Transcripts For KNTV Dateline NBC 20150118 : comparemela.com

Yep. And her husband he really played the field. How many other women besides you was levi chavez having an affair with . Ten. Reporter so many suspects. But so few clues. What really happened to tera . She had told her boss that she had done something bad. If i never said anything, maybe shed still be alive. I think the last statement in her diary said it all. 3 f2 its hard. Its hard work. From one call to the next, you dont know what youre going to meet up with. Reporter but our story is about what happened when a First Responder had to face a crisis in his own home. Baby, please wake up, please reporter a cop, pleading for help, from his fellow men and women in blue. Tell them im a cop. Please tell them to hurry, please. Reporter in one moment a family is shattered. It was, like, disbelief. Its like a surreal moment. Reporter and over time, an entire communitys secrets would be revealed. I laid there and cried. It doesnt make sense. Reporter it starts here in the village of los lunas, new mexico, 25 miles south of albuquerque. Tera chavez grew up in a loving family, with her twin brother josh and younger brother aaron. Joseph and Theresa Cordova are their parents. She was a girly girl. Very motherly. She always was working with drawings and poetry, always writing. Reporter melonie gonzales was teras best friend growing up. She was amazing. She was shy. I know a lot of times in School People thought that she came off kind of stuck up. But that wasnt her . Not at all. Reporter then, one day at summer camp, that shy girl met the handsome boy who would change her life in so many ways levi chavez. How did she talk about him . She loved him. It didnt take very long before she fell hard for him. He was charming towards her and she thought he was gorgeous. Reporter tera was quiet and artistic. Levi was a guys guy. He loved basketball and boxing. Reporter their love bloomed in the new mexico desert. Tera got pregnant while they were still in high school, and they got married just before her graduation. He was happy about it, scared as well, just like she was. Something that they neither one of them expected. It just happened. Every time we would see them, they were happy. Reporter Michael Romero is levis uncle. And as a town magistrate, he performed the ceremony. On that wedding day, the whole family was there . Yes, our family was there. It was a joyous occasion. They were a lovely couple. Reporter and together, they dreamt of the life theyd have. Tera worked as a hair stylist but had bigger goals. She was really wanting to start her own business. Her own business meaning her own salon . Yes. So, she approached me. Im all for it. Ill be a silent partner although she did laugh at me, cause, dad, youre not silent. Reporter levi worked long hours as an officer with the Albuquerque Police department. It was his dream job. In levis world, police work was known as the family business. His grandfather from his fathers side was a Police Officer. And and he has, four, five uncles that are Police Officers. And im an exPolice Officer myself. He was a Natural Police officer . He was a natural. Reporter by 2007, they were raising two children andrea and little levi and had settled into a new house in los lunas. But while levi was out fighting crime in the big city, tera was finding out that life in the suburbs wasnt entirely crimefree. Teras brother aaron she called me and told us, you know, i think somebody tried to break in my house. So, we immediately, lets go to the house. We checked and the door did look like somebody had messed with it a little bit. Reporter whoever did that didnt steal anything, but it put levi and tera on alert. He says he suggested she keep one of his old duty guns at home to protect herself. Did levi and tera live in a tough neighborhood . Valencia county, in general, i think they have a high crime rate. They tend to have a lot of breakins, a lot of crime there in that area. Reporter and levi and tera were about to experience it first hand. Levi had recently bought an expensive new truck. Late one night, tera was home alone and heard their dog bark. She looked outside and the truck was gone. She said, hey, guess what, levis truck got stolen. And i was like, well, what happened . Are you okay . Is levi home . She said, no, he was at work last night. Reporter that made melonie worry. And it turned out there was plenty to worry about. Two weeks later, on a sunday, the kids were away visiting levis parents. Levi himself had a pretty quiet weekend on patrol. But when he stopped to check on tera, and saw what was in front of him, this Police Officer found himself on the other end of an anguished call to 911. Please, please have somebody come here right away. Please. What happened to the plofrs wife . A closeknit Community Reeling with grief and shock. It was disturbing, a young, handsome Police Officer, a young, beautiful wife. And a distraught husband overcome by guilt. Ill never forget this, never. People of earth. Oh boy. Americas strongest lte signal is here hey guess what day it is . . Hump day hummmp daaay its hump day yeah hey Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike mike mike. Hey he knows hey guess what day it is hey camel guess what day it is its not even wednesday. Let it go, phil. If youre a camel, you put up with this all the time. Its what you do. sigh if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. Its what you do. Ok. Crest gave one friend crest 3d white whitestrips. And the other, a whitening toothpaste. Heres what they thought. I cant tell if the paste whitened. Well the whitestrips worked. Yeah. The paste didnt do that. Crest whitestrips work below the enamel surface to whiten 25x better than a leading whitening toothpaste. Crest whitestrips. The way to whiten. 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Com or call 1844444hepc to find out how you and your doctor can take the next step towards a cure. Because the answers you need may be closer than they appear. It was a blustery october night, with high winds gusting over new mexicos sandia mountains. Albuquerque Police Officer levi chavez called 911 from his own home. Baby, baby, please, wake up please reporter he told police hed found his wife lying in a pool of blood in their bed. In a panic, levi begged for help. Okay, theyre on their way. Levi, is it going to be easier for you if you go to another room . I cant leave her alone. Okay, okay. Thats okay. Oh, my god. Reporter aaron jones was a detective with the Sheriffs Department in suburban los lunas. I received a call from my sergeant saying that there had been a Police Officers wife that had been shot. Reporter it was just after 9 00 p. M. When jones got to the chavez home. It was disturbing. I mean, it was a young, handsome Police Officer, a young, beautiful wife. Reporter jones saw tera lying on the bed with a gunshot wound to her head and he found this glock 17 by her body. It was the same gun levi said hed given her for protection. It was his Service Weapon . It was his Service Weapon. That he left at home . Yes. Reporter and beside the bed on the nightstand, there was a threeword note im sorry, levi. Jones quickly determined that tera hadnt been a victim of crime but had turned the gun on herself. She was only 26. We do have a lot of suicides out there, unfortunately. Valencia county has a high rate of suicides. Its not uncommon. The uncommon part of it was the fact that it was a Police Officers wife. Reporter within minutes, members of levis own Police Department in neighboring albuquerque came over to the house to offer levi support as the news of teras death spread, one officers wife called teras best friend melonie. She just came out and said it, mel, teras dead. And it took me a minute to process it. And i was like, well, what do you mean . I dont understand. Reporter at the scene, police saw an inconsolable husband. He kept referring to himself as a piece of crap and other things that, you know, he just should have been a better husband and that he should have just been with her. I will never forgive myself. Never. God, let her go to heaven. Reporter jones, the local detective, took a statement from levi, the big city cop, who bared his soul. Dude, the rest of my life, ill never be able to move on. Reporter he told jones he blamed himself for teras suicide. His wife was prone to drama and deprssion, he said, but at times he didnt take it seriously. Now, it was too late. How old are the kids . 10 and 6. Reporter the detective did his best to bring a weeping levi under control. Whatever is going on right now, take a deep breath. Youre trying to make this guy feel better. I am. I was concerned that possibly i guess my my sympathy and empathy gone to the point where i was afraid that he might hurt himself, too. Reporter officers went through the scene in the bedroom and stumbled on something. Tera the writer had kept a journal, tucked under her mattress. Parts of it were very dark, described a young woman that was having some dark times in her life. Reporter tera had laid bare the depths of her despair. Writing sometimes i want to just disappear and im depressed. I want to fall off the face of the earth. Every day, i feel my time and work, kids and endlessly trying to make my marriage work, im getting nowhere. I never do. That sounds like depression to me. Classic depression. Reporter and police found another page of writing that sounded desperate, torn up and buried in the trash can. And levi showed detective jones Something Else. Ive got a text. Reporter a text he received from tera earlier that day. It says, im afraid im going to hurt myself. Im so, sooo, upset, sad and hurt. Reporter open and shut. By 2 a. M. Police were wrapping up their work at the chavez house. And detective jones headed to teras parents home to break the news. He introduced a deputy and a chaplain. And they said, its about your daughter. So, im already feeling weak. What did you think . I thought there was a terrible traffic traffic accident. I never never thought to hear otherwise. I asked them what happened. And aaron jones said, its an apparent suicide. Reporter possibly the most painful news a family can ever hear, but the cordovas werent prepared to accept it and they felt a deep conviction that no one outside this family saw coming. When you hear suicide, what did you think . No way, no, no way. That girl loved those children. And i knew right then and there that she would not take her life and leave those children behind. 3 f2 y dejaria esos chicos solos. I never would have in a million years thought shed ever take her life. Was teras death definitely a suicide . Just something about it, things about it started stinking. Our commitment to current and former military members and their families is without equal. Start investing with as little as fifty dollars. Hi there we brought queso oh my ill cube the velveeta. Ill add the rotel diced tomatoes and green chilies. I love it. Quesofantastic catch the newest butterfly look loreals new butterfly intenza mascara. Loreals new double wing brush intensely volumizes. Stretches lashes outward to the extreme. An ultraintense fanned out look new butterfly intenza. From loreal makeup designer paris. The schelp then the spill. Now the scrub and the second guess. Finally, the rewash. Or you can make it easy and do the pop with tide pods. The first 3 in 1 laundry pack. It cleans, brightens, and removes stains in one step. Tide pods one step to an amazing clean. Food is more than just a meal. Food is love. At monsanto, we believe everyone deserves a healthy, balanced meal. And a future that sustains us all. Its time for a bigger discussion about food. Be part of the conversation at discover. Monsanto. Com hey guess what day it is . . Hump day hummmp daaay its hump day yeah hey Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike mike mike. Hey he knows hey guess what day it is hey camel guess what day it is its not even wednesday. Let it go, phil. If youre a camel, you put up with this all the time. Its what you do. sigh if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. Its what you do. Ok. Family and friends awoke to a piercing sadness in this tight new mexico community. Tera chavez, the wife of an Albuquerque Police officer, had committed suicide. I laid there and cried. I couldnt believe it. I mean, somebody that i talked to almost every day is gone and you dont know why, you dont understand it. It doesnt make sense. Reporter when levis uncle michael tried to help his nephew that next morning, he says he saw a broken man. I went and saw levi. And he was in bed and i just didnt know what to say. Its the worst thing that could happen to anybody. What did levi say to you that day, do you remember . He didnt say. He was too emotional. He couldnt even speak. Reporter but along with the shock, teras best friend was overcome with a sense of disbelief. Part of me was like, no, this isnt right. This isnt what happened. Like, theyre lying, its not its not true. Reporter and thats exactly what teras parents were telling the detective whod come to their home with that terrible news. For one thing, they told him there was simply no way tera would leave her children. You would not be the first family of a loved one who committed suicide who did not want to believe that that was possible. Well, josh, i dont know about other families. But i knew tera. I knew tera. Reporter but what about the depressed person who emerges from that diary police found at the scene . Teras family points out that many of the darker passages in that journal were several years old. Her journal, i think, was an outlet for her just to vent sometimes. Reporter gina cordova is teras sisterinlaw. I mean, im married. I have kids. Sometimes, i just want to disappear and it doesnt mean that im going to harm myself in any way. Reporter and the very last entry, three months before her death, suggests tera was in fact the opposite of depressed. Tera wrote goodbye to the person i used to be. Welcome new day. Happiness. I think the last statement within her diary said it all, happiness. Reporter and her family says she had lots to be happy about. Tera was finally making plans to open that new hair salon she had long dreamed of. She was even starting to look at real estate. She was so excited to do it. Reporter gina says tera had an appointment to look at this location with her dad scheduled for just two days after her death. She was thinking about how she was going to decorate and how it was going be, you know, girly. And she was just really excited about it. Reporter thats the tera her brother aaron saw all the time. And, he says, just two days before she died, she had sent him this funny video of her kids. And they were dancing around the shop, just being goofy, joking around, you know. And it was pretty funny, actually. Nothing on that video to suggest that she was in a miserable place. No, and, you know, theres a little second in there on that video that you see her and shes shes laughing cause her daughter and her little boy are just goofballs, you know. Reporter and teras best friend melonie reread the last text tera had sent her around that same time and saw nothing frightening. It was real simple. She just said, hi, i havent talked to you all day. How are you doing . Doesnt sound like someone in the middle of a terrible depression. Not at all. Could you have conceived of her taking her own life . Not the tera i knew. I never would have, in a million years, ever seen or expected or thought that she would ever take her life. Reporter melonie and the cordovas say their instincts were telling them something was wrong in that suicide scene at the house and they let detective jones know it. I talked to aaron jones. I dont think he believed you. No, im sure he didnt. It looked like a suicide to them. Thats correct. But something you said to him or some way you said it made him think that he needed to dig a little deeper. Yes. I promised teras mom and dad that i would look at it. I knew that i couldnt just close this case out without without looking at it and digging into it. Reporter to begin with, jones knew from experience that bedroom scene was very unusual. Just 10 of gun suicides are committed by women. And he wondered about that recent breakin attempt and levis stolen truck. Had someone been casing the neighborhood, targeting the officers house . I wanted to check and make sure that that there wasnt any kind of indication of any kind of breakin or that maybe somebody else had done this. Reporter but nothing seemed to be missing from the house, and jones could find no sign of forced entry. Still, he went back to the photos from the bedroom, started noticing things. Like, what appeared to be a swipe of blood on the bed. What could that smear of blood on the bed sheets indicate . Well, it could indicate the fact that she didnt commit suicide and the person that fired that fatal round would have had blood on their hands. Reporter and the detective remembered Something Else from that night that now struck him as odd. A red substance in a toilet on the other side of the house. Was it teras blood, and if so, how did it get there . If youre in a situation where someones died, they certainly didnt get out of bed