02x03 - A Fatal Attraction

[bunniefuu]

[water flowing]

[tense music playing]

[dramatic sting]

[man speaking]

[woman speaking]

[woman speaking]

It was just a matter of time
before someone really got hurt.

[woman speaking]

[audio glitching]

[music intensifies, fades]

[dispatcher speaking]

[caller speaking]

[dispatcher] Yes.

I'm sure that she was coming for me next.

[music intensifies]

[audio glitching]

[music ends]

[mellow music playing]

[woman] In 2016, I was living in Florida.

[bicycle bell rings]

My daughter and I were living together
near the beach.

I was enjoying my job, hanging out
with some friends occasionally,

spending a lot of time with family.

Life was good.

I was happy, actually, being single.

Not really dating, maybe meeting
a few people from time to time.

[keyboard clacking]

One day, I was on Facebook.

And I was in a few groups, singles groups.

And I came across a lady
by the name of Joyce.

She had a nice smile.

And I liked her picture.

Suddenly, I got a private message.

And it happened to be Joyce.

We exchanged phone numbers,

and we started talking on the phone
for a while.

We kind of bonded
over the similarities in our professions.

I was a home health care aide at the time.

And I found out that
she was a registered nurse.

We talked, and we just really enjoyed
each other's conversations,

and we decided after about a month

that we would really like
to meet each other in person.

Joyce was living in the Atlanta area
at the time.

She said, "Hey, why don't you
come on up to Atlanta?"

"I'll show you around."

I was a little bit nervous,
but also excited.

That first weekend that
Joyce and I spent together,

we were staying at the Omni Hotel
in downtown Atlanta

and just learned a lot more
about each other.

She had told me that
she was legally married.

However, things were rocky
and complicated,

and she and her wife were separated.

Joyce painted this beautiful picture
for me.

She was very attractive.
She dressed very nicely.

And when we would go out for dinner,

she would pull out stacks of cash
out of her pocket

and tell me I could have
whatever I wanted to eat or drink.

Joyce also had told me that
she owned a hydrocolonic clinic

that brought in quite a bit of money.

So that was pretty impressive to me.

She seemed to be very caring
and very generous.

And she had everything
that I was hoping for.

When it was time for me to go back home,

we didn't really want to part ways.

We really wanted to continue
to spend more time together.

After I was dating Joyce
for about two months,

she drove down to Florida
to my home to visit me.

[crickets chirping]

And we began talking about exes,
as you do sometimes in relationships.

And Joyce proceeded to tell me that
a previous girlfriend had gone missing.

She wasn't sure what happened to her.

She had begun to cry.

And she cried for just a minute,

and then she seemed to get happy again

and didn't talk about it anymore that day.

I didn't really think much about it.

But once Joyce went home,

I thought it seemed a little strange.

[crickets chirping]

[dramatic sting]

[Katie] A couple of months later,

I went to visit her in Conyers, Georgia,

which is where Joyce was living.

She insisted that I stay in a hotel

because she had family
staying in her home.

And I was okay with it.

[bell dings]

I was just happy to see her again.

During that visit,
Joyce seemed a little more subdued.

So I asked her if she was okay,

and she said she just had a lot
weighing on her mind.

She couldn't stop thinking about
the girlfriend before her wife

that had gone missing.

I was thinking,
"Well, maybe this just happened recently."

She said,
"Well, she went missing in 2011."

That had been five years.

She said that the police detectives
were contacting her

and that they thought that
maybe she had some information

as to what happened.

I asked her if she knew what happened,

and she was very adamant that

she just disappeared
and never heard from her again.

By this time, Joyce and I had been dating
for about six months,

and she had brought up
this missing girlfriend about four times.

[tense music playing]

The more I listened, I finally learned

that missing ex-girlfriend's name
was Shawndell.

When I returned home, I thought,
"I'm going to find out what's going on."

It just kind of seemed not normal
in my eyes.

New at 11, a family is desperate
for answers after a Lithonian woman

disappeared with no explanation
nearly five months ago.

[Katie] I had seen several news stories
that were posted online

about the missing case.

[man] We believe in,
that, you know, somebody

knew something and…
wanted this lady missing.

[Katie] But the one
that really affected me the most

was the one where
they interviewed Shawndell's mother.

[crying] I'm just waiting and hoping
and praying.

[reporter] This is how Badicea McLeod
tells me she spends some days.

Looking out the window,
hoping for a sign of her daughter,



No sign. No call. No trace.

[Katie] Me being a mother myself,

I could never imagine if my daughter
was missing and there were no answers.

She would never walk away from her family.

[dramatic sting]

[birds chirping and twittering]

[gentle music playing]

[man] When the Shawndell McLeod case
came to me in 2011,

I had been with Special Victims
and Domestic Violence Unit

of DeKalb County Police Department
for roughly 11 years.

Well, after receiving the case,
I went to see the victim's mother.

She said the last time
she spoke to her daughter was

the day before she went missing.

They was a tight-knit family.

A day doesn't go by that
she don't speak to her daughter.

I knew that this wasn't
just an average missing person case.

This wasn't a case that
somebody actually got up

and needed a break from their family
and walked away.

This was something more serious than that.

[music ends]

On the day Shawndell went missing,
Sunday, September 25th, 2011,

she was supposed to report to work

at a nursing home facility
where she was a cook.

It was her responsibility
to open the kitchen.

She never made it to work that morning.

[tense music playing]

When Shawndell's co-worker arrived
a few hours later,

she found the back door slightly ajar,

and all the lights
in the kitchen were off.

[door squeaking]

She was very scared at that point
and went to the management to report

that Shawndell hadn't made it to work
and the back door was open.

Shawndell is not someone who misses work.

She was a very dedicated
and devoted employee.

And when they weren't able to get her
on the phone, they were very concerned.

[tense percussive music playing]

Later that evening,

Shawndell didn't show up
to a family dinner at her mother's house.

So Shawndell's mother contacted
the police.

When detectives started working the case,

they immediately tried to determine
if there was any activity

that would indicate that
Shawndell was alive

and maybe had gone off on her own.

They looked at Shawndell's bank account,
her credit cards, her telephone records.

Nothing was found.

[Detective Guest] I learned
while speaking to Miss McLeod

that her daughter was involved
with a Joyce Pelzer.

[Katie] After I learned more
about Shawndell,

-I had Googled Joyce's name.
-[keyboard clacking]

A news story popped up that immediately
listed her as a person of interest.

I was taken aback.

I wasn't quite sure
what it was that I was dealing with.

Should I cut off contact?

Is she a terrible person?

[music intensifies, fades]

But maybe what I'm reading isn't true.

And at this point,
I had fallen in love with her

and wanted to give her
the benefit of the doubt.

Joyce told me that
Shawndell was the type of person

that wanted a lot of nice things.

And so she and Shawndell
bought a house together.

Joyce told me that
Shawndell had good credit,

but that Joyce had all the money,

and so they decided that
Shawndell would get the loan in her name,

but Joyce would pay for everything.

According to Joyce,
she put all the money down on the house.

She paid to have the house remodeled,

new floors,
new lighting fixtures, new kitchen.

Things seemed to be going well.

But a short time later, Shawndell just
did not want to be with Joyce anymore.

Shawndell wanted Joyce to leave.

[suspenseful music playing]

[Shannon] Joyce was furious
that Shawndell broke up with her,

that she had kicked her out of the home.

In July, just mere months before
Shawndell went missing,

Joyce was talking
to some of their mutual friends

and seemed obsessed.

Like, she couldn't leave it alone.

She pleaded with their mutual friends
to get Shawndell to talk to her

and made Shawndell feel
very uncomfortable.

Joyce's behavior became really concerning.

To the point where Shawndell got a g*n.

She was telling people
that if anything happened to her,

that it was Joyce.

Shawndell reported to the police
that Joyce had broken into the home

that they used to live in together
and threatened to k*ll her.

Shawndell had to get
a temporary protective order

blocking Joyce Pelzer
from having any contact with Shawndell.

From what Joyce told me,
when Shawndell was at work one day,

Joyce decided to go
and take everything out of the house

and just clean her out.

[Shannon] She had taken everything
down to the light fixtures,

the light plate covers.

She took Shawndell's beloved cookbook
collection and threw it in the trash.

This was someone doing
anything they could to cause pain.

[music fades]

[Detective Guest] After talking
to Shawndell's mother,

it was plain to me that
this was a violent relationship.

So I reached out to Miss Pelzer.

I explained to her that
I need to speak to her.

It's about Shawndell missing.

She said she hadn't seen Shawndell
since they broke up.

And she said she had moved out of the home
that her and Shawndell shared

and had moved in with Miss Rosalyn Lewis.

[intriguing music playing]

[Shannon] Rosalyn Lewis was
a relationship that Joyce had

during the course
of Shawndell and Joyce's relationship.

[Detective Guest] But Joyce was sleeping
with both of them.

Shawndell's mother was telling me this.

Shawndell knew that
Joyce was out there doing something,

and she just wanted out
of the relationship.

After speaking to Miss Pelzer
on the phone,

her and Rosalyn Lewis came into my office.

[dramatic sting]

[pensive music playing]

[Detective Guest]
I interviewed Joyce first.

[on tape] How do
you know Miss McLeod?

[Joyce] We dated for about
five and a half, six years.

When was the last time you seen her?

About a couple of weeks ago.

She had called me because she wanted
some stuff that I have in the storage.

[Detective Guest] Hmm.

-How was the conversation?
-[Joyce] It was fine.

We hugged, chatted a little while.
She visited with the dogs.

That was that.

[Detective Guest] What broke y'all up?

Uh, she just said
it wasn't working anymore,

and she wanted something different.
I wanted something different.

[Detective Guest] I didn't really see
a caring person

that was in a relationship with somebody
for that length of time,

and when I told them they was missing,
it was just, like, it didn't faze her.

She said, "Well, she's not missing."

She told me she was going back to
her country. She was tired of her family.

And after interviewing the family,
I kind of figured that wasn't true.

I explained to her that I need to know
the timeline of everything that happened

when Miss McLeod went missing
September 25th, 2011.

Okay. Let's go with the 25th.

That's going to be Sunday.
What was yous doing?

We woke up at, like, about 10-something.

[Detective Guest]
What did you do after that?

[Joyce] Watched TV.

-Did you go out any time?
-Mm-mm.

[Joyce clicks tongue] Nope.

After getting her side of the story,
I spoke to Miss Lewis.

Ros said they was together all day.

They didn't leave the house.

[dramatic sting]

During this investigation,
we got a search warrant

on Miss Pelzer's cell phone.

We can't say for sure where Joyce was
when Shawndell went missing.

But what we can say
from her telephone records

is that she was out of her home network,

and that is in direct contradiction
to what Joyce and Rosalyn told the police.

So, I locked her up for false statement.

At this point,
Joyce was my main person of interest.

During this time,
I was monitoring her jail calls

to see if I can just pick up
anything on this case.

My thing was,
eventually, she's going to talk.

But the lady was good. She said nothing.

So, I had to let Miss Pelzer out
of the jail.

Joyce told me that
the police asked to see her computer.

But they found nothing.
And she kind of laughed and said,

"Of course they didn't
because I have nothing to do with this."

[Detective Guest] All of the evidence that
we gathered points right back to Joyce.

But nobody's telling us how this lady
went missing or where she's at.

[dramatic sting]

I worked this case strong for over a year,

but I wasn't getting enough leads on it.

[Shannon] It's always challenging
when you sort of feel in your gut that

something has happened,
but you can't prove it.

There wasn't a physical struggle
at her house.

There wasn't a m*rder weapon.

There wasn't any evidence anywhere else
that anything had happened to Shawndell.

I stayed in contact
with Shawndell's mother.

I just wanted to bring
some kind of closure to this family.

I wasn't gonna stop looking for this girl.

[dramatic sting]

[Katie] The more times that
Joyce and I got together,

the more I thought about
Shawndell going missing.

I had never known anybody that had been
involved in a situation like this.

But the more that
she talked about Shawndell,

she seemed to become more agitated,
more defensive.

And a couple of times

when I decided to ask Joyce
for a little bit more information,

she would reply by saying,
"What are you, the cops?"

I just kind of let it go.

I didn't want to cause any problems.

We still had a good time.

She was very loving,
as long as I went along with

whatever it was that she wanted to do.

[dramatic sting]

[Katie] The next time
that I went to visit her,

I was sitting at her dining room table
with her and a couple of family members.

She and one of the family members
got into a heated discussion.

And the family member stood up
and looked at me

to let me know that Joyce is a fraud
and a phony, and she uses people.

And told me that I needed to be careful

because Joyce was still involved
with her wife Rosalyn.

[pensive music playing]

Joyce had brought up Ros to me
on several occasions.

But she had said that she was separated.

When I asked her about the relationship,

she said,
"Think whatever you want, Katie."

I kind of got my answer
without really getting an answer.

I then began to wonder what else is there?

What else could she possibly lie about?

[woman] My first impression of Joyce was
I didn't like her.

[tense music playing]

Rosalyn used to always tell me,
"Errica, you know, give her a try."

"She's really nice.
I really like her. She's funny."

And I was like, "You're being gullible,
and you can't see it."

I don't know what's wrong with the woman,
but she's not everything.

Rosalyn to me is the big sister,
the friend, the confidante.

She was everything to me.

We have a huge family.

And everyone cared for Joyce,
and they welcomed her in.

So she was a part of our family.

They were together for a very long time
before they got married.

Rosalyn didn't share a lot with me

when it came to her relationship
with Joyce once they were married.

But I always told my sister,

"Keep your head on a swivel."

"And if anything go down,
even though I'm the little sister…"

[laughs] "…I'm still your sister,
you know?"

So then she started telling me
that Joyce was cheating.

And that's when I was like, whoa.

Joyce was lying about
where she was going,

who she was going out with.

Lies upon lies upon lies.

Ros was… She was hurt.

My sister went back because Joyce said,
"It will never happen again." You know?

She was very manipulative
and just lied about everything.

[music fades]

[Katie] After about a year
of Joyce and I seeing each other,

Joyce seemed to want to be in control
of everything that we were doing.

Where we would go to eat,

if I was going to travel to Georgia
to see her

or if she was going to come
and travel to see me.

[sinister music playing]

We would still do things together.

But Joyce's demeanor seemed to be
increasingly aggressive as time went on.

One day, I was visiting her
in Conyers at her home.

And she decided to take a shower.

[shower running]

She got into the shower.

And I let her know that
I was going to go to the store

and that I would be right back.

[faucet squeaks]

As I walked through the house…

Joyce came flying out of the shower,

grabbed me around my neck,
and told me that I was not going anywhere.

She then moved a little closer
to the kitchen counter

and picked up a knife
and held that against my neck.

[dramatic sting]

Inside, I was afraid.

But I never let her know
that I was afraid.

I just remained calm.

She said, "You're not going to leave me."

"You don't leave
until I tell you you can leave."

And she kept squeezing my neck
tighter and tighter.

And I said, "Can you just let me go,
and we can go to the store?"

And she finally let me go.
She put the knife down on the counter.

And then she turned around
and gave me a hug and started to laugh.

And she said, "You know I love you."

"You know I wouldn't do anything to you."

And she just proceeded about her day

and acted as though none of that
even ever happened.

It was as if I was looking at somebody
that I had never seen before.

From that point on,
I never showed Joyce any rejection

for fear of something happening to me.

One night…

[indistinct TV chatter]

…Joyce looked at me,

kind of worried.

[TV turns off]

And she said,
"Katie, I want to tell you something."

[ominous music playing]

"I k*lled Shawndell."

[music intensifies]

[audio glitching]

[music continues]

Then she proceeded to tell me
what had actually happened.

Shawndell had gone to work
early in the morning,

and it was still dark.

Joyce had hired a hit man
to take Shawndell

and hold her hostage for a couple of days.

They rented some heavy equipment
to dig a very large hole

somewhere out in the North Georgia woods
where nobody would ever go.

And then they took her
to the edge of this very large hole

and they tasered her,

which caused her
to fall down into this hole.

[body thuds]

And they covered up the hole with dirt

and left her there.

After she shared
this very devastating news with me,

she dried her eyes

and just got right back
to being happy again.

And I knew this girl was crazy.

I didn't think about calling the police.
I was completely overwhelmed.

And, at that point,
I was pretty frightened.

I wasn't sure
what she was capable of next.

I decided that I should probably
distance myself from Joyce

and cut off ties as quickly
and as smoothly as I could.

[music fades]

One day, I was out with some friends
near my home in Florida.

And I got a phone call from my mother

that there was a detective
trying to get in touch with me.

And she gave me the phone number
of a Detective Guest.

[Shannon] Even though the case went cold,
Detective Guest never gave up on it.

He researched and tracked Joyce's life.

Who she was seeing, where she was living.

And he kept tabs on her.

This is a case I've been pushing for,
like, seven, eight years.

[pensive music playing]

Finally, I discovered that Joyce had been
in a relationship with Katie Long.

I wanted to see if Joyce actually just
said anything to Katie about her past.

[Katie] Detective Guest let me know

that he was investigating
a missing persons case.

He wanted to know if I knew anything
about Shawndell going missing.

And I said yes.

So I met with Detective Guest
in August 2018.

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Katie speaking]

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Katie speaking]

[Detective Guest] Mm-hmm.

[Katie speaking]

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Katie speaking]

What Miss Long gave us
was a new beginning.

I believe Katie Long did not reach out
to the police

because she was scared of Miss Pelzer.

I told her to be careful.

You didn't leave Joyce Pelzer.
Joyce did not like rejection.

[interviewer] And what would happen
if you left Joyce Pelzer?

Mm… What happened to Shawndell McLeod.

[audio glitching]

[Katie] After my interview
with Detective Guest,

he asked me to keep in touch with Joyce
as much as I could

as long as I was comfortable
and felt safe to do so.

I had built a rapport with her,
where she did trust me

and felt comfortable
to share information with me.

I wanted Katie to record
her conversation with Miss Pelzer.

And she agreed to it.

I was actually happy to do so
because any little bit of information

might help to either solve a situation

or prevent something further
from happening.

[dramatic sting]

[phone vibrating]

[Katie] Joyce called me one late afternoon
and let me know

that she was going to take
a little road trip to New Orleans.

[tense music playing]

She said, "There's just something
I have to take care of,

and it's going to be taken care of."

I knew that Joyce was referring
to her estranged wife Rosalyn

because she had told me that
she had relocated to New Orleans.

[Errica] Ros had come to New Orleans
to take care of my dad.

At that time,
her and Joyce were already separated.

She'd already told her
she wanted a divorce.

In Rosalyn's and Joyce's marriage
and financial situation,

Rosalyn did hold down the fort.

Joyce was lying about her jobs,
lying about going to work,

not paying some of the bills.

So Rosalyn, she cut all the lights off.

She done stopped paying utilities.
Rosalyn took her name off the lease.

Joyce was calling billions
and billions of times,

telling her to come home,

she missed her wife, she's sorry.

But Rosalyn, she was fed up,
and she was done.

Up until that point,
Ros had never mentioned that

Joyce could be dangerous.

[music intensifies, fades]

[Katie] On that phone call,
Joyce started to tell me

about a little .25 handgun

that she had purchased
from a guy off the streets in Atlanta.

[unsettling music playing]

So I went and grabbed my old cell phone.

I put the phone call on speaker
and recorded with my other phone.

She seemed to be on a mission.

[Katie speaking]

[Joyce speaking]

[Katie speaking]

[Joyce speaking]

[music intensifies, fades]

[Detective Guest] In the tape,
Joyce is telling Katie

she's gonna lure Rosalyn back to Georgia,

get a hotel room, and when she pulls up,

get in the car with her
and just sh**t her.

She also says,

"I wanted to call Detective Guest
and tell him that Ros k*lled Shawndell."

So Joyce was going to set up Ros
to take the fall

for Shawndell McLeod's m*rder.

[Katie] When I was recording
the phone call,

I was becoming increasingly nervous
about something happening to Ros.

I knew that she was serious.

After I spoke with Joyce on the phone,

I thought that Ros should know
what Joyce's plans were.

So I contacted her through Facebook.

Being the other woman, I was thinking
maybe she would be angry with me.

But she, in fact,
was very willing to talk to me.

I told her that I thought that
Joyce was after her.

I said, "She's on her way there,
and she's looking for you."

Ros was very adamant about
going to the police station immediately.

[dramatic sting]

[indistinct chatter]

Okay.

[Rosalyn] My wife is here in town.

She threatened me a few weeks back.

Her… Well, I guess now
it's her ex-girlfriend,

because the woman
don't mess with her anymore,

called me and said that Joyce is in town,

and she says that she's going to k*ll you.

And when I pulled in my parents' driveway,
as I was backing up into the driveway,

I saw her start her car and come that way.

She had her head turned,
but I know what she looks like.

We had been together for 14 years,
so I definitely know what she looks like.

I'm thinking I should have called
the police a long f*cking time ago.

[disturbing music playing]

[Errica] The night that
Joyce drove down to New Orleans,

Joyce thought that
only Ros was at home with my dad.

But once she got there,
I had cousins that was also there.

And I think that's what spooked her
and scared her away.

[Rosalyn] Y'all need to find where she is
because I don't know what her plans are,

because she threatened to k*ll me.

[tense music playing]

[Rosalyn sniffles]

[exhales deeply]

[crying] I don't know what I could've done
to make her do this.

I've been good to this woman.

And for her to try to k*ll me now.

k*ll me, period.

I'm not understanding.

It's frightening to know that someone
who my sister brought into our life

could potentially want to harm her.

At that point for me,
that's when it got real.

I didn't know the extent
of how crazy Joyce was.

[music intensifies]

[dramatic sting]

[pensive music playing]

[Detective Guest] Katie called Rosalyn
and told her that

she probably needed to call
Detective Guest.

At this point, Ros is afraid for her life.

I drove all night getting to New Orleans.

When I got to town, I went to Ros's house.

I said, "Well, why?
Why does she want to k*ll you?"

I said, "What do you think?
Why does she want to k*ll you?"

Rosalyn Lewis was so fearful of Joyce,
she told me nothing.

She, uh… She told me nothing
about Shawndell McLeod's case,

uh, Joyce's involvement in that.

She… She said nothing.

I told Ros she needed to be careful.

'Cause she's gonna be
coming after you next.

[Errica] Rosalyn wanted a divorce
from Joyce.

She said, "I'm never going back.
She's lied to me too many times."

"She won't stop cheating."

"She's crazy."

But Joyce was not willing
to sign those papers.

Her whole thing was,
"Rosalyn, I'm going to do better."

"I will be a better wife.
I will be a better friend."

"I will be a better lover.
So let's give us another chance."

[Katie] Several months later,
Joyce called me,

and she was pretty upset.

I tried to get any other information
out of her that I could,

but she just wasn't doing
a whole lot of talking.

And she let me know
she was going to go back to her wife

and for me to never call her again.

[Errica] She didn't want Rosalyn to go.

Rosalyn was adamant.

She was like,
"I'm just gonna fly up there,

and I'm going to
make her sign these papers."

And I remember telling her,
"Rosalyn, are you crazy?"

"No, you're not going to go fly anywhere
where Joyce is to get her to sign papers."

"This girl can be crazy,
and you don't know what she would do."

No, absolutely not.

[inhales, exhales deeply]

[dramatic sting]

[intriguing music playing]

[dialing]

[line ringing]

[dispatcher speaking]

[caller speaking]

[dispatcher speaking]

[dramatic sting]

[sirens wailing]

[man] On December 10th, at about 10:35,

Conyers Police received a call
of a trouble unknown

at the Motel 6
located in the city of Conyers.

They said it was a stabbing.

[dramatic sting]

[suspenseful music playing]

When I arrived, the first responding
officer was already there.

[audio glitching]

[indistinct chatter]

[officer] She's bleeding profusely
from the abdomen.

[Clay] We was able to identify the female
as Rosalyn.

[officer] Ros, listen to me.

[Rosalyn groaning]

[officer] I need you to hold still, okay?

You're okay.

I need you to hold still, okay?

[Clay] Rosalyn is laying in the doorway.

Blood's on the door.
It's all over the room.

[officer] 598 radio,
we've got multiple stab wounds.

She's in and out of consciousness,
breathing pretty heavily at this time.

We knew we had a serious situation
that had happened,

and it didn't look very promising
for Rosalyn at the time.

[officer] Ros!

Who did this?

-[Rosalyn faintly] Joyce.
-[female officer] Who?

-[Rosalyn] Joyce.
-Joyce?

-[Rosalyn] Yeah.
-Okay. Do you know Joyce's last name?

[Rosalyn] Pelzer.

-[officer] Pelzer?
-[Rosalyn] Yes.

-[officer] Who is she to you?
-[faintly] My wife.

She's your wife?

-[Rosalyn mutters incoherently]
-Okay.

You're doing good.
Just hang tight for me, okay?

[dramatic sting]

[Clay] Once I learned that Ros
was stabbed by a female named Joyce,

who was her wife,

I then started assigning duties

for people to try to identify
who Joyce was.

[sirens wailing]

Meanwhile, EMS had arrived
and were attending to Rosalyn.

She was really fighting hard for her life.

She was definitely a fighter.

[indistinct chatter]

[suspenseful music playing]

[Clay] Once we were able to get Rosalyn
to the ambulance,

we could really investigate
the crime scene.

It was obvious it was a violent attack
inside that room.

We did observe a knife laying on the floor
that was covered in blood.

It was one of the worst crime scenes
I've been on.

Reviewing the video of the room,

you could tell by the movement
of the curtains

that there was an outright fight
inside the room.

It almost appeared at one point

that someone was trying to yell
through the window,

because a curtain held open for a moment
before it quickly closed back.

The door opens and Joyce exits the room,

and Rosalyn falls to the ground
inside the doorway.

I observed Joyce walking toward
her vehicle on the sidewalk

with no shoes on
and only was wearing socks.

She then got into a little trot
to her car,

where she got in the car and then exited
the parking lot at a high rate of speed.

[tires screeching]

Rosalyn had been stabbed 34 times
by Joyce.

She was transported to the hospital,

but unfortunately
she succumbed to her injuries.

[music fades]

I was home with some friends,
and I get a phone call

[somber music playing]

to find out that
my sister had been m*rder*d by Joyce.

The most horrific phone call
I've ever gotten.

It didn't register in my head that Joyce
could have stabbed my sister to death.

[poignant music playing]

I can't even scream

because I'm so numb, I'm so in disbelief.

This is a dream,
and someone is lying to me.

It wasn't a dream.

Joyce m*rder*d my sister in cold blood.

[music fades]

[Clay] About three hours
after the initial call to the hotel,

we were working a full-blown
m*rder investigation at this point.

What we had learned was, Joyce had
kind of lured Rosalyn to the hotel room.

Rosalyn went there,
what we feel was the intent,

to serve divorce papers on Joyce.

[pensive music playing]

[Errica] Could that have provoked Joyce
to stab my sister

as many times as she did?

I believe that rage came from somewhere,

and she unleashed it on my sister.

[dramatic sting]

[dramatic music playing]

[Clay] We have no idea
where Joyce may be headed,

but we needed to make sure
we could find her as fast as possible.

We obtained the phone number for Joyce,

and we contacted the phone company
and requested a ping on the phone

so we can determine the direction
that she may be traveling.

While we were waiting
to get the ping back from the phone,

we found out that she had a past
with a female identified as Katie Long.

When our ping returned
about two hours after the request,

the phone pings indicated to us that
Joyce was headed south toward Florida.

We learned that Katie Long
resided in Florida.

We were afraid that
her life may be in danger

because she knows
she had k*lled Shawndell.

[music fades]

[Katie] My phone starts to ring,
and it's Joyce.

I did not answer the call.

[tense music playing]

[Clay] We continued to get pings
on Joyce's phone.

Every ping we got,
she was getting closer to Florida.

She continued to call
approximately 25 times.

[police siren wailing]

[Clay] Georgia State Patrol saw
Joyce Pelzer's vehicle on I-75 south

and attempted
to initiate a traffic stop on her.

[sirens continue wailing]

She refuses to stop
and began to increase her speed.

Georgia State Patrol decided to initiate
a pit maneuver on the car.

[loud bang, crash]

[tires screeching]

When Georgia State Patrol
got Joyce's car immobilized

and they were approaching the vehicle,

Joyce raises a g*n and points it
toward the direction of the officers.

They begin to open fire on the vehicle…

[g*ns firing]

…striking Joyce one time in the neck.

At approximately 2:30 p.m.,
the calls stopped.

[siren wailing]

[Clay] Joyce did not die
from the g*nsh*t wound.

She was transported to a local hospital
for treatment of her injuries.

[Detective Guest] When she didn't die
from that incident,

it was like the lady had nine lives.

[Katie] On early Tuesday morning,
December 11th, 2018,

I got a phone call from Detective Guest.

And all he said was, "Ros is dead.
Joyce is in custody. I will be in touch."

I couldn't wrap my head around the fact
that she k*lled Ros.

I couldn't wrap my head around
the fact that

she could have been coming
to also k*ll me.

[dramatic sting]

[Clay] Once she was able to be released
from the hospital,

she was then transported
to Rockdale County Jail

for the charge of m*rder of Rosalyn.

[Detective Guest]
Now that Joyce is in jail,

and I had the opportunity
to interview her once again,

hopefully she would,
at this point, tell me

what exactly happened to Shawndell McLeod.

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Joyce speaking]

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Joyce speaking]

[Detective Guest] Mmm.

[Joyce speaking]

[Shannon] Joyce ends up telling the police

exactly what she said she was going to do
in the phone call to Katie Long.

She blamed Rosalyn, and she said that
she was just a bystander.

But no one believed it.

[Errica] The allegations that
Joyce have made toward my sister

is the most disrespectful, beyond evil.

And the reason why
you're blaming things on Rosalyn

is because she's not here
to defend herself.

Do I believe that Rosalyn had anything
to do with Shawndell's m*rder?

Absolutely not.

[Detective Guest speaking]

[Detective Guest] After we did a search
on Arabia Mountain,

we didn't find Shawndell's body there.

We found nothing.

But I felt I had enough evidence
to charge Joyce Pelzer

for the m*rder of, uh, Shawndell McLeod.

[dramatic sting]

[tense music playing]

[Shannon] Ultimately, Joyce Pelzer took
a plea offer out in Rockdale County

to the m*rder charges
involving Rosalyn Lewis.

[Errica] Went to the hearing
for her to be sentenced.

When Joyce walked out of the doors
into the courtroom,

she showed no signs of remorse.

When she was asked to say something,
she held her head down,

and she never answered.

You're sitting there in a courtroom
with people who adored Rosalyn,

and you don't have anything to say
to this family?

Not even a "I'm sorry."

[inhales sharply]

You should rot in jail
for the rest of your life.

[dramatic sting]

[mellow music playing]

[Shannon] After Joyce was sentenced,

Detective Guest came back to the DeKalb
County District Attorney's office

and asked us to take another look

at the suspected m*rder
of Shawndell McLeod.

Detective Guest pointed out to us

that we now had a third-party confession
from Katie Long.

I knew that we had a case
that we could present to a jury.

It was the state's theory
that Joyce was enraged about the breakup,

about losing the home,

and had decided to seek revenge.

We believe that
Shawndell was kidnapped from her work

and then held for some amount of time

before ultimately being taken
to the Arabia Mountain area,

where she was k*lled and buried.

No body was recovered,
but at this point, we have motive,

we have opportunity,

and we have a confession.

[dramatic sting]

[soft percussion music playing]

[Katie] In November 2023,
I attended Joyce's trial

and testified against her regarding
her confession in the m*rder of Shawndell.

I had not seen Joyce since 2018.

I was sitting in the stand watching her
walk across the courtroom floor…

[chains rattling]

…being escorted by two guards,

with chains around her ankles
and handcuffs on her arms.

And it was very chilling… for me,

very emotional to see her
in a completely different light

than the day that I had met her.

When I was on the stand
and answering questions,

I actually stopped in the middle
and broke down.

She never looked up from the table,
not once.

[dramatic sting]

[gentle music playing]

[Shannon] Shawndell's family
will never get her back,

and this verdict and the sentence
that Joyce will have to serve

doesn't change that.

But there is now some measure of justice.

[Detective Guest] This case is important
to me because I'm a father myself.

I have daughters.

And if one of my kids went missing,
God forbid,

I would want somebody to work it
the same way that I worked it.

No parent should have to lose a child
in the hands of somebody else

and not let it be investigated
all the way through.

[Katie] I feel very lucky
to be alive today.

I am extremely confident that
after Joyce carried out the m*rder of Ros,

I'm sure that she was coming for me next.

I am mostly back to my old self.
Happy, enjoying life.

I will be honest and say that

the situation with Joyce
still to this day affects my life.

I don't think it's something
that I will ever completely get over…

but I have learned to cope with it.

[music fades]

[dark percussive music playing]

[music ends]