disappearance, they learned that gavin had troubles he kept hidden. the man who seemed to have it all struggled with addiction. he also had serious financial problems detectives were far from answers, but that would change when someone gave them a name that led to a crucial discovery. here s keith morrison with more. reporter: like it or not it s a fact, an element of human nature. some people have affairs. some of them just flings and others a lot more. as detective ty poked through gavin s life, one name kept popping up, chandy. her full name, chandrika creech. she d already told the detectives that she and gavin had an affair years earlier and that he called her right before he vanished. but now, nine months after gavin disappeared, the detectives got a tip. her father knew more.
expect the worst, you think that you can t be shocked, but you can be is all i can say about that. reporter: but if gavin was dead, and certainly it looked that way, where was his body? how did his car wind up in the storage locker? and above all, who would have wanted him dead? reina lim certainly seemed an unlikely suspect. she told them she had rented the storage unit for someone else. meanwhile, detectives looked further into chandy s affair with gavin and discovered the two had met in rehab. and in december 2010, less than two years before gavin disappeared, lisa found out about it. i was heartbroken. reporter: so she took an extreme step to save her family. she and two of her sons, then 14 and 20, went to the creech s house to speak to them, family to family. and i was really upset when we were driving there. so i stayed in the car, and i let my sons go in the house.
phone? yes. reporter: but chandy said she didn t see him may 1st, hadn t heard from him since. last sighting? a colleague saw him driving his black mercedes. we felt that the vehicle was still out there somewhere. reporter: so find the car and maybe find out what happened to gavin. and nine months after gavin vanished, they finally got the break they were looking for. i said, i m here to talk to you about your daughter. and he started crying. and he said, she saw everything. coming up we just waited until she showed up and kind of surprised her. she was very nervous, startled. a new witness and the game-changer of a clue. i kissed my partner on the cheek. it was pretty exciting. it was a big piece of evidence. you think that you can t be shocked, but you can be. when dark valley continues. ( )
bobby grace. you don t normally find a body two years later after somebody is killed. you don t normally have key witnesses who don t come forward until years later. reporter: in january 2015, nearly three years after gavin smith disappeared, creech was charged with first degree murder. he pleaded not guilty. and chandy, well we didn t know if she set it up or if she had something to do with it. coming up an undercover sting and chandy s the target. and i was like, stop it. i was like screaming my head off. and then he comes out of the car and he s like, you re next! then, a stunning moment in the courtroom. i wanted to get away. i was scared. i was afraid of what i would see. when dark valley continues.
reporter: but as much as he loved his boys, detectives learned gavin had been unfaithful to his wife, had been seeing a woman named melanie, and now that gavin had disappeared without a trace we went to talk to her and to see if she had any information. did she? no. the relationship had ended, and she had not talked to him, and she had no idea where he was at. reporter: but though melanie was the reason gavin moved out of his house a month before he vanished, she was not his first affair. there had also been a woman named chandy. that relationship was years in the past, but phone records showed gavin called her on may 1st, the day before he disappeared. cops tracked her down, too. what did she tell you? she acknowledged the prior affair, and she said that she had not been in contact with him for some time, but then they started communicating via e-mail. and that would explain the fact that he called her on the