>> and my mom called, and she was very weird on the phone, and i thought, "i'm really trying to keep it together." i said, "is she dead? i just need to know. is she dead?" "yes, yes." >> to homicide detectives, the murders appeared to be a robbery gone wrong. not that way. police found bullet casings and not at all. a bloody footprint near the bodies but little else to go on. >> she fought by she gave us what we needed. >> sometimes butch casey was known to carry a lot of money, as well as he was thought to perhaps maybe have access to drugs, but the primary thought, since the house was ransacked, planned, calculated, cold-blooded murder. that someone was looking for >> the dna can't direct an something. >> as police investigated, investigation. curious neighbors gathered it's very difficult to carry out outside. a crime like this without leaving behind some sort of evidence. >> that was the key to finding out who did it.

>> who was extraordinary. he may have com perfect crime. >> they thought they knew who >> some of those citizens were coming up to me and talking to me, telling me stuff. they were looking for. >> one neighbor named gary foy said he'd seen something this was completely different from what they expected. suspicious the morning of the murders. >> gary foy told me that he saw these two guys in butch's mercedes convertible. >> foy thought it was odd that >> create a picture of this two young men would be driving casey's car. person actually based on the dna >> he took off out towards hollywood boulevard. in the case. gary foy followed him, and he looked at them. >> trace minute evidence he said one of them looked latin, and the other guy, he said, "i really couldn't see, analyzed. >> there was something there. but he wasn't latin." >> she saw it coming. she saw who her killer was. i'm thinking, like, "this guy is gold now, you know? he's shocking. >> absolutely shocking. actually saw them." >> police were convinced if they found the men who drove that car, they had their killers. as investigators continued to comb through butch casey's >> on this episode of "death row stories," a triple murder execution style. >> they shot them like they were nothing. >> and the crime is caught on tape. >> most significant piece of house, they discovered a cache evidence i've ever seen in a case.

of videotapes hidden in the >> but clear images of guilt --h bedroom. they appeared to be sex tapes filmed from a secret camera mounted above casey's bed. crime. >> there's your guy. an officer then noticed a souvenir film slate on a high bookshelf in the living room. it's a slam dunk for the prosecution. >> only deepen the mystery. >> he looked behind it, and it was the camera, and he's >> you're going to kill somebody. it's not even a sure conviction. discovered that it was attached >> what they didn't have is they to a vcr. didn't have any physical evidence. >> there's no doubt in my mind >> i was outside. that he's innocent. they were like, "come here. you >> there's a body in the water. got to see this," and took the >> he was butchered and murdered. tape, popped it into the tv, and >> many people proclaim their it starts up, and there's butch innocence. >> in this case there are a number of things that stink. casey walking around the night >> this man is remorseless. >> he needs to pay for it with before getting ready to go to his life. >> the electric chair flashed in front of my eyes. >> get a conviction at all costs. let the truth fall where it may. work. we start fast-forwarding it. he goes out the door. then the sun comes up. the room gets bright. then he comes walking in with >> on a sunday morning in the the girls, and we go, "we're summer of 1994, a palm beach going to watch this crime unfold police officer noticed smoke on video," and it did right in front of us. hurtling across the sky near

belle glade, florida. as the officer drew closer, he noticed a car engulfed in flames by the side of the road. dine outer, take outer, veggie person, definitely-not-just-veggie person, bread lover, or cheese lover... all you have to do is answer personal assessment questions >> there's a lot of isolated land out near the everglades. and get scientifically matched with a proven weight loss plan. the car was found burning, no one in it. >> the black mercedes had a find out which new customized plan can make losing weight pungent odor of gasoline but no signs of being in an accident. easier for you! >> once the fire was under the new program from ww. control, and various forensic weight watchers reimagined. people began to look for join for free + lose 10 lbs. on us! hurry, offer ends february 3rd. he's a systems quarterback. evidence to see if they could where's the truck? what? identify who it belonged to, parked it right there. from there, that's how the case male voice: what did i tell you, boys? got started. tonight we eat like kings! >> police discovered the car belonged to casimir sucharski of (chuckling) you're a genius, gordon! miramar, florida. sucharski was better known to locals as butch casey, the brake! hit the brake! manager and former owner of the uh, which one's the brake? popular nightclub, casey's (crash, bottles smashing) nickelodeon. stop! stop! sto-o-op! (brakes squealing) what's happening? what? there's a half of cheesesteak back there. with geico, the savings keep on going. just like this sequel.

15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance. casey's attracted hard-partying locals with bikini contests, raccoon: i got the cheesesteak! ladies' nights and hours until dawn. >> butch was a charming womanizer. girls loved him. >> butch casey lives in the miramar city limits, and so the miramar police department, once they were notified that his car was found, they sought to locate him. a quick knock on the door, no sini wasn't sure...clot was another around the corner? response, no answer. or could things go a different way? >> the miramar policeman left i wanted to help protect myself. my doctor recommended eliquis. his card in the door unaware of the gruesome scene that lay just eliquis is proven to treat and help prevent inside. another dvt or pe blood clot. almost 98 percent of patients on eliquis didn't experience another, and eliquis has significantly less major bleeding than the standard treatment. eliquis is fda-approved and has both. the same sunday that butch casey's charred mercedes was don't stop eliquis unless your doctor tells you to. found in the everglades, police eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases fatal bleeding. were notified by the families of two aspiring models, sharon don't take eliquis if you have an artificial heart valve anderson and marie rogers, that or abnormal bleeding. if you had a spinal injection while on eliquis both women were missing. call your doctor right away if you have tingling, >> so i remember it was june numbness, or muscle weakness.

26th. while taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily it was a sunday. and it may take longer than usual for bleeding to stop. seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding, my mom called, said she hadn't like unusual bruising. spoken to sharon, and i thought, eliquis may increase your bleeding risk if you take certain medicines. tell your doctor about all planned medical "well, she's 25." or dental procedures. she liked to go out and have a good time, but i could hear in what's around the corner could be worth waiting for. my mother's voice that something was not right. ask your doctor about eliquis. >> police discovered the two women had been at casey's nickelodeon the previous night. >> they were there up until around closing time. casey, being a ladies' man, flirted with them and invited them to come to his home. >> by late sunday with no sign of casey, anderson or rogers, police returned to casey's home. >> this time, the officer (vo) in every trip, there's room for more than just the business you came for. actually walked around the ♪ this wave is rolling, let's get going ♪ ♪ we got places to be entire perimeter of the house, worked his way into the ♪ hey-ey-ey backyard, looked through the (vo) whether that's taking in every moment... sliding glass door, and he could ♪ see the bodies. ...or capturing a moment worth bringing back. that's room for possibility. >> inside the home, butch casey,

sharon anderson and marie rogers ♪ let's see how far we can go, oh oh ♪ had all been shot in the head at ♪ oh oh oh point-blank range. detective craig scarlett was one of the first officers at the scene. >> when i saw it, it was, you know, it was pretty hard to look at. detectives on the scene of a it wasn't some random, "i'll brutal triple murder in miramar, shoot you here, and i'll shoot florida, had made a stunning discovery: a hidden surveillance you there." camera had videotaped the entire they were all laid out in a row. crime. >> certainly a gruesome scene, >> it was really amazing bloody, killed execution style. because, you know, back in 1994, the home itself was ransacked, not many people were hooking their houses up with all kinds of video. and some items missing, jewelry. on the video, the girls are sitting at the kitchen table. butch casey was licensed to they grabbed a bottle of wine or carry a gun. champagne. we could see that that gun was missing. they're sitting there and >> they had cordoned off a giant talking. >> and lo and behold after a area of the property. substantial amount of time, in police officers, police cars, walks the murderers. chief was on his way. >> two men enter casey's house i believe there was already news there. >> around 2:30 this morning, casimir sucharski was found

tec-9 machine gun. >> butch is, like, stunned for a minute it looks like. he knows he's got a gun in the other room. one of the girls runs into the bedroom. >> ms. anderson tried to get away, go to another room, and the second intruder then immediately chased her. the intruder with a gun came in, took the butt end of his gun and just struck butch casey. >> and then they just start beating on him with the gun across the face. whack. >> the other intruder who had chased ms. anderson secured her. you can see that he came out of the bedroom with a gun that he didn't have before, which it turns out to be butch casey's gun, and laid her down on the

floor. >> minutes pass. the criminals appear to be searching for something as casey and the two women huddle on the floor. >> at one point, butch casey seized a moment when he thought that he could overcome the intruder with a gun, so he grabbed the gun and began to struggle. >> he's not in the best position to put up a fight, and eventually the suspect shot him in the back to make him let go, and he did. finally came time to leave. i guess they didn't get what they wanted. now that butch was shot, they just lined them all up. boom, boom, boom. >> the second intruder uses the tec-9 to finish the job. >> then the other guy comes and puts it right to the back of the head, boom. moves over to the next one, boom.

>> as the men prepare to leave, one of them makes a fateful mistake. >> one perpetrator removed a cover from what appeared to be a towel or a shirt of some sort over his head. you got a fairly and particularly clear picture of his face. the other intruder continued at all times to wear a baseball cap and sunglasses. >> from start to finish, the crime lasted 22 minutes. >> as gruesome as it was, the video was probably the most significant piece of evidence i've ever seen in a case. >> the shocking news of her sister's murder sent deborah

bowie, who was 9 months pregnant, into labor. >> it forced my delivery. best moment of my life, completely robbed of that experience, to have a baby 3 days after being told your sister was murdered, so the day that i came out of the hospital was the day of her funeral. >> the first thing that the police did with the video was to see if it could be enhanced in some way where you could get a clearer view of the perpetrators. they utilized the fbi to find the best images of the face, put it on a still photo, and they put it on flyers just -- and passed it around to different law enforcement agencies.

>> but there was little movement in the case until 2 weeks later. >> there was a home-invasion robbery in dade county. three men come in, tie the people up. he asked them for drugs, money, same type of mo. it was very violent. >> this time, one of the victims managed to call police who arrived at the crime still in progress. >> the police corral the place and grabbed the three of them. >> the three men were alberto rincon, 24, alex hernandez, 20, and pablo ibar, 22. >> dade county police look at the flyers, look at their three are the two guys." >> metro dade called us up and said, "i have somebody you should at least come look at." that was pablo ibar. i'm saying, "this is great. this is the guy." >> gary foy, butch casey's neighbor, came in and positively ided ibar as the man he saw driving the mercedes the morning of the murder.

>> he doesn't pick alex hernandez as the passenger, but he says he looks very similar, but he does pick ibar. he says, "i'm sure that was the driver." >> ibar seemed a good match for the mustached killer, and police soon got a second id from ibar's roommate, jean klimeczko. >> were you sure right away that that was pablo on that tape? >> yeah. >> klimeczko also claimed to recognize the other man on the video as someone named penlover. police determined that klimeczko was referring to 21-year-old seth penalver of fort lauderdale. penalver and ibar traveled in the same circle of friends, and on the morning of the murders, klimeczko said the two grabbed a tec-9 gun from the house and later returned driving a new black car. to get a second id on seth penalver, detectives went to an ex-girlfriend, melissa munroe. >> and they tell her they're

there about seth. eventually, they take her back to the police station. they show her the two same pictures, and they're saying to her, "who is this?" >> the left photograph is pablo ibar, and the right photograph is seth. >> melissa munroe had also seen seth and pablo together at casey's bar on the night of the murders. >> i saw them at casey's on the sunday. well, saturday night, sunday morning. i talked to him when i was on the dance floor. seth kept asking me to dance. >> you had all of these witnesses that corroborated and connected seth penalver and pablo ibar to mr. butch casey, the tec-9 gun and his car. >> seth penalver, a high school dropout with a previous robbery to his name, soon learned he was wanted for murder. >> i actually seen all of their stuff in the newspaper. they want to question me about a triple murder. they had a description of my car in there. "if you know his whereabouts, please contact us."

>> seth decided to turn himself in. >> because i didn't commit the crime. i mean, what person in their right mind is going to turn their self in knowing that you did a triple murder? >> seth claimed innocence, but when detectives asked him where he was on the night of the murders, he couldn't be sure. >> it's like you're talking 30 days later, they want to speak to me. why would you remember where you're at 30 days ago? you have no reason to remember. >> police latch onto it, matches the build of the killer, they think. they realize seth has a history, and he's violent, and then the game is on for the police. >> seth was about to realize he looked very similar to the killer on the video, and soon he would be facing the death penalty.

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in august 1994, authorities announced they would seek the death penalty against pablo ibar and seth penalver for triple murder. veteran death penalty defense attorneys hilliard moldof and pat rastatter were appointed to represent penalver. >> the general consensus was, "here is a triple homicide on video. there's your guy. this case is closed. we're just going through the motions." >> you're left with, "well, the video looks like seth." it was a uphill battle the whole way. >> ibar and penalver were tried

th 1997. prosecutors played the entire 22-minute video for the jury. >> when they finally play that video for the first time, it may as well be watching the nuclear bomb go off in hiroshima. i mean, you know, your guts are wrenching. the courtroom was silent. there's people crying by the end of that video. >> prosecutors also produced a set of tire tracks found near butch casey's burned-out mercedes. the tracks were left by a getaway car which the state said matched seth penalver's oldsmobile. >> you know, it was damning [q!] evidence, and it was evidence that on top of everything else, it probably hurt us. >> finally, the prosecution called their witnesses against seth, including kimberly san, one of seth's former roommates. >> kim is saying she and seth were living together at a house in sunrise, florida.

she said seth had come to the house with pablo ibar, a black mercedes, came in, had blood all over his clothes. he and pablo took their clothes off, washed them in the washing machine. red bubbles had come out of the washing machine. >> and she said she saw him with ibar changing clothes, taking a shower and driving off in the mercedes. >> kim is saying, "i come home. i see bloody bubbles just flying out of the washing machine." but when crime scene technicians went to that house, they actually lifted the washing machine and luminol tested it, you know, for any type of dna, and they came and testified in our trial and said, "if this story was true, what she said, it would have been there. i would have found it." >> after months of testimony, the case went to the jury, but after 3 days of deliberations, the jury was deadlocked. >> what they didn't have is they didn't have any physical evidence. they didn't have any dna. they didn't have any

fingerprints. they didn't have any of that thing that juries want. >> witness stories had also changed since the murders. for instance, pablo ibar's former roommate, jean klimeczko, now said he didn't remember identifying ibar, and melissa munroe said police had pressured her into iding seth and pablo. >> they asked me, "do the pictures resemble anybody that i know?" i told them, "no." they proceeded to keep badgering me, and they said, "listen, we're just going to tell you we know these are pictures of seth and pablo. we want to know which one would be which one." i was young. i was scared. i had no clue of who was in the picture, you know? >> i was dealing with a situation in which my witnesses are changing their testimony. clearly, the motive there was

protection, not going to convict your friend. >> with the jury unable to break their deadlock, a mistrial was declared for both men. a second trial lasted 7 months with the same witness testimony and the same damaging video, but this time, pablo and seth were tried separately. finally on november 11th, 1999, the second jury reached a verdict. >> you know, they came back and said, "guilty." i just stood there. i couldn't believe it. you know, after all of that fighting, after all of that time to come to that conclusion was earth-shattering. >> a hearing was held to determine seth penalver's sentence, life in prison or death by lethal injection.

seth's attorneys wanted to argue that his tumultuous childhood should be taken into account. >> seth had a terrible childhood. his mom was a drug addict, and he was raised somewhat homeless, had to rely on himself. >> he was a middle school dropout. his dad is deceased, and his mom is a heroin addict. he had no siblings. >> i told my attorney, "no. you're not going to get up there and argue any of this. i'm not going to beg for my life for something i did not do because, yeah, i might have had a messed up childhood, but that doesn't mean i committed this crime." they gave me three death sentences, two life sentences and a 15-year sentence, and they close that door behind you, and then it's like, "damn [q!], this is real now. this is for real. am i supposed to die like this?" >> seth's codefendant, pablo

ibar, was also found guilty and sentenced to death. >> i thought that the sentence of death for both of them was fair, and i've heard people say, "well, you know, the death penalty is not a deterrent." well, it's not meant to be. it's called justice. >> from the time of his arrest through years of trials, one of seth's childhood friends had been following his case from afar. after seth was sentenced, she went to visit him on death row. >> most american people think that the criminal justice system works. they think that when you're innocent, you're going to be found not guilty, but that's not really how it works. >> renee worked as a paralegal and decided to take a fresh look at seth's case. >> when coming into this, i didn't know what to expect or what i was going to find, but i just found things that had never been disclosed.

all of the evidence was hidden. there are so many leads that have gone unanswered. there's no doubt in my mind that he's innocent. uh... do you mind...being a mo-tour? -what could be better than being a mo-tour? the real question is... do you mind not being a mo-tour? -i do. for those who were born to ride, there's progressive.

while the middle-class continues to struggle. that's what happens when billionaires are able to control the political system. our campaign is funded by the working people of this country, and those are the people that i will represent. no more tax breaks for billionaires. we are going to guarantee health care to all people and create up to 20 million good paying jobs to save this planet. i'm bernie sanders and i approve this message because we need an economy that works for all of us, not just wealthy campaign contributors. after being sent to death row for triple murder, seth penalver appealed his conviction to the florida supreme court. in their appeals, seth's attorneys argue that no physical evidence linked seth to the crime and that all of the witnesses against seth had changed their stories over time.

>> at the second trial, prosecution argued that i was tampering with witnesses, that i tampered with melissa munroe, changed people's testimony, and there wasn't a sliver of evidence. that was so damning [q!] to let a prosecutor argue that without anybody ever being charged, without no type of physical evidence, no audio, no nothing. >> a decision from the supreme court would take 3 years to come down, but in 2006, seth got word from his former codefendant, pablo ibar, also on death row. >> pablo sent word. he's like, "your appeal has been granted. congratulations. you got another chance at life," and i was just in such shock. >> the florida supreme court had unanimously granted seth a new trial. >> appeals are really about, "does the judge make errors?" we were able to reverse that case on appeal and be granted a new trial for what the court calls cumulative error. >> i was disappointed for the family.

it was gut-wrenching that you have to go through this again. >> but for seth's lawyers who spent more time arguing seth's case than any attorneys on any case in broward county history, the prospect of a third trial was daunting. >> it was just so draining especially the third time. i'm not the young man i used to be. >> i do respect what hilly does, but there's just not enough time in the day to dedicate all of his time to such a humongous case. >> knowing his third trial would likely be his last chance at freedom, seth turned to a childhood friend for help. >> me and renee, you know, childhood friends. we were young, 15, 16. that's how we met, and i wound up finding out she was a paralegal. >> so this is the first time that i've seen seth in 20 years, and i didn't find out until later on that his mom, dad and his grandmother all died while

he was in prison. after that, i started to go see him because i figured, you know, "he's all alone. he's fighting for his life." i've seen the video, and i never thought it was him. the guy is too big to be him. >> renee read seth's trial transcripts and decided to help. >> i get a phone call from hilliard. "seth wants to go through his file. will you go down and take all the boxes down and just let him go through them one by one?" i said, "sure. no problem." >> renee, a single mom with two kids, worked on the case for free in her spare time. >> i'd clock out at 5:30 at work, and i'd just pick up the box and start at the first folder, and i would go see seth on the weekends and go through the boxes with him. >> one by one, i'd look at it and look at it all through a visitation booth with the big plexiglass, and the stuff that we saw, it floored me.

>> we get to a box where it says that alex hernandez was a suspect in an affidavit. i heard there were no other suspects in this case. well, if he's not a suspect, how is there an affidavit stating he's a suspect? seth and i sat back and said, "well, what else is it that we don't have?" >> as seth's third trial loomed, his team caught a break. seth's former codefendant, pablo ibar, had gained access to files police deemed irrelevant to the case and thus never disclosed. >> he gets 50,000 pages of public records, everything that we have gotten and a lot that we haven't. that made all the difference in the case, i think. >> seth and i, at this point, start going through the documents, and i just found things that had never been disclosed.

there are so many leads that have gone unanswered. >> some of those leads concern the man at the center of the murders, butch casey. butch's reputation of being a playboy also included reputed ties to the mob. >> you have a confidential informant saying, "hey, man. this guy just got beat up by the mafia. they put him in the back of the car, and these are the guys who did it." >> there has been statements given that the morning of the murders, there were two latin men that came into the club, and they say to casey, "we'll see you at the house later." an hour later, he's dead. now as a detective, that would be important to me. >> renee was also about to learn about a man named johnny mcgill. mcgill would confess to police that after the murders, he was the one who drove butch casey's mercedes to the everglades and set it on fire.

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>> just before seth penalver's third trial in 2012, he received dozens of boxes of previously undisclosed files related to his murder case.

>> seth and i go through those documents on the plexiglass page by page. >> the documents included a lead sheet containing a confession to police by a man named johnny mcgill. >> in both the trials, the state's theory is that pablo and seth drove the mercedes through palm beach county, but going through the documentation from the miramar police department, we find a lead sheet. johnny mcgill walks into the broward county sheriff's office and says, "my boss ordered me to drive the mercedes to west palm beach county and set it on fire." you've just walked in and admitted that you've committed arson in a triple homicide, and the broward county sheriff's office let you walk out. you have witnesses who all put seth and pablo in sunrise with the mercedes and seth's car. the theory was that they were together, but it doesn't add up. it doesn't match.

>> a few days after talking to police, johnny mcgill was murdered at a nightclub in miami. police never verified mcgill's claims and never told the defense. other documents police withheld included an inventory of security camera footage seized from butch casey's bar. >> butch casey had a number of cameras in his club. one of the tapes showed the bar area. another one showed the entryway, so those tapes would have possibly shown if ibar came in the club, if he came in with seth or he came in with rincon or hernandez. >> they always said that me and pablo went in there that night at casey's nickelodeon. the general manager came in there and said, "if you were in that club, you were on the video." >> the defense has always been told these videotapes don't exist. they don't have them, and they were presumed to have burnt up in the mercedes, but we find that those tapes have been

sitting in the miramar police department for 18 1/2 years, no property receipt, no chain of custody. >> seth's defense now petitioned to see the tapes. >> we put them in the machine. they're blank. they're snow. we send them down to the sheriff's crime lab. they come back up and say, "these are blank, but they're not blank because they're new. they're blank because they've been intentionally erased." >> the police department took out the evidence that put anybody else as a suspect, and they basically molded this case to how they wanted it to be read. >> other police files pointed to pablo ibar's associates, alex hernandez and alberto rincon who were caught red-handed with ibar at a robbery in dade county.

one report referenced butch casey's next door neighbor who saw a man in a white car outside butch's house on the morning of the murders. >> it was a miramar major crime summary, and it lists all the witnesses including mr. and mrs. branyi. they lived next door to casey, and at 7 o'clock in the morning, they heard two males' voices outside their window. the wife saw a white car with a stocky male outside it. it's the first time we had ever heard of them. >> a witness says that they see a white toyota outside the house with a stocky male getting into the white toyota. alberto rincon owns a white toyota and is a stocky male, so if it was alberto rincon in the toyota, he's now at the scene, and if he's at the scene, he could be one of the intruders. >> when rincon was arrested in dade county, police had also found evidence that seemed to link him to butch casey's house. >> the footprints at the crime

scene were nev seth, but that home-invasion robbery that happened in dade as that match the footprints that are found at the crime scene. >> there was certainly enough evidence to portray rincon as a suspect, especially since he's wearing the shoes. he has a vehicle that's the same color as a vehicle that's seen outside the residence the morning of the murders, so there are so many leads that have gone unanswered. >> yeah. i remember the first time i had seen some of that stuff, i cried. i cried. i was so angry. how could our government hide this evidence that i'm not the man? >> after spending months working together, seth and renee's relationship grew into more than friendship. >> she always has had a fighting spirit, doesn't like to lose.

after, i think, reading all that material, seeing the injustice and seeing my innocence, that was a drive, and during the time of our friendship, we began to and during the time of our friendship, we began to have a bond closer than friendship. so the began to be the love, the friendship, and the injustice all combined into one. >> it was just raw emotion. one of the things that i've always loved about seth is that he was so positive. and one of the darkest places, in the darkest time of his life, he was always very upbeat, happy, smiling, energetic. at some point, the broward county sheriff's office finds out that him and i have a personal relationship, and we had to have a hearing because they didn't want me coming in the jail and working on his case anymore. so there's a three-month period when i continued working on the case, but i wasn't actually allowed to go see seth. >> but with the trial about to begin, the state stood firm,

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seth penalver's third trial began on july 30th, 2012. once again, he was facing the death penalty. chuck morton, by now, chief prosecutor of broward county could have someone else try the case but he decided to try it himself. but 18 years after the crime,

morton was facing a much tougher battle. >> years later, memories change and fade. the persuasive value of the case now was much stacked against me. >> and this time, seth's defense tried an unconventional strategy with the crime scene video. >> we approached it much, much differently. we embraced the video and didn't run from it. >> we decided we were going to make the video our ally, a giant picture of the intruder and put it next to him and said this is not our guy. >> our defense was it's a mistaken identity. it's definitely the wrong person. with y we and we talked about how law enforcement manipulated and tricked and pressured people. >> they also showed payments to

an anonymous person who called seth the pent lover. >> the detective denied it under oath twice in front of a jury. and john clemenco, i asked, did you ever get a reward, no. no. no. i called paul manzella to the stand, it's your handwriting, your notes. and he says yeah. so when that testimony finished and the jury realized that paul manzella and clemensco were ready to lie under oath. in order to have seth convicted. >> they had of seth fixated. ignoring other suspects that failed to implicate him. >> our theory at trial was obviously it was ibar and

rincon. why wouldn't it be? they were his buds. couldn't they be the image just as easily as seth penalver? >> i think they were throwing stuff up just to feel doubt. if he saw your brother walking down the street in a video, even though it's blurry, you'd know it's him. >> after ten nerve-wracking days, the jury finally returned on december 21st, 2012. >> you're fraught with just every emotion in the world. >> the moment was captured by cell phone video. >> we the jury find, count one of the indictment, not guilty. >> it kicks in that you know what? i'm not guilty. i don't know what happened. >> i left my body. i was crying like a baby.

it's too much emotion. just too much. >> i could not believe it. is this even real? i got right on my knees in the middle of the courtroom, and i went to praying and praying and praying. >> later that night, seth penalver walked away from prison a free man. seth's case brought up serious questions about the use of video as evidence in murder trials. >> video is not 100%. sometimes video can create more issues than one would guess. >> the video is powerful for the emotions it wrenches in you. but does it always tell the whole story? >> the video is the truth it is what happened. but it's everything else that was a story. you may have known the ending,

but you had to create the beginning of it. you had to create the middle of it. it doesn't portray the whole picture. >> but just as seth claimed his prior guilty verdict doesn't match the truth, so, too, does the prosecutor. >> i was very disappointed, because i do believe that the evidence establishes that pablo ibar and seth penalver committed the crime. not guilty doesn't mean innocent. >> seth's co-defendant, pablo ibar is still on death row. in 2012 he wrote a letter to seth that raised questions for the victim's family. >> there's this handwritten letter that's full of rage from pablo ibar. it basically tells him, you're not a victim. man up. take responsibility for your actions. >> for deborah buoy, the letter and the video of the crime can only mean one thing. >> i know that seth penalver is a murderer. he may pretend with anybody else

that he's talking to and tell whatever story and thump whatever bible he wants to bring in, but that man is a cold-blooded murderer, and he may be acquitted. and he may be free, but he is guilty. on this episode of "death row stories," executions around the country go horribly wrong. >> it was clear something was not right. >> he looked like he was trying to get up off rn