a mother. and now her body lay at the bottom of the basement stairs. it was devastating. reporter: if ever there was a woman who took life in big gulps, it was annamarie cochrane rintala. even as a little girl growing up amidst a big irish-italian family in springfield, mass, she d loved the limelight. pasquale martin is her uncle. the first time i had seen her take the stage and sing mambo italiano, it just knocked me out. reporter: not afraid of the spotlight, huh? nah, she loved it. reporter: she could belt it out to the rafters but was she any good? her friends t.j. donahue and mary petrone are diplomatic. she thought so. she was oh. no, i she could carry a tune. but she thought she was much better than she actually was. it didn t really matter because she it didn t. head the charia
and so we have to practice safety everyday. utilizing pg&e s talent and expertise in that area trains our firefighters on the gas or electric aspect of a fire and when we have an emergency situation we are going to be much more skilled and prepared to mitigate that emergency for all concerned. the things we do every single day that puts ourselves in harm s way, and to have a partner that is so skilled at what they do is indispensable, and i couldn t ask for a better partner. reporter: after two hung juries, the prosecutors in cara rintala s third murder trial weren t taking any chances. this time, they added a lesser charge manslaughter. did it mean you didn t believe in your case as much or you wanted to salvage half a loaf out of this thing? we thought there s no harm in giving this jury yet another option of a verdict of guilty.
gym, a 30-minute drive from the rintala home, about 3:00 p.m. the afternoon of the murder. said she went out for a long run. then left the gym at 7:00 p.m. investigators located security images that supported her account. is carla s alibi rock solid? or does it have a window for foul play? i would say it s pretty rock solid unless she had access to a helicopter. reporter: that left investigators with one remaining suspect, the one who d topped their list since the night of the murder. the person who knew ann best, who loved her, and who fought with her cara. because as sunny as these two seemed in public, sometimes behind closed doors they went after one another. as cara admitted in her police interview. we d argue and it would get physical, absolutely. and i m no angel.
an extraordinary journey through the criminal justice system was just beginning. reporter: coming up little evidence, but some odd behavior when cara saw her wife at the bottom of the stairs. cara s a paramedic. what does she do? does she rush down there, oh, my god, ann! are you okay? no. when dateline continues. when you have a cold stuff happens.
in 2008 ann had cara arrested for assault. she dropped the charges. but a year later, each woman filed for divorce, with ann asking for custody of daughter brianna. within weeks, each applied for a restraining order against the other. brianna was caught in the middle. when the other would try to pull brianna away, that was problematic. reporter: so the child was the glue that held them together, but it was mm-hmm. reporter: also the source of a lot of this friction, huh? correct. reporter: money was an issue, as it so often was with ann. cara was frugal. ann, free-spending. and between them, a growing pile of debt. their finances were now starting to become commingled. and ann s debt and ann s spending problems were part starting to become a problem for cara too. reporter: but in early 2010, they were together, working hard on their marriage. in february they went on a cruise.