grown really close to Lily and Eric since Adrian's passing, and she adored both of them. Even from the very first time she met Lily, she loved her. So when the big day came, Arlene not only gave her blessing to both of them, but she spoke from the Song of Solomon. 8 verse 6, quoting from Scripture, she said love is stronger than death, which seems fitting.

Everyone was happy, but it was bittersweet that Adrian couldn't be there to see her best friends celebrate such a big milestone. By now, friends were actually desperate for answers, especially Lauren, the survivor. She was terrified. She had been living at home with her parents, but she was still in town. She thought, what if the killer wasn't done? What if he was going to come back for her?

She was freaked out. She was stressed. She was calling the detectives every single day for updates in this case. Had anyone been caught? Did they have any new suspects? And to help Lauren any way they could, her friends decided they were going to try to take action in their own way. They knew that there were some sort of

psychics out in Los Angeles who supposedly could talk to the dead. And I know what you're already thinking. Maybe you're a skeptic and that is okay. But they were out of options. So they figured why not. But these weren't just psychics. They were a married couple, Marty and Michael Perry, and they were both mediums. Michael believed that he could channel the deceased and he actually called it conscious possession. And his wife, Marty, would sketch what she would see or hear during these readings, what she would perceive that the spirits were telling her. That's what she would draw on paper. They knew nothing about Adrian and Leslie.

They were not told any details about the murder, nothing. This session was audio recorded, and I have to say, it's creepy. I have some clips of it that I'm going to play for you, and whether you're a believer or not, I would say it's still interesting. I'm including it in this video because this is a Halloween deep dive, but also because I do think it's important with everything that happens later. So is it going to turn you into thinking

that some people can communicate with the dead? I don't know. I'm not trying to convince you of that. But immediately, when Michael is doing the session, he says that he can see two people, and one of them is loud. They're coming through very confidently, and he's getting the letter A.

Well, Lauren was like, oh my God, that's Adrian. The spirit. was taking the lead, and she was telling Michael that there was a party and that their lives were taken. I have two people here. One says my first name is A. She took that party. They said their life was taken.

At this point, Michael says that he can actually feel stabs to his neck. And then he says that both the spirits are telling him murder. They're saying the word murder. I can feel stabs up here around my neck, or my neck's cut. Murder. the same murder. After that point, Lauren was completely convinced that they were the real deal.

And now she wants to set up yet another reading, but this one she wanted to focus on something in detail, to possibly find the killer. So she goes ahead and consults with Detective Primo, and he gives her the go-ahead. Lauren shares more with the mediums, telling them that she hopes that they can ask Leslie and Adrian who killed them.

Now, this next reading was more intense. Lauren and Detective Primo are together while Michael and his wife are in LA on the phone. He says that Adrian was taking the lead once again, speaking with Michael, and she had a message for Lauren. She wanted her to know that if she had stayed in that house, she would be dead too. I mean, that's pretty powerful, but I was thinking, like, could they have read the newspaper? I mean, I don't know what kind of details they had. I'm not trying to be, you know, judgmental.

at all, but if I was a grieving survivor like that, I don't know how I would feel. But then Michael revealed something else. Something that was actually never released to the media or anyone, not even Lauren. He said that now he was envisioning himself being at the scene of the crime, and he sees the first responders going in the house. And there's a female officer who goes inside and gets physically ill. She threw up at the sight of the victims. Lauren didn't know, so she's looking over at Detective Primo, and he nodded,

Yes. Confirming that that really happened. So I guess that's a lot, right? Maybe they were getting visions. There's something that happens to Marty when she's in the middle of one of these sessions. If someone that she's envisioning or getting an image of happens to have facial hair, if they're a man, her face will start itching where the hair is.

And in this case, her face started itching right near her upper lip and her chin, and she knew that the killer had a goatee. When everything was said and done, here is the image if you're watching that she turned over to detectives. It was a Caucasian male with light eyes and a goatee. He maybe looked like he could have been in his 30s. He didn't look like he had much hair or maybe it was very light.

To me, it looked like it was receding. But when Lauren saw this picture, she didn't think she knew this man at all. But she still thought that something about him seemed familiar, but she just couldn't put her finger on it. But I also want to say that sometimes our brains want so badly to connect the dots that they make us think that there's a connection. But by this time,

the police get assistance from the state police and also the FBI. And they conducted more than 1,300 interviews. And they had collected at least 218 DNA samples for men who were in contact with any of the roommates, whether in the present or the past. And Leslie's case meant that they had to go to different states and many different ex-boyfriends, some of which even came to her funeral.

But her mother never thought it was anyone that Leslie had dated, because Leslie was so sweet that even after she would break it off with someone, she would still talk to them. She would keep them in her life. She would never cruelly reject anyone. They not only got samples, but they also extensively interviewed many of these men throughout Leslie's past. And there was a common theme. And it wasn't wanting to hurt her. They all still loved her.

She was the one that got away. And by summer, it was Leslie's turn to forever, the only 26 years old. Her birthday on August 1st went by without her there to blow out her candles or make a wish. And that was tough, especially on her brothers who were getting more and more impatient with the lack of information in this investigation.

Her best friend Kelly, on the other hand, was almost a part of the investigation because she struck a deal with the show 48 hours. And she was about to step inside the home where Leslie had been killed. She had been struggling. And perhaps maybe she thought that this would bring her some kind of closure because she kept trying to put the murder out of her mind,

but it was nearly impossible. She kept imagining Leslie's suffering in pain, and it was just an unshakable feeling, having a friend who you were imagining dying this way. Well, luckily, she had an acquaintance that worked in the medical examiner's office, and they wanted to offer some insight into stabbings, and I thought this was very interesting.

They explained that survivors who had been victims of multiple stab wounds reported that they didn't actually feel the pain of the stab wounds in the moment. Your adrenaline takes over, and it feels more like a punch. It's almost as though you feel the fist, that's hitting your body and not the blade.

I know that sounds really hard to believe, but your brain almost puts yourself into the zone where all of your endorphins and, like they said, adrenaline come flowing through your body, and some survivors report that they're confused by what's going on, and it's not until later when they're at the hospital or they're more lucid and they're aware of their wounds,

that they actually become painful. I really am not sure if this eased Kelly's Z's fears of Leslie's suffering are not. But survivors did not die. And I'm not trying to be insensitive or morbid, but just came to my mind. We don't know what that's like. But I did look into it. And scientifically, when you do lose a lot of blood, you start to get woozy and dizzy and weak until you can no longer move. You don't have the strength to open your eyes or speak or breathe. And then you pass away. It could sound peaceful, but we can't know for sure what it feels like.

Kelly, stepping into the place where Leslie took her last breath was emotional to say the very least, but that's exactly what the producers of this show wanted. They wanted pure, raw emotion so Kelly could tell Leslie's story. The psychics even visited the house with Detective Primo. They walked into every room, and it was shocking. They were able to pinpoint the exact location where the girls died, as well as where very important blood evidence from the killer had been found. I had never heard of psychics being this spot on before in a case, so I'm sure that's why it was reported. But Michael the medium told Detective Primo that the killer was someone the victims

knew, which is what they already believed. But who? It felt like they'd gone through everyone. And it was starting to get closer to the one-year anniversary of the murders and to Halloween. And it seemed more frightening than ever. Everyone was on edge. What if the killer was waiting and he was about to strike again? There was a new police chief, Rich Melton, who decided they needed to comb through all of the evidence again. Go beyond the norm, expand their analysis, and that is when a company called DNA print Geonomics came into play. They had new technology. Was it 100% accurate? No, but could it provide more details about the killer through a more extensive technique? Yes, so it was worth a try. This method broke down the killer's ancestry.

They knew he was most likely of northwestern European descent. He wasn't Hispanic. He wasn't black or Asian. So he was a white male. And his gene markers predicted that he would have either blue or green eyes and lighter colored hair. That was more than they had before. But they didn't want to release it to the public just yet because they were looking into

something else to build a better profile. They went back to those cigarette butts. These cigarette butts did not have names on them, but they did have a unique characteristic, tiny gold symbols around the filter. So they began reaching out to manufacturers and finally they connected the brand to Camel Cigarette Company. Those particular cigarettes were a newer release

called Camel Turkish gold. They had only hit the market in California about a year and a half ago. And most stores in that area of Northern California didn't even carry them. And the ones that did told the investigators they only sold about one or two packs a week, if that. This seemed like another lead.

Most of us know about brand loyalty, but for a smoker, if they like a certain flavor of cigarette, then they find a brand that they like, they rarely switch. No one in that house smoked. They already knew that these were the killer cigarettes. Someone close to the killer was bound to know that they were loyal to this particular brand and product line, right? So this is when the detectives decide to go public.

on September 22nd of 2005. They release everything that they've got. That they believe the killer is right-hand dominant. He's a white male with light eyes, either blue or green, that he was close to the victims in some way, and he smoked. But not just any kind of cigarettes. Camel, Turkish, gold.

Now it was just a waiting game. All the ex and current boyfriends in the victim's lives had been cleared. But then the detective started to think, What if one of them hired someone else to do it? And that could definitely complicate things. They thought they might be waiting a very long time for answers, but they were wrong

because the killer was watching the news. He was feeling the pressure. He knew it was only a matter of time until he was caught. As a matter of fact, he knew detectives were onto him because they had called him twice. Once on September 7th and again on September 22nd, the same day the information was released to the media. He didn't want to give the government

the satisfaction of stealing his fate, so he decided that he was going to take matters into his own hands, but not before he wrote letters to his family, to his brother, to his boss, and two different ones, one to each of his parents. He put them in the mail, and then he planned his self-exit. This man, this monster, had worked for a local engineering firm, and one of their clients was this

sanitation district where Adrian had worked for three years. His employer was actually one of the companies that donated to that $100,000 reward fund to help find Leslie and Adrian's killer. But he hadn't worked there since November of 2003, a year before he committed the killings. Now he was employed at another civil engineering firm doing land surveys. He was a normal guy, or so everyone thought, quiet, kept him himself, polite, came from a good, loving family. His father was in the military when he was growing up, so he did move a few times before they settled right there in Northern California. He was smart. He graduated from Napa's Vintage High School in 1997, and he was the exact same age as the victims,

even in the same industry as Adrian. He wasn't a loner. He was actually happily married and had a beautiful, intelligent, and successful wife. He'd never been arrested. He'd never even gotten a parking ticket or a traffic offense his entire life. No one suspected. He would ever, could ever hurt someone, let alone kill someone, especially people he knew. Because he did know Leslie and Adrian.

He'd been to the Dorset House. He'd been inside. He'd gone to their funeral. He sat with their friends and even their family members. All the while, he was right there. So many people had looked into the eyes of a killer without knowing it. Does it scare you? I think it should because it scares me that someone that no one would ever expect

would be a monster hiding in plain sight. He was the type of guy who mowed his neighbor's lawn for them, like to get his hands dirty building things out in his garage, which is why no one noticed the cuts on his hands from the knife that he used to kill Leslie and Adrian. It was normal for his hands to be beat up. He'd smile, he'd ask how your day was, he was also at the candlelight vigil,

that his actions forced into existence. I think that this hidden dichotomy is something worth studying in criminal profiling because it's that fascinating, but in a bad way. He had a dark side, though. One that would reveal itself even more even more when he had been drinking. And over the past couple years,

he'd been drinking more than ever. He was getting older, and sure he had a career, if you could call it that, but his life was more routine and mundane than anything else. He'd been stressing before the killings. He was a control freak.

He didn't like the unknown, he liked the familiar, and his life had been comfortable until it wasn't. That's when his plan was set into motion. No, this was not a thrill-kill or anything like that, it was rage, and they were right about that from the start.

Halloween night for the killer began with a simple drinking game. But he was already buzzed, if not on the verge of being drunk, before he started to lose again and again. So he downed more and more alcohol. That's when he opened his mouth and started an argument, one that ultimately led him to be back at his apartment all alone, festering. He'll claim later that he was blackout drunk, but he still had the wherewithal to go in. into his garage, grab zip ties, and a six-inch knife, get into his car, drive about five minutes, park outside the door, said house.

And he stood in the front, and even went into the back, watching, waiting, deciding his next move. Eventually, he goes to the front porch, and I wonder why no one saw him. No one thought this looked suspicious. It was Halloween night, and there wasn't many homes on the small street, and it was dark, but there were motion-activated lights.

They came on several times as he moved around the house, yet no one noticed. But that light did alert, Lauren, that someone was outside. He will later admit that he did have a target. The source of his rage that night, or at least the pincushion, to take out such rage, it had built up over time. And speaking of time, the date of the killing was significant.

It wasn't a random night, and it wasn't chosen because it was Halloween. The women were killed after midnight. It was November 1st, and that held meaning. He knew what he was doing, but of course later he will claim insanity, that he doesn't remember much, and he'll change a story a few times as well. He'll try to pull the sympathy card and pretend that he's remorseful, but his intentions were all laid out in those letters to his loved ones. His motive was clear. Revenge. Not because of rejection. He didn't want any of the women that lived in that home. They weren't objects of his desire. They were obstacles in his way, especially one of them. And now she was dead.

Once he was finished inside, he left as easily as he made his way inside. He got back in his car, drove home and burned all of his blood-soaked clothing, including his shoes, in a fire pit right behind his apartment building. And then he went on with his life like it never even happened. He became a killer that early fall morning, but for almost a year he played the role of a loving husband, which blows my mind. But when his brother received that letter, he and his parents got together and they immediately bed the killer not to harm himself. But instead, do the right thing. Turn yourself in, especially his mother Robin, she was beside herself with grief. In the letter that she received, he wrote in part, quote,

I am leaving this life because I know that the consequences of my actions must be faced and they spell death. I will not grant the government the satisfaction of watching me die, so I will end my life in a place and manner of my own choosing. I don't consider it suicide, I consider it justice." End quote. Was he really going to do it? Probably not. Because when push came to shove, he was a coward.

He could play God and take the lives of two innocent women. But when it came to him leaving his world behind, he refused to follow through. And I'm glad. Because justice comes with the truth. And that was about to come out. He would have gone to his grave without having to face that truth. This monster walked into the Napa police station.

On the night of September 27th, he walked right up to a deputy and admitted that he killed Adrian and Sonia and Leslie Mazara. It was hard to believe, and actually detectives did think that this might be a fake confession. Sometimes people with mental health concerns can admit to crimes that they did not commit. They thought this might be the case. And many of the detectives had gone home for the day, but they came racing back to sit down with this man. Lead detective Schulman met with the killer and his family in an interview room, and they spoke for hours, making sure that this was the real deal and that this was the killer.

He had to provide information about the murders that no one else would know. But the first clue was right in his hand, a camel Turkish gold cigarette. During the six hours, he was interrogated, he smoked the same brand of cigarettes that were found at the crime scene. And he explicitly confessed that he took both Leslie and Adrian's life. But here's where things get blurring. His version of the killings was not as detailed as they would have expected. Remember I told you that he would say he blocked out? And some of what he said didn't really match the evidence. The detectives had already determined from CCTV footage,

Lauren's recollection, and the way the blood was distributed in that home, that this killing took four minutes. I know. Four minutes. That's it. It may have felt like it happened in slow motion, but it was quick. He was in and out of there with intention. But he wanted the authorities to believe that he went into that house in a drunken stupor with no real motive,

climb the stairs, fell asleep on the floor of Adrian's bedroom, where Leslie would later die, and that he woke up to Adrian punching him right in the face. So he had to defend himself. He claimed to not remember the stabbing. He didn't recall hurting either of the girls, but he admits he knows he did. He said, he was just pain.

when Adrian looked right at him, because of course, she recognized him. He was a friend. If anyone was panicked, it was her and Leslie. They were probably shocked and confused about why he was doing this to them. Why? That was the biggest question. And the killer wasn't disclosing that. He was acting as though he randomly found himself in this house and was faced with these two victims fighting him off.

He called it having flashes of memory. that both of the girls came at him, except he's the one in their home with a knife. Come on. The detectives weren't buying it. The fact that he burned his clothing when he went back home, that's evidence that he knew what he had done was wrong, and he was actively trying to destroy evidence of his crime.

And the knife? Well, he apparently couldn't remember what he did with it. Well, that's convenient. By 3 o'clock that morning on September 28th, he was officially arrested in charge with two, counts of murder. And I realize that if you have not heard of this case, you probably want so badly to know who the hell is he? Well, Arlene found out first. The detectives had called her when he was still being interrogated, but he'd given enough information that they were confident that he did it.

Arlene was contacted about the arrest, and of course, she was shocked, but not as shocked as she was when they told her his name, she was like, wait. What? 26-year-old Eric Matthew Cople. Yes, that Eric, Lily's husband, as in Adrian's best friend's man. How confusing is that part? Eric, the All-American, intelligent, normal guy in the friend group. He helped move Adrian and Lauren into the Dorset Street House. He was at their housewarming party. He went on double dates with them as couples. Adrian's mom spoke at his wedding. That Eric. The first thing Arlene wanted to know was why. And did Lily know? Arlene loved Lily and Eric. She had gotten closer to both of them since the murders, and it was sickening to think that all along she was sitting right next to her daughter's killer.

I mean, how could he do that? I just couldn't believe it. I was in shock. But what was confusing was why this man hadn't been looked into right away. He was at that house all the time. His then girlfriend was best friend and worked with Adrian. Even Eric's former employer was connected to Adrian's workplace. He was an own smoker among their friend group

and yet his DNA was never obtained. Why? There were so many questions, especially when Leslie's mom got the news. Who was this guy? She wasn't aware of him like Arlene was. She wanted to know what led him to commit. such a heinous crime. What did her daughter Leslie do to deserve this? This monster even sat down with producers of the 48-hour show while his wife cried about her best friend being murdered.

It is so creepy looking back when Lily is looking into that camera and says, somebody must have seen something. Somebody out there knows something because this kind of thing can't happen. Somebody would have had to notice a friend acting strange or have bruises or something. It's a violent crime. It doesn't seem like somebody could walk away from it and be fine. Somebody out there knows something. Somebody would have had to notice a friend of their acting strange or, you know, had bruises. It doesn't seem like somebody could just walk away from it and be fine. Well, Lily, did you? Did you notice your husband acting strange? Well, actually, she did. but it wasn't until the end right before he confessed.

And we're going to get to that because Lily won't be speaking publicly until December of 2006. So more than a year later, we'll get there. Here's what really happened that led to the murders after Halloween night. And it all had to do with Lily. Everyone who knew Eric said

that as long as they had known him, which, you know, he came there in high school, he was always Lily's puppy dog, following her around, letting her take the lead, she was his life, his purpose. The only thing in his life that he felt was a sure thing. He liked control, remember? And he felt that once Lily and Adrian became friends in 2003, his relationship felt unstable, and yes, it blew my mind

that Lily and Adrian had only been friends for a freaking year, and she gets killed by her best friend's boyfriend. Eric believed that Adrian was telling Lily that she could do better, that she deserved more, but everyone who knew Adrian said, she never spoke badly about Eric. That was all in his head. The truth was that he was the one making Lily reconsider because he had changed.

His alcohol consumption had become an issue, and Lily had enough. At one point, she wanted to move in with Adrienne so that she could have some space from Eric. Maybe that would help rekindle their relationship because they were having problems. But he saw that as Adrian taking Lily away. He made such a big deal about it

that Lily reconsidered. And things would get better for a while, and they eventually got engaged and planned their wedding for November 1st, the same day that Eric killed Leslie and Adrienne. Yes, I told you that date was meaningful. Eric felt that Lily canceled their wedding in March because she wanted to be free

to spend more time traveling and hanging out and having fun with Adrienne. No, that wasn't it, But it was true that once the wedding was canceled, Lily realized that she and Adrian had already submitted vacation day requests for a couple weeks in November, which would have been for the wedding and the honeymoon in Hawaii. So the girls figured, let's not waste those days. Let's go on vacation together to Australia to see Adrian's sister. Eric was livid. Adrian was ruining everything again, when in fact, that wasn't the case. Lily was a grown woman who should have been allowed to have a best friend. She was merely trying to make a negative outcome into something positive

and build memories in her 20s. But Eric saw it as betrayal. So to answer the question, why? It's because of jealousy. And here's where the disgusting irony comes in. Remember that Bible verse that Adrian's mother read at Lily and Eric's wedding? The one that started with love is stronger than death. Well, the next line is jealousy as cruel as the grave.

Its flames are flames of fire, a most vehement blame, and that proved to be true for Eric. Jealousy wasn't just as cruel as the grave, it's what led two innocent women being sent to theirs. The date of Adrienne and Lily's vacation was looming. Eric was stewing. He thought if she left and she had too much time as a free woman, she may choose to leave him, and he couldn't have that. He couldn't let Adrian influence Lily. They were still on and off at this point.

The wedding wasn't happening, but they were still living together, just minutes away from the Dorset Street home. On the night of Halloween, Eric and Lily went to a friend's house, and they played drinking games until Eric was extremely wasted, which wasn't uncommon. And neither was him making an embarrassing comment to Lily and getting her so upset. She demanded,

they leave. She drove him back to their apartment, dropped him off and left to spend the night to her parents' house. And guess what? They were out of town because they couldn't cancel their flights to Hawaii that they booked for Lily's wedding. So she was house-sitting for them. Wow. Eric chose to use that time all alone to sneak into his girlfriend's best friend's home and kill her and her roommate. Sadly, it appeared as the So Eric mistakenly thought that Leslie was Adrian in that first room in the dark. He entered the wrong room. He killed Leslie thinking it was his target.

Yet I want to mention one other interesting piece of information that was received by the police. A friend said that Eric was infatuated with Leslie. They could tell because there were times he would sit there mesmerized by her, just staring. And then one time Lily had to pry him away from a conversation with Leslie because she She wanted to leave, but he wanted to stay and talk to her. So there are some people who believe that he may have wanted Leslie that night to, at the very least, while he was there, bind her and have his way with her before killing Adrienne. We're never going to know.

Other people think that maybe he probably tried to make a move on Leslie in the past. She rejected him because she was Lily's friend, and it was only a matter of time until she revealed the truth to her. So she had to go too. nothing could come between his relationship with Lily. It didn't help that Lily had broken off their wedding the very same month in March that Eric's parents had filed for divorce. He told detectives he was extremely depressed, having ideations of exiting this world, but instead of getting help, he self-medicated with substances. At his preliminary hearing on October 15th of 2005,

it was revealed that Eric's DNA matched the killer's blood at the scene as well as the cigarette butts and the rubber were banned on the zip ties. The DA wanted the death penalty. And this crime qualified because of special circumstances. There was more than one victim. He was lying in wait. And it was felony murder because it happened during a burglary. Now, if you were wondering, Lily was standing by her man.

But Arlene understood in some way because she had forgiven Lily. She felt terrible that Lily had also been a victim in all this. She was married to the man who killed someone she loved and that she cared about. It wasn't going to be easy going through all the judgment and the humiliation, but I just don't know if I could stand by someone, even stand by my vows of death to his part, if my husband was a murderer. But what about you? Lily would later say, and we'll get to this in more detail,

but she would say that the man she married was not the same man who killed Leslie and Adrian, and that essentially he wasn't in his right mind. But he himself said he had a dark side. He said it in his letters. So was it the real him all along hiding in the shadows pretending to be a loving and kind husband? And I wanted to point out, not only did the psychics kind of draw a sketch that looked similar to Eric, I mean, I'm going to put them both on the screen, he did end up having a goatee. But the police were onto him. Remember how I told you they called him twice?

Well, they had figured out from Lauren that the only people in their friend group that had smoked were Lily and Eric. So they were calling to interview him. He never answered. They went to his work. He didn't answer there either. They left a message. So all this to say, they were onto him, but it took a really long time. And that's what ultimately made him confess.

And apparently at some point, and we don't know when, he told him. his wife what he had done. And he showed her a scar that was on his hand. So before he came clean in court, Lily did know. What do you think about that? I still think they could have found him way sooner. But the bottom line is they caught him. On December 5th of 2006, family members, friends, the public, the media, and Eric's counsel joined the judge and the district attorney and the Napa county courthouse. They were all ready for a trial, and then it was announced that they had come to an agreement. Eric had taken a plea deal. The details were as followed. Eric pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder for killing both Leslie and Adrian, plus he admitted to the special

circumstances. He also agreed to waive his right to appeal, but he wanted life in prison instead of death. And if he ever tried to appeal, death could attach again. This plea deal was accepted by both sides and Eric admitted an open court that he was guilty. Next was a sentencing which was scheduled for January 11th, 2007, just a few weeks after his plea deal. Leslie's mom said by that time she and her sons who initially wanted to see Eric be put to death no longer felt that way. Kathy was actually a pastor, so she had her moral and her religious convictions and she didn't think death was just. However, her sons did not see eye to eye, but she was but finally, they just wanted it to be over.

Arlene agreed she felt for Eric's family. This woman was very compassionate. She didn't want another family to lose a child. But the victim's loved ones did get a chance to speak to their killer face to face. And I just really wanted to share some of what was said because, wow, I felt like the media did chop up a couple of things and take them out of context to make them more viral.

I'll tell you which one. But Leslie's mother went first, and she told Eric she was glad that he found God if that was true, but she could never forgive him for killing Leslie. However, Leslie's best friend, Amy, did forgive Eric. I don't know how she had the strength. But Kelly, on the other hand, told Eric that she wanted him to rot in hell. No forgiveness given. Arlene's statement was the most powerful, in my opinion.

She had been so kind to Eric, and she was. so angry. She said, Eric, I know you. I know that you are a man who brutally and callously took the life of a wonderful woman. You are a man who violently stabbed to death, the best friend of the woman that you love. That is not love, Eric. You cannot love Lily and murder her best friend. You cannot love Lily and bring a knife into Adrian's home and stab her and stab her again and again and again and again, and she said this over 12 times as she banged her fist down on the podium. And if that's not compelling and intense, I don't know what is. You are a man who violently stabbed to death the best friend of the woman you love.

That is not love, Eric. You cannot love Lily and bring a knife into Adrian's home and stab her and stab her again and again and again and again. She even mentioned how he sliced her daughter's throat, something that had not been revealed publicly. She said, yes, Eric, I know what you did. You are a man that's so cold he would invite the mother of the woman that he murdered to stand up at his wedding and read scripture to him of love and death and to bless your union. I know you, Eric, you were a murderer and a coward. And after that intense speech, it was actually Lily's turn.

And this is what I just wanted to point out that the media kind of, I just want to say, switch the narrative a bit. It was what was said, but it just made for a very viral moment where they made it seem like one of the first things that Lily said in court looking at Eric was, there's nothing that you could do to make me love you any less. And of course, when you're sitting there watching the footage and that clip comes up, you're going to want to I hate this woman. I mean, some of you may anyway, no matter what, because she still loved Eric. But the first thing she did, she thanked the victim's families, and it was for agreeing to the plea deal. Because she did love her husband. That was true. She also told Arlene she was very thankful of how loving and supported that she had been towards her, even though her husband had killed her daughter.

But after that, she chronicled the days that led up to Eric confessing and how she knew that something was wrong, but he wouldn't open up to her. Of course, she had no idea that he was hiding the fact he was a killer. She just wanted her husband to feel comfortable talking to her. So this is when she told the court. She was begging him to tell her what was wrong, and she told him at the time, Eric, there is nothing in this world you can do to make me love you less. Eric, there is nothing in this world that you could do to make me love you less. But she explained. She understood that people were not going to comprehend why that statement was still true that day like it was back that, meaning she still loves her husband and there really is nothing he can do to make her love

him less. So she really said it, but in her mind, in the way she explained it to everyone that was sitting in that courtroom was that there was nothing that ever pointed to him being able to carry out such a terrible crime. She said he was honest, he was a Christian, he was gentle and reserved, and she was shocked. She said it was just the perfect storm. Her words, between their breakup, his parents getting divorced, his chronic depression, substances, alcohol, he just lost control. It felt like a slap in the face to the victims and their families, and they still had the burden of hearing.

This monster's appalling excuse for his disgusting actions, and I felt not one ounce of compassion for him. I think he was only sad because it was too dumb not to get caught and too cowardly, not to do what he said he was going to do and remove himself from this planet instead of two innocent people before he carried out the axe. I really don't wish that on anyone. I'm just saying that's how I felt hearing him speak. And I'm sure I'm going to play some audio, hopefully. I think I can. YouTube's so weird with that stuff. But he had a lot of time to come up with what he was going to say. And instead of just being honest, talking to everyone, an easy to understand, straightforward manner,

he decided to read poetry that he wrote. And to me, that was narcissistic. Like, show us how smart you are, Eric. Show us how eloquent you are with your words. Not the time or place. But here's what he said. Almost stuttering because he, like, couldn't get the words out. He was tearing up.

He said, I'm a broken man. And then since he couldn't speak, he's like, oh, this sucks. He's like saying it under his breath. Well, yeah, it does suck. It more than sucks. But he started over, he regained his composure, and he said, I'm a broken man splintered by a penetrating awareness of my own potential for wickedness. I am a broken man, a man splintered by penetrating awareness of my own potential for wickedness.

While I cannot fathom the full extent that my actions have caused, I recognize that my sinful deeds have inflicted terrific agony, on a great number of people. The words evade me to articulate the depths of my sorrow or turmoil I created. To what extent I'm able to endeavor some of the circumstances that led up to this heinous crime, I have suffered from depression from adolescence,

and I had strong suicidal tendencies from my early teenage years. I've always been a decidedly introverted person. That's his excuse? Poetry out of the lips of a killer. He went on to explain that in the months before Halloween, all these tragic things were happening in his life. His parents got divorced, his grandfather had a stroke,

and then died. Financially, he wasn't doing well. He couldn't get a job that he wanted, and he thought his relationship with Lily, who he described as the singular ray of light in his otherwise black world was in peril of collapsing his words. He said that these were the factors that fertilized the seed of anger sewn in his heart as a youth

and that Lily had pleaded with him to get help, but he refused. And he turned to self-medication that only worsened his depression. It sounds like a sorry excuse to me. No. He didn't seem remorseful. And actually, what he said to the police about him blacking out and all that stuff, he said, that was true. That you just, like, wanted to the... they're drunk, stumbled upon some dirty clothes, fell asleep, all that, and I just called

BS. But the case was closed. We probably will never know what this wicked man really intended, and we don't need to know. Any reason we'll do because what's done is done. He's evil. He'll spend the rest of his life where he belongs. After this, Lily did divorce him, and he decided to enter a ministry program in prison, and that path for him might be meaningful. but it doesn't fix what he did. It doesn't return these two innocent victims. And there's one more moment I need to share because it does say something about

what grief sometimes becomes after all the cameras go off. After the sentencing, when reporters were packing up, a friend leaned over towards Kathy Leslie's mom and she said, do you want to meet Eric's mother? Kathy said she was terrified, but she said yes. And this other woman is walking towards her

just trembling. And Kathy just looked her in the face and she thought, oh my God, I am her. They even looked alike. So here's this woman who lost her daughter at the hands of this other mother's son. And she hugged her. And for a second, they were just two moms standing in the same room holding on to each other because they were both so broken. I don't know how she did it. I know that Kathy is a reverend, I understand that, but that would be way too hard for me. Next time Halloween rolls around, you're going to see masks everywhere. Cute ones, creepy ones, clever ones, but just remember, the mask isn't the danger. The danger is the person who never needed one.

The monsters who choose to wear a human mask to hide the evil that's inside. I want to thank you truly for being here for Leslie and Adrian's story. I will see you in my very next video. Bye.