True Crime with Kimbyr - PART 2 Online Date Ends In Murder - The Horrifying Case of Samantha Lezark | True Crime Stories

Episode Date: January 4, 2026

In part 2 of this chilling case on True Crime with Kimbyr, Kimbyrleigha dives deeper into the horrifying murder of Samantha Lezark. Explore the investigation’s twists, shocking evidence, and the dark motives that slowly unraveled the truth behind what seemed like an innocent online connection. True Crime with Kimbyr examines the aftermath, the law enforcement pursuit, and the emotional toll on those left behind. With detailed storytelling and compassionate insight, Kimbyrleigha uncovers the layers of deception, danger, and betrayal, leaving listeners on edge as the full story of Samantha’s tragic fate comes to light. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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The investigators did uncover somewhat of a treasure trove when it came to very detailed information about everyone who was coming and going in that area. And that is because one of the guys who lives in the neighborhood was part of the neighborhood watch program. And this man, he had pads upon pads upon pads of paper where he would just sit and write down every single vehicle that went up and down the street, the make, model. color, tag numbers, you name it. This man had a record of it. I don't know how long that he had been doing this, but he took his job very seriously. And he doesn't hesitate to provide all of this

information to investigators because that's what the neighborhood watch is for. He's probably thinking, see, I was doing my job and it was worth it. And it was. Detectives wouldn't have been able to have that much detailed information. Another neighbor said that she wasn't sure about the vehicles, but she did remember men coming in and out of Samantha's house. She obviously didn't have her record or anything to give to the investigators, but they do jot down her name just in case they have any more questions later on. When they were about to leave, one of the children from the neighborhood comes forward. It was a 12-year-old young man, and he said he saw a motorcycle that was coming and going around Samantha's house.

And he also said that the motorcycle was red and black. At this point, investigators don't have a cause of death or a time of death. So they're not even sure when to ask neighbors if they heard or saw anything, but none of them reported anything peculiar or out of the ordinary within the last couple of days. It's time to put together a timeline of Samantha's last few days. So the investigators turn to the people who know her best, starting with her mother. Even though Samantha's parents and loved ones are in deep despair and shock, They realize providing as much information as soon as possible can help find her killer.

So through their sadness, they meet with investigators who try to piece together her very last days. Sharon says she spoke to Samantha three or four times on January 5th. In the morning, Samantha said she had plans to hang out with her boyfriend Chris and go to a tattoo shop. The last time she spoke to her was about 5 o'clock in the evening and everything was fine. As far as Sharon knew, Samantha planned to hang out with Chris, that he was going to come over in the morning, they were going to go to the tattoo shop, spend the day together, but that's all she really knew. Investigators wanted to know if she knew more about this Chris person. And Sharon explains, well, I know that they met online, and she said he's really nice.

She really liked him. He was sweet. He was fun to be around. And they were seeing more and more of each other. Investigators have done this long enough to know that children, even if they're adults, children, they don't always tell their parents everything about their lives, especially their dating life. They're more likely to tell their friends about those aspects of their lives. So investigators want to confirm this information with one of the friends that is the closest to Samantha, and that's Lisa.

Lisa explains that she was very apprehensive about Samantha meeting guys online. But Samantha would say it's no different than meeting a guy at a bar. Everyone's a stranger before you meet them. Lisa also told investigators Samantha shared John's concern about the fact that she was meeting guys in chat rooms with her and he had the same outlook that Lisa did

that it was a little weird and that she should be careful but Samantha was adamant it's not weird it's not even random it's just a different way to connect with people that you don't know what do you think I'm just curious one of her closest friends her mother

and even her soon-to-be ex-husband are all concerned for her safety but she wouldn't listen to any of them. She also wouldn't give them much information because she thought they would be judging her about her choices. She held back a little bit. She didn't let them know exactly what was going on, but investigators were about to find out. However, Lisa does say that Chris is not just one of her random guys she's talking to, that it was getting serious. She started to refer to Chris as her boyfriend, like her mom said. Lisa went on to say that she spoke to Samantha on the evening of January 5th and Chris was at Samantha's house. They asked her how she knew that and she said you could hear a guy in the background.

Lisa had just gifted Samantha a DVD set of the latest season of friends. Samantha told Lisa the night that she was going to watch it with Chris and that she would call her the next day. That's the last time Lisa ever talked to her. Investigators want to know how well Lisa knew Chris. She says I don't know Chris. I've never met Chris. All she knew was that it seemed like Samantha was really into him, and they were hanging out a lot. The last phone call Samantha had was with Lisa at 6 p.m., and that's the last time anyone had contact with Samantha. However, they get some information from one of Samantha's guy friends. His name is Zach Adams. He indicated that he attempted to contact her on both her home phone and her cell phone

at approximately 9.30 p.m. on Sunday. Zach stated that he received no answer from either one of those phones. Investigators are not sure how or where to begin. The internet is still a very confusing and vast place for all of us. I would say it's even more confusing now than it was in 2003. Why? Because nowadays so much can be faked. People can catfish one another.

A lot of people are just like hiding by anonymous profiles. But Yahoo Messenger had only been created in 1998. So we're talking this was the dawn of all of this technology. chat rooms, people talking to anonymous people without faces or names that don't really match. It's very uncharted territory for investigators. They had Samantha's computer. They know she was using Yahoo Messenger to communicate with various individuals. But what is it that these services save?

What kind of information? Because I can tell you even now, it takes months to subpoena a company like Instagram, Twitter, for various DMs or information about users. It's a lengthy process. And not all the information we want. is readily available at our fingertips. A lot of times there's an extremely dense amount of data you have to go through to find where you're looking for. And they didn't even know what they were looking for back then or where to start.

What they can do is turn on Samantha's computer, go to Yahoo Messenger and try to see who was in her contact list. Back then you sort of had an address book, you had your favorites, you had your friends list, if you will, and possibly some chat history. The The first place investigators went was to her internet history. Where had she been? What websites had she been frequenting? And that's how they actually found out it was Yahoo Messenger that was a service of choice for her.

The next thing they were able to determine is that Samantha's username was Meow Mix 28. And Lisa confirmed this. Once they figured this out, they realized they stumbled upon hundreds of conversations and exchanges between Samantha on her username and various people going back months. It was literally worse than trying to find a needle in a haystack, because this haystack almost never ends. Detectives do have the ability to go back through her chat history. So they come to find out, Samantha, she was really sad. And it seemed like talking to people in these chat rooms and a messenger was bringing up her spirit.

People were giving her attention and her confidence was being boosted, but they noticed something else. A lot of these conversations were very sexually charged. There are so many messages that investigators think it could take the months to sift through. Plus, no one is showcasing their real name. Of course not. There are just all kinds of usernames like Samantha's. They believe their best bet is to work forward to backward, starting with any individual who she chatted with in the days before her murder, and then work backwards all the way to the beginning of her chat history, focusing on anyone with the name Chris. When they're sifting through all of these chats, investigators pinpoint a conversation from January 1st, which was just four days before her murder.

The actual messages were never publicly released, but the context of the messages were insinuated through different stories and research that I've done. There were some very troubling things in this conversation in question because of how sexual it was. And not only that, because of what investigators perceived as this person that was really persistent to a point of being demanding and scary. But before they even went into the conversation, what caught their eye was the username. CP-238. The fact that the username started with a C led them to believe this could be the Chris that they're looking for. The conversation started out pretty normal. They asked Samantha what she was going to be doing that night and she let him know.

But then he said something along the lines of, well, are you planning to be naked during any of those activities or any time in between? And it seemed like Samantha was trying to be nice and kind of go along with it. But he's also asking questions like, do you live by yourself? Investigators thought that that was very suspicious. Why would a person need to know whether she lived alone or not? Not only that, he goes on to blatantly say, tell me where you live. He was even asking for her exact address. And he did this numerous times throughout this conversation.

And that's when Samantha actually says to him, you could be a serial killer. Too bad that doesn't stop her from giving him her address. It seems as though the conversation was playful. But this could be a manipulation tactic. This is also the first time investigators were kind of shocked to see a totally different side to Samantha. I mean, they don't know Samantha, but from what they've been told that she grew up in a small town, that she's only been married to one man for the last eight years, with them for 13, high school

sweethearts. They were just taken aback because they were under the impression she was just a little more innocent sexually, I guess. It doesn't matter. The point is, the conversation goes into a very straightforward exchange about role playing, being submissive and, you know, one person being the master, one person being the slave. one person being the slave and he's asking her if she's kinky or not and she's teasing him. They're going back and forth. Eventually it gets into a bunch of fantasies that they want to play out.

Investigators are continuing to confirm the information they're finding with Lisa. Did this sound like something that Samantha would be talking about? And Lisa's like, I don't know. I don't know everything about my friend. But listen, she could just want to experiment. open herself up, maybe do things that her and her husband had never done before. She's an adult. It seems like she's just having fun, but however, not everything is just fun in games and the decision to give someone you don't know and have never seen before and can't

background check, the address to your house could lead to devastating consequences. CP-238 is at the top of investigators list of potential suspects and now they have to figure out who this person is. wait do you remember the neighbor who was obsessed with writing things down on pads and pads of paper description of cars things like that well investigators go back to that evidence book and they start going through it and they stop at January 1st wait until you hear this because I am sure detectives were having one of those aha moments piecing this all together because on January 1st the neighborhood watch log

had a handwritten description of a 1996 Mercedes Mercedes Ben with California license plates parked at Samantha's house. The investigators run the plates, and it turns out, the vehicle belongs to a man named Christopher Porter. They cannot believe this. They're like, okay, we're on the right track. We got to bring this guy in. So they dig into his background, and guess what they find out.

He's a 22-year-old Air Force lieutenant, any station nearby. Immediately, they make the connection with the square knot. and the military. He could have gained that knowledge. And also, how convenient is it that this man is in the military? He probably travels to different cities, different states all around the country and beyond. And he could be utilizing these chat rooms, speaking with women, and even going into them so he could find them nearby because they didn't have Tinder. Maybe he would go to one that said, like, Wichita Falls, and then track them down and do them harm. So they have to find him. Luckily, it wasn't hard considering he is in the military, and they waste no time.

They don't waste any time. They tell him what's going on and what happened to Samantha. And they said, you were at the victim's house on January 1st. Who is she to you? And what were you doing there? They wanted details. So he fills them in. He says, yeah, I'm CP 238.

I met Samantha in a chat room. We talked. We were in private messages. But he tells them something else. Remember they asked for details? Well, he's going to give them. them details. He says that Samantha gave him her phone number. He was on his way from work and he called her up because he knew her address. He was close by. And he gave her some commands to carry out.

He said he's going to come over and he wants her to answer the door in nothing but a blindfold. They're like, this is it. This is the Chris. This is who she was with. This is who her friend heard on the phone. So we're going to get this guy. We're not going to let him get away. So now they're like, you don't even know this person. You're going to tell them to blindfold themselves and come answer their front door? What is this? What kind of game is this? And he explains it's a role-playing thing.

She consented. She wanted to do it. And I get that. But I'm sure investigators are thinking the same thing I am. You don't even know who you're going to meet when you open the door. And neither did Samantha. She's blindfolded. And that's really convenient.

If someone was trying to do someone harm and they come and tell them to be blindfolded, they can't even see who it is. So Christian is just trying to explain it from his point of view. This is just something they normally do. It's just kinky role play, you know. She was my submissive, I was the master, we had our sexual encounter, and then I left. That was it, sort of like a Tinder date, you know? They were both going on there and looking for the same thing, this one thing,

and once they had their exchange, they went their separate ways, that's it. So they asked him, okay, are you sure you haven't seen her after that because that was January 1st, not the 5th, remember, or the 6th? And he's like, no, I never saw her after that. And I have an alibi. I was at the batting cages with my friends and they can vouch for me. Now, just so you know, the autopsy report, it hadn't come back yet. And I'm going to get into that in one moment. They don't know whether Samantha was killed on the night of the 5th or the early morning of the 6th.

But all of this is just too much of a coincidence. How do you get a guy? CP 238, his name is Christian, Chris. And they know for a fact, she told her family she was dating a guy named Chris. Once again, they're back with Lisa asking her about Christian, trying to find out whether Samantha ever said that Chris was short for the name Christian or something like that. But Lisa kept reiterating to them, I don't know. I've never seen him.

We're not friends. They didn't want me to meet him yet. they wanted to get to know each other better and then you know Samantha was going to slowly introduce all of us to him. Christian's alibi checks out. Then he provides his DNA sample and it's a waiting game. But now Lisa is 100% convinced that the killer was someone that Samantha met online. She just had a gut feeling and she shared that with investigators and yes feelings are just feelings but after rocking her brain over and over again she couldn't think of anyone in real life that they They knew who would want to do her harm.

They had to let Christian go at that point because they didn't have anything to hold him on. So now they go back through all of Samantha's other conversations. And then they get a call from Lisa again. Lisa tells investigators, she thinks she might know who killed Samantha. And it's not Christian. Well, that's a surprise. Lisa has been doing her own investigation. So she's been going through all of their messages.

Every message they exchanged their emails. we're trying to remember their phone calls and she pieced some information together. She remembered something. And by the way, when I was researching this case, I kept thinking, I am so glad I have a best friend. Thank you, Courtney, for being there, for being my confidant, because if anything were to ever happen to any of us, it's good that we're sharing details with someone.

It sounds morbid. I wouldn't want anything to happen to me, you, nothing like that. But it's good to let people know what you're doing and what's going on. Sometimes we're apprehensive about sharing things, but I truly believe there should be at least one or a few people in your life that you share with, that you're honest with and open with, even if it's a therapist, just to have some kind of record. Lisa dug up an email that Samantha sent her where she was telling her she was scared of a guy that she was seeing and she met him in a chat room. she forwarded these messages calling him a stalker and Lisa looked at the messages and she agreed they were really odd apparently Samantha and this guy had hooked up a few times and they had sort of an ongoing relationship in the fall between somewhere between August September and I think

it ended in October and then she tried to break it off while this guy wasn't having it he wouldn't take no for an answer Samantha said that he would be outside. She would look out the window and his car would be sitting in her driveway. He would stop by without even telling her he was coming over and it made her really uncomfortable. Anytime she would tell him she was busy she couldn't hang out, he would not leave and he would call her non-stop, just leaving her all kinds of emails and calling her on both of her phones and she had had enough of it. She just wanted him to stop bothering her. She was getting worried. Lisa also also tells investigators that his real name is Charles Kent, but his username is death metal

1969. Armed with this information, investigators go back and sift through all of Samantha's conversations between the two of them, and they start to see a pattern, the pattern that Lisa warned them about. At first, Samantha and Charles, they would just talk. They would, you know, talk about everyday things, and then they would talk about meeting up for sex and then having sex and it was casual but it seemed like even though casual it developed into a more frequent but casual relationship and it's also apparent because of the messages that Samantha was ready to call it quits and Charles wanted more investigators found messages from Charles that would say things like oh I was just thinking about stopping by 10 minutes ago and Samantha would say good thing you didn't

It was obvious. It would have been obvious to most of us that she wasn't interested anymore. Finally, about two months ago, Samantha was able to get through to him. And how she did it was she just told him she was seeing other people. But that's all it takes for someone to become enraged and do something completely crazy. Rejection does not go over well with a lot of people. So investigators use this information and they decide to run his name through the DMV. and they get a hit with his address. They take this information and they make a little trip to Charles House to see what's up with him. They ask him what he was doing on January 5th and he says he was home all day on his computer. Well, that's kind of suspicious.

They do get permission to actually confiscate his computer and they collect his DNA and his fingerprints to compare to the evidence that was found at the crime scene. So now they have three possible persons of interest to look into. They have Christian, they have John, the ex-husband, and now they have Charles, and they just have to wait on those DNA results. Something that made Charles look even more suspicious was the way he reacted when he found out that Samantha was dead. He was just nonchalantly answering the questions. He didn't even seem to care that somebody he was close to had been murdered. They can't just arrest him with no further evidence, though, even though that alibi was wrong.

really crappy. Meanwhile, I did tell you that I wanted to talk about the autopsy report. The autopsy report came back. It was a homicide. With the cause of death being strangulation, the report also indicated significant blunt force trauma to the back of Samantha's head. The medical examiner believes that the perpetrator definitely used their hands to initiate the exfixiation because there were marks that indicated that, but then they took the cable and tied it around Samantha's throat and made that knot. Interestingly, they did not find any indications of forced intercourse. So the murder weapon in this case were the cable and the fire extinguisher.

And both of them were tested for DNA and fingerprints. And as it turns out, both of them had not only Samantha's DNA on it, but unknown DNA from who detectives believe would be the killer. Plus, get this, this was huge. There were fingerprints on both the cable and the fire extinguisher, because they have fingerprints, they can go back to the men that they already interviewed and got their information from and their fingerprints and compare them to the actual murder weapon. This was easy.

All they had to do, simple comparison. And they would know whether one of those men were there that night. While they're tracking down that information for analysis, Samantha's funeral was underway and her funeral was beautiful. It was big, which I was surprised about coming from a small town. but so many people came out to pay their respects. The entire place was packed. It was full of people who loved and cared about her so much.

No parents should ever have to say goodbye to their child like that, especially in the type of circumstances and in such a violent way. It's unbelievable. And Sharon could not cope. She couldn't even have pictures of Samantha up around the house. And she was never truly the same. A funeral is, of course, to pay her. to pay our respects to the victims, to the person who is deceased, who lost their life.

But a funeral is also a place where people can come and give their condolences. To that person's loved ones, to care and support the family that's left behind. Because those are the ones that are truly feeling this. The pain that Samantha felt in her last moments is incomprehensible. But the pain of those left behind who have to live every single day without their loved one, can be unbearable. And that's why a lot of people came to the funeral. Some of them didn't even know Samantha. They just had compassion and understanding for her family. And they think about what they would want others to do if this were them. At this point, everyone just wants justice for Samantha.

And that's why there was a lot of hope in this moment. Because of those fingerprints, they were going to find her killer. Unfortunately, that's not what happened. Unbelievably, and to the surprise of all the detectives, none of the men had matching fingerprints to the one at the crime scene. They just laid Samantha to rest, but she can't be at peace. The casket may be closed and she's beneath the earth, but this case is nowhere near being closed. And secrets are still buried. Secrets from what happened. Secrets as to why Samantha found herself in a fatal situation. detectives are working harder than ever to figure out what direction they should even go in next. So they go back to Samantha's friends begging for more information.

And that's when they noticed Lisa became a little apprehensive. She now realizes none of the people that they thought were suspects had anything to do with the crime as far as they knew. Didn't match. Lisa wouldn't be hiding something, would she? Is there a reason why Lisa would hide? something from investigators. Well, kind of. Samantha had a secret. Lisa knew about it. It might have been a secret that Lisa would take to her own grave. However, this is a grave situation. She knew she had to come clean. There was someone else that Samantha was involved with, someone that nobody

knew about, only Lisa. Somebody that she thought that she could rule out, but now, After none of the suspects or persons of interest matched the DNA at the crime scene, Lisa felt that she had no other choice, but to be honest about her best friend, about the affair that Samantha was carrying on with a married man. This next part was shocking to me. It also made me mad and sad and concerned and infuriated. There were a bunch of emotions going through me when I heard what you were about to hear. I don't know what you're going to think.

Everyone has different thoughts and opinions on these things. leave it in the comments if you want to have a conversation and a discussion, but it's not good. Lisa tells detectives that Samantha had an affair with Terry's husband, John. Remember Terry and John, the couple that stumbled upon Samantha's lifeless body? Things are starting to look way more suspicious now. The man that they interviewed when they found Samantha deceased was a man she was having an affair with? What is going on? And why didn't John tell them that information? That's not okay. And I'm not just talking about the affair. It's not okay to withhold information about the fact

that you had more than a friendship with a woman who was just found dead. At the time, they had no reason to take John's DNA, his fingerprints, because according to Terry, she was just really good friends with Samantha. And John was just her husband and that's all she wrote. I'm just the husband's driving my wife over here to her friend's house. We just found her dead. Never mentioning anything else? Well, investigators are not okay with this. They track him down immediately and they're not happy. They want to know why he lied because omitting information is still lying. Detectives don't hesitate. They confront him right away. Why did you lie? Why didn't you tell us you were sleeping with Samantha? He says, okay, yes, yes, it's true. We had an affair.

It was short, though. It was intense, but it was short. Okay, John, but why didn't you tell us about this? And that's when he's like, please, please, please, please. I didn't want my wife to find out. And you know what he said? He didn't want his wife to find out because she wouldn't be happy. Well, yeah, John.

Your wife's not going to be happy knowing that you cheated on her. And he was just as desperate with these investigators. He was begging them. Please, don't tell my wife. They're looking at him. Like, he might be the reason. that Samantha's dead. Was Samantha going to tell Terry what was going on?

Considering Samantha's own best friend broke up her marriage with her own husband John, and now Terry's husband John is having an affair with Samantha, they're starting to think maybe John killed Samantha so that his wife Terry would never find out. When he was asking the detectives to keep his little secret, they were laughing at him.

No, John, they're not your friend. they're not going to stop you from getting in trouble with your wife. They're here to find out who killed Samantha. That's it. He insists he has nothing to do with anything that happened to Samantha. He did not hurt her and he has nothing to do with her murder. And he's still begging them. Please do not tell Terry.

So pathetic. That was definitely unexpected. Detectives get his DNA, his fingerprints, and then they just have to wait. But now they go back to those logs from the neighborhood watch. They're trying to see if there are any other vehicles that would match the description of the vehicle that John or his wife Terry drove. Because they can't roll Terry out, maybe she has something to do with it. Everyone has to be tested. Their DNA, their fingerprints. They're all in the database now. But it takes weeks for those results to come back.

That's when police remember the motorcycle. They had been looking into cars and whatnot, but they hadn't really focused on the motorcycle that the 12-year-old had talked about seeing. in the neighborhood. Maybe because they heard that from a 12-year-old. Nevertheless, they decided they need to go question, said 12-year-old, and ask a little more information. And while they're there in the neighborhood, they kind of go back around to Samantha's immediate neighbors and just say, hey, did you think of anything else? Can you remember anything from the night of the crime or the day before? Crazy enough, one of the neighbors, Kathy, she comes forward and she says, I saw a blonde guy. It was like right before 6 p.m.

He drove up on a motorcycle. That may be why they remembered more information because they were asked specific questions about the motorcycle. Kathy said, Samantha and this guy actually got out of Samantha's pickup truck around 4.50 p.m. And then they went inside Samantha's house. Another neighbor Rebecca said that she actually spoke to Samantha outside that day. And she saw the guy.

And she said, oh, who's that? And Samantha said, oh, that's my boyfriend. And Rebecca said, yeah, he was driving a motorcycle. And that motorcycle stayed there until Rebecca left for church, which was approximately 6 p.m. Later when Rebecca came home from church, around 8.10 p.m. The motorcycle was gone. Now remember Samantha's friend, Zach? He said he called her around 9.30 on both of her phones and got to be.

no answer. So now they think that something could have happened between 6 p.m. when Rebecca left and when Rebecca returned and here's why. When Rebecca came home from church, she noticed that there were no lights on at Samantha's house. Rebecca lived right next door and she knew that Samantha turned her porch light on every night due to the neighborhood watch program. So it concerned Rebecca. However, she had to wake up early early the next morning so she didn't really give it much thought and she went to bed. The next morning Rebecca got up around 5-10 and she noticed that Samantha's porch light is still off and it didn't seem like anything changed from the night before. That's the morning that Samantha was found. Things

are about to heat up again. The forensics unit goes through the computer and they type in the word motorcycle hoping that one of the men Samantha was chatting with might have mentioned that he had a motorcycle and sure enough one of the chats has the word motorcycle in it and it's a conversation between Samantha and the username I am Elliot it's time for them to dig into these chats now these ones were not as sexual in nature they weren't weird they weren't odd they were just everyday conversations they talked about music pets hobbies tattoos it seemed like they both like tattoos and they could see that Samantha had met him for the first time just weeks before her death they knew that she met him in person

in person because the conversation said, I had a lot of fun with you last night. I Am Elliot seemed like a gentleman. He even offered to bring Samantha some lunch one day, but they can't seem to find out any clues to his identity. They just have a username. And it seemed like I Am Elliot and Samantha had quite a few things in common. They had both just gotten out of relationships and were looking for a companionship. And apparently since they both like tattoos, they had planned to go to a tattoo shop together. Investigators recall Sharon saying that Samantha was planning on visiting a tattoo shop with Chris on January 5th. So now they go door to door to visit local shops hoping that they could gather information about that outing. And sure enough, they get a hit at a place called

Southern Star Tattoo and Piercing Studio. It turns out Samantha was there on Sunday at 3.15 p.m. with a blonde guy and they drove up in Samantha's pickup truck. So they have a blonde guy. So they have a blonde guy, that's at her house on January 5th. She calls him her boyfriend. She tells her mom she's going to hang out with a guy named Chris at the tattoo shop. The boyfriend has a red and black motorcycle. I Am Elliott has a motorcycle. I Am Elliot and her plan to go to a tattoo shop.

She goes to the tattoo shop and who she go with a blonde guy. So what does I Am Elliot look like? Well, we're about to find out. And it's all because of photography. But not a photo of I Am Elliot. Not yet. but because he was helping Samantha with photography. She had been taking some photos and he tells her you should bring them into Metro.

Metro was the name of a local photo developing center and kids. This was before digital cameras or at least we were still using film. She was still using film and she needed to get it developed. He wasn't just giving her advice on where to go. It turns out he worked there. Metro is close by. So police are ready to go. They go straight to Metro Photologist.

And what do they see outside? A red and black motorcycle. So they run the plates. And what happens when they do? They find that the motorcycle is registered to a Christopher Russell. Christopher with a K, not a C. So that's why the CP-238 username didn't really work out for them because this Christopher spells his name with a K, not a C.

And the motorcycle license was from Nebraska. However, when they're looking at records from the tattoo shop, apparently both Chris and Samantha had had to leave their information, including their telephone numbers. So they run the number given by Chris and it's returned to a Kyle Russell with the address of 3814 Stone Gate Drive. Christopher's middle name is Kyle. Christopher Kyle Russell. So they figured that Kyle is Christopher's father.

So when Christopher was talking to Samantha telling her I just moved back to Texas, now they understand. He moved from Nebraska and he's probably living with his parents. So they decided to go ahead and pull up Christopher's Nebraska driver's license photo. Can you guess what color hair Christopher has? Blonde? Of course he did. But they needed something else.

They needed Christopher's fingerprints because remember when they have the print. they can get the match. So the FBI helps them to obtain Christopher's fingerprints. I love when things are coming together. They take his driver's license photo and they bring it to Southern Star Tattoo and piercing studio where Jeff Miller was an employee. He was able to identify the person who came into the tattoo shop on that day on January 5th with Samantha was the same person in the photo.

They have to cover all bases. They have to connect everything. They're about to try to arrest a man for murder. Whenever things are coming together like this, I can imagine the rush of adrenaline that these investigators must get while they're piecing everything together because it's becoming more and more apparent that Christopher Russell is probably their guy and they have to find out where he is and fast. It's always a race against time.

And since Christopher was from Nebraska, they want to find out who he was and we want to find out who he was and what he was doing in Nebraska before he came back to Texas, so they do a background check. They find out Christopher is married. That's right, to a woman named Tara. It gets worse. Unbelievable worse. Because Christopher said he just got out of a relationship. When he was talking to Samantha on Yahoo Messenger, that's something they had in common. They were getting over the loss of their significant other. Well, Chris is a loss was a little bit different than Samantha's. Christopher's wife was dead. That's right. She died. And Samantha's dead. Christopher Russell was a widow. Now the conversation is making even more sense.

They go back. They're checking the chat. Yeah. He's getting over the loss of his wife. Wouldn't that mean she died recently? I mean, I know it can take a very long time. Maybe you'll never get over the loss of a loved one. There's no time frame to put on that. But this just becomes suspicious because it turns out, Tara died two months to the day before Samantha. To the day. Tara was found dead November 6th.

And just two months later on January 6th, Samantha's found dead? Wait, because there's more. And you're not going to believe this. It gave me the chills. Tara and Samantha have the exact same. birthday just one year apart they were both born on May 13th Tara was born on May 13th and Samantha was born on May 13th 1974 what is going on not only that when they pull up pictures of Tara they find out she bears a striking resemblance to

Samantha they both have brown hair they both have brown eyes and a number of Samantha had tattoos on her left arm, two dragons on her left leg, a heart on her upper chest and loving memory on her left forearm. And as for Tara, she had hearts on her left breast, her left buttocks and her left leg and flowers around her right wrist and her left ankle and a bear on her left leg. Not only that, both of these women met Christopher on the internet. detectives are shocked. So they decide to reach out to the police department in the town where Tara died. And that agency tells detectives that Tara's death was suspicious. And you know I would never try to take away attention from Samantha in this story.

But we have to stop for a moment and talk about Tara. Because the first thing detectives want to know is how did Tara die? Tara Russell was from Shadron, Texas. And she graduated high school in 1991, and then she served six years in the Navy as a nurse. She and Christopher had just moved to Shadron in March of 2002. And like I said, they met online and they were married a few months later on November 28, 2001. They had been married less than a year when Tara was found dead. I had so many questions, so I dug up newspaper clippings because I dug up newspaper clippings because

I had to understand what happened to Tara. On the morning of her death, Tara was brought back to her house around 2 o'clock in the morning by her friend Renee. Now, according to Tara's mom, Donna, Christopher was at home waiting for Tara to arrive. They were alone. He actually came out and helped her get into the house because she had been out, you know, having a good time that night.

Her friend Renee that dropped her off actually used to live with Tara and Christopher for seven months. She had just moved out a week. week before Tara was found dead. Tara and Renee had been out that night and there was nothing wrong with Tara according to Renee. She wasn't sick. She didn't have a fever. She didn't have a cold or an infection of any kind. They were just having fun together.

However, the next morning, Christopher told police he found Tara's body on the living room floor dead. At the time of her death, a forensic pathologist determined the cause of Tara's death, was pneumonia, but get this. Christopher insisted that Tara be cremated and he had that power. As her husband, he could make that decision. Just a few weeks later, he's packing up a U-Haul and police go by there and they're like, hey buddy, where are you going? He explained, well, my wife died and I'm going back to live with my parents in Texas. That's when they asked him to go for a polygraph and he agrees. He's like, yeah, okay, yeah, I'll take one, but he never shows up and he leaves town. He was gone just a few hours after police came by.

Tara's mom said, she wasn't sick. There was nothing wrong with her daughter. She had no underlying health conditions. So all of this is looking really, really bad. Christopher Russell could be a potential serial killer. Was he planning to do this again? Did he kill Tara?

Investigators have to find him. And with all this information and evidence, a judge issues a search. search warrant and they bring Chris down to the station, they collect his fingerprints, his DNA. He never says a word. He wouldn't even give them a statement. Nothing. That search warrant included access to his parents' residence where he was living. And that's where they find a few things that definitely connected him to the crime scene. The first was a book on knots. I'm not kidding. And no pun intended. He had a book on how to create different knots. And in that book,

was the square knot, the one that was used around Samantha's neck. They find coax cables and laser pointers in his closet. The same kind of laser pointer that was found on Samantha's bed. This man is strange. He collects laser pointers. He has a book about knots. What is he doing? Well, what he's not doing is talking to police.

But it doesn't matter because guess what? He doesn't have to say a word. His DNA speaks for itself. That's right. They match his DNA and his fingerprints to the crime scene. They're all over the cable. And they're on the fire extinguisher. They caught their killer. And on February 20th, 2003, they arrest Christopher Kyle Russell for the murder of Samantha Lysark. Chris was 21 years old. He was a student at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls. And guess what he was studying? Criminal Justice. It's like he was.

trying to learn the things he was going to use to hurt people and that's sick. This man came from a good home. He looks like just like a clean cut all-American boy and his family they're well respected within their community. They're members of a big church in the town. He had been in the Marines but guess what he left. They sent him home in less than a week and that is a huge red flag. I've said this before but looks can be deceiving and you know that there was something wrong with Christopher Russell. They searched his bedroom and they found a picture of what they thought was a picture of Samantha and it turned out to be Tara. That's how much these women looked alike. They were also able to confiscate Christopher's computer and confirm that he was the person behind

the username, I am Elliot. Not only that, he was dating another woman from Wichita Falls. He had a girlfriend. He probably would have done this again because he thought he got away with murder at least once. But what about Tara? He pleads not guilty to Samantha's murder. And in Nebraska, they're reopening the case involving Tara's death. They might not have her body anymore, but luckily, the forensic pathologist that conducted the autopsy, took tissue samples, blood samples, and photographs.

There were marks on Tara's neck. And her mom felt so bad because she was just like, if you wouldn't have let him go, Samantha wouldn't be dead. here's what prosecutors said happened when they went to trial. Their theory was that Samantha and Christopher were dating. Chris came over to spend time with Samantha that day. It was a normal day. They also believed that the laser pointer was a gift to Samantha for her cats.

Because you know how cats play with the little laser pointer? And then he gave it to her to build rapport to gain her trust. Why would he have more than one though? There's something else I don't really believe as far as what their theory is. But who am I? I don't know. They said they thought something happened to cause Chris to go into a rage, but I think he planned this all along. I don't think he was triggered by anything.

I think he was looking for the perfect opportunity. And if he killed Tara, the perfect opportunity was right when Renee moved out. And with Samantha, the perfect opportunity was finding a beautiful, vulnerable woman who just got out of a relationship and was trusting of a man that she met online. And she reminded him so much of his last victim

if it's true that he did anything to Tara. In my opinion, he killed her. They said that he ripped that cable out from behind the TV. We know that they were planning on watching the DVD of Friends. So maybe they were just sitting in that area watching TV in her bedroom

and they were just close by and he just grabbed that cable because it was there. But he also had those cables at his house and the laser pointers. I think it was planned. It's kind of morbid that these kind of cables can be used for internet and things like that. And they met on the internet. I don't know. It's just really strange.

But the fact that there was no indication of forced intercourse leads me to believe that he just knew he was going to do this all along and then he came there for one reason. After a quick deliberation, the jury found Christopher Russell guilty of first to murder and he was sentenced to the maximum 99 years in prison. It was a relief to have someone like him off of the streets. Someone who at first glance looks like a really nice guy. Someone that goes to church and goes to college and seems to be bettering himself. But it's really not what's on the outside. It's what's on the inside the counts. And it's sad because on the inside Samantha, she had a loving, caring heart and she

was loved by so many people around her. I don't know how someone can do what Christopher did, but I'm glad that he can't do it to anyone else. Just be careful, do background checks. Even if someone is really good looking, you just never know what's on the inside. Thank you so very much for being here once again. I will see you in my next video. Bye.