>> it paid off. >> it paid off immediately. >> also tonight another l.a. mystery, another missing woman. >> he said, where's my mom? and i just instantly knew. i said, michael, call the police, i'm on my way. >> a loving mother. >> always there for me. >> a beloved friend. >> she was just so easy to like. >> vanishes. >> something was very, very wrong. >> was she murdered? was it for her money? >> how much money did she have in the bank? >> i think it was over seven figures. >> or was it something or someone else? >> it really threw him for a loop when he found out that my mom had met somebody else. >> police had a suspect and a case that was about to take an unbelievable turn. >> one of the most shocking things i've ever seen in a courtroom. >> i'm lester holt, and this is "dateline." tonight, two missing women, two heartbreaking mysteries. we start with "betrayal." here's josh mankiewicz. >> reporter: southern california's south bay. a singularly stunning strand of shoreline with familiar names like hermosa, redondo and manhattan. >> we call tithe sand box. no one thinks that this part of o los angeles exists, but it does. >> reporter: their seaside playground is lined with beachfront properties worth millions and nestled among these small beach towns is an oasis called el segundo. >> it's main street usa. >> a great place to raise kids. >> reporter: in el segundo and the south bay a decade ago, one of the rainmakers in the real estate business selling those beautiful homes in the sand box was the woman on this business card julia keller known as deede. >> she really just embraced everyone that came into her path. >> deede's best friends, mortgage executives cindy ertman and real estate sales partner linda doddero. she was good at her job. >> i loved working with deede. everybody did. >> she was so easy to like and wanted the best for everybody. her clients were loyal over the years. >> reporter: deede was loyal, too, not only to her clients but as a divorced mom, to her children, mike and julie. >> i remember my mom explaining to me when i was about 10 years old that, as you get older, we're probably not going to be as close our won't like me quite as much. and it never happened. if anything, we just got closer. >> reporter: but deede keller had a heart problem, not literally. it may have been a little too big. she loved without limits, and she simply hated to disappoint or let anyone down. she loved dogs so much she literally couldn't say no to another one. she was surrounded by them at home. even in her real estate ads. >> i would joke that as soon as i graduated college, that's when she started replacing us with dogs. she never stopped being a mom. >> reporter: and she never stopped sort of loving everybody, i guess? >> no, she never did. she was ready to be embraced and to embrace you whenever you wanted it. >> reporter: but there was one area of her life in which deede keller's honesty and embrace hadn't caught hold. your mom was so lucky and life was so easy in so many ways, she couldn't quite make the man in her life thing come out right sfr? >> she had a wonderful life, but no, i guess she hadn't found that person. >> reporter: she did have a long-term relationship but that ended sadly in 1997. soon after, she met someone new. he was a real estate client named irwin howard, a pilot and airline mechanic originally from bolivia. >> i remember deede telling me that she was not going to date anyone else unless they loved, treasured and adored her. and she did feel loved, treasured and i doored by irwin. he treated her like a queen. >> reporter: when irwin popped the question, deede said yes. >> surprise! >> reporter: at deede's bridal shower in march of 1998, irwin dutifully delivered his fiancee to the surprise party, but the smiles didn't last after the engagement was over and the marriage began. >> it wasn't more than six months after they were married and she just blurted out that she had married him on the rebound. >> reporter: and was having second thoughts? >> apparently so. >> it was very hard for her to think about ending it because of what it was going to do to him because she knew he loved her. >> reporter: so much, in fact that the marriage lasted another four years after that conversation. ultimately, their divorce was amicable and a year after the split, in the summer of 2004, deede seemed to be finding her footing once again. she'd begun dating a well-known south bay car salesman named bobby lowe. that new relationship was going so well that on the evening of thursday, july 8th, bobby lowe took deede out to dinner at this restaurant to meet his father. >> i talked to her before her date. >> reporter: any sign that she was nervous about anything? >> she was in a happy state when i talked to her. and we had made plans to hopefully get together the following night, and so i could get any update on the date. >> reporter: but that conversation never took place. >> i called her on friday, and she didn't call me back, which was not unusual for deede. i called her on saturday, and she didn't call me back. that was pretty typical. but by sunday i started getting concerned. >> reporter: concerned, too, was daughter julie. she talked of meeting her mom that same friday during a layover at l.a.x. as julie headed for cabo san lucas, mexico. >> i might have an appointment that morning, but if i don't, i'll come by, i'll text you, we'll have coffee. i didn't get a text. it was a little odd. i didn't think much of it. >> reporter: deede's son mike was beginning to worry. after he returned from a business trip to the san francisco area. >> when i called her cell phone, the voice mail was full. and that has never happened with my mom. and she prided herself on being responsive. >> reporter: so you go over to your mom's house? >> i went in the back gate. and instantly, it was clear that she had not been there for a while. >> reporter: what made that clear? >> the dog's water dish was bone dry. my mom would die of thirst before her dogs went without water. >> reporter: mike's first call was to cindy. >> and he said, cindy, where's my mom? and i just -- i instantly knew in that moment that something had happened. i just knew. and i just said, michael, call the police, i'm on my way. >> reporter: where was deede keller? >> not only was there no water left outside for deede's beloved dogs, but detectives noticed lots of other things wrong inside the house. her purse was there, but her wallet was missing. and this was a woman with money, lots of it. >> how much money did she have in the bank? >> i think it was over seven figures. >> who got that money in the event of her death? >> the beneficiaries were her two children. grab some tools. and bring it in on budget. we did good. great job. now what? more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot. this ryobi one+drill and impact driver combo kit, now just 99 bucks. [ agent smith ] i've found software that intrigues me. it appears it's an agent of good. ♪ [ agent smith ] ge software connects patients to nurses to the right machines while dramatically reducing waiting time. [ telephone ringing ] now a waiting room is just a room. [ static warbles ] there's a bonus in store... now a waiting room is just a room. ...at the petsmart double bonus sale. save and get more free! save $10 on all bayer® k9 advantix® ii and advantage® ii flea or tick 6-packs and save $2 on any bayer® expert care shampoo or conditioner, with purchase. at petsmart®. and those people are what i like to call... wrong. take metamucil. sure it helps keep you regular but it doesn't stop there. metamucil has psyllium, which helps lower cholesterol, promotes digestive health, and helps maintain healthy blood sugar levels. it can multi-multitask... look at it, it's doing over a million different things right now. metamucil. 3 amazing benefits, 1 super fiber. ♪ 1 super fiber. because what you dont know can hurt you.urance, what if you didn't know that it's smart to replace washing-machine hoses every five years? what if you didn't know that you might need extra coverage for more expensive items? and what if you didn't know that teen drivers are four times more likely to get into an accident? 'sup the more you know, the better you can plan for what's ahead. talk to farmers and get smarter about your insurance. ♪ we are farmers bum - pa - dum, bum - bum - bum -bum ♪ on a sun-splashed sunday in l.a.'s south bay, clouds were rolling in over one household. it was july 2004, el segundo real estate agent julia keller, known to the world as deede, was missing. deede's son mike had gone to her home when he hadn't heard from her for three days. the biggest red flag? deede's beloved dogs left without food or water. what did you think had happened? >> i didn't know at that point. i just knew that something was very, very wrong. >> reporter: mike called his mom's best friend, linda dondero and cindy ertman. cindy who had last spoken to deede three days before as deede prepared for a date rushed to the house. >> you could tell just the dogs had been, you know, run ining around for days, but the way the tv was on and the way the shades were, i felt like thursday night had never ended. i felt like friday morning never came. >> reporter: cindy immediately phoned deede's new boyfriend, car salesman bobby lowe. he reported they had dinner thursday at a local restaurant, then returned to deede's house for a night cap. >> he said she'd had a little bit too much wine and laid down on the couch and was starting to fall off to sleep, so he just said good night and let himself out. >> reporter: anything about what bobby lowe said sound in any way suspicious to you? >> not at all. >> reporter: the next call, to el segundo police. and soon of the scene then detective sergeant carlos mendoza. >> this does not happen in el segundo, especially people as well known as deede is. >> reporter: and what detectives found in their initial search of deede's home, only deepened the mystery. in the kitchen, deede's purse, her cell phone still inside but no wallet. a vodka bottle that police learned was usually kept in the freezer was out on the counter. and in the living room, the tv was on cnn. >> we discovered that whenever she left the house, she always put the tv on to a classical music station so it would relax the dogs, but it was on cnn when we came into the house. >> reporter: so deede was watching cnn, had the dogs there, was having a drink and then left for some reason. suggesting kind of whatever happened happened in a big hurry. >> she didn't have time to do her routine that she usually does before she leaves. >> reporter: and it appeared deede had left in her car. the garage was empty, her silver 1999 mercedes gone. but strangely, police found the car keys sitting on deede's patio. >> we decided to call the l.a. county sheriff's department homicide bureau to come and assist us. >> reporter: and answering that call, veteran detective jimmy gates. >> there was no forced entry whatsoever. and when we started walking through the house, i noticed several articles that were very valuable. >> reporter: so she let in whoever it was and it wasn't robbery? >> absolutely correct. she didn't let them in, that person let themselves in. and they may have had a key. >> reporter: gates wondered had deede left in her car with someone she knew? and how did her car get taken without its key? if you don't have a key, is it as easy to steal a car as movies depict? >> it's certainly not a 1999 mercedes that's hard to hot wire that's hard to steal it. you almost need a key to gain access to it. >> reporter: if your car doesn't have a key, the next stop is a car dealership to have one made, but first gates and his crew searched the house looking for deede's spare mercedes key, without success. and gates quickly became convinced of one thing. you thought finding deede's car was going to be the key to this? >> that was going to be extremely important. >> reporter: deede's friends and family printed up posters and, along with law enforcement, launched a massive search. >> an army of people band together to try to help find her, and we broke up into teams, and we mapped everything out in one-mile increments to start to search every parking lot looking for her car. >> we would ask people have you seen this woman? have you seen this car? it was frantic, it was heartbreaking. >> reporter: and it was leading nowhere. at the same time, detective gates wondered who might have had a motive to have abducted deede from her home? those most common of motives, love, money, jealousy, are always the ones police hug first like old friends. deede made a lot of money being a realtor. >> she was successful, yes, sir. >> reporter: how much money did she have in the bank? >> i think it was over seven figures. >> reporter: seven figures. a lot of murders committed for a lot less than that. >> absolutely. >> reporter: who got that money in the event of her death? >> the benefit ris were her two children. >> reporter: and the detective noticed something about the whereabouts of deede's two children, mike and julie. at the time of deede's disappearance. >> they were both out of town at the time that their mother went missing. >> reporter: why is that significant? why wouldn't the reverse be more true? >> i thought that the mother goes missing and it just so happens that mike, you know, is gone in san jose and julie's gone at a resort, and it's been my experience that sometimes people dissipate stress when they commit a crime in different ways. some people drink, some take drugs and some leave the area to dissipate stress. >> reporter: and there was, strangely, one more person who just happened to have been traveling near the time of deede's disappearance, her ex-husband erwin howard had just flown to his home country of bolivia. and erwin was a mechanic who worked for american airlines in l.a. the common thread in all these trips? nearby l.a.x. airport. and so the detective thought, what better place to dump a car? l.a.x. is a big place. >> very big place. >> reporter: a lot of parking lots. >> it took a few days. >> reporter: you looked through them all? >> every one of them. >> reporter: no mercedes and no shortage of persons of interest. a lot of people close to deede keller were about to be hugged like old friends. coming up -- deede's daughter julie rushes back from vacation to help find her missing mother. >> it was the most surreal experience. >> never suspecting detectives have questions for her. [ male announcer ] meet the best low-light smartphone camera. [ camera shutter clicking ] better than iphone. better than galaxy. the windows phone nokia lumia 928. ♪ are proven to be effective pain relievers. tylenol works by blocking pain signals to your brain. bayer advanced aspirin blocks pain at the site. try the power of bayer advanced aspirin. waiting for your wrinkle cream to work? neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair has the fastest retinol formula. to visibly reduce fine lines and wrinkles in just one week. neutrogena®. and struggle to sleep comfortably together, now there's a solution. introducing sleep number dual temp, the revolutionary temperature-balancing layer with active air technology that works on any mattress, including yours. whether you sleep hot or cool, sleep number dual temp allows each of you to select your ideal temperature. and it's only at one of our over 400 sleep number stores nationwide. sleep number. comfort individualized. in the days after the disappearance of el segundo realtor deede keller, all of l.a.'s south bay seemed to be looking for her and for her missing mercedes. leading the search -- her best friend cindy and linda. a lot of times people disappear and you get the immediate family working on it and everybody else is like well -- >> not in this town. >> she had an army. >> reporter: deede's daughter julie rushed back to l.a. from a trip to mexico. >> it was the most surreal experience. >> reporter: only to be greeted by suspicion. l.a. sheriff's detective jimmy gates had discovered that in the event of their mother's death julie and her brother mike stood to inherit more than a million dollars, so he confronted deede's kids using one of the oldest tricks in the investigator's handbook. do you remember an interview that you did with jimmy gates? >> i do. >> reporter: in which he ask you had some pretty basic questions like what's your name, where do you live, pretty ordinary stuff, then all of a sudden he says, did you have anything to do with your mom's disappearance? >> i think it was more, did you kill your mother. >> reporter: and you're what, startled or angry? >> it was a horrible question, but i can understand why it needed to be asked. >> reporter: detectives ask similar questions of julie. next, in attempting to rule out as suspects those closest to deede, detectives turn their attention to her ex-husband erwin howard. it turned out that, although deede and erwin had been divorced for more than a year at the time of their disappearance, friends told police she had recently invited him back into her life. about six months earlier deede's been in a car accident. as she recovered she needed help with her dogs. deede also apparently felt bad about the pain their divorce had caused erwin. >> she called erwin to help her because that is what he did best was to help and assist her. so he helped kind of nurse her back to health and take care of the dogs and the house and her. >> reporter: and in taking a hard look at erwin howard, the detective found he had a rock solid alibi. on the night of deede's disappearance, july 8th, erwin had clocked in to work for his job as an airline mechanic at the american airlines hangar at l.a.x. at 8:30. he said he worked all night but it wasn't just erwin's word. he had to use an electronic key card to get into the hangar. that's not something the employee can influence. >> that's absolutely correct. >> reporter: that left the last person to admit seeing deede alive, her new boyfriend car salesman bobby lowe. lowe said he left deede's house between 11:00 and midnight that night, then gone to the gym the next morning. what possible motive could bobby lowe have to want deede either dead or out of the picture? >> there was no motive that i could determine whatsoever. >> reporter: and lowe provided investigators with two important clues. first, he said, while he was at deede's that night her dogs had all started barking at something outside as if someone were lurking. and the next morning, he discovered someone had keyed the side of his ford explorer, leaving a long scratch. which suggests what, somebody's following them on that date? >> absolutely. that's what it meant to me. >> reporter: but who was following deede and bobby? who was that angry? that act of vandalism pointed away from bobby lowe. >> i was an investigator for several year, and i've never known anybody to vandalize their own car. >> reporter: that kind of thinking is what would make it a perfect alibi? >> sure, sure, if he's sophisticated enough. but his background indicated that he was a well-liked guy, kind of successful himself and didn't have a lot of enemies. >> reporter: and then, even as investigators looked at suspects, came the news that all who knew deede had at once hoped for and feared -- deede's car had been found. not at l.a.x., not in l.a., but 2 1/2 hours down interstate 5 in san diego. that silver mercedes had been parked on this street in downtown san diego for days, earning it several parking tickets. when the local pd ran the plate, it came up as belonging to a missing person. and when the trunk was finally opened, there was a body wrapped in sheets covered by a blanket which was itself decorated with dog paws. deede keller was no longer missing. police asked to meet with deede's family. >> it was just a wide range of emotions. there was almost some type of retrieve that they had found her because we were starting to think at that point how long could this go on. >> hardest days of my life. >> mm-hmm. >> those were the hardest days for my children and all of her friends and her family. >> reporter: deede keller was dead at age 54, an autopsy showed she'd been asphyxiated. and the clues that were and were not left in her car were about to take this case back in a familiar direction. coming up -- just days before she was murdered, deede had a visit from a stalker. >> she said that she was in the shower, kind of pulled her out of the shower, and they had this huge altercation. he was calling her every name under the sun. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ every day, more people enjoy their music on the iphone than any other phone. a blt with best foods is the best. ♪ ♪ bring out the unmistakable taste that can only be best foods. bring out the best. 100% greek. 100% mmm... wow, that is mmm... it's so mmm you might not believe it's a hundred calories. yoplait greek 100. it is so good. yoplait greek 100. my dad can't fly. he doesn't have heat vision, or even wear a cape. he doesn't battle evil villains. and he can't save the universe. he doesn't have super-human strength... he's just super, because he's my dad here's to the original superman, from sears and shop your way. on a downtown street in san diego in july 2004, deede keller had finally been found, dead in the trunk of her silver mercedes. the car had been the subject of a massive search ever since deede had been discovered missing a week earlier from her home two hours north in el segundo. homicide detective jimmy gates, who'd always thought finding the car would be the key to finding deede, now gave the mercedes a thorough going over. fingerprint ors dna on the car? >> there wasn't one fingerprint either on or in that car nor was there a partial print, nothing. >> reporter: deede's or anybody else's? >> nobody's. >> reporter: what does that say, professional? >> someone went to great lengths to make damn sure that they weren't identified through fingerprints thaerks for sure. >> reporter: but the killer did leave a clue in the wrapped around deede's body. >> i never had seen tape like that. consistent with red duct tape. >> reporter: that started gates in one direction, but he also looked closely at the way deede's body had been placed in that car. >> someone took great care to place her in that car, and that indicated to us that someone cared deeply about her. >> reporter: so part of this says professional and part of this says somebody that knew her? >> that's exactly correct. >> reporter: but the suspicions that said professional soon fell away in favor of those that said someone who knew her. not her children, but someone who had re-entered deede's life in the month before her death -- her ex-husband, erwin howard. you ever think of erwin as violent or dangerous? >> no. i never suspected that he would do something physical. >> reporter: but detectives soon learned something had changed in erwin howard in the months before deede's murder. remember, after a car accident in january 2004, deede had invited erwin back into her life to help care for her and her dogs. that request had apparently been misinterpreted by erwin. we know he started wearing his wedding ring again. erwin wanted back into her life and sounds to me like on some level she sort of appreciated that part of him that adored her and wanted to take care of her, even if it's somebody that you're not going to be with any more. >> yes. >> right. >> reporter: do you think she made that point clear enough to him? >> no. >> reporter: she was too nice. >> always too nice and very trusting. >> reporter: and that may be why, investigators thought, erwin seemed surprised when, just two weeks before deede's murder, erwin gained access to deede's computer and found e-mails referring to a relationship with a new man, bobby lowe. >> and i think it really threw him for a loop when he found out that my mom, you know, had met somebody else. and that's when things started getting scary. >> reporter: scary because erwin, detectives learned, had started doing things that pointed to an obsession with deede. and how did they know that? in one of those only in a small town coincidences deede's son mike lived just down the block from deede's new boyfriend bobby lowe. one night mike was sitting in his living room when he saw a familiar green range rover driving by, and inside was erwin. >> as the evening went on, he continued to drive by the house. >> reporter: you call your mom and say, by the way, erwin's driving around the block while you're with bobby lowe? >> i didn't. i didn't really put two and two together. >> reporter: but the very next day, now just ten days before her murder, deede would call her friend cindy ertman in a state of panic. >> she was crying hysterically, she said that she was in the shower, erwin came into the house without her knowing, pulled her out of the shower and they had this huge altercation and that he was calling her every name under the sun. >> reporter: deede told the same story to her friend linda do in, dero. >> i said do you realize that erwin's behavior is escalating, deede? and she said yes. >> reporter: and you said, call the police? >> no. i said have you changed your locks? and she said, no, i'll do it on the way home. and, of course, she never did. >> reporter: but investigators soon learned that in those conversations with her friends, deede had left something out. a detail she mentioned only to her daughter julie. that during that argument erwin howard had also slapped her. >> i said, mom, you have to call the police. you have to get a restraining order. then i remember her asking me not to tell michael. and that she was going to handle this. and i remember being torn like, okay, this is my mom telling me -- i got it. but also thinking maybe she didn't have it. >> reporter: and days later it was clear julie was right. the very night her mom went missing, julie got another phone call, this time from erwin. >> i got on the phone, and he's like, jewels, jewels, jewels, what is your mom thinking? i said, erwin, i really don't want to talk about this. i feel like this is between you and my mom. and he's like, well, you just need to pray for her soul. and i remember thinking it was a little odd, but then, you know what, given his grasp on the english language sometimes he'd say some funny things or get something wrong, but i just remember thinking that was an odd comment. >> reporter: detective gates now felt erwin howard's motive for killing deede keller was clear. but proving erwin had the means to commit the murder was another matter. and erwin steadfastly maintained his innocence to investigators, from the moment he stepped off the plane as he returned from bolivia after the murder through the months after, even though he was clearly the prime suspect. and the case against erwin was not without its problems. it's one thing to stalk someone, quite another to kill them. there was no physical evidence tying erwin howard to the crime, and there were those key card records showing him clocking into his job at american airlines the night of the murder. still, detective gates took the information he had gathered to the l.a. county district attorney's office and asked for a warrant. >> they declined to file charges. >> reporter: they won't file. >> they won't file. >> reporter: did jimmy gates have the wrong man in his sites? was there ever going to be enough evidence to arrest the killer, any killer? coming up -- finally, a break. >> that's like lightning striking. >> twice. >> make that three times. >> one of the most shocking things i've ever seen in one of my cases in a courtroom. arantee. but we're gonna get it right. of course. we're gonna be this color a lot. oh what about this? "dazzle." does it say modern? does it say chic? it says blue. [ male announcer ] valspar signature. look for it only at lowe's. [ male announcer ] valspar signature. go ! [ male announcer ] valspar signature. olive garden's three course italian dinner, just $12.95. five new choices like new grilled chicken toscano with parmesan risotto. plus unlimited salad and breadsticks. then dessert! three courses just $12.95. go olive garden. summer had come and gone in l.a.'s south bay without an arrest in the murder of beloved el segundo real estate agent deede keller. and as the months dragged on, detective jimmy gates kept pounding the pavement, building what he thought was a strong circumstantial case against keller's ex-husband erwin howard, but the l.a. county d.a.'s office had so far declined to issue a warrant for howard's arrest. deede's son michael wanted answers. there was a long time when erwin was walking around free. >> seemed like decades. it was so frustrating, painful, emotional. >> reporter: jimmy gates was feeling all of those same things, and soon his hard work started paying off. that unusual red tape found on deede's body? a specially trained dog found erwin's scent on it. and detectives found similar tape at erwin's workplace, that american airlines hangar at l.a.x. but what about erwin's alibi, computer records showing him at work in that same hangar the night of deede's disappearance? and that he worked a ten-hour shift? it turned out the more detectives dug into that alibi, the less solid it seemed. detective gates painstakingly dissected the procedures at the hangar and he found this. erwin howard could swipe in to work at the employee parking lot using a key card at this turnstile, then clock in inside the hangar, but he could also leave whenever he wanted by walking out the large bay doors and catching an employee shuttle back to the parking lot. there'd be no record of his leaving. jimmy gates discovered that on the night of the murder erwin used his key card to swipe in to the parking lot at 8:24 p.m. and again at 10:21 p.m. and for a third time at 1:47 a.m., which completely blew apart his alibi that he'd been at work the whole time. so he would swipe his card to get back in? >> absolutely. >> reporter: after there was no record of his leaving. >> right. >> reporter: by now you're convinced erwin's the guy? >> absolutely. all the witness, all the evidence, everything pointed directly at erwin. >> reporter: and there was one more key piece of evidence. the day after the murder, a witness saw a mercedes on the street in el segundo. she thought it belonged to a friend, so she sped up to catch her. >> she sees it's not her friend and she sees a male hispanic driving the car, and she remembers that license plate. >> reporter: the license plate belonged to the mercedes owned by deede keller. the man driving, the witness helped the police artist draw this sketch. who does it look like? >> it looks like erwin. >> reporter: the witness was then shown a photo lineup, and she picked out erwin howard. that's like lightning striking. >> twice. >> reporter: and then it struck again. six months after the murder, jimmy gates' phone rang. it was deede's next door neighbor who'd been interviewed once and had offered nothing of value, but now apparently she was having an attack of conscience. the neighbor now told the detective that she'd seen erwin on june 30th, the day erwin had confronted and slapped deede. >> she said the conversation lasted 15 or 20 minutes where he articulates that he was mad enough to strangle her with work gloves. >> reporter: that's what deede neighbor said erwin said to her? >> correct. >> reporter: why do you think she didn't tell you for six months? >> i have no idea why a neighbor during a murder investigation just wouldn't simply tell the cops the truth, he wanted to kill her. >> reporter: armed with that new and threatening statement, detective gates was able to get his warrant and soon erwin howard was under arrest for the murder of deede keller. now the case was in the hands of l.a. county deputy district attorney john lumer. what made this case different? >> i love cases where you have a very good idea who the suspect is, but it's a question of kind of putting the evidence together. so circumstantial cases where you have high motive, but you're looking at lots of little facts and seeing, okay, what can you turn this into? >> reporter: it would take three years for the case against erwin howard to come to trial. cameras were not present in the courtroom that day when trial began in the fall of 2008. john lewin laid out his case in a devastatingly thorough 2 1/2-hour-long powerpoint presentation to the jury. >> opening statements are like a check. i'm writing a check. jury hears it. and if i do my job right after opening, all they're waiting to see is if there are funds in the bank. >> reporter: in other words, if you deliver during your case what you say you're going to deliver in the opening statement, you'll get a conviction. >> that's my hope. >> reporter: but never in this prosecutor's wildest dreams did he believe his opening statement would have the effect it did on erwin howard and his defense attorney andrew flyer. you hear that opening statement and something changes. >> something changed. after the opening statement, i went back into lockup and i spoke to erwin, and i said, hey, listen, remember how i was speaking about the circumstantial case and it could be powerful, i think there could be some problems now. and his answer was, i need to tell you something. >> reporter: that something would stun deede keller's family and friends and the prosecutor himself. >> one of the most shocking things i've ever seen in one of my cases in a courtroom. what do you think? that's great. it won't take long, will it? no. okay. this, won't take long will it? no, not at all. how many of these can we do on our budget? more than you think. that didn't take very long, did it? summer's here, so are the savings. that's nice. post it. already did. more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot. buy ortho home defense max with comfort wand and get ortho bug-b-gon max free. just getting clean with no water. kinda like using t.p. with no moist wipes. ohh. ohh. [ female announcer ] nothing leaves you feeling cleaner and fresher than the cottonelle care routine -- now with a touch of cotton. keurig has a wide variety of gourmet coffee and tea to choose from. keurig is the way to brew fresh, delicious coffee in under a minute. way to brew! so, with keurig, every cup tastes like it's brewed just for you... because it is. brew what you love, simply. keurig. ♪ [ female announcer ] you've never tasted anything like new fruttare. the taste of delicious strawberries and creamy milk, bursting together and perfectly frozen in time. when you look on the bright side, it's all good. ♪ new fruttare. it's all good. ♪ your children's health can affect their gpa. yes, exercise and education go hand in hand. so make sure your kids are active 60 minutes every day. you'll help them feel good and even perform better in school. the more you know. in a los angeles courtroom in september 2008, something extraordinary was taking place. the murder trial of erwin howard, expected to last three months, was on the verge of ending in just two days. prosecutor john lewin had presented a powerful opening statement. >> i had seen the defendant during the opening, and i thought maybe, you know, something had gotten to him. >> reporter: and the d.a. was right. because after the opening defense attorney andrew flyer had spoken with howard who then made a stunning admission. >> for the first time in my career, i heard a defendant confess to a crime, and i was the first one he told. >> reporter: until that moment, his defense was, i wasn't there, and i didn't have anything to do with it? >> correct. >> reporter: the defense attorney walked into the courtroom and made a statement that caused mouths to fall open. >> defense attorney gets up, and he says that -- you're going to see something that you'll never see in a court ever. and he says, my client killed deede keller, but he didn't murder her. >> reporter: what did that mean? >> they were basically trying to see if they could get a manslaughter out of it. >> reporter: so deputy d.a. lewin asked to speak with erwin howard behind closed doors and made an offer, plead guilty to second degree murder and be eligible for parole in 15 years. >> my memory is that, as i was saying this, he's nodding. >> reporter: because it wasn't just about erwin admitting it to you, he had also come into court and admitted it to everybody? >> yes. >> reporter: and erwin howard did just that? >> i do. >> reporter: surprising a courtroom filled with deede's friends and family. >> howard, h-o-w-a-r-d. >> there was such a sense of relief to think that, oh, my gosh, you know, we're going to hear the truth finally and erwin's going to confess. >> reporter: he guided erwin through the sequence of events beginning with why erwin went over to deede's house on july 8th, 2004. >> i wanted to talk to her. >> what did you want to talk to her about? >> to apologize for my act on june 30th. >> reporter: june 30th, 2004, when, after discovering she was dating another man, erwin stormed into deede's house, confronted her in the shower, tossed e-mails in her face and slapped her. on that final night, though, erwin says he knocked and deede, alone after her new boyfriend left, he says, let him in. >> i said, please listen to me. please listen to me. at some point i guess i raised my voice. and the little dog rossi started growling. >> reporter: erwin said he threw a pillow at the dog and that angered deede. >> she told me how dare you hurt my dog. and she slapped me. i reached towards her, i grabbed her hand. she started pounding her hand on my chest. i put her hand down. i grabbed her, pulled her towards me, she struggled, we struggled. >> reporter: erwin said he put deede in a sort of bear hug. >> i just kept holding her, telling her, please, listen to me, i don't want to lose you. i love you. i don't want to lose you. >> how tightly were you holding her? >> i felt her body go limp. i stood there and i thought god, i've killed her. i killed her. i killed her. i killed her. >> reporter: erwin said he came back the next evening and put deede's body in the car, using a spare key he had for the mercedes, he started driving and headed for mexico. but he wondered how he'd get back across the border. so he left the car on a street in san diego and hired an off-duty taxi to take him back to l.a. erwin admitted to the murder, but he talked about it in a way that made it seem almost accidental. >> yes. he was willing to accept responsibility for the rage and for the anger. he was not willing to accept responsibility na the murder happened intentionally. >> reporter: but despite that, lewin felt a second degree murder conviction was the best he could secure. and after erwin left the stand and took the plea, deede's friends and family had the chance to speak to him. they offered surprising words of gratitude and forgiveness to a now confessed killer. >> thank you. >> did you the right thing with the circumstances and for that i have to thank you. >> thank you. thank you for doing the right thing. i remember thinking that something really special had happened, that, you know, although nothing is going to bring my mom back, we got the best possible outcome given the circumstances. >> reporter: it's rare in a murder trial to hear so much of a sort of lack of anger and vitriol toward the defendant. >> they're good people. they're not vengeful people. i think they also realized that deede, in hindsight, had not handled things as best she could have in terms of terminating that relationship. >> reporter: erwin howard will not be eligible for parole until the year 2020. deede's friends and family, their sorrow tinged with regret, now honor deede by urging other women not to ignore the warning signs of domestic violence. >> we want deede's life the count for something. so i hope people will reach out for help, get support. >> reporter: i know you don't blame deede for this, but i know that you also wish that she had been more forthright with the two of you. because you would have acted even though she didn't want to. >> yes, we would have. >> there's no question i would have done things differently about if i could go back and relive it. >> reporter: but for deede's friends, regrets give way to wonderful memories. today there's a plaque at the local dog park both remembering and honoring a woman whose big heart wouldn't ever let her turn away a stray. and now, our second hour of "dateline." another l.a. family confronted with a disappearance coming to terms with a terrible truth. it begins with a young hollywood actress who you might know from "friday night lights." >> is there anything about you that isn't football? >> but off camera life became more like a big screen thriller when her sister and her sister's husband seemed to vanish. >> did you think that wherever they were, they were probably together? >> yes. >> detectives combed their apartment. >> no sign of a struggle, no blood. >> no. >> but maybe the important clues weren't visible to the naked eye. >> she really wanted people to believe that she had it all together. >> had something forced them to leave town? >> she mentioned going underground? >> yes, she did. >> or was the truth very different? >> the dog told you that a dead body had been in the back of lyle's car? >> correct. >> with few clues to go on, hollywood detectives would stage a press conference like no other. a piece of theater that just might reveal a killer. >> i was just floored by what was happening. >> the story of a sister's search. here again is josh mankiewicz. >> reporter: in the movies and on tv, people can just disappear without a trace, leaving family and friends with nothing more than memories, questions and worry. in real life, vanishing is more a magician's trick than an everyday occurrence, which brings us to that crossroads where magic and entertainment collide -- hollywood. the cops who roll down these streets call it hollyweird because they know anything can happen here and sometimes what does happen makes no sense. hollywood's a real place, but it's also a myth, and the fantasy of what might be has always drawn the hopeful from every town in america with a bus station. for quite different reasons, it drew these two sisters, lesley and aasha. maybe you recognize aasha davis. she's one of the lucky few for whom that hollywood fantasy came true. within a few years of her move west, aasha's star was rising, first with small parts on tv, a college student on "the gilmore girls," a patient on "house," a street-wise girl on "the shield," and in 2007, her big break on "friday night lights." she was cast as waverly, the sharp as a tack teen aged preacher's daughter. >> you ask me all your questions and blah, blah, blah, we caught up. go for some gold. >> reporter: just as aasha's career was taking off, a real life drama began, one that would test her strength in a way the climb up the hollywood ladder never had. >> hi, i'm here to plead for help to find my sister lesley. >> reporter: aasha was used to facing the cameras, but this wasn't on a set or for a publicity tour. the scene was a news conference where aasha begged for help from anyone who would listen. >> we are heartbroken and extremely concerned for her well-being. >> reporter: any sister would be frantic with worry, but aasha and her big sister lesley were closer than most despite their gap in age. lesley was how much older? >> she was nine years older than me. >> reporter: and so she was sort of a surrogate mom when your mom wasn't around? >> yeah, she was almost like having another mom because my mom was a single mom so she worked day and night, double shifts, and lesley was in charge of us. she was a mama bear. >> reporter: lesley always wanted things a certain way, her way. she was definitely type "a." everyone in the family knew that if lesley was in charge, everything would be just right. >> my sister's the type that, even when we were younger, she would take me on dates with her. >> reporter: i'm sure they loved that. >> like my little sister, but that's who she was. she made sure that we were taken care of. >> reporter: lesley never stopped feeling responsible for aasha, and so a few months after aasha moved west in late '97, lesley followed. she found herself an office job that some of us would call boring, but in it lesley saw material for stories that kept her sister laughing. >> she's so charismatic and such a great storyteller. she could take a little tiny thing like a tape dispenser and create this amazing story. >> reporter: the move west had been good for both sisters, especially for lesley, after she met the right guy in an unlikely place -- the 99 cent store. >> by the time we were checking out, shes was giving him her number. they went to the movies afterwards and inseparable after that. >> reporter: his name was lyle herring and he had a great job as a recruiter at a local university. he'd grown up in los angeles. and his wooing of lesley was spent introducing her to her new city. a courtship at warp speed. >> she called me one day and she said, do you want to be a witness at my wedding? and i'm like, you're getting married? yeah. >> reporter: married less than a year after they met. lesley and lyle were clearly happy together. they seemed a pretty good match. >> yes. >> reporter: vivian, lesley and aasha's mother, thought her eldest daughter had found, for her, the perfect man. >> lesley and lyle even dressed alike. they had the same jackets, they had the same sweater, they had the same caps. >> reporter: and they were together all the time? >> all the time. >> reporter: it was funny about lyle, after the marriage, he became closer to lesley's family than he was to his own. vivian felt it. >> he always told me he loved me more than he loved his own mother, and he told me that my family was better to him than his own family. >> reporter: you loved him like a son? >> i loved him like a son. >> reporter: as for lesley, she was the mama bear, first to aasha and then, after they got together, to her husband lyle, but it was her own mother who lived all the way across the country to whom lesley turned for comfort. and you talked to her almost every day? >> every day. a quarter of 11:00 every morning on her way to work, and sometimes in the afternoon. >> reporter: how old was she? >> 45. >> reporter: and she's still calling her mom every day? >> she called me in the morning so we could pray together. and then sometimes i say to her, where are you now? she said, i'm in the elevator. i say you make me pray all the way to the elevator? she said, mm-hmm. >> reporter: they shared daily prayers and they shared confidences. in fact, lesley would talk to only her mother during those rare times when she was ticked off at lyle. >> whenever she was unhappy, if i wanted her to laugh, i would always say to her, what do you expect? you met him in the 99 cent store. >> reporter: soon enough, aasha was married, too, and in 2008, she and her husband jesse found out she was pregnant with a boy. >> lesley was so excited so have a nephew, and she was so supportive, she threw my baby shower. she was going to get to see her little sister become a mom. >> reporter: the little boy named evert joined the family in january of 2009. though aunt lesley was sick with a cold, she couldn't resist coming by to look through the window at her brand new nephew. those should have been happy times for aasha and her sister, a time of the family bonding with its newest member, but then aasha got a phone call from lesley's boss that changed everything. >> he said, lesley didn't show up for work yesterday, and she's not here today. i just went ah. instantly felt wrong. >> reporter: the joy of new motherhood melted away. it was tuesday, february 10th. lesley had missed two days of work and she hadn't called in sick. together it was completely out of character for the always responsible lesley. >> i instantly called the two people who would know where she is, that's the one she's always with, lyle herring, a and my mom who she talks to twice a day. >> reporter: aasha's mom hadn't heard from lesley. and now, they realized, lyle couldn't be found either. but no one disappears without a trace, do they? remember, this is hollywood where pretty much anything can happen. and like a special effect, lyle would briefly reappear, but the scene would raise more questions than it answered. >> he got into the back seat, slides down in the seat and pulls my suitcoat over his head. >> he's hiding? >> he's hiding. one to kill adult fleas and ticks, plus another to kill flea eggs and larvae, destroying the future generations of fleas. and it keeps fighting for a full 30 days. ask your vet about frontline plus. accept nothing less. where we've switched their fruits and veggies with produce from walmart. it's a fresh-over. that's great. tastes like you just picked them. so far, it's about the best strawberry i've had this year. walmart works directly with growers to get you the best-quality produce they've ever had. all this produce is from walmart. oh, my gosh. i'm shocked. [ laughs ] i know where i'm going to be shopping for strawberries now. find fresh berries and all your quality produce backed by our money back guarantee. walmart. backed by our money back guarantee. dithat's smooth and even.... maybelline new york launches the rocket mascara. the jumbo volume brush and latex-like formula load on... smooth, even,...explosive volume! 8x the volume. no clumps. new the rocket. maybe it's maybelline. ♪ [ female announcer ] with mccafé, any moment can be a moment of delicious wonder. ♪ the latest -- new mccafé blueberry pomegranate smoothie. sweet blueberries, raspberries, and a splash of pomegranate juice. it's the newest addition to all the unique tastes of mccafé. the blueberry pomegranate smoothie. there's always something new to love from mccafé. now with in-wash pre-treaters. moms know kids keep throwing you one stain after another. so new all attacks many tough stains better than ever. give us your worst. we'll give it our all. just like a tablet. so easy to use, it won a best of ces award from cnet. and it comes inside this beautifully crafted carrying case. introducing the all-new 2014 chevrolet impala with the available mylink system. ♪ [ beeps ] ingeniously connecting you to your life and the road. that's american ingenuity to find new roads. it used to take weeks or months to get life insurance. now people can buy a term life policy in a single phone call. lucy (into phone): that should do it. congratulations, ma'am. i've just completed your new policy. now please enjoy this hold music, performed by the world's cutest, sweetest, cutest, musician ever. did i mention he's cute? employee: she's... ... not supposed to... ... do that. anncr: get term life insurance in one call. call 1-888-metlife to apply and buy today. when someone you love disappears, it's hard to know what to do. there are no drills like for fires or earthquakes, no how-to books. aasha davis had a million questions and almost no answers. >> we were wondering if we had to file a missing persons for both of them. we were nervous about what -- you know, what would we find in the apartment? what if they got robbed? >> reporter: aasha's sister lesley and her husband lyle were always together during their marriage. now they were both suddenly gone. lesley missing and lyle's missing. >> yeah. >> reporter: did you think that wherever they were, they were probably together? >> yes. >> reporter: aasha and her husband jesse grabbed their newborn son and headed to the herrings' condo complex in the hollywood hills to see what, if anything, they could find there. >> lesley's car's there in her assigned parking spot. and that made it feel a little heavier. all of a sudden you're like, her car's here and she's not answering her phone. >> reporter: they went into the building to knock on lesley and lyle's front door. aasha wondered if lesley, who suffered from migraines, might be sick inside. but their knocking got no response. they waited. and they waited. they returned to the garage where they saw a man parking in the spot next to lesley's. >> have you seen who owns this car? i haven't saw her but i saw her husband the other day. >> reporter: that was strange, so aasha and jesse waited in their car by the front gate, because if that neighbor was right, maybe they'd find lyle when he came home from work. >> and i remember a few cars coming in, no, no, no, then all of a sudden a car that matched his description came in. >> reporter: but then the car turned away from lyle and lesley's building. >> and we said, oh, i guess it's not him. >> reporter: because it went in a different direction? >> right, that's what we thought. >> reporter: aasha and jesse probably would have waited all night, but they had a new baby with them. so they headed home. it wasn't the last time aasha would have to balance being a sister and being a parent. while all this was going on, you had a brand new baby, so i'm guessing you weren't sleeping a whole lot anyway. i'm thinking maybe this made it just about impossible. >> i did not sleep at all. it was like such an amalgamation of, you know, sadness and fear and love and excitement for this baby. it was what kept us going was him. >> reporter: a new life is always a reason for hope, but the situation with lesley and lyle both missing was leaving the family feeling hopeless, so they called the lapd. aasha and jesse couldn't get into the herring condo but police could. officers went inside. and found nothing that looked unusual. they also found no lyle and no lesley. aasha worked the phones. friends and relatives knew nothing. then she reached lyle's boss who said he hadn't heard from lesley, but he thought he'd seen lyle on tuesday, which was the day after lesley missed work. no less confused, aasha decided it was time to file that missing persons report. >> we went to the police station, and we gave them, you know, a picture of lesley. and the guy said thank you, and he put her picture in a pile. and in california, i'm sure, i don't know how many people go missing, especially in hollywood, a day. >> reporter: a lot of people come to hollywood from somewhere else, but their dreams of making it big here don't always work out. they can lose touch with their families. then suddenly the folks back home are calling the cops thinking they're missing. when really they're just lost in the meat grinder that is hollywood. aasha, desperately needed something that would make lesley's case stand out. >> we went back to the car, and we thought, i don't know where to go from here. you know? and the phone rang. and it was malcolm thomas. >> reporter: malcolm thomas is lyle herring's cousin. he wanted to talk about a very distraught lyle who he'd also seen in the days after lesley missed work. malcolm told aasha that lyle seemed almost suicidal. did he mention lesley at all? >> he said don't bring up her name any more, he doesn't want to hear about her any more. >> reporter: did you get the feeling that's because they'd had a fight or they were splitting up or she dumped him? >> i thought maybe there was a disagreement. people do have disagreements, people split up for short periods of time and get back together. and i said, well, maybe he's just upset over something. >> reporter: lyle asked malcolm to drive with him to his condo complex. lyle led the way in his suv. you're following lyle to his house. >> yes, i am. >> reporter: but he doesn't go straight to his house, does he? >> no, as soon as he pulled into the driveway, he made a sharp left turn. and that was different. >> reporter: away from his home. >> away from his home. >> reporter: they ended up in a remote garage underneath the condo complex. >> he opens up my back passenger side door, he got into backseat, closes the door, slides down in the seat of the car and pulls my suitcoat over his head. >> reporter: he's hiding. >> he's hiding. and i said, man, don't do that in my car. i said, what's going on? he said there are some people at the end of the driveway that he doesn't want to see or have them see us. >> reporter: some people near the end of the driveway? as she listened to malcolm's story, aasha suddenly realized that's you. >> it was us. and so we ran back into the police station, took the baby back out of the seat, went back in. you know, we just talked to my sister's husband's cousin, and he had a really -- a really frantic interaction with him. the policeman said, wait a second. i'm going to get you guys a detective. >> reporter: the next person aasha met was detective chris gable. missing persons cases are not usually your department? >> no, they're not. >> reporter: but this was different? >> this was different. coming up -- inside lesley and lyle's home a strange clue buried in a closet. and then inside their marriage something buried there, too. >> she found out about that. >> yes. >> i'm guessing was pretty furious. >> she was furious. ♪ yup. another pill stop. can i get my aleve back yet? ♪ for my pain, i want my aleve. ♪ [ male announcer ] look for the easy-open red arthritis cap. to cwe're bringing you the5th unbelievable five fifty-five deal. a large pizza hut pizza for just $5.55 when you carry out. so ask for the five fifty-five deal now through june 15th. pizza hut. 55 years of helping you make it great. to showe're bringing their canson home from collegees, along with a few friends... no one gives you more capacity than the new kenmore elite refrigerator... so you'll be prepared for any challenge kenmore. tested for living. found at sears. [ kids ] a bunch! what would you buy with all this money you saved? i'd buy a change-o machine so i could change my brother into a puppy. change-o machine? couldn't you just buy an actual puppy? but if my brother's a puppy i could bring him to show and tell and say, "here's my puppy brother!" well when you say it like that it makes perfect sense. [ male announcer ] it's not complicated. saving is better. come to at&t and trade up to iphone 5. get it now for $99.99 when you trade in your current smartphone. ♪ wednesday, february 11th, 2009, detective chris gable was working the homicide table that night at the lapd's hollywood station when the officer from the front desk walked aasha, jesse and their baby back to detectives. >> we went back to the detectives, and we explained everything about lesley and about how worried we were. we didn't know what was going on. >> reporter: lyle and lesley were both missing and unreachable. maybe they were together. maybe they weren't. maybe they were safe. and maybe they weren't. >> my instincts are that there's something suspicious going on. i still don't know what it is. they could have both taken off. i don't know these people. they live a pretty isolated lifestyle, but from the thins that i found so far it seems suspicious. hospitals, coroner's offices and the highway patrol and came up with exactly nothing. he put out a bolo, be on the lookout for, asking police throughout southern california to look for lesley and lyle herring, and he brought cousin malcolm in to hear firsthand about lyle's strange behavior. most of the family is telling you that the relationship between lyle and lesley is terrific? >> yeah. >> reporter: malcolm's the only one who sends up some sort of red flag? >> based on his conversations with lyle that previous days after she was missing, yes. >> reporter: whatever had happened was beginning to feel like foul play. gable knew he had to move fast, and so at 3:00 a.m., some 11 hours after first meeting aasha, gable and his partner vicky binumb were in the herring condo search warrant in hand. the apartment didn't appear to be a place where a murder had been committed. >> it didn't, but the apartment was real telling to me about the two people that lived there. we didn't know much about them, but it was almost like an apartment divide. the part of the apartment that was lesley's, for example, was very orderly and put together. then there was a room that was lyle's. and it was just like a tornado had been through it. >> reporter: but still, no sign of a struggle. >> no. >> reporter: no blood. >> no visible blood. the only thing that caught my attention that night was there was a large amount of towels hanging over the showers of both bathrooms. i just made note of it, but i thought there was some sort of a flood or something that they sopped up. >> reporter: inside the apartment, he also saw spilled candle wax. if the ocd intensive lesley had seen that, she'd have cleaned it up right away. so did it happen after she left? and gable and bynum found something else, a receipt from starbucks dated february 9th at 9:17 p.m. that was the first day lesley missed work. where did you find that receipt? >> that receipt was found inside of a purse inside of lesley's purse inside of her closet. >> reporter: so presumably it was lesley who went to starbucks? >> exactly. >> reporter: it was 6:00 a.m. when they finished collecting their evidence and night turned to day in hollywood. and what had dawned on these detectives was this may not have been the happy home of a happy couple. a visit with aasha and lesley's mother vivian gave them a glimpse behind the bright picture lesley had always painted. >> that weekend lyle cooked some food and he put a certain spice in the food. when she asked him what spice he had in the food, he couldn't tell her. >> reporter: vivian knew that certain spices strigerred lesley's debilitating migraines, but vivian also knew and was the only one who did know, that this fight over spices was just a symptom of so much that was going wrong between mr. and mrs. lyle herring. things had not been good between your daughter and lyle? >> no, they had financial problems. >> reporter: to say these were financial problems is to understate what had been happening. vivian said lesley had told her that lyle needed cash badly, so badly that he had committed identity theft against his own wife. >> he forged her signature and took money from her credit cards. >> reporter: and she found out about that? >> yes. >> reporter: and i'm guessing was pretty furious. >> she was furious. >> reporter: it turned out that for months lesley had been telling her mother she was nearing the end of her rope. vivian cautioned lesley not to tell lyle she was thinking of leaving him. >> i said if you want to leave, you cannot let him know what your plans are. just leave. >> reporter: so don't tell him the plans, don't leave a note. >> no. >> reporter: was this mother just trying to hold on to anything that might mean her missing daughter was still alive or did she know more than she was saying? coming up -- a new clue pushes the investigation into high gear. >> i'm guessing you watched that video several times? >> oh, yeah. >> why this changed everything. well, i travel a lot and umm... [ male announcer ] at visa signature, every upgraded experience comes from listening to our cardholders. visa signature. your idea of what a card should be. so do tire swings! this is our ocean spray cran-lemonade. it's good, old-fashioned lemonade. only better! whoa! [ splash! ] ocean spray cran-lemonade. a bold twist on an old favorite. [ male announcer ] moving object detection. ♪ blind spot warning. ♪ lane departure warning. safety, down to an art. the nissan altima with safety shield technologies. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪ a blt with best foods is the best. ♪ ♪ bring out the unmistakable taste that can only be best foods. bring out the best. that can only be best foods. (laughing) sorry, i was just checking out your phone. that's the galaxy s4 right? yeah, i just got it. did your video just pause on its own? yeah, it does that every time you look away from the screen. and that's a big screen too. is that that phone you answer by waving your hand over it? yeah. is it? am i doing it right? someone has to call you first. well, give me your number, i'll call you. yeah, give him your number. c'mon. buy a gs4 and get a samsung galaxy tattoo for $199. exclusively at at&t. i've always had to keep my eye on her... but, i didn't always watch out for myself. with so much noise about health care... i tuned it all out. with unitedhealthcare, i get information that matters... my individual health profile. not random statistics. they even reward me for addressing my health risks. so i'm doing fine... but she's still going to give me a heart attack. we're more than 78,000 people looking out for more than 70 million americans. that's health in numbers. unitedhealthcare. no one seemed to know where lesley herring was. her husband lyle had been seen but wasn't returning anyone's calls, not even those from the lapd. had lesley simply left her husband without a word to anyone? it seemed unlikely, but then her sister aasha was still in the process of learning about lesley's marriage, how bad it really was, how unhappy lesley was, things lesley was apparently telling only their mother. >> the thing about my sister, i think she really wanted people to believe she had it all together, so she wouldn't tell us about the problems that she was having with lyle. >> reporter: she'd always taken care of you. >> mm-hmm. >> reporter: you're on tv and doing great. and maybe she thought, you know what? i'm not -- i'm not going to break aasha's concentration for a minute? >> oh, definitely. yeah, out of protection, a little bit of pride. >> reporter: so perhaps lesley was still alive somewhere and just keeping her head down. it's what vivian was hoping. >> i believed that lesley would come home. i went to sleep every night and imagine i could hear the doorbell ring, i could imagine that there were knocks on the door, i imagined the phone would ring. >> reporter: she believed it because vivian knew something aasha didn't know, something vivian didn't tell the detectives right away, that lesley had spoken openly to her mother months earlier about some people who could help her just vanish, an underground. she mentioned going underground. >> yes, she did. >> reporter: did she seem serious about going underground? >> yes. she wanted to leave. >> reporter: as much as he knew her family wanted to believe that, detective chris gable knew it didn't make sense. >> you would bring something. she had a lot of cash she left behind. she would certainly have her migraine medication. for all intents and purposes from what we could tell there was nothing -- she took nothing with her. >> reporter: and one week after lesley was a no-show at work, their investigation changed course. remember that starbucks receipt police found in lesley's handbag, gable and his partner vicky bynum got their first look at a security camera showing the cash register at the exact time the purchase was made. i'm guessing you watched that video several times. >> oh, yeah. >> reporter: it's pretty clear video, and it's pretty clear that it isn't lesley. >> and lo and behold, it's lyle herring. lyle herring by himself, no wife, with his long dreadlock hair, and he purchases a single item. >> reporter: he doesn't buy another cup for somebody who might be waiting outside? >> no, and we're looking for that, obviously. >> reporter: you're thinking you weren't meant to find it in lesley's purse? >> i suspected so, and as the investigation moved forward, i knew. that's what we were expected to find it there. >> reporter: three more days passed, an instant in hollywood, an eternity for aasha and her family. and then the bolo got a hit. lyle herring had been stopped at the mexican border. not fleeing but returning to the united states. the detectives dropped everything and headed south. you don't want to wait till the next day. >> oh, no, our spidey senses were up thinking that something could be awry. we didn't know, so we needed to get down there and talk to him. i'm chris gable. and we needed to find out if lesley was with him, if not, where is she? and what does he know? >> reporter: finally the detectives heard a story from lyle that explained just about everything. he confirmed what his mother-in-law had told the cops, that he and lesley had been fighting that weekend, they'd been fighting a lot, but this time he said was different. lesley had apparently had about enough of him. and lyle said that when he woke up in their apartment that sunday morning, lesley was gone. >> did she leave to go to the store and never came back? what happened? >> she just got up and left. >> reporter: the detectives were surprised to hear all this from a closely cropped lyle herring. a man who had been known for years for his long dreadlocks. lyle explained to the detectiveses that he owed money to some gang members and that when he couldn't pay them back, he held him down and cut off his hair. >> they cut my hair, thecut my mustache. next we're going to cut you. >> reporter: you used to work the gang unit. >> yes. >> reporter: have you ever heard of a gang holding someone down and giving them a haircut as a way of getting money that they wanted? >> not only haven't i heard of that, but the shave was a little added touch that i had never heard. a little hard to keep a straight face when i heard that. >> reporter: lyle said before she dumped him he and lesley had planned a valentine's day vacation in mexico and he'd gone to look for her a week after she disappeared. >> so you went so far to look for her? >> it was stupid, right? >> no, it was not stupid at all. if it was me i'd be looking for my wife wherever i could. >> reporter: but lyle had come up empty. >> do you have any idea where your wife is? >> i do not. >> reporter: then gable asked lyle if during his search he had tried to phone or e-mail his wife. listen to lyle's answer. >> i called her but i believe -- i can't verify this in my mind, but i guess you can verify it with my cell phone. you can check my cell phone records. >> reporter: he volunteered check my cell phone records. >> yes. >> reporter: did you think he want meese to see his cell phone records the same way he wanted me to see the starbucks receipt? >> yes. >> reporter: suspicious? yes. but proof of a crime? not even close. lyle herring was not under arrest for anything. but gable was able to seize lyle's suv. he then brought in indiana bones from the l.a. county coroner's office, a german shepherd trained to sniff out the scent of human decomposition. they sent the dog through lyle's suv and also through a classic cadillac he owned. in both vehicles, she stopped in her tracks and alerted. the dog told you that at one time a dead body had been in the back of lyle's car? >> correct. >> reporter: that's when you know lesley's dead? >> yes, now i know she's dead. >> reporter: gable did not share that with lesley's family because he wasn't close to closing this case. there was still so much he didn't have, a crime scene, a witness or the one thing most homicide investigations begin with -- a body. had you ever done a murder case in which you didn't have a dead bod sne. >> no, this is the first one. >> reporter: you'd never done that before? >> no, i never had. >> reporter: the herring case wasn't going to be easy. so detective gable decided he needed a little help from the media. he held a press conference, but this would be a press conference unlike any you've ever seen. it would be pure theater worthy of hollywood. everyone would be there. detectives, family, even the prime suspect. coming up -- lesley's husband center stage in a command performance. >> he didn't want to speak. >> i'd like to introduce lyle herring. >> our captain said the next person to speak is lyle herring. i think he had no choice at this point. and exciting new brands you'll want to know. many on sale now, at 20-40% off. you add the kids, the pets, the craziness, the laughter, and the love. ♪ [ sneezes ] you're probably muddling through allergies. try zyrtec® for powerful allergy relief. and zyrtec® is different than claritin® because it starts working faster on the first day you take it. zyrtec®. love the air. that everyone should have access to good nutrition. so they're donating two meals to feeding america for every purchase of one a day women's multivitamins. help families across america get nutrition they need. buy one a day women's, make a difference. [ camera shutter clicks ] ♪ ♪ [ camera shutter clicking ] ♪ [ male announcer ] meet the best low-light smartphone camera. [ camera shutter clicking ] better than iphone. better than galaxy. the windows phone nokia lumia 928. ♪ and struggle to sleep comfortably together, now there's a solution. introducing sleep number dual temp, the revolutionary temperature-balancing layer with active air technology that works on any mattress, including yours. whether you sleep hot or cool, sleep number dual temp allows each of you to select your ideal temperature. and it's only at one of our over 400 sleep number stores nationwide. sleep number. comfort individualized. lesley herring was still missing. she hadn't turned up dead or alive. now detectives turn to lesley's family with a request, and it wasn't an easy one. that you and your mom all give police a dna sample. >> mm-hmm. >> reporter: now, you know that when police get to that point -- >> yeah. >> reporter: they're probably not looking for a live person any more. >> that was -- >> reporter: hard to do? >> yeah. it's like you end up talking and dealing with all these morbid things, talking about finding bodies and where is she? what kind of ending did she have? >> reporter: those were questions detective gable had, too. questions he wasn't close to answering. so 44 days after lesley went missing, the lapd held what started as press conference and ended as something quite different. >> i thank you all for being here this morning. >> reporter: gable's hope that getting lesley's story in the news might jog someone's memory in a way that would roll the investigation forward. aasha and her entire family were there. and so was lyle. did you think he was going to speak at the press conference? >> he didn't want to speak. >> i'd like to introduce lyle herring, the husband of lesley at this time. >> our captain just went ahead and said the next person to speak is lyle herring. i think he had no choice at that point. >> if lesley's out there, please give us a call, let us know what's going on. >> reporter: then it was aasha's turn. >> very unusual for her not to be in touch with her family. she's a creature of habit. and this is why her disappearance is so alarming to us. >> reporter: for aasha, the actress, this day played out more strangely than any script she had ever followed. >> the press conference was really difficult because it was the first time i was going to see lyle since it happened. >> reporter: how did you not run up to him and start shaking him? >> to me, approach everything with love. i didn't think shaking him was going to get an answer. you know, i hugged him like i always do when i see him. >> reporter: but that didn't work either. >> no. >> she did not run away. >> reporter: unlike his sister, aasha and lesley's brother did not approach lyle with love. >> i would like you, lyle, to tell me what's going on here because we came a long way to know what's going on. this is killing our family. >> reporter: through it all stood lyle herring, either a husband worried about his wife or a killer worried about being caught. >> i'm the lead investigator for this case. >> reporter: when detective gable began to speak, a reporter asked if lyle was being helpful in the search for his missing wife. >> has he been cooperative? >> reporter: i would describe his cooperation as fragmented and less than helpful. >> reporter: at one point reporters asked detective gable is lyle cooperating? and with lyle standing right there detective gable says, not really. >> i was, you know, just floored by what was happening. >> reporter: and gable wasn't done laying out the inconsistencies in lyle's story to an audience of eager listeners that included lyle. >> he left the condominium on tuesday, the following tuesday and went down to san diego to apply for a job at some colleges down there. following that, he went down to mexico for a day. >> reporter: then reporters turned on lyle. >> less than cooperative? those are some rather charged statements. >> reporter: lyle told gable he did not want to answer. >> i need an opportunity to speak. >> reporter: and lyle took it. >> we will be taking things out of context. okay? i had an opportunity to take a trip -- we've had an opportunity to take a trip to mexico to celebrate for valentine's day. i went down there to look for her. look for all the places that i thought she would be. that's one of the places that we had planned to go, okay? so for you -- for detective gable to take out of context and throw that out there arbitrarily, he went to mexico, yes, to look for my wife. >> reporter: but gable had never believed that lyle went to mexico to look for lesley. >> it's obvious he's lying and i can see he's lying. >> reporter: seeing through lyle's lies was one thing, but what gable really needed was a break. i kind of get the feeling that what you were hoping for with that press conference was not somebody who had seen lesley alive but maybe somebody who had seen lyle in the process of moving or disposing of her body? >> yes, that's what i was hoping for. >> reporter: somebody you maybe hadn't talked to before? >> correct. >> reporter: and it paid off. >> it paid off immediately. >> reporter: thank you very much for coming down. coming up -- what a new witness claims he saw, a stunning revelation. >> you think that was lesley? >> absolutely. >> then what little sister aasha believes could have changed everything. >> i really, really wish she had, yeah. i do. coming up wednesday on "dateline" -- >> i just started screaming. somebody get us out of here. >> it was a nightmare of an accident, a car crushed and left teetering off the side of a bridge. inside a young mother and her two children. she didn't know if they were dead or alive. >> we've got two trapped. one can't breathe. >> and rescuers didn't know how to save any of them. >> it was hard to wrap your head around it at first. >> i remember screaming at him, you can't get us out. you can't. >> what were the chances they'd make it out alive? >> we're going to fall. and my baby who is crying in the back has no idea if this is the last moments of her life. are four times more likely to get into an accident? 'sup the more you know, the better you can plan for what's ahead. talk to farmers and get smarter about your insurance. ♪ we are farmers bum - pa - dum, bum - bum - bum -bum ♪ ♪ [ snoring ] [ male announcer ] zzzquil™ sleep-aid. [ both snoring ] [ male announcer ] it's not for colds. it's not for pain. it's just for sleep. [ snoring ] [ male announcer ] because sleep is a beautiful thing™. ♪ zzzquil™. the non-habit forming sleep-aid from the makers of nyquil®. ♪ the nonit's a new worldleep-aid from of wonder.et, nyquil®. at petsmart, the destination for everything reptile. during reptile mega month, save up to 20% on select terrariums from top brands. and save 50% on all ball pythons. at petsmart®. a talking car. but i'll tell you what impresses me. a talking train. this ge locomotive can tell you exactly where it is, what it's carrying, while using less fuel. delivering whatever the world needs, when it needs it. ♪ after all, what's the point of talking if you don't have something important to say? ♪ if you don't have something important to say? what that's great. it won't take long, will it? no. okay. this, won't take long will it? no, not at all. how many of these can we do on our budget? more than you think. that didn't take very long, did it? summer's here, so are the savings. that's nice. post it. already did. more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot. buy ortho home defense max with comfort wand and get ortho bug-b-gon max free. gather. we're going to get quiet and think about her. and all about her today. >>. >> reporter: in the weeks after that surreal press conference, aasha davis continued getting the word out about her sister lesley herring. lyle herring continued to play the part of the grieving husband. inside hollywood station, detectives gable and bynum were continuing to put the case together against lyle. one with no dna, no blood and still no body. but there was evidence that came in tiny little pieces. they'd found an undated dear john type letter that lesley had written to lyle saying she was leaving him, that she was broken. and detectives finally got those cell phone records that lyle was so eager for them to see. >> here we have february 7th. there is their condominium right here. this is the south side tower. >> reporter: turns the out that lyle did call lesley after the time he said she'd run off, but the records had more details than lyle expected. >> there was activity between both phones, that part is true. >> reporter: but ? >> but the problem was where the phones were located. based off the cell towers, we were able to show the phones were in the same location. >> reporter: lyle was holding his phone in the other hand and dialing lesley's phone which was in his other hand? >> exactly. >> reporter: then came the lead spawned by that press conference. >> thank you very much for coming down. >> reporter: a neighbor from the condo complex had seen lyle herring getting into the elevator at around 12:30 a.m. sunday on that weekend that lesley disappeared. lyle was moving what looked like a big rolled-up carpet. >> how like the diameter, would you say? >> it was pretty thick. no, it was round, like round enough for a body to be inside it. >> reporter: you think that was lesley inside that carpet? >> absolutely. >> reporter: it would take more than a year, but in april 2010, lyle herring was finally arrested and charged with the murder of his wife lesley. it would take three more years to get to trial. >> over the next few weeks, my colleague here and i are going to present to you the layered web of evidence that caught him, put him in this courtroom and proves beyond a reasonable doubt that that man, that calculating husband, that killer, is the defendant, lyle herring. >> reporter: what do you think happened? >> i learned throughout the investigation that one of the thingses that lyle does when they're having arguments is that he washes lesley's hair. >> reporter: as a way of what? >> getting back into her good graces. >> reporter: gable believes the herring's bathtub was the real crime scene. >> and i believe that they were talking about the letter that he had already received, and she was likely adamant what she was leaving. he would have no part of that. and i think he just pushed her under. >> reporter: and drowned her right there. remember all those towels gable saw? he believed lyle used them to mop up the bathroom, then he wrapped up lesley, put her on the dolly and had the bad luck to run into a neighbor in the elevator that night. the defense said none of that happened, that lyle was not guilty because lesley wasn't murdered. she's not even dead. >> i don't want you to expect or hold me to any promise that there's going to be some perry mason moment and lesley will walk through the door and say, here i am, but i will tell you at the conclusion of this trial, there will be more than sufficient evidence to believe that she in fact could. >> i wish they were right. let me say that. i would love to be hugging my sister, and i wish that were true, but i know who she is and i know she's not alive. >> reporter: after a 3 1/2-week trial, a jury agreed with aasha. >> we the jury in the above-entitled action find the defendant lyle stanford herring sr. guilty of the crime of murder. >> reporter: this morning lyle herring was sentenced to 15 years to life for murder in the second degree. it's not quite the end because lyle is holding on to one last secret from a marriage that apparently had a lot of them. he's never told anyone where lesley's body is. lyle's probably going to see this program. >> i know. >> reporter: anything you want to say to him? >> yes. we pray that you will tell us where lesley is so we can have closure in our life. we know that you know exactly where she is. >> reporter: through her pain and loss, aasha is trying to find a lesson. >> it's so important to me that women or anyone who's fearful about what other people are going to think about the way they're living their life, it's hard to not live up to what we think is success, but it's so much more important that you share even your sadness with people. >> reporter: you wish lesley had talked to you? >> i really, really wish she had, yeah, i do. i don't think i'd be here right now. take one. >> reporter: but aasha has also had an opportunity to bring some laughter back into this family. >> hi. >> reporter: she's starring in a web series called "the unwritten rules." >> why can't the people in my office think for themselves? >> reporter: it's a comedy about a black woman working one of those deathly dull jobs in a mostly white office. it's a little bit like lesley's life. >> and i read those scripts, and i just -- like i felt lesley. i felt her in my heart. i laughed again the way she used to make me laugh. >> so soft and real. >> reporter: and so one sister is paying homage to another. it won't bring lesley back, but it makes her loss a little less painful. in this hollywood story, it's the only happy ending that's available. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." we'll see you again for