i went in shock. alls i can remember is people jumping up and down like cheerleaders. i didn t know until afterwards that i told them to shut up. as they left the courtroom, the reality of what had happened sank in. back inside, alex says he felt far from victorious. there s not much to be excited about. emily is still gone. and my kids don t have their mother. i felt completely unchanged. i was innocent when i walked in the courtroom and i m innocent when i walk out of the courtroom. so what s there to high five about? you know there are people that are never going to believe you re innocent. yeah. i m very aware. you re okay with that? i m not okay with it. i can t let it bother me. i m not going to let what somebody says keep me from holding my head up high. emily s parents are among those who still believe in
how would you describe emily fazzino in the months leading up to her death? sad. why was emily fazzino sad, do you know? cause she wanted, she wanted to get away from alex. reporter: the children s nanny also recounted a conversation with emily just before her death. i asked emily two questions. the first one was if she was scared of alex. what was emily s response? her response was yes. what was the second one? i had asked her if she was worried that alex would harm her or kill her. what was emily s response? she nodded her head yes. reporter: less than a week later, emily fazzino was dead. prosecutors said there was only one conclusion: alex murdered his wife. the only explanation here after looking at all the evidence, all the circumstances, is that the head injuries were inflicted, and who would ve done that.
reporter: finally, in december, 2011, two months before her death, emily reached out to her mom for help. did she say she had become addicted to this painkiller? i don t know if she used the word addiction, but she had felt like she was abusing it. and alex was upset about it. reporter: emily s doctors had recommended inpatient rehab. instead she decided to detox at her mother s house, and to hide it from alex and the kids by saying she had mono. the reason is because they were scared of what it would do to their image. is the reason that you put out this cover story about emily having mono, is that because sending her to rehab would ve been some kind of embarrassment to your family and you didn t want your name tarnished? absolutely not. we ve always done the best thing for our children, and it was emily s desire to keep it from alex.
thing, the voice was telling me something different. what was the voice telling you? she was scared. there was something wrong. reporter: they hung up around 6:00 p.m. two hours later, emily would be dead. i will never forget that phone call. because that was the last time i heard her voice. reporter: for investigator schnitker, a new picture was emerging. a marriage in shambles, a husband pushed to the edge. maybe this wasn t an accident or suicide. maybe it was murder. it seems hard to believe that alex would kill his wife and his kids are just a couple of rooms away. but that s if you re thinking that this is well thought out you know, oftentimes couples get in arguments and they escalate and somebody dies. you had seen your wife endanger her life.
been prosecuted. that was where you came down right, was from the beginning, was that the case shouldn t have been brought? absolutely not. i took that position because of the lack of evidence. alex fazzino was totally innocent. there s no more pressure than when you if you have an innocent person that you re trying to defend on this kind of a charge, first-degree murder. reporter: kutmus says that from the beginning, prosecutors targeted alex and refused to consider anything else. they reviewed all the information, the toxicology reports, everything associated with her death. they concluded, we don t know what the cause of death is. we don t know the manner of death. and what happened almost a year and a half later, the state finds some guy from sioux falls, south dakota, a pathologist who said that the manner of death was was a homicide. they found this person. reporter: kutmus stated his case to the jury. emily fazzino passed away as a result of an accidental dro