ideologue undercover every day. that's what made me nervous. >> they had a secret plan. >> were you armed? >> yes. >> to solve a baffling case. a college student on a friday night out who vanished. >> she's a very shy girl. but she was something special. >> the possible suspects just about everyone -- the friend, the boyfriend, the mysterious older man, even her mom.

>> i was shocked that they even suspected me. >> so why were police at a dead end? enter this guy. >> he sees things other cops don't see. >> phenomenal. >> they call him the evidence whisperer. he's about to crack this case before your eyes. >> the answer was in the details. >> it was right there. >> and you won't believe how. >> you walk out of there thinking, i spooked him, it worked? >> i hoped. i was quite sure. >> the night lynsie disappeared. hello, welcome to "dateline extra." i'm craig melvin. the college student was the baby of the family, a sheltered young woman who lived at home with her mother. on the night she vanished, she had been out club and told her mom she was at a sleepover with friends. that wasn't the only secret she was hiding. it would take an eagle eye detective to uncover the truth of what really happened that

night. here is josh mankiewicz. >> reporter: sometimes the tracks are as clear as the sky, but other times you need to know where to look to see the truth. this man has made a career of noticing what others do not. what is his reputation? >> meticulous investigator. just pours over the volumes of evidence and finds things that other investigators do not find. >> reporter: the evidence whisperer. >> correct. >> that night i went out dancing. >> reporter: does this man act guilty? does he know more than he's saying? >> i didn't know anything was going on. all right. i just heard lynsie. >> reporter: what about this man? can you believe the story he's telling? >> i was supposed to pick her up twice, she was so out of character, she didn't show up on either day. >> reporter: the evidence whisperer wasn't at either of those interviews. but watching them helped him solve the mystery of what happened to a vivacious young

woman, and bring answers to the mother who loved her. >> i was always proud of her. she was a real fighter. >> reporter: lynsie arrived on july 2nd, 1980, the youngest of three. maybe that fighting spirit isn't visible in her photos, but her mother nancy says it was always there. she had a passion for animals. she helped out in her spare time at a local shelter. kim davidson, who worked at lynsie's middle school remembers she also had a sense of compassion. >> it was freezing cold and i didn't bring a jacket that day. and i felt these little hands up on my shoulder and a sweater come up around me and i turn around and it was lynsie. and she said, i can't stand watching you shiver and she wrapped me up in her sweater. >> reporter: she gave back in other ways. her mother says she would lie about her age so she could give blood. remarkable in itself because lynsie struggled with her own disabilities. her left arm was paralyzed, her

left leg impaired. did she talk about how she became disabled? >> she brought it up to me and said she was in a car accident and was thrown when she was a little girl. but very matter of fact, not poor me or not anything like that. >> reporter: but growing up, she needed so much care. her mother nancy was with lynsie like her shadow. >> somebody had to be with her 24 hours a day. >> reporter: that was you? >> yes. it was her and i alone. she was my only purpose. in my life, it was to make her as normal as she could be. >> reporter: by the time kim met lynsie, her dad and brothers had modify -- had moved away. kim remembers a tight family unit of just two. how close were they? >> unbelievably, extremely. >> reporter: but as lynsie reached adolescence, that started changing. like a lot of teens, she wanted her own identity. she changed the spelling of her

name from this to this. by high school, there were girlfriends, even some boyfriends. and by the time she was 20, after so many years of mom and daughter being each other's best friends and confidants, lynsie began to keep some things in her life to herself, like where she was really headed. one night in february, 2001. does it make any sense she would lie to you about what she was going to do to you that night? >> i have never known her to lie to me. but you don't know what you don't know. >> reporter: it was a friday night, lynsie was in college part time and working, but still living at home. she told her mom that instead of their usual friday night dinner, she was staying the night with a girlfriend named andrea, someone nancy had never met. and then a young man named chris came to the door to pick lynsie up.

>> reporter: she introduces you to this guy chris. did he say hello? >> mm-hmm. >> reporter: did he have good manners? >> mm-hmm. >> reporter: but nancy said something was wrong. it was a struggle to let go, but she did. >> the last thing i said to her was, remember your seatbelt. she looked over her shoulder and said, back at you, mom, love you. >> reporter: nancy locked up the house and went to bed. lynsie was supposed to call but when the call never came, nancy found out that lynsie never showed up at her job. >> all of a sudden she wasn't where she was supposed to be. she had taught these girls for four months, about. >> reporter: and you had no way

of reaching her. >> no way. >> reporter: nancy was frantic. >> i started calling hospitals, i called the morgue, that's how desperate i was, to see if there was a jane doe in the morgue. >> reporter: there was no jane doe and there was no ekland. >> we had no unidentity bodies. we checked everything, we checked everybody, we checked everything. there was just no sign. it was just as if she vanished. >> where was lynsie? detectives uncover a secret, one the missing college student kept from just about everyone. coming up -- >> when was the last time you saw lynsie? >> a week ago. >> when the night lynsie disappeared continues. n the nige disappeared continues. here at... snowfest...

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her daughter was missing. nancy ekelund began handing out flyers and counting the days without lynsie. ticking them off on little post-it notes. she also went to talk with a detective from the police department. nancy wanted them to know about her lynsie, how they were best friends. it was a speech the detective had heard before. >> sometimes parents give you the idea this is an idillic family life because there's a fear that if they don't paint a rosy picture, we won't look for them. >> reporter: that you won't work hard. >> that we won't work hard.

>> reporter: they were working the case. they brought in the usual suspects like the boyfriend. >> when you guys were dating, she hasn't been dating anyone else to your knowledge? >> no. >> reporter: his name was matthew ramirez. >> when i went to her house on thursday -- >> reporter: as can happen with young romance, what was off was soon back on. lynsie and matt were back together in time for the weekend. but not in time to make plans for that friday night. >> i told her, have fun, be careful. she said, okay. >> reporter: then in came the last person known to have seen her. chris mcamus, 21 years old, out of school. lynsie had met him through friends four months prior. it turned out he never drove lynsie to andrea's house for a leapover. chris said that was a lie lynsie

made up for her mother. the real plan was to go clubbing all night in san diego. >> don't tell my mom that we're going to san diego because my mom won't let us go or won't let me go or something like that and definitely don't tell her that we're clubbing. >> reporter: chris told police when their night of clubbing went bust, they headed home earlier than expected. he dropped off the other girls, he said, and then headed to lynsie's house. chris said it was after 4:00 a.m. when he finally got back here to lynsie's neighborhood and he said that lynsie was worried that her mom might hear his truck pull up at that hour. so chris said lynsie asked to be dropped off not at her house but here at the corner, about 50 yards away. that sounded strange to police until they heard from lynsie's friends that at other times she had asked to be dropped off right here. chris said he then drove home and police even found a photo from a bank atm of what looked like chris's truck heading north

on the right street, at the right time. to the cops, chris's story added up. and that was when police learned matthew and chris were not the only men in lynsie's life. there was someone else who both matthew and chris had mentioned to investigators. an older man who drove lynsie around. no one knew his name. they had heard lynsie refer to him as her friend. >> all anybody knows him bhy. >> as her friend? >> yeah. >> reporter: nancy had no idea lynsie had any friends who were an older man. you get a phone call. you're pretty much at your wit's end. >> yes. >> reporter: the phone rings and it's a guy named marty. did you know a marty? >> no. >> reporter: as far as you know, did lynsiemarty?

>> no. >> reporter: he said he had money that lynsie needed for tuition. none that have made any sense to nancy. >> nancy gets a phone call from a guy named marty. >> marty rossler. >> reporter: what does marty say to her? >> marty says he's befriended lynsie and he's concerned because he hadn't heard from her. >> reporter: what did you learn about marty rossler? >> marty rossler was not marty rossler. >> reporter: marty rossler was really marty predegenzer. he sdrntdidn't have a criminal d but he had a relationship with lynsie that he didn't tell his wife about. he gave her rides. that was it. he was 58. >> she was 20. >> reporter: and they were boyfriend and girlfriend? >> i don't think so. >> reporter: police brought in marty. over two days. they recorded those interviews,

at times on video and sometimes just on audio tape. >> when is the last time you saw lynsie? >> a week ago. >> no. i don't think so. >> absolutely. >> no. absolutely not. >> marty said that he had last seen lynsie the day that she went to san diego on that friday. >> reporter: did you believe him? >> we really didn't believe him. >> reporter: they didn't believe him because a clerk at a local clothing store had called to say she had seen lynsie with a much older man who matched marty's description together at her story after the day lynsie went missing. >> i flat wasn't there on that day, okay? i have been in that store, all right? i said, i'm like you, i'm easily, you know, identified, okay? probably every place i've been with her would know that i was in there with her, okay? >> it was a very long, very long interview. >> reporter: friendly? >> no. no. i remember drilling down on him,

because i really thought that he might know where lynsie was. you're a parent? >> yes. >> how many kids do you have? >> two. >> if you had a child gone for eight days, vanished, vaporized, in thin air, would your heart not be broken? >> oh, absolutely. >> do you not feel some compassion for nancy? >> unbelievable. i think this is a nice girl. and, you know, this family has had their share of hardships, and this is just, you know, i mean, i feel so, you know, helpless. >> i don't think you are helpless. i think you can help us. recorders mar >> reporter: matter insisted that he couldn't. detectives weren't buying. >> no. never. >> by accident? accidents happens. >> i never touched her, okay? never touched her.

>> have you put her someplace where she's left? >> no. no. >> reporter: police searched marty's home and found nothing. no proof that marty had anything to do with lynsie's disappearance. so they moved on to a new suspect. someone closer to lynsie than anyone else on earth. the night lynsie disappeared returns after the break. maria ramirez? hi. maria ramirez! mom! maria! maria ramirez... mcdonald's is committing 150 million dollars in tuition assistance, education, and career advising programs... prof: maria ramirez mom and dad: maria ramirez!!! to help more employees achieve their dreams. they can save you these. in fact, if you had a dollar for every time they said it,

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to create a plan that works for you, visit cigna.com/mystressplan. cigna. together, all the way. nancy and lynsie had been together all lynsie's life. now alone, nancy waited, ticking off the days. in the dark about where her daughter was and about the pace of the investigation. police were not keeping her in the loop. so nancy was delighted when they called to say they were coming to visit. >> reporter: you look at the boyfriend, matthew. you look at marty, the older guy, the relationship nobody knew about. he denies it. >> right. >> reporter: you look at chris, he says i dropped her off, i never saw her again. >> right. >> reporter: and you look at lynsie's mother. >> we did look at lynsie's

mother. we have to. >> so i made my cookies and all this silly stuff that i always do. >> reporter: and some coffee. >> yeah. >> reporter: the cops weren't coming for coffee. they arrived with a search warrant, shovels and cadaver dogs. >> i was shocked that they even suspected me. i didn't know what even a search warrant was. >> reporter: the house nancy and lynsie had once shared was torn apart. how much of a suspect was nancy? >> i don't know that nancy was on the radar for a long time. she was on the radar long enough to be able to set her satisfias. >> reporter: after that search, they did just that. they believed this anguished mother had nothing to do with the disappearance of her daughter. so they took nancy off the list. they also took off the boyfriend, matthew. he had an alibi that held up, putting her somewhere else at the time lynsie went missing. that left just two. >> i haven't seen her since that day. >> reporter: marty, who police

didn't trust because of his secret relationship with lynsie, and because he had lied about his identity. and the man who dropped lynsie off at that corner, the last american to see her before she vanished, chris mcamus. april 2002. more than a year after lynsie went missing. detectives decided to start over. they brought chris back to see if his story still held up. >> i really would like to think that lynsie has been like either abducted or something has happened to her. >> like what? >> i would really rather think that she was with a friend or things like that. >> police turned up the heat. >> let's cut the bull about being positive, and get down to the nitty-gritty, if it were a perfect world, that she was

someplace. >> it's a possibility she's dead. >> right. >> reporter: police thought chris seemed oddly calm, talking about a friend who may have been murdered. >> if it turns out somebody killed her, what do you think should happen? >> find them. i want to find them and they should go to jail. >> how long should we search? >> as long as it takes. >> like what? >> for a while. >> reporter: that's as strong as you could get out of him. >> that's as strong as we could get out of him. >> reporter: not that he should go to hell, i would personally electrocute him. >> not that he should get the gas chamber, that she was my

girlfriend. nothing. >> reporter: they thought perhaps chris should move to the top of the list. but it was not evidence. chris was free to leave and detectives weren't any closer to learning what happened to lynsie, and neither was nancy, who remained convinced her daughter would one day just come home. you thought one day she would walk back through the door? >> yes. >> reporter: she believed it because she wanted to, and because over the years, several people had told her they had seen lynsie. >> they never saw the front of her face. they always saw the back of her. and i held on to every word they said. >> reporter: her friend kim remembers how hard it was on nancy, thinking lynsie had just left her. >> she went through the period of her being angry at her and thought, okay, maybe she is, maybe she did leave me, and they threw some of her pictures out and clothes out, because she was so angry. >> reporter: it was torture for

nancy, no matter what version of events you believed. and police still weren't telling her anything. nancy, during all this time, feels like she's been sort of cut out of the loop. >> yes. >> reporter: like you're not telling her anything, maybe you're not actually working on it. >> right. >> reporter: whatever you are doing, you're certainly not sharing it with her. >> nancy was pretty angry. we worked this case diligently for a long time. at some point you hit the wall. >> reporter: at the time, there were nine detectives in placentia working everything, drugs, gangs, rapes, murder, and cold cases. by 2008 it was clear placentia pd had hit that wall. they would need help. and who they needed was a guy named larry. tell me about larry. >> larry is phenomenal. >> reporter: phenomenal because what, he sees things other cops don't see? >> phenomenal because he sees

things cops don't see. i don't know anybody who could have done a better job than larry. >> reporter: the evidence whisperer was about to listen to what the facts of this case were really saying. >> was there something police had missed? you bet. coming up, that picture of the truck spotted on the night of the crime, something about it just doesn't seem right. and the evidence whisperer is all over it, when "the night lynsie disappeared" continues. we've seen a thing or two. even a- (ernie) lost rubber duckie? (burke) you mean this one? (ernie) rubber duckie! (cookie) what about a broken cookie jar? (burke) again, cookie? (cookie) yeah. me bad. (grover) yoooooow! oh! what about monsters having accidents? i am okay by the way! (burke) depends. did you cause the accident, grover? (grover) cause an accident? maybe... (bert) how do you know all this stuff? (burke) just comes with experience. (all muppets) yup.

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...but dedication can get you there. so just start small... start saving. easily set, track and control your goals right from the chase mobile® app. ♪ ♪ chase. make more of what's yours®. i'm dara brown with the hour's top stories. eight witnesses on the schedule this week in impeachment hearings including u.s. ambassador to the eu gordon sondland, a key figure who was allegedly trump's point person in pressuring ukraine to open investigations into the president's political rivals. in hong kong, riot police stormed a campus occupied by

activists. protesters fighting back with molotov cocktails and bows and arrows. now back to "dateline." welcome back to "dateline extra." i'm craig melvin. where was lynsie eckeland? detectives had two possible suspects but no evidence linking either of them to her disappearance. it was time to call in the evidence whisperer. his name is larry montgomery, a detective famous for his ability to spot clues others had missed. here again is josh mankiewicz. >> reporter: by 2008, lynsie eckeland had been missing for seven years. the case had gone from cold to frozen in time. so placentia pd decided to outsource the investigation to the cold case unit at the orange

county d.a.'s office, to a guy named larry montgomery. with more than 30 years working homicide, larry has put away his share of bad guys, not usually by knocking on doors. instead larry works by looking very closely at the evidence. he doesn't work fast. in fact larry is meticulously slow. and that was just what this cold case needed. was there anything in the original investigation that struck you as something that you needed to reexamine? >> everything. >> reporter: everything that had led placentia police into that wall, trying to decide between two suspects. >> i mean, i'm concerned about this girl, okay? you know, she's missing. >> reporter: marty, lynsie's older friend who kept their relationship a secret and lied about his name. and chris. >> in my heart it seemed like she might be still alive. >> reporter: the last person known to have seen lynsie when he dropped her off at that

corner. >> any idea on your point which of those two was a more likely suspect? >> no. i don't know until i get into it and see the details. >> reporter: you're aware that you have a reputation for believing that -- i don't know if god is in the details, but guilt is in the details. >> or innocence. >> reporter: was it marty or chris wom chris? larry even considered, could it have been random, someone who had seen lynsie at just the wrong time? >> so you've got a bad guy just waiting, hoping that a girl drops out of a car at 4:25 in the morning. >> reporter: it happens. >> yes. you consider that and you weigh it. and you go, is that a good possibility? probably not. but still, keep an open mind. >> reporter: and so larry sat down and read through the entire case file. all the witnesses statements. all the interviews. he did that for two years. >> here we go down this dead end

road again. >> reporter: he watched the february 2001 interview that police did with a very unhappy marty. doesn't it strike you as tremendously suspicious that marty would call after lynsie disappears, talk to lynsie's mother, and give a phony name? >> if you didn't know the background of marty, then absolutely. >> when i talked to the mother on the phone i just gave her an identifier, okay? marty rossler, that's what i said, all right? >> which is a lie. >> which is a lie. >> reporter: watching that interview, larry chalked up marty's dishonesty as an attempt to save his marriage. >> i don't want my wife to be brought into this thing. >> reporter: larry also took a closer look at the idea that marty and lynsie were together at that clothing store after she went missing. >> i flat wasn't there on that day, okay? >> reporter: no one ever found any security video of that, and larry's learned over the years that well-meaning people often

get dates wrong. and larry learned a key fact. marty it actually participated in those early searches for lynsie. you eliminated marty fairly quickly, then. >> yes. >> reporter: marty's behavior matched up with that of an innocent person, not with a guilty one? >> that's correct. he is doing what you would do if you were looking for lynsie, he was searching. >> reporter: so larry turned his attention to chris mcamus. guilty or innocent? chris was the last person known to be with lynsie. he told police he drove straight home after dropping lynsie off. and police had found that photo which showed his vehicle from this atm camera. the video from the atm camera, police at the time saw that as not ironclad proof that chris was telling the truth, but

suggestive that what he said, eliminated did. >> correct. >> reporter: but when larry compared photos of chris's truck with the photos from the bank, he saw something no one else had noticed. the paint on the back of the side view mirrors on chris's truck was white. what about the truck in the photo? >> the truck in the photo had a dark spot in that area. whatever mirrors were there, if there were mirrors there, were back. >> reporter: so it's not the same truck. >> that's right, it's not. >> reporter: suddenly chris's alibi had a big hole in it. larry moved on to chris's history with women. two ex-girlfriends talked to police about how chris would become unhinged by rejection or what he called disrespect. larry heard about how chris had once crushed a pet crab with a hammer right in front of one of his girlfriends because he thought the crab had killed one of his fish. this is a guy with some significant anger issues. >> it certainly appears that

way. >> she told me it was from a car accident. >> reporter: larry listened to chris's interviews and caught him talking some of the time about lynsie in the past tense. >> her hand was pretty much stuck like this. >> okay. >> reporter: then larry found something in the paperwork from placentia pd that proved chris had lied to the police early on about his whereabouts on saturday, february 17th, the day lynsie didn't come home. chris had told the cops he stayed close to home. but larry checked chris's credit card statement. >> there was one entry on february 17th. and it turns out it was santa clarita, which is 50 miles north of where chris lived. >> reporter: why would chris be in santa clarita? >> well, that's what i wanted to know. >> reporter: digging through the reports, larry found information about chris's dad, that he was in construction, and that in

2000 and 2001, he had a job site in santa clarita. you can't tell now, but back in 2001, there was a major construction site. chris had told police that he did not work for his dad that winter when he was on unemployment. but larry saw some big cash deposits going into chris's bank account in addition to his unemployment checks. he thought that chris might have been working for his dad off the books. and larry came up here to ask around. and they told you that it was chris's father's construction company? >> chris's father did some of the tractor work at that site. >> reporter: and chris worked there? >> and chris was one of the tractor drivers that the superintendent said was there every day. >> reporter: is this where you thought to yourself, that's where lynsie eckeland is? >> i thought chances were excellent that if i killed lynsie and i was in chris's situation and i had use of a tractor out in the middle of

nowhere, i might use that tractor to dig a hole to put her in. >> reporter: now all the evidence whisperer had to do was prove it. >> coming up, an undercover operation. were you armed? >> yes. >> and you were wearing a wire? >> yes. >> reporter: could she help get them the prove they need? when "the night lynsie disappeared" continues. ght lynse disappeared" continues for your worst sore throat pain try vicks vapocool drops. it's not candy, it's powerful relief. ahhhhhh! vaporize sore throat pain with vicks vapocool drops. there's a company that's talked than me: jd power.people 448,134 to be exact. they answered 410 questions in 8 categories about vehicle quality. and when they were done, chevy earned more j.d. power quality awards across cars, trucks and suvs than any other brand over the last four years. so on behalf of chevrolet, i want to say "thank you, real people." you're welcome.

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since one of its ingredients may harm your unborn baby. your doctor should do a pregnancy test before starting dovato. use effective birth control while taking dovato. the most common side effects are headache, diarrhea, nausea, trouble sleeping, and tiredness. so much goes into who i am and hope to be. ask your doctor if starting hiv treatment with dovato is right for you. welcome back. while reexamining evidence in lynsie eckeland's disappearance, cold case detective larry montgomery picked up clues others had missed, all pointing to lynsie's friend chris mcamus. montgomery not only suspected chris killed the missing college student, he had a hunch about how the young man disposed of

her body and where. but could he get chris to lead them to lynsie? here is josh mankiewicz. >> reporter: it was october of 2010, nine years after her daughter disappeared. nancy ekland was still waiting and doing what she could. she was now at 3,535 days without lynsie. she didn't know it but a few miles away, larry montgomery had recruited a motorcycle cop from a nearby town to go undercover. >> they needed a police officer who looked like a college student and didn't have the mannerisms of a police officer. >> reporter: spring sandeli was that officer. how were you dressed? >> jeans and a little shirt, something that a college student would wear, but something that would also appeal to a guy. >> reporter: were you around? >> yes. >> reporter: and you were wearing a wire?

>> yes. >> hi, are you chris? >> yes. >> hi. my name is nicolle anderson. i'm from the college magazine. >> okay. >> reporter: officer sandeli was posing as a student reporter complete with a phony press pass. she knocked on chris's front door. chris had talked to a student reporter from lynsie's college in the past about the case. you used your real name? >> i used a fake number. >> we heard that remains have been found that they believe belong to lynsie. i guess they're doing dna testing right now, and in the meantime, i'm supposed to contact friends, family, to get their initial reaction for a story. >> okay. >> reporter: when i told him that the police believed they found lynsie's remains, his demeanor changed. >> how? >> quite drastically. the color in his face went white. >> reporter: police had not

found lynsie's remains, that was a lie. police do it all the time and it's legal. larry had gotten some interest from cadaver dogs, but nothing more. just down the street from chris's house, bryce angel from the placentia pd was listening and keeping an eye on the action. so you're watching him while this interview happens on his front doorstep? >> yes, i was sitting ten houses down, watching the reporter, the undercover police officer. once she left the area, we were in business. >> reporter: what happens? >> later that night he was seen coming out of his house and going into the garage. lights go on. we're talking like 3:00 in the morning. it was clearly a sign of somebody who couldn't sleep. >> reporter: detectives were sure they had rattled their suspect. the next day they trailed chris when he left his house. >> at some point it became apparent that he knew that we were following him. >> reporter: they broke off

surveillance. and brought chris in. >> chris, have a seat. >> reporter: larry had red all about chris and he had looked at tape of every time chris had been in for an interview. >> here's what the situation is. >> reporter: today he and chris were going to meet for the first time. >> i have been investigating this case for two years now, the cold case investigative unit. larry had a plan to get chris to talk without asking for a lawyer. larry promised to fill him in on the case in detail thinking chris would want to know if the cops had the goods and then maybe he would have something to say. >> since you're under arrest i have to advise you of your rights which i will do in a moment. after that i would like to explain to you everything. >> reporter: larry read chris's rights and before chris could really respond, larry laid out his case. he said he knew chris had never dropped lynsie off that night

because the atm photo that at first fooled investigators actually proved chris wasn't there. >> it wasn't your truck. but for years, it was thought that it was your truck. it's not. as a matter of fact your truck did not go by that night. it wasn't there. >> reporter: he told chris about the credit card statement and how he found someone who remembered chris working on the job site. >> all of a sudden, big red flags. you are working. you're out there when you said you were not. but he said you guys don't work on saturday. lynsie disappeared on a saturday morning. none of your credit card usage up there is on it, any weekend. all of it is on weekdays except for the day lynsie disappeared. >> reporter: he told chris the lie about lynsie being found. >> we went recently, found dna and had that checked against the body and it's lynsie.

so now we've got lynsie where you were at the time when you did not drop her off and we have enough to prove the crime. >> reporter: and knowing about chris's anger issues with previous girlfriends, larry summoned up a little empathy to draw chris in. >> i know you have that ability to be angry. but i don't know what would cause her to get you that angry or what she could have done. >> reporter: chris didn't say much, until a little body language revealed that larry was on the right track. >> was it a premeditated thing? i didn't think it was. so what did she do? >> reporter: larry finished talking. he was hoping chris would give it up. >> i think i need a lawyer to talk to you about this with me. >> reporter: well, it's up to

you. >> the supreme court has made it pretty clear, if someone declares they want an attorney, the interview is supposed to stop until one can be hired or provided. but in this case, larry was walking a line, believing that asking for a lawyer isn't the same as wondering if you need one. corinne loomis was watching from another room. >> reporter: were you holding your breath when he said that? >> yes. this was a make or break interview. if he didn't confess, he was going to walk again. >> "the night lynsie disappeared" returns after the break. disappeared" returns after the break. let's be honest, every insurance company says

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welcome back. chris was sitting across from cold case detective larry montgomery who just laid out the very detailed case against him for the murder of lynsie

eckland. chris knew if he didn't crack now, years of work would be wasted. he didn't crack, he said he thought he needed a lawyer. now with the conclusion of our story, here's josh. >> i need to know what occurred so i do the right thing because something happened to her. >> larry montgomery spoke for 45 minutes giving chris everything he had. >> take a look, the credit card usage. >> this is not a very convenient time right now. >> a phony story about finding the body and then the interview had suddenly stopped dead. >> i think i need a lawyer to talk to you about this with me. >> well, it's up to you. >> and because chris said i think i need a lawyer and not i want a lawyer, larry thought whatever came next would be

admissible in court. detective angel, who had been letting larry do the talking, then spoke up. >> i knew that was a moment of truth and i had to interject something very quickly. >> chris, nobody likes to be labeled a monster and in this case that's the way it's pointing. only you have the other side of the story. nobody is going to be able to speak for you, that's why we're here now. there's a reason everything happens. i'm sure there's some circumstances that happened that night or that morning. >> he kind of sighed and he layed out a story. >> all right. what happened was -- >> and suddenly you realize -- >> this is it. he's going to give it up. i was sitting next to the detective from the other agency,

and i reached over and grabbed his arm and i said, he is going to confess. >> it was sad and it was ugly. >> she -- i was going to take her home. >> okay. >> she was telling me, why don't i just sleep over to your place because i don't want to upset my mom. >> makes sense. >> as larry had suspected, chris never dropped off lynsie at that corner. >> i was trying to kiss her, and then she elbowed me in the chest. and then i went to my -- i went to my kitchen in my apartment and i drank a lot of vodka. and then i went back and i tried to do the same thing. she pretended to be asleep, and i pulled her pants down and i

was totally drunk. >> okay. >> she got up, said, oh, my god, what are you doing? i'm calling the police. when i got up and walked to her, she tried to knock me out with my phone, my home phone. >> did she -- >> yeah, she like this to my face. >> okay. >> and being drunk, it enraged me. it set me on fire, and i grabbed h her, threw her on to my bed and i got her into a headlock. >> okay. >> and she died. >> then what did you do? >> then i tried to figure out what i should do because i couldn't believe how it just happened that way. >> quickly, huh? >> i couldn't believe it. i thought she was going to pass out and i ended up killing her.

>> that was it. lynsie eckland had been killed before anyone realized she was even missing. chris says he then drove up to the work site and used a skip loader to dig a hole. he held on to lynsie's body for a few days and then when no one was around, he buried her. >> did it feel any better to finally know? >> no, because i was really devastated. there was a relief, but i wasn't any happier because of it. >> after the confession detectives left chris in the interview room with another detective to watch him and chris simply could not stop talking. >> unbelievable. it's been so long. i finally -- you know, it feels better when you finally say what you were supposed to say, you know?

i know my life is ruined now. do you know if i'm going to get the death penalty for this? >> you're going to have to ask them those questions. >> then larry came back, always meticulous, he wasn't done. he wanted that final detail. >> where approximately did you dig the hole to put her. >> where exactly chris left lynsie. >> right up here? >> he explained to chris, even though they had found the remains, the grave site shifted because of flooding. >> the tractor was parked and exactly where you dug the hole. >> with the detectives, chris returned to the site that had become lynsie's final resting place. >> and right where this tree is i pulled my truck over and parked it. >> this tree to our left here? >> uh-huh. didn't used to exist there when we had construction. >> okay.

>> he wasn't sure of the exact spot. >> it's over in this vicinity. >> way up there or way over here? >> from this tree all the way to that brush. >> to that brush? >> yeah. >> it took more than a day of digging to find what was left of lynsie. first they found a shoe, then a jacket, then a bracelet. that's how nancy knew they had found her. the coroner confirmed it using dental records. >> the back of my truck was over here. >> two years after he confessed chris pleaded guilty to second degree murder. his sentence, 15 years to life. >> when you told me that, you thought you had let this consume your life too much? >> oh, it did. it does to this day. >> well, now it's over. what are you going to do? >> i don't know.

i mean, life is opening up to you and i don't know. i don't have any answers. i just have to get over this. >> and that's all for this edition of date line extra. i'm craig melvin. thank you for watching. i think i was just in shock to find out that she's gone and the cause is a gunshot wound. you just wonder how could this happen? it seems very surreal. >> a quiet night at home shattered by a gunshot. >> i came