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An extraordinary journey through the criminal justice system was just beginning. reporter: coming up little evidence, but some odd behavior when cara saw her wife at the bottom of the stairs. cara s a paramedic. what does she do? does she rush down there, oh, my god, ann! are you okay? no. when dateline continues. when you have a cold stuff happens. ....
It. there s nothing. nothing to point to cara. how could this possibly be the worst possible outcome? how? reporter: afterwards, reverend lori souder, cara s pastor, friend, and firm defender, lamented. brianna has clearly lost her other mother now, in a sense? yes. god, where art thou? reporter: ann s family was also stunned. but pleased. murder one i m still reeling on that one. it s what we wanted for the last two trials. it was a surprise but really, just an affirmation of everything we had done. the possibility that it could have been anyone else and adhere to the timeline reporter: so what was the jury s thinking? they say they kept running into inconsistencies, beginning with cara s account of discovering ann s body. why didn t she rush to help her? she was a paramedic. so to see your loved one at the bottom of the stairs and she could ve easily have gone down there and started cpr and saved her. ....
Ended up working with people. reporter: did she like the adrenaline of it? running hot with the blue lights going? i would say yes. i would say yes, 100%. yeah, who she was. reporter: it was under those flashing lights, back in 2002, that ann met another paramedic named cara rintala and fell for her. like ann, cara was compassionate. but in other ways, she was ann s opposite. if everything about ann was larger than life, everything about cara was contained, even cautious. sandy montagna is cara s mom. carl montagna, her stepdad. she had a plan. always had a plan. was very conscious of where she was headed in life. reporter: after a couple of years together, ann moved into cara s house in the western mass town of granby and they decided to adopt. this is a real step. i mean being a couple together and moving in your furniture is different than, we are going to raise a child together. you know, this is right. a commitment. and so, i don t think it was looked upo ....
Three total credit cards with her, one of which had racked up about a $7,000 balance at one point. reporter: and another thing. after ann s death, when investigators asked mark what he was doing the day of the murder, he wasn t straight with the facts. not at the beginning. first, he said he was at home that day. later he changed his account, said he d actually been shopping, then shared a meal with his family. reporter: that must make your nose twitch when a guy doesn t give you the straight out story. i agree. it s going to raise the suspicions a little bit. reporter: even though mark oleksak s story changed, investigators accepted it. he had receipts for his purchases. and the final texts between the two seemed to affirm they were close until the end, mark promising ann a big long kiss cause i love you. even the morning of the murder they were very lovey-dovey on text messages that particular morning. reporter: and you don t think but he also reporter: the fi ....
yet you re reawilling to cre their subjective impression that the paint was either wet or shiny, correct? correct. reporter: finally, the defense called, of all people, state trooper jamie magarian. in the first two trials the lead investigator had been a heavyweight witness for the prosecution. not this time. he was vital to the defense theory of a keystone kops investigation. is he going to say, investigator, you ran a shabby case here. you didn t secure the scene. certainly. reporter: there were tests you didn t run. there were things to be known. you re relying on this junk science of how paint dries. yeah, that s his job. he just needs one nugget of doubt. reporter: in pursuit of that nugget, the defense attorney grilled the investigator about the two people of interest. first, mark oleksak. remember, he d changed his alibi. but what motive could he have for murder? well maybe this ann, the drama queen, had angered him when she left her wife for her old girlf ....