reporter: did you wash your hands before saying that to police? no, i absolutely not. i never washed my hands until they said, go wash your hands. reporter: conrad s attorneys were working hard to establish reasonable doubt, and the state medical examiner s shifting opinion on heidy s manner of death only helped them. that s your case right there. you would think. reporter: i mean, if he has reasonable doubt, hard to argue a jury shouldn t. exactly. reporter: the medical examiner told the jury that in the final analysis, he didn t know the manner of heidy truman s death. i finalized the autopsy report with the cause of death as gunshot wound and the manner of death as could not be determined. reporter: the m.e. also testified how, in his experience, a contact wouldn t like heidy s is rare in homicide cases. with the contact gunshot wound, it would be consistent with a wound that s self-inflicted. reporter: after 15 days of testimony, the jury began deliberations.
and, according to the medical examiner, that was impossible. he testified heidy s head wound was so severe that she could have at most walked a step or two. this issue of distance was this big issue. reporter: now for ann taliaferro, just seeing the house and how small it was was proof enough that the prosecution s argument didn t hold up. when you walk in the house, there s no way that there s even 12 feet there. reporter: what s more, according to the defense team, conrad never told the police heidy shot herself in the bathroom. instead he told them he had no idea where she was when he heard the shot. tell me your theory of what happened here. we believe that heidy truman shot herself in this very area, and we believe that she fell right in the area directly in front of me on the ground, and that s the very area where she was found when law enforcement entered the home that night. reporter: which they also said was completely consistent
and it s pretty small. it is. it s really small. we immediately started measuring, and we knew right away that there was a big problem with their diagrams and the measurements. reporter: the problem? all those measurements were off. instead of 139 inches, somebody took the figure 139 and interpreted it to be 13.9 feet. 33 inches became 3.3 feet. and on and on and on. reporter: according to moffat, those flawed measurements, which were used in court, made the house appear much bigger than it was. they used the theme of distance to argue that mr. truman was lying about where he said his wife was when he heard what turned out to be this fatal shot. reporter: at trial, the prosecution argued, to believe conrad, you d have to believe heidy shot herself in the bathroom and then walked 12 feet before falling to the floor.
think so. reporter: at just 20, heidy started working in the not entirely feminine gas and chemical industry just outside salt lake city. sandi sanchez was one of heidy s co-workers. we worked with hazardous chemicals and gasses. crazy things that you wouldn t expect a couple of girls to want to do. reporter: heidy seemed to thrive in a workplace that favored hard hats over heels. it was dangerous if you didn t follow the rules. in fact, quote from heidy, everything is dangerous, it s just what will kill you the quickest. reporter: to sandi, heidy became more than a co-worker. i considered her my best friend. she s a person that you knew into never stab you in the back. she s a person that you knew would always have your back. reporter: in person she could be both, sweet and salty, and that caught the attention of one of her colleagues, 25-year-old conrad truman. i noticed her first in the hallway. reporter: what did you think? i thought she was cute, and i noticed
at some point conrad heard a pop, and when he turned, he saw heidy standing somewhere between the kitchen and the bathroom hallway bleeding. and he either runs over and catches her or she falls down. reporter: wallace then went back to the truman home, making detailed measurements of the kitchen and surrounding rooms. he wanted to see if conrad s story checked out. his conclusion it did not. her body s at the top of the staircase. it doesn t add up that she would have traveled that distance he said she had gone then fallen in that location. reporter: it was hard for wallace to believe that heidy could have traveled from the bathroom to the stairs after sustaining such a head wound. she would have fallen immediately to the ground. reporter: wallace shared his findings with assistant district attorney craig johnson. johnson agreed. everything pointed to conrad. why would conrad truman want to kill his wife? under the circumstances, i d