what goes on behind the closed doors of a marriage is not always apparent to the outside. >> my wife fell asleep in the bathtub. i just came up here, and she was laying face down in the bathtub. >> something wasn't right. she was just unconscious. >> a beaming bride. a haunting death. >> he was just telling me he could never ever love another woman as much as he loved her. >> what had happened? >> did she have an aneurism? did she have a seizure? >> police were baffled. >> i expected something to be wet. i expected there to be water on the floor. >> things were not adding up. >> something was screaming to me, "something's bad, wrong."

>> could this death have been deliberate? >> she was murdered. >> i love sarah. i would never have hurt her. >> i started crying because i just felt so bad for him. >> there's just no chance he had anything to do with it. >> three trials, three juries. >> we're scared that the truth may not come out. hello and welcome to "dateline extra." i'm craig melvin. sarah and ryan were newlyweds. a young coupled that appears to be deeply in love. sarah mysteriously drowned in their bathtub. ryan claimed it was an accident. to investigators, his story did not add up. was this a tragic mishap, or was something more sinister at play? here's dennis murphy.

>> reporter: sometimes the shades are drawn early in a marriage even for a young couple so in love like newlyweds sarah and ryan. everything in life was still fresh. at home on your average monday night. after his workday as a sports planner, ryan says he plopped down on the sofa, on an august night to chill with the bengals preseason opener against green bay. sarah, he says, went upstairs to draw a bath in the master. she liked her calming baths. the young dental hygienist had been tormented with more headaches that afternoon. the young couple in the suburban cincinnati home that evening had been married just under four months. 114 days to be exact. they vowed till death do us part. and that moment was only minutes away from arriving. they had begun the two of them with a blind date at a pub that worked out.

sarah, sarah stewart had been fixed up by her friend, dana. dana had an inkling that sarah would hit it off with ryan. >> i came home. i said sarah is amazing. i think their personalities would get along. he said, well, let's see what happens. >> what happened over drinks and nibbles was chemistry. laid back ryan, the college jock and baseball player, super organized sarah, who needed everything just so talked about getting together. >> she said let me check my book. she gets out her little black book. she's looking through. he is peeking over looking. he said, later he calls us and tells us there was nothing written in her black book. >> reporter: a fast track courtship. and before very long. ryan was bringing his new girlfriend home to meet his mom, jill. >> i liked her a lot. probably number one thing that struck me the most was how -- beyond her years in maturity she was. >> poised, huh? >> yeah. sarah didn't have a problem

telling anyone anything. so if you -- made sarah mad, you knew you made sarah mad. >> as for ryan he never seemed to lose it. >> i don't think i've ever seen him upset. he doesn't get mad. >> he is so laid back and easy going, go with the flow. she is so on it organized this is where we are -- we have to be. he just says okay. >> jill enjoyed her days with ryan and his new girlfriend, sarah. >> our family tends to do a lot of barbecues and picnics and things like that. we would spend some time down on the lake in kentucky. they would come down there. >> were you pleased she was becoming a serious part of the family? >> i was very pleased, yes. >> the couple brought a nice four bedroom house together in a good neighborhood and ryan surprised sarah with an engagement ring. >> the ring in a dog collar. >> around the dog's collar. >> she was very excited. he was excited. sarah made him happy. >> reporter: soon the wedding invitations were in the mail. the bridesmaids knew they better snap to. >> she is a planner.

she had everything ready to go. wanted to make sure the girls wore the same eye shadow. she gave us makeup kits for the wedding so we all looked the same. >> how was ryan doing? >> just as happy, happier than i have ever seen him with her. >> reporter: it cost sarah a big screen tv to seal the deal. but she got ryan to take ballroom dance lessons for the wedding. >> i was amazed. never in a million years. >> reporter: your son at dance lessons? >> she could get him to do more things than any woman he had ever dated. ♪ >> reporter: the wedding in april 2008 was a formal affair. the bride was beautiful. ryan's dance came off without a hitch. and the happy brides maids all matched just as sarah wanted. >> very beautiful. i mean every detail was planned obviously to a "t" because it was sarah. and she was gorgeous. >> awesome. >> probably the most fun wedding we had ever been to, ever. >> reporter: the newlyweds went to costa rica for their

honeymoon and had a great time. then back to cincinnati to begin their journey together as mr. and mrs. ryan widmer. >> they worked really hard. built a beautiful deck. had a trip planned to cancun. they had everything to live for. >> reporter: august 11th should have been another day on the calendar in a young marriage? >> yes. >> august 11th, monday night. ryan remembers being downstairs watching "monday night football." and sarah had gone upstairs to her bath. she was in trouble. >> 911, what is your emergency? >> my wife, she fell asleep in the bathtub. i think. i went downstairs. i came up. she was laying face down in the bathtub. >> i got a call it was ryan. something has happened to sarah. >> emts were rushing sarah to the hospital. by then they worked on her for 45 minutes. but hadn't gotten a response. minutes later, jill was with her son waiting anxiously together in a room off emergency. >> finally, a woman came in and then we said is she gone?

and she said yes. and he just dropped down to his knees and was just bawling and sobbing into the chair. >> reporter: sarah widmer, 24 years old, the bride of less than four months, was dead. her husband ryan told the emergency services people he thought she had fallen asleep in the bathtub and drowned. but the emts doing cpr tried everything they could to save her. they didn't understand one crucial observation they made at the home that night. there is something here that doesn't look right. >> a drowning in a dry bathroom? >> i expected something to be wet. there's a towel on the floor. there's a mat on the floor. but everything is perfectly dry. >> the questions deepen. (pirate girl) ahoy!!!!! (excited squeal, giggling/panting) gotcha! (man) ah! (girl) nooooooooooooo! (man) nooooo! (girl) nooooo...

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show me decorating shows. this is staying connected with xfinity to make moving... simple. easy. awesome. stay connected while you move with the best wifi experience and two-hour appointment windows. click, call or visit a store today. >> reporter: that monday night the cincinnati bengals were looking more than decent against green bay. fans across town, like jeff braley, wondered if this could finally be a miracle season for the back-then hapless local franchise of the nfl. but braley didn't get to see all of the game. he was a cop, a detective. and you don't get to pick your down time. >> i've was at home watching the bengals game. i get a call from the sergeant. "lieutenant, we're out on a drowning. the paramedics are working on her. but something's not right here." >> reporter: as he rolled to the house he knew some of what to expect.

when you are a cop more than a decade you become familiar with the signs of the drowning like the froth about the victim's nose and mouth. >> your mind starts running immediately about possibilities. they initially tell me i have a 24-year-old drowning victim that died in the tub. i'm thinking that we will find evidence of something. drugs. evidence of an overdose or something. as he pulled up the victim was already loaded in the back of the ambulance. the arriving police officer was still inside the house. and he gave the detective a fill on what he had found when he was led to the master bedroom where the 24-year-old woman lay on the carpet off the bath. >> he felt for a pulse. he assisted with cpr on what he described as a completely dry body with her hair being only damp. >> wet head, dry body. >> correct. >> for some one who drowned in a bathtub full of water. >> yes. >> go ahead and get her out of bathtub and get her on the flat surface. >> okay, okay. >> the 911 dispatcher had been quite clear. he instructed the husband to get his wife out of the bathtub and put her on the floor.

>> i'm dropping the phone. >> the husband went away and came back to say he moved his wife from the tub to the bedroom. >> go ahead and get back to cpr. try cpr. we'll be there in a little bit. >> reporter: the detective wondered along with the emts and arriving officers why a woman who drowned in a bathtub would be mostly dry. he needed to see the scene. what story would it tell him. >> i start mentally preparing myself based on what they told me. what do i want to see versus what do i see? >> he headed for the master bathroom. >> i expected something to be wet. expected water on the floors or towels or whatever it might be. it is not there. >> dry-dry. >> there is a small remnant of water, what you might call droplets on the bottom of the tub around the drain. other than that there is nothing. >> you got any bath mats. wet towels on the floor. >> there is a towel on the floor. a mat on the floor. everything is dry. >> reporter: he had a drowning

victim that didn't appear to be wet. someone that supposedly fell asleep in the tub and pitched down in the water. but a bathroom that was dry and undisturbed though presumably the husband had to wrangle her limp body out of the tub as he moved her to the bedroom. >> whether it's lotions, soap, whatever is on the side they weren't knocked off. that bothered me if you are pulling somebody quickly out of the tub. that's still together. >> the detective making mental notes. >> something was screaming to me something is bad wrong, something bad really, really, really bad has happened here. more so than just a tragic accident where she drowned. >> the forensic techs arrived and were taking photos. cutting out sections of the bedroom carpet where the mixture of blood and fluid common in drownings had stained it. what they wondered was there another explanation for the stains. >> they wanted to get the things to our lab right away to start, start checking out some things. >> reporter: though it was early hours in an incident. so much would depend on the findings of an autopsy, the detective knew this was not a

case that was going to be closed out that night. >> when i left the house at 2:00 a.m., i knew i had a suspicious death. still there were questions -- how long had sarah been out of the tub? and had she been out of the tub long enough for her body to air dry? >> it wasn't possible. you know if you are pulling somebody directly out of a tub of water the body has to be wet. no other way around it. unless a substantial amount of time has passed or we're not being told an accurate story of what transpired. >> question -- was it possible for ryan to lift sarah out of the tub without knocking over those bottles that the detective noted were undisturbed? was it possible for water not to be splashed around as she was moved to the bedroom? and that overriding question -- what had happened to the young wife in the master bedroom? >> we knew she had drowned from the scene itself. it was the manner in which she drowned that had raised all the questions. >> but detective braley would have the most questions for the seemingly happily married husband.

was it possible there was stress in the marriage that no one knew about? >> i had to rely on the fact in the back of my mind that nobody knows what goes on behind closed doors. as police consider foul play, friends and family wonder was there something medical behind this mystery. coming up -- >> did she have an aneurysm? did she have a seizure? >> was there something medical behind this mystery? >> she was complaining of headaches. i was telling her, "how long has it been since you have been to the doctor?" nce you have been to the doctor?" with my bladder leakage, the products i've tried just didn't fit right. they were too loose.

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>> sarah widmer had died of drowning in her home. and her body would be examined by the coroner. there was nothing for ryan, her husband of four months, to do but leave the hospital and head home. his mother, jill, took him back to the house in the wee hours. ryan asked me, mom i can't go back in there. can you go in and grab clothes for me. so i went upstairs. when i got to the bedroom. there were a couple pieces of carpet cut out of their carpeting which i thought was odd. >> it hadn't occurred to mother or son that the authorities were looking at sarah's death as anything but a tragic explainable incident of some

sort. >> there were a million questions in our mind, did she have an aneurysm, did something medically happen to her? did she have a seizure? >> day light and word was spreading that sarah was gone. dana and chris, the couple who had fixed the newlywed up could not believe what they were hearing. >> we had just gotten back from a trip and told her i would call her as soon as we got back and we would get together to dinner. i didn't get a chance. >> shocking news. >> dana, a nurse, tried to make sense of what had happened to her dear friend. she thought back to her conversations with sarah. >> she was complaining of headaches, saying what do you think of her medical background? i said, maybe you should get your blood pressure checked, i said, you should get a checkup. >> there was that funny trait sarah used to have that people would kid her about, that she would fall asleep at the drop of a hat.

maybe it was part of an underlying condition that explained her death. her mother-in-law noticed it when she first got to know sarah. jill was taking home videos in 2007. >> i panned over, there's sarah having a good time. sarah was sound asleep in the family room. there were 15 or 20 people in the room, laughing, talking, kids running around, and sarah went to sleep. >> sarah snoozing in the car. friends kidded her about it. >> she would always fall asleep at the beginning of movies, we would be nudging her, sarah, wake up. >> was it so noticeable that you guys joked about it? >> even at the dinner table, we would be saying, sarah, don't fall asleep. >> i would say, sarah, you have narcolepsy. she said, no. i'm just tired all the time. >> had she fallen asleep and drowned in the tub? was that possible? ryan thought so.

he said as much to the 911 dispatchers. >> my wife fell asleep in the bathtub, i think she's dead. >> but all the observations about sarah was just anecdotal information, not the stuff of real medical investigation. the medical examiner would have the first real results about sarah's death. what was he finding? >> no evidence of stroke, no evidence of a heart attack. >> but the medical examiner had discovered something else. bruising to sarah's head and neck. what had caused those injuries? the investigators checked off what they had so far. a young woman supposedly drowned in the bathtub with a damp head of hair and a dry body. it didn't figure. >> if you're pulling somebody out of a tub of water, it has to be wet. there's no way around it. >> a woman with unexplained bruises. and a husband whose story they didn't believe. >> ryan's story doesn't fit at all. we determined at that point we had a homicide.

>> sarah murdered. and the authorities believed her husband ryan did it. how shocking is that to you? >> oh, i can't even tell you. >> they charge ryan with murder. >> i mean, you've got to be kidding me. like why would they think -- why? and i can't even tell you what that was like. so on top of losing this beautiful member of our family, he didn't even get a chance to grieve because now we're scared to death and he's scared to death that he's going to be charged with murder. >> and that is exactly what would happen. just two days after his new bride's death, a warrant was issued for ryan widmer's arrest. >> by ryan's admission, he was the only one in the house. ryan murdered sarah or he's covering for somebody that did. >> it didn't seem possible at first glance. a clean cut young couple, him

without a criminal record of any kind, them with no history of arguments, no problems in their marriage. what was the motivate for murder on a monday night? any boyfriend/girlfriend issues here? >> no evidence of that. >> money trouble? >> not that we can find. >> any anger issues with the guy? >> no. >> you're not getting a negative picture of this couple. >> no, we're not. >> as unlikely as it may seem, police say there's no other explanation for sarah's death. ryan is charged with his wife's murder. his family and friends were devastated. >> ryan and i were both so broken hearted. i could not have ever conceived, nor could ryan, that they would have had any idea that he would have been the person to hurt her and that it wasn't just a tragic accident. >> it broke my heart, knowing that he was feeling that grief and fear for his own life too. >> is there any moment when you think maybe i don't know the guy? >> never. >> maybe an instant of something

awful happened? >> he never said anything where he was remotely angry. >> even sarah's family was behind ryan. so much so, the two families decided to delay sarah's funeral until ryan was out on bond. >> sarah's family were very livid about the fact that he wasn't guilty and they weren't going to go forward with the service until ryan could be there. >> the families are both on the same page here. >> yes. >> that you're four-square behind ryan. >> mm-hmm. >> and you're not going to even grieve together formally until he's there with you. >> right. >> the dead woman's brother, mike stewart, asked the judge to lower ryan's bond amount so he could attend the funeral. >> in our heart of hearts, we don't believe ryan would do this. >> but eight days before the judge lowered ryan's bond from $1 million to $400,000. by then it was too late. the funeral had already been held so out of town relatives could return home. >> it was a nice ceremony. her brother got up and said a few nice words.

and i know that ryan wrote a letter that was read during the service. the minister that did their wedding did her funeral as well. >> chris and dana grieved for sarah. but also tried to comfort a shattered ryan. >> i remember him telling me, dana, i love her so much. >> ryan was so distraught, he felt he couldn't go back to the home he had bought with sarah. so while he waited for his trial date, he moved in with his mother. >> it was great to have him staying with me, but -- >> there's only one topic in the household, huh? >> there's two. one was continuing to talk about how much we miss sarah, trying to grieve for her. the same time this young man who lost the love of his love, he's trying to grieve for his wife and he's got a murder charge hanging over his head that he might go to prison the rest of his life. >> ryan wondered why couldn't everybody just see that he loved his wife and the death wasn't murder?

coming up -- the case goes to court and out comes the evidence. >> it would be virtually impossible for somebody to fall asleep and not wake up. >> and later, ryan speaks out at last. so you think they wanted to make a case here? >> why would they arrest me a day after if they didn't want to make a case? t to make a case? (dad) got it? (boy) got it. (dad) it's slippery. (boy) nooooooo... (grandma) nooooooo... (dad) nooooooo... (dog) yessssss.... (vo) quick, the quicker picker upper! bounty picks up messes quicker and is two times more absorbent than the leading ordinary brand. (boy) hey look, i got it. bounty, the quicker picker upper.

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president trump is spending christmas in washington, tweeting, i am all alone, poor me. in afghanistan, a suicide bomber and three gunmen struck a government building killing 23 and wounding more than 20. all three agagunmen were killed. gud as sarah's relatives lead her to rest, her husband sat in a jail cell, charged with murder. investigators weren't buying his story. soon, a family member rethinking

an incident that may not have been so innocent after all. had trouble been brewing in their seemingly happy marriage? sarah was wonderful. the most loving person. she was just a great person. >> sarah widmer had been a daughter, a wife, a loyal friend in her brief life. but in death, to those who would never know her, she would become simply the victim. the case could be summarized as briefly as a true crime paperback: the bathtub murder. radio host bill cunningham could feel the court of public opinion respond to the story. the bathtub murder case had the phone ringing. >> the idea that such a young man could be watching a bengals game, that was shocking. i had a large number of callers who said to me, he didn't it, he doesn't fit the profile, there was no history.

i said, wait a minute, wait until the trial takes place. i'm led to believe there is going to be clear and convincing evidence. >> seven months after sarah's death, the only jury that mattered was sworn in to hear the case against 28-year-old ryan widmer, a charge of aggravated murder. his friends stuck by him. >> his life hangs in the balance. >> that's a scary thought. >> sarah's family sat across from ryan's as they had the previous year during the couple's wedding. sarah's family's support for him had eroded. for sarah's mom, the situation seemed to get stranger by the minute. her son on trial for murder. >> i see my scared baby is what i see. i mean, he was scared to death. >> but the prosecution's message for the jury was blunt. there had been a violent confrontation in the widmer

house that night. >> ryan widmer purposely killed sarah stewart widmer and murdered her by drowning. >> the prosecutors began with the first moments of the case. ryan's call to 911. >> my wife, she fell asleep in the bathtub, i think. i was downstairs. i came up here and she was laying face down in the bathtub. >> the emergency dispatcher testified that the voice was giving more details than normal. >> the caller was rather calm. usually i can't get anything out of them. >> she's in the bathtub? >> the water is draining right now. i was out there watching tv. she falls asleep in the tub all the time. >> to the prosecutors, the husband was trying to place himself as far away as possible from the bathroom where sarah had died. >> he really gives very little information about her condition. it's more important for him to

say i wasn't there and i don't have anything to do with this. >> and could sarah even be dead face down in the bathtub? could a body contort that way? >> that seems an odd position for somebody who has, quote, fallen asleep, to be face down with your face near the faucet. >> in terms of the possibilities of how -- the enclosed space of the bathtub is shorter than she is long. >> we're not talking about an mcmansion whirlpool tub. >> right. >> so much of the case was built upon the observation of first responding officers and emergency responders. they noted not only was ryan not wet. this man who had lifted his wife's body out of the tub just minutes before they arrived. sarah was also mostly dry. >> i noticed her body was dry. her hair was damp. >> others on the scene corroborated this observation. damp head, dry body. >> things were not adding up. it would seem to me her body

would have been wet, the floor would have been wet, the carpet would have been wet. >> you're talking about from the time he says i'm taking her out of this bathtub to the time that other people are there, her hair is described as simply damp, not even wet. the carpet's not wet. there's not water dripping off of her hair onto the rest of her body. the floor is not wet. >> the officer noticed something else. the victim's fingers and toes. we all know what happens to them when they've been soaking in a bathtub. >> it was my understanding she had been in the water 20 to 30 minutes. i would have thought that her fingers would have been pruned up, her toes would have been pruned up. >> did you see any indication of that? >> no. >> from simple observations, the murder case had grown. the jury was being told that ryan widmer's story didn't gibe with what he had told officers. like the bathtub and tiles that should have been soaking wet but weren't. that raised a question for the jury. is it possible that this young woman who drowned had never been in the tub in the first place?

>> the bottom line is there would have been water everywhere. if there wasn't, it was cleaned up. if there was a cleanup, then there was something to hide. that was her murder. >> an expert witness for the prosecution spoke to the issue of whether a person can actually fall asleep in a bathtub and drown in a bathtub. her testimony was no, that can't happen. >> it would be virtually impossible for somebody without the influence of drugs or alcohol or something external to fall asleep and not wake up. so first, the sensation of water on your face would wake you up. two would be the gag reflex, water entering your airway, just choking. three, if for some reason, that didn't, the drop in oxygen would cause you to wake up. >> but maybe sarah hadn't fallen asleep. perhaps she had suffered a catastrophic but perfectly natural event. something to her heart, her brain. the coroner didn't find any. >> any evidence of heart problems?

>> no. >> any evidence of brain injury or seizure? >> no. >> one of the amazing things about sarah widmer is that she had regular medical care, for a person her age, she went twice in two years for a regular physical. this is not a person who didn't have the opportunity to interact with her medical professionals. >> and to the coroner, the bruising he saw on sarah's neck and scalp while performing the autopsy looked ominous. the wounds significant, and not in the right spot to have been caused by the emts' lifesaving efforts. >> the three bruises able to be seen on the right side of the scalp, another faint bruise on her forehead. she's got a significant degree of neck hemorrhage. she's undergone significant cpr. however there is no hemorrhage anywhere in the area of the chest. so it's difficult to try to rationalize that the hemorrhage in her neck can be the result of cpr.

>> as the coroner saw it, the significant bruising on sarah's neck was caused by ryan's forceful drowning of her. >> do you have an opinion as to the manner of sarah's death? >> yes. the manner of death was homicide. >> and that took prosecutors into the realm of speculation. what had happened in the bedroom that night if sarah hadn't drowned by herself in the bathtub? this forensic pathologist had one scenario explaining a damp head but dry body. >> her head was pushed over the edge of either the bathtub or the sink or the toilet, either forwards or backwards, either into water or under running water. that's how she died. >> experts also noticed these strange prints, invisible to the naked eye. the prints were most likely made by a small person. if ryan had forced sarah over

the side of the tub, had she tried to brace herself as she was pushed into the water? >> to my experience, those look like prints going in a downward motion. >> how do you fight back? keep your head out of the water? put your hands against the tub, or put your hands on the bottom of the tub? do you grasp at somebody and lose your only hold on life? >> a stark image, a husband pushing his wife's head underwater and holding her there until she drowned. >> she had been subjected to something forcibly drowning her. >> the jury had to wonder what the motivation could be for such an awful crime. sarah's mother was now testifying for the prosecution. she said when she was out shopping with sarah, her daughter seemed to feel she needed to check everything with ryan who could see her purchases on his computer. >> she would buy something, ryan would call her as soon as she bought it, sometimes, telling

her did you really need it, why did you buy it or something. he thought she was spending too much money. >> he was very concerned about her shopping habits. >> correct. there were still stresses, things going on in their family. >> even the prosecutors had to acknowledge that this didn't necessarily add up to a clear motive for murder. but they believed there were things happening in the little house that no one but sarah or ryan knew about. >> anybody who has been married or in a relationship knows that what goes on behind the closed doors of a marriage is not always apparent to the outside. >> but was the prosecution's case too thin? too much observation lite with not enough persuasive hard evidence? the defense would argue passionately that it was and that ryan had nothing to do with his wife's sudden death. ryan's defenders were not giving up. coming up -- >> i know that she had fallen asleep in the bathtub before. h

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be able to tell the jury what caused sarah widmer to drown that night. but they were going to show that ryan widmer had no reason to hurt his wife. and as far as damp hair/dry body, they would explain that. the bottom line for the defense -- >> i know one thing. ryan widmer had nothing to do with his wife's death. >> ryan widmer's defense attorney argued his client was plagued from the get-go by the unhappy choice of words on that 911 call. >> she falls asleep in the tub all the time. >> it sets the alarms going. >> exactly. >> had ryan told the 911 dispatcher only that his wife was unconscious, it wouldn't have been suspicious. >> the only thing ryan knows is, she fell asleep in the tub. they jump on that and say he's a liar. >> the coroner, his attorneys says, was all too quick to rule the death a homicide. >> he had no idea she was suffering from a headache that

day. >> remember, an expert witness for the prosecution said it would have been impossible for sarah to fall asleep and die in the tub. but those who knew her sleep habits say it may have been a sign of an undiagnosed, underlying medical condition. sarah's boss, a dentist, testified sarah's quirky sleep habits were well-known around the office. >> she would go to her car and take a nap. that's odd because people don't usually do that. >> the dentist recollected that sarah had not been feeling well on that last day of her life. >> she had a sore throat. her stomach had been bothering her earlier in the day. >> she was still feeling crummy later in the evening when she spoke to a friend. >> she had a headache and the back of her neck was hurting. she sounded tired. she didn't sound like she felt very good. >> sarah turning off the day and retreating to her bathtub? that sounded just like the sarah they knew.

>> she would always leave our house and say she had to get home and take a bath. >> sarah dozing off in the tub was a trait that her friend from childhood days was very familiar with. >> she had fallen asleep in the bathtub before. we had talked about that, because i had fallen asleep in the bathtub too. >> the sleeping habits, the headaches. the defense claimed they could have been the symptoms of an underlying and potentially fatal condition that went undetected, something an otherwise healthy young woman wouldn't take that seriously. even with all their scientific art, argued the defense, sometimes pathologists simply cannot say why a person died. a doctor who specializes in emergency medicine testified that unexplained deaths occur far more often than many of us would guess. >> nationwide, there are approximately 300,000 episodes of sudden death per year. of those episodes, 1 to 2% occur in young people. one-third of those young people

that die have normal autopsies. >> in other words, people sometimes just die, and their autopsies may never reveal the cause. but the issue that might decide the case was the observation by the arriving officers and emts of damp hair and dry body. what looks suspicious was easily explainable, says the defense. hair simply stays wet longer. >> if you get out of a pool or bathtub, the skin dries before the hair? >> yes. >> the defense told the court you have to look at the clock, the elapsed time of the incident. the defense claims sarah's body dried off in the time between when ryan spoke to the dispatcher and when the police arrived. what about the fingers and toes that should have been pruned up but weren't? no one knows what time sarah got into the tub. >> we don't know if she was primping in front of the mirror. we don't know any of that stuff. >> and by the way, says the defense, you can't have it both ways. if ryan had killed sarah in the

small bathroom, there should have been water splashed everywhere. >> if there was a violent struggle, there would be water, on the floor, on the walls, on the counter, everywhere. if they want to claim that it was a staged scene where he cleaned up the water, where is the wet towel? >> and investigators looked for wet towels. in the dryer, even in the garage. nothing. and say for argument's sake there had been a struggle. you would think ryan would have gotten scratched up as sarah fought for her life. but ryan didn't have a mark on him. how would sarah have reacted? >> sarah was a very spunky person and she was small in stature, probably 5'1". i think she weighed around 140 pounds. but she wasn't frail by any stretch of the imagination. she was a strong girl. >> she would have gone for her attacker? >> i heartily believe, yes. she had beautiful french manicured nails.

none of them were damaged at all. she didn't have skin from ryan underneath her. >> and the very notion of ryan attacking sarah is preposterous, say their friends. >> ryan is a lot like my husband in the aspect of, when there's an argument, chris says, okay, what can we do to fix it and let's move on. that's kind of how ryan was. >> as far as accounting for the bruising noted to her neck and scalp, to the defense, they were certainly caused by the emts working on sarah. >> 45 minutes of resuscitation efforts. not five, not ten. 45 minutes. >> it looked perfectly consistent to this emergency room doctor, an expert for the defense. >> i was not surprised at the injuries at all based on the prolonged cpr and the number of intubation attempts.

>> add it all up, results of lifesaving efforts, skin that may well have dried before the authorities show up, and you are left, the defense argued, with an unexplained death, something that experts tell you happened. and jurors, the reason you didn't hear about love affairs or out of control finances is because none of those things existed. >> motive. they don't have motive. >> it didn't add up that this man of 27 years who has never even shown anger in his entire life would all of a sudden kill his wife. it made no sense. >> i hope that you agree that ryan widmer is not guilty of any wrongdoing. >> what the prosecution would tell the jury in its closing argument was that while they may never know if ryan killed his wife of four months, that he nonetheless did, and that the clock was ticking as he staged his scene before calling 911, and that explains the dry

body/damp hair mystery. >> sarah widmer was either out of the bathtub for a long period of time or her body was never fully in that bathtub. >> they claim ryan spent so much time cleaning up the scene before he called for emts, that sarah's dead body was showing signs of rigor mortis when she arrived. >> she was she was already dead by the time they got there. rigger motoris was setting in. >> now it was up to the jury to decide. >> we're scared that the truth may not come out. we know without a doubt that ryan did not do this. >> 23 hours of deliberation. the verdict. and the controversy. (excited squeal, giggling/panting) gotcha! (man) ah!

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welcome back to "dateline extra." attorneys had mounted a vigorous defense. the newlywed had no motive to kill his wife. she had merely dozed off in the tub. prosecutors said evidence at the time crime scene proved it. now it was up to the jury to decide. here again is dennis murphy.

about the only fact of the case that was indisputable was that sarah widmer had drowned. but was it a natural death in her bathtub? what about the suggestion of a neurological event, something with her heart? the medical examiner could not find anything. >> her medical history was devoid of anything that would suggest these things. >> or had sarah died at the hands of her husband ryan? >> they had failed to prove their case. they failed. >> the jury was out all day. the couple's friends waited. >> we're scared that the truth may not come out. we know without a doubt that ryan did not do this. and we pray to god that everyone else sees that too. >> billy cunningham, i immigrate america. >> ryan widmer might have wished that the listeners on bill cunningham's radio show had been on his jury. >> the calls split 90/10 in favor of ryan widmer, because during the trial there was no smoking gun. >> ryan's mother agreed.

she was cautiously optimistic. >> i never let myself get cocky. i just felt that in having sat there and listened, there were a lot of holes and not a lot of evidence. he felt like there was a lot of reasonable doubt. >> the jurors were hard at work. they asked for the tub where sarah had been found dead to be brought to them in the jury room. by the second day, ryan's defense attorney was getting anxious. >> when they're out more than 20 hours, it's clear that somebody is saying that this isn't as straightforward as it seems. >> correct. >> but the prosecutors weren't worried by the long jury deliberation. >> we knew it was going to be a lot of evidence to weigh. >> they had two counts to died. count one, aggravated murder. and count two, nonpremeditated murder. did it happen suddenly, without prior thought? final, after 23 hours, the jurors reached a verdict.

the lawyers were summoned. >> it's a very traumatic moment. your heart is racing, you're anxious to hear what the jury says. it's a profound moment. >> as jill hurried back to the courtroom, outside, a storm hit with biblical fury. she saw that as an ominous sign. >> the skies just opened up. there were tornado warnings. and it all just culminated when the verdict was about ready to be read. >> ryan widmer took his place at the defense table. >> the defendant will please rise. the verdict on count 1, aggravated murder, we the jury find the defendant ryan k. widmer is not guilty. >> a moment of relief for ryan. the jury did not believe he killed his wife with premeditation. but he still faced the second count of murder. >> we the jury in this case find the defendant is guilty. >> guilty. the jury had decided that ryan

widmer did indeed murder his wife sarah. >> is there anything you wish to say? >> the accused, now the convicted, would kiss his wedding ring and address the court for the first time. he hadn't taken the stand, as was his right. >> i love my wife. i did not hurt her. i was never given a chance. the day after she passes away they charged me with murder. if i had an answer, i would give the answer to what happened to her. but i can't. i was not in the bathroom with her. >> he was very upset. he doubled over when addressing the court. i was surprised that he was at outspoken as he was. but he indicated to the judge and everybody that he loves sarah and he would never have hurt her. >> i love my wife and i did not hurt her. >> ryan widmer was given the

mandatory sentence, 15 years to life in prison. >> he said two or three of the jurors had done home experiments where they showered and dried. >> home experiments, what was that all about? >> ryan widmer was about to get a break when the bathtub mystery continues. a break when the bathy continues. of our camping trips. but with a range of sizes, depend fit-flex is made for me. with a range of sizes for all body types, depend fit-flex underwear is guaranteed to be your best fit. get stronger... get closer. start listening today to the world's largest selection of audiobooks on audible. and now, get more. for just $14.95 a month, you'll get a credit a month good for any audiobook, plus two audible originals exclusive titles you can't find anywhere else. if you don't like a book, you can exchange it any time, no questions asked. automatically roll your credits

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welcome back to "dateline."

ryan widmer insisted to the judge that he did not hurt his wife, sara. but the jury had spoken and ryan was headed to prison. then, a stunning twist. a juror, troubled by an incident was about to deliver a bombshell and it would turn this case upside down. what went on behind the closed doors of that deliberation room? with more of our story, here is dennis murphy. >> ryan widmer had been convicteded of murdersing his wife, sara, and was given the mandatory sentence, 15 years to life in prison. he was cuffed and moved to a holding cell. >> he stopped next to me and said, can i say goodbye to my mom? they said, no, just keep moving. >> how difficult was that? >> beyond difficult. >> dana, who had set up her friend with her college roommate, was devastated. >> she wasn't murdered. one of my best friends.

>> there isn't a whisper of doubt that said my best friend may have been murdered? >> no. >> absolutely not. >> my impression was that the community was stunned by the verdict. >> the verdict was so unpopular in the court of public opinion that candlelight vigils were staged to protest the jury vote. >> there has never been a case for candlelight vigils about a condemned kilter. it's never happened before. >> bill cunningham regards himself as a conservative, but even he felt this was a case of justice denied. >> this is one of the flimsiest and one of the weakest i've ever

seen. >> someone out there following the trial was mike, a young newlywed himself and a web page designer. even though he had never met ryan, he launched a free ryan widmer website. >> the goal is for him to get a new trial. if he doesn't get a new trial, i believe it's going to outrage a lot of people. >> angry citizens, taxpayers, voters. even though the real trying was over, the prosecution hadn't completely called it quits. >> they found evidence that he had been on the site, but no evidence that he followed through. if they were such a happy kubl, why somebody on the computer searching, looking for a hookup

spot? that makes no sense to me. >> the judge had not allowed the web surfing or other pornography investigators say they found on his computer to be introduced as evidence since there was no way to know if sara even know about ryan's internet trolling. still, was it a sign that their marriage was not as happy as friends and family believed. >> my understanding of some of these sites, supposedly, that he visited ended up being pop ups on a computer and i'm not the most computer literate person, but i don't think the full story was told there, either. and i don't understand if they got the verdict they want, why they have to continue to attack my son and my family. >> and ryan's mother said if the couple had fought over anything, the family would have known. sara, always outspoken, wasn't the type to suffer in silence. >> sara told everybody everything. she's a chatty person. she had just been with her family for the entire weekend without ryan being there.

if there were any problems, believe me, they all would have known it and i probably would have known it because sara probably would have called and yelled at me about something me son was doing that wasn't nice to her. >> and the defense lawyer couldn't get over the guilty verdict. >> it was awful. this was on my shoulders. it was my duty to my client to get a request proper verdict and i failed. >> ryan had become more than a duty to him. >> i had him around my wife and my kids. there was no question in my mind he was innocent. innocent. >> he wrote an order for a retrial. >> it was a roller coaster ride. >> he may be in prison for 15 years. >> he may be.

the appeals process can take forever. >> as ryan widmer got processed into the ohio prison system, his trial was way from over. >> the day after the attorney filed his motion, his fax machine started humming. the fax was a letter from a juror. >> he was having problems living with himself. he said it was a moral dilemma to let it go without bringing it to somebody's attention. >> the juror claimed there had been forbidden monkey business during deliberations, over nothing less than the biggest issue in the trial. damp head, dry body. >> he said that two or three of the female jurors had done home experiments where they had showered and air dried. >> they were testing out this theory of how quickly the body dries coming out of the tub or shower? >> yes. >> at home? >> at home.

>> if the faxing juror was correct, the panel had directly violated the judge's instructions to consider only what they had heard in court. the allegation was jury misconduct, a serious matter. this attorney runs the ohio innocence project. he saw the juror letter as a way to persuade the judge to grant ryan a new trial. >> it's unusual for a juror to come forward and say the jurors performed experiments and brought that into the deliberations. >> the judge began reviewing affidavits from the jurors about just what went on during the deliberations. in one of those sworn statements, a juror said of those taboo home experiments, the times to air dry influenced my decision. >> jurors are not supposed to go home and do experiments. >> in the end, the judge agreed. four months after ryan widmer's conviction, he ruled that the husband would get another trial. the not guilty verdict on the aggravated murder count, however, would remain. so the prosecution could only retry him on the second count of unpremeditated murder. his mother scraped together

enough cash to post the $400,000 bond for him. ryan was released from prison. by then he had already spent five months behind bars. >> the quest for justice can deplete both bank accounts and emotions. >> yes. >> how far are you prepared to go? >> i'm prepared to go to the day i die, if i have to live on the street in a cardboard box at the end of this, i'll do what it takes to get my son out of this. >> ryan and his family ended up not only at the brink of financial bankruptcy but also at the edge of emotional collapse. >> he says he can't sleep. he says he sees her when he closes his eyes. >> he misses her. he still wears his wedding ring. >> everything in ryan's life was spiraling down. he lost his job after the guilty verdict and was left to do odd jobs. the house he and sarah bought together went into foreclosure. now another jury would be asked to peer inside the mystery of a marriage and decide what happened behind those closed doors.

the prosecutors would have to convince other jury that ryan widmer had killed his wife. it's got to be hugely frustrated, you got a guilty verdict, you've got to do it over again. >> on the other hand, we knew how a jury would react to our evidence. >> on the other side of the choice, the defense has seen your case. >> and we can't change it very much. >> ryan widmer trial, take two. >> imagine ryan at 6 '2". >> a new juror makes a dramatic return to the scene of the drowning. and later, ryan widmer tells his own story. >> did you kill your wife? no, i did not. i couldn't hurt sara emotionally let alone physically. >> so you're saying you're wr g

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a little more than a year

after a jury found ryan widmer guilty of murder, only to have the verdict thrown out, it would start over again. this time a new defense team would take over ryan's case. the new lawyers worried that even though they were starting the trial with a clean slate of jurors, the verdict from the first trial would still hang over the accused. >> he's still innocent until proven guilty. everyone thinks and knows he was proven guilty. >> across the courtroom, the prosecution team was the same. it would hammer home the argument that a healthy 24-year-old woman just does not die alone in a bathtub. >> did you see any evidence that sarah suffered a seizure that caused her death by drowning? >> no. >> sarah's body dry to the touch, the officers and emts testified. and the bathroom where her husband lifted her soaking body out of the tub was also not wet. >> towels, a rug, magazines, all

appeared to be dry. >> the juror would again hear the 911 call that to the prosecution's ears, sounded odd. >> she was face down in the bathtub. >> the message was, my wife's dead and i wasn't around when it happened. >> but unlike the first trial, the defense lawyers asked to take the jurors to the home where ryan and sarah had lived to inspect for themselves the very bathroom where she died. the lawyers had made a pretrial visit. >> the first thing we said was, man, this is small. >> they wanted the jurors to see for themselves that this was a cramped space in a modest builder's home. >> imagine ryan at 6'2" and sarah, 5'1", 5'2", and imagine them interacting in here. >> it was such a small bathroom, a defense expert argued, that if there had been a violent struggle, both husband and wife would have shown more obvious bruises and scratches. >> i would have expected to see more injury if a violent struggle had occurred.

>> but the prosecutors argued that widmer, in an explosion of anger, could have overtaken his wife so quickly that she would have had no time to fight back. and in their closing arguments, they told the jurors that ryan widmer not only killed his wife but also delayed calling 911 to buy time to cover up his crime. >> things looked so nice because ryan widmer had the opportunity to reset the scene. he had time to put things back into place. >> but ryan's defense lawyers were hopeful this jury would see the case the way they did. an innocent man on trial for a murder he did not commit. >> absolutely believe him. no doubt in my mind. >> the case was given to juror number two. and it seemed as though everyone in cincinnati was on the edge of their seat, waiting for its decision. but three days into deliberations, nothing. the jurors asked to see the judge. >> there's an impasse. >> he sent them back to deliberate some more. >> it is desirable that the case be decided.

>> it was turning out to be the longest deliberation in warren county history. as the jurors left for a long holiday weekend, the specter of a mistrial hung in the air. dana and chris once again waited with ryan. >> we have to make sure he knows we're here. that's what we do as friends, support him and be hopeful and have the faith that this is going to turn out the way that it's meant to turn out. >> the jury returned to work on tuesday morning. but at 5:00 p.m. on the fourth day of deliberations, they asked to see the judge again. >> the note reads we cannot agree and further deliberations will not serve any purpose. >> they were deadlocked. walking out of the courtroom, ryan widmer's frustration spilled out. ryan's parents vowed to stand by their son. they had already spend more than

a half a million dollars on his defense, tapping out bank accounts and retirement plans. >> we know he's innocent and we'll do whatever it takes. >> we'll move forward. >> ryan's dad gary was firmly behind his son. but in another odd twist, it had taken ryan's arrest to reunite the pair. he had been out of his son's life for 13 years, the consequence of a bitter divorce. he hadn't even known there was a sarah until he learned his son had been charged with her murder. father was reintroduced to son while ryan was in jail. >> this is the first meeting you've had with your boy in a long, long time. he's on the other side of the glass and you're talking through one of those phone devices. >> mm-hmm. >> that's kind of a hard thing to take right there. >> it was. it was hard but so sweet to see him. >> a poignant reunion, father and son. and a father who completely believes in his son's innocence and would will anything to help. >> if there's any avenue to take, you have to take it. it's my son. you have to take it. >> your son didn't do it. sarah widmer died for reasons unknown. >> yes.

>> give yourself a round of applause. >> beyond ryan's family and close friends standing behind him, it was a case that had galvanized a personal army. there were ryan widmer t-shirts and wrist bands. >> he was getting a lot of support, an anonymous donor said to contribute $60,000. a stranger. >> yes. >> even the prosecutors were a bit worried. so much taxpayer money would be spent on a third trial. so many ryan widmer supporters beating very loud drums. a plea deal was floated. >> we felt it was a subject worth bringing up. >> but the kists said there was no way ryan was taking a deal. >> they offered a plea, which they hadn't done in two trials. >> and he turned it down? >> of course he turned it down, he says i'm innocent, why would i admit to something i would never have done that i did not do? >> ryan widmer was gambling that the next jury would acquit him. but his roll of the dice was taking its toll not just on him

but on his family as well. ryan's mom made headlines when she was stopped for drunk driving. she had pleaded not guilty to the driving under the influence charge. but police say they found two open bottles of vodka in her car. >> she broke down, hospitalized. a terrible toll on her. you could just feel her going deeper and deeper into this. >> but it seemed for every person that came out to support ryan widmer, there were those who believed just as strongly on the other side that he had deliberately drowned his wife. one of those people would soon change everything. ten days after the juror deadlocked, a phone rang in the prosecutors' office. it was a woman with a hand grenade of a story. someone came forward and say this guy confessed to me. >> we want to find out more what she has to say and what she knows about this. >> the prosecutors came away convinced they had the long missing pieces of the puzzle.

a confession and a motive. jay clark, the defense attorney, would have to worry overtime about this bombshell of a witness. because the new witness feared for her life, saying that ryan widmer had threatened her, her identity would not be disclosed to the defense team until the beginning of the trial. and trial three would begin with virtually everyone holding their breath. who was this person and what did she know? the mystery witness takes the stand. and what a story she has to tell. comes r coming up -- >> she strols in wearing a suit with decently done hair, normal makeup. >> sarah had found out that she cheated on her when she went away with her mom. she said they were in the living room and arguing about his pornography. >> but why this story now? >> the pain and the hurt in her mom's face.

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welcome back to "dateline extra." i'm craig melvin. ryan widmer was heading to court for a third trial, charged once again with murdering his wife, sarah. this time, the prosecution would

introduce a mysterious new witness, a woman who claimed ryan threatened to kill her if she ever told all she knew. who was she and what secrets could she share? returning to our story, here is dennis murphy. mr. widmer, is there anything you wish to say? >> the first trial ended with a mistrial. the second with a hung jury. with this next you're reach a verdict? these three jurors from the last trial said the prosecutors failed to convince them that ryan widmer had killed his wife. >> there's just nothing to prove to me he had anything to do with her death. >> and the next group of jurors would also not be able to reach a unanimous decision. >> we sat in jury deliberations for 36 hours. the likelihood of 12 jurors coming to the same conclusion was very unlikely. >> we really didn't think that another jury would not be deadlocked. >> they would soon find out. ryan widmer's extraordinary third trial for the murder of his wife was about to start all over again. the prosecutors felt it was their duty to argue their case

for sarah. >> we're committed to seeing that justice is done for the victim of this case. and that's what we've got to think about. >> it promised to be a judicial groundhog day. repeat testimony from the emts and arriving officers at the widmer home. the oddity of a bathtub drowning victim with a damp head and dry body. a 911 call that to some listeners volunteered too much. and jurors to the wife's neck and head that spoke to the prosecutors of homicide and not resuscitation. >> the facts which came out in this case gave rise to the idea that there had been an assault that occurred which progressed into an instant of domestic violence. >> and this time, sarah's own mother described the couple's relationship as more tense than she had in the previous trials, telling the court that ryan and sarah's arguments made her very uncomfortable. >> they would just call each other names and get hateful with each other. i told them, you guys have to stop, i can't take it.

>> what really was stunning was something that haunted the defense since they learned about it the previous summer, the prosecution's mystery witness who would testify that ryan confess to the crime. her anymore was jennifer crew from iowa. it was the first time the defense would get a look at this person that ryan had allegedly confessed to. and they worried. >> she strolled in wearing a suit, decently done hair, makeup. >> how did this woman who lived 500 miles away from ryan widmer have such a starring role? it turned out she watched "dateline"'s story from the first trial. after watching the show, she sent ryan an e-mail telling him how bad she felt about his plight. >> i felt sorry for ryan. i asked him what i could do to help him. >> before long, the two were in frequent touch.

>> struck up e-mail, texts, ultimately a phone relationship. >> correct. >> as the relationship continued, ryan sent her photos of his dogs and asked her to send him a picture of herself. initially she sent this one of a friend. she says things got a little racy on the phone. >> he told me he was watching porn in his mom's basement. >> there was even talk of jennifer visiting ryan in ohio for a three-way. >> ryan asked me to ask my friend and i said i would. >> but the reason jennifer was on the stand was to testify about one phone conversation in particular. one very different than their usual banter. it was october 26th, 2009. jennifer said she had been asleep when ryan called. it sounded to her as though he had been drinking. >> he was crying. and he was saying, i did it. i did it. i killed sarah. i did it. i thought what he meant was that he didn't do enough to save her life that night. he said, no, jen, listen to me, i did it. >> she said ryan told her it had

started with a fight between the two of them. >> sarah had found out that he had cheated on her when she went away with her mom. he said that they were in the living room and they were arguing about his pornography. >> what happened when she came upstairs? >> she was getting ready for the bath. he said their argument continued, he said sarah told him that the marriage was over. >> ryan, she testified, then told sarah -- >> nobody leaves me, nobody ever leaves me, and i mean nobody. >> that's when jennifer crew says ryan hit his wife. >> she fell backwards and hit her head. he said, jen, i blacked out, i blacked out. >> but why this story now? jennifer crew waited until almost two weeks after the second jury had deadlocked before coming forward, even though ryan had allegedly confessed to her eight months earlier. she said she had promised ryan she would not reveal his secret and said she was unnerved when he gave her a veiled threat.

>> i promised him i would never tell anybody. he said, i hope not, i don't want you to be where sarah is at. >> but she said she thought the jury would have convicted ryan. when they didn't, she contacted authorities after seeing pictures of sarah's mother. >> i saw the sadness and the pain and the hurt in her mom's face. i'm a mom, i couldn't do that to them anymore. they needed to know the truth. >> coming up -- >> she came downstairs crying and she was like, he did it. she was scared, actually. she was upset. >> when the bathtub mystery continues. n the bathtub mystery continues. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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japanese stocks plunged. did dow dropped below 22,000 on monday following the treasury secretary's failure to reassure investors. and the death toll in sunday aup tsunami has fallen to 429. rescuers are sifting through debris for any signs of life. now back to "date line." welcome back. ryan widmer was in court for trial number three, again. prosecutors charged that he had murdered his wife, but this time they called a bombshell witness. her name was jennifer crew and she claimed ryan confessed he killed sarah after the young

bride threatened to leave him. the details of jennifer's story were stunning. but would a jury believe her? once again, dennis murphy. >> surprise prosecution witness jennifer crew had just taken the stand and her story was a lot to absorb. ryan confessing, fighting with a wife who was leaving him, blacking out in the bathroom. would the jurors believe any or all of it? the defense had to make certain they didn't. but they were worried that they might. >> i think she had invented this story and started to live it and really wanted to believe it. >> so they aimed for the jugular. could this woman be trusted? >> she had a jaded past. theft convictions, stealing. that's not something that an honest, credible person does. >> a one-time bartender at a strip club who managed the dancers, jennifer crew admitted to misdemeanor brushes with the law. >> you were convicted of theft? >> yes, sir. >> also of fraudulent practices, correct? >> i believe that's when my record states. >> she was also in a methadone treatment program for her

addiction to painkillers. >> you were using oxycontin for five years. you've used false names to get drugs? >> yes, i did. >> the defense indicated because of her addiction to drugs, her memory was not to be trusted. >> when detectives talked to you, you told them that your memory is not very good, didn't you? >> i don't recall saying that. >> do you remember telling them, i don't remember verbatim the conversation between you and ryan? >> i do not remember the conversation verbatim. >> the defense hammered on what day the phone call came through, even the day it was placed. >> you told investigators the call was in the middle of the night. >> i was asleep and i thought that the call came in later than it did. >> everything critical in terms of time, duration, any memory about the call, was all different once she got to testify, but only after she saw her phone records. >> after jennifer crew stepped down, the prosecution called the woman's fiance to try to undo any damage to her testimony

caused by the defense. he confirmed that she related the alleged confessional phone call to him immediately after hanging up that night. >> she came downstairs crying, she's like, he did it. she was scared, actually. she was upset. >> if the jury believed jennifer crew's story, ryan widmer was sunk. the defense called a witness about the emotional call from ryan. it was another woman who had become interested in ryan widmer's case after seeing our first "dateline" report. melissa from seattle, like jennifer from ohio, struck up a phone and e-mail relationship with ryan in 2009, she said was she drawn to the case after the death of her sister-in-law. >> how often did you talk? >> three times a week. he talked about sarah a lot, he was having a hard time accepting everything.

>> melissa's husband supported her friendship with ryan. >> was it a little out there? yeah, but i was still comfortable with her and our relationship. without a shout of a doubt, i was 100% behind her. >> i did feel strongly about supporting him. there was just no chance he had anything to do with it. >> but the importance of the seattle friendship. their phone call finished just 15 minutes before the call to jennifer in iowa. melissa said ryan was perfectly composed for almost two hours when she spoke to him that night. >> how do you know he was not upset or drunk? >> every conversation we had, he had never been intoxicated or upset. >> melissa was convinced that jennifer crew made up the whole

story about the confession. >> i was shocked that somebody would go under oath on the stand and lie. >> but still, had the defense paid a price by putting yet another woman on the stand. >> is there a larger issue here? is there a risk about these women getting involved in ryan widmer? >> that's easy to get sucked into that. but he's never been able to grieve for sarah. he's never been able to mourn for her. she contacted him and it was companionship. >> it was time to wrap up trial number three. the prosecutor saying it was a sudden violent murder. >> anybody who's been in a relationship knows that sometimes things go off, they snap, for no good reason. i think something like that happened. at some point ryan saw that his perfect marriage was falling apart and that's what led us here. >> the defense arguing a medically undetermined death by natural causes. >> it's probably going to bother me for the rest of my life, what happened to sarah we'll never know. >> sarah had drowned.

but how? a third jury retired for deliberations. >> another stunning development. a new sarah enters ryan's life. coming up -- >> he just want telling me how much he loved sarah and he could never, ever love another woman as much as he loved her. i think i started crying because i felt so bad for him. >> do you love ryan? >> i love him, yeah. >> later, ryan tells all. >> she's awesome. loving, caring. >> you guys kept it secret. >> oh, yeah. i knew they would try to make it into something negative. e it into something negative. w?w?uhió

the jury had been out for a

day. again, it seemed everyone in cincinnati was waiting for a verdict. while widmer still had a number of ardent supporters, trial watchers say this time things were changing in the court of public opinion. >> you have a candlelight vigil for now, and you could probably hold it in a phone booth. >> one strong voice that had turned against widmer was radio talk show host bill cunningham. he was disguchted with how ryan used the free ryan widmer website. >> he used the free ryan widmer website to pick up chicks. >> it sounds like it fell apart for you on the character issue. >> it did. the wallpaper of the case changed. >> day two in the courthouse was going round and round. >> i felt awful. >> i was nauseous. i hadn't felt that way for 20 years. >> the jurors were working their way through the evidence. they parsed the 911 call. >> my wife fell asleep in the

bathtub, i think she's dead. >> the more you listen to it, the more and more it starts to sound like it was staged. >> there was sarah's body. officers testified it was too dry. >> 2 1/2 minutes after being removed from a tub, you would expect a body to be wet. >> the alleged confession as recounted by jennifer crew. >> i just don't believe anything she said. >> the prints in the tub. >> under normal circumstances you cannot leave those kind of fingertips on the side of a tub trailing down. >> the bruising to sarah. >> both the defense and the prosecution put up good arguments about that. that that's teetering on a razor's edge with me. >> at the end of the second day, they took their one and only vote. they had a verdict. a blast of calls went out. the kists got the news. >> i said, i can't believe they're back so soon, i'm worried. >> the judge asked for the jury ballot.

>> anxious? >> very. sick. >> ryan widmer stood with his lawyers. his life hanging in the balance. >> i can actually hear ryan shaking. i can hear it. it's that silent in there and he's that nervous. >> the verdict. >> we the jury in this case find the defendant ryan widmer is guilty of murder. >> guilty. ryan dropped his head to the table. >> he was hysterical. he was crying. he was a mess. >> a bad, bad, bad dream. >> ryan composed himself enough to proclaim to the court his innocence. >> i did not do this, judge. i don't know why this has to keep going on. my life has been ruined. i love sarah. i would never have hurt her. never. >> outside the court, ryan's father gary slumped to the ground. the son he was recently reunited with after years apart taken from him again. >> it was a horrifying moment. it just totally caught up with me at that point, the total shock.

i just went weak. >> ryan widmer for the second time was given the mandatory sentence, 15 years to life. as court officers handcuffed him and led him away, few people were aware of a young woman on his side of the benches, crying. this is also a sarah. sarah manhurst. she's another twist in the story that has had so many. >> do you love ryan widmer? >> i love him, yeah. >> sarah wore an engagement ring and is the mother of ryan's son, born in the summer after trial number two. >> what did you name the baby? >> his name is ryan. >> you see ryan's face in the baby's? >> yeah. >> sarah, a canadian via new york, like jennifer from iowa and melissa from seattle, also became aware of ryan after our first "dateline" program on the case aired back in 2009. >> i thought that he was railroaded. >> she sent an e-mail to ryan saying how sorry she felt with him. he sent one back.

soon they were talking on the phone. a little more than a month later, sarah came to cincinnati to visit ryan. she stayed with him at his mother's house. >> i thought it was a little awkward, because we had talked on the phone but hadn't met. he was telling me how much he loved sarah and could never love another woman as much as he loved her. i started crying because i felt so bad for him. >> sarah went back to new york and three weeks later returned to cincinnati as ryan's guest at his mother's thanksgiving dinner. that was the weekend they became intimate. >> the first time we were together i got pregnant. >> how did ryan take the news? >> shocked, obviously very bad timing. >> they kept the pregnancy a secret, as ryan's second trial would take place the following may. >> i decided, yeah, i was going to have the baby. and he was okay with that. but it was just difficult, because i'm thinking, here i am pregnant, and you're facing

another trial, and my child could potentially grow up without a father, which -- -- now he's in jail. >> with ryan sentenced to 15 years, sarah is raising their son. >> i'm still in shock. i can't believe this happened to him. >> if in your own mind you couldn't get to beyond reasonable doubt, if there was a sliver of doubt that he had done this thing, would you have stayed? >> never. i would never have stayed with him. there's no way he could have done this, ever. >> but had he? in the course of three trials, played out before three jurors, ryan widmer's guilt or innocence has been passionately debated. he's now telling his story. widmer speaks from prison, when we return. >> did you kill your wife sarah?

>> you think they fabricated this. >> i know they did. >> why would they have it in for you? e. >> this young husband is about to make a startling claim. >> jennifer, i did it. i'm telling you, i did it. did that conversation happen? >> nope, and never happened. >> so jennifer crew's story is made up? >> 100% made up.

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welcome back. after three years and three remarkable trials, sarah and her loved ones had finally received justice. her husband ryan was convicted of her murder. through it all, ryan never took the stand to tell his story, but he did share it with us.

listen closely and decide for yourself what really happened in the widmer's bathroom. now with the conclusion of our story, here's dennis murphy. this is ryan widmer's story as he tells it. he remembers a loving relationship with his wife sarah that was right from the first date. >> we hit it off perfect. >> was there any friction? >> none whatsoever. >> everything was cool? >> perfect. >> he only had one worry about sarah. >> my biggest problem with her was her sleep. she would work a regular day and need to be going to bed early or taking a nap. something wasn't healthy about it. you're 24 years old. >> but he says they fell into their everyday lives, their jobs, walking the dog, building a deck on their house. all routine, he says, until that august night. sarah had come home from work, he says, with a headache. they had dinner, watched tv. >> she's what? >> laying on the couch. she says her neck is killing her, she's going to get in the bath and go to bed. >> ryan says he stayed

downstairs and watched the game until he too was ready for bed. upstairs to the master bedroom and back. >> tell me what you see, just like a videotape recording. >> i walk in the room. i walk over to the night stand. and i put some things down, turn on the tv. and then i walked in the bathroom. i saw sarah, i knew something wasn't right. she was just unconscious. >> how did you see her? >> her head was just underneath the water. i don't even remember. >> was she face down in the tub as you told 911? >> all i remember, yeah, just finding her. i mean, i knew it wasn't good. she was laying in the water. i don't know what else to say other than it wasn't right. the only thing i remember certain things because of what i heard on the 911 tape. >> it's such a shocking image, you would think you would remember. >> i wasn't thinking i would have to remember what did i see, what did i do. >> head, nose, under the water? >> underwater, yes. >> what did you do next? >> i tried to get a reaction out

of her and i got not guilty. >> that's when he says he called 911. >> i think she's dead. >> when you chose that word, i think she fell asleep. >> when you chose that word, falling asleep -- >> it's not about choosing a word. it's about what i said. it was her sleeping issue. >> they're saying that 911 call is suspicious. they're telling us he's downstairs what's going on, she's upstairs. >> i was watching the football game. i don't know what they wanted me to tell them. >> maybe just get an ambulance here quick. >> i don't know. i called and that's what i said. i don't know. >> prosecutors say the first arriving officer was at the house no more than six minutes after the 911 call was answered and less than three minutes after ryan lifted sarah's body out of the tub. >> the observations of the arriving officer, what do we have here and why is this woman's hair damp and why is her

body dry? it doesn't make sense. >> i understand that. >> how do you explain it? >> i left the house and there was cops there by themselves and they came up with the story they came up with. >> you think they fabricated this? >> i know they did. >> you think they wanted to make a case here? >> i know they did. why would they arrest me the day after if they didn't want to make a case? >> why would they have it in for you? why would they lie? emts and police officers don't even work for the same agency. >> they clearly do when they get up to testify, they're coached what to say. >> what about the story of the woman who says ryan confessed to her that he killed sarah? >> listen to me, i did it. >> here's jennifer crew from iowa on the stand saying he called me one night, he was sloppy, and he confessed to me. >> right. >> jennifer, i did it. i'm telling you i did it. >> mm-hmm. >> did that conversation happen? >> nope. it never happened. >> jennifer crew's story is made up? >> 100% made up.

the same goes, ryan told us, for sarah's mother's testimony about hearing hateful arguments between the couple. >> they would just call each other names. >> she's a liar. >> sarah's mom is making this stuff up? >> we were never mean to each other. never. >> a one-time mother-in-law from an earlier life who he says is embellishing the reality of his marriage. now ryan widmer has a baby with a new sarah. >> she's awesome, so loving, caring. there are similarities i see in sarah, my wife, as i see with sarah now. >> you guys kept it secret? >> oh, yeah. because i knew they would try to make it into something negative. >> in that court of public opinion, the women from far away places, iowa, seattle, new york, who became involved in his case, didn't go down well with everyone. a character issue. we talked to somebody who says you're using the free ryan widmer website as a dating service, just a way to meet women. >> i don't know who said that, but it's not true. >> but investigators wondered how good the marriage really was based on what they found on widmer's computer.

>> did you have an unhealthy addiction to porn? >> no. >> but you looked at porn? >> yes. >> he says that certainly does not mean anything and does not make him a murderer. did you kill your wife sarah? >> no, i did not. i couldn't hurt sarah either emotionally or physically. >> she didn't get in your face and say she's leaving you? >> no. >> didn't happen? >> didn't happen. >> you were watching the ball game. not upstairs and found her in a bad situation and that's it? >> that's it. >> you don't know how she died? >> no. >> you say you're wrongly convicted? >> i'm 100% wrongly convicted. >> and the 30 jurors or more found you guilty after hearing the story? >> yes. >> they're not getting it? >> they're not getting it at all. >> but these jurors from his third trial are confident they got it right. they say among other things it came down to what they saw as sarah's too-dry body, oddities in the 911 call, prints on the tub, and the unlikeliness of an out of the blue medical event

striking sarah in the bath. >> i went into it believing he was innocent. but everything that was put together with the evidence came down with four or five facts that we could not deny. we believe he intentionally drowned her. >> and the guilt of ryan widmer will also never be doubted by the prosecutors. >> do you believe he actually did this thing? >> absolutely. she was murdered and he killed her. and he was the only one who could have done it. >> ryan widmer lost a federal appeal in february. >> i'm not letting this stand. i'm going to fight this until it's made right. >> the passage of time hasn't made the events inside the little house on crested owl court any clearer. and time of course brings changes. sarah manners and ryan are no longer a couple, but she told us she still believes in his

innocence. and more change. his mother jill passed away. nothing, it seems, stays quite the same except the central mystery itself. and that will likely be argued for years still to come. that's all for this edition of "dateline extra". thank you for watching. it's been 15 years of frustration, of tears, and fighting for what we wanted. how long can you keep reliving your sister's murder? >> reporter: it all began when this bestselling author married this elegant executive. >> they brought us together. they made us a family.