drive 21 1/2 hours. edward ates lawyer tried to show that his client was not in new jersey at the time of paul dunsac s murder and he wasn t in any physical shape to be killing anyone. but edward ates still had to explain away the rest of the prosecution s case. they have nothing. and he was willing to do just that in a jailhouse interview with dateline during a break in his trial. for starters, he said that drive he and his wife had taken from florida a week before paul dunsac s death was not a reconnaissance as the prosecution claimed. it was rather an innocent vacation up north with a detour into new jersey to make sure his daughter, stacey, had her children and her former husband paul did not. wait a second. your daughter s moved out. yeah. she s got her own little place with the kids. there s no reason to go to the house at all, right? other than to make sure he was really on vacation. we felt guilty. is he really on vacation? were you smooping on him? no, what
didn t do it. just as had he with dateline, edward ates told the jury his version of those computer searches and the trip north a week before paul dunsac s death. but in so doing, he left himself open to the prosecution s cross-examination. you had murdered paul dunsac in cold blood, fled that scene driving to your mother s home. isn t that the truth? no, sir, that s not true. the victim s brother said he listened to ed ates testimony in utter disbelief. he was praying the jurors had too. you knew he was lying. i did not kill paul dunsac. you knew, you just felt he did. but it was ed ates shifting alibi for the crime that the prosecutor believed would undo the florida man. when he changed from i was in louisiana on tuesday to i was in louisiana on wednesday, that was
a mammoth sea change that the jury, i fellt, would never buy. it was the big lie. he has lied to you again and again and again. in his closing, the prosecutor theorized for the jury just why edward ates had gone to such lengths to kill paul dunk sack. it was for his daughter, stacey, whose life had been in freefall ever since her divorce from the victim. she really has nowhere to go. her father, the protector, wants her back and wants those grandchildren in florida. and so long as paul dunsac is alive, that will not be, and i think in part, ed ates viewed this manner as he just needed killing. look at ed. you look at him. all wrong, replied the defense. it closed its case by underscoring again why ed ates couldn t be the killer. he had no motive and was too unhealthy to kill paul dunsac
and flee the scene as police claimed and he couldn t have been in two places at one. in new jersey when paul dunsac was dying and in louisiana where a neighbor named matlock clearly identified him. matlock saw him and his car there wednesday night. august 23rd. now it was the jury s case, but it wouldn t take long. just a little more than a day for it to render a verdict. what is your verdict? guilty. the 12 men and women who had heard the case agreed ed ates had in fact murdered his former son-in-law paul dunsac. his too fat to kill defense may have won points for being original but these two jurors said the panel rejected it completely. he held his hand out, shot a gun and went to the neighbor s yard and got in a car and drove. they found the prosecution s evidence circumstantial though it was pointed overwhelmingly to the man s guilt. the computer searches, the sister s testimony, the mystery trip to new jersey. he knew the comings and