a colorful way to do it. >> it's hard to pull off a fake kidnapping, it just is. that's all for now. i'm lester holt. for all of us at nbc news, thanks for watching. i'm craig melvin. >> i'm natalie morales. >> this is "dateline." >> he married the woman of his dreams, beautiful and sweet.

>> usual when you see healthy middle aging males, they're trying to get away from the fire. so maybe they're overcome by smoke. >> it had a weight and had the fire department pump some of the water out so we could enter the

basement and conduct our investigation. >> that job would take several hours giving detectives from the major crimes unit time to question neighbors. >> canvassing is the most time consuming thing, but you have to do that right away. >> the former prosecutor was on the scene in the predawn hours. >> unlike district attorney's office nationwide. in new jersey, a county prosecutor is not just a chief law enforcement officer of the county, but also directly overseas the investigation of all major crimes. >> he says from the first time he layed eyes on rob cantor's body something didn't look right. so he asked the medical examiner to fast track an autopsy. >> you could see some indication that this wasn't just somebody that was smoking in his bed and the bed lit fire. >> what was your gut telling you as to what this could be. >> the first thought was well whoever did this act lit the crime scene in an effort to

frustrate law enforcement because dna evidence is always important. >> later that morning, autopsy results confirmed the prosecutor's hunch. the medical examiner found a small hole at the base of his skull and bullet fragments inside. who killed rob cantor and why were questions that would lead investigators far from the still smoldering house on elm avenue. >> turns out there wasn't just one case of fire and murder in this county. there were three. >> coming up. >> it wasn't just a shooting. it was an execution. >> diabolical? >> despicable. >> are those murders something that comes to mind. >> there was discussion. could his killer be the same killer. >> when dateline continues. it felt like a fantasy. but the second you know you can't compete anymore, you owe it to yourself, to your team,

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by all accounts, rob cantor, the man whose body was found inside this house was an easy going man. >> i never met the man but every person i have spoken to says he was a great guy. i believe he was truly a great guy because of the impression he left on his family and friends. >> an avid guitar player he worked as a software engineer for verizon. for 26 years they lived on this

street. they raised their two daughters here. now investigators had to figure out who wanted him dead. >> it wasn't just a shooting. it was an execution. they shot him from behind, execution style. >> diabolical? >> despicable. >> at the scene of the fire, investigators found a bullet casing for a .380 caliber handgun. analysis in that bedroom revealed something else. >> the forensic scientist was able to determine that ethanol was on the comforter. >> that suggested an excel rant h -- accelerant was used to set his body on fire. that was a disturbing development. this was now the third arson homicide in less than a year. >> are those two other murders the first thing that come to your mind when you see the crime scene? >> there was a discussion and deliberation on the topic.

certainly within the first few weeks of the murder. >> on the surface, there were haunting similarities. in april of 2010, 69-year-old delores was found stabbed to death in her burning home. >> she was known to leave her house open. she did not knock her doors. it could have been a stranger from the street. >> a few months later, 74-year-old joan davis, a well-known activist was found strangled and stabbed to death in her burning home. >> we had always believed that the person that murdered joan davis was someone that she let into the house. >> and now, rob cantor had been found dead in his burning home. >> very early on, we were looking at could rob cantor's killer be the same killer with miss davis. >> the answer was unclear at

first but detectives did have leads in the cantor case. a neighbor reported seeing a stranger near the home before the fire. >> did you hear about the stranger in the area? >> yes. >> can you tell us about that? >> we weren't able to track who the person was and we tried through canvassing to trace. but we never had him coming outside of the house. we never had him going inside of the house. >> according to rob's freniends someone had been stalking him. rob told them he got some creepy e-mails that suggested he was being watched. >> rob, saw you this morning with this woman on upper west side. how are things with her. >> very very strange e-mail addresses. strange names. eor247. >> the e-mails seemed intending to intimidate according to brian st. clair that headed the

computer crimes unit. >> i imagine he was quite troubled that somebody knew where he was at a particular time. who he was with. >> with that in mind, the prosecutor and his top detectives decided to take a hard look at rob's personal relationships, starting with his wife of 27 years, seen here in happier times. >> sergeant cecilia love was the case detective. >> what was going on in their lives? >> they were living separately. they had -- still had a relationship because they had the two daughters together. >> they were divorcing? >> yes. >> and they had been discussing selling the house, you know, dividing up assets. >> that can get tense, even for the best of relationships. >> absolutely. >> did you need to take a close look at her? >> in the beginning, you would think it could be his wife or

his ex-wife. >> not only that, rob's friends told investigators that he had a younger lady in his life. a french woman that lived across the river in manhattan. >> was this divorce because of the other woman? >> no. it definitely wasn't because of the other woman. they had been talking about divorce before sophie. >> the detectives had a lot of questions for the women in rob's life. >> coming up. >> when i asked her why would rob cantor be found in the basement bedroom, she broke down and she began to cry. >> when dateline continues.

after rob cantor's murder investigators searched for a link between his death and two other arson homicides. they couldn't find one. so detectives intensified their focus on those that had been closest to rob. >> was this high priority? >> absolutely. we interviewed the friends and family members. >> lots of people to talk to. >> yes. >> at the top of the list were the two women in rob's life. his lover, sophie, and his estranged wife, susan, seen here in a facebook photo. >> we did bring her in and speak to her.

>> who wanted this divorce? rob or susan? >> i think they both wanted it. it was a mutual decision. >> still, the detective says rob's estranged wife seemed devastated by his death. according to susan, she had been at home on the phone with a friend on the night of the murder. >> nothing really lead us to believe that she had any involvement in this. >> over in manhattan, detective love met with the other woman in rob's life. >> she was crying. she knew that he was deceased. >> did you tell her that he had been murdered? >> later on in the interview, yes. >> what was her reaction? >> she was shocked. like anyone would be if you found out that information. >> sophie told the detective that she had seen rob hours before he died. >> rob with his two friends had gone to new york city to meet

sophie and her daughter, her 8-year-old daughter at a museum. >> how open is sophie to you? >> she was a very open person. when i asked her, why would rob cantor be found in the basement bedroom, she broke down and she began to cry. >> what was significant about the basement bedroom? >> that was the place that she and rob had consummated their relationship. >> the french-born sophie was 40. 19 years younger than rob. they had been seeing each other for more than a year and had a lot in common, running, philosophy, and science, but there was one problem, sophie was married when they met and raising three daughters, ages 5 to 10 with her husband. >> sophie was living a bit of a secret life. >> initially, yes, but it wasn't too long before it all came out. >> sandra, who was a close

friend of sophie's husband was living in france when she heard about the affair. >> i was sad. you know, my friend was really going through a terrible time, and i was so far away. >> sandra met tony living in new york in the 80s. she says when tony first met sophie, he fell hard. >> they were a beautiful couple. i was very happy for them, and i was very happy for tony and then sophie being french. so that was great. >> when contacted by investigators, sandra told them all she knew. sophie had a career, an important job in finance, tony stayed home with the kids. he served as president of the pta at their school. >> did tony share with you the joys of being a dad? >> yeah. we talked about it all the time. he was so full of love for his girls and he was there 100% of the time. >> he's mr. mom.

>> yeah. >> once the girls were older, tony wanted to work too. so with sophie's financial help he opened a computer store. hopes were high, but business was bad and sandra says when tony learned sophie was having an affair, his world fell apart. >> he was really, really hurt. but trying to do his best for the girls, as always. >> the couple soon went their separate ways. but when rob cantor was killed a year later, investigators came to see tony. >> the reason we're here is because there's been an incident that happened in new jersey. >> okay. >> the detectives told tony he was just one of several people they were questioning. don't take this the wrong way, was your wife cheating on you with rob. >> yes. >> tony admitted he was upset when he first learned of the affair but told detectives he moved on. >> if my wife is seeing somebody

else, i'm not going to be too happy. >> according to tony, he had been at home alone the night before. >> reading e-mails and watching the news. >> the detectives weren't convinced. but with no smoking gun, no witnesses, and no dna, it seemed unlikely this case would be solved in a matter of days or weeks. still, when months passed with no arrests, robs friends became impatient. >> outraged over a lack of progress invol progress solving a murder case. >> first they hired an investigator and petitioned the governor and when that din work, they picketed outside of the courthouse. >> one of rob's co-workers spoke for a group. >> we hired our own world class private detective. they said he is not doing a good job. who is doing it? everything we do, we're so

frustrated. >> was it moving slowly as they claim? >> i'm sure for them it was moving slowly, but every investigation is different. >> in fact, this investigation was a lot further along than the protestors knew. >> coming up, a suspect but no evidence. >> you had no bridge video, you had no taxi receipts, you had no witnesses. >> we didn't have him at the george washington bridge. we didn't. >> then a break. the eerie e-mails. he used these e-mail addresses to start contacting mr. cantor. at some level just trying to shame him. >> could the sender be the killer? when dateline continues.

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>> now back to dateline.

>> welcome back to dateline. i'm natalie morales. investigators were digging for clues in the murder of a new jersey man that was shot and then set on fire in his basement to cover up the crime. with no physical evidence to go on, finding clues was slow work, but when detectives started following the digital trail, that's when their case got hot. here's andrea canning with more of the fire inside. >> for more than a year, rob cantor's friends had been telling detectives that rob's murder was related to his affair with a married woman. the woman's husband was the jealous type. a man that had actually come to confront rob. >> he had made visits to rob cantor at his home to talk about this relationship and ask him to

end it. >> this is tony. he admits he did some foolish things in the wake of his wife's affair, but insists murder wasn't one of them. he said he was surprised investigators suspected him. >> did you tell them everything? >> yeah. why would i lie about stuff like that? i didn't do anything wrong. >> according to tony, he only went to rob's home to put a face with a name. >> that's a bold move. >> i want to know who the person is. >> so you ring the doorbell. >> yeah. i said my name is tony, i'm sophie's husband. can i come in and talk to you? he was like okay, yeah, sure. so i walked in. >> what do you two talk about? >> first, just small talk and family stuff. >> this sounds crazy. >> no one would believe it. >> as awkward as it sounds, tony says, the two men actually found common ground. >> you're talking about cooking

as well. >> a little bit. i made a comment about his stove. he had a lot in comment. we obviously like food. we obviously both love sophie. >> for several hours the conversation was mostly light chitchat but in a strange turn tony asked to see the basement bedroom with rob and sophie had sex. >> why go to the room? that's like torture. >> i'm confronting someone having an affair with my wife, i want to see the rest of it. >> what could you gain by seeing that room? >> i guess, how he treat her. i remember i was real upset. >> that it was a room in the basement. >> yeah. you took sophie down here? what's wrong with you. >> how angry are you when you leave? >> well, i'd like you to stop seeing my wife. >> what did he say? >> he said i can't answer you

right now. >> remarkable, right? but get this, tony says he went back two more times. >> and both times i said this is pointless. >> he's still letting you in. >> no, that time we were on the patio. tony, call me. >> you're becoming a regular visitor at your wife's lover's house. >> his wife is still living there. >> this sounds all very cordial. >> it is cordial. >> tony insists that was the last time he saw rob. that was a year before the murder. >> where are you that night? >> i'm at home. >> you're just hanging out at home. >> yeah. >> doing what? >> watching tv, reading, wash dishes, the computer. >> for months, investigators searched for evidence that tony had crossed the river from his home in manhattan to new jersey that night. they checked bridges, they

poured over bus schedules, taxi and limo records and in the end they came up empty. >> you had no bridge video, you had no taxi receipts, you had no witnesses. you had nothing physically placing tony there. >> you're right. we didn't have him at the george washington bridge. we didn't. >> still the investigators kept digging. remember the anonymous e-mails sent to rob suggesting that he was being watched, turns out they all traced back to tony. >> he created all of these on the same day which was the same day that he learned about the affair. he used these e-mail addresses to start contacting mr. cantor. at some level trying to shame him into stop having an affair with his wife. >> that wasn't all. a close look atony's computer indicated a massive amount of data was destroyed on the night that rob cantor died.

>> what he was doing less than two hours after the murder was obliterating the data. he was doing the digital equivalent of lighting it on fire. >> that seemed more than consequential. >> so in may 2012, the county prosecutor decided it was time to arrest tony. >> i answer the door in my boxers and my t-shirt, the detective yanked me out of there, gun to my temple, slammed me against the wall. what the heck. >> you're mr. mom and now you're accused of murder. >> yeah. and burning a house down. >> in the fall of 2015, tony finally went on trial for murder. rob cantor had been dead for nearly five years by then, given that prosecutors still have no physical evidence connecting tony to the crime, getting a conviction looked to be an uphill battle.

>> coming up, on the stand, a star witness. >> he told me that there had been a fire. >> the two women in rob cantor's life finally face to face. >> it was just validation that they both were on the same page. jardiance asked- and now you know. jardiance is the first type 2 diabetes pill proven to both reduce the risk of cardiovascular death for adults who have type 2 diabetes and heart disease... ...and lower a1c, with diet and exercise.

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>> in october 2015, the rob cantor murder case went to trial. almost every day for the next two months, rob's friends and

families would be there. >> did you follow the trial? were you able to over the internet? >> i was able to, yes a little bit. >> for sandra, the man she read about in online accounts was no resemblance to the man she had known for 30 years. >> did you think for a second maybe i don't know tony as well as i think? >> no. no. because tony knew also that doing something stupid as in going to kill this man, then what? then you end up in jail for the rest of your life and is it really worth it? i mean, what mattered for him was his girls. >> the veteran prosecutor that was chosen to try the case saw it differently. >> this case was about perhaps the oldest motive in the world. in this case, she and he done

him wrong. >> his rage simmered until one event set him off on march 6th, 2011. that day was the day tony learned that sophie had introduced one of his daughters to rob. >> this would be the first time that a child had met mommy's friend rob. >> in a time line partiall captured by security cameras, tony is seen just after 8:00 p.m. that night talking with his daughter cleo in the lobby of her mom's apartment building. >> i had a lovely day today. mommy and i went to a museum. i met her friend rob. the time is now 8:20 a.m. >> almost two hours pass before

tony is seen again. >> he is seen on video parking his car at 10:10:00 p.m.. we see him on that video walk from his car to his residence. >> then about 20 minutes later, security cameras again catch a glimpse of tony. >> you will see him walk to his car. you will see him enter his car. you will see him spend perhaps two minutes in his car. you will see him walk to the corner. not his corner. he's not going back home. >> according to police, tony's car never moved again that night. >> how do you think he got to new jersey? >> he definitely got to new jersey by car. and he definitely had help in some form. >> what's the theory? >> that particular form of help took is unknown.

but there are many ways for an individual to get to new jersey without having a record of that trip made. >> the prosecutor argued that tony had plenty of time to make the 13 mile trip and return in time to start destroying computer files. >> just hours later, as that body has been recovered from the embers of a horrible arson, he just happens to be feverishly erasing 170,000 bits of information on his computer. >> in spite of that, the prosecutor said, a critical piece of evidence was found on tony's e-mail account. in november of 2010, just months before the murder, tony e-mailed a friend in texas asking for help getting an ammo magazine for a .380 caliber handgun.

though the friend never sent the magazine, the prosecutor says the e-mail was significant. >> he just happened to have an interest in the precise caliber weapon that was the killing weapon in our murder. don't you find that remarkable? >> though the murder weapon was never recovered, the prosecutor says this video seems to show tony existing his car that night with something in his right hand. >> something was taken from that car. that something i suggest to you, is the gun. >> in one of the most anticipated moments of the trial, the state then called the woman at the center of it all, tony's now ex-wife. >> please state your name for the record and spell your last name. >> perhaps no one in the packed courtroom listened more intently to sophie's story than rob's

wife at the time of his affair with sophie. >> where were you born? >> paris. >> her marriage was already in trouble when she met him in the fall of 2009. >> i was wearing a t-shirt that had paris marathon on it and rob said oh you run and i said yeah and he said oh, i run too. so we started talking about that. >> as the weeks passed, their friendship turned into something more. i knew that he had feelings for me, and i started to develop feelings for him as well. >> sophie said it was on valentine's day weekend 2010 that the relationship became intimate at rob's home. >> he said that there was a bedroom in his basement. it was a bedroom that the kids used when they were teenagers and so we went down in that bedroom and we made love.

>> a few days after that, sophie says she learned that tony hacked her private e-mail account and knew everything. >> did he question you about intimacy between you and rob? >> yes. >> can you tell us about that part of the conversation? >> he wanted to know where we had slept together, and i told him we slept together in the basement bedroom. tony was really upset that i had slept with an older man in a basement. >> days later, sophie says tony told her he was going to china town to buy a gun. >> he came back home with a brown paper bag and he opened the paper bag and showed me a

gun. >> could you tell if it had a magazine? >> no. >> a year later the prosecutor argued tony used that gun to end sophie's relationship with rob. >> the body of robert cantor was found in the basement bedroom on the remains of the bed where mr. cantor had sexual relations with his wife. >> for her part she learned of rob's death the next day when she got to work. >> and there were voice messages on my voice mail and e-mails from rob's friends, and they told me that there had been a fire in rob's house, and that he was dead. >> it was in that moment perhaps, that the two women in rob cantor's wife, two women

that had never before met bonded. when court adjourned that day, susan embraced her husband's lover. >> it was an emotional moment because they really had never met before in person. and i think it was just validation that they were on the same page. >> in closing, the prosecutor returned to the one theme he pounded the hardest during the trial. >> this murder could have happened no other way other than the murder is seated before you. >> it was now the defenses turn to argue that for all the theory and conjecture, the prosecution really proved nothing. >> coming up, the stranger near the crime scene. >> i saw an older gentleman with a red cap. >> had police overlooked clues.

>> they just let it slide because they got their man. >> a powerful final moment, the verdict. when dateline continues. lk away? well, not because it was easy. i mean, the game is all i know. you think back to your draft. it felt like a fantasy. but the second you know you can't compete anymore, you owe it to yourself, to your team, to find a fresh start. so, yeah, that's why i did it. that's why i walked away... from my fantasy league. (announcer) redeem your season on fanduel. play free until you win. fanduel. more ways to win. 3 days is really fast. sensitivity, the dentist is going to be able to provide that to their patients. sensodyne rapid relief in my opinion is a game changer. it's going to let the dentist offer their patient sensitivity relief in 3 days. it has a formulation that lays down a barrier of protection against sensitivity. within 3 days, say over the course of a weekend you're going to start feeling significant results.

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>> there's a lot of bad things adding up here. where he was killed. you wiping your computer hours after the murder. you going to visit him. >> yeah, but i didn't kill him. >> did you have someone drive you over. >> no. >> for sandra malone, the prosecutions theory that tony murdered his wife's lover out of jealousy made no sense. >> sometimes in crimes of passion, you don't really think

it through. you're angry. >> well, crime of passion when you're angry, that happens right then, doesn't it? does it really happen over a year later when things are working out? >> turns out, that was the same argument his attorney made to the jury. why he asked, would tony kill rob a year after rob had shown him the bed where he had sex with his wife. >> if he didn't kill him right there and then, he wasn't going to kill him at all because that was the time to do it. with his bare hands. >> investigators never seriously considered the possibility that someone else may have wanted rob cantor dead. >> tony was the only suspect. >> another potential suspect was the stranger who had been spotted near the cantor home shortly before the fire. charles johnston was the man

that reported him to the police. >> saw an older gentleman, 65 to 70 white male, red cap on, white hair. >> was it someone from the neighborhood. >> no. >> detectives never followed up on that because he only had eyes for tony. >> they just let it slide. let it slide because they got their man. >> on the night of the murder, tony was at home alone watching an indiana jones marathon on tv. as for the late night destruction of all the computer files, he says that was just an unfortunate coinsdense. >> he decided to do it at that time. >> what time did he delete the material? >> i believe it started at about 2:00 something in the morning and ran for like five hours. >> so we're talking about two hours after the fire start ed.

>> yeah. >> it looks bad. >> sure, that's why the prosecutor's office has a case. >> equally bad for the defense is the evidence that months before the murder tony tried to get him a friend to buy him a magazine for a .380 handgun. >> it's a conversation starter. >> you're from texas, respect these things cheaper over there. >> it looks bad that you're asking a friend for a .380 caliber magazine and that's used to kill rob cantor. >> did you show sophie a gun? >> yeah. i was holding it for somebody. >> according to the defense, the business about the magazine amounted to nothing. first the friend never followed through and second there was not a shred of evidence that tony was in new jersey on the night rob was killed. >> how can you prove that a man

committed a murder in new jersey when you cannot even prove that he was in new jersey. >> in closing, he urged the jurors to ignore the prosecutor's circumstantial theories and emotional appeals. >> what we have to do to follow through on what's right and not what comes out of here, but what comes out of here. >> after a trial that lasted two months, the jury spent several days deliberating. for the former prosecutor it was a tense time. >> did you worry as the jury was deliberating? they had questions. they wanted to hear things again. did you worry that they couldn't visualize him there. >> i will never admit this while i was a prosecutor, but i can admit it now. >> on the fourth day of

deliberations, the jury sent a message to the judge. they reached a decision. >> has the jury agreed upon a verdict. >> yes, your honor. >> is the verdict unanimous. >> yes, your honor, your verdict is. guilty. >> it was an emotional moment of release for rob cantor's widow and daughters. it was a moment that tony said he never expected. >> you hear the word guilty. >> unbelievable. >> though tony never took the stand during his trial, at his sentencing, two months later he spoke publicly for the first time. >> i'm really sorry what happened to robert cantor and especially to his two daughters. coming from a father of three daughters, i can tell them that i didn't kill their father. >> as expected, no one on the

cantor side of the courtroom was buying it. suzanne, rob's widow, spoke for the family. >> i think what the defendant leaves is a legacy of darkness and destruction and vengeance and cruelty. >> one of rob's colleagues also addressed the judge. >> please, please make sure he never sees the light of day. >> when all was said and done, that's exactly what the judge decided to do. >> if you'll please rise, as to count one murder, we sentence you to life in prison. the no early release act will apply. >> tony faced his fate alone that day. his daughters, now living in europe with their mother, were not there to say good-bye or shed a tear. but rob cantor's daughters were.

>> tony mercilessly executed robert cantor and forever changed the lives of so many people. and for that, he has to pay a price, which is to say he has now forfeited his life. and that's justice. >> that's all i'm craig melvin. >> and i'm natalie morales. >> this is "dateline." >> how do you feel that so many people think that steven avery is innocent? >> it's emotional. they made him look like he was a nice person. >> what's happening is wrong. >> the evidence is beyond overwhelming. steven avery is guilty. >> i'm innocent. >> the story gripped the nation, inhe