10x27 - Summer Obsession

[bunniefuu]

NARRATOR: A young mother
mysteriously died just hours

after dining in an
upscale restaurant.

The search for clues
revealed secrets hidden

in an attic, an upscale
gentleman's club,

and underneath the
young woman's skin.

[theme music]

NARRATOR: Shortly
after midnight,

police in a wealthy
Philadelphia suburb

received a frantic 911 call.


Rabinowitz said

he had just found his wife,
Stephanie, in the bathtub.

When police arrived, they found
Rabinowitz in the bathroom

holding his wife's
head above the water.

They performed CPR, and
rushed her to the hospital.

Unfortunately, there was
nothing doctors could do.

When Craig learned of his wife's
death, he collapsed in grief.

Doctors had no explanation.

CHARLES CRAIG: I asked
the doctor, you know,

help me out here.

What do you think happened?

And he said, he
really didn't know.

He told me, some time people
die for unexplained reasons.

Could have been an aneurysm,
a heart attack, whatever.

But on first glance, there
wasn't any sign of trauma.

NARRATOR: Rabinowitz told
police that he and his wife,

Stephanie, had dinner
at a Thai restaurant,

came home, had a drink.

Then Stephanie took
a bath while Craig

said he watched television.

CHARLES CRAIG: And while he
was watching the hockey game,

he heard a thump, which he
attributed to the shampoo

bottle falling on the
floor in the bathroom.

He didn't think much of it.

He watched the hockey game for
approximately 20 to 30 minutes,

and realized, hey, his wife
hasn't come back to the bedroom

from the bath.

So he went into the
bathroom, and found

her unconscious in the bathtub.

NARRATOR: Detective
Charles Craig

had investigated many
unusual deaths before.

And a spouse with
something to hide

would usually act suspiciously,
but not Craig Rabinowitz.

-Generally when we
interview people,

witnesses, victims,
suspects, we look

to see if they have
eye contact with us,

see if they're shaking,
or they're very nervous,

or if they're perspiring.

And he didn't exhibit
any of those signs.

NARRATOR: And police found
nothing suspicious or out

of place in the couple's
home after Stephanie's death.

CHARLES CRAIG: TV was on.

The shampoo bottle
was in the bathroom.

There was water in the bathtub.

We checked all the
doors and windows,

and found that the
house was secure.

We went through
the master bedroom.

Didn't appear to have
any signs of a struggle.

We didn't find blood, or
anything of that nature.

NARRATOR: Craig and Stephanie
were a classic love story.

They had been together since
they first met in summer camp

as teenagers.

JIM NOLAN: The Rabinowitzes were
the perfect couple, in love,

with good jobs.

They had a beautiful young
daughter, a year old.

He had a business
of his own, selling

latex gloves and supplies.

They had been
married since 1990.

She was a lawyer, Bryn Mawr
and Temple University educated.

NARRATOR: Craig was
proud of his wife,

and worked hard to put
her through law school.

-Stephanie spoke about her
marriage in very idyllic terms.

I mean, she thought she had a
wonderful relationship, almost

a perfect relationship in that,
and she was extremely happy.

NARRATOR: Between her law
practice and his business,

they were very
affluent, and lived

in the exclusive mainline
section of Philadelphia.

But even wealth and privilege
can't prevent unfortunate

incidents like the one that
befell Stephanie Rabinowitz.

MITCHELL BACH: I came to the
office Wednesday morning.

I walked in and
everyone was crying,

and I was shocked to
hear that Stephanie

had died Tuesday night.

I heard that she
had an accident,

that she drowned in a bathtub.

That's all we were told.

NARRATOR: But why had
Stephanie drowned?

Was it caused by
something she ate,

medication, was she depressed?

Forensic investigators
needed to find out more.

The cause of Stephanie
Rabinowitz's death

was a mystery.

JIM NOLAN: Stephanie
Rabinowitz may have slipped,

hit her head in the tub,
subsequently drowned.

It was a real tragedy.

A mother of a
one-year-old child,

devoted husband,
happy family life.

-I mean, I was at a loss as
to how she could have died.

I didn't see any type
of drama, any cuts,

any abrasions, any of
that type of thing.

NARRATOR: Stephanie came from
a religious Jewish family.

In accordance with her
religion, Stephanie's parents

and her husband
Craig wanted to bury

her before the next sundown.

-There was a push to
have Stephanie Rabinowitz

buried quickly
under Jewish custom.

NARRATOR: But the coroner
overruled the family's wishes,

saying he wanted to
perform a complete autopsy.

His action was prompted
in part by something

Craig Rabinowitz told police.

He said Stephanie
was having trouble

adjusting to the demands of
caring for their new baby

and her work as a lawyer,
and she occasionally

took a prescription
sleep medication.

In the meantime, a
tipster called police,

suggesting they investigate
Craig's involvement

in a gentleman's club
named Delilah's Den.

-Delilah's Den is the upscale
strip club in Philadelphia.

It's a place where it's
not uncommon to see

a lot of professional
athletes or entertainers,

or people who visit
Philadelphia from out of town,

businesspeople, and just groups
of guys out to have a beer

or for a bachelor party to
show up at the Delilah's Den.

NARRATOR: When detectives
visited the club,

they discovered Craig
was a regular customer,

and that his interest was
primarily in only one dancer,

named Summer.

Employees said this
wasn't unusual.

MISS BUNNY: Well,
Summer didn't come

dance at clubs to make friends.

Like, she was definitely
there to make money.

And she was sort of known
as something of a shark,

like she was always
a big moneymaker,

she always went after
the like customers

that appeared to
have the most money.

You can either be
entertaining on stage,

and make it real clear to the
customers that we're going

to have a good time
while you're here,

but the fun ends at the door.

Or you can sort of
draw the customers

into this like longer,
drawn out fantasy,

and develop regular customers.

NARRATOR: When
interviewed, Summer

admitted that Craig was a good
customer-- but strictly that,

a customer, and not
even her best one.

CHARLES CRAIG: They
would each have

two or three good customers
who would spend a lot of money

on them, even buying them
furnishings for their house,

or paying repair bills,
or doing dental work,

that type of thing.

-She said there was no sexual
relationship between the two

of them, that they
weren't dating,

or anything of that nature.

We were always suspicious
of that, of course.

MISS BUNNY: I know dancers
who have gotten cars

from their customers, other
elaborate gifts of jewelry,

um, you know,
apartments, et cetera.

NARRATOR: Delilah's
customers who

want something a
little cozier can get

private dances in
the champagne room.

They use Delilah's
Dollars, house money

bought with credit cards.

Club records indicated Craig
was spending as much as $3,000

a week at Delilah's--
a lot of money,

perhaps, but
certainly not illegal.

-In fact, Craig's visits
too Delilah's were not

unknown to Stephanie Rabinowitz.

I think he had really told her
that he did business there.

And that is not an uncommon
thing to see in any city

with people who
are doing business,

especially something like sales.

NARRATOR: Whether Craig's
interest in Delilah's was

professional or
personal, it certainly

didn't explain
Stephanie's death.

That would have to come from
the forensic accountants.

In the 12 months before
his wife's death,

Craig Rabinowitz
spent almost $100,000

in Delilah's Den, an
upscale gentleman's

club in Philadelphia.

Investigators searched
the Rabinowitzs' home

for financial records,
interested to know how

Rabinowitz could afford
this kind of spending.

-He was a latex glove
salesman, but nobody

could really find a
lot of latex gloves.

NARRATOR: But detectives
did find a hidden crawl

space in the bedroom closet.

-So basically I just lifted
up the board covering

the crawl space, looked
around, didn't see anything,

but felt around the
top of the crawl space,

and found this bag.

And it turned out
to be a shopping

bag filled with a
lot of paperwork.

NARRATOR: The paperwork
included credit card receipts

for Delilah's Den, hotel
receipts, and gifts

he had purchased for
his favorite stripper.

There was also pornography.

-Basically, Craig
Rabinowitz's double life

was squirreled away in the crawl
space of the top of his home.

NARRATOR: The bag
contained pawn shop tickets

proving Craig pawned
Stephanie's heirloom

jewelry just after she died.

The bag also contained an
accounting ledger, possibly

for Craig's surgical
gloves business.

But investigators weren't sure.

-They brought a
forensic accountant,

which I'd never been
involved with before.

And he uh, very thoroughly
and systematically went

through every bill
that Rabinowitz had.

NARRATOR: Ric Zayas is an
expert at finding the real cost

or value in accounting records
that have been written in a way

to hide their true meaning.

RICARDO ZAYAS: He was
describing importing containers

of these latex
gloves from overseas,

that the cost of a container
would be $20,000 or $22,000

per container, that he was
then going to be able to sell

those containers for
twice that amount.

That was the pitch.

Sounds too good to be true.

NARRATOR: It was
too good to be true.

Zayas discovered that Craig's
latex glove distribution

company had never bought
or sold a single glove.

The only money coming
into the company

was funds from investors,
Craig's family and friends whom

he was scamming with a
Ponzi or pyramid scheme.

-So the money from
investor two was now

going back repay
investor one, and just

keeping that cycle running.

NARRATOR: And Zayas learned
that Craig paid no office

or warehouse rent
anywhere in Philadelphia.

The closest thing
Craig had to an office

was his seat at
Delilah's strip club.

JIM NOLAN: When his
family, when his wife, when

his friends, when his in-laws
thought he was out making sales

calls for his latex glove
business, at least one, two,

three days a week, Craig
Rabinowitz was in dark,

air conditioned strip
club in a back room,

getting couch dances
and lap dances

by a 24-year-old stripper.

NARRATOR: Zayas
estimated Craig was

in debt to the tune of $800,000.

He owed most of it
to his shareholders,

who had invested in his
non-existent business,

and who wanted their money back
at some point with a profit.

Apparently, not even Stephanie
knew what was going on.

-Of all the people
that Craig conned,

quite clearly uh, he-- he
conned Stephanie the most.

NARRATOR: And the
forensic accounting

identified a possible
motive for m*rder.

On the In side of the
handwritten ledger,

were amounts that corresponded
to the life insurance policies

on Stephanie, including
$1.5 million worth,

which Craig had just purchased.

The Out side of the
ledger listed the amount

owed to each of
Craig's investors.

He made small, token
payments to pacify them,

and through a series of
financial calculations,

Zayas was able to tell
when they were made.

-They were only accurate
for a limited period of time

during the middle
part of April of 1997,

leading to an inference that the
document was prepared about two

weeks before Stephanie
Rabinowitz was m*rder*d.

JIM NOLAN: Craig
Rabinowitz, it was

very apparent to the
investigators at that time,

had literally done an
accounting of the value

of k*lling his wife.

NARRATOR: The insurance payout
not only would have eliminated

Craig's debt, but
also allowed him

to continue his extravagant
relationship with Summer,

and still not have
to work for a living.

All of this showed motive, but
if the medical examiner didn't

rule Stephanie's
death a homicide,

it was salacious,
but little else.

After Stephanie
Rabinowitz's death,

her family wanted a quick
burial, in accordance

with their religious customs.

But it was Dr. Ian Hood
who overruled that request,

in order to perform
a full autopsy.

And almost immediately, that
decision paid big dividends.

The first clue was the food
found in Stephanie's stomach.

IAN HOOD: We know she very
recently ingested a meal.

In this case, shrimp and bean
sprouts were quite clearly

seen with very little digestion
having occurred in the stomach

contents.

So she obviously died
probably within an hour or two

of ingesting that meal.

NARRATOR: That meant Stephanie
died around 10:30 PM.

But Craig didn't call


Dr. Hood also
discovered small bruises

on Stephanie's right
elbow and knee.

And he saw tiny red marks on her
forehead and around her eyes.

These petechial hemorrhages form
when tiny blood vessels burst

because the blood
flow is constricted.

Dr. Hood then examined and
dissected the neck muscles.

IAN HOOD: She had some more
subtle bruises and abrasions,

very hard to see, on her neck,
where there'd been clearly

as I found out from looking
at beneath the skin,

hard gripping of the upper neck.

NARRATOR: Toxicology tests
showed Stephanie had taken

a higher than normal dose of a
prescription sleep medication.

A check of local
pharmacies revealed

the drug had been prescribed
for Craig, not Stephanie.

Dr. Hood concluded
that Stephanie

had been drugged, and
then strangled to death.

Stephanie was finally laid
to rest in her family plot.

Immediately after
the burial, police

brought Craig Rabinowitz
in for questioning.

During the interview,
Craig told the same story

as he did on the night
of Stephanie's death--

that he had been watching
a hockey game on TV

when Stephanie went
in to take a bath,

and no one else had
been in the house.

That's when police revealed the
evidence that proved Stephanie

was dead for two hours
before he called 911,

and that the autopsy proved
she had been strangled.

Prosecutors concluded
that the motive was money.

BRUCE CASTOR: He had dug
himself into this deep hole

financially.

Now part of it is lavishing
money on the stripper.

But that he needed to have that
cash so that he could get out

of debt, because clearly he
could have divorced his wife,

and run off with the stripper
if she would have had him.

But I don't think
she'd have him if she

found out that he was broke.

NARRATOR: Craig had
stretched his business

scam as far as it could go.

His investors wanted
their money back,

and were putting
pressure on him.

BRUCE CASTOR: We had evidence
in the case that indicated

the they were expecting
to get their money

at the end of April.

Well the m*rder was in
the last week in April.

NARRATOR: And despite
Craig's denials,

his credit card receipts
told investigators

that he was visiting local
hotels, possibly with Summer.

-On some of those
receipts, there

was room service for two people.

So we assumed that he
was going there with her.

NARRATOR: Prosecutors believe
Craig set his plan in motion

after they returned home from
dinner in the Thai restaurant.

Before going to bed, Craig
spiked Stephanie's drink

with his prescription
sleep medication,

more than enough
to knock her out.

He carried Stephanie
upstairs, removed her clothes,

and placed her in the
bathtub to drown her.

But the bath water revived her.

Her bruised elbows and knees
showed Stephanie struggled,

but she had no chance.

The forensic evidence shows he
gripped her around the neck,

and held her under water.

Frightened by what
he had done, Craig

waited two hours to call 911.

-The gamble that Craig
Rabinowitz engaged in

was that we would not
conduct an autopsy.

JIM NOLAN: I think
the autopsy decision

was a very critical decision.

I think because when
it first came across,

the outward
appearances of it was

that a horrible accident
had taken place.

There were
sensitivities, I think,

in trying to be sensitive
to the family's wishes

to bury Stephanie
under Jewish custom,

and to bury her within
a day of her death.

NARRATOR: But the autopsy found
the petechial hemorrhages,

the neck bruising,
and the two hour delay

between her death
and the 911 call.

The forensic accounting
uncovered the motive.

When he was charged with
first degree m*rder,

Craig Rabinowitz
pleaded not guilty.

But on his first day in court,
he had a change of heart.

He said his wife appeared
to him in a dream

and convinced him
to end the trial

and confess to what he had done.

IAN HOOD: I think that's
complete nonsense.

I think he plead guilty
for selfish reasons.

He knew that we would spend
several weeks just completely

annihilating his character
in front of the whole world,

including his mother
and friends and whatnot.

JIM NOLAN: Craig Rabinowitz,
if this proved anything,

was a selfish,
self-absorbed, weak person.

And I think the prosecutor
saw his plea not just

as a heartfelt act of contrition
to help the families, but as

a self-serving, cowardly act,
that allowed him to avoid truly

confronting and articulating
in public the detail

and the exact nature
of he had done.

NARRATOR: Craig Rabinowitz was
sentenced to life in prison

without the
possibility of parole.

MITCHELL BACH: I had no doubt
that this would work out,

and Craig would be convicted.

What this was doing
to Stephanie's family

had a much more
immediate impact on me.

And I think they
really needed closure.

They needed a full understanding
of what had occurred.

And to me, that's what
the forensic evidence did.