>> jessie gave her all. to everything she did. >> she was on a mission. >> her whole life. >> and then someone took it all away. >> i was like, jessie. nothing. i jiggled her a little bit and then i knew, this is not good. >> what is the problem? >> my daughter won't wake up. >> she had been murdered in her own bed after coming home from a pool party. a party that hadn't been all fun and games. >> she was 19 and these were men in their 40s. we want to talk to them. >> did something happen at that party? what was happening around this small town? >> i saw someone running behind me and then i noticed he had a knife in his hand. >> it was either i try to save myself or let this guy do whatever he wants to me. >> there were searches on serial killers and searches on bondage. >> could he be caught before he done it again. >> i knew he had done it, now i had to go prove it. hello and welcome to "dateline." in a small wisconsin town, a 19-year-old girl came home from a party, said good night to her mother and went to bed, safe for the night. but the next day she was dead and police were calling it murder. who would want to kill this talented young woman and was it somehow connected to reports of an attacker on the loose? here's andrea canning with "friends until death." >> she was a young woman who devoted her whole life to making music. an accomplished musician who played several instruments, acted, even wrote her own songs. >> that was her biggest passion. she saw music as a way to change the world. >> that is the only friend i had that sang and did the piano. >> who could have predicted on july 15th, 2015, the music and a young girl's dreams would end so suddenly. >> we were in shock and disbelief. >> it was hard to come to grips with. >> oh, my god. >> ma'am, stay on the line with me. we're going to get ems out for you. >> a small town was face would a mystery, with police asking what was real and what was a performance. >> he's an actor. he's two different people. >> who is this guy? who does he think he is he can go around and do this to women. >> ask anyone who knew jessie blodgett and they would tell you she was happy, passionate, full of life. her dad, buck, said she had always been that way. >> did she have a happy childhood? >> oh, yeah. i can show you 600 pictures on my computer and she was a really happy kid. >> jessie, an only child was the light of her parents' lives. their miracle baby. buck and joy blodgett thought they couldn't have children, so they cherished their little girl that much more. >> every day since we talked about drugs and we talked about sex and there was nothing off limits. >> her mom says jessie's friends were part of the family. >> they always seemed to hang out at our house. >> we did. she would find any reason to throw a party. >> three of her closest high school pals. >> we always hit it off right away. >> hard not to. she had a contagious personality. >> jessie had a more serious side. one that loved to debate issues and fight for causes she believed in. >> jessie sounded like an old soul. >> i don't know much high schoolers that are super activists about animal rights. >> she made herself well versed in just a lot of different opinions and viewpoints. >> jessie wanted to make a difference. that much was clear. but what made her happiest was sharing her gift. >> every time i went over to jessie's house she would be playing the piano. even though i was trying to talk to her. i was like, hello, jessie. >> jesse's passion for music grew even stronger in college. in the summer after her freshman year she teamed up with dan and together they wrote this heartfelt song. ♪♪ ♪ it will be just fine ♪ >> we had a music room. he had a music room at his house. he would bring his guitar and they both sang. >> that summer jessie won the title role in "fiddler on the roof." >> did she just fully embrace it? >> she did. she enjoyed being the person who really opens the show and sets the mood and sets the feeling. >> it was july 14th after the sunday matinee, jessie and the cast gathered for a pool party. >> we went out to a cast member's farm. he had a pool and some llamas and other animals there. i left early with my family and i remember her sitting there and said good night and thanked her for her performance. >> she came home around what time? >> it was late, 12:30, i believe. >> you were still awake? >> i waited up for her. i couldn't go to sleep until i knew she was in the house. >> they chatted briefly and said good night. the next morning jessie's mom popped into her room and saw jessie fast asleep. >> nothing odd. >> this is her first morning to sleep in a very long time. >> joy returned for lunch and saw jessie was not downstairs ready for her afternoon violin lesson. >> i went to the top of the stairs and jessie and i came in and came around the bed and then i kind of jiggled her a little bit and nothing. and then i knew. this is not good. this is not good. >> joy made a frantic call to 911. >> what's the problem? >> my daughter is blue. i went to wake her up and i just got home for lunch and she won't wake up. >> is she breathing? >> i don't think so, no. >> just hours before, she had seen her daughter sleeping peacefully and now joy, a chiropractor, was fighting to save jessie's life. your mother instincts and doctor instincts. >> i kept thinking she fell asleep and stopped breathing in the pillow or something. >> as joy moved jessie to the floor to better perform cpr, first responders arrived. >> did you at that point start to feel her slip away and hope was dwindling fast? >> i think i was thinking, they'll do it. they will take her to the hospital. they can do all kinds of stuff. >> but they never took jessie to the hospital. it was too late. she was gone. a tragedy and now a mystery. what happened to jessie blodgett. coming up, detectives hear something from jessie's mom they find interesting and troubling. when jessie got that home that night from the party, she was upset. >> what's going on. oh, the guys, you know. >> what about the guys? 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and joy, no more words came. just tears. so i raced home. >> but when buck arrived home, police cas and a crime scene truck was already in the driveway. >> i went in the door through the yellow tape and when i saw joy's eyes in the living room, i knew jessie was gone. >> buck was not allowed in jessie's room because police were in there. detective robert thickens was one of the first on the scene. he looked around and saw a typical teenager's messy bedroom, nothing strange there, but when he saw jessie's body it was clear to the detective that jessie didn't die of natural causes. >> first thing i noticed a very red mark running pretty much all the way across her neck. >> did you need an autopsy to tell you what you were seeing? >> no, it was very apparent this was a ligature mark at that point. >> jessie had been murdered, strangled. but inside her bedroom there was no murder weapon, no sign of a struggle, except one thing did seem odd about jessie's bed. >> the covers were over the bed in a perfect manner and a kid who had stuff all over the bed, there was nothing on the bed. >> this is somebody trying to ensure they did not leave something of themself behind. >> did they finally let you go upstairs to say a proper good-bye. >> they released her room as a crime scene at the end of the day and brought her down. after waiting all day and finally getting my moment to say good-bye and tell her i love her and tell her i'm sorry suddenly everybody is around watching me and i never really had that moment alone with her to say good-bye. >> that is heartbreaking. >> yeah. >> having barely digested the news of their daughter's death and still in shock, buck and joy sat down with investigators to tell them everything they knew. there was no sign of forced entry to the house, but they explained, like most people in this quiet, safe town, they often left a door unlocked. >> this individual found that one door. the house wasn't ransacked. it looked to us that this person knew right where to go to find her. >> to the detective, it didn't seem random. it was clear jessie was targeted. one of buck's first thought, a crew of tree cutters that recently worked outside jessie's window. >> it made me wonder if they had thoughts when they were in the trees off the bedroom. just wonder if they noticed here is this teenage girl home alone sleeping. >> buck also told detectives about a problem jessie had at her part-time restaurant job. trouble with a co-worker. >> she came home and said he was inappropriate with her. >> what was he doing that was inappropriate? >> he would make sure he had to rub against him. >> when i heard that i was almost out the door to go and talk to him. >> the restaurant was just down the road. it seemed possible that this co-worker jessie found creepy knew where she lived, had been watching the house. >> certainly we're going to take any possibility. we don't want to close any avenues of an investigation at that point. >> then joy told the detectives something that really caught their attention. jessie had come home from that "fiddler on the roof" cast party clearly upset. >> i said, what's going on? she said, oh, the guys. you know, they're always making passes and i don't know why they have to always turn it there. >> jessie told her mom two older men from the cast were flirting with her and it made her uncomfortable. one pulled her on his lap and the other told a dirty joke. at the time, joy thought the flirtations seemed harmless and her young daughter simply didn't know how to handle it. >> she didn't like men taking privileges on women. >> but perhaps the incidents were more serious than her mother had thought. jessie wrote about them in her diary that night ending her final entry with god be with me. >> she was 19 and from what joy understood, these were men in their 40s. >> is that a bit of a red flag for you? >> can be. we want to talk to them. >> detective thickens could see the pretty, talented teenager could attract unwanted male attention. now he had to figure out if any of it had to do with jessie's murder. >> a party packed with older men, but only one had raised eyebrows. had police found a possible suspect? coming up -- >> someone that was flirting with her less than 24 hours before her death. >> we thought it was him. who else could it have been? >> when "dateline" continues. it was hard to believe a murder like this could happen in peaceful hartford, wisconsin, yet alone to a warm and loving teenager like jessie blodgett. within hours of her death, word had spread. jessie's close friends, jackie and amelia, raced to the blodgett house. >> drove up to her driveway and her parents were standing outside and said jessie is no longer with us any more. >> was that when it became real for you? >> just really shocking, i guess. so it's probably the worst pain that anyone could feel. >> jessie's theater director, jerry becker, was also stunned, having just celebrated with jessie and the cast of "fiddler on the roof" the night before. >> the best way to describe it is simply surreal. >> finding jessie's killer became the police department's number one priority. >> this is a girl who was attacked in her home where she should be safe and that put people on edge. >> detectives talked with cast members from "fiddler on the roof" and heard again how jessie had been upset after the cast party, in particular with one man named randy tally. >> we made contact with him and asked him to come in and speak with us. >> are you thinking this could be the guy? >> he was someone significantly older and someone flirting with her less than 24 hours before her death. he is certainly a person of interest. >> randy came in for questioning and admitted to joking around playfully with jessie at the party and swore there was nothing more to it. but part of randy's story didn't sit well with detective thickens. where had he been during the time of the crime? >> he was scheduled to work through a temp agency and didn't go to work that day. >> where was he then? >> he said he spent most of the day by his apartment by himself. >> did you come right out with it. >> i asked him if he had any involvement in his death and he said no. >> but the detective wondered. >> it's hard to gauge whether he's acting or being truthful. >> investigators issued a search warrant for her phone records. >> we'll verify where randy was and look at his alibi. was his cell phone anywhere near that house in this time period. >> jessie's friends quickly heard the police were looking at a cast member. what was being said about the cast member? >> he was kind of creepy. >> we thought it was him. >> but the play's director, jerry becker, couldn't believe it. he couldn't imagine randy being responsible for jessie's death. did you pick up the phone and call randy when he was going through this? >> yes. he was saddened by all this. >> how did that conversation leave you feeling? >> i was exceptionally confident at the end of the phone call that he was not involved in this in any way. >> when the detective got his hands on randy's phone records, he began thinking the same thing. did his phone records tell you anything of significance? >> he had been talking to her on the phone that we could see in this time period that we were looking at and he hadn't been near the house. we haven't eliminated him, but we were had to look at other options. >> so, working day and night, they went over the other leads from jessie's parents. they interviewed the tree trimmers who might have been peering into jessie's window. >> there was nothing of significance found as far as their possible involvement. >> and they tracked down the restaurant co-worker jessie had been upset with. >> he was actually out of the country as our understanding was at the time this happened. >> case closed on that one. >> he is not going to be involved. >> remember, joy mentioned a second man from the cast party who made jessie uncomfortable. the one she claimed told an inappropriate joke. turned out that guy was none other than jerry becker. >> i have to believe it was some sort of misunderstanding with regard to who jessie was talking about. >> it was a surprise to you that she brought up your name specifically? >> absolutely. >> did you have anything to hide about that night? >> my daughter and my son were there at the picnic with me. >> jerry told us he had just a brief conversation with jessie that night and nothing flirtatious about it. detectives didn't think it sounded like much of a lead and jerry never became a suspect. in fact, the investigation was going no where leaving the town on edge. >> every time someone would come up behind me, i would jump. >> then news of another crime heightened everyone's fears. >> an attack so brutal she had to get 15 stitches on her hand. >> it happened in a neighboring town. another attack on a young woman close to jessie's age in a park less than ten miles from her house. did you think there was any possible connection to the park attack? >> they were too similar. they were too violent. they were against young women. they must be connected some way or another. >> what had happened in that park and could it lead detectives to jessie's killer? coming up, a harrowing first-person account of that vicious attack. >> you grabbed the knife with your bare hands. >> either i try to save myself or let this guy do whatever he wants to me. >> with someone stalking the young women around this small town when "dateline" continues. age before beauty? why not both? visibly diminish wrinkled skin in... crepe corrector lotion... only from gold bond. clerk: hello, how can i? sore throat pain? ♪honey lemon♪ try vicks vapocool drops. in honey lemon chill. for fast-acting sore throat relief. wooo vaporize sore throat pain with vicks vapocool drops. mom, hurry! our show's gonna start soon! i promised i wouldn't miss the show and mommy always keeps her promises. oh, no! seriously? hmm! it's not the same if she's not here. oh. -what the. oh my goodness! i don't suppose you can sing, can you? ♪ the snow's comin' down ♪ -mommy? ♪ i'm watching it fall ♪ watch the full story at www.xfinity.com/sing2 i'm dara brown. here's what's happening. queen elizabeth after a year of great loss for her family and many others. the 95-year-old monarch delivered her first holiday address to the nation since the death of prince philip in april. pope francis used his christmas day address during mass to pray for the end of the coronavirus pandemic, urge health care for all vaccines for the poor and more conversations to help resolving the world's conflicts. now, back to "dateline." after the vibrant 19-year-old with a passion for music was strangled in her own bed, jessie blodgett's grief stricken parents couldn't stop thinking about the way she died. that's such a dark place to go. to think about her last moments. >> doesn't get any darker than that. i laid on her bed early on and held my breath as long as i could trying to blackout to see how that was which was nothing like what she went through. >> police thought jessie had been targeted but now some of jessie's friends wondered if her murderer was the same person who attacked a person in a nearby park. >> when i found out about that i was almost thinking, who's next. if he's still out there, he could still be plotting and be hunting. >> i was like, who is this guy? >> this is melissa richards, the victim of that attack. it happened three days before jessie was killed. her courageous story of survival is amazing. you arrive at the park and what is the first thing you see? >> a blue minivan. >> anything out of the ordinary? >> no. >> u melissa richards and her dog went for a walk. >> the guy was still parked in the car and what i noticed was him looking out of the driver's side window. >> did it seem weird? >> i just thought he wanted his privacy. >> i noticed someone running behind me and i was like, oh, you scared me and i noticed he had a knife in his hand and he was still coming towards me. >> before melissa could run, she was knocked to the ground and the attacker pinned her down on her stomach and melissa fought back and did something almost unthinkable. she grabbed the knife by the blade. you grabbed the knife with your bare hands? >> right. >> what possessed you to do that? >> it was either i try to save myself or let this guy do whatever he wants to me. >> with melissa resisting, the attacker apparently panicked and seemed to give up. >> he finally was just kind of got up off of me. he was still holding on to the knife and he was like, can i just go? and i said no. >> a defiant melissa wanted her attacker to stay put and answer for his crime. but instead, he dropped the knife and fled. >> so he ended up running back to his car. i got in my car and i got out of here as fast as i could. >> wounded and bloody, melissa picked up the knife and got herself to a hospital for stitches. there she was met by detective clausing of the washington sheriff department. >> this wasn't a robbery. he didn't save give me your purse. this wasn't a dognapping. he didn't say give me your dog. this was a personal attack on a stranger. >> melissa had never seen her attacker before, but lucky for investigators she had an almost photographic memory. >> he was wearing glasses, he had blonde, shaggy hair. i said he is about 6'2", 210 pounds. >> did he look like a normal guy? >> yeah, especially with what he was wearing. normal clothes from kohl's. >> melissa could even tell police the make and model of his van. >> she knew it was a blue dodge caravan likely around 2000 to 2002. >> despite that great description, investigators could not identify melissa's attacker and he was still at large when jessie was murdered and while some of jessie's friends had been speculating about a link, investigators disagreed. >> you're not linking the two crimes or trying to force them to fit together? >> not at all. one's in a park with a knife and the other one is in a private home with strangulation. >> so, the two investigations remain separate and hartford police continue to look for new leads in jessie's case. one by one, they called in her heartbroken friends to ask them what they knew. >> did you consider any of her friends as possible suspects? >> never. >> not one friend? >> never. >> the interviews with jessie blodgett's friends revealed nothing new and then detectives in the park case got a huge break. one that would change the course of both investigations. melissa's description of her attacker's van triggered the memory of a deputy who routinely patrolled the park where she was assaulted. >> deputy myer had approached us and said several weeks ago i was in that park and there was a blue van parked in the exact same spot that you had described. parked the exact same way. >> at the time, the deputy thought the van seemed suspicious and ran its license plate, but he found nothing alarming and continued his patrol. now, his intuition was telling him the van was the same one involved in melissa's attack. he had no paper record of the plate, but in his squad car, the computer kept a log of old searches and after hours of back tracking -- bingo. >> it wasn't a bingo, but it was very good. >> close? >> it was close. >> the van belong to a laura and melvin. melvin was too old to be melissa's attacker, but they learned they had a 19-year-old son who matched melissa's description perfectly and when the detective called that son's cell number it rang somewhere that would surprise everyone. >> he answered and i introduced myself and i needed to speak to him and his name came up in an incident and i asked him where he was and he told me he was at the blodgett house and i said, where? >> coming up, was this the break detectives so desperately needed or just a strange coincidence? >> we were saying, no, not this kid. >> no way he could kill our friend. >> 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. ♪i want to break free♪ (vo) ready to break free? with no sticky feeling. let's get away to a place where we can finally be free. ♪i've got to break free♪ (vo) plan your getaway with norwegian. sail safe, feel free. 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>> got stabbed with a screw at work. like a cart. >> he had road rash on his leg with injuries that looked consistent with the injuries that someone might have had with attacking melissa richards. >> detectives were skeptical about the work injury story? in fact, they were sure this 19-year-old didn't even have a job. >> if we checked with your employer, would you still have your job? >> no. >> that's what i thought. when did you lose your job? >> a while ago. >> it's the first time we had him in a lie. picked up my chair and moved it over next to him. started different phase of the interview. >> no more lies. it just makes things worse. >> after the detective's warning, the suspect tried another story. this time he claimed he had cut his finger while cooking. >> nobody in their right mind would lie about cutting themselves if it happened at home cooking. okay. >> okay. >> what happened? just be honest. >> i've gone to the park before. i've been there. >> as the police continue to press the young man, he began to crack and quickly. >> and you were in your van, correct? or your mom's van. >> yes. >> and you went after that girl, right? >> yes. >> he admitted to going after melissa richards with a knife and then offered a bizarre explanation for why he did it. >> i wanted to scare someone because everyone else is so confident. i don't understand it. i need someone to be like me. >> detectives placed him under arrest, but were far from finished. the reason. remember what he told detectives when they reached him by phone. >> a house in hartford. jessie blodgett. >> the confessed attacker was also a friend of jessie's. >> is that the girl that just passed? >> yeah. we were visiting his parents. >> his name was daniel bartelt. dan to his friends and he was the same dan jessie had been writing this music with this summer. detective clasking called police right away. they had a suspect in custody. jessie's parents refused to believe the news. >> no, not this kid. >> he's a friend of ours. >> he's a little screwed up, he just got back from college but we don't think it's dan. >> after all, dan was more than jessie's friend. he was her first love in high school. >> he had everything going for him. he was a straight a student. got the lead role in most of the musicals. very talented. >> i like this kid because he could make me laugh and he came from a nice family. >> we said it's not dan. he's a good kid. >> jessie's friends agreed. when detectives called daniel's cell phone they were with him at the blodgett house grieving together. >> we were all crying and our friend dan his phone rang and he was like i got call under to the police station for questioning. >> amelia and jackie drove dan into the police station this afternoon. they assumed it was routine questioning about jessie. >> you know, dan, they might question you as a suspect. that's what they've been doing for all of her male friends. he was like, oh, yeah, i didn't think about that. >> now even with dan under arrest for the park attack, they couldn't imagine their friend was capable of murder. >> i was thinking it was a mistake. like, yes, maybe dan did attack this girl in richfield, but no way he could have killed our friend. >> but the detective that just interrogated daniel thought the opposite. did you believe daniel could have killed jessie? >> yes. it was a sense you got, a feeling you got. >> you were sitting across from a killer? >> yes. >> detective thickens went to grill dan himself. >> i was hopeful we might get more information that would advance our case. >> when was the last time you saw her? >> last week. i think. >> daniel admitted to having romantic feelings for jessie but swore through sobs he had nothing to do with the murder. >> what do you think happened to jessie? >> i have no idea. >> do you think it could have been accidental? >> i don't know why someone would do that to her. >> but detectives didn't believe him. and he fit the profile of the killer they were looking for. someone who knew jessie and her habits. >> she usually wouldn't get up before 11:00 or 12:00. i would text her in the morning and ask if she wanted to hang out or something and she wouldn't respond. >> he knew where she was going to be. knew she didn't have a dog in the house. knew she didn't have siblings. knew where her parents were going to be. >> as for his emotional denial, they thought it was an act. >> he was making these noises, gulping and sobbing noises as if he was crying. he didn't shed a tear during the entire time i talked to him. i knew he had done it and now i had to go out and prove it. coming up, dan faces a jury and jessie's family. >> buck, joy, i can't give you the answers that you're looking for. >> when "dateline" continues. was another around the corner? 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with no sticky feeling. let's get away to a place where we can finally be free. ♪i've got to break free♪ (vo) plan your getaway with norwegian. sail safe, feel free. welcome back to "dateline." i'm natalie morales. as police searched for evidence against jessie blodgett's killer, they also searched for a motive and found something about her friend daniel that sent chills throughout the community. here's the conclusion of "friends until death." >> daniel bartelt confessed to a violent attack against a woman in a park. but after police spoke with them, they realized he could also be guilty of something far worse. did you leave that interview having any doubt that dan was the killer? >> none whatsoever. >> daniel told investigators on the morning that jessie was killed he was in a park reading a book. and when they checked the security cameras. >> we found video that put him there. >> but that didn't mean daniel was innocent. detectives decided to search the park, combing through more than a dozen garbage bins hoping to find anything that linked daniel to jessie's murder. >> in one garbage can this cereal box full of ligatures. >> ropes that were very likely the murder weapons used to strangle jessie, plus a whole lot more. bloody sanitizing wipes, tape, shoe laces. >> i guess he didn't believe that we would have made the effort to go through the garbage to find anything. >> police sent the evidence for testing and forensics showed that both jessie and daniel's dna were on the ropes found in the park. detebtiv detectived shared the incriminating evidence with jessie's parents. >> the other half of me was like, what happened to dan? >> daniel bartelt was officially charged with murder. buck and joy tried to wrap their heads around what happened to the funny teenager and had nothing but empathy for their parents. >> they didn't do this. they didn't do anything wrong. they provided a great environment for him and his sister. they're good people. >> i can't say he's totally evil but something went very wrong. i don't know what. >> also randy for the cast member who is now completely cleared. >> just more collateral damage from one person's choices. >> seemed to give the d.a. a slam dunk case, daniel pleaded not guilty. gary was his attorney. >> some people might say there was overwhelming evidence against daniel. why go to trial? >> you go to trial when your client and, in this case, dan, denies having committed a crime. >> whether the defendant is guilty -- >> when daniel's trial began, the courtroom was full of conflicted hearts. supporters on both sides knew or cared for jessie or daniel. >> what was it like watching one friend being tried for killing another? >> it was like i was watching a tv show. you're in the same room as the person who murdered your friend. it's crazy. >> it was the strangest mix of emotions. when he walked in from the back room of the courtroom, i wanted to hug him and make him feel better. i felt his humiliation and shame. i wanted to punch him. >> prosecutors said from the start, there was no easy explanation why daniel did what he did. >> why did he pick jessie? was he mad at jessie? no. he wasn't mad at jessie. he picked jessie because she was convenient. >> there was evidence that showed this young man was obsessed with murder. on his computer, police found disturbing internet searches. >> what is he doing in the days leading up to this? serial killer by number of victims. >> their most alarming find was a violent pornographic film with a plot eerily similar to how jessie was killed. prosecutors claim daniel used it as an instructional video. >> at some point in the movie he finds out a binding and places it around her neck and then strangled her. >> searches on serial killers and searches on bondage. >> did dan who was big into the theater, a straight a student, was he also a serial killer in training? >> i think that is the potential. >> prosecutors showed the jury all the physical evidence. the dna, the tape, the wipes, the likely murder weapons that tie daniel to jessie's death. through it all, daniel sat quietly at the defense table looking at no one and showing little emotion. even when the d.a. presented evidence the public had never heard before. >> performed a dna analysis. >> dna that the state argued that showed he not only killed jessie, but also raped her. >> daniel's dna was found under jessie's fingernails and inside her which was one of the toughest pieces of evidence to combat in front of the jury. >> difficult, difficult. didn't have really an alternate explanation for that. and don't have one as i sit here right now. >> in any case, daniel was never charged with rape. and for the murder, the defense rested without calling a single witness to the stand. the jury deliberated just three hours. >> we the jury find the defendant daniel bartelt guilty of first degree homicide as charged in the information. ladies and gentlemen, was this your verdict? >> it's not a good day for anybody. nobody won. >> jessie's father, buck blodgett. >> months later at the sentencing buck stunned the courtroom when he said this. >> dan, i forgive you, a have every single day since we found out it was you. >> in response to since unbelievable grave daniel looked straight at them and continued to deny his guilt. >> buck, joy, i can't give you the answers you're looking for. i pray for you for all of you and i hope that i believe that some day i will be before a court that will know that my conscious is cleared. i love you and i'm so sorry for your loss. >> he's such a liar. he looked right in our face. i mean, with all this evidence that there's just no refuting it and then for him to still be looking at me saying this. i'm thinking, kid, do you honestly believe i believe you with this. >> i think dan's a sociopath. he doesn't seem to have the conscious or if he does, he doesn't care. >> buck and joy have accepted they may never hear the truth from daniel or know why he turned so violent. daniel was sentenced to life in prison without the chance of parole. for the attacker on melissa richards, he was sentenced to five more years. >> melissa's our hero. if it wasn't for her, they wouldn't have caught him. we are forever indebted and grateful to her for that. >> the police and the blodgetts commend you and feel like other women could have been murdered if it wasn't for you. >> i tried to help out as much as i could. i just wanted to help them out. i don't know. i tried. ♪ i'm singing this song for you ♪ >> jessie's parents have started an educational campaign in their daughter's honor called love is greater than hate. >> i'm doing it for the millions of people who will be jessie, if not murdered, sexually assaulted and have their lives changed forever because of it. >> those who love jessie say her zest for life changed them for the better and still lives on through her music and her spirit. >> we started thinking differently because of her and acting differently because of her. >> have the tables turned? you were the one always proud of her and do you feel she is proud of you. >> she's lifting me up and encouraging me through life where it used to be the other way around. ♪ there is nothing i wouldn't do i'll be here, i'll be here for you ♪ >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm natalie morales. thank you for watching. i'm craig melvin. >> i'm natalie as a friend, ande were lucky to have been with her. >> a bright and beautiful teen invites a friend to sleep over. the next morning, she's dead. >> oh, my god! i don't feel a pulse. >> what in the world happened? how could this be? >> turned out this was no ordinary slumber party. >> we know from their phones that this was a planned event. they had discussed it. they took pictures. >> stories surfacing of a dangerous experiment. >> the main purpose of having the sleepover was to try it. >> an experiment that just might tempt other teens. >> we know it's entered our high school. >> why the clues in this mystery could save a life in your family. >> y

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