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 out of the shower. there was blood.

>> a young wife dieing on the floor. >> she wasn't talking at all. i'm asking, conrad, what happened here? >> i was utterly confused. >> so many different stories about what might have happened. >> he said many things that night. >> maybe someone could have shot something at the house. >> at one point he said it was 80% suicide. >> police had their own theory. >> i thought, oh, man, there's something going on here. >> you don't see a lot of women that commit suicide naked. >> conrad's stories were not adding up. >> but something else want adding up either. a key piece of evidence. >> we went to the house and we walk in and we think, aha -- >> would a mistaken measurement send an innocent man to prison or free a guilty one? >> we thought it was over. we thought this was settled. >> one suspect, so many stories. only one of them could be true. >> something's going to break, and when it does, the truth's going to be known. >> "as night fell."

hello and welcome to date line extra. heidi and conrad truman had a special bond. deep love. envied by others. o one tragic evening a gunshot rang out. conrad's behavior in the minutes and hours that followed would be highly debated for years. detectives would focus on the grieving husband, but were they looking at the wrong man? this is josh majors. they seemed so incongruous. the soaring majesty of the wausau mountains and a woman struck down in her youth. it was a lot of things. tragic, crushing, stunning. but was it an accident or a suicide or a murder?

police felt they knew, but as most cops will tell you, both the evidence and the jury have their own stories to tell, and the answer's not always so clear. certainly that is true for this story and quite possibly for the woman at its heart. her name, heidi wagner. >> as a baby she was favored. everybody loved her. she could do no wrong. >> autumn was one of heidi's four sisters. >> she was just special and she'd walk into the room and she'd -- she's ready for that good time. >> heidi grew up with no fewer than seven older siblings. >> tell me about her growing up. >> she was a fun-loving girl. she was rather shy though so heidi seemed like an appropriate name. >> heidi's mom, janet. >> when we got together we were loud and boistrous. she got embarrassed easily.

she'd hide her face. >> as heidi got older, she was cute and bubbly, but make no mistake, heidi was no pushover. >> she was kind of intimidating. for being so small you wouldn't think so. >> at just 20 heidi started working in the not entirely live feminine gas and chemical industry outside of salt lake city. >> we worked with chemicals and gases, crazy things you wouldn't expect girls to do. >> heidi seemed to thrive in a workplace that favored hard hats and heels. >> it was dangerous, if you don't follow the rules. in fact quote from heidi, everything is dangerous, it's just what will kill you the quickest. >> i considered her my best friend. she was a person that you knew would never stab you in the back. she was a person that you knew would always have your back. >> in person she could be both, sweet and salty, and that caught

the attention of one of her colleagues, 25-year-old conrad truman. >> i noticed her first in the hallway. >> what did you think? >> i thought she was cute. i noticed her hard hat and they have a little personality, stickers, and hers said, it's all about me, deal with it. i was thinking, this girl is kind of a feisty girl. >> soon conrad asked heidi out on a date. >> i'm not that. i'm not super serious. it was almost like we were inseparable after that night. >> after that first night? >> yeah. yeah. >> he shared her love for guns. >> heidi knew how to handle a handgun? >> yes. >> one year after their court ship conrad decided to pop the question. in true utah form he popped the question. >> i started bawling and she

said, yes, right off the bat. >> conrad's sister couldn't believe it when her little brother introduced heidi to the family. >> i was actually sort of surprised when i first met her, like how did he land that girl? it seemed to be a good match. >> you saw love and chemistry there? >> oh, it was almost awkward. they were definitely an enviable couple. another year later came the wedding. >> it was amazing. we went up on a lift, a chair lift, and then all of the guests left down these slides. so it was just so them. they said their vows and he's kind of doing this champion pose like he was just -- everything was right with the world. >> the enviable couple was just starting out with a future as bright as their smiles until, that is, a sunday evening in september 2012, three years after the trumans were married. >> tell me about that day.

>> that day was just like any other day. >> as night fell, heidi decided to take a bath. conrad said he went to the kitchen to get something to eat. as he fixed himself a sandwich, he said he heard a noise coming from the direction of the bathroom. >> it was like the new year's poppers or the halloween poppers where you can pull two strings or you can pull one and confetti and stuff comes out. >> that's when conrad said he turned, saw heidi standing there in the hallway naked. >> she wasn't talking. she wasn't talking at all. she was coughing. she was heaving. >> and she was bleeding? >> she was bleeding out of her mouth and her nose. i needed to call 911 immediately. >> 911, what's your emergency. >> come quick. >> an unimaginably shocking scene, heidi on the kitchen floor in a pool of her own blood. conrad on the phone pleading for help. >> there's blood.

help me. i really don't know what happened. oh, my god! >> it was bad to begin with and it got so much worse. >> as you will learn, truer words may never have been spoken. what happened in that house? coming up -- >> i'm asking, i'm like, conrad, what's going on? he said, i don't know what happened. everything was different ans ers, different theories, different little things. >> a search for answers and a race to save heidi. >> this is not happening. this is truly not happening. i really don't understand any of this. this is so crazy. >> when "as night fell" continues. he'd be proud of us. protect your family, your business and everyone who counts on you. see how lincoln can help. your business and everyone who counts on you. ♪ do you recall, not long ago ♪ we would walk on the sidewalk ♪

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>> i have officers and paramedics on the way, okay? >> the 911 call came into the oren, utah police department 11 p.m. september 9th back in 2012. >> we got a call of a gun shot wound or some sort of injury. >> sargeant bill crook, now retired, went to the truman home. >> so we all kind of rushed to our cars and headed that direction with lights and sirens. >> on the other end of the phone was conrad kneeling on his kitchen floor covered in blood and consumed by panic. >> it was devastating. it was a nightmare. you can't even explain it. >> with one hand he held the phone, with the other his bleeding wife. >> it's so hard when it's your loved one like that. i had no -- i just did the best i could to try to keep her breathing. >> by then conrad said he realized heidi had been shot in the head. >> when you went to heidi, did you see a gun? >> no. >> he remembered the pop he had heard and wondered if a stray

bullet might have come through the bathroom window and hit heidi. >> i was trying to think of the noise, how it wasn't very loud and maybe someone could have shot something at the house. >> it seemed farfetched, but he said neighborhood vandals had recently been shooting the back of his house with paint balls. >> i was utterly confused. >> within minutes sargeant crook arrived. conrad now had moved to the doorway of the home to waive crook down. >> he had blood on his hands and he was screaming and shrieking. >> conrad led him through the door, up the stairs and then to a scene straight from a horror movie. >> i could see heidi laying there, she was naked, blood everywhere. horrific scene. >> what's conrad doing? >> he's screaming and yelling. >> and as these police photos make clear, covered in blood.

>> i'm asking him, what's going on here? she was in the bathroom. i don't know what happened. everything was different answers, different theories. different little things. >> right away crook went to check one of those theories, a stray bullet perhaps coming through the bathroom window. >> the window ease closed. >> nothing to indicate -- >> he went to the kitchen and he discovered a gun. >> what did you think happened? >> honestly, i didn't know. >> was this an accident, an attempted suicide, or something far more sinister? at least for now those answers would had to wait. heidi was clinging to life. >> my focus at that time honestly was to help heidi. >> paramedics took heidi to a nearby hospital. conrad followed in a police cruiser. a dash cam recorded the absolute desperation in his voice. >> this is not happening. this is really not happening. i really don't understand any of

this. this is so crazy. >> about an hour after conrad arrived hospital staff delivered the devastating news. heidi wagner truman could not be saved. >> it was pain. it was misery. it was why? how? >> in a neighboring town heidi's mother janet would soon agonize over those very same questions. it was after midnight when two police officers came to the door. >> what must that be like? >> the most horrendous thing ever and i would never like anybody to ever have to feel that, that pain, that agony of knowing that your daughter, for whatever reason, is dead, is gone. >> the officers wouldn't give janet any details, only where her daughter had been taken. >> i'm driving down to the hospital and i made a comment to my daughter, i go, you know, autumn, as hard as it is that we lost heidi, we're going to have

to be supporting conrad because he must be overwhelmed with grief. >> conrad's sister colette was thinking the same thing as she raced to the hospital. >> what kind of condition was your brother in? >> he was just a total wreck, just absolutely hysterical. didn't know how it could have happened. >> no one did, but back at the truman home sargeant crook had started analyzing the evidence and was already developing a theory. >> i thought, oh, man, there's something going on here. >> you got a feeling? >> i got a feeling, yes. it wasn't just me. everybody was looking around. there's something wrong here. we need to check it. >> coming up, was it an accident? >> she was completely naked. we don't see a lot of women commit suicide. >> or something else? >> i thought they felt i did something. >> when "as night fell" continues. the van just talked. sales guy, give 'em the employee price,

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utah's wasatch mountains questions soared at their base. how did heidi truman wind up on her kitchen floor shot in the head? for sure police were wondering about her husband. after all, conrad truman was in the house when heidi was shot and there was no evidence of an intruder. >> i felt like they thought i did something. >> soon after he arrived at the scene sargeant bill crook did begin to have his suspicions. >> we're telling him, conrad, back off. the paramedics are here. back off. and he wouldn't. >> he was moving around keeping paramedics from the body? >> yes, sir. >> there were other scenarios that needed to be explored like accident and suicide. that's where then detective tom wallace came in. >> there had been a number of theories. we obviously are going to exhaust them. that's going to happen. >> the medical examiner didn't make wallace's job any easier. his preliminary finding, heidi's manner of death could not be

determined. so wallace tackled each theory one by one. accident seemed hard to believe. thanks to conrad, heidi had firearms experience. >> can you think of any way it could have been an accident? >> no. heidi would have not been so careless. >> so what about suicide? >> she's completely naked. we don't see a lot of women that commit suicide naked. that's not common. >> did you find anybody that heidi had spoken to about suicide or about being depressed? >> no. >> neither heidi's mother janet nor her sister autumn could imagine heidi even thinking about taking her own life. >> heidi would never do that. in fact, heidi was against that. she had a friend who committed suicide and she thought it was selfish, and in her words, dumb. >> did heidi ever tell you she was depressed? >> no. >> ever act depressed? >> no. she was probably one of my happiest, most up beat kids. >> that left wallace with homicide, and it put conrad back

in the police crosshairs. wallace decided to speak to the officers first on the scene about conrad. >> everyone thought he was strange. >> crook found those threats so alarming he took out his phone to record them. >> [ bleep ] everyone of you [ bleep ] if she dies. >> it could be just the way this guy reacts to trauma, but i'm telling you it was a red flag at that time. >> also a red flag, conrad was drunk. he admitted he and heidi had been drinking earlier that night. >> i could see in his eyes the redness. red flag number three. conrad told crook he and heidi had been arguing, a minor dust up, he said, no big deal, but enough for heidi to draw a bath and ask to be left alone. >> she went and locked herself in the bathroom and then he details how he picked the lock and went in the bathroom. then she kicked him out.

to me that's another -- it's just more proof of there was an arg gult, a bigger argument. >> as for the location of the gun itself, that, too, was suspicious. >> that gun's how far from heidi? >> i would say eight feet, ten feet maybe. it's far enough that it wasn't like a normal if she shoots herself and falls to the ground type of thing. >> later that morning police ask conrad to come to the station for more questioning. >> they can say whatever they want but i did not hurt my wife. i know that. bottom of my heart. i did not kill my wife. >> heidi's family thought otherwise. after finally learning from police the details of how heidi died. >> the minute i heard how she died, i knew he did it. >> i was like, he had a temper and he was very intoxicated and he did something that perhaps he didn't plan. i just knew he did it. >> detective wallace next poured

over conrad's statements to police about what happened that night. as wallace saw it, conrad's story went like this. conrad was in the kitchen, heidi was in the bathroom. at some point conrad heard a pop and when he turned he saw heidi standing between the kitchen and bathroom hallway and she was bleeding. >> he either runs over and catches her or she falls down. >> he went back to the conrad home making detailed measurements. his conclusion, it did not. >> her body's at the top of the stairca staircase. it doesn't add up that she would have traveled and gone the distance that she did and fallen. >> it was hard for wallace to believe that heidi would have traveled from the bathroom to the top of the stairs after suffering such a head wouldn't.

>> she would have fallen down. >> he shared his findings with assistant attorney general, conrad johnson. he agreed. >> why would he want to kill his wife? >> under the circumstances, i'd say the motive was based on this heat of passion argument that they were having. alcohol, argument, fight, guns, that's where we got murder. >> at the same time johnson was reluctant to pass charges. >> they couldn't say whether heidi's death was a homicide. he knew that would be a huge hurdle in court. >> based on my experience in courts with jurors, it carries a lot of race. >> they showed the me a 96 page powerpoint presentation of all their evidence, including those measurements, hoping something would sway him. the presentation worked. the medical examiner changed his ruling to homicide.

>> it sounds like one of the things that got the medical examiner to move from incon christ sieve to homicide is that the measurements suggest the poddy was too far from where she had been shot. >> so after a 10-month investigation they arrested conrad truman and charged him with his wife's murder. >> my mom called me and i fell to the ground crying, so happy that he was finally behind bars. >> going into trial, what did you think? >> i thought we had a strong circumstantial case. >> at trial, the prosecution argued domestic violence leading to violence. the defense, self-inflicted gunshot wound. the jury sided with the state. it was murder. >> i was like, finally got him.

finally got him. >> as far as you knew, that was it? >> that was it. >> did you think that was it? >> but if you think that was it, well, then you haven't been watching enough "dateline." coming up, heidi's heart break. >> she did not know her dad and she always wanted to know that. >> and conrad truman's hope. >> this is going to work out. it has to. because i didn't do this. >> when "as night fell" continues. (burke) at farmers insurance, we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two.

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i'm dara brown. out of fresno, california, at least nine people were shot at a football watch party at the back of a home. several are dead but police did not give a number. officers say as of now no one is in custody. the violence in hong kong hit an all-time high on sunday. they stormed the strong hold. demonstrators set fire to the entrance of the university in an

attempt to stop police advances. now back to "dateline." you're back to dateline extra. the alcohol, the bizarre actions, it was all enough to convince a jury. he had more to say about it first in court and then he wanted to talk to us. here again is josh. just more than two years after his wife heidi's death, conrad truman stood convicted of her murder. he was looking down the barrel of a life sentence when he returned to a utah courtroom to learn his punishment. this is the moment where some convicted killers ask for mercy because of their difficult lives or tell the court they've been

misunderstood and sometimes they don't speak at all, but not conrad truman. >> listen to me please. i can't say sorry for something i did not do. >> i understood speaking out would make it way worse, but i was like -- i don't know, i was like, the hell with this. i didn't. i didn't kill my wife. there would be no proof. i didn't. this is the truth. this is a big injustice. >> the judge had heard that before. the sentence he imposed, 16 years to life, crushing for conrad and his family sitting behind him, including sister colette. >> you want to believe that things turn out the way that they're supposed to, and that's just not always the case. >> in prison conrad did what many do. he retraced the steps that led him there and thought a lot

about the night heidi died. as conrad saw it, the police rushed to judgment began precisely when officers first rushed through his front door. >> it felt like this guy's drinking, there's firearms in the house so he must have shot her. >> why couldn't it be exactly that simple? this wouldn't be the first time that mixing alcohol, an argument and a handgun led straight to a prison sentence. conrad told us what he told police, it isn't that simple. sure he and heidi had been drinking and they were arguing but he said neither was an explanation for what happened. >> i could have upset her with some of the things i've said or with the way i acted with not being attentive, you know, to her. i know i do that sometimes when i drink, i don't pay a lot of attention. >> this still doesn't seem like grounds for a gigantic fight. >> no.

it got to the point where i think i upset her. i was really -- i just know she went to go take a bath. >> which is what she did when she was a little irritated? >> yes. >> conrad also shared with us how he picked the bathroom lock. not he said to confront heidi but just to apologize. >> she just said, get out. i said, okay, so i let her be. >> as for conrad's behavior after police arrived at his door, he said he had good reason for acting that way. >> i was trying to save my wife. i don't know, does that make sense? i just wanted her to live. >> i get how frantic you must have been. i'm not sure i understand the threatening part of that, and i think that's one of the things that ended up getting you in trouble. >> could be. i was like do i have to -- how do i explain this to you guys? like get her help. when you can't explain that to someone, i just started -- i started making threats. >> well, if all that's true, then why and how did heidi wind

up with a bullet in her head? >> i think police found it hard to believe you're there with her in a small area, she's shot and you don't know what happened. >> maybe in their heads -- in mine, i was confused. >> could this be an accident? >> what i say to them, i didn't see it. i don't know how it happened. >> that's how he felt hours after the shooting but as months passed, conrad came to the conclusion heidi may have taken her own life. >> was she as sad person? was she a depressed person? >> when she would drink you could see it come out. >> heidi sanchez saw another side to heidi. >> that strong, funny, you know,

person also had some things inside that were very painful. >> according to sandy, those things had to do with heidi's upbringing. most significantly, heidi grew up not knowing the identity of her father. >> that really bothered her. you know, she did not know her dad and she had always wanted dad. >> it bugged her tremendously. >> enough to take her own life? >> had she ever attempted suicide before? >> never to my knowledge. >> she never talked about it? >> no. >> what seemed like a pretty happy marriage to you, she's going to spur of the moment decide to commit suicide like that? >> that's a tough moment. how do you really know when someone's going to do that, you know? >> as he lived his life behind bars, conrad continued to speculate. he also tried to stay helpful. >> i was like, this is going to work out. it has to because i didn't do

this. >> conrad's family never gave up on him so they scraped together the money to hire conrad some new attorneys. >> mark looked into the case. to them it was immediately apparent there were 1078 problems. >> mark and anthony were the attorneys. what they first did was visit what became the scene of the crime. >> we went to the house and we walk in and we think, aha. >> within moments of being in that home we knew immediately that there was a huge problem. >> not a problem for them, more for the people who had put conrad truman away. coming up, is an innocent man in prison for someone's mistake in math? >> we immediately started measuring. we knew right away that there was a big problem. >> i remember thinking, that's strange. that's -- that couldn't be

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welcome back. conrad truman was serving a sentence for the murder of his wife heidi, but he had not given up on himself yet and neither had his family. they had just hired new lawyers and it was the legal team's first visit to the crime scene that confirmed something conrad's sister suspected. this case could not have added up to murder. here again is josh. while conrad truman sat in a utah state prison marking time, his sister colette searched endlessly for ways to get him out. >> was there a time when you or anybody else in your family thought maybe we don't know him as well as we thought we did. >> no. >> he couldn't have killed her? >> not possible. >> so much about conrad truman's

trial bothered his sister colette, but one detail in particular kept nawing at her. it had to do with the diagrams used by the state depicting the area where heidi's body was found. >> i remember thinking, that's strange. that's -- that couldn't be right. >> post verdict colette shared her concerns with conrad's new attorneys, mark move fett and antal ferra. the defense team decided to visit the home to see if the state's diagrams were accurate. we later made that same trip with moffitt who showed us what they discovered. >> this is the area in question and it's pretty small. >> it is. it's really small. we immediately started measuring and we knew right away that there was a big problem with the diagrams and the measurements. >> the problem? all those measurements were off. >> instead of 139 inches, somebody took the figure 139 and

interpreted it to be 13.9 feet. 33 inches became 3.3 feet and on and on and on. >> according to moffitt, those flawed measurements, which were used in court, made the house appear much bigger than it was. >> they used the theme of distance to argue that mr. truman was lying about where he said his wife was when he heard what turned out to be this fatal shot. >> at trial the prosecution argued to believe conrad you'd have to believe heidi shot herself in the bathroom and then walked 12 feet before falling to the floor, and according to the medical examiner, that was impossible. he testified heidi's head wound was so severe that she could have at most walked a step or two. >> this issue of distance was this big issue. >> but for antal ferro, just seeing the house and how small

it was was proof enough that the prosecution's argument didn't hold up. >> when you walk in the house there's no way that there's even 12 feet there. >> what's more, according to the defense team, conrad never told police heidi shot herself in the bathroom. instead, he told them he had no idea where she was when he heard the shot. >> tell me your theory of what happened here? >> we believe that heidi truman shot herself in this very area and we believe that she fell right in the area directly in front of me on the ground and this is the very area law enforcement found her. >> she was completely in line with what the medical examiner said. >> that's exactly what our argument is. >> according to moffitt, this was not a simple mistake. >> is this just a case of a

small town police department making some incorrect measurements or adding up some figures wrong? >> i don't believe so. i believe that they willfully lied to secure a conviction against conrad truman. >> and for these attorneys, there were more issues with the state's case. one had to do with gunshot residue tests. the defense learned police swabbed both heidi and conrad's hands but they were never sent to the lab. >> when you have gunshot residue that was never tested, those things matter. >> the defense team decided to test those swabs themselves. conrad's hands were negative for residue but there was a question whether conrad watched his hands so those results were meaningless. >> that's probably why they didn't test it. >> as for heidi's swap, there was no residue on her left hand but there was on her right

behind and significantly heidi was right-handed. >> when you have it in a location and absolutely in line with the evidence. >> the deeper they got into the case, the more it seemed to them heidi's fatal wound was self-inflicted. they believed the head wound, a contact wound, ruled out homicide. >> contact gunshot wounds to the right temple are the most common sight of self-inflicted gunshot wounds that there are. >> moffitt and ferro decided to take their information to the me. >> we gave him a bunch of information, then he on his own with his investigator went to the home to look at it. >> and the result was just what

they had asked for, heidi truman's manner of death, once undetermined, then a homicide was now officially once again undetermined. it was mail from forensic heaven. >> how often do forensic examiners change their findings and then change them back? >> i've never had a case where this happened ever. >> it took another year but conrad truman's conviction was overturned and it was granted a new trial. >> i never even thought that was even a possibility for the medical examiner to change that. i never would have thought that. >> is there a part of you that thinks, i can't get my hopes up about this? >> yeah, yeah, that's exactly what i felt. >> i was beyond happy. we were just absolutely over the moon. >> for heidi's family it was just the opposite. >> we couldn't believe that. >> you thought this was over? >> we thought it was over. we thought this was settled. >> halves a hard, hard, hard moment. we hated it.

we just thought, so what are they going to come up with this time? and we know that's what you're thinking, too. coming up, a new trial, a new jury, a different verdict? >> did those incorrectly measured measurements change him? >> there was enough there there beyond a reasonable doubt. >> why would this work out. >> when "as night fell" continues. continues. - [narrator] meet the ninja foodi air fry oven.

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welcome back. in a stunning turn of events, conrad truman had been thrown a life line. his verdict had been overturned and he was facing a retrial for the murder of his wife heidi. based on measurement errors, gunshot residue tests and the location of her head wound,

conrad's lawyers were ready to argue that heidi took her own life, but a witness who knew her as long as anyone would tell a different tale. with the conclusion of our story, here's josh. >> conrad truman had been convicted of murder and had already served more than three years. now the revelation of those flawed police measurements had led to conrad truman's new trial. that stunned everyone in the utah county da's office, especially the man responsible for conrad's conviction. >> this took us by surprise. >> the defense says you had to have known. >> that's their take. they're doing their job to zealously represent their client. >> just the same as lee detective tom wallace.

what went wrong? how did that happen? >> from transposing measurements from the crime scene program, numbers were transposed wrong. >> wallace admits the error but says it was minor, that conrad truman did not deserve a new trial. >> it's not that significant as they made it out to be. >> did those incorrectly entered measurements change your opinion of conrad true map's guilt? should they change anyone's? >> they didn't change my opinion. >> nor did they of deputy d.a. timm tailor who decided to prosecute conrad again. >> i think craig had been in the case for a long time. i went through all of the evidence. even with the medical examiner changing his opinion i stip -- still felt there was a lot. >> conrad's rambling, incoherent

description of what had happened that night. >> the core of our case were his inconsistent statements. >> the story was hard to follow. jumping around all over. it wasn't making sense to me so it was hard to follow. >> those officers also told the jury about conrad's threats. >> he was telling that we were going too slow, and we needed to hurry up or he was going to kill us. >> i'll [ bleep ] kill you if you don't save her life. >> if you are making violent threats of those who are there. >> if you are making those threats, how are you treating her when no one is there. >> heidi was not suicidal. >> in your experience as hidy's mother, was she a sad or depressed person? >> no. i didn't see her that way. >> did heidi's not knowing her father or not really knowing who he was, that made her depressed or sad? >> no.

no. >> the prosecutor pointed out conrad's story evolved over time. immediately following the shooting on the way to the hospital conrad insisted heidi would never commit suicide. >> i think something shot her. she would never shoot herself. she would never shoot herself. >> taylor argued after suspicion against conrad mounted that he changed his tune. >> as for the gunshot residue on heidi's right hand. >> nobody can identify the shooter based on the results of this test. that is the limitation of this. >> defense attorney told the jury that before being allowed to wash his hands that night conrad had pleaded with police to confirm he had no residue on them. >> he's telling them, test my hands. test my hands, i didn't shoot a gun. >> did you wash that before

saying that to them. >> no, i did not, until they said, the state medical examiner's shifting opinion on heidi's manner of death only helped them. >> that's your case right there. >> you would think. >> i mean, if he has reasonable doubt, hard to argue a jury should. >> exactly. >> the medical examiner told the jury that in the final analysis, he didn't know the manner of heidi truman's death. >> i finalized the autopsy report with the cause of death as gunshot wound and could not be determined. >> the m.e. testified that how in his experience a contact wound like heidi's is rare in homicide cases. >> with a contact gunshot wound, the jury began deliberations. >> you felt pretty good?

>> there was enough there there beyond a reasonable doubt. >> conrad was having a much harder time. >> it was really difficult, you know, why would things work out if they didn't work out the first time, you know what i mean? >> eight hours later the verdict. >> pull of your hands. you're not wearing handcuffs. >> no cuffs. >> you're not in custody? >> i'm free. >> that's right. this time conrad truman got the verdict he wanted. not guilty. >> conrad kept saying, did they say not? he just grabbed my arm, are you sure? >> in the courtroom conrad's family shared tears of joy. >> i was giggling and crying at the same time. it was weird. >> on the other side of the courtroom aisle were tears of a different kind. >> i don't know. my heart sank and i just was in shock. >> you fainted? >> i did. i couldn't believe there was a

situation where that long shot happened where he would be freed. >> jury brian kristiansen said he and his fellow jurors had no choice but to set conrad free. >> i believe that we all pretty much felt that he probably did it. >> but you voted to acquit. >> we voted to acquit. >> because? you had reasonable doubt? >> we had reasonable doubt. >> those measurements either put an innocent man in prison or let a guilty man go free. >> well, so you're right. my opinion hasn't changed. do i think he got away with murder? yeah, i do. >> what ends up having your work free a man that committed murder? >> it's difficult because this ended up freeing him. >> what's life been like for your family since then? >> we're trying to put the

pieces together. >> for heidi's family, that is easier said than ton. >> i miss the things that we had together. i miss the simple conversations. i miss her sassiness. i miss her wonderful personality. she lives on forever in our hearts. >> conrad is left looking both backward and forward. >> i mean, i would do anything to take another day, another walk. i loved her and i do love her still. >> you've got a lot of life left, a lot. how are you going to lip it? >> to the best of my abilities. >> there are jurors who think you might have done it but they had reasonable doubt. >> god bless them but there's a lot of people who do believe in me. >> he's made his own piece with a simple truth, the very thing that freed him is going to

shadow him for the rest of his life. that's all for this edition of "dateline extra." i'm craig melvin. i'm craig melvin. thanks for watching. denita was a light in this dark world. that's what she was about. she was just a cup of love. i'm like, "who saw this coming?" >> a beautiful young student gunned down. >> things like that just didn't happen there. >> why?pp who? who would want to do this? >> i thought i had my man. >> her boyfriend was a police officer. >> if anyone knew how to do this and get away with it, wouldn't it be him?ne >> then someone told police what he saw.