president biden says there is every indication russia is ready to attack ukraine. what's more and far darker than that is this. his words suggest the administration now considers war a matter of when not if. >> yes. my sense is this will happen within the next several days. >> secretary of state antony blinken addressing the u.n.

security council was no less blunt and remarkably specific about how it would start. >> first, russia plans to manufacture a pretext for its attack. second, in response to this manufactured provocation, the highest levels of the russian government may theatrically convene emergency meetings to address the so-called crisis. next, the attack is planned to begin. we've been warning the ukrainian government of all that is coming. and here today we are laying it out in great detail with the hope that by sharing what we know with the world we can influence russia to abandon the path of war and choose a different path. while there is still time. >> secretary blinken went on to say his case is validated by what has been unfolding in plain sight for months. and we certainly saw more of it today specifically in the eastern region that ukraine's president zelensky just visited.

outside observers there reporting a sharp escalation in cr sees fire violations along the front line. this is where many fear a russian provocation could take place. for its part in a document sent to washington today moscow denied that russia was planning to invade but warned it would be forced to take, quote, military technical measures if its demands on rolling back nato expansion are not met. so there is that. there is moscow's expulsion of the american chief of mission, the bridge that was there yesterday but is gone today. a big security conference gearing up in munich, and much more. as only cnn can we've got live coverage across the board. kaitlan collins at the white house, clarissa ward in kyiv and senior contributor jill dougherty in moscow. >> reporter: the ukrainian military has brought us nearly

400 miles toward the front lines in the east of the country. it is already dark by the time we land. we'll only have a short time on the ground but they are determined to show us the aftermath of heavy shelling earlier in the day. this kindergarten is less than three miles from the so-called line of contact, the front line. witnesses in the area said around 8:00 or 9:00 this morning they started to hear shelling. it was loud enough they could hear the whistle of the shells going by. two of them landed here at this kindergarten. let's take a look. >> at the end of the hallway this is what remains of the play room. the military says the first shell hit at 8:45. mercifully, the children were eating breakfast in another part of the building. this teacher tells me she immediately rushed them into the hallway away from the windows.

>> she is saying in that moment she was only really afraid for the children. i asked her how they reacted to the situation. >> our youngest children thought it was a game at first and we let them pretend she told us. our older children understood what was happening and they were afraid. video released by ukrainian police shows the kids being hastily evacuated from the building. >> obviously very dark here. i'm not sure if you can see. but this is actually a children's playground. if you just turn over here you can see this is a crater and the local authorities are telling us this is where the other shell hit. our time on the ground is restricted. fighting usually begins after dark here. as we finish up a live shot our ukrainian minders grow nervous. >> did you hear the sound? >> yes, i hear it. >> let's go to the bus. >> john, please excuse me but

are ukrainian -- our ukrainian minders are asking us to move because of the shelling. we'll check in with you as soon as we can. thank you. >> let's go. >> let's go. >> reporter: on an average day there might be three or four major cease fire violations here. today the military says more than 30. >> let's go, guys. >> okay. they are telling us we have to go. there is a steady stream of artillery in the distance. we are getting on to the bus to leave. in the hours after we leave, another shell hits a house in the same town as this front line continues to heat up at a time when calm is desperately needed. >> so, clarissa, glad you're safe. startling images from the donbas region. this area has seen violence from russian backed separatists for over eight years. are ukrainian authorities viewing the new attacks as an escalation ahead of possible invasion or more of the same? >> reporter: there is no question this is an escalation, john. i mean, if you look at a graph of what the cease-fire incidents

would look like, violations i should say, it would go like this and then like that with today. there is a massive uptick in the number of major cease-fire violations. you said, this war has been going on for eight years but the front lines have largely been frozen. other than a few violations here and there for the most part it's been relatively quiet. to see a kindergarten where roughly 20 children were there, they happened not to be in that room but were there in the building and it was by the grace of god that the shell hit in a different area, that is absolutely a significant escalation here. no one here is pretending this isn't significant and you could feel a sense of angst and nervousness talking to people on the ground there. it did feel somehow different, that it did feel somehow ominous. >> what a dangerous, precarious moment. kate l kaitlan we heard president biden not mincing words when asked if he expected russia to invade. did he talk about why?

>> we talked to officials and they say they are watching what russia is doing, what russian state media is saying, and also paying attention to what the russians are not doing and that is pulling the troops back from the border. as you heard multiple officials say today they are only adding to them. of course we learned 7,000 figure last night with some arriving as recently as yesterday and you also heard the defense secretary today talking about the other steps they are taking shoring up blood supplies, bolstering their support, and they're talking about the aircraft they're adding, all of these steps they are taking that they are saying is only adding to their capacity to carry out an invasion. so president biden today putting a timeline on it saying he believes this could happen within days. we should note for president biden he has been having the nearly daily conversations with other world leaders. of course on saturday he had two big ones with zelensky and president putin as well. since then he had near daily conversations. today the italian prime minister. now the canadian prime minister's office is saying tomorrow he is hosting a call

with the same set of allies once again to talk about this ongoing crisis and of course to talk about what their plan is to try to deter an invasion from happening. >> jill, to you in moscow, what is the russian reaction in the media especially to these shelgs in eastern ukraine and to president biden's comments? >> well, they're not really -- excuse me. -- saying that, actually, you know, the ukrainians are attacking as opposed to the russians are attacking and a lot of concern about the civilians who are in that area. and i think, you know, the most significant thing today was really that answer from the russians to the americans it seems like kind of a tennis match sometimes but the diplomatic negotiation, discussion that is going on.

i think that was probably the more significant thing though it didn't seem to really go anywhere. >> no except open the door to military, technical measures which seems to be intentionally vague. clarissa, if the logic for lack of a better word is that any military response from the ukrainians to the shelling could be used by the russian government as a pretense to begin an invasion then how does ukraine respond if at all? >> this the conundrum ukraine finds itself in. uptick in shelling, kindergarten hit. on the other hand they know they have to be incredibly careful in terms of how they respond because there is a strong belief this is a deliberate sort of provocation which is not to say necessarily that whoever launched the shells was deliberately targeting the kindergarten. we don't know that at all but to say when you see that kind of uptick in activity the fear is that it is designed to generate a response and that once you

have that that kind of heavy artillery flying back and forth you could be moments from a serious escalation. president putin has said over and over not just in this conflict but others before in 2008 and georgia he has said he will always protect russian people, ethnic russians, russian speakers. he has been handing out passports like candy in the russian backed separatist regions. 600,000. it would be very easy for him to use something like this if it did escalate further. if there was a strike that hit on the other side of the border and as jill said the russians were saying there were strikes going both ways today. that he could use that as a pretext for launching an incursion. this is something u.s. intelligence services have been predicting, a false flag, all of which is to say anxiety is definitely a significant notch higher today i would say having been here for much of the last five weeks than we felt before.

usually over the last month it seemed like people on the streets were relatively calm, going about their daily life. i would say today and of course right by the front line so a different situation than being in kyiv but i definitely felt a palpable sense of anxiety, shock, and a little bit of a sense of for boding about the future >> i listen to how you talk very carefully, clarissa, and this is decidedly a different moment at least based on what you saw today. kaitlan, we heard secretary of state antony blinken being very explicit about the steps the u.s. thought russia would take ahead of invasion. what is the strategy here being so open with the intelligence? >> it almost felt as if you were reading an intelligence report listening to those comments which were not on his schedule. he went to new york to make this appeal in front of all the other representatives and he was talking about what it would look like when they try to justify an

invasion and what an actual invasion beginning would look like. he went into very stark detail when it came to the attempt to justify one. he talked about a staged, mass grave, staged bombing, fake drone strike, fake chemical weapons attack, real chemical weapons attack potentially laying out every scenario not saying that is what the russians are going to do but saying this is potentially what it could look like. you'll see russian state media talking about it. they already have been talking about it including the shelling today. that is a little warning for the white house and also the beginning of an attack and going into detail just making clear i think to the russians that they know what they're potentially planning and could potentially carry out within a matter of days according to the president. deeply informative and unsettling. but extremely informative discussion. thank you all very much for your reporting tonight. and as it has been every night for all we can see and report on

ourselves so much more is hidden from view or only discernible to a trained military or intelligence expert. fortunately we have one of those retired army major general and cnn military analyst james "spider" marks. you hear the reporting. clarissa explicitly saying it feels different tonight. does it look different tonight to your trained eye? >> what we're seeing clearly is additional build up for what i think is an inevitable incursion. your question is good. what do we see? now there are limit. clearly, information is publicly available but there is a host, tons of classified intelligence that our intelligence community can gather and intelligence we're getting in partners and allies with whom we have sharing arrangements. that is what is critical. i can guarantee our president

and secretary of state are seeing very deep, classified special category type intelligence that we will never see. we'll certainly see them after they are unclassified or if the president certainly wants to declassify that stuff and put it out there. clearly they are looking at things we're not seeing and that has to be clearly with signals intelligence which gets into communications intelligence, hi john this is spider. spied ther is john. different types of coms like that. electronic intelligence which is radars. how do they light up, where are they located, and then human intelligence which is quite phenomenal and clearly we have sources probably in russia, clearly we do, and we may even have sources inside different ministries in russia where we're getting pretty good insights and clearly in ukraine and the donbas region we have sources and a pretty good sense of that. but you and i are not going to, you know, the guys who don't have the clearances are not

going to get that stuff. >> people need to know that. we're seeing pictures of artillery set up here and there. it only scratches the surface of what is available to people making these decisions now and maybe beginning to at least hint at what is in there. spider, do you think there is still an off ramp to de-escalate at this point for vladimir putin? >> there's always an off ramp right? it is just what is the cost of the off ramp? i know what that is. i don't know. i hope our department of defense or state department are working on what those off ramps might look like but i don't know what nato is prepared to do that would give putin a win. look, nato has to win. our president has to win. putin has to win. what does it look like? if putin can say ukraine is never going to join nato and again nato is not asking for ukraine to join right now. that is not on the table. but it seems to be the discourse here. but if putin can get a

declaration from ukraine and nato that says we're not going to be expansive and when you look at a map of nato as it exists, existed in the 1980s and then with the acceleration post 1999 and 2004, russia is all those former buffer countries, buffer zone russia had with the soviet union they all belong to nato other than belarus and ukraine. that is why he wants to lock up ukraine. ukraine is the second largest country in europe. it is monstrous. he would love to have that under belly, that avenue of approach into russia that every enemy he's had used. he would love to have that as a state listening to him. >> always a pleasure to speak to you. thanks for being with us. >> thank you john. >> next, just days after their accounting firm fired them a judge in new york delivers another blow telling them to start talking under oath in the investigation that could turn the family business inside out. later dr. anthony fauci on why he thinks lifting school mask

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a plan with tax-smart investing strategies designed to help you keep more of what you earn. this is the planning effect. so when a judge says the centerpiece of your argument, quote, complete hi misses the mark, it is more than a hint your case won't end well and it didn't for ivanka and donald trump jr. they were trying to get out of answering questions under oath into their allegedly shady business practices. the judge did not buy their claim that doing so would undermine their constitutional rights. he ordered them to sit for depositions within 21 days and gave the former president 14 days to comply with demands for certain documents and records. now, trump' attorneys have said they will likely file an appeal. perspective now from cnn senior legal analyst preet bharara and abc news chief washington

correspondent jonathan karl. author of "betrayal, the final act of the trump show." preet, the trump lawyers have said they will appeal. that is their indication. do you think they have a good chance of getting this ruling overturned? >> no, they don't. they have a right to appeal. it will go to the -- the first department, which is the appellate-level division in the new york state court system. but this is a garden-variety civil investigation. and there is no reason to suppose that i think the very well-crafted opinion -- strong opinion -- by the trial court judge in this case would be overturned. so i don't think -- um -- that it's going to make a difference because the reasoning is -- is sound. >> how long will it take do you think, though? >> that could take a little bit of time. it depends what the appellate court's docket is. but importantly, what -- what really matters is whether or not the appellate court will issue a stay because, otherwise, the default position is you got to appear for your deposition. so it's not just the issue of whether offer not, you know, the appellate court decides that the

subpoena can be quashed and they don't have to comply. but also, whether or not, in the interim, they stay what the lower court said they had to do, which is comply with the subpoena. i think that is very unlikely and if they don't get the stay, then trump and his kids -- two of his kids at least -- have to appear shortly. >> so, john, eric trump already sat down for a deposition in this investigation back in 2020 and he pleaded the fifth more than 500 times. i just want to remind people, what the former president said about pleading the fifth -- this was back in 2016. >> so, there are five people taking the fifth amendment, like you see on the mob, right? you see the mob takes the fifth. if you're innocent, why are you taking the fifth amendment? >> so with your keen political judgment and sense, john, do you think -- do you think the former president may change his tune on that? >> well, look. first of all, it was an interesting new bit of information that came out from the judge. first of all, that it was a

full-two years ago eric trump had given his deposition. we knew that he had given a sworn deposition. didn't know when. and that it was 500 times that he had taken the fifth amendment. look. i don't think that the legal strategy is going to change. it is hard for me to imagine that suddenly, ivanka, don jr., and donald trump, himself, decide they are going to answer all the questions. you know, the -- the path here is set. they took the fifth amendment, which is entirely in their constitutional rights. but i -- i imagine that trump's view of those constitutional rights will probably change a little bit, should this deposition go forward. >> so, preet, you talked about, you know, the likelihood of appeal failing. you also said maybe there won't even be an injunction granted here. what happens, then, if the trumps still do not comply? what if they still just refuse to be deposed? >> oh, i mean, if there is outright defiance, unlike situations we have seen with defiance of defiance of congressional subpoenas, it is controversial and there is not a lot of

enforcement mechanism. in state courts and federal courts if you defy a subpoena, outright, and you don't obey the order of a judge, you can be held in criminal contempt and contempt of court and then you go to prison for a period of time. we have seen that happen in cases, large and small. large cases get a lot of attention, but it happens in cases, from time to time. i don't think that's going to be the -- the end result here. i think as jonathan points out, donald trump and his kids' view of the fifth amendment and the propriety of invoking it is likely to change but that has consequences, too. in a criminal case, the fact that you invoke your fifth-amendment right against self-incrimination gant county be used against you. no lawyer can make an argument about it. no jury can make an inference about it. that is not true in civil cases. in civil cases if you say i am going be my fifth amendment right against self-incrimination, the civil lawyers who would try to find you liable for some violation of law can say that the jury should, i know, make an adverse inference based on the fact that you invoked your fifth amendment

right so it is a much bigger deal in some ways than a criminal case. >> yeah and 500 times, heck of an adverse inference there. jonathan, your book which is terrific, that during the 2016 election, trump proudly embraced an image he was anything but a regular guy. he was the guy who always wins. he is the guy who is richer than anybody. he is the guy who never loses. so how central is that ethos to this whole saga, that the former presidents thinks he is above the law and immune to any legal ramifications? >> i think it's central and i actually think the more legal jeopardy he is in -- let's remember, you have a manhattan da case. you have got the new york attorney general. you have fulton county da case in georgia. you have the new york -- you have the d.c. attorney general. you have the january-6th committee. who knows if anything coming from the justice department. i think the bigger trouble he is in may actually push him more

toward running for that very reason, he feels that he has the power if he is running, he can portray himself as a victim of politically-motivated prosecutions. and of course, all along the way as he is a political figure, the rnc is paying much of his legal bills. >> right. it's -- it is a discount for him. very quickly, preet, on the merits of the case here, what are the kids if they testify -- there is no parent-kid privilege like attorney-client privilege here. what is the jeopardy for them if they go in? >> the same donald trump is in. are there evidence this is a civil violation? was there intentional fraud committed here? look, the thing the attorney general's office wants to learn is who knew what when? what was their intent? they clearly have a considerable amount of evidence the judge himself pointed out that there -- there was an inflation of assets on certain occasions, and then deflation on other occasions when it suited the

trump organization. the accountants have stepped back as you already reported. the question is, whose fault is it? and so, if you get testimony from people and they don't -- and they take the fifth amendment and they make admissions about having knowledge and the intention to defraud, that exposes them to criminal liability, not just civil liability. >> preet bharara, jonathan karl, great to see you both. thank you so much. more announcements today about school mask mandates that are about to end, include for the country's most populous state. dr. anthony fauci, however, calls ending these mandates right now risky. he joins us next to discuss.

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breaking news about school mask mandates. a short time ago, california governor gavin newsom outlined his state's plan to return to normalcy. he promised a date for the end of school mask mandates would be announced at the end of this

month. quote, the masks will come off he said. the news follows similar announcements today by the governors of new york, washington, and new mexico. and yesterday, michigan -- all democrats, by the way -- and all calling for an end to mask mandates in schools. on wednesday, our next guest, dr. anthony fauci, said the move to lift school-mask mandates was, quote, risky. and dr. fauci joins us now. so nice to see you, dr. fauci. why do you think unmasking children in schools right now is risky? what do you think could happen? >> well, john, if you look at the cdc -- that tracks the metrics, in this case, the metrics being cases. although they are coming down rather sharply, which is really, very good news. both, hospitalizations and cases are coming down in a rather sharp decline. they have the coding of either substantial or high degree of viral activity and well over 90% of the country is in that area

where it's recommended by the cdc to keep going on with the masks. we would hope that if that trajectory goes down, and the projection, at the hlocal level of lifting masks' mandates after a period of time. i don't know -- different states have different projections of when they want to do it. hopefully, that will con side -- coincide with the level being so low that the actual metrics of the cdc will coincide with pulling back. but right now, what is going on with over 90% -- 95 -- more -- more -- 97% of the country is within that zone that the cdc recommends to keep the mask on. and it is risky if you take it off right now. what we are all hoping for, john -- and i believe there is a reason there will be a good chance we are going to see that, that over the next few weeks, if that trajectory keeps coming down at that sharp angle and we don't have a flattening off at a

level that's above the level of, you know, really being a problem, that we could be in reason by reasonably good shape but we have got to be careful. we have been to this show before where things came down, you pull back a little and it bounces back. not only the current variant doing that but we have always got to be prepared to address it, and readdress it again if we get a different variant. hopefully, we'll not going to see that. but we have got to be prepared for that scenario. but right now, i am looking at that chart and it's coming down really nicely. so hopefully, new metrics will help guide the people at the local level of what to do. >> look, it's great the cases are going down. phenomenal. i am thrilled. i guess, my question is are you concerned that -- that taking off masks in schools will cause that number to go back up, again? >> well, i have said it before, john, and there is no reason for me to -- to change that now. it is risky. it is risky. you may get away with it very well. it is possible you are going to get away with it but you do have

a risk when you pull back, if you have a certain dynamic of infection, that you will have a rebound. and hopefully, the states that are doing that have a plan, if, in fact, we do see a rebound up, they will be able to reinstitute the mitigation methods that they are now pulling back on. i know, when you want to pull back and say we're done -- well, i know, the virus may not be done with us. so, going down may be the right thing. keep going down. pulling back. but you have to be prepared to re-mitigate again if you see a rebound coming up. >> the fact of the matter is what you are telling me is a recommendation. the cdc issues recommendations. i think that word has been manipulated by some over the last two years, to be sure. but, if state after state and city after city is ignoring or going around the cdc' recommendation, has the cdc lost some of its relevancy? >> no, i don't think so. i don't think so at all.

the cdc is very relevant, john. they look at the scientific data. they analyze the data. and they make recommendations. it has always been the case that at the local level, the local-health authorities, working with their administrative leaders, be they governors or mayors or leaders at the local level, will make their decision. they could utilize or not. we -- we -- i -- i think it's the wrong thing to say that the cdc is irrelevant. they are the scientific organization that accumulates the data and makes recommendations on the basis of the science. it is up to the local people, how they are going to use that. >> dr. anthony fauci, want to leave it at that but i want to leave people with a positive message. you say cases are headed where right now? >> they are going way down, john. i mean, what i like is -- is -- is the -- is the steepness of the slope down. it went way up really high in literally every seven-day evaluation of the average. we now, yesterday, had 126,000 cases.

remember, wasn't too long ago, when we had close to a million cases a day. >> i know. believe me. dr. anthony fauci, thank you so much for your time tonight. appreciate it. >> still to come. more on breaking news on ukraine, and how president biden is managing a major geopolitical crisis, that could affect america's influence abroad while also trying to keep his domestic agenda afloat. former obama white house senior adviser david axelrod joins us ahead. ♪ ♪ wow, we're crunching tons of polygons here!

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more on breaking news this evening. president biden will host a call with world leaders tomorrow about the ongoing crisis in ukraine. that is according to the canadian prime minister's office. the white house has yet to confirm. also scheduled to be on the line, leaders of france, germany, united kingdom, nato, and more. i am joined now by david axelrod, former senior adviser to president obama. he is also a cnn senior political commentator. david, what is it like to be in the white house juggling a crisis -- a serious geopolitical crisis like this? one, that the american people may not be as concerned about, though, as they are about other things, like inflation, like

their daily lives here. how -- you know, what are the conversations in the oval office? >> well, look. you can't ignore a crisis like this. this is a frontal assault on the -- you know, the -- the global order. and on the -- the sovereignty of nations. so, you can't ignore that. uh, but you do that knowing that you are focusing on this and attention is focused on this, and probably not on what people are talking about around their kitchen table. president did go forward today, and have an event out in the count are i on country on infrastructure. so they are trying to keep a normal schedule for him but the focus in the white house is very much on this and it has to be. >> you wrote an opinion piece in "the new york times" about how you think president biden needs to start framing things as he heads into the state of the union. show some humility. you wrote in part, the state of the union is stressed to claim otherwise, to highlight the progress we have made without fully acknowledging the hard road we have traveled and the distance we need to go would seem off key and out of touch.

you simply cannot jawbone americans into believing that things are better than they feel. end quote. what do you mean? >> yeah. no. i think that is important. i think you have to link up to the lived experience of people. and there is an impulse and, look, we felt it in the obama white house during the great recession. there is an impulse to report on the -- all the good things that you've done, and all the efforts you've made and the progress that it's produced. but if you do that too energetically, without regard to what people are feeling. without regard to the fact that we have gone through an epic-national trauma, from which people are still recovering, then you are not gonna be heard. and joe biden is well-equipped do that. he is a guy who has a natural empathy. he is middle-class joe from scranton and that is the guy who needs to show aup as the president of the united states

on march 1st when he speaks to the nation and congress. >> i mean, did you see maybe that he was slipping into something that wasn't going to do well for him? >> well, i watched his press conference on the anniversary on the eve of the anniversary of his inauguration, and he very energetically wanted to report on all the things that he had done. he treated it like report-card day, and i thought it was a little off key. and then, when he was asked what he had learned from the last year, he said well i am going to get out into the country more and i thought that is a great answer. but then, he said because i want people to know what i have -- what we have done, you know, for them. and that's not what really why he needs to get out into the country, why any president does. there is some of that, yes. but you also want to hear from people, and you want them to know you -- you want to hear from them. so, i just thought that -- uh -- the state of the union would be better, if it takes just a slightly different tact and we will see what happens. >> um, very quickly. obviously, there is this trend around the country to lift mask

mandates. how does the president deal with this clear desire that's popping up around the country? >> yeah, very tough of. i mean, lot of democratic governors are out in front of him and i think one of the reasons, john, they scheduled this speech so late is his hope is by march 1st, this -- he will be able to align himself with people who want to -- who want to stop wearing masks. >> david axelrod, great to see you tonight. thank you so much. >> always good, john, thank you. coming up. disgraced-south carolina attorney alex murdock and new questions about the mysterious death of a 19-year-old man named steven smith. why authorities are re-opening the cold case. (thank you, have) ♪ (trumpet solo) ♪ (bell dings) (pages slipping) ♪ ♪ ♪ (trumpet solo) ♪ ♪ ♪ (typing) (bell dings) ♪ ♪ (cheering ♪ ♪ (typing) ♪ ♪

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in south carolina, five deaths appear to have connections to alex murdoch, the once prominent attorney facing

several charges, including insurance fraud and a botched fake suicide attempt, including the death of a young woman involving a boating accident, also the double homicide, in which that son and murdock's life were brutally murdered, plus the death of murdoch's long-time housekeeper. there is also the death of a 19-year-old man which for years has been unresolved, but has now been reopened based on evidence discovered by south carolina law enforcement in the double murdoch homicide case. our randi kaye is in south carolina tracking the evidence. >> almost seven years with no answers for you in terms of what happened to your son. what does that feel like? >> heartbreaking. you know, he was a human, and he deserves justice. >> sandy smith is talking about her son, a bright, blue-eyed 19-year-old with dreams of becoming a doctor. stephen smith was killed july 8, 2015. a passer by on sandy run road in hampton county called 911 about 4:00 a.m. >> on the road or side of the road. >> in the roadway.

>> stephen smith's body was found in the middle of this road. a pathology said it appeared to be a hit and run. but the highway patrol's incident report noted they didn't find any vehicle debris, skid marks, or injuries on stephen's body consistent with someone being struck by a vehicle. according to the case notes, stephen died from blunt force trauma to the head. he had a dislocated shoulder, but there were no visible injuries on him other than a gaping head wound. sandy has never accepted her son was the victim of a hit and run. >> what do you believe happened to your son? >> i believe he was beaten to death. >> and then dropped in the road? >> and then laid in that road, hoping somebody was going to run over him. >> reporter: for sandy, much doesn't add up. she says her son would have been too afraid to walk alone in the middle of the night.

also, if stephen had car trouble, his car was located a couple of miles from the scene with his gas cap off, sandy says he would have used his cell phone, which was found on his body, to call for help. >> he was literally left on the side of the road like a piece of trash. >> reporter: mike hemlap is sandy smith's lawyer. he too believes her son was murdered, and here's why. >> being hit by a car is a brute brutal and violent act, and you would have lots of injuries all over your body. i've never seen a hit and run where the shoes remained on the feet. >> reporter: evidence from the scene shows stephen's loosely tied shoes were still on his feet. it's not just stephen's family who have doubts. audio included in the case file shows even the lead investigator at the time didn't believe this was just a hit and run. south carolina state trooper todd proctor. >> typically you don't see the highway patrol working a murder, and that's what this is. there's no doubt. we're not classifying this as anything other than a murder. >> reporter: yet stephen's case went cold and might have remained so had it not been for the double homicide of the wife

and son of disgraced south carolina attorney alex murdaugh. they were found shot to death last june. just days after the south carolina law enforcement suddenly announced it was opening an investigation into the death of stephen smith based upon information gathered during the double murder investigation of paul and maggie murdaugh. >> you know he was put on the shelf for so long. now he's back out there. >> reporter: s.l.e.d. has not said what was found or what if anything stephen smith's relationship was with the murdaugh family. during interviews in the case file, the murdaugh name is mentioned dozens of times by both witnesses and investigators. did your son know the murdaugh family? >> he went to school with buster, yeah. and they played, like, little league ball together. >> buster murdaugh, alex murdaugh's surviving son, is mentioned during witness interviews.

during one audio interview in the case file released by highway patrol to cnn, the investigator, state trooper todd proctor says this. >> foster was on our radar. the murdaughs know that. >> reporter: why exactly he was on their radar is still unclear. our attempts to reach buster and proctor were unsuccessful. sandy smith also says randy murdaugh, alex's brother and a personal injury lawyer, tried to insert himself into the case by calling stephen's dad before the parents had even seen stephen's body. >> he said, that was strange. randy's wanting to take stephen's case, investigate stephen's case pro bono. >> sandy describes randy murdaugh constantly calling, asking them to give them stephen's electronics, including his ipad and cell phone. >> the thing that's most surprising to me is how quickly he called because the family had just found out. >> reporter: we reached out to randy murdaugh to ask about

this, but he didn't respond. >> there are people in hampton who know what happened without question. and for whatever reason, they haven't come forward. perhaps that's fear. >> reporter: sandy smith hasn't given up hope her son's case will be solved no matter who may be involved. >> what does justice look like for you? >> somebody go to prison. and stay there for a long time. >> reporter: and john, the south carolina law enforcement division tells me that they are making progress on this investigation. it is active and ongoing even though they haven't made any arrests. but to be very clear, john, this is a murder investigation. you heard the investigator in our story say that. he believes the scene was staged, that the body was placed in that road. and now after all these years, john, still so many questions and so few answers for that family. >> what a tangled web. randi kaye, thank you so much for that. we'll be right back. alright, so...cordless headphones,

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