as the trees that reach for the sky. >> i think she's dead! >> it eats at me. i can't sleep most of the time. >> reporter: a crime like a storm -- everyone could see it coming. >> everybody in town has their suspicions. >> she was missing -- the matriarch with a grip on the family's powerful fortune. did someone have a powerful motive to do her harm? >> i saw bruises on bonnie's arms, like someone had grabbed her. >> she looked at him and said "you tried to kill me." >> who was behind this? a search in the dark. >> right there, right there! >> a secret in the family. and a jailhouse interview to make your jaw drop! >> reporter: you said you wished she were dead. and then later, she became dead! >> i'm lester holt, and this "dateline" is a twisted tale deep in the heart of texas. >> people who are desperate will do desperate things. in this country power and mon and struggle to get hands on both, the saga of a proud texas family never as cold hearted as some of the people you're about to meet. this epic tale of greed and betrayal is set not in dallas, but in san saba, a tiny town in the texas hill country, and it stars a family that learned how to make money grow on trees -- pecan trees. at the heart of the matter, a feud fueled by a lust for land, stoked by a battle of generations, and front and center, the life and times of the matriarch -- bonnie harkey, who controlled a family fortune a century in the making. >> well, i always say she was queen of the county, because she was. she really was a big fish in a small pond. >> reporter: this is teresa cook, bonnie harkey's niece. >> they were well off and -- they were property owners. >> reporter: and by local standards, very wealthy. >> by local standards, sure. >> reporter: they were so prominent, in fact, that the harkey name is carved on monuments, painted on road signs in san saba. >> i'm the sixth generation in my family here in the county. >> reporter: dwight harkey says all the harkeys descended from two brothers who came to the hill country in the 1850's. >> well, there was two boys that came, and they were cavalry scouts, and they found this country, and nobody lived here. >> reporter: a proud family history, to be sure, but on march 25, 2012, a new and bloody chapter was added. >> i remember that sunday morning because of what happened the rest of the day. >> reporter: the events that would forever fix that day in the reverend sam crosby's memory, centered on 85-year-old bonnie harkey, an active member of the first baptist church of san saba. you could set your watch by bonnie harkey coming to church? >> you could. >> reporter: she'd be right here. >> she'd be right here. >> reporter: right. and even after she had to have 24 hour care, a caretaker would bring her. >> reporter: the trouble began a few hours after church out at the harkey home a few miles west of town. >> 911, what's your emergency? >> reporter: it was about 5:30, when the san saba sheriff's department dispatcher received this call from a young boy. >> i found my mom on the floor, um, she -- i think she's dead. i'm at the harkey residence. >> turns out, the 11-year old's mother was karen johnson, bonnie harkey's caretaker. >> and you don't know the address out there? >> no, ma'am. i'm just really, really worried. >> what phone are you using? >> um, i'm using bonnie's house phone. i can't find bonnie anywhere. >> reporter: within minutes, the san saba sheriff's department had deputies on the way. >> all right, i'm going to bonnie harkey's, right, out on 190 west? >> yes, sir. do you have an eta? >> five minutes. >> in a rural area where locals listen closely to police scanners, some worried deputies might be chasing some dangerous desperado. >> is there somebody loose that i should be -- >> oh, no, no, no. >> okay, i just was wondering, because they're all sitting up there near ms. harkey's place. >> reporter: the harkey place was a local landmark, and john wilkerson, a san saba sheriff's deputy in 2012, was among the first investigators to arrive. >> when i walked in, of course, karen johnson's body was lying face down in the doorway which raised some suspicion. >> reporter: sign of a struggle? >> you know, there really wasn't any clear signs of struggle. there was some questionable -- issues that were at play. >> reporter: like what? >> the fact that she was, you know, dead right by the front door. that just didn't make a whole lot of sense -- the fact that i found a broken fingernail on her hand. >> reporter: karen johnson's son, the boy who'd called 911, told investigators that he had been playing a video game in a spare bedroom all afternoon and had not heard or seen anything unusual. strange, but what also concerned the lawmen was the fact that bonnie harkey was not there. so you're thinking bonnie harkey is out there somewhere maybe in the orchards? >> that was the thought with sheriff brown. >> reporter: bonnie had serious health problems. she was frail, suffered from dementia. in short, she had to be found, and fast. >> sheriff brown had called in prison dogs. he had the dps helicopter out >> reporter: can't have gone far. >> correct. and that's -- that's what our thoughts were. >> reporter: by nightfall, word of bonnie harkey's disappearance had spread far and wide. her step son, bruce harkey, who'd been visiting his brother in fort worth that weekend, called the sheriff's office, wanting to know the details. >> this is bruce harkey. i'm getting some awful strange phone calls and i'm trying to figure out what the hell is going on. >> what are these calls in reference to, or -- >> she said they found some lady dead, and bonnie was missing, and something about allen having the road blocked off and everything? >> reporter: even bonnie's niece teresa in memphis heard the news within a few hours of that first 911 call. >> my mother and i always speak on sunday nights. and -- she had called me and said, "bonnie's missing." and -- we both kind of went "oh, no." >> reporter: teresa cook may have been hundreds of miles from where searchers were looking for bonnie harkey, but she says she knew right away that her aunt's disappearance was connected to the decades-long battle over the remains of the harkey fortune. not home invasion? >> no. her family. >> when we come back -- the search for the missing matriarch. >> i saw bruises on bonnie's arms, like someone had grabbed her! >> somebody sure seemed to know something. >> i might have some information about where bonnie harkey is. >> i was definitely concerned. >> reporter: if the "harkeys of nurse mariyam sabo knows a moment this pure... ...demands a lotion this pure. new gold bond pure moisture lotion. 24-hour hydration. no parabens, dyes, or fragrances. gold bond. champion your skin. we're carvana, the company who invented car vending machines and buying a car 100% online. now we've created a brand-new way for you to sell your car. whether it's a year old or a few years old. we wanna buy your car. so go to carvana and enter your license plate answer a few questions. and our techno wizardry calculates your car's value and gives you a real offer in seconds. when you're ready, we'll come to you, pay you on the spot and pick up your car, that's it. so ditch the old way of selling your car, and say hello to the new way at carvana. find your rhythm. your happy place. find your breaking point. then break it. every emergen-c gives you a potent blend of nutrients so you can emerge your best with emergen-c. >> reporter: if the "harkeys of san saba" were ever made into a television drama, it would be chock full of character actors. there'd be a gentleman farmer, a pair of impatient heirs-in-waiting, a ne'er-do-well grandson, his enabling girlfriend, and the rock of the family would be a white haired matriarch named bonnie harkey. >> she had book clubs. she was red hat society. she just constantly -- you know, socializing. >> reporter: there were roughly 200 acres to the harkey spread with valuable water rights along the san saba river, a rambling farm house and nearly 3,000 pecan trees. when people hear the harkey name in that part of the country, what do they think? >> you know, the harkeys were the somebodies in town. and you know -- i know bonnie enjoyed that. >> reporter: and maybe that was just the way she'd pictured it, back in 1963, when bonnie met and married riley harkey. at the time riley was a recently divorced father with two boys -- bonnie a single mom with a teenaged daughter of her own. >> that was a coup. you know, it was a coup. especially for -- a single mother who was really looking at having to either find a husband or work for the rest of her life. in the early '60s, it was tough to be a divorcee. it was tough to be a single mother. >> reporter: now, nearly 50 years later, the queen of the county was missing. searchers were still out in the orchards looking for bonnie harkey, when a resident who'd been listening to the police scanner called with a vital clue. >> i know things are crazy with everything going on right now, but i might have some information about where bonnie harkey is. >> reporter: the caller said she knew that bonnie harkey's 28-year-old grandson, carl, had visited her that very afternoon. >> i'm 99% sure carl pressley's involved. >> reporter: who's carl pressley? >> carl pressley is the adopted grandson of bonnie harkey. bonnie harkey had a daughter, connie. connie adopted carl pressley at a young -- at a very young age. >> reporter: when you hear that that call's come in, you're thinkin', "oh, this is"-- what? >> well, i was definitely concerned. >> reporter: why so much concern over a grandson's visit to his elderly grandmother? that's a tangled tale really, that begins with the way carl pressley came to join the harkey clan in the first place. >> connie said that she adopted him from a homeless woman, a homeless couple. they were living in a car. >> reporter: from a homeless couple. >> yeah. and that they couldn't take care of him and so they were willing to give him up for adoption. that's what i know. >> reporter: teresa says there was always something little bit "off" about carl. something that tended to make other people uncomfortable. >> it was very odd and very sad at the same time as he seemed to be a very lonely, needy child. very clingy child. and nobody really seemed to want him to cling to him. >> reporter: but teresa says there was nothing bonnie wouldn't do for carl. >> she'd buy carl a truck and he'd wreck the truck. and then she'd buy him another one. and -- he'd get a job. he'd lose a job she'd house him. he was stealing pecans from the harvest and selling them. i mean she was constantly bailing him out of one situation or another. giving him money. >> reporter: in spite of that, carl had a harder shell than anything that came out of these trees and was known to be verbally abusive to his grandmother if he didn't get what he wanted. teresa says that once, when she dropped by to visit bonnie, she had an unsettling encounter with carl, who was also there. >> everything i said he'd argue against. he just fought with me, fought with me. it was like he couldn't get along with anybody. and i saw bruises on bonnie's arms, like somebody had grabbed her. and little old ladies bruise so easily that i said to my mother on the phone, i said, "i would not be surprised if carl pushed her down the basement stairs." >> reporter: given that history, it was understandable, then that investigator's ears perked up once they learned that the last person to have seen bonnie harkey the day she went missing was carl pressley. >> we were pretty sure that -- if he we were able to find carl, we were gonna be able to find bonnie harkey. >> reporter: according to the tipsters, carl was with his girlfriend, lillian king. they were riding in her car. >> do you have any information on her vehicle? >> all i know is she's driving a 2004 mustang. >> reporter: soon just about every lawman in texas was on the look out for a 2004 mustang. but in the meantime, deputy wilkerson says the san saba sheriff took a more personal approach. >> he's tryin' to call his cell phone. he's sendin' him multiple text messages. >> reporter: you have carl's number because of his numerous brushes with law enforcement? >> oh, absolutely. absolutely. >> reporter: wouldn't it be great if police could just text suspects and get them to come in? but the world doesn't work like that -- except, perhaps, in san saba. just after midnight, carl pressley responded. he was in normangee, texas. he told the sheriff where he and his girlfriend lived in a trailer at an rv campground. though normangee is more than three hours from san saba, carl promised the sheriff that he would be back by day break. >> so i think maybe about the time my eyeballs closed -- my phone rang. and it was about 7:00 in the morning. and dispatch told me that carl pressley had showed up to the sheriff's office and sheriff brown needed me up there asap. >> reporter: and so with little or no sleep, deputy wilkerson says he headed back to the office and a face to face encounter with the man most likely to know where bonnie harkey was. >> devote care talker dead matriarch missing . >> >> coming up, another life in danger? >> he had three knives on him, i had to do what he said. >>nd a dark secret, down by the creek. >> right there, right there! >> when "dateline" continues. er! >> when "dateline" continues [♪♪] did you know, you no longer need to visit a dermatologist to get access to top skincare ingredients? introducing dermageek featuring top dermatologist recommended ingredients and 0% fillers. dermageek's new detoxifying facial serum contains twice the amount of beta hydroxy acid. it delivers two times more exfoliation for brighter skin, with dermatologist tested levels of hydration. get top derm-ingredients at a fraction of the price. try the new dermageek skincare lineup, with a money-back guarantee. hey, angie! you forgot your phone! hey lou! angie forget her phone again? yep. lou! mom said she could save up to $400 on her wireless bill by switching to xfinity internet and mobile. with nationwide 5g at no extra cost. and lou! on the most reliable network, lou! smart kid, bill. oh oh so true. and now, the moon christmas special. gotta go! take the savings challenge at xfinitymobile.com/mysavings or visit an xfinity store to learn how our switch squad makes switching fast and easy this holiday season. here's the thing about lawmen in rural texas, they don't have all the gadgets and gizmos that come with working in a big city. >> it's a different world. you're workin' with a limited budgets. >> so you have to improvise? >> yes, yes, you have to improvise. >> and that's what san saba deputy john wilkerson did when carl pressley, the chief suspect in the disappearance of bonnie harkey and the death of her caretaker, came in for questioning. wilkerson used the video recorder embedded in his car. >> we're ready. is he recording? >> and that's your interrogation? >> and that's my interrogation right there in the sally port. my name's john wilkerson, and i'm sheriff's office here. this is mr. -- chief deputy bill price, okay? >> he was not under arrest, but carl pressley wore prison stripes for his interview because investigators had taken his clothes so they could run tests on them. >> i'm not making any accusations at this point. i'm just tryin' to -- to get him locked down in -- into his original story. >> from the beginning, carl pressley admitted he and his girlfriend, lillian king, had gone out to his grandmother's house for a visit that sunday. >> do you remember how long you stayed there? >> no sir, i really don't. >> he started -- durin' the interview, he started to -- you know, try to pretend like he couldn't remember certain things. >> eventually carl's memory improved. he remembered how he took his grandmother out of the house to protect her from tough guys he owed money to. >> the story is he, to -- to protect his grandmother, he picks her up in the evening and drives her to rainey's crossing and drops her off in the in the bushes. >> an eight -- an 85-year-old woman? >> correct, yeah. >> wilkerson wasn't buying. but officers did search that location. then carl told another story. he said he'd taken bonnie back to his trailer home in normangee. >> he -- he misses his grandmother and -- and he wanted to see her -- which again didn't make a whole lotta sense. >> that's because investigators knew nothing to suggest carl pressley had ever missed anyone during his 28 years on planet earth. >> we're tryin' to figure out where is your grandmother at? look at me. where is she at? >> i think she's up there. >> okay, where up there? >> in normangee. >> where did you put her up there? or -- or -- hilltop lake. >> in short order, texas rangers and local lawmen near normangee were combing carl's trailer and the surrounding campground for clues. but they found nothing until carl was flown to normangee. >> i told her i wanted to show her a fishing hole down by the creek and we went down there and -- stuff happened. >> tell me what kind of stuff happened, carl. >> it's hard, sir. >> is that gonna be her? >> right there, right there. >> it's all right, carl. it's all right, it's all right. >> i didn't mean to. i didn't mean to. i didn't mean to. i didn't mean to. >> bonnie harkey was dead. her body lying in a creek bed near carl's trailer, buried beneath a pile of sticks and leaves. >> so carl admits that -- he pushed her on the back of her head -- holding her face underwater until she no longer moved. >> it was the same story lillian king had already given to lawmen back in san saba. she'd been there. she said when the caretaker was killed and stood idly by while carl killed his grandmother. but in lillian's telling of the story, she could have very well been carl pressley's third murder victim that day. >> he had three knives on him. three. you know, so i had to do what he said. >> what had driven carl pressley to kill one of the few people on earth who had ever loved him? that was a question to which no one could supply an answer. >> she doted on carl. >> she did dote on him. no one could quite understand why. >> and i'll bet she couldn't in the last four or five hours of her life. >> yeah. yeah. investigators didn't know why carl pressley killed his grandmother. but they were pretty sure there was more to this murder than met the eye and that there could be clues in the harkey family history. >> coming up. a million-dollar inheritance. a neighbor from hollywood. and a harkey with a handful of ex-wives. >> he's just a solid jerk. >> it was really just constant drama. >> police were about to get to the heart of the bonnie harkey murder. kidney alert for type 2 diabetes! forty percent of people with type 2 diabetes will develop chronic kidney disease, or ckd. did you know ckd can lead to kidney failure and dialysis? 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[♪♪] looking to repair dry, damaged hair without weighing it down? try pantene daily moisture renewal conditioner. its color-safe formula uses smart conditioners to micro-target damage helping to repair hair without weighing it down. try pantene. ♪ after a night like this, crest has you covered. crest, the official toothpaste of santa. follow us @crest to celebrate the 12 days of crest smiles. kentucky coroner's office has confirmed 12 dead and like de over 100 and curfew has been imletted in the hardest hit location in the state, damage in bowling green consistent with a tornado with winds roughry 150 miles an hour. now back to "dateline". ♪ >> reporter: the matriarch of a prominent pecan growing family had been brutally murdered by a member of that family. but why? the more investigators pondered that, the more they came to believe the answer might be found in a long running family feud. >> the first time i met the harkey family, i was bailiffin' in court 'cause we were shorthanded and i got to sit through -- a little hearing where the harkeys were tryin' to -- to gain control of the property. and you could tell it was a very heated situation. very heated. >> reporter: that pot had been at a slow boil ever since that day in 1963 when bonnie harkey became stepmother to her husband riley's two boys, bruce and john. >> bruce and johnny just didn't like bonnie. they didn't like her at all. and so almost from the beginning it was acrimonious. >> reporter: what form did that acrimony take? >> bruce and johnny were just rude to bonnie. openly insulting her. >> reporter: and riley put up with that? >> let it go. he just let it go. >> reporter: a lot of blended families have rough starts. but this newly grafted branch of the harkey family tree never had a chance. >> i don't think riley made a real effort with his boys to say, "this is a wonderful woman. i want you to grow to love her like i love her." i think he just said, "here you go." >> reporter: riley seems to have been better with pecans than people. >> yeah. yeah. >> reporter: soon enough, john was off to college, and bruce was shuttled off to live with his mother in nevada for a while. that left only bonnie's teenaged daughter connie at home. >> riley never adopted connie. she was an afterthought. she was never brought into the family. >> this is sounding less like the brady bunch and more like the ewings, every day. >> you know, it -- just the ewings without the -- the culture. you know, it was really -- just constant drama. >> reporter: the boys took different career paths. john became a businessman. bruce had a number of different jobs. at various times he was a cop in reno, a medicaid fraud investigator for the texas attorney general's office and a nursing home administrator. along the way he married and divorced eight -- count 'em -- eight women. still, as the years rolled by, the brothers' feelings for bonnie seemed to fester. there were a lot of reasons for that, but maybe the biggest one was a will their father, riley, had drawn up shortly before he died in 1997. >> riley's will specifically said that bonnie could live on that property as long as she was alive. and then when she died, the land would go to the boys. and then there was a small inheritance for connie. and if connie died, then there would be a trust for carl. but the majority of the inheritance went to bruce and johnny. >> reporter: though the property alone was worth more than $1 million, for the harkey brothers, it wasn't worth a dime because they could neither farm it nor sell it until bonnie died. bruce, especially, seemed to chafe at the thought of that. >> he said he was the poorest millionaire in san saba county. >> reporter: local pecan merchant shawn oliver says bruce harkey was down and out in late 2007 when he resettled in san saba after being away for many years. >> he had no income coming in. and he -- every time he drove by that property, all he could see was the millions that -- what he thought was millions that he was missing out on. >> reporter: by then, bonnie harkey was becoming increasingly frail. her dementia had made her vulnerable to phone scams. she was unable to manage her daily affairs, so her daughter connie became her guardian. after connie died in 2011, bruce harkey thought carl pressley should be bonnie's guardian. when a judge tried to appoint someone else, bruce and john challenged that in court. >> bonnie asked the judge if she could speak. and the judge said yes. and she said, "i don't want them to be my guardians. i'm --" >> her -- her -- >> -- "afraid of them." >> her stepsons. >> reporter: that had to be about the last thing bruce and john wanted to hear. >> it delayed any inheritance, certainly. >> reporter: a lawyer named darrel spinks was chosen to manage her business and financial affairs. bonnie's long time friend betty ann johnson was asked to make sure bonnie's daily needs were met. it was betty ann who'd hired karen johnson, the in-home caretaker who was killed the day bonnie was kidnapped. >> you felt safe with karen takin' care of bonnie. >> i did. >> reporter: what bruce wanted me to do was to put her in the nursing home. >> reporter: he told you that. >> yes. and i said, "as long as we can have help 24/7, she's not going anywhere." >> reporter: bonnie's financial guardian, darrel spinks, says he also butted heads with bruce harkey. >> the best way i can explain bruce harkey is greedy and, for lack of a better word, just a jerk. he's just a solid jerk. >> reporter: according to spinks, bruce not only accused him of mismanaging the harkey estate, but also tried to bully him into accepting the sale of a chunk of land to their neighbor, the actor tommy lee jones, for half a million dollars. it was good for bruce. but spinks says not for bonnie. so he killed it. >> he wanted bonnie to get virtually nothing. i know it was less than $50,000 is what he wanted -- wanted her to get. >> reporter: and the rest of the money for the sale would of gone to bruce. >> the rest of it would have gone to bruce and john. yes. >> reporter: and so you said to bruce, "i'm not for this." >> and that sent him in orbit. i mean, he just became irate and cussed me out and said, "i'm gonna do everything i can to -- to get at you." >> reporter: investigators were getting a pretty good taste of the river of bad blood that ran through the harkey family. bonnie harkey's grandson, carl pressely, and his girlfriend, lillian king, were in the county jail. and now men with badges decided to take a harder look at bruce harkey. >> coming up -- we had some questions for bruce harkey, too. you didn't put carl up to it? >> would you really hire forrest gump to commit murder? >> reporter: forrest gump? then this jailhouse interview was like a box of chocolates. we didn't know what we were gonna get. >> you said you wished she were dead. and then later she became dead. >> when "dateline" continues. firefighter maggie gronewald knows how to handle dry weather... ...and dry, cracked skin. new gold bond advanced healing ointment. restore healthy skin, with no sticky feeling. gold bond. champion your skin. ♪ ♪ cases of anxiety in young adults are rising as experts warn of the effects on well-being caused by the pandemic. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ before discovering nexium 24hr to treat her frequent heartburn... claire could only imagine enjoying chocolate cake. now, she can have her cake and eat it too. nexium 24hr stops acid before it starts for all-day, all-night protection. can you imagine 24 hours without heartburn? i've been telling everyone... the secret to great teeth is having healthy gums. crest advanced gum restore. detoxifies below the gumline... and restores by helping heal gums in as little as 7 days. crest. the #1 toothpaste brand in america. >> reporter: the final decision to kill bonnie harkey was made on a friday, two days before the murder. as carl pressley laid it out for investigators, his uncle bruce was broke, and couldn't wait any longer for his inheritance. >> he set me down on the bed and he says, "we gotta get rid of bonnie. we gotta rid of her quick. we're runnin' out of money." >> reporter: texans are generally thought to be pretty hard nosed when it comes to business. but carl pressley? not so much. >> carl bruce says, "i'll give you $500 if this happens right now, this weekend, if bonnie dies." >> if bonnie dies. >> and then i said you're a broke man, and i threw a number out there like $250 and he said, no no no. >> reporter: they argued about the prize, according to carl. bruce wanted, adamant he was gonna pay him $500 and carl was adamant he only needed to pay him $250. >> reporter: in the end, carl says, bruce agreed to pay him $100 down, and $150 once the job was done. then we found out he stopped by his bank and made a withdrawal for $200. which was great, because that's the date and time stamped and now i got you on video. then he leaves there and about 30 minutes later, he shows back up in front of lillian king's house. and carl runs out the door, to, to collect the hundred dollars down from, from bruce harkey. >> reporter: the idea that bruce harkey was in cahoots with carl pressley seemed odd to some. >> evidently bruce detested the fact that carl would refer to bruce as uncle bruce. and yet, carl was always seemingly seeking approval and acceptance from bruce. >> reporter: jack schumacher, one of the investigators on the case, believes bruce may have used that bit of psychology to his advantage when he decided it was long past time for bonnie harkey to meet her maker. >> so when bruce say, "hey, i want you in on my murder plot," what? happiest day of carl's life? >> you know, could be that carl thought that he was finally gonna receive that acceptance he'd been seekin'. >> reporter: a theory? perhaps. but then investigators also knew that bruce harkey had never made any secret of how he felt about his stepmother, bonnie. >> excuse my language, but this is exactly what he said. he said, "that old bitch doesn't have the decency to die." >> reporter: investigators didn't know if bruce paid carl or just manipulated him into killing bonnie harkey. but they were sure he was involved. so two days after carl led investigators to bonnie's body, bruce harkey was arrested and charged with murder. >> when lawmen came to question bruce in jail -- the he -- did not mince words. >> bonnie was poor miserable wretch of a human being. ok? she didn't have two brain cells to rub together anymore. i didn't go out there and say somebody needs to kill her. i said she needs to go. she just needs to go. >> reporter: according to bruce, carl pressley had his own motives for killing bonnie harkey. that's because, a year earlier, carl had sold his future interest in the harkey estate to the harkey brothers for fraction of what it was worth. but here's the thing. the brothers only gave him a fraction of the money they owed him. bruce says he told carl the brothers would pay him the rest, about $55,000, once they inherited the orchards. this is how bruce says carl responded. >> well how long after my grandmother's death do i get that money? "carl, it has to go through probate first. hell, that could take years. i don't know." >> reporter: according to bruce, the money that he gave carl shortly before bonnie's death was for gas money, nothing more. then bruce harkey turned the tables on the lawmen and asked them a question that would become central to his defense. why would he want to kill a sick old woman who already seemed to have one foot in the grave? >> why would i plan on bonnie's demise, or offer to pay somebody to do what numb nuts did, when i'm thinking this is just around the corner anyway? why guys? >> reporter: when we spoke with bruce harkey through a thick pane of glass, he insisted that he was an innocent man. >> i had nothing to do with it. >> you didn't put carl up to it? >> absolutely not sir, no. that's exactly like the first question my attorney asked me. he said, "would you," he said, "i have to ask you, would you really hire forrest gump to commit murder?" i said, "i wouldn't hire anybody to commit murder." >> so your argument is contrary to what carl told investigators, he did this all on his own. >> i don't know that he did it all on his own. i know there was at least two people involved in it, and that would be carl and lilly, his girlfriend. other than that, i'm not gonna attest to anything because i don't know. >> how many times in your life did you say you wished bonnie harkey were dead? >> i don't know, several. >> i mean -- >> i can't give you a number. >> that's one of the reasons you're in here. >> i understand that. okay. >> because you said you wished she were dead, and then later she became dead. >> but i didn't have anything to do with it. you can't wish someone dead and have it happen, and then get blamed for it. it's not against the law to have wishes, it's not against the law to make comments. >> reporter: maybe not, but when bruce harkey's murder trial rolled around he would have to answer for all of them, and more. >> coming up -- >> i will simply say, that's a devastating piece of evidence. >> the past comes back to haunt bruce harkey. and, a question haunts lillian king. could she have saved bonnie? [ coughing and sneezing ] cold season is back. bounce back fast with alka seltzer plus. with 25% more concentrated power. alka-seltzer plus. ♪ oh, what a relief it is ♪ so fast! also try for cough, mucus & congestion. that's a nice truck. yeah, it's the chevy silverado. check out this multi-flex tailgate. multi-flex, huh? wow. it becomes a step. mom, dad's flexing again. that's not all. you can extend the bed for longer stuff. is he still... still flexing. that's right! and, it becomes a workspace... you can put your laptop here. i'm sending an imaginay email. hey dad, dinner! hey! look who stopped by daddy's office. wait, you work here? the chevy silverado with the available multi-flex tailgate. find new flexibility. find new roads. chevrolet. align. fast acting biotic gummies helps soothes occasional abdominal discomfort, find new flexibility. find new roads. gas, and bloating and it works fast. in as little as 7 days try fast acting biotic gummies from align. the #1 doctor recommended probiotic brand. >> reporter: in the years after bonnie harkey took her place alongside the other harkeys in s the san saba cemetery, life in the texas hill country got back to normal. most people could only speculate about what really happened on the day bonnie harkey and her caretaker, karen johnson, were killed. but jack schumacher says he knows. >> this is where karen johnson was laying. she was murdered right here in this doorway. >> reporter: how was she killed? >> choked, smothered, just bulldogged down by carl. >> reporter: jack schumacher says he knows that because carl pressley told him how it all went down that weekend. he also knows that bruce harkey wanted everyone in san saba to know that he was going out of town. jack vaughn, a local businessman, says he had only a nodding acquaintance with bruce harkey, and yet -- >> bruce started telling me how that he was going to be out of town all weekend long. stressed that "all weekend long." from, "i'm leaving town early on saturday morning. i won't be back in till late sunday night. it might even be monday before i make it back in." he said, "i'm going to be gone all weekend long." >> reporter: by the time bruce harkey went on trial in april of 2014, his nephew carl pressley had confessed to his part in killing bonnie harkey and her caretaker. and carl's girlfriend, lillian king, had admitted her involvement. with the two of them set to testify against bruce harkey in exchange for lighter sentences, prosecutor sonny mcafee felt confident that he had a solid case against bruce. >> the facts of the crime were so horrendous that i didn't think once the jury believed that he was a party to the crime that they'd have any difficulty at all finding him guilty. >> reporter: lillian told the jury that she had heard bruce harkey and carl pressley talk about killing bonnie harkey many times. but she told us she didn't learn the plot had actually been set in motion until the friday before the murder. that's when lillian says she overheard a phone conversation between bruce harkey and carl pressley. >> because after he got off the phone with bruce, he looked at me and said that bruce was going to pay him to kill his grandmother. >> reporter: lillian testified that while bonnie and her caretaker were in church that sunday morning carl slipped into the house and hid. once bonnie returned home, lillian says, carl sent her a text telling her to come distract karen johnson while he smothered his grandmother. >> so i rang the doorbell because the door was open. but the storm door was closed. ms. johnson came and answered the door. i was in the process of stepping in and closing the storm door when i see this flash. >> reporter: inside the house? >> coming from the den. >> reporter: so coming up behind ms. johnson? >> yes, yes. and i saw that it was carl and he was yelling at me to close the door, get in here, go in there with his grandmother. >> reporter: once karen johnson was dead, lillian says, carl led bonnie to her bedroom where, she says, carl asked her to pray. >> i see the pillow and then while they're praying, he starts pushing her down onto the bed. she fought him. she did. but the doorbell rang, and it scared carl. so he jumped up and he told me to go look and see who it was. >> reporter: lillian says, whoever it was left after about five minutes. it was then, lillian told the jury, that carl decided to drive his grandmother to normangee. in your mind, was it clear that she knew that carl was trying to kill her then? >> yes. >> reporter: what'd she say? >> she looked at him and said, "you tried to kill me." and carl was like, "no, grandma, i wasn't doing that." >> reporter: lillian says the last time she saw bonnie harkey alive was later that night when she says she saw carl leading bonnie to her death. >> i went to the bathroom again and when i was coming out, i saw him and her walking into the trees. >> reporter: you knew what was coming. how'd you let that happen? >> it's hard for me. but, you know, if he did it to her, he's going to do it to me, too. >> reporter: the prosecutor knew a jury would not vote to convict bruce harkey on the testimony of lillian king and carl pressley alone. so he used bruce harkey's own words against him. >> he talked about how he couldn't get his land until she was dead. and that she just doesn't have the decency to die. and he said all of these in the weeks leading up to the murder. >> reporter: richard davis was bruce harkey's attorney. he told the jury carl pressley wanted to kill bonnie harkey because he wanted the inheritance and needed no prompting from his uncle. davis reminded jurors how many times carl had changed his story before telling police bruce was part of the plot. >> my theory is it's all carl. and that was essentially our testimony. and the testimony of carl in the trial makes it clear that this guy was an erratic personality. he gave numerous different descriptions of what the events were. how he did it, why he did it. and it was -- >> reporter: and originally that he didn't do it? >> well, right. "i didn't do it, i did do it, and if i did do it, it was because of this." >> reporter: and finally, he names bruce? >> exactly. >> reporter: sort of at the point where prosecutors and police are starting to talk about the death penalty. >> and my question, in any case where there's a statement from a witness who has a lot to lose, what's the most likely to be the truth? >> reporter: the jurors might question carl pressley's credibility, but the prosecutor had a bombshell in his arsenal. turns out this was not bruce harkey's first rodeo. mcafee told the jurors that ten years earlier bruce had done prison time for his role in another murder plot, an unsuccessful one that targeted one of his many ex-wives. >> i think there's a lot of things that are extremely similar in it. and the main one is that he gets somebody else to do what he wants done. and he does it through influence. >> i will simply say that that's a devastating bit of evidence. >> reporter: yeah, because that makes me think, well, they probably got the right guy. >> and just hypothetically speaking, let's say the case is purely circumstantial and looks kind of bad. and then there's proof in front of the jury that says, "and by the way, he did it before." that makes all the other evidence seem much more important. >> reporter: if you're a prosecutor -- >> that's great stuff. that's the end of the story whether it should be or shouldn't. >> reporter: it took the jury only one hour to reach a guilty verdict. bruce harkey received a life sentence, as did carl pressley. lillian king was sentenced to 45 years for her role in the murders. >> i'm not a violent person. i'm not. and i loved ms. harkey like she was my own grandmother. >> reporter: and yet? >> i know. i keep kicking myself, you know? hoping i can do something different. but it's not going to change. it eats at me. i can't sleep most the time. >> reporter: the estate bruce harkey had so fervently hoped to inherit is but a memory now. in the years since our story first aired, lawyers have i'm craig melvin. i'm natalie moalas. this is "date line >> it wasike oh, wow. he did it. he took off and we didn't know where he was. >> call it a mother's intuition. >> she had a sign. i don't know how it was. >> a daughter away at college.

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