05x02 - Lost Innocence

[bunniefuu]

[suspenseful music playing]

[man] So, when I was a kid,

my grandfather brought home a shotgun.

And I remember the first thought

that went through my head

was, "Damn, it would be

so much easier in life

if I were to just k*ll her

and get this over with."

But it was just a thought.

You know, it was just

It was just a thought.

[suspenseful music continues]

[man] I wish I could go back

and tell me not to do it.

To literally do probably

just about anything else but that.

And I hate that it's ended up impacting

so many people in so many negative ways.

Especially Ashley.

[Ashley] The loss of our victim's life

weighs heavy on me.

And I don't think I've gotten over

what happened to this day, fully.

But I'm not really a m*rder*r.

And it's a title I have to carry

for the rest of my life now.

[music swells]

[music fades]

[theme song playing]

[man 1] I think

we could all be dangerous people.

[man 2] People say you're a monster.

[man 3] I'm not sitting here

saying I'm innocent.

[man 4] I just m*rder*d

some guy in cold blood.

[theme song fades]

[rain pattering]

[uneasy music playing]

[man] When someone

knocks on your door after midnight,

something is not right.

My wife was concerned.

And thinking back on it,

she was probably correct.

When I opened the door,

I had a young couple standing there.

They were cold, and they were wet.

They told me that

they'd had some car problems.

So I I told them I'd drive them

a couple miles down the road

to where they were going.

[dramatic sting]

What happened after that

was totally beyond my comprehension.

I I couldn't have imagined that, uh,

they were even capable of that.

[police siren sounds]

[music fades]

[suspenseful music playing]

[Ashley] My name is Ashley Morrison,

and I was sentenced to 30 years.

I was 17 when I got arrested.

[Christian] My name is Christian Sims.

I have a 35-year sentence

for first-degree m*rder.

I was 16 when I was arrested.

[Christian]

I've had a lot put on me in my life.

It was just too much.

I just couldn't take it anymore.

I me Everybody has their breaking point,

and I think that was mine.

[Ashley] When I look back,

I feel, like,

this really big sense of loss.

And always that question of just, like,

"What if?"

[music fades]

[hopeful guitar music playing]

[Ashley] We moved to Texas when I was 11.

It was a small town.

They have generations

that have grown up there.

At the school that we went to,

I was always really quiet and shy.

I was very insecure.

So, yeah, I guess I was kind of a nerd.

I definitely had bullies.

But band gave my life a purpose.

I was actually able

to be a leader in my section.

Almost all of my friends

were in band, yeah.

Me and Christian met

'cause we both played the clarinet.

And at first, he was very standoffish.

He didn't talk to anybody,

he didn't have any friends.

Um

And I remember liking the mystery of it,

where he gave off this impression

of being somebody that was not

Like, almost untouchable because

nobody really knew anything about him.

It drew me more to him.

[music fades]

[Christian] As As a teenager,

I mean, I I was fairly introverted.

I was living with my grandparents,

and if I'm just being perfectly honest,

I hated it.

It was not enjoyable.

My grandmother was not very

How do I put this?

She was very heavy-handed.

She, if I'm just being honest,

went out of her way to, uh, destroy

quite a few friendships that I had formed.

So I just never allowed myself

to get very close with people,

because I'd intentionally

always set myself apart.

But with Ashley, you can say

that she finally made me feel accepted.

I was in sixth grade

when I met Ashley Morrison.

She was in seventh grade.

[laughs]

Uh

I mean, she was a pretty girl.

I don't know

if you would call it chemistry.

It was funny.

We had some sort of rivalry going on.

She ended up texting me,

and it kind of just went from there.

[Ashley] As I did get to know him,

Christian told me about

how he had gotten adopted

by, um, his grandparents

because of his home life not being okay,

his parents not being able

to take care of him.

And that's why

he never felt like he belonged.

He told me about his grandparents

and how he wasn't really happy.

[pensive music playing]

Me and my mom

didn't have the best relationship either.

But he made me feel like I had finally

met somebody who understood me.

And it was so nice to feel completely

just understood for once in my life.

That, um, I think in that moment,

is the moment

that I fell in love with him.

We were obsessed with each other.

Looking back,

it wasn't even like I was myself.

I was like an extension of him.

Like, it didn't matter

what I wanted, what I thought.

Like, everything and anything for him.

And I was okay with that.

[Christian] It ended up

sparking pretty quickly.

I mean, we would see each other every day.

I guess because I fell in love

or whatever it may have been,

I ended up letting her in,

ended up getting close to her,

talking with her about stuff

that I didn't talk with anybody about,

you know.

Most likely, that that was

what was drawing us closer together.

We were trying

to find comfort in each other.

[Ashley] So, one night, me and my mom

got into a really bad argument.

And, um, my very first instinct

was to tell Christian,

because he'd protect me.

He'd be there for me.

He and I got together,

and we fabricated a story

for him to be able to move in with me,

because I thought

that he'd be able to protect me.

[pensive music playing]

[Ashley] At first, it was great.

But I didn't know about his mental health

until he moved in with me and my family.

I don't really think

I fully comprehended it.

Little things would make him so angry.

He'd get angry around my sisters,

especially the youngest one,

who was only three at the time.

And he had g*ns in the house,

um, that he had brought with him.

It made it scary.

[Christian] At first, it was great.

Uh, I obviously didn't have

my grandmother there making my life hell.

But it just seemed like

the more time went on,

the less smooth things started to go.

And it just seemed like everything just

kept tumbling and getting worse and worse.

And I just wanted to get away from it.

And suddenly just, like, you know,

it's, "f*ck it. I'm just gonna leave."

I ended up telling Ashley, "Hey, uh,

I don't know if you wanna come with me,

but I'm leaving."

And she said, "I wanna come with you."

I told her

[softly] Well

Anyway, she ended up

deciding to come with me.

[Ashley] We had one plan,

which was to run away together.

Typical teenager stuff.

But it transformed.

He mentioned wanting

to k*ll his grandparents,

steal everything from them,

go start our own life.

No rules, no authorities.

I wasn't okay with that.

Did I believe him? Not really.

But I just remember at that point,

like, I wasn't really happy anymore

being with him.

[voice breaking] But he brought my family

into it and threatened them.

When he said, "Well, if I just take away

the reason that you would not go with me,

then you're gonna go with me one way

or the other." Basically, regardless.

At that point, it didn't matter

whether I believed it or not,

because I wasn't gonna take the risk

of not believing he was capable

of something like that and being wrong.

[unsettling music playing]

I honestly don't remember

how that day started.

I remember packing my bags

and my mom coming into the bedroom

and asking what was going on.

And I I remember crying

and telling her, like,

"I have to get out of the house. Like,

we're moving out. Like, we're leaving."

And as I went to go out the door,

my mom shoved me out.

She took my keys. She took my phone.

I wasn't coming back. I was

[voice breaking] I was done

in that family.

[uneasy music playing]

[rain pattering]

[Ashley] So, we started walking.

It was nighttime.

We walked for a long time.

We eventually got to a house

where we knocked on the door

and asked for a ride.

This man gave us a ride

to somewhere in the vicinity

of Christian's grandparents' house.

[music builds]

[Christian] We go to my aunt's house.

Uh, the door was locked.

I end up popping the screen off,

opening the window. We go inside.

So I go looking through the house.

I end up finding the g*n.

I check all the rounds, load it back up.

Tell Ashley, "Hey, I'm going to be back

in, like, 15 minutes. Just wait here."

And I leave.

[suspenseful music playing]

[dramatic sting]

[Christian]

I go up to my grandparents' house.

I can see my grandmother in the house.

I grab some rocks

out of the gravel driveway.

And, uh,

I threw the rocks at the washtub on

the back, trying to get her to come out.

[softly] I don't know, man. This is

[sighs] So,

she came out.

As soon as she looked at me, I shot.

[dramatic music playing]

I ended up walking up to her.

She was still shaking.

So, I was thinking,

"Well, she may still be alive."

So, I put another one

in the back of her head.

[music swells]

"I f*cked up." [chuckles]

That was the first thing

that went through my head. "I f*cked up."

"What have I done?"

[Ashley] He came back and was manic.

I mean, I knew something wasn't right,

that something was wrong in that moment.

He was waving the g*n around,

talking about,

"Hurry, get our stuff, get in the car,"

screaming at me because

I wasn't moving fast enough.

I was confused.

He told me that he had k*lled his grandma.

[dramatic sting]

I don't really think I fully

comprehended it in that very first moment

or even the moment after that.

He had told me, but, like I said,

I didn't really believe him.

I don't really know which moment

my brain decided to shut down

in the process of everything.

It was like a reality I wasn't gonna face.

What he said to do,

I did without hesitation.

I never thought to save myself.

Um

And I I just I don't know why

I never thought to do that.

[suspenseful music builds]

[dramatic sting]

[suspenseful music swells, then fades]

[uneasy violin music playing]

[Christian] I told an officer immediately

it was all me. She had nothing to do.

You know, if I'm just being honest,

she's an innocent bystander in all this.

Like, she

She definitely doesn't doesn't deserve

to be locked up for some

for my mistake, you know?

[violin music intensifies]

[music fades]

[hopeful guitar music playing]

[man] There's no real words to describe

what it feels like to wake up one morning

knowing you've sat next to a m*rder*r

on the school bus.

To this day, it's still difficult

to wrap my head around.

But I think that,

had Ashley not been in the picture,

this wouldn't have happened to begin with.

My name is Eric Shelton,

and I went to school

with Ashley Morrison and Christian Sims.

[guitar music fades]

I've known Christian

for probably 12, 13 years.

I would describe Christian

as a private person.

You could tell that

he was a very intelligent kid.

Um, smart, he was studious.

Um He just wasn't the most outgoing.

[pensive guitar music playing]

There is no question that Christian was

dealing with some demons from his past.

But he made good grades in school,

and you could tell just by

talking to him that he had a future,

he had a plan, he was going somewhere.

Ashley was a year older

than Christian and I.

[uneasy music playing]

And when you're in high school,

a one-year age difference is huge.

The power dynamic between them was,

if she walked,

he kissed the ground she walked on.

If Ashley asked Christian

to jump off of a cliff,

not only would he do it, but he would ask

her what he should wear when he does it.

It's hard to speak on

what happens behind closed doors,

'cause obviously I don't know 100%.

But I saw

what their relationship was like.

What she wanted, went.

But all of a sudden,

when something bad happens,

of this nature,

that is punishable,

she says she has

no participation at all whatsoever.

That's what sticks out to me.

[woman] From the beginning,

we looked at this as a case

that there were two individuals involved.

But one of the difficult things for me is,

you know, why did this happen?

To me, there was no clear motive.

My name is Jill Drake,

and I was an assistant district attorney

here in Lamar County, Texas,

when this m*rder was committed.

[pensive guitar music playing]

I was involved with the case

from the beginning.

When the call came in and

we learned that it was the Sims family,

we all said,

"Oh my goodness, Christian Sims,

he was a victim in a case previously."

And, kind of,

the memories started flooding back.

Christian had been a victim of a child

physical abuse case way back in '06.

It was quite a horrific case.

His mother's boyfriend had physically and

potentially sexually abused Christian Sims

when Christian was eight years old.

[Christian, on recording] My mother

ended up getting with some guy.

His name was Anthony Trenton Barbour.

I remember his name.

I don't know. It's kind

It's kind of difficult to talk about.

He was just what you would call demented.

There's quite a few different things

that ended up happening.

I mean, there's beatings,

diff different things like that.

I was scared, I would piss the bed.

And one of his remedies for that

is that he would take a clothespin

and he would put it on,

you know, my privates.

I I guess you could call it

sexual in nature.

[Jill Drake] As a child abuse prosecutor,

it's very difficult for me to hear

the things that Christian says happened

to him, some of which I know are true.

[voice breaking] And it hurts me

to hear that.

It was just a horrible situation

for this child to be in.

[pensive, soft music playing]

His grandparents, they were a very

well-known and well-respected family.

And, you know, did the best they could

and gave him a home.

But this child was going to have PTSD.

He was going to have

to work through these issues

throughout the rest of his adolescence.

And we hoped that

being in the loving home with the Sims,

um, that he would get that help.

[Christian, on recording] I move in

with my grandparents.

And, uh, pardon my French, but f*ck it.

[chuckles] I might as well

just go ahead and talk about it. Uh

You're not supposed

to speak ill of the dead,

but my grandmother

was definitely the worst,

most poisonous person that I've ever met.

My grandmother mentally,

physically, and sexually abused me.

Uh, she would come in late at night.

She'd do pretty much the same thing

Trent would do, except

instead of beating me and stuff, she's

trying to cause me pain in other ways.

She would, uh, grab my privates and twist.

I don't know, she was just real sadistic

with the things that she would do.

Far worse than Trent.

[dramatic sting]

[Jill Drake] Well, that was

very interesting. [sighs]

It's the first time I've heard

any allegations of this nature.

I hate to discount when I hear

a person say that they were abused.

I can tell you,

I'm I'm not sure I believe it.

If his grandmother had done

something to him to make him k*ll her,

then it sure would've been important for

him to tell his lawyer that at a trial.

[pensive piano music playing]

[Jill Drake] It's shocking to me to hear

Christian say his grandmother abused him.

If If that had come out,

we certainly would've investigated that

further and taken that into consideration.

That's what we do.

Prosecutors seek justice.

But he pointed a g*n at her

and shot her in the cheek,

shot her right in the face.

And, to me,

that is his way

of making himself feel better

that he's in prison for k*lling her.

[music continues]

[music fades]

[sheep bleat]

[woman] My mom was the best mom

that you could ever have.

Just very giving and loving.

For Christian to even say that

my mom would've ever mistreated him

is a complete outrage.

It's just another stab in the heart,

a stab in the back, that

my parents did all this for you,

and then this is how you react.

I'm Laurie Geer,

and my mom was Annie Lois Sims.

[soft music playing]

[sucks teeth]

Um, here's a photo of my mom and dad,

and this would have been

probably right after church.

There's my mom in the kitchen.

Yeah.

I wish I could call her today

and ask her some cooking questions.

[pensive, guitar music playing]

When my parents first took Christian in,

it was 100%, you know,

"This is what we need to do."

And there's no way in hell that

my mom would have ever mistreated him.

That's not who she was, and that's never

anything she would have ever done.

They, um, raised him

like they did my brother and I.

But he had been through a horrific thing,

and so they tried to get him the help

that he needed and the counseling,

and then provide a stable,

you know, loving home

to help support from that side of things.

So, there was nothing that that

he would've needed that he didn't get.

[uneasy music playing]

The first time I found out about Ashley

was when they went to prom together,

and I saw the pictures.

You know, you could tell from the picture

that he was, you know, really into her.

But once Ashley came along, uh,

Christian, you know, totally changed.

[soft music playing]

He became, you know,

rebellious and argumentative, and,

you know, th that kind of stuff.

I just don't believe that Christian

would've done anything like this

if it weren't for meeting

and being in a relationship with Ashley.

I hate Ashley Morrison.

You're not supposed

to hate people, but I do.

Uh, I believe Ashley is

just as guilty as Christian, 100%.

She just thought

she could do whatever she wanted,

and that she wasn't gonna have to,

you know, pay the consequence.

I knew Ashley had changed her story.

I think she's very manipulative.

[pensive guitar music playing]

[man] When you go into an

interview, you hope for the best outcome.

And when I was going to interview Ashley,

I was hoping that she would tell me

100% the truth

about everything that happened

and answer every possible question I had.

But do I ever get what I want? No.

My name is Stacy McNeal.

I'm a Texas Ranger

assigned to Paris, Texas.

When I first met Ashley,

my initial impression of her was

she looked like a typical

17-year-old high school student,

maybe a little bit on the immature side.

She spoke very freely and openly,

and she chose to go ahead

and speak with me

outside the presence of her attorney.

She denied having any knowledge,

at that time,

of Christian's grandmother

even being dead.

And she made a statement

that Christian did not have a r*fle

when he'd left the house.

Ashley was saying,

"I'm just a poor, frightened girlfriend

that was afraid that Christian

was gonna do something to my family

if I didn't just go along with him."

[dramatic music playing]

In the second interview,

she's trying to keep from implicating

herself in a criminal offense.

But what she actually ends up doing

is implicating herself more thoroughly.

In the second interview,

she's changed a lot of vital information.

She admitted to

helping Christian load a r*fle.

This was the first time that she admitted

that Christian had a weapon when he left.

And then Ashley admitted

that Christian had told her

it was his intent

to go out to the residence

and k*ll both Mike and Annie Lois Sims.

She told no one, she took no action.

She didn't do anything

to try to prevent this.

They were working together,

in concert, to commit this offense.

No doubt you're a party to this.

You're a defendant. You're a m*rder*r.

[uneasy music playing]

[Jill Drake] You might think, "Okay. Well,

you can't charge me with m*rder

unless I was the person

who was the sh**ter."

Well, in Texas, if you help in any manner

in the commission of a crime,

you are a principal.

You are the one who did it,

whether you pulled the trigger or not.

And we believed

Ashley Morrison aided Christian

before, during, and after the crime.

[music fades]

[soft piano music playing]

[Jill Drake] One of the key pieces

of evidence at trial

were the text messages between

Ashley Morrison and Christian Sims.

These are text messages

that were on December 16th, 2014,

which would be two days before the m*rder.

Christian, "I'm going to my grandparents'

and robbing them blind."

"I guess we will have to start early."

Ashley, "Yeah, without a car or money."

"Or yeah, all of those

with my grandparents."

Ashley, "Yeah, I guess so."

Christian, "We could do it tonight."

Ashley, "I don't know

if she's gonna let me go or not."

"Especially if Dad gets involved."

"Well, they can f*ck off.

I will k*ll your dad."

"Okey dokey."

As a result of these text messages,

it was very clear for us

that they planned to leave,

they were gonna rob grandparents blind,

they were gonna k*ll whomever they needed.

It's all right there.

"I'm gonna k*ll your dad." "Okey dokey."

What was that?

She's She's a participant.

[music fades]

[Ashley, on recording] I pled not guilty,

'cause I didn't feel that I was.

I thought that the truth

was gonna get put out there,

and they were gonna see

[voice breaks] Like, they were

just gonna see me.

And, um,

that just everything was gonna be okay,

and I was gonna be able to go home.

But they said, because I never

reported him before it happened,

after he told me what he wanted to do,

I was just as guilty

as if I had pulled the trigger,

even though I wasn't

the one that pulled the trigger.

I didn't know that he was

actually able to k*ll his grandmother.

I mean, he had told me,

but, like I said,

I didn't really believe him.

[Christian] I understand the things

that we had talked about and whatnot,

but those are just the ravings of somebody

who was angry and hurt, you know?

I mean, just, what kind of what kind

of 17-year-old girl is gonna think

that her 16-year-old boyfriend's

actually gonna do that, you know?

I mean, who could

who could reasonably expect that?

[pensive music playing]

Honestly, I feel like it's a bit unjust.

[on recording] Because in my mind,

when I look back,

I don't think there was anything

I could have done to have saved her.

[Jill Drake] I hear Ashley saying

that she feels like it's unjust.

But we charged her, and she was convicted.

That's all there is to it.

This is just Ashley Morrison

rewriting what happened in her own mind

so she can live with herself.

To me, it's an excuse.

It's just something

for her to say at this point

to make her feel better about the fact

that she willingly went with him.

[uneasy violin music playing]

[man] At the trial, the prosecutors said

that Ashley Morrison was a party

to the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.

But the key piece of evidence

that I'm concerned with

is Christian Sims' statement.

"It was all me.

She didn't have anything to do with it."

[soft piano music playing]

My name is Roland Mosher,

and I am an attorney

in the state of Texas.

I practice criminal defense, and I did

most of the work on Ashley's appeal.

[keyboard keys clacking]

I think that there is a sense

in which Ashley was associated

with Christian Sims' actions.

She didn't call the police.

She didn't refuse

to get in the car with him.

She went with him.

But there's enough of a case to be made

that Ashley was coerced.

It's critical to the assumption

of the law of parties

that you be a willing participant.

And if you're being coerced,

you're not a willing participant.

The state's case, essentially,

is that Ashley, a 17-year-old girl,

didn't go out of her way

to disagree with or interfere with

her demonstrably emotionally

unstable and homicidal boyfriend.

But if your crazy boyfriend

comes to your front door and says,

"I'm gonna leave and you're coming with me

and I'm gonna m*rder people today,"

it's very reasonable to conclude

that, if you do something to offend him

or if your family

does something to upset him,

that they'll be next.

[pensive music playing]

[pensive music continues]

[woman] The person who's

responsible for this matter is Chris,

not Ashley.

I think when people vilify Ashley,

it's partially because

there's intent that's attributed to her

that I don't believe is at all accurate.

My name is Rycke Marshall.

I'm a clinical psychologist.

I did an evaluation with Ashley Morrison.

And I have Ashley's full permission

to discuss this case.

I met with Ashley on four separate

occasions for a total of 12 hours.

She was friendly, but she was traumatized.

Almost childlike, in some respects.

And she's someone

who could be easily manipulated.

For an adolescent to be interviewed

by police, without an attorney present,

would be terrifying.

It's not a level playing field.

And I don't think it's surprising at all

if her story changed.

Chris said,

"I could k*ll both your parents,

and I could make it

look like a m*rder-suicide."

[dramatic sting]

It seemed like a very real threat to her,

so she had no choice but to go.

You know, it was Chris's plan.

It was his actions. It was his thoughts.

It wasn't what she wanted.

I just hate it when I think

somebody's being treated unfairly.

And I think she would have

a good chance of a different result

if she were tried again.

But, unfortunately,

that's not what happened.

[soft, dramatic music playing]

[pensive guitar music playing]

[Ashley] So I changed my plea to guilty

during my second trial

because I was guilty.

And I am guilty.

Regardless of my frame of mind,

regardless of the fact

that my family was threatened,

[voice breaking] regardless

of those things, like, I had a choice.

I could've made the choice

to try to stop him.

I could have made the choice to get help.

And I do take responsibility

for my choices.

I don't know if I could have stopped it,

but a really big part of me

wishes that I had just tried.

[music fades]

I was given 30 years all over again.

Honestly, it feels unjust,

when I did not commit the m*rder.

That's me speaking from my point of view.

That's me speaking from watching

my life slip through my fingers.

But now it's my opportunity

to tell the truth.

My interviews with police,

I was terrified. [chuckles]

But I remember very distinctly

thinking to myself,

"They'd never believe me if I tell them

the truth of what really happened."

I wanted to paint things

in a better light.

But I just wished that

I had told the truth from the beginning,

because now it will always be a question

of, "Well, what really was the truth?"

[Stacy McNeal, on recording]

When I was gonna interview Ashley,

between the first

and the second interview,

she'd changed a lot of vital information.

She admitted to

helping Christian load a r*fle.

And then Ashley admitted

that Christian had told her

it was his intent to k*ll

both Mike and Annie Lois Sims.

[Ashley] I did not go

to his grandparents' house.

I did not commit the m*rder.

And, in my mind,

I was never helping him load the r*fle.

There was a bunch of b*ll*ts

on the ground,

and he wanted me to pick the b*ll*ts up

and count them back to him.

And that's simply all I did.

I mean, obviously, looking back now,

there's no way I couldn't think that

he was gonna go harm somebody, right?

That's what everybody thinks.

But at the same time,

you don't believe somebody

is capable of something like that,

especially somebody you love,

somebody that you're in love with.

[Jill Drake, on recording] It was

very clear Ashley Morrison aided Christian

before, during, and after the crime.

They were gonna k*ll whoever they needed.

Christian, "I will k*ll your dad."

Ashley, "Okey dokey."

"I'm going to k*ll your dad."

"Okey dokey."

What was that?

She's a participant.

[Ashley] Those texts, that looks horrible.

Like, I understand that.

I understand, from the outside

looking in, how bad that is

and how bad that looks.

But I know for me

that I was brushing Christian off.

Any time I said "okay" or "okey dokey,"

that was my "whatever" to him.

I didn't take him seriously.

But it became serious.

I definitely regret

not trying to stop what happened.

And if I could say something

to the Sims family, I would tell them,

even though it makes up for nothing,

that I'm genuinely sorry.

But, at the same time, I cannot

take responsibility for what he did.

I do believe

I should be in prison for my involvement.

Yes.

Do I believe that I should've gotten

30 years for my involvement, though?

No.

Because the man who pulled the trigger

and concocted the plan only got 35.

[dramatic music playing]

[Christian] I shot my grandmother because

she had beaten and molested me as a child.

I would not have done it

for any other reason.

But, from the outset,

there was no, like, plan.

If I'm just being honest, uh,

I'm an incredibly intelligent individual.

Uh, and I don't mean to say this to sound

uh, like an as*h*le or anything like that,

but had I planned this out, it would have

happened in a completely different way.

The reason why

I didn't mention the the prior abuse

is because I didn't think

that I would be believed.

[Laurie Geer, on recording]

For Christian to even

say that my mom

would have ever mistreated him

is a complete outrage.

And that's never anything

she would have ever done.

It's just another stab in the heart,

a stab in the back,

that [sighs]my parents

did all this for you,

and then this is how you react.

[Christian] Nothing I can do

or say's gonna convince anybody.

They weren't there.

They didn't have to experience it.

And, if I'm just being honest,

I don't have remorse

for her being dead as a person.

Uh, I think that

I think that she deserved

a lot worse than what she got.

I just hate that it was

[scoffs]my dumb a*s who did it.

I honestly couldn't say

what Ashley thought.

[scoffs] What I think that

she's probably told y'all

is probably some truth

with a bunch of bullshit mixed in.

Like, she's talking about how she's

scared of me and other sh*t like that.

I treated the girl like a princess.

Like, I never did anything to

to hurt her.

Uh, I didn't force her to do anything.

[dramatic music continues]

[end theme music playing]

[music fades]