14x16 - Gone Ballistic

[bunniefuu]

Up next, a
real-estate developer lives in

fear for his life.

Somebody wanted this guy dead.

I was scared for him.

I was very scared for him.

On a spring
afternoon, his worst fears come

true.

A computer search exposes some
dark secrets.

Someone was researching death.

But it's a


unlock the case.

Are you kidding?

You found a b*llet that had been
fired in 1989?

In western
Colorado, a successful

land-developer, Alan helmick,
and his wife, Miriam, were going

through difficult times.

Professionally, Alan's
real-estate ventures weren't

what they once were.

On a personal level, someone had
recently tried to take Alan's

life.

While Alan is waiting for
Miriam, he noticed smoke coming

out the back end of his car.

It was right in the middle of
a parking lot in broad daylight.

Apparently, someone
had placed a lit fuse in the gas

t*nk.

Fortunately, Alan saw the smoke
and got out in time.

For whatever reason, the
conditions weren't right for an

expl*si*n.

The car did not explode.

Unfortunately, the
parking lot had no surveillance

cameras, so it was impossible to
tell who had planted the device.

Cameras, so it was impossible to
tell who had planted the device.

I had the sense, and I think
the investigators had the sense,

that this was gonna be a
drawn-out deal.

Did a business deal go bad?

There was some sales of some
properties that involved various

people.

Were one of those people angry,
and took it out on Alan in a

different way, maybe because
they lost money?

Six weeks later,
Alan missed a scheduled lunch

date with his wife.

When Miriam drove home, she
found him on the floor of his

office.

When police and

paramedics arrive, they
pronounced Alan helmick dead at

the scene.

He'd been sh*t once in the back
of his head.

A shell casing from a

.25-caliber handgun was next to
the body.

su1c1de was immediately
eliminated.

No w*apon present, and the
location of where the injury was

was not feasible to be su1c1de.

Alan's son-in-law
learned of the m*rder when he

arrived at the scene.

I knew it!

It was terrible for all of us.

It was... It was beyond terrible.

It's terrible for someone to get
sh*t, because this is a person

that people loved and respected,
and he loved his family, and he

tried to make his life better,
and he loved people around him.

At first, it looked
like robbery was a possible

motive.

Several drawers were pulled
out, and the jewelry box was

empty, but there was no forced
entry, so that theory was

quickly ruled out.

It was not consistent with
other burglary cases that I have

worked.

The rest of the house was not
ransacked, as you would expect

to find in most of the burglary
cases that we've worked.

Since
Miriam helmick found the body,

she was automatically considered
a suspect, but she willingly

agreed to take a g*nsh*t-residue
test.

Anyone who fires a g*n usually
comes into contact with the

gases discharged when the b*llet
is fired.

Detectives swabbed Miriam's
hands, arms, and face, but no

g*nsh*t residue was detected.

Investigators now wondered who
wanted Alan helmick dead, and

why.

Alan and
Miriam helmick had been married

for about two years.

It was the second marriage for
both.

Alan and Miriam were known as
being inseparable.

Social friends of theirs said
they were always together.

They were like two peas in a
pod.

Miriam was
convinced that Alan's m*rder and

the attempted car-bombing six
weeks earlier were both related.

A week after Alan's funeral,
Miriam found a greeting card

under her front doormat.

It was addressed to "the greving
widow."

She opened the card, and it
read, "insanity is doing the

same thing over and over again
and expecting a different

result.

Alan was first.

Your next!

Run run run."

Miriam essentially collapses,
physically collapses.

Many words in the
message were misspelled,

including Alan's name.

There was no postmark on the
envelope, which meant it had

been hand-delivered.

Miriam is frantic about this.

She is convinced that the k*ller
is now out to get her.

The simple block
lettering made handwriting

analysis impossible.

There were no fingerprints on
the envelope or the letter.

The envelope wasn't sealed, so
there was no saliva on the

envelope flap, and no DNA to
recover.

And the bar code on the back of
the card was missing.

It had been cut out, as if
somebody knew we might want to

try to trace that greeting card
and find out where it came from.

Investigators
contacted the company that made

the card and learned it was sold
in three different stores in the

area.

The most recent sale happened
just four days before the card

was delivered.

It was a cash purchase at a
store 13 miles from the

helmicks' house.

Detectives asked to see the
store's surveillance tapes.

Lo and behold, who's
purchasing the greeting card?

It's Miriam helmick.

Based on her haircut, her
glasses, the way she walked, her

body shape, there's no doubt in
our mind that it was

Miriam helmick.

Miriam was
confronted with the surveillance

image.

She did admit to placing the
card at her house.

Her explanation was, to get law
enforcement to re-focus on the

investigation and be more
active.

Now suspicious
investigators searched Miriam

and Alan's computer hard drives
for possible clues.

They had two distinct
computers, side by side.

Alan used one, Miriam used one.

People tend to be very
intimate with their computers.

They will ask it questions
through Google that they would

not ask another human being.

And investigators
soon learned that Miriam had

been searching the Internet for
all sorts of interesting

information, especially about
the prescription dr*gs Alan had

been taking.

I recovered approximately 180
online medical searches for

things such as "Viagra
overdose," "Ambien overdose,"

"lisinopril overdose," a
combination of those three dr*gs

mixed together, painkilling
overdoses.

I think she was looking at
various ways to k*ll Alan.

Investigators also
learned Miriam would benefit

handsomely as a result of Alan's
death.

Alan's real-estate holdings were
worth millions.

Yes, the oldest motive in the
world.

There was only one
problem... investigators had no

proof Miriam sh*t and k*lled her
husband.

Investigators now
believed that Alan helmick might

have been m*rder*d not by an
angry business associate but by

his second wife, Miriam.

When police checked her
background, they discovered

something suspicious.

Six years earlier, Miriam's
first husband, Jack giles, sh*t

himself to death while he was
sleeping next to her.

Anytime you hear that a woman
has more than one husband die of

a g*nsh*t wound to the head, you
get concerned.

And Colorado
investigators soon discovered

something odd about this
su1c1de.

For one thing, it was Miriam's
half-brother, a local policeman,

who was first on the scene, and
declared the death a su1c1de...

This despite the fact Jack giles
apparently k*lled himself with

his right hand.

Jack couldn't do anything
with his right hand.

He was a complete lefty, and
yet he would choose to sh**t

himself, k*ll himself with his
off hand, his right hand.

That didn't make sense to us.

Also strange was
Miriam's explanation as to why

Jack committed su1c1de.

She said, yes, he was very
depressed, because of her

daughter, Amy, who had
supposedly overdosed.

Miriam changed that story when
she told it to me, quite a few

times.

It was overdose once, and one
time it was some sort of

physical...

Ailment.

Records showed
Miriam was the beneficiary of

Jack giles' $100,000
life-insurance policy.

She apparently gets some
insurance settlement, and very

quickly is back living the life.

While trying to
solve the m*rder of Miriam's

second husband, Alan helmick,
investigators found a series of

checks totaling $40,000 made out
to Miriam.

The checks were signed by Alan.

But now police weren't so sure.

We believe there were a lot
more checks that she probably

forged, but we tried to limit
them to the checks that we

thought we had the best evidence
on.

Forensic document
examiners determined 10 checks

were forgeries, although it was
impossible to say conclusively

that Miriam was the forger.

Police now believed that the
attempted bombing of Alan's car

was Miriam's work.

She was conveniently away from
the car inside the store when

Alan found the lighted wick
sticking out of his gas t*nk.

To investigators, it reminded
them of the car-bombing scene in

the hit film
"no country for old men."

The villain in that
particular movie blows up a car

using a homemade wick, and we
wondered if Alan and Miriam had

actually seen that movie.

We checked their cable-billing
statements, and, sure enough,

they had rented that movie four
days before this attempted car

fire in delta, Colorado.

Police had a wealth
of circumstantial evidence...

The surveillance image in the
card store, the check forgeries,

the attempted car bombing, and
the computer searches.

There were so many
components, and if you look at

the totality of all the
components, it's very clear what

happened in this case.

The only thing they
didn't have was the m*rder

w*apon, a .25-caliber handgun.

Alan's daughter told police her
father did own a .25-caliber g*n

that was a family heirloom.

My little sister christie
recalled seeing the g*n that

they believed was used in the
m*rder in my father's dresser

drawer under the socks.

She was putting away laundry for
him.

That g*n was now
missing from the home's

inventory.

It would have pointed the
finger at Miriam helmick, the

person who would have had access
to it, and easy access to it.

The gift that kept on giving.

Every time you thought you knew
everything, something else would

come up with her.

And investigators
learned something more.


had been fired in a domestic

dispute involving Wendy's
grandparents.

My grandfather went a little
crazy and tried to sh**t my

grandmother in their front lawn
one day.

A neighbor saw what
was happening and intervened.

He jumped on my grandfather,
and the g*n went off.

Turns out it went into the lawn.

That's where this history from
this g*n comes from.

The neighbor who
intervened in the sh**ting

incident 20 years earlier was
still alive, and remembered it

vividly.

The neighbor did tell the
police where he believed it had

entered the lawn.

With the slimmest
of hopes, forensic analysts

searched for the b*llet that had
been buried for almost 20 years.

We went out there with metal

detectors and, after some time,
we were able to locate the

b*llet.

Are you kidding?

You found a b*llet that had been
fired in 1989?

Amazing.

We don't get those sorts of
breaks.

Could the b*llet
from the 1989 sh**ting tie

Miriam to the g*n that k*lled
her husband?

Family members told
police that Alan helmick owned a


now missing.

The thing that Alan's
daughter remembered about this

g*n was that it was smallish and
that it had a white handle.

A b*llet from that
w*apon was fired into the ground


dispute.

Incredibly, with the help of an
eyewitness and metal detectors,

investigators found that b*llet.

Unfortunately, after two decades
in the ground, it had taken a

b*ating.

The b*llet was badly corroded
and weathered, and it bore marks

that are consistent with damage
caused by striking sand or small

stone particles.

The b*llet that
k*lled Alan helmick was also

damaged as a result of impact,
but the lands and grooves from

both b*ll*ts were still visible.

Investigators compared those
markings to see if both b*ll*ts

came from the same w*apon.

I was able to determine that
the b*llet recovered from the

yard corresponded with the
b*llet from the victim in a

number of land and groove
impressions and their widths.

I was able to determine, also,
that the fired b*llet from the

yard was a right-hand twist.

My result was that the two
b*ll*ts could have been fired by

the same firearm.

The ballistics,
along with the circumstantial

evidence, was more than enough
to charge Miriam helmick with

m*rder.

Prosecutors believe Miriam was
systematically stealing money

from Alan's business accounts,
and that, at some point, Alan

found out about it.

Thinking their relationship was
soon to end, prosecutors believe

Miriam tried to k*ll Alan, first
by giving him an overdose of his

prescription medicines.

When that didn't work,
prosecutors believe Miriam

placed a lighted wick in the gas
t*nk of the car while Alan

waited for her in a
shopping-center parking lot.

Fortunately, the attempt failed
miserably.

But prosecutors believe Miriam
knew about the family-heirloom

.25-caliber p*stol Alan kept in
his sock drawer.

And when the couple was alone,
Miriam waited until Alan was in

his office, walked up behind
him, and fired a single sh*t.

She showered, changed her
clothes, and drove to the

Chinese restaurant in order to
set up her alibi.

She left a message on Alan's
voice-mail asking where he was.

No one knows where she disposed
of the m*rder w*apon and her

clothes, but, presumably, she
did so on her way to or from the

Chinese restaurant.

When Miriam returned home, she
called 911 saying she had just

found Alan's body in a pool of
blood.

After Alan's funeral, Miriam
purchased the greeting card and

used it to make it appear that
she, too, was a potential

target.

She didn't realize the store's
surveillance camera would

capture the purchase.

Oh, it was clear as day Miriam.

She was wearing some of the same
clothes that she'd worn in the

interview when she was
interviewed by law enforcement.

During her trial,
Miriam took the stand in her own

defense.

Trial-watchers said her
performance did more harm than

good.

I didn't know what happened
to him.

Mm-hmm.

And I, um, held his hand for
a few minutes and tried to make

some sense of it all.

I don't get many
opportunities like that, and

that is something that will stay
with me for some time, because I

had to call her, more or less, a
k*ller, in front of the jury,

and I wasn't gonna b*at around
the bushes with that.

I was gonna let the jury know
that I didn't buy into her

crying act.

In speaking with the jury,
when I asked, "what was your

impression of her," about six
people answered together and

said, "liar."

We, the jury, find the
defendant, Miriam helmick,

guilty of first-degree m*rder.

Miriam helmick was
sentenced to life in prison plus



Our father is gone, but we
are gonna move forward, and we

are gonna have a fulfilling
life.

And, um...

You, Miriam, got what you
deserved.

He was looking for love.

He thought he found it.

He found someone that was after
his money, and it cost him his

life.

All the unique twists that
this case took will be one that

will be etched in my memory.

The greeting card stands out,
the b*llet from 1989, the

likelihood of us finding that
one b*llet that allows us to

compare it to that one g*n that
we can't find... the work that

was done on that, amazing.