yes. and younger sister terry, even though she had suspected mike for years do you still think of mike lubahn sr. as a part of your family? yes. but most anguished of all, mike and carol s son, mike junior. is there anything about the way you remember your mom that would make you think or made you feel that she would leave you and never come back and never say good-bye? no. he loved his dad. but also secretly doubted him. something he d never revealed n until now. i was sweating so profusely during that whole trial. he never knew i had these feelings so on the stand publicly, i had to basically say, yeah, i am thinking maybe there s some weird things about your story and it was the first time that my father really would have known i felt that way.
isn t it true, mr. lubahn, that the last place that carol lived, her last breath, was taken in that bathtub when you murdered her? what are you looking at the judge because i m waiting for him to correct you. no. i didn t murder her. i m sorry. in the bathtub? and mr. lubahn, if you had murder her, you would tell us today if i asked? i would have admitted it. you would admit it on the stand today? yes. do you think that statement s believable? i think so. i m done. of course, believeability was a question for the jury to decide. and decide they did. though as you ll see, that wasn t the end of the story. not by a mile. coming up, a final push for the truth.
deputy d.a. john lewin went ahead anyway. what i m going to be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, ladies and gentlemen, is that despite the fact that mike lubahn is a decent man, he murdered his wife. of course, lewin knew that to prove a murder occurred he had to show the victim was, in fact, no longer alive. for that he turned to detective wallace who explained to the jury the facebook and social media presence he created for carol had turned up a whole lot of nothing. have you been contacted by anybody, either by phone, e-mail, in writing, who says, you know what, i ve seen carol lubahn after the day she disappeared? no. reporter: though as lewin and the team also let the jury hear, family members like carol s sister, gail, believed what mike told them that carol had run off.
welcome back to dateline. i m craig melvin. detectives believed mike lubahn was on the verge of confessing to the murder of his wife carol, but then he refused to talk, and the investigation hit a wall. without a body, how could they prove there was a murder at all? the answer would sent the investigators into an unexpected direction. could facebook help them find out what really happen tod carrel? here again is keith mower here again is keith morrison with secrets in the mist. deputy d.a. john lewen and the cold-case team believed mike lubahn killed his wife carol back in 1981. but they had one big problem. they couldn t prove carol was dead. the biggest assumption is going to be how do you know she gent across the country or changed her identity? kind of an important question with no answer.
because he never talked about my mother. at all? never. but mike never confronted his father. i just knew in the back of my mind that this could be a possibility, and i really honestly at that time, i never wanted my father to go to jail. i just wanted to know. it was so important to me the truth behind that evening. to get the truth and avoid a trial, prosecutor john lewen was willing to make a deal. we had offered him voluntary manslaughter if he gave us carol s body. and he turned you down flat? he did, repeatedly. mike pleaded not guilty. the case was going to trial. and if members of carol s own family didn t believe mike did it, what would a jury think? coming up, the accused on the stand. isn t it true, mr. lubahn, that carol lived her last breath in that bathtub when you murdered her?