lot about the way the law works and about the way forensics play into a case where there is no eyewitness especially. can the dead speak to the living? a michigan woman tried to do just that leaving a note to her survivors telling them her death was no accident. forensics uncovered the secrets she almost took to her grave. it seemed like a love story from a time gone by. david duyst and sandy bose met in high school and fell in love. they went to the same college, got married after graduation and started a family. >> the duysts were church-going people, pretty conservative and well thought of. he was an insurance salesman

making a lot of money that had three kids. >> sandy had her own business boarding horses in a stable on their land. >> sandy was very good with horses. she loved the horses. her favorite place was to be in the barn, very favorite was to be there. out of any place, you could tell she was in the barn. >> but sandy soon learned the horse business could be dangerous. sandy said one of the horses got spooked and kicked her in the head. bleeding profusely and barely conscious, sandy was able to crawl to her neighbor's house for help. >> after the accident, sandra started to experience extreme difficulties, mood swings, severe depression. after about a year, it got to the point where i believe that she was in such a state that their marriage had deteriorated, completely. >> sandy's doctor prescribed

antidepressants. she appeared to be working. until 18 months after her accident david duyst called 911. >> 911. what is your emergency? >> ma'am, my wife just tried to kill herself again. i think she did it this time. >> what did she do? >> she shot herself. >> where did she shoot herself at? >> in the head. >> sandy was rushed to a nearby hospital but she was declared dead on arrival. >> and i said, no, it was hard to believe because she was so young is what it was. >> she was only 40 years old. in sandy's bedroom was a 9 millimeter semi automatic pistol the family owned for protection. david duyst told police he and sandy were having marital problems and no longer slept together. sandy slept in the master bedroom, david slept on the sofa

in the family room. >> he told me that he had heard a shot and responded to the bedroom where his wife was asleep and found her. he took the gun out of her hand, laid it on the bed, ran back ought of the room and called 9111. >> the children were in their bedrooms. they said they could hear their father downstairs. >> she can hear his movement immediately after hearing the shots. she can hear his movement from the den area from the other three rooms opening the bedroom door and going this. >> this corroborated david's story, but just to be sure, police confiscated david's clothing. at that point, they did make a visual inspection of the shirt and the pants. and their report indicated that it was negative for blood staining. >> to make certain nothing was left undone, police asked david to take a lie detector test. he passed. >> we didn't have any reason to dispute his story. and quite frankly, given his background, the fact that he appeared to be a stable, normal

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anytime someone like sandy duyst dies of what's believed to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound, it immediately raises suspicions. statistically, it's rare that woman uses a pistol to kill herself. >> as is our custom, we do perform autopsies on suicide victims. we are, under law, obligated to investigate such deaths. >> in examining sandy duyst's head injuries, the forensic pathologist expected to find a single bullet wound, but he found something else. >> at that point, he said, oh, i think you should come and see this. >> they found not one, but two entrance wounds. an inch and a half apart. >> it did show two separate wounds tracts right through the middle of the brain, each one of

them. indicating that the first one had to be incapacitating. >> and this ain't right. she's got two in her head now. doctor colt immediately -- his immediate statement was, that can't be. >> two entrance and two exit wounds meant that either the pistol double fired or sandy pulled the trigger twice. >> i have had a number of cases in my own experience and there have been a number reported in the literature of more than one suicidal gunshot wound to the head. the common denominator in all those cases is that the first shot was not incapacitating. >> also suspicion, investigators found blood spatter on the .9 millimeter pistol, but none on sandy's arm. >> it really suggests that she is not in control of the weapon, but the weapon certainly was exposed to the battery thin.

>> then investigators got a telephone call from sandy's sister. she told them about a conversation she had with sandy a year before her death. >> sandra had indicated to her sister, if anything ever happens to me, i've left a note for you in the china cabinet at home. please just get it and read it. >> with a warrant, investigators searched the duyst's home. >> the china cabinet not only held china, but it seemed to be like a repository, if you will, for family paperwork. so i just began searching the china cabinet from top to bottom. on the very bottom shelf, way in the back behind some dishes, there was a white energy. all it said on it was the name of sandra's sister. and i immediately retrieved it from where it was. it was sealed. i didn't open it up at that point. >> the note was immediately sent to the crime lab, where it was opened by forensic analysts. it proved to be nothing less than a voice from the grave.

>> to anyone interested in what happened to me, look first to david duyst. he could be my killer. >> for the first time, sandy described what really happened in the horse stable 18 months earlier. >> on november 19th, my accident was no accident. david beat me with a hammer/axe. he came up from behind while i was in dexter's stall, hit me repeatedly. i figured he would come back to kill me. >> the only information that we had prior to this that mrs. duyst had always indicated that this -- she was kicked by a horse. so now we have to begin kind of looking at this whole circumstance and trying to validate that. >> i would never commit suicide. he may have killed me. respectfully, sandra a. duyst. >> investigators sent the note to a forensic document examiner who compared the handwriting to sandy's known handwriting samples.

he found it to be consistent. scientists found a fingerprint on the letter. it was sandy's. and dna testing confirmed that sandy licked the envelope to seal it. now that sandy claimed the incident was an attack, investigators reviewed hospital medical records and discovered that the attending physician doubted a horse had done that damage. >> they were semi circular in nature and there were a number of them. they put lacerations in her head, when she had to staple shut and he said it didn't look like any horse kick injury i had ever seen. >> dr. john holsing was in the duyst barn shortly after the incident. he, too, noticed inconsistencies. >> i went in that stall and i couldn't find any blood on the wall where this reportedly happened. it was all outside of the stall in the walk-in area.

>> david duyst was confronted with the letter and denied that the incident was anything other than an accident. but he did make a confession. he admitted he was having an affair with his secretary, linda ryan, and that sandy had found out about it. david also gave police a voice mail sandy left on his office phone. he said it proved she was suicidal. >> david, as far as i'm concerned, my christmas is over, my life is over, and you can -- you can go on without me. i don't know what else to say. police now had evidence that

police now had evidence that sandy duyst's horse barn incident was no accident. in a letter found among her private papers, sandy described the incident as a murder attempt perpetrated by her husband. >> my accident was no accident. look first at david duyst. >> instead of leaving the marriage, sandy apparently tried to make it work. >> sandy really, truly loved david.

she stayed with him because she did love him. and she wanted the whole family to stay together and that -- and family was very important to her. and so i think that she just really loved him. >> i think family first, stay with the family, make it work, do everything you can. >> david duyst denied hitting sandy in the stable and incysted her shooting death was a suicide. he said the gun must have double fired. to find out, investigators sent the weapon to gunmaker brad batchhelder. >> it still had the original grease in the gun, had basically been fired very little. there was almost no wear on the gun whatsoever. >> the gun was designed for safety. it could not be fired without a complete pull of the trigger. various safety mechanisms had to be in place for this to happen. all there to prevent an

accidental discharge. >> so that gun can't accidentally through recoil or slam firing or dropping or any malfunction that i've been exposed to thus far involuntarily fire a second shot without full manipulation of the trigger. >> and tests showed that this trigger was difficult to pull. on most pistols, it takes between four and six pounds of pressure to pull the trigger. but this gun required almost 12 pounds of pressure. the conclusion, the gun could not have double fired. >> one of the beautiful things about mechanisms is they don't think. they'll either function or malfunction. and it's very easy, with the right amount of background knowledge to look at a mechanism and determine if, in fact, it could or did fail. with that knowledge, it makes i very hard for me to believe that

story. >> but it is possible for a suicide victim to shoot herself more than once. >> in 30 years i've encountered two situations where a weapon ultimately was fired twice during a suicide event. it's not the typical, but it's not unheard of. >> but in sandy's case, doctors say either shot would have caused massive brain injuries and would have killed her instantly. >> but what the wounds did that she received from that first bullet was it went right through the center of her brain that controls your motor functions, the thalamus, the hypothalamus and the basoganglia were all destroyed in that first shot. so she was incapable of squeezing the trigger a second time. >> the fact that she had two contact gunshot wounds to the head, each of which would be instantly incapacitating and nearly instantly fatal were sufficient for me to conclude that this was a homicide and not the suicide as it appeared to be.

>> but if david duyst shot his wife two times at close range, why was there no blood spatter on his shirt? >> when the clothing was sent over, it was labeled as a suicide, not a homicide investigation. they just basically held it up and looked at it with a naked eye. >> the clothing was examined again. this time, criminalists used a high-powered microscope connected to a video camera. under high magnification, there were stains invisible to the naked eye. tiny microscopic blood stains. >> these stains were referred to as back -- they're coming from the entry wound and they're ejected back towards the shooter. >> the blood penetrated into the fabric weave. the signature sign of high velocity blood spatter. and there was high velocity blood spatter on the back sleeve

of david's shirt. >> finding the spatter on the back of mr. duyst's sleeve i think is rather telling because it suggests that his arm is not just down, but rather it's extended and up at the moment of that spatter event. which is consistent with the position that one would have to be in if they're firing a weapon into mrs. duyst. >> david duyst was arrested and charged with first degree murder. he continued to maintain his innocence. he said when he found sandy, she was coughing, which explained how her blood got on to his shirt. it would be up to a jury to decide if david duyst was lying or telling the truth.

prosecutors didn't have to look very hard to look for the motive for sandy duyst's murder. they were heavily in debt. >> all the income that was going into the duyst home was absolutely going out in expenditures. there was no money left over. >> david duyst was an insurance agent and he had written a $500,000 insurance policy on sandy's life, which would pay even in the event of suicide.

and prosecutors also learned that david's lover, his secretary, was insisting he leave sandy immediately. >> by having her out of the picture, being dead, as opposed to just divorcing her, he avoid paying alimony, child support, and adding further financial whoa to his particular situation. the motives were the oldest ones in the book, money and women, and he had both of them. >> with $500,000 worth of insurance on sandy, prosecutors think david duyst chose murder over divorce. they believe the first attempt on sandy's life took place in the horse stable. sandy's letter said david hit her on the back of her head with an ax hammer. but she survived those injuries and covered up the incident. 18 months later, with david and

sandy sleeping separately, prosecutors believe david slipped into sandy's perform shortly before dawn and used the pistol he kept in the closet. the blood spatter on david's shirt and under his right sleeve proved he was the shooter. david left the gun on the bed, then called 911. >> she shot herself in the head. >> she must have had some inkling that he was going to be doing something and here is the guy who thought he was smart enough to get away with it. if not for the second shot. >> after he was arrested, david duyst continued to tell anyone who would listen that he was innocent. he claimed the gun double fired. ad that his wife's letter was actually an attempt to frame him for her death. during his trial, david duyst took the stand to tell the jury

his side of the story. >> nothing was ever good. everything was always bad. that kind of -- that kind of mind-set. that's what she thought. that's what she said. that's how she expressed herself. >> but most trial observers had david's testimony hurt him more than it helped him. >> it was almost kind of light hearted, jolly. i said this to someone right afterwards, he testified like the insurance salesman that he was. >> after a month-long trial, the jury made its decision. >> all 12 jurors being in agreement find that the defendant, david duyst, as to count one, guilty of murder in the first degree. >> david duyst was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. >> i am the best expert witness in this entire case because i know what i did and i know what i did not do that morning.

i am innocent and i will maintain my innocence for the rest of my life. >> he can stick to his story all he wants, but there's nothing that supports it, certainly none of the evidence we found. >> he wanted it all, the kids, he didn't want to lose the kids, he didn't want to lose the house, he didn't want to lose nothing. those things he would have lost if he had gotten divorced, and he knows that. >> prosecutors don't think david's girlfriend, linda ryan, had anything to do with the murder. but questions about the case remain. why did david fire the second shot? did something that happened that night that anchored him so much that he wanted to walk into the bedroom and absolutely hold the gun to his wife's head and shoot her not once, but shoot her twice and then say it was a suicide? it just doesn't add up. i don't know if i'll ever be able to answer that question.

>> forensics were the case. if we don't get dna off that energy and fingerprints off the letter, we can't authenticate that she had written that. if we don't have the autopsy results that we have and the blood spatter results that we have, we have a whole different ball game here. a young woman just landed her first big modeling job. a few hours later, she disappeared. the weave pattern on some fabric, the mixture of some concrete and some dog hairs were the keys to the mystery. it was a friday night in central illinois, around 10:00 p.m. a motorist saw an abandoned car along the side of the road. the driver's side door was open. the lights were still on. the engine was running, but er