Unseen - Groomed To Kill | The Case of Lisa Knoefel | UNSEEN

Episode Date: July 23, 2024

“He was chopping it up. That was sketchy.”-- On November 16th, 2012, 13 year-old Megan Zanella witnesses her mother being attacked by her foster sister, Sabrina Zunich. Tragically, the police arrive too late to save Megan’s mother, Lisa Knoefel, and Sabrina is apprehended at the scene. However, in the subsequent investigation and trial, Megan and the police come to understand that nothing is as it seems, and become suspicious of Megan’s step-father, Kevin Knoefel. Megan must now gather her strength and face off against her own family in her quest to get justice for her mother. Credits: Directing, writing & editing by Alexandre Gendron Research by Tianyi Zhang Script revision by Tiffany Loxton Produced by Alexandra Salois & Salim Sader Voiceover by William Akana Sources: WEWS-TV - ABC - Sabrina Zunich Accused Dayton Correctional - A Look Inside Dateline - Deadly Betrayal Investigation Raw - Unrequited Love Law & Crime - Sabrina Zunich Interrogation Sex & Murder - Family Love Triangle Snapped - Sabrina Zunich Snapped: Behind Bars - Sabrina Zunich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1994, on the 27th of October, four days before Halloween, a little girl named Sabrina was born on the outskirts of Cleveland, Ohio, faded with alcoholic and abusive parents. She became a child of the foster care system until Lisa Canafel, a social worker specializing in sexual abuse, took her under her wing. From then on, Sabrina had it all, two loving parents, two sisters, and a bright future ahead of her. Or so she thought, since on August 6, 2014, Sabrina was put on trial for the murder of Lisa, her own foster mother. You recognize this knife, and you attacked her with such bigger and force that you managed to put a 20-degree bend in a stainless steel knife, correct? Two years before this was recorded, Sabrina was arrested inside her foster parents' home with a bloody knife in her hand. Lisa Canafil was stabbed to death. Her 18-year-old foster daughter is in. in custody tonight.

I can't see the Sabrina that I know being violent towards anyone, let alone what she did. She would never have done this by herself. At the time, the police's only other lead was Kevin Knaefel, the victim's husband, and Sabrina's foster father. We're just trying to figure out what happened that night. You know, his wife was probably murdered here. You can feel free to talk. He's no lawyer.

I'm not about your relationship with Sabrina, no. Tell him? No. But someone else knew what really happened. On the night of the murder, Megan Zanella, Sabrina's foster sister, was also present at the scene. My name is Megan Zanella, and I am the daughter of Lisa Knapple. This is my first interview, and I have been waiting for this since my mom passed away. After calling 911, Megan waited six agonizing minutes before the police arrived.

She tried to fight off Sabrina, but at only 13, she was easily overwhelmed. Eventually, she heard the sirens wailing in the distance. I rush outside to meet them, and they point a gun at me because they thought I was Sabrina. She's waving her hands. You need to hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry. Worst case, scenario was going through my head. What am I going to see? How bad is this going to be?

After clearing up the confusion, the officers entered the residence. They called out to Sabrina and Lisa, but were met with only eerie silence. Eventually, after entering the first room past the stairs, the officers came face to face with Sabrina, covered in blood, knife in hand. It was a very tense couple seconds. I could see blood on the blade, I can see blood on her. Immediately we started to scream to drop the knife. Sabrina looked straight at the officer for a couple of seconds, as if she was in a trance before throwing away the knife and putting her hands up. While his partner cuffed her, Randy Mullinex approached Lisa's bed.

I could barely even see. It looked like she literally showered in blood. I knew there's nothing I can do. After his partner dragged Sabrina outside, the officer began clearing the room when he suddenly heard something unusual. I could hear a child crying from my left. We opened up the door to clear the closet, and that's when I found a very, very small child screaming. This was Haley Knavel. Megan's little sister, who crawled into the closet in fear once the attack began.

Later, at the station, Sabrina tried to act as if she didn't remember anything, but couldn't hold it in when the detectives brought on Haley and Megan. You had a knife and you stay, please, son. Kayak gets my flight, hotel, and rental car right, so I can tune out travel advice that's just plain wrong. Bro, Skycoin, way better than points. Never fly during a Scorpio full moon. Just tell the manager you'll sue.

Instant room upgrade. Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. Megan's mother, Lisa Canafel, first met Sabrina through her job as a social worker. During their conversation, Lisa felt a deep sense of empathy for the teenager. At 16 years old, Sabrina never had a stable home or foster parents and longed for some sense of normalcy. believing she and her husband Kevin could provide Sabrina with the support she needed,

Lisa made a major decision. This wasn't her first time taking in a foster kid, so I do remember when we actually went to go pick up Sabrina. She was really nice, and I thought she could be a big sister figure for me. She worked a lot in counseling, how to cope and how to manage with everything she was going through. She was going to class, getting good grades. I think Sabrina really was thriving in their home. For over a year, Sabrina mingled well with the Knafels,

especially with her sisters, Megan and Haley. Even with Kevin, Megan's stepfather and Lisa's husband. But eventually, Kevin began spending more and more time alone with Sabrina, neglecting the rest of his family. Lisa tried to address this through text messages, but Kevin dismissed her concerns, insisting she was overreacting. I started to notice that something wasn't right between Sabrina and Kevin. Lisa being in the field of working for the job and family services in the sex division,

I think she had a pretty good inkling on what was going on. Sabrina had never experienced a stable family, a loving household, the sense of security, the sense of belonging. Kevin seemed to know how to prey on Sabrina's vulnerabilities. Kevin Keneffel is a sexual predator. He was no better than the people that sit. sexually abused the kids that Lisa was trying to help. With no way to prove her suspicions,

Lisa began talking about divorcing Kevin and putting Sabrina back into foster care, but her husband insisted they wait for Sabrina to finish high school before letting her go. In the meantime, Lisa became more strict towards her foster daughter, ensuring she stayed home to prevent Kevin from approaching her, but her safeguarding quickly escalated. For unknown reasons, Lisa isolated Sabrina from her sisters too, creating a very tense environment inside the house. There were some tensions between Lisa and Sabrina,

and then Sabrina and the minor child too, Megan. It was all downhill from there. And I never knew that it could lead to this. As he was leaving for work, she gave him a hug and she whispered something to him. And I just didn't think that was right. From the corner of her eye, Megan noticed that Sabrina received an unusually high number of text messages over dinner and the rest of the evening.

Even past bedtime, she could still hear her foster sister's phone buzzing from the next room. Suddenly, at 1 a.m., the sound stopped before a high-pitched shout pierced the silence. I was hearing screaming, and I was like, what the hell is going on downstairs? So I walked down there and Bree is stabbing my mother to death. I said, get off of her. I was actually on her at one point and she shoved me. So I immediately go into the office area and call 911. At only 13, she was trying to explain the situation to the operator

while fighting off Sabrina in an attempt to defend her mother. And this keeps going on for over six minutes. Megan's worst nightmare coming true. I have trouble sleeping every night. I have flashbacks all the time, and that will never stop. Following Sabrina's arrest, she had to be taken to a hospital to treat the numerous stab wounds Lisa and Megan caused to her hands during the attack. After she was stabilized, police took her back to the station and immediately began her interview. Our main goal when we first interviewed Sabrina was to get Sabrina to tell us exactly what happened.

We caught her coming out of the room, so we knew she did it. We wanted to know why. So what do you recall? Yesterday? Mm-hmm. I don't know. For over an hour, Sabrina claimed she had no recollection of the events and was unaware of Lisa's passing.

Her story was that she took too many ibuprofen, blacked out, and woke up in the hospital. But Parmiter, a veteran detective, knew the teenager was hiding something. First thing she does is she has an itch on her forehead from no. apparent reason. When people touch their face or, you know, start scratching or start tamping her toes, it's a good indication to us that the person's probably lying. They're nervous. The detective couldn't gather anything from her, except that she was deceptive. Several people at the station proclaimed he shouldn't open an investigation since they caught Sabrina red-handed, but Parmiter couldn't shake off the fact that it was unusual for a suspect to deny everything

whilst being caught in the act. So he asked Kevin to come to the station for an interview, To his surprise, Kevin requested that his attorney be present, and Michael Connick, said attorney, refused on his behalf. To convince them to show up, Parmiter gave them a false pretense. They would only talk about Lisa's work. You told me you want to talk about his wife's work? Correct. It's a subject matter. Yeah.

Kevin, do you know anything that was happening at the house tonight before you left to work that night? Talked about his wife's work. What's going up the house the night before is not his worst work? We're just trying to figure out what happened that night. You know, his wife was brutally murdered here. Were you and Lisa in the process of going through a divorce? Okay, now we're getting outside the scope. We're not going to get into the relationship between Kevin and Lisa.

The police couldn't help but find this strange. Why wouldn't Kevin help them? Why was Michael so defensive with his client? But what really caught Parmiter off guard was Kevin and Michael's reaction when he brought Sabrina into the conversation. Before then, the detective knew nothing of Kevin and Sabrina's strange relationship. You can feel free to talk. He's no where he's no way of it. I understand where he can still say what he wants to say. I mean, how about your relationship with Sabrina? No. In the aftermath, Kevin kept looking over Megan for a few days before her own father

could move her out of the house. During that short period of time, the 13-year-old witnessed many things that forced her to reconsider her stepfather's involvement in the events of November 16th. All I know is that the next day, he was getting rid of my mom's stuff. She was just murdered. She didn't die from cancer. It wasn't, you know, long coming or anything. She was murdered. On that very same day, mere hours after his wife's murder, Kevin was on the phone with his insurance company. Turns out, he previously had terminated his own coverage, along with those of his two children, and transferred them to Lisa, giving her quadruple protection six months before her death. When he hung up, he had cashed in over $785,000.

He did, taking it out the morning of. I was shocked. It was a lot of money, and he blew through all of it. He was buying cars. He was buying a camper. He was remodeling his house, all with Lisa's insurance money. During the rest of the week, Kevin tried to visit Subcommittee. Sabrina in jail every single day, but was denied each time.

Megan couldn't help but wonder why Kevin would do such a thing, but his strange behavior had only just begun. The next day, he brought an axe into her mother's bedroom. The bed my mom was stabbed to death on, he was chopping it up, like cutting it up. I thought that was very odd. Even after Megan reunited with her biological father, her suspicions kept rising. Every time she saw Kevin, she noticed something strange about her. his behavior. At her mother's funeral, he asked the attendees to pray for Sabrina, the person

allegedly responsible for the murder of whom they came to mourn. By merely glancing at her stepfather on that day, Megan knew she was onto something. I was looking over at Kevin. He had no emotion. It's like my mom was never there. Your wife was murdered, and you haven't even cried once. That's weird and sketchy. And that's when I knew he did this. After six months, the case went cold. Both Megan and Parmiter knew Sabrina did it, but didn't know why, and couldn't shake off how odd Kevin had been acting since the murder of his wife.

That was until Sabrina, still in custody, agreed to talk to Karen Kowal, or case prosecutor, through a process called a proffer. So a proffer is a good faith first step, when the defense attorney, the prosecution, meet with the suspect, and it's an opportunity for them to be 100% complete honest and tell exactly what happened. As Parmiter and Kowal investigated, it became clear that Sabrina was probably trying to protect somebody when she claimed to have blacked out during the attack. Even from inside her cell, Sabrina appeared to be overwhelmed with regret for what she did,

and her concern for the rest of her foster family never lessened. For these reasons, Kowal went straight to the point during the time. proffer interview. What we believe from conversations is that what led up to this homicide to this murder is that there was another party involved in planning that. Yes. Is Kevin Canafel, my foster father? From what they've gathered, Kevin appeared to be a groomer, a sexual predator who builds

a relationship with an underage person to gain their trust and prepare them for sexual abuse. Kevin often used attention, gifts, and secrets to make the 17-year-old feel special. and dependent on him. He promised her that he would help her get into a maso therapy school and that she should train on him. From there, it didn't take long for him to get what he really wanted from the teenager, and he would continue to exploit her every time they were alone together. Sabrina had an appendix surgery, her appendix burst, and I visited her in the hospital. That day, while I was there shortly after, Kevin had sexual relations with her in a hospital bed. after she just had appendix surgery.

That makes me sick to my stomach. Does he ever tell you, hey, you can't tell anybody about this? All the time. Do you say what would happen if you'd be taken out of my care and I could lose my foster parent license? Kevin extended his control over Sabrina during the following year. After every sexual encounter the two would have, he would talk about Lisa,

twisting the narrative to make Sabrina believe that the only way for them to be together was to get rid of his wife permanently. Slowly but surely, he manipulated Sabrina into believing that killing Lisa was her only option. He wanted to get a divorce, but Haley, which is a three-year-old daughter of his and her, was in the picture and she would get custody, and he didn't want that happening. He said, well, look, I'm going to kill myself because I can't deal with this anymore. And so when he said that, it kind of triggered me.

I was like, no, I don't want that to happen. That's what he manipulated me with. And so I was like, okay, I'll do it. Why doesn't he kill her? Because then Haley wouldn't have a father. He'd be out of the prison, and basically he convinced me that I wouldn't get caught. I was supposed to take a ring, her necklace, all of that, as if somebody came in and burglarized her. But things didn't go as planned.

Lisa woke up while Sabrina stood frozen in front of her bed, realizing she'd reached a point of no return, the teenager attacked her foster mother and fell into a blind rage when Lisa and Megan tried to fight back. Why did you stop? You realized this isn't going away I thought I would. Because I said, well, it's too late now. I'm going to go to jail anyway. Matter of just getting done. And then during the time when you would see Lisa, I mean, would you think like, oh, I can't do this.

My heart would be out of my chest when just thinking about it. I still sit here in disbelief that I did it. Kowal and Parmiter were hesitant at first, since Sabrina could have easily invented everything. Yet, instead of demonstrating the usual behaviors associated with lying, Sabrina was now much more confident, assertive, and consistent in her account of the events. To back her claims, she even mentioned that someone else knew about the plot, her high school friend, Autumn Pavlik.

Myself and Chief Assistant Prosecutor knocked on her door, We introduced ourselves and she says, I've been expecting you guys. Are you surprised that he was also talking to you about that? When he got on the phone, it became a reality. I'm like, okay, well, if I could talk her out of it, and if I can make it, so where him manipulating her is no longer there, maybe it won't have. Since Kevin had already talked to Autumn about his plan,

the police thought he might do so again if she confronted him. So they wired up the 17-year-old and sent her to meet Kevin. When she accused him of killing his wife and of having conspired with his foster daughter to do so, Kevin didn't deny her claims. He didn't even react at all. If somebody's accusing you of being involved to something, you know you're not involved, you know, you would say something like, what are you talking about? I have no idea what you're talking about.

Armed with Sabrina and Autumn's testimonies, Parmiter didn't waste any more time. I got an arrest warrant. We went to Kevin Caneval's house and we arrested him. I don't think he was surprised. It was kind of weird because he was sleeping up in Sabrina's right. After his arrest, the police finally had Kevin to themselves, but it wouldn't last long. We have a lot of your involvement in this case. We would like to know your story on us on what happened.

What was the relationship now with Sabrina? And you got to the point to where police got really frustrated and I dealt with Sabrina. Elaborate more on how your relationship with this. We're getting into all this stuff. I'm supposed to have my lawyer? You know we have the evidence. I'm going to have a little bit.

on indictment here. Lake County grand jury indicted the man for plotting to kill Lisa with help from his foster child. But that's not all. He's also accused of sexual battery for having relationship with that child. I was out to eat and I remember just seeing my mom's face on the news and my dad looked at me and said, Kevin got arrested today. And I was like, really? And I had no emotion.

I had no emotion because I didn't know what to say. At the trial, 12 witnesses took the stand, from Sabrina's teachers and social workers to family and friends of the Knaefel. Each of them corroborated that he acted suspiciously after the murder, and many either knew or witnessed him acting suggestively with Sabrina. Even Kevin's best friend, David Strunk, testified against him. In a report he filled in the weeks after the murder, he explained that Kevin insisted on showing him some of Sabrina's suggestive modeling pictures and that he kept talking about

visiting her in jail, just like Megan noticed. He told me that he just wanted to let her know that he was still there for her. This was the person that had just killed his wife and I was shocked that he would want to have any sort of contact with her. After nine hours of consideration, the jury came back with the verdict. Guilty, sexual battery was charged in the indictment of conspiracy from an aggravated murder. Guilty but complicit a aggravated murder is charged in the incident. In an interview with Karen Kowal, the case prosecutor,

journalist Josh Mancuitz remarked that even though they had won their case, a judgment like this bore little satisfaction. This is really just betrayal on top of betrayal, on top of betrayal, isn't it? I mean, you got Kevin betraying Lisa, Sabrina betraying Lisa. Then you have Kevin betraying Sabrina and ultimately Sabrina betraying Kevin. Yeah, it's a perfect circle. But the journalist is for the journalist is for. forgetting someone in this allegory because no one has been betrayed more than Megan.

Forced not only to witness the attack, Megan tried to save her mom to no avail, and now she has to carry that trauma with her for the rest of her life. Yamava Resort and Casino at San Manuel is California's number one entertainment destination for today's superstars. Catch the Jonas Brothers return to the Yamava Theater stage on April 30th, the powerful vocals of Demi Lovato on May 17th, and the signature Southern Country Rock of Eric Church on July 19th. Tickets on sale now at Yamava Theater.com. Only at Yamava Resort and Casino,

celebrating its 40th anniversary. You in? Must be 21 to enter. If I had to pick one emotion, I would say angry. I'm very angry. To take away someone who was helping a lot of people in their life and doing what they could for their family is awful. I believe that I should do time because I know they deserve justice, and the only justice they can get is to be behind bars. Sabrina pled guilty to all charges, and, like Kevin, was condemned to life behind bars without parole until 2042. In 2017, Haley and Megan filed civil suits against them and were awarded over $6 million in damages. From her jail cell at Dayton Correctional, Sabrina was interviewed twice since her incarceration, once by Dateline in 2015 and again by HLN in 2020. In both cases, she pleaded for forgiveness from her former foster sisters.

I realized that there's more than one victim in this story. If I had a chance, I would tell them that I was selfish, and then I'm sorry. And then I never meant to hurt them. And I know, how could I say that when I killed their mother? I was in a place that I wasn't thinking about anybody but myself. And that was wrong and it doesn't make it right. I know no matter what I say, I can't bring her back. And I can't undo what's already been done and what they've solved.

It means anything. I truly do apologize. Sorry will never be enough for the act that you did. The pain I go through every day, knowing that my mom is not there to see me get married and have kids. You took that away from me. Since Sabrina and Kevin's condemnation, Megan has grown up to become a strong and independent woman. She may never forgive her former sister, but instead she turned her adversity into purpose by studying criminal law in college,

hoping to someday bring justice and reparation to other survivors of violent crimes. Today, Megan continues to show a desire to help others, a trait she will forever share with her mother. She just wanted to help people, you know, make a difference. Thank you.