True Crime

00:09 I'm no different than any other teenager in America. 00:16 I love my family and my friends. 00:21 My two dogs and my cat. 00:23 I love writing, I love reading. Despite me trying to be a normal teenager, someone does want me dead. 00:48 This is the picture of me, a description of me, where I lived, where I worked, that Mastermind365 posted about me. 00:56 On the Murder for Hire website? 00:57 Yes. 00:59 Hi, my name is Yura. We have hundreds of gang members, criminals, and people who love to kill for money. 01:11 They are anonymous. You are anonymous. So come and get rid of those nasty problems. 01:20 This is deadly serious. This is talking about the murder of a human being. 01:25 It definitely changed my life. I kept looking over my shoulder. I didn't know who I could trust. I could be killed on my way to work. I could be killed on my way home from school. 01:37 And that terrified me. 01:40 You can submit your orders to kill the people you hate. 01:52 We've got some significant leads on who Yura might be. 01:55 Do you think you're getting close? 01:57 Yeah, absolutely. 02:01 As a dark web intelligence analyst, my job is to uncover that which is hidden. 02:09 Is there a chance, as I look up on your screen, that may be our guy? 02:17 Everyone can be found. Yura can be found. 02:24 So we are literally a car ride from where we're talking right now to where you believe Yura actually lives. 02:32 Yes. 02:33 We're going to make a left at the next street. 02:36 Go slower, go slower, go slower. Where's the house? 02:42 It's this one right here. Yeah, it's this house right here. Where Yura might presently live. 02:48 Man, my heart is racing. 02:50 I'm alive. Go. 02:51 Are you Yura? 02:55 stop recording right now 03:45 Late on a frigid night in February 2019, 18-year-old Alexis Stern was driving near her hometown of Big Lake, Minnesota when she says she noticed a white van in her rearview mirror. 04:01 So we started driving around town, taking detours. 04:05 But the van stuck with her. In a growing panic, she called authorities, who later located and spoke with the van's driver. 04:17 He claimed he was lost. He didn't know where he was. 04:20 You have no doubt you were being followed, right? 04:22 Yeah. 04:24 Alexis had every reason to be worried because of something that had happened just months earlier when out of nowhere, the police had called her. 04:33 You have to talk to you. It's dire and you need to come now. 04:37 It's dire, he says. 04:38 Yes, he said it was urgent. 04:42 I had no idea what to expect. Did someone die? Is someone hurt? Like, am I in trouble? 04:48 When Alexis arrived at the police station, she got stunning news. 04:53 He was just like, I think you should sit down. Someone put a hit out on you and they want you dead. I was like, this is a joke, right? 05:04 It was not a joke. On the dark web, someone using the alias Mastermind365 had gone to a hitman for hire site and paid about $5,000 worth of Bitcoin for Alexis to be assassinated. 05:21 giving chilling details. 05:24 Where I lived, where I worked, my picture of me, a description of me, everything. 05:29 FBI and Homeland Security agents soon got involved. Although many dark web sites are scams, Alexis knew someone out there wanted her dead. 05:40 And that terrified me. 05:42 Authorities promised to investigate. The aspiring horror book author had read about the dark web. 05:49 A hidden online marketplace where criminality ranging from human trafficking to illegal weapons is advertised for sale. 06:00 Even murder. 06:02 but the more you start to dig, the darker it starts to get. 06:04 It was in 2017 that 48 Hours first investigated Dark Web Murder for Hire. The next year, we exposed about 20 active murder plots. Police received a tip from the CBS News program, 48 Hours. 06:22 48 Hours alerted law enforcement, leading to arrests in two states and two foreign countries. 06:31 Our investigation also led us to this mysterious figure known as Yura, who has been operating Hitman's sites for about five years. 06:42 We don't know his real name or location, but he sent us these video diaries. 06:49 I am doing this video diary entry to give you official statements. 06:55 Looking for criminals on the dark web is not for the faint of heart. 07:01 For most of her career, this woman has lived in the shadows. 07:06 I was a member of the intelligence community. 07:09 Now she's a CBS News consultant who we hired to help us look for Yura. 07:15 What makes it challenging is this isn't your traditional law enforcement investigation where there's DNA and there's fingerprints and a weapon and a crime scene. 07:27 Lisa, as we'll call her, has altered her appearance for this interview. 07:32 In the world of the dark web, DNA is email addresses, usernames, passwords. 07:39 Lisa analyzed Ura's writings. 07:42 His English is very good. 07:44 But she says the evidence suggests he is foreign born and doesn't work alone. 07:50 There's definitely some support. 07:53 She says the murder-for-hire sites are all about making big money and that she found millions of dollars of profits in an online account she believes is linked to Yura. 08:05 Upwards of, I think, $5 million. 08:08 Apparently, about $5,000 of those profits was allegedly paid to kill Alexis Stern. When her parents found out, they weren't taking any chances. You left Minnesota? 08:21 Yes. 08:23 We just started driving. 08:26 It was scary. 08:27 But who would want her dead? Alexis thought she knew. 08:33 Back in 2016, she was a high school sophomore struggling with her self-esteem. She was just 15 when a friend introduced her to an older man online. 08:46 I ended up meeting a guy named Adrian. 08:48 Adrian Fry. 08:49 Yes, Adrian Fry. 08:51 She was intrigued to learn that Adrian Frye lived in England. 08:56 I was always partial to British accents, so I thought it was kind of a bonus. 09:00 Adrian was 20. He said he was training to be an accountant and liked to stream video games online. 09:09 His screen name, Rocket Wind. 09:12 What is up, ladies and gentlemen? My name is Rocket Wind, and welcome to another patch. 09:17 I wanted to have a boyfriend, and it was the perfect opportunity. 09:22 In August of 2016, Fry flew to Minnesota and got a hotel room near her house. 09:30 This is Adrienne right here? 09:31 Yes. 09:32 Do your parents have any idea this is going on? 09:35 No, they had no idea. 09:37 The two began a relationship. Alexis had just turned 16. 09:43 He was already pretty much talking about getting married, honestly. He was 100% set on being with me. 09:49 Adrienne Frye visited Alexis twice more in the summer of 2017 and in the spring of 2018. 09:58 She says her feelings were changing. 10:01 He really started trying to control my normal everyday life. 10:05 They had considered themselves a couple for about two years when Alexis told Adrienne it was over. 10:13 He freaked out. He did not like that at all. It was a lot of pleading, a lot of begging. 10:19 A few months later, when she told him she had a new boyfriend, she says he became angry. 10:25 Pretty much saying, you deserve everything horrible that happens to you. 10:29 Do you sense that he's basically sending you a message? 10:32 100%. 10:33 And what is that message? 10:35 That it's not going to end that great for me. 10:52 someone could sneak into the house and kill me i could be killed on my way home from school we asked alexis stern to read the disturbing emails between the person who wanted her dead code named mastermind365 and yura the alleged murder for hire kingpin on the dark web 11:17 I can see on your website that the services you offer are murder, assault, and arson. Kidnapping is the job that I had in mind. 11:26 Mastermind365 sent this picture of Alexis to Jura. Then for some reason, about a week later, he upgraded his order from kidnapping to, I would just like this person dead. 11:42 I would just like this person to be shot and killed. 11:49 It was another cold and clinical Minnesota hit order that triggered our original Dark Web Murder for Hire investigation. 11:58 In 2016, a 43-year-old dog trainer named Amy Allwine was killed in nearby Cottage Grove. Police questioned her husband, Steven. 12:11 We're a normal family. 12:12 There's nothing unique, nothing strange. 12:17 Like Mastermind365, Stephen Allwine had paid Jura thousands of dollars to arrange a hit. 12:26 When it didn't happen, Allwine took matters into his own hands and shot his wife in the head. 12:34 In 2018, he was convicted of murder. 12:40 Do you have any doubt in your mind who put out the contract on your life? 12:45 I have no doubt in my mind that it is Adrienne Frey. 12:50 Adrienne Frey, her ex-boyfriend from England. When she saw the kill order dated July 15th, she says the timing suddenly made sense to her. What had happened the day before July 14th? 13:05 That is when I told Adrienne that I was dating someone else. 13:10 And it wasn't just the timing of the hit order. She says it was the language too. 13:17 It sounds very British. I would just like this person dead, but if there's any more information you would like, inbox me. I don't know anyone in America that uses the term inbox me. Adrian, on the other hand, often would say that. 13:34 Alexis noticed Mastermind365 sometimes referred to himself with a lowercase i. She says when Adrian wrote her, he did the same thing. 13:46 She also saw that Mastermind365 wrote thank you as one word. In Adrian's messages to her, he done that too. It's a quirk that would become more significant later in our investigation. 14:01 And there was more. 14:03 Mastermind365 to Euro. My problem is that I don't currently have an extra five grand, but I will have it in about a week's time. This part is from Adrian to me. If there is a chance you may like me in years time, then I will happily wait. 14:19 The phrases week's time and year's time are common in British English. In writing them, both Mastermind365 and Adrian Fry had left off an apostrophe. 14:33 So there's a couple of phrases that matches Adrian's patterns. 14:38 Yes. 14:40 She also realized Mastermind365 seemed to have grown impatient with Yura over time. And that's when she saw one particular message that sent a shiver up her spine. 14:53 Do you guys sell guns? 14:56 I need a pistol with a silencer. 15:00 He's asked Yura to help him get a gun with a silencer. 15:03 What does that tell you? 15:05 It sounds like he is willing to take matters into his own hands if it doesn't get done. 15:11 Just like Steven Allwine. 15:14 And that's what worries our dark web expert, Lisa. She believes Yura's websites are a scam and that frustrated clients may be moved to violence. 15:26 The fact that he's a scammer as opposed to an actual hitman for hire provider does not remove the fact that he is a threat or is a criminal. 15:38 There are people out there who believe it is a real hitman website. 15:44 Alexa Stern says after more than a year with little apparent progress on her case, she became frustrated and agreed to try her luck with us. 15:55 I decided I might as well take a chance and see what 48 hours can help me with. 16:01 She is determined to see Justice catch up to the man she says ordered her murder and the person who promised to arrange it. 16:11 Lisa, we have always thought in our investigation that Ira must live overseas. Are we right? 16:18 No, Peter. Ira might live right here in New York City. 16:38 The Hitman marketplace is like any other auction site. It brings customers and vendors together. He's still out there somewhere. 16:48 The CyberGhost Yura. 16:51 Still uncatchable in a hidden world. Still a confounding mystery. 16:59 It's probably no surprise that our global manhunt for Jura began on a computer. 17:06 So I ventured into a very strange place for the first time in my life, the dark web. 17:11 In 2018, we wrote to him on his website asking for an interview. Much to our surprise, he agreed to sit down with us on camera in London. 17:26 We were already there to interview a self-styled cybercrime researcher named Chris Montero, who'd been monitoring Jura and his Hitman sites for more than three years. 17:38 And some people attracted to the website are very nasty individuals. 17:45 So we've flown from New York to London, rented this studio. You can see the lights behind me for the big interview. And we even brought in a master of disguise who's going to camouflage Jura's face. Now all we need is him. 18:01 The elusive Jura never showed up, claiming we could have been followed by police. But he did start sending us those video statements. 18:10 We will be waiting for you to come place your orders and get rid of your problems. 18:15 Jura, who seems to enjoy taunting 48 Hours, sent us this email in June 2019. 18:23 Unfortunately, after your show, the business has decreased tremendously. 18:31 people concluded that the site is a scam. 18:34 Jura even claimed he's going legit, moving away from the murder for hire sites into the real world. I opened a restaurant business and I live nice. 18:47 Lisa, our dark web expert, doubts Jura has left his criminal past behind. 18:53 He's still very much in business. 18:54 He's still working. 18:55 Absolutely. 18:56 And as the cases of Amy Allwine and Alexis Stern show, even if Jura's hitman sites are scams, the customers paying him to have people killed are horrifyingly real. 19:13 A lot of people want other people killed. 19:15 Correct. 19:17 All across the United States. 19:19 And the world, yes. 19:21 Lisa is determined to unmask Yura. 19:24 Everyone can be found. 19:27 Yura can be found. 19:30 And she quickly spotted her first clue, a massive trail of hacked digital data. Digging through that treasure trove, Lisa believes she's unearthed a few gold nuggets. 19:43 Hi, this is Eura again. Including Eura's likely password from one of his early murder for hire sites. 19:51 In this case, we've got this very unique password of frunza22. 19:56 F-R-U-N-Z-A 22. So this sounds like a lead. 20:00 From a digital forensics perspective, this is a huge lead. 20:04 Lisa immediately launched a worldwide search across the dark web and the regular internet for that password possibly linked to Europe. 20:15 In a matter of hours, she zeroed in on two hits from different sides of the planet. 20:23 Just on the Google search. 20:26 Friends at 22 actually led us to Moldova, of all places. 20:33 The Republic of Moldova, a former Soviet state in Eastern Europe. There's a village here called Franza. It's also a common last name. 20:43 Franza, 22, gave us all this intelligence with which to work with and narrow down who Europe possibly could be. 20:51 Lisa discovered that the online seller of this car in Moldova had also used Franza 22. Could there be a link? 21:00 The license plate for this car obviously gives us more information. 21:04 Do you have an answer yet as to who owns this vehicle? 21:07 Unfortunately, we do not. We're coordinating with people on the ground in Moldova to see who this car is actually registered to. 21:15 But the most compelling clue, Lisa says, connects Yura's possible password to a standard email address here in the United States. 21:26 I was able to identify that with a very high probability with an older Russian woman in New York. 21:37 Lisa thinks the woman could be Jura's relative. 21:42 The cyber search for Jura and his anonymous dark web connections will involve a tedious, time-consuming process of following digital breadcrumbs. 21:55 One piece of evidence stands on its own and you look at it as a breadcrumb and you try to chase that for a bit and then you find another breadcrumb. 22:04 And collectively, when you start to add all of these things up, you have a higher confidence assessment. 22:11 I keep my identity private. Everything that could help with recognition. 22:19 As our global hunt for Yura intensifies, we're reminded that his borderless reach from the bottom of the internet has left shattered lives in his wake. 22:31 Amy Allwine, murder. 22:35 and others marked for death, living in perpetual fear. There are people around the world in danger, and I had to do something about it. What Chris Montero did was secretly hack into Jura's websites, dredging up disturbing emails from clients ordering grisly hits, and passing them on to 48 hours. 23:01 We immediately informed law enforcement. Three cases we investigated in 2018 in Illinois, Tennessee, and California have led to explosive conclusions. 23:13 Do you understand the terror that you have caused? 23:19 Woodridge, Illinois. Tina Jones, a registered nurse, got involved with a married colleague. When he ended the affair, she allegedly paid Yura about $12,000 to kill the man's wife. This was a nurse, someone who saves lives. Truth really is stranger than fiction. 23:46 So Woodridge Police Sergeant Daniel Murray, acting on the 48 hours tip, brought a chillingly calm Tina Jones in for questioning. The easier it'll go for everybody involved. So I'm just going to ask you right now. 24:01 Did you make any threat or did you try to have somebody do something on your behalf to Jeff's wife? No. Okay. 24:08 You sure about that? 24:09 Pause. 24:12 You buying it? No. 24:14 Why not? 24:15 She just doesn't come off as believable. 24:17 I really don't know. Okay. Moments later, the truth. What you got to tell me now? 24:24 I did. 24:25 You did? 24:25 Yeah. 24:29 Tina Jones just pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree murder. 24:33 In August 2019, Tina Jones learned her fate. She will spend the next 10 years in prison. 48 hours also tipped off Detective Michael Ulrey in Clarksville, Tennessee, who broke the news to then 22-year-old Sidney Minor, a single mom. 24:59 Someone went on the dark web. There is a Murder for Hire website and someone has paid to have you murdered. 25:09 What? 25:11 What? 25:14 Sydney, who was pregnant with her second child, quickly identified the father of her unborn baby as a suspect, Brandon States. Sydney says he had pressured her to get an abortion. 25:28 He's married. Didn't know it at the time. 25:30 The only person in our mind was Brandon States. Because? Because it was his child. And she refused to get rid of the child. Brandon States eventually pleaded guilty to attempted premeditated murder. 25:45 In March 2019, the Army Specialist was sentenced by a military court to 15 years in Fort Leavenworth. 25:54 By his final court hearing, Sydney had given birth to a little girl named Sailor. Brandon States asked to meet his daughter before going to prison. Sydney reluctantly agreed and handed the little girl to the man who had paid money to kill them both. 26:14 Give me a sense of what was going through your mind at that moment. 26:18 Fear. A lot of fear. 26:22 She had to meet him in a courtroom with police officers and armed guards. 26:29 I told him, I'll never forgive you for what you've done. 26:39 Around the same time in San Luis Obispo, California, this man awaits trial. 26:47 We know that you wanted your stepmother murdered, but we don't know why. 26:50 Why did you do it? 27:02 In late 2019, Bo Brigham, a one-time YouTube star, is on trial for solicitation of murder after 48 hours tipped authorities to his case. 27:22 In 2018, Brigham allegedly had paid Yura to arrange the assassination of his stepmother. During questioning by detectives, he seemed to acknowledge ordering the hit. 27:34 I remember going on some stupid site and I was in a rage just sending a bunch of stuff. 27:43 I do not deny he went to the site. I absolutely deny that he had any intention whatsoever of hurting his stepmother. 27:51 Defense attorney Ilan Funky Bilou says Brigham wasn't serious. 27:57 Evidence shows Brigham paid less than $3 in Bitcoin toward the $5,000 hit. 28:04 If there was true intent, it wouldn't stop at $2.95. 28:09 After nearly three weeks of testimony, it takes the jury seven hours to find Brigham guilty of solicitation of murder. 28:19 And a month later... 28:21 So I just came out of the courtroom. He was sentenced to just three years in state prison. 28:28 But with credit for time served, he was released in January 2020. 28:38 Alexis Stern is frustrated that in her case, there hasn't even been an arrest. 28:45 48 Hours tracked her ex-boyfriend, Adrian Fry, to this house in the city of Bath, England. 28:53 And we're watching the place. So far, he hasn't emerged. 28:58 A Hitman Marketplace is like any other auction site. 29:02 The man who took the kill order Adrian allegedly made is still at large too. 29:08 But Lisa says finding Yura may partly depend on exposing and flipping the people who work with him. 29:15 Everyone has a network, right? 29:18 We uncovered information about an important thread in Yura's web. 29:25 A thread stretching all the way to the sprawling city of Kolkata, India, and a computer contractor named Santos Sharma. 29:36 Yura contracted Santos Sharma to assist him with digital marketing and promotion. 29:42 Yura had become so brazen, he actually was promoting his dark web sites on the regular internet by hiring a marketing specialist. 29:53 Our producer in India, Arshad Zargar, spent weeks looking for Sharma. But we managed to track down both his addresses. 30:06 We tipped authorities who summoned Sharma to the police station. After they questioned him, Sharma agreed to an interview with us. 30:15 We asked him about the sites he created on the regular internet to advertise Eura's sites on the dark web. 30:23 What are the websites that you created for him? I have created MurderForHire.com, BesaMafia.com, HireAHitMan.com. 30:32 He insisted he was just an everyday internet marketer hired on a freelance job. 30:38 Have you ever spoken to him? 30:40 No. I just chat with him, chat and email. I have asked her phone number how he didn't send me. 30:48 He said they're not in touch at all anymore and that he doesn't know Yura's real name or location, but wishes he did because Yura scammed him too. 30:59 Yura still owes him about $400 and he has been trying to get in touch with him, asking for the money. 31:10 Sharma was released without charges, but hacker Chris Montero says Yura's operations took a body blow. 31:18 The work of 48 hours investigating Santos Sharma in India, that was very important in shutting down his advertising operations. 31:27 Lisa wants to see Yura shut down completely, and she believes she's getting close to finding him. 31:35 And it'll be right up here, right on the right. 31:38 I'm gonna drop my head down. 31:40 Man, my heart is racing. 31:45 And we're closing in on Adrian Frye, too. He lives in this house west of London. 31:52 Here we go. Let's see what happens. 31:58 Hey, good evening. 32:13 We staked out Adrian Fry's house in England. The young man Alexis believes ordered her murder and asked Jura about obtaining a gun. For days it seemed like nobody was home. Then one night in February 2020... Take a look at this. A car has pulled up in front of the house. So we're gonna head over now and go knock on the door. 32:38 Let's see what happens. 32:41 and see if we can speak face to face with Adrian Fry. 32:49 Hey, good evening. My name is Peter Van Sant. I was wondering if Adrian's here. 32:53 Adrian's brother answered the door saying Adrian was visiting friends. He gave us the name of a nearby town and we went to check it out, but couldn't find him. 33:07 Would you ever meet with Adrian Fry again? 33:11 Not unless he's behind bars. 33:14 But that now seems unlikely. In November 2019, Alexis Stern received a letter from the FBI saying the case was being closed because the United States Attorney's Office has declined to prosecute. 33:31 But authorities never explained why the case was dropped and refused to tell 48 hours what, if anything, they had ever done to investigate Adrian Fry or Yura. 33:43 To all law enforcement, just try and close our side if you can. 33:48 In our own two-year global search for Yura, we'd been stood up in the UK. 33:55 What did he say? I don't think he's coming. 33:59 found Yura's marketing guru in India, but not Yura himself. 34:10 And hit a dead end with that car ad in Moldova, where we had hired a local researcher to track down the owners. 34:19 Lisa now believes it's just a coincidence that Frunza 22 appeared in the car ad. 34:26 There's no direct correlation 34:31 In January 2020, we followed Lisa's lead to a woman in New York City who Lisa now believes is Yura's mother-in-law. We've just left Manhattan. Where are we heading? 34:44 Queens. Maybe we'll find Yura. 34:46 I hope so. 34:47 It took three months of digging through digital clues for Lisa to uncover what she calls strong evidence against the man she now believes is Yura. It includes a link to that unusual password Frunza 22, and 48 Hours discovered an email address that included gun and killa connected to the man Lisa found in New York City. 35:13 It was enough to make me pause when I saw that email address. 35:17 Lisa believes the man had moved to the US from overseas in the 1990s, and now owns a large repair business, registered some kind of tech company, and most recently bought a restaurant. 35:31 I have high confidence that this man is very likely Yura. 35:38 What's that confidence level if you put it in a percentage? 35:41 75 to 80, which is in intelligence terms quite high. 35:45 Lisa says there's no such thing as 100% certainty on the secretive dark web. That's why we decided not to name the man or show his face. 35:59 and we're in a position where we can take a look down a sidewalk and see if he approaches. We spotted him on a public sidewalk. That's him. 36:11 Hey, how you doing? 36:12 I'm Peter Van Sant with CBS News, and we have some questions we'd like to get answered, if we may. 36:20 That's him. 36:22 Our investigation of Murder for Hire on the dark web has led us here. And I wanted to ask you, are you Yura? 36:31 Who? 36:32 Yura. I don't know who you're talking about. My name is . 36:35 Jura is a person who runs, has run various murder for hire sites on the dark web. 36:44 What are you talking about? Can you explain yourself? 36:47 I then asked him about Frunza 22, that potentially incriminating password. 36:53 Lisa says to pay special attention to the man's reaction after I mentioned the password. 37:08 The minute you hit him with the evidence that is the key piece of evidence in this case. The password. The password. He immediately then shuts down and starts going, no, no, no, no, I don't want to be here. 37:16 He then did something I've never seen before. 37:20 Before we start anything, I want to make sure the whole world knows what's going on. 37:25 He started streaming our conversation live on Facebook, where he began speaking more to his followers than to me. 37:33 What's up, guys? 37:35 Something is going on. I got some guys over here. 37:38 This in itself is taking control of the communication. He wants his words and his voice to be heard and not yours. 37:46 You can answer my question. There's no Yura's here. 37:48 We also tried to ask the man about another striking similarity between him and Yura in the real world. Well, Yura wrote us and said that he'd recently taken his money and opened a new restaurant, which you've done that. 38:04 What restaurant are you talking about again? 38:07 This restaurant, not far from where we met him. He opened the place in 2018. Just six months later, Jura wrote 48 hours that he had done the same. 38:20 Do you run these murder for hire websites? He's calling me some stupid names. Stop recording right now. As his anger grew, I'm going to smack the of your camera right now. I'm telling you. 38:30 The man suddenly made us an offer. No cameras allowed. 38:34 I have no idea who's you, Rhys. You want to talk to me privately? Let's go to the office. Me and you sit down and we'll talk without this. 38:41 I turned him down because the situation was starting to feel dangerous. Oh, hey, guys. And our conversation was about to take a major hit. 38:55 I'm a reporter, investigative reporter that's been following this for over a year. 38:59 Hey, come on, don't do that. 39:02 That was just on video. That could be an assault. Don't do this. You are assaulting me right now. I'm asking you a question. 39:11 We quickly left the scene. And the man, still angry, continued to stream live. Someone's using my identity. He's confirming that the information that we've presented to him is legit. 39:39 I'm asking you a question. 39:42 Based on all of the evidence that has been accumulated, my confidence is still quite high. 39:47 In fact, she says, having seen the video, it's even higher. 39:51 Around 80 to 90%. 39:54 Over the next two weeks, we reached out to the man four times, requesting an on-camera interview at CBS News. 40:02 Do give a call back and let us know your decision. 40:07 We were eager to hear any explanation for the apparent links between him and Europe. He apologized for his actions. Who you think you are? But never sat down on camera. 40:20 Adrian, this is Peter Van Sant, correspondent with 48 hours. 40:22 Neither did Adrian Fry, though he did text us. 40:27 Hi, Peter. I can assure you that I did not go onto the online web to hire a hitman or anyone to kill Alexis. 40:39 But it was his last text, declining our interview request, that startled us. 40:45 Thank you for the opportunity, he wrote. We realized that just like Mastermind365, Adrian had once again written thank you as one word. 41:09 48 hours. Don't miss an episode. 41:53 Simpsonville is a tight-knit community. 41:57 It's got that small-town southern charm. 42:01 This is a place where you bake a cake and take it to your neighbor next door. 42:04 It was a great place to be a police officer, and murderers and serious assaults for a few and far between. 42:11 My name is Patty Piver, and Katie Blauvelt is my daughter. 42:22 katie was 5'1 she was a teeny little thing she was just a free spirit she made friends so easily she loved animals that was her biggest thing she loved animals she touched a lot of people's lives she did john blauvelt was working over there at the armed forces center 42:49 He was a recruiter for the military. 42:52 He was someone that was respected by the community. 42:56 Somebody who's in the military, you can rely on them. And I think she wanted that, somebody stable and dependable. 43:05 John was a catch for Katie. She married him, was happy, wanted to have kids and get their life started. 43:13 They were moving into their new house, so everything was really cool. 43:17 What did John and Katie seem like as a couple to you? 43:20 At first, they were really great, honestly. 43:25 They had a little honeymoon after they got married, and once they got back, things were no longer as good as they were. 43:32 It seemed like ever since then, just everything went downhill. 43:35 Their marriage had fallen apart. 43:39 Hannah Thompson and John were hanging out a lot. 43:42 He started dating Hannah Thompson, who I believe was 17. 43:47 And was Hannah in love with him? 43:49 100%. 43:53 She loved John, and she wanted to be with him, and Katie was a problem for her. 43:57 And if they got Katie out of the way, she could have John to herself. 44:01 On October 24th of 2016, Katie Blauvelt went missing. 44:07 She disappeared. 44:08 She disappeared. 44:09 Off the face of the earth. 44:10 Yes. 44:12 And now nobody can get in touch with her. Her phone's cut off. We don't know what's going on. 44:17 Shortly after midnight, I got a phone call from our chief of police at the time, and he advised me that they'd found a body at an abandoned house. 44:27 Very dilapidated house. How had she died? She'd been stabbed in the neck. 44:33 John did it. I know John did it. 44:36 Oh yeah, I immediately thought John. 44:38 We did our first interview with him several days after her body was located. 44:44 I'm just gonna ask you point blank. Did you kill Katie? No. 44:48 Do you know who killed her? No. 44:50 Shortly after that interview is when he fled the state. 44:55 John disappears and he is on the run. 45:00 John Blauvelt goes on the run. Where's Hannah? 45:03 With him. 45:05 I contacted the United States Marshals. This is their bread and butter, what they do best. 45:11 I'm a deputy U.S. Marshal. 45:13 We go after fugitives, violent offenses. He's been trained on how to defend himself. 45:20 He's been trained on how to kill. Does that make him a unique fugitive? It does. So we don't know where he's gonna go. We don't know what he could be doing next. When you heard that he was on the run, what'd you think? 45:31 I was like, oh, my God, you're never gonna find him. 45:44 . 45:45 . 46:23 In the soft South Carolina night in the city of Simpsonville, Katie Blauvelt was missing. It had been two fearful days for her mom, Patty Piver. 46:34 I just was terrified that something was gonna happen to her. 46:38 Then past midnight, October 26, 2016, investigators Cheryl Schofield and Keith Moorcraft were dispatched to the scene. 46:50 Katie's mangled body had been found in an abandoned farmhouse, 22 years old, a knife blade left in her body. 47:00 There was a rectangular concrete box kind of in the center of the basement. We found Katie's body inside of that box. 47:09 Her body had basically been folded into this box. It was a picture of what you would see in a horror movie. 47:18 Katie's mom was overwhelmed. 47:20 I was totally empty inside. 47:24 She did not deserve to be murdered. 47:27 Katie's stepsister, Jennifer Piver. 47:30 I just prayed and cried and just sick. Just sick. 47:38 Moorcraft and another investigator went to tell John Blauvelt his wife's body had been found. We went to make the death notification. 47:46 I'm so sorry if we lost that. 47:50 At first, Blauvelt appeared distressed. 47:54 But as the conversation progressed, his demeanor changed. 47:58 Didn't ask normal questions such as, where did you find her? How did she die? He wasn't shocked by the news. He didn't seem to be at all. What did that suggest to you? that he knew how she had died, he knew where her body was. 48:10 John Blauvelt did have one question, but it wasn't about Katie. 48:16 Am I being charged with a crime? Because he's recording me and I'm not comfortable with that. You're not being charged with a crime right now. 48:22 Right away you sensed this could be our guy. 48:25 I was pretty confident at the time. 48:28 But they couldn't arrest him on a feeling. First, Moorcraft and Schofield had evidence to gather and a case to build. 48:37 But just as they got started, John Blauvelt took to the road. Traveling with him, Hannah Thompson, his new girlfriend, all of 17. How concerned were you about Hannah's safety? 48:51 If he was willing to kill his own wife, there's no telling what kind of danger Hannah Thompson would have been in by fleeing with him. 49:00 But John Blauvelt hadn't always been considered threatening. Back in 2014, in this quiet city of some 20,000, he was a welcome part of the community, the larger-than-life public face of the U.S. Army. A person of principle, someone willing to sacrifice for his country? Yes, that's what I think. These are all admirable traits, right? 49:21 Exactly. 49:23 It was then that John met Katie, just yards from his recruiting office, at this sub shop where she worked. Katie turned 20. John was 26. They started dating. 49:35 And they just hit it off. She's lovable, caring, funny. 49:40 They wouldn't fall in love with her. 49:43 In the summer of 2015, recruiter John Blauvelt convinced Katie to enlist. But after just two months, a health issue prevented her from finishing her training. 49:55 They found a problem with her spine. She got a medical discharge out of the Army. 50:00 While Katie's military hopes were dashed, John told friends he had found his calling. 50:06 He loved his military career. That's one thing we learned is that his career was everything to him. 50:12 With his war stories about his deployments in Iraq, his sharp uniform decorated with service ribbons, John impressed local teenagers. 50:21 Like, to me, like, he had all his ducks in a row. Almost like a role model, right? Almost like a role model. More, like, it was definitely like a role model. 50:29 Ali Somerville, a close friend of Katie, says she often ate lunch with John at his recruiting booth in her school. She adds he also sometimes showed up at local hangouts. 50:41 I thought he was cool. He was very interested in your life, what you were up to and things. 50:45 Yeah, he made sure I was okay. But as he began dating Katie, her family was never half sure about John Blauvelt. 50:54 I don't think I ever had a meaningful conversation with him. 50:58 Did he seem interested in you and the family? 51:01 No, not at all. 51:04 Then, after about a year and seemingly out of the blue, Katie surprised her family with an alarming announcement. 51:13 She says, oh, by the way, she said, me and John got married today. 51:18 I'm in shock. She said, oh, we got married at the courthouse. 51:23 They went on their honeymoon, but within two months, that honeymoon was over. 51:43 Staff Sergeant John Blauvelt and his new bride were putting down roots in the community. Katie had taken a job at the local PetSmart. 51:52 Yeah, she's gonna love that. And she did. And she was passionate about animals. This could be a career for her. 51:58 As for John, he already owned this four bedroom home in Fountain Inn, right next to Simpsonville, where investigator Sheryl Schofield worked. 52:09 Once they got married, this is the house that they were supposed to move into and have a family. 52:14 She wanted a family. She wanted to have kids. 52:19 Katie moved in, and soon the house was crowded with kids, but not the kind Katie imagined. 52:27 Unfortunately, the only kids that were here were the teenagers that John Blauvelt invited. 52:32 John had invited Katie's niece to stay with them. And later, Hannah Thompson and Allie Somerville crashed there, too. 52:40 Allie says it became a party destination for kids from their high school, where John often worked as an Army recruiter. 52:50 We were just smoking weed all day, every day. 52:53 And how old were you then? 52:54 16 years. 52:56 And Allie claimed it wasn't just weed that was the draw. She said at times there was booze, acid, and cocaine. This is with the U.S. Army recruiter, right? U.S. Army recruiter, yeah. 53:06 Letting us party at his house. 53:08 Like, this is awesome. 53:10 Patty says it wasn't long before Katie grew frustrated with all of the partying and told John it had to stop. 53:18 Her dream house turned into a party house. Right. And that's the last thing your sister wanted, right? Absolutely. 53:25 As Katie and Blauvelt drifted, Hannah Thompson was there to fuel the fire. 53:31 Hannah absolutely despised Katie. 53:34 And what was the nature of Hannah's relationship with John as time went on? 53:39 Hannah became John's puppy. Anytime that John would tell her to do something, she would do it. 53:45 It was all too much for Katie. According to police records, after being married less than three months, Katie moved out. Captain Schofield says John and Hannah wasted no time. 53:58 She moved into John Blauvelt's bedroom in this house when Katie moved out. 54:03 Whoa, that's creepy. Like, you're in your late 20s and she's 17, dude. Like, you're not supposed to be doing stuff like this. 54:09 Hannah's father went to the police and told them he hadn't seen his daughter for two weeks. That night, on February 26, 2016, cops showed up at John Blauvelt's house. 54:23 When they arrived, what happens? 54:25 They tried to make contact with John, and John refused to come outside. 54:30 Allie Somerville was inside the house with John and some other minors when police arrived. 54:37 And John was like, lock the door, nobody go outside. What were they saying? Like, John Blaville, like, come out of the house with the hands up. 54:45 But you must have been a little terrified, were you not? 54:47 Terrified, yeah. 54:47 These are people with weapons. Were weapons out? 54:49 Oh, yeah, there were weapons on and everything. 54:52 A veteran of the Iraq War. 54:54 and they're having to pull their guns to get him out of the house. 54:57 Yes. 54:58 It's kind of extraordinary, isn't it? 54:59 Yes, very much so. 55:02 John eventually opened the door and was questioned by police. On February 27th, 2016, he was arrested and charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor. His soldier's image replaced with a mugshot. 55:18 He's the exact opposite of what everybody thought he was. Exact opposite. 55:24 And soon, Blauvelt's troubles would get even worse. Police talked to Katie the day Blauvelt was arrested. She told them about a more troubling incident she says happened a month earlier. 55:37 There had been a domestic violence incident where John allegedly pointed a gun at Katie. 55:42 Pulls out a gun, points it at her head. Says what? 55:46 That he was going to kill her and also threaten the family. 55:49 Threaten the family, what do you mean? 55:50 Threaten to kill the family. 55:53 Fountainhead Police Department investigated the matter and ended up charging him with domestic violence. 55:59 A restraining order was issued preventing Blauvelt and Katie from seeing each other. 56:05 He blamed her for ruining his life because there was obviously going to be a consequence from the military. 56:13 That consequence came... 56:16 just a few days later, when the Department of the Army cut John's pay and suspended him from the recruiting duty that defined him. 56:25 You can't do this and be a military recruiter. 56:28 The Army reassigned him to a small back office and began an investigation that might lead to his dismissal. 56:38 He was like, I can't be out in the field, like on the front lines. I'm not recruiting people for the Army. 56:44 Now I'm sitting behind a desk. And that's what made him so mad. 56:48 Katie quickly moved on from her short, disastrous marriage and told her mother she planned to divorce John. 56:56 Your daughter moves out. Does she move back with you? 56:59 Yeah. 57:00 But despite the restraining order, Katie and John still had some contact, including visits to the house she had shared with John. 57:08 The only reason she would go back over there was because she had her dog over there, Jupiter. 57:14 For some reason, I just was terrified that something was going to happen to her. 57:18 As for Blauvelt, the military career he cherished was in tatters. And according to Ali Somerville, he planned to get revenge. 57:28 Did he ever say anything about harming Katie? 57:31 Yes. 57:32 He did say multiple times that he was going to kill Katie. He said that she ruined his military career. That's all he's ever wanted to do in life. 57:41 You destroy my career, I'm gonna destroy you. 57:45 Yeah. 57:45 Do you think he'd really go through with it? No, never. 57:49 He was very vocal on the fact that he wanted Katie dead, he wanted Katie gone. 58:06 Police say Katie Blauvelt was last seen alive on October 24, 2016 at her job at PetSmart. 58:16 But come morning in Simpsonville, no one had heard from her. Calls to her went to voicemail. Her mother reported her missing. 58:29 Did she tell the officer she spoke with that she was suspicious of John Blauvelt? She did. 58:36 The desperate search and the painful waiting began. 58:41 I didn't think she was alive anymore. 58:43 It's terrifying. It's the worst feeling. You feel helpless. 58:49 But after midnight, two of Katie's friends followed a hunch that sent them deep in the woods to the old abandoned farmhouse. 59:01 Teenagers would go there and they would party, they would drink, they would smoke marijuana. 59:07 Katie and John were known to have gone there, too. 59:12 The friends made their way to the basement. They were horrified by what they found. One of them called 911. 911, what's the location of your emergency? 59:24 We found my friend Katie dead in the house. 59:28 OK. OK. Are you saying she's dead in the house? 59:31 Yes, ma'am. Is she cold? She's very ill, and there was no response. 59:36 Katie Blauvelt's body had been stuffed into that cold, concrete box. You believe Katie was killed outside the house and brought in? 59:46 Yes. And we believe that she was actually killed on the gravel driveway and then drug on her face through that window. 59:52 And if she's screaming, there's no one to hear? 59:55 You wouldn't hear it from that house where that house was located. 60:01 And you live with that every day? 60:03 Every day. 60:05 Doesn't get easier, does it? 60:06 No. 60:10 It was October 26, 2016. Investigators made that official death notification visit to Blauvelt. 60:20 They got their first sense of the resentment he held towards Katie. She flipped my life upside down. 60:27 Moercraft and Schofield wanted more information from Blauvelt. And so, just a week later, they spoke with him. 60:35 Anything you say can be used against you in court. 60:37 Didn't seem to really care that she was gone, let alone had been murdered. 60:41 I lost a friend. 60:44 Maybe not the best wife, but I lost a friend. 60:47 He told them he visited Katie at the funeral home. 60:51 Did you fire yourself? 60:52 Yeah, well, I took hands with you. Did you? 60:55 Blauvelt said he hadn't seen Katie in months. Their marriage had been a nonstop argument. 61:02 What kind of stuff are you all arguing about? 61:05 Everything. Just normal. Just normal stuff. 61:08 He seemed very arrogant, cocky, narcissistic. Then the cop fired point blank that question. 61:17 Did you kill Katie? No. 61:19 Do you know who killed her? No. 61:21 Sitting across, talking to this man, what are you sensing in John Blauvelt? 61:26 That he very much is the one who more than likely committed this murder. 61:30 Like he was put off, like we were taking up his time. That he was smarter than we were, and that he was going to get away with this. Next up, Hannah Thompson. 61:38 Hannah Thompson. 61:40 I don't know anything about her murder. 61:42 You do. 61:42 I don't. 61:43 You do. Investigators confront Hannah, sensing she must know something. 61:49 Tell us exactly what happened to Katie. 61:52 I really don't know. 61:54 And while they suspected Hannah might know something, they did not know exactly what. I can tell you already you're lying to me, okay? 62:06 You do not want to get wrapped up in catching a murder charge. 62:09 You're 17 years old. You have your entire life ahead of you. 62:13 You may love John and you may think you two are going to get married and walk down Yellow Brick Road. 62:18 But no man and no woman is worth going to prison for. Do you agree? 62:23 Yes, sir. If you know something and you're trying to cover up for it, you're going to go down with the person who did this to her. 62:31 For knowing anything, whether it was beforehand or after the fact, you're going to go down with them. 62:38 Investigators showed Hannah an autopsy photo of Katie. Look at her, Hannah. She's right here. 62:43 I don't want to look at her. 62:45 That's your friend. 62:47 I don't want to do this anymore. 62:49 Don't want to do what? Don't want to help us find out who killed her? 62:55 Can I please leave? Hannah, this is a friend of yours that we're trying to do. I know, and I want to help, but I can't. Just listen to me. 63:05 With no help from Hannah, police hands were tied. We had to let him go. Potential hard evidence had to be processed, including Gloveld's cell phone records and his DNA. 63:18 It's very aggravating because we know we're sitting across from the person who killed his wife. And shortly after that interview is when he fled the state. 63:29 He had taken this red GMC Yukon. And he was gone. He lost. 63:35 John Blauvelt, trained in survival and combat, suddenly loose on the open road. 63:46 I didn't think they were ever going to find him. He just disappeared off the face of the map. 63:52 And so did Hannah Thompson. Police believed she was with Blauvelt. 63:58 Prosecutor Kinley Avey would begin building the case with the chilling evidence she says he left behind. 64:06 First, what I want to kind of show you is, you know, the knife that was found in Katie's neck. And so what you can see here is this x-ray that the actual knife blade broke off inside of Katie. 64:19 What you're holding there is what I'm seeing on this x-ray. 64:21 Exactly, matches exactly right there. That's what was found and lodged in her neck. And that's how she died. 64:28 Simpsonville police knew they needed help to find John Blauvelt. I contacted the United States Marshals. 64:37 The investigation is, let's find him, let's find him, let's find him. 65:00 On November 18th, 2016, John Blauvelt, still on the run, was charged with Katie's murder. 65:11 What kind of fugitive are you dealing with? A cocky one. John thought we weren't ever going to find him. 65:19 U.S. Marshal Will Cook, based near Simpsonville, would become the point person in the hunt for Blauvelt, who had been skilled at evasion. 65:32 He had training from the army that the government provided him to... Avoid you guys. Avoid us. And he was good at it. 65:42 Investigators remained uncertain about Hannah Thompson's involvement in the murder, if any. 65:50 but they knew for sure she was traveling with Blauvelt. 65:55 They uncovered photos of Blauvelt and Thompson shopping and Blauvelt at an ATM. 66:03 His red Yukon truck passing through Texas and New Mexico heading west. 66:13 Were you able to get hits on where this vehicle was from time to time? So there were a couple of license plate reader hits. 66:21 But by the time police were able to respond, Blauvelt was gone. In a game like this, all the seconds count. Then, after a month, investigators caught a break. Hannah Thompson made contact with her family from Eugene, Oregon. She wanted to come home to Simpsonville. 66:43 Cheryl Schofield couldn't wait to talk to her. 66:47 We are very glad that you're back and that you're safe and that nothing bad happened to you. 66:53 Hannah's story was that John had left her in Eugene, just up and walked away. 66:58 Did you ever see John again? 67:04 And, Hannah added, she had no idea where John was headed. But apparently, she had enough of life on the run. 67:13 She thought it was going to be a fairy tale. 67:15 You know, they were going to live on the lam and make things happen. But after a few weeks of that, reality set in. 67:25 Any romantic notion Hannah may have had was derailed when John got the Yukon stuck in the mud in the Pacific Northwest. Couldn't get out. Could not get out. 67:42 Miles and miles. 67:44 The couple was reduced to panhandling for change. 67:48 And they use that for food? Sustainment. 67:53 Hannah says while on the road, Blauvelt confessed, sharing the awful details of the killing. 68:02 He told me that the knife broke. 68:05 I can't believe that he would do something like that. What else did he tell you about it? 68:14 I know it's hard. He told me that the last thing she said was that if he let her go, she wouldn't call the police. 68:29 An adult can psychologically take advantage of a child. Do you believe in a way that's what was going on between John and Hannah? Absolutely. 68:37 And he was just crying and screaming and, like, he was, like, saying that he did all that stuff for me, like... Did all that stuff? Like, killing Katie, like, he was, like... 68:49 I did that for you and like all that kind of stuff like trying to make me feel like it was my fault. 68:56 Hannah told conflicting stories about her involvement, eventually saying she dropped Blauvelt off by PetSmart the day Katie disappeared and then left. 69:07 Hannah says she did not know he planned to kill Katie, but later that day, he asked her to help hide Katie's car. She also admitted she had lied in her first interview just days after Katie's murder. 69:23 He told me that if I lied to the police, that he would keep me safe. 69:27 Investigators did not charge Hannah right away because they needed her. 69:33 We had a long-term goal of A, finding John, B, prosecuting him. And she was the key to a lot of that. 69:40 We're still hunting for John. 69:43 They hoped she might lead them to Blauvelt. 69:47 Has John contacted you by Facebook at all since you separated? Or has he contacted you by any means at all? 69:53 Please don't keep a secret from us, okay? 69:58 But if Hannah knew where John was, she wasn't ready to tell them. 70:03 I still don't care about him. Even though he did something really bad. I feel like I should hate him. 70:13 And part of me does, but... 70:22 Blauvelt was still out there. 70:25 Months turned into years. Lives changed. He's beating us, and we don't like to lose. It's driving you crazy. It's driving us crazy. Was it frustrating that you retired with this case still out there? 70:38 It was very frustrating, and it was the only case that I still had that was open. 70:42 Those who knew Blauvelt thought justice for Katie might never come. 70:47 John is the type of person that if somebody was going to get away with it, it would be John. I never really thought that they would get him. 70:57 The cops in Simpsonville interviewed Hannah repeatedly over the years. Then in 2022, six years after Katie's murder, Hannah finally revealed a secret. 71:10 She had been in regular contact with Blauvelt for years. 71:15 We have been talking the whole time. 71:18 Like at first we were talking every single day, multiple times, like for hours a day. Did anybody know you were still talking to him? 71:28 Hannah told investigators how they communicated. 71:31 She said their conversations ended in 2019. 71:44 Authorities believe Hannah had matured with time and distance away from John. She told them she realized what she had done was wrong and gradually offered more leads. John might still be in Oregon, and she added John told her he had been living with another woman for years. 72:05 Honestly, she's in danger too. 72:07 based on some of the information that Hannah gave us, zoned us in on John's new girlfriend and Medford, Oregon. 72:16 Medford, a small city in the Northwest. Investigators jumped on the lead and discovered a phone number that John had used to text a mystery woman. 72:27 And this sounds tantalizing, isn't it? Very tantalizing. 72:31 Marshal Chris Tamayo is Will Cook's colleague in the Northwest. His team got an address that corresponded with the mystery woman's house. He took us to the scene. They started to stake out the house. Stake out the house. And they followed a subject out, a male, that appeared to match our description. 72:53 But six years after John allegedly murdered Katie, how could investigators be certain they had their man? 73:02 John has some unique tattoos. 73:05 Can you show me? So this is a still shot from one of John's initial interviews with Simpsonville police. 73:13 The tattoo of a pirate. 73:16 It was a quiet morning in Medford. 73:20 As I'm starting to pull through this neighborhood, my heart is racing. 73:26 The marshals made their move. 73:30 That's the house right there. 73:31 Did you see any activity? We did see him come out. He was just coming out shirtless. 73:37 But was it for sure John Blauvelt? 73:41 A pirate told the tale. 73:43 I could see his pirate tattoo. 73:46 Right? It's about to happen. It is. 74:04 On July 20th, 2022, some six years after Katie's death, Chris Tamayo joined marshals and other law enforcement for the takedown of the man they believed killed her. 74:21 John's about three-quarters of the way down the driveway. 74:25 and the guys start going right at him, giving him commands. Police, show us your hands, get down on the ground. 74:30 And what does he do? His eyes got wide, pure shock. 74:36 And he drops down to the ground fast. 74:39 John Glauvelt under arrest. He's getting handcuffed. Handcuffs. But the suspect told the marshals they had the wrong man. He said, I'm Ben Klein. He said, no, you're not. And he's stuck with Ben Klein. Ben Klein? We have a device that allows us to mobily print someone in the field. Fingerprint. Fingerprints. Fingerprints. 75:01 it took less than five minutes for ben to become john your fingerprints show that you are john blavelle you were wanted out of south carolina he knew it was over he knew it was over when the marshals went inside the house they realized the raid could have taken a fatal turn there was a firearm a handgun sitting right on the nightstand and what did that tell you that was an indication to us that he probably would have given a fight All of it was apparently news to the woman Blauvelt was living with when she returned to the house later that day. 75:37 Pure shock. She was visibly shaking, crying, scared. Tamayo recorded audio with her at the scene. So he's being arrested on charges out of South Carolina. For what? For murder. 75:54 Are you serious? Yeah. I can't believe it. 75:56 My God. 76:01 Laveld's girlfriend told the Marshalls she had no idea who he really was. 76:07 We've been together for like six years. He would do random odd jobs. He was basically here watching my cats and my dog all the time. 76:17 She loved him. She loved him. 76:19 The news hit Simpsonville like thunder. 76:23 I was over the moon just freaking. It's just, that was such a great day. And I was completely elated. 76:31 John Blauvelt would go cross-country again, this time handcuffed, brought back to a South Carolina jail to await trial. 76:41 Just three months later, Hannah Thompson would be charged with five felonies, including obstruction of justice and accessory after the fact. She would plead not guilty and be released on bail. 76:59 Prosecutor Kinley Abey, who began putting the case against Blauvelt together a few months after Katie was killed, would team with John Meadors, preparing the case for trial, starting with that blade investigators found in Katie's neck. 77:14 Doesn't get any worse than that, and that's what she died from. 77:19 And you can actually see through the collar of the shirt where that knife blade entered. 77:25 And you can see it right there. Yeah, right into her neck. 77:28 They focused on that abandoned farmhouse where kids once partied, where they found Katie. 77:35 They would throw their bottles, their empty beer cans, and that's exactly where he discarded Katie's body. 77:39 So do you think John was making a statement by placing her body... Absolutely. 77:43 ...in this bin that normally you put trash? 77:45 Yeah, absolutely. 77:47 Prosecutors say Blauvelt blamed Katie for the abrupt end of his military career. It's all Katie's fault. 77:54 He's not responsible for what he did. He's blaming his wife. 77:58 Yes. 77:59 And there were John Blauvelt's own words. While on the run, he kept a journal that the marshals found. Like a diary, correct? Correct. And it held a damning entry. So at the end, it says boldly, I did it. 78:17 And for you, that's what? 78:19 That's evidence and proof that he murdered Katie. 78:26 In September 2024, eight years after Katie's death, John Blauvelt went on trial for murder. 78:35 Patty Piver described the child she adored. 78:43 Allie Somerville stared at the man she once called a role model. He looked like a stone cold killer to me. The prosecution's key witness was Hannah Thompson. she would admit to helping Blauvelt the day Katie died. 78:58 You loved John Blauvelt a bit? 79:01 Yes. You helped him hide Katie's farm after he killed him, didn't you? 79:05 Yes. 79:06 You didn't know he killed her then? 79:08 No. 79:09 But she did help him? 79:11 Yes. 79:12 And prosecutors played this grainy video. Hannah says it shows John Blauvelt getting out of Katie's car and into his. Hannah was at the wheel of his Prius. 79:23 Yes. And the Prius, yes. 79:29 Once on the run, she says he told her the details of the murder. 79:34 He told me that he killed her. He told me that he stabbed her. 79:43 He said that he threw her phone into water that was on the ground in the abandoned house. 79:52 And he said that he had to cover up her blood with dirt. 80:00 But Blauvelt's defense team, Paul Neely and Anna Walker, made Hannah admit that her story changed over the years. 80:08 You've lied to your friends and your family. 80:12 Yes. 80:13 And he kept lying. 80:16 Yes. 80:18 Then the defense zeroed in on the lack of DNA evidence at the scene. Was there any DNA that tied John Blauvelt to this murder? No. 80:29 There was no DNA match to John Blauvelt. 80:34 And what about John Blauvelt's journal, in which he wrote, I did it? His lawyers told 48 Hours much of it was a fantasy. 80:43 A lot of this journal is filled with these fictional stories of observations. It's filled with poems, drawings, all kinds of things. 80:51 As for Hannah Thompson... You heard she has five pending charges for the information she ultimately provided to law enforcement. 81:02 The prosecution pointed to the importance of her testimony. 81:06 She is facing 55 years in jail. 81:11 upon conviction for those crimes. And she got up here with no deal. State didn't offer her a single thing, no agreement to dismiss her charges, no cooperation agreement, no nudge, nudge, wink, wink, none of it. 81:26 She got up here and testified, and she told you because she thought it was the right thing to do. 81:31 She did a great job going up there and telling the truth and giving the key details of what John had told her, what he had done to Katie. 81:44 The trial lasted four days. The jury was out for some five hours. 81:49 As to the charge of murder, we, the jury, unanimously find the defendant, John K. Blavelt, guilty. 81:55 John Blavelt has been found guilty for the murder of his estranged wife, Katie Boider Blavelt. 82:01 Taylor Farmer covered the case for WSPA. 82:05 It was very emotional in the courtroom, kind of quiet, but you could tell Katie's family was very emotional. 82:12 As soon as the jurors got out, I just started crying. 82:16 John Blauvelt was sentenced to life in prison without parole. 82:20 He's a monster. 82:23 She was helpless. 82:26 And what did the family think about Hannah Thompson, who allegedly covered for Blauvelt for so long? 82:33 I would think she was a stupid 17-year-old until at trial when I heard how long she had been in touch with him. 82:42 You are not willing at that time to turn him in. 82:46 I have hard feelings about that. It's unfathomable. 82:52 What would you say to your sister today if you could? 83:00 That I'm sorry that I love her and that I think she was brave. 83:29 CBS next Saturday, a wife terrified of her estranged husband. 83:32 I don't want him anywhere near me. 83:34 Is found shot to death. 83:35 Lady down, lady down. 83:37 The hunt was on. You leave no rock unturned. But could her murder have been prevented? 83:41 I knew this was going to happen. 83:43 48 Hours is all new. CBS next Saturday, 10, 9 central and streaming on Paramount+. 84:32 It was so unusual for something like this to happen right outside your door. 84:36 Behind the gates of a beautiful community. 84:40 Well, as they say, a lot of things go on behind closed doors. 84:44 The Chadwicks lived a very suburban life. 84:49 Peter was very quiet, very soft-spoken. QC, she was bubbly and vivacious. When you say bubbly and vivacious, did she have a sense of humor? She was very funny, yes. And so smart and talented, she could do anything. Our kids started the same school as her children. 85:11 They were all friends. 85:13 You see, she came from Malaysia, not speaking English, and she met Peter in school, she told us. 85:21 Peter would work out of the home, managing the family investments. 85:26 You know, they lived well. 85:27 So from the outside, did it seem like the Chadwicks had this idyllic life? 85:32 Yes, from the outside, it definitely seemed that way. 85:44 I work out of my house, so my office just faces the street here. Between 4 and 5 p.m., I saw cop cars in front of her house. 85:55 And I'm thinking, what's going on? 85:58 One of our other friends, she came right up to me and said, Karen, where's QC? Where's Peter? 86:07 At that point, we just knew that she didn't pick up the kids. It was kind of talk of the neighborhood and that Peter and her were missing. 86:16 We send a patrol officer out there, so they go inside. It just looks like a typical Newport resident where there was lunch being prepared. The house is immaculate. There's still vacuum lines in the carpet. Everything's made. It looks good. 86:32 And then when they go upstairs and they walk into the master bath, they realize there's a broken vase and a little bit of blood splattered around. 86:41 Now we're actually starting to get worried about it. 86:50 Investigators quickly identify Peter as a primary suspect in his wife's disappearance. 86:54 Chadwick was arrested, but made bail, and then he just disappeared. 86:59 In January 2015, Peter Chadwick becomes a fugitive from justice. 87:04 The search intensifies for a millionaire fugitive accused of murdering his wife and skipping bail. 87:11 We had no idea this manhunt was going to become the logistical monster that it has. Two! 87:17 I mean, this manhunt has really expanded the entire globe. 87:21 But now that manhunt is over. Peter Chadwick's life on the run ended, and we'll tell you how law enforcement got their man. 88:28 After nearly five years on the run, the international manhunt for Peter Chadwick accused of killing his wife, QC, ended August 4th, 2019. 88:39 We're pleased to announce that Peter Gregory Chadwick was located in Mexico on Sunday night. With the help and cooperation of the United States Marshal Service and authorities in Mexico, he was flown to Los Angeles International Airport, where our detectives took custody of him. 88:56 But how did it come to this? 89:00 It's a twisted tale that began on a picture-perfect autumn day back in October 2012 in this posh neighborhood in Newport Beach, California. 89:11 The couple had been living the good life, enjoying the trappings of wealth and raising three sons. Their oldest was away at boarding school. And when his two younger brothers headed home that day, the family's world turned upside down. 89:26 So these boys got out of school, and what happened? 89:29 So they get out of school, and a bus drops them off at a bus stop near their house in Newport Coast. 89:33 Sergeant Ryan Peters remembers that day. 89:36 A neighbor saw them sitting at the bus stop past the time that they typically get picked up by either Peter or QC. So she stopped and asked, have you reached your mom and dad? And they said no, they haven't been able to reach them. They were calling them, and nobody was answering. 89:50 It was very unusual for the Chadwicks not to be punctual. 89:53 Lieutenant Brian Moore was called in later. Dad should be here to pick them up. 89:58 Dad is always here. Normal protocol during a missing persons case is we're checking with friends, we're checking with relatives. 90:06 And checking the hospitals, checking with family, neighbors, anybody have any idea where they are? 90:11 All attempts to locate them were a dead end. 90:15 That same night, with their parents still missing, the boys slept at a friend's house. 90:20 Investigators combed the Chadwick home for clues. 90:24 And then when they go upstairs and they walk into the master bath, and that's when patrol realizes there's more to the story. 90:32 In the master bathroom, they initially saw the broken glass, decorative glass that was around the bathroom, tub, the edging. 90:40 We had blood at the bottom of the bathtub. As you continue through the downstairs, the safe is clearly ajar. 90:48 So it's starting to look like more than just a welfare check situation. 90:53 Yeah, obviously whoever left, left in haste. It looked quite suspicious. 90:57 We were all in shock, like, where is she? What's going on? Why is she missing? 91:02 Word that the Chadwicks were gone spread quickly through the neighborhood. 91:07 Heidi lived just across the street. 91:10 What were they like? 91:11 Well, QC was the one with all the personality. She was always looking forward to my annual Christmas party because she came over, she got to dress up, and she looked like a million dollars, and she had fun. 91:23 My first impression of her was that she was a completely devoted mother. 91:30 Karen Thorpe had known QC for years. Their children went to school together. 91:36 She was very... 91:38 determined to make sure they were getting good grades and they were completing their assignments and they were taking music and they were doing a sport and she wanted them to be the best at everything. And how were they? They were the best at everything. 91:52 Their father, Peter, came from a wealthy family. He was born in Britain and had dual citizenship. QC's family was also affluent. They met at Arizona State University. Did you get the sense that she was very in love with him? 92:07 Yes, that she was in love with him and that she depended on him also. What do you mean, dependent on him? QC found our country to be a bit new and strange, different from where she had come from. And she was learning about how to do things here. 92:24 Did you get the sense that Peter liked her depending on him? 92:28 Yes. 92:29 Yeah. We definitely all felt that he was completely comfortable with that. She was definitely less independent than many of her friends. 92:39 QC and Peter married in 1991. When he grew more successful, the couple moved to that home in Newport Beach. They eventually had three sons. 92:52 Art Scott taught the two older boys piano. 92:56 They were great students. They did everything I asked. I would teach them piano. 93:06 Then after a few months, after he got more advanced, I would teach him. 93:10 And it would expand beyond that as he got committed and did more work. 93:16 I really enjoy being in their home. She always had a beverage for me and something to eat every single time. And that doesn't happen every day for all the clients that I see. And so she's very congenial, very much making me feel warm in her house. 93:34 And what was Peter like? 93:37 He almost seemed painfully shy when we first met him. 93:40 I felt like I never really knew him very well. What did Peter do? At first, we didn't really know. We thought he ran his own business, and then we learned he managed some apartment buildings. Was Peter kind of a mystery? 93:57 Yes. Peter was a mystery. 94:00 But, Karen says, she did sense that the couple's dynamic had been evolving over the past few years. 94:07 QC was really beginning to come into her own and be her own person. I'd say she was less insecure about what to wear and what to do, and she was able to follow more of her way of doing things. 94:21 So you could see the self-confidence? I could see the self-confidence, yes. 94:25 I felt at the time like I really knew the family, but I have to say, with so many things in life, you never really know about people's inside lives and what's really going on. 94:37 Now, police were left with two missing parents and those disturbing clues in the master bathroom. 94:46 And what were the boys saying? 94:48 Boys had no idea where mom and dad were. 94:50 Anybody have any clue? 94:52 No, at that point, nobody had any clue at all. 94:55 But that wouldn't last long. 95:00 The first big break came here, near the Mexican border in San Diego. It was just before dawn the day after when someone here, 100 miles from Newport Beach, called 911 with an emergency. 95:13 It was Peter Chadwick. 95:15 They took her. They took her. Who took her? 95:21 The guy broke into my house. 95:24 He drove me here. He had a friend. I think they're going, they might be going to Mexico or somewhere. 95:49 In these surveillance pictures taken at a gas station near the Mexican border, you can see Peter Chadwick. He's about to make that 911 call. 96:04 Chadwick tells the operator QC had been murdered. 96:09 My wife's dead. They've gone in the pickup truck. 96:12 So your wife is dead? 96:15 She's dead. 96:17 Hold on. Let me get my supervisor on the phone. 96:21 This is the gas station where Chadwick called 911? 96:24 Yeah, this is where he chose to kick off our investigation. 96:26 And this was a huge break? 96:28 This was huge. 96:29 Sergeant Ryan Peters. Just to get a sense of where we are, how close are we to the border? Is that... 96:37 It's right there. 96:39 What are we looking at? 96:39 We're looking at Tijuana. 96:41 We're that close? 96:42 We're that close. 96:43 What did Chadwick tell 911? 96:46 Chadwick calls 911 and says he was kidnapped. And he was kidnapped by a guy named Juan who had killed his wife in Newport Beach. 96:53 How do you know Juan? 96:54 I picked him up to look at some painting work at the house. I brought him to the house. 97:01 So Peter and Juan go back to his home, and then what did Peter say happened? 97:05 At some point, Peter and Juan separated. Juan continued upstairs, and Peter went down to his office. Peter said within seconds, he heard his wife QC screaming. 97:17 He hears QC scream, Peter, Peter. And as he runs upstairs, he sees Juan strangling QC, who's in the bath in their master bedroom, and he's drowning her. 97:29 How do you know she's dead? 97:31 she drowned and she drowned her body was stiff even as he goes up and sees this witnesses this he's held at bay by juan with a two-inch pocket knife chadwick told police he was helpless to save qc instead of being able to rescue his wife he's held at bay by juan and juan proceeds to finish killing his wife 97:56 Then, Chadwick said, Juan ordered him to help get QC's body out of the tub and wrap it in a blanket. 98:03 And Peter says he walks over and grabs a green blanket and wraps her up in it, and that's the blanket they use to take her downstairs. 98:09 With Juan at his side, Chadwick said he was forced to drive all through the night with his wife's body in the back of his SUV. 98:19 I've been driving with him. 98:22 I think they might be going to Mexico or somewhere. We need to get him. 98:26 Chadwick says that's how they ended up here, at this border town gas station, where they met up with another man named Chi. 98:35 And they took the body out of Chadwick's car, put it in a truck, and took it to Mexico. 98:40 Chadwick says Juan and Chi drove away, leaving him alone with his vehicle in this dreary parking lot. 98:47 That's when Peter made his 911 call. 98:50 Within a few minutes, police arrived and took him to the station. 99:19 Lieutenant Brian Moore says his detectives found holes in Chadwick's story. Any signs of Juan at all? 99:28 No. 99:29 Chadwick told 911 that QC was killed at about 11 o'clock the previous morning. But surveillance footage shows Chadwick's SUV leaving his gated community in Newport Beach about two and a half hours after that. Police say there's no Juan in the vehicle. And later, Chadwick's at a toll. Again, no sign of Juan. 99:53 Everyone we talked to and described this one individual, no one had any idea who that was or could give us any information related to this person. 100:03 What about Chi? 100:04 No. Some of the video surveillance we picked up in the area where Peter said he met this Chi person, there was no other vehicles involved that we could see. 100:15 What's more, Chadwick's own body had some incriminating injuries. 100:22 He had scratches on his neck and arms. He had a bite mark on his forearm. 100:27 Did he try to explain that as these came from Juan? 100:31 He explained some sort of a struggle between him and Juan, but there was never any specifics on how he obtained those injuries. 100:38 And then there was this, a packed suitcase in Chadwick's car. 100:42 We had a suitcase, all male clothing inside, that was just kind of thrown in there as if somebody kind of packed hastily. 100:48 I'm sorry, there was a bag in the car of men's clothes? What kind of kidnapper says, hey, go ahead and pack yourself an overnight bag? 100:56 Which is part of the problem. That's not normally the thing that happens, no. 101:05 QC's friend Karen says nothing Peter said made any sense. 101:11 When you first heard that story, did you buy it? 101:15 Absolutely not. I don't even think the 911 operator bought it. If you've heard the tape, her reaction is, mm-hmm, really? Mm-hmm. 101:25 Detectives weren't buying any of it either. 101:43 During the initial contact, Peter was kind of all over the map. His story was very disjointed. He'd go through the range of emotions, crying, however, the officer never saw a tear, to moments of anxiety and just complete quiet. 101:57 So he went from great displays of being distraught to nothing. 102:02 And the most interesting thing was during the entire contact with law enforcement and with our detectives, he never once asked about his kids. 102:10 He never asked about the boys? 102:11 No. And we're talking he hasn't seen them since the morning prior when he dropped them off for school. 102:16 What did that say to you? 102:18 To me, it means that he's more concerned with his story, creating an alibi. 102:23 Than he is about his own sons. 102:25 It appeared so, yes. 102:30 People's first feeling was that there had been a takeover robbery and they had both been kidnapped. And I don't even know if there was speculation in the media about that, but I never for a moment thought that it happened. I somehow knew he had killed her. 103:09 I remember calling and I said, he's killed her, hasn't he? 103:14 I can't tell you why I knew. 103:18 My friend said, are you okay? Are you at work? And I said, I am, but I'm going home now. 103:27 On October 11th, 2012, just six hours after that 911 call, Peter Chadwick was arrested for murder. 103:37 He wasn't defensive, angry, sad, emotional in any way, as if somebody that was being placed under arrest that was innocent would have acted. 103:47 Almost like he wasn't surprised that we were putting handcuffs on him. 103:51 Chadwick quickly lawyered up and stopped talking to detectives. The community was shocked. 103:58 Just unthinkable that he would do that, that someone would do that, that she would be gone. 104:07 Karen Thorpe could only guess what led to her friend's murder. I think over time, knowing QC, it seemed that she wanted to become more independent and she would start doing more things for herself. And I wondered then if maybe some of her reservations and insecurity were because of Peter. Why do you think she didn't confide in you? I think she was very proud and I think everyone was shocked. 104:38 Brian Moore believes QC had uncovered a dark side of her husband. 104:43 Probably the most telling things that we discovered was a handwritten piece of paper that had Peter's computer search history on it. It looked like it was written out by QC. 104:55 And what did that say? 104:56 How to torture, Chinese sex massage, abortion costs in Orange County. 105:02 These were all in his search history? 105:03 Yes. 105:06 So as we dug into it further, we started to get the real account that there was some turmoil in their marriage. 105:13 There was some talk of divorce. He visited prostitutes? Based on his search history, we have to assume so. 105:20 This isn't that happy Newport Beach family that it appeared to be from the outside. 105:25 Absolutely not. 105:27 In court, Peter Chadwick pleaded not guilty. 105:32 His two sons, who had lived at home, were now with their mother's brother more than 50 miles away in the Los Angeles area. Their mother was missing and presumably dead. Did the boys have any idea about what happened to their mother, what their dad was doing? 105:50 None whatsoever. 105:52 Then, seven days after Peter Chadwick called 911, detectives got another big break. 105:59 This time, a tip they say they can't discuss. 106:03 that led them to a location in the mountains more than 100 miles from Newport Beach. 106:10 This is remote. It's extremely remote, kind of south San Diego County in the middle of nowhere. 106:20 So where are we headed? So we're going to crime scene number two. 106:24 Detectives found themselves on this barren mountainside in rural San Diego County, Wildcat Canyon. They believe Peter Chadwick came here that night. 106:35 What do you think he's thinking as he's driving up this road? 106:37 If you kind of put yourself in his position, he's been driving around for hours, over 10 hours, with QC's body in the car. He needs to find a place to drop the body. He needs to find a place to drop the body where he's not going to be seen, where it's dark and it's not going to be seen anytime soon after he drops it. 106:57 The first place he comes to is this little road. Yeah, it's right here. 107:01 That's it? 107:02 That's it. 107:09 So this is where he stopped. 107:11 We were not sure if we were ever going to find her. The chances were slim to none. 107:17 When we lifted it up, it was full. So what did you see? We started finding QC's items. We found nice bags. We found a really nice purse. So we set those aside. When we opened up the bag, that's when we found QC's ID, her permanent residency card, $10,000 cash. And all of this stuff is the stuff that he described Juan taking with QC's body into Mexico. 107:42 And wrapped in that green blanket, QC's body. 107:46 It was a huge break for us. 107:49 The dumpster was scheduled to be picked up the Thursday morning, which was the next morning after we believe Peter disposed of QC's body. The issue with that was there was some kind of billing dispute. 108:00 So they were supposed to pick up the dumpster, but they didn't. 108:06 Once detectives finally found QC, the medical examiner was able to determine how she died. 108:12 There was a pretty violent struggle, which resulted in strangulation and possible drowning. 108:21 As the state built its case against Peter Chadwick, he sat in jail, that is, for two months, until December, when bail was set at $1 million. No sweat for the multimillionaire businessman. 108:36 I heard he got out on bail, and I remember being absolutely infuriated and disgusted that he should not be out on bail. 108:47 Prosecutor Matt Murphy says the court really had no choice. Chadwick was entitled to bail. 108:53 We had a guy that had no criminal background. He had roots in the community. 108:58 Chadwick also had that multi-million dollar home and three sons, and he surrendered his U.S. and U.K. passports. 109:07 We can keep him on a short leash. We can keep him, you know, engaged in the process. We can keep, you know, we can keep eyes on him. 109:15 Peter came back and got her van, which was really creepy. He returned to get her van because his car was impounded. So he drove off with her van and I was just happened to be out in the street and he gave me a nod and I'm just like turned my head in disgust. Even before Chadwick could face trial, Karen's mind was made up. 109:35 He was shameless. Talk about chutzpah. He sent out an email. 109:41 inviting people to a 100-day vigil, candlelight vigil, at the home where he murdered her. 109:52 How can you kill your wife, throw her in a dumpster, and hold a candlelight vigil at the home where you killed her? 110:04 Two years passed. Chadwick moved into his father's home in Santa Barbara, a swanky town up the coast. All three sons ended up in boarding school. 110:14 How solid did you think your case was as you headed for trial? 110:19 Extremely solid. I mean, with all the circumstantial evidence, the body, the injuries, and the lack of plausibility on behalf of Peter's story. So overall, we thought we had this thing wrapped up. 110:32 So as you're looking down the road, you're thinking Peter Chadwick is going to end up where? 110:37 In prison. 110:39 But Peter Chadwick had other plans. 110:42 Breaking news to tell you about an accused murderer on the run from California. 111:02 Peter Chadwick was awaiting trial and making his court appearances for hearings, doing what he was supposed to do. Until he wasn't anymore. 111:11 Yeah, we got word from his attorney that said, I don't know where he is. 111:16 After two years out on bail, Peter Chadwick disappeared. 111:21 This is one of the most wanted suspects in the entire United States. 111:26 What do you mean he's gone? You know, didn't somebody keep an eye on this guy? Prosecutor Matt Murphy was outraged. 111:33 Nobody thought that he would flee from his sons. 111:37 He abandoned his family, he made his attorney look terrible, and he thumbed his nose at the court and the justice system. 111:43 Is part of this just that rich guys can get away with an awful lot? 111:48 You know, it's just frustrating. 111:52 You shouldn't be able to take advantage of the system because you have money. 111:56 And, you know, that's what happened here. Most people can't afford this bail. You shouldn't be able to do this because you got money. He took full advantage and he used his financial resources to do it. 112:05 A million dollars bail really wasn't enough to keep someone as cold-hearted and narcissistic as him to stay around. 112:14 At first, investigators heard that Peter Chadwick might be dead initially michael chadwick started relaying information that he was suicidal so michael chadwick peter's dad said he was going to kill himself that peter was going to kill himself he alluded to the fact that he was suicidal i don't know if it was his attorney or his father had said he had been despondent and suicidal no by the time investigators realized that he'd flown the coop chadwick was long gone He had a three-week lead on them, and he'd been studying up. 112:49 They discovered books in Chadwick's home on how to disappear and how to change identities and leave false trails. 113:02 Investigators learned from a taxi company that someone who police now believe was Peter Chadwick took a cab from his dad's house to this airport here in Santa Barbara. 113:13 And get this, the cab driver says that the person he picked up that day was a woman. So was Peter Chadwick in disguise? 113:26 When he got here, he went inside with his suitcase. And then he must have changed clothes because surveillance cameras have pictures of Chadwick dressed as himself hanging out at the Santa Barbara airport. Hours ticked by, but he never got on a plane. Instead, he went back outside, got into another cab, and drove away. 113:48 And that's the last anyone here saw of Peter Chadwick. 113:53 The search for Chadwick was now an international manhunt with the U.S. Marshals leading the way. 114:02 Here they are training in the mountains above Los Angeles. 114:08 We're gonna catch him. 114:10 Marshal Craig McCluskey led the team that would track Chadwick. He's gonna make a mistake. We're gonna choke him off and grab him. 114:20 Not only did Chadwick have a head start, his life on the run would be well financed. 114:26 What makes him so difficult to find is the fact that he fled with a decent amount of money. 114:32 So it was about a million dollars that he had in cash when he left? 114:35 Approximately a million dollars, yes. 114:38 Do you feel like he slipped through your fingers? 114:42 Yeah, I honestly wish we could have wrapped this case up a lot sooner. He got the better of us at this point. 114:54 Once you find a string, you got to start pulling on it. And we found a couple of strings. 114:58 Before the final tip that led investigators to Mexico, tips had come from everywhere. 115:04 The countries that we've had active leads and that we've pursued include Japan, they include Canada, Belize, Panama, the Ukraine. 115:14 McCluskey was convinced Chadwick was getting help while on the lam. 115:20 I didn't think this case was gonna turn into what it did. But I think one reason that it did is not because Peter's smart. It's not because he was savvy. It's not because he outsmarted us. It's because he's getting help. 115:34 And I think once we cut him off from his source of help, that he's gonna make a mistake and we're gonna catch him. 115:41 Karen Thorpe had always hoped whoever was helping Peter Chadwick might have a change of heart. 115:48 Someone needs to come forward, someone with a conscience. 115:51 someone who cares about those kids and who cares about what has happened to this lovely woman, this lovely, devoted mother, who has no justice. 116:03 Justice would be in reach when the manhunt ended south of the border. 116:08 But wait till you hear what Chadwick was doing while on the lam. 116:13 He went from a real estate millionaire to bussing tables. 116:17 I think he was just desperate to fit in and stay on the run. He was willing to do anything to sustain his flight. 116:27 Learn more about Peter Chadwick's life on the run in Mexico at 48hours.com. 116:43 After almost five years, basically overnight, everything changed. August 4th, 2019, 48 Hours learned of a new dramatic development in the Peter Chadwick investigation. 116:57 48 Hours had the only news crew on the scene when Peter Chadwick landed in Los Angeles yesterday. He disappeared in 2015 after being charged with killing his wife. 117:08 In handcuffs and shackles, authorities had their man, and Newport Beach Police Chief John Lewis made the official announcement. 117:16 After receiving hundreds and hundreds of tips from all over the world, one of them led us to our suspect. 117:22 The chief would not go into detail about what that tip was. Chadwick was picked up by Mexican federal police near the city of Puebla, south of Mexico City. 117:32 I believe he was surprised. I don't think he expected to be arrested. 117:37 Marshal Craig McCluskey was at the airport in Los Angeles when Chadwick arrived, and he slapped the cuffs on him. 117:45 What's the first thing you said to him? 117:46 Peter, my name is Craig McCluskey. I'm from the U.S. Marshals. I'm placing you into the custody of the United States Marshal Service. I think he had recognized me from the initial 48 Hours episode that aired. He watched the 48 Hours episode? I believe he did. 118:01 He's going to make a mistake. We're going to choke him off and grab him. 118:05 Our 48 Hours report on the hunt for Peter Chadwick aired in May 2019. And he recognized you from the 48 Hours? 118:12 Well, because the first question he asked me looked me right in the face and he asked me, how's Ben? And Ben's his oldest son. I guess he assumed that I had some contact with his family. He said when he saw that episode, he realized that his situation had escalated a lot because he didn't realize the U.S. Marshals were after him at that point. So he was watching us, watching him? 118:34 In essence, yes. 118:35 And he knew, he knew how many people were after him. He'd seen the coverage. 118:39 He really became stressed out. That was an incredible weight, yeah. I mean, looking over your shoulder every day. 118:46 Details are still murky about where Chadwick spent all his years on the run. But when he was picked up in Mexico, he was living in this apartment. 118:55 Peter was in a small village outside of Puebla, Mexico, about two hours north of the Guatemalan border and about an hour and a half south of Mexico City. The makeup of that town was mostly Caucasian, but also Asian community as well. His hideout was next to a country club. He had tennis courts, and of course, Peter preferred playing tennis. 119:15 So he continued to play tennis? 119:17 Yes. 119:18 Did he change his appearance? 119:19 He changed his appearance slightly. So his hair was a little darker. He had some facial hair, so he had a goatee. He tried to make himself a little younger, and I think he was successful in that. I mean, his face looked a little different. A little nip and tuck in Mexico. Possibly. I don't know for sure. 119:36 Chadwick apparently used many fake IDs and aliases, including Paul Cook, Paul Craig, and John Franklin. 119:44 He even had an ID card that it was a copy of some fictional security force, and he was representing himself as some type of analyst with top secret access with his photo on it. What do you think he used that for? Maybe to get some unassuming local police officers off his back. It's essentially a toy ID saying, hey, I'm a secret agent. Correct. 120:08 But strangely, Chadwick never got a fake passport, and that may have forced him into some lifestyle changes. He'd started off his escape staying in nice hotels. 120:18 And he stayed in some fancy hotels at the beginning? 120:21 He did stay in hotels. I think he started to change his pattern when Mexico started changing some of their immigration laws, where they required visas for non-citizens when they checked into hotels, which forced him into, you know, more discreet places like hostels, you know, that would accept cash and no identification. 120:40 And then there was money. Even though authorities figure he had about a million dollars in cash when he fled, he occupied his days picking up odd jobs. What was he doing for money? 120:51 He did flee with a large sum of money. Most of it, he lived off of that. But I think he did some small things on the side, maybe taught conversational English or something like that to children to make a few extra bucks. I think he was bussing tables, working in kitchens. But he went from a real estate millionaire to bussing tables? Right. I think he was just desperate to fit in and stay on the run. He was willing to do anything to sustain his flight. 121:18 One of the biggest investigative breaks that led the marshals to Chadwick was their discovery that he was in communication with people who knew him. 121:26 We learned that he was receiving help from those close to him. To what extent, I don't know. And the quantities of money that were provided to him, I don't know exactly. But we know that he was getting some assistance from those close to him back up here still. 121:39 That information, combined with the new tip and old-fashioned police work by Newport Beach police, the marshals, and Mexican authorities, ultimately led to Chadwick's arrest. The bizarre thing is that this took, you know, nearly five years to unfold, and then, boom, it happened overnight. 121:58 Yeah. That's entirely due to the relationship we had with the Mexican authorities. Their response to intelligence that was gathered and their own intelligence-gathering techniques, I mean, that's really what paid off. 122:11 At this point, authorities are not saying if they'll charge anyone else in connection with Chadwick's escape. Meantime, they're savoring their victory. Chief Lewis says he always knew Chadwick's days were numbered. Did you ever for a moment think he's gone forever? 122:28 Not for a minute. I believe in our investigators. I believe in our process. I believe in the heart of this police department towards solving these cases. And so in my mind, it was just a matter of time before we got them. It wasn't going to be a if, it was a when. 122:41 Did he seem at all relieved? 122:46 He did, at the end a little bit. He said something along the lines of, it was getting hard to keep up with the lies. 122:52 is captured in Mexico. 122:54 For Karen Thorpe, QC's close friend, Chadwick's capture brings mixed emotion. 123:00 What's it like to see that? 123:04 I'm angry. I'm repulsed. I want to make him know the pain that everybody else suffered. 123:14 One of the things that we heard was that he was at a resort in Mexico. What do you think of that? 123:20 Outrageous. Somebody who could do this to her and then live the high life is just a testament to his coldness and his depravity. 123:33 And that coldness, investigators say, extended to Chadwick's willingness to abandon his three sons forever. 123:41 Our investigation shows that Peter Chadwick never intended to return from Mexico. He had no intentions of coming back to Orange County to face trial or to raise the three sons that he had abandoned. 123:53 Speaking of the boys, our hearts go out to them. We'd ask that everyone respect their privacy during this incredibly emotional time. 124:01 We don't know how the Chadwick boys have reacted to their father's capture, but we do know that in recent months, Karen Thorpe told us, they've been doing well. Do you have a sense of how the boys are doing? 124:12 They're really, really strong, really strong. 124:19 really supported by QC's family. There's so much love around them and so much love for them. They've really, they've continued to flourish in spite of this tragedy. 124:34 And that is a fitting tribute to a dedicated mom whose life was cut so short. 124:45 We lost in QC a mother who cared for her children deeply. 124:50 and who loved life and loved vibrancy and loved to give her children all that she possibly could. 125:15 A young woman waiting for her wedding day. Her fiancé gunned down. 125:20 Someone had a vendetta against Patrick. 125:22 Did police uncover a plan for murder? 125:25 This wasn't a random killing. It was an assassination. 125:30 48 Hours, Saturday on CBS.