i told them that david and i were swingers. and suddenly the investigation turned on its heel and headed in a whole new direction. they would meet couples on the internet. and her husband would prearrange it, then they would engage in some type of sexual relation with the couple itself. did that make your investigative mind click? the person who shot david shannon might be familiar with joan shannon. maybe the swinger lifestyle might have had something to do with that. finally, a possible lead. had the shannons unusual sex life created a motive for murder? coming up, an intriguing new lead. david actually said, you need to meet my wife joan. was there a fatal love triangle in this circle of swingers? when dateline continues. [ giggling ] let s play dress-up.
or why. and there weren t many clues either, at least not in plain sight. but that wasn t necessarily because the killer covered his tracks. the home was cluttered. there was filth, clothes all over the floor. dishes in the sink. food on the counter tops. and the crime scene itself, what did that look like? finding evidence is like, you know, finding a needle in a haystack. the house was in such disarray. the cops picked their way carefully through the clutter but found no fingerprints, footprints, or any usable dna. though on the floor near david s body, they found two live bullets from a .9 millimeter semi-automatic handgun. joan confirmed david kept guns in the house but couldn t say where those two live rounds came from. she also tried to help police make sense of the shadow images her waking eyes saw.
way of shattering what seems to be. and now the shannon family secrets were spilling out. of course you can have no idea what might exist behind the photo of family values. that s what detectives are for, after all. the shannons may have moved to the bible belt, here to fayetteville, north carolina. lots of churches here. but there are also other activities that occurred at night that had nothing whatever to do with family values. joan and david shannon were swingers. enthusiastic members of clubs whose sole purpose is to organize various combinations of spouse swapping. as joan told the police, she and david had been swinging for years, long before moving to north carolina. fayetteville, after dark, to their happy surprise, offered plenty of fresh opportunities to continue their lifestyle, as it s called.
shannon s own mother and sister insisted, elizabeth was a devious and manipulative liar. especially when she got herself in a jam. so it didn t sound surprising that liz would try to set up her mom like that. because as a child, if there was trouble, liz was usually there. but she always had to share the blame. she blamed somebody else? oh, yeah. even if she was caught red handed? absolutely. elizabeth always shared the blame. so now joan shannon s fate would be decided by a jury. da billy west told them about joan and david s swinging lifestyle. joan s affair. jeffrey wilson s claim she wanted to run away with him financed with insurance money from david s death. then there was the allegation that joan tried to poison david. and testimony from a young man who insisted joan asked elizabeth to recruit him to commit the murder and dispose of the gun.
and did it lead to murder? she is absolutely cold-blooded. soon, there would be questions for mother and daughter. it was another shock. welcome to dateline. army, when he was attacked in the middle of the night, police launched an investigation that would reveal eyebrow raising secrets, secrets that might hold the key to murder. here is keith morrison. the wind in the northern prairie sweeps across a vast flatland. grave markers around a military ceremony. the final resting spot for a few dozen veterans, many of whom died in combat. this is where he is resting now. major david shannon, who lost