her room. as my youngest gets older, we'll tell her the nascar nana story about when she was born, and just never let her memory die. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm craig melvin, thank you for watching. melvin. thank you for watching. i'm craig melvin. >> and i'm natalie morales. >> and this is "dateline." >> it's never good news when the phone rings at 5:00 in the morning. i knew something wasn't right. he just began sobbing and saying no, no. >> it was just before midnight when the shooting started. >> he had been shot multiple times. he was on the ground, face down. >> a man was dead. but not just any man. >> how do you kill superman? how is superman dead? >> he was an olympian and a

father. killed, his wife says, by an intruder in his own back yard. >> describe how fast they were. >> pop, pop, pop. >> but if her husband was dead outside, why was the gun found hidden inside? and what other secrets were hidden away? >> sometimes she would say things like "i'd be better off if dave wasn't around." >> was her husband defending his family or was she? >> she rose that night. >> the mystery may not be who did it, but why. >> the truth will come out and justice will be served. i have to believe that. welcome to "dateline." elite athlete dave laut took home a bronze medal at the 1984 olympic games. for dave home was ventura county, california, where he

grew up. where he met his wife jane, and where he lost his life. jane said there was a prowler and then gunfire. police found dave dead and troubling holes in jane's story. what happened at their home that night? here's keith morrison with "the hometown hero and the homecoming queen." [ siren ] >> it was late when it happened. very late. too late. the sky had already fallen. no one saw it coming. no one heard the warning. but now in the night it was done. they work hard here in their homemade garage gym. because in part it isn't just a gym. it's a kind of shrine. >> i look at the wall and there's a bunch of pictures. and it's -- that's what makes it

special, i think. >> these were the moments before they were born, when a shot-putter named dave laut became his family's superman and his little brother watched him win a bronze medal at the 1984 olympics. >> i mean, after i just cried. how do you not? how do you not cry when you see your brother up there getting the medal? he was my big brother but he was like my superman. he was my superman. >> don laut is dave's younger brother by 9 1/2 years. dave and don inherited a passion for athletics and fitness from their father. >> i remember my first milk when i was a kid was a protein powder. >> this is all really just built into your dna almost. >> yeah. >> it's part of your life. >> yeah. it really is. >> here is where that dna was planted. oxnard, california. a farm town on the beach north of l.a.'s encroaching sprawl. they grow mostly strawberries

here now. lima beans back then. they were different, those days. >> when we grew up, you know, you could ride your bike anywhere. everybody knew everybody. >> this is helen coluris. of course she knew the lauts growing up. and that big old farming family of her childhood best friend, jane laubacher. >> our dads were both farmers. old farming families we're both from. >> the laubachers were big here in oxnard. >> there was just lots of -- lots of laubachers, always lots of laubachers around. it was just -- they multiplied. they were good catholics. >> and helen's friend, jane, grew up to be especially beautiful. featured in her high school yearbook as homecoming queen. >> but she was not ever concerned with that. she's always very, very shy. >> how do you get to be a homecoming queen if you're shy? >> she's always just a very kind

person. very gentle person. >> and as that yearbook shows a star volleyball player, too. >> she could spike -- i mean, she's not that tall. but she could jump. >> jane soon met that other gifted athlete, dave laut, already well on his way to becoming one of the best shot-putters in california. they began dating after high school, and sometimes let don, little laut, tag along. >> she was wonderful. she was fun. they got along so well. they loved each other. it was just neat. >> when they got married in 1980, jane's friend helen was a bridesmaid. >> going that morning of the wedding to jane's parents' house and all the girls getting dressed up. that was really fun. it was just sweet, and jane was quite excited. she looked gorgeous. >> he had her on a pedestal. he always said such wonderful things about her. >> this is don's wife, rebecca.

>> we became very close. we'd talk maybe once, twice a week. on the phone. and probably for hours, her and i. we just hit it off. we were family. >> jane was there by dave's side as he became a national and then world competitor. dave won the bronze medal at the 1984 games. but after, his career faded quickly. he kept trying, but knee injuries. he didn't make the olympic team in 1988. >> he was disappointed, but he knew -- i mean, it's like a point of your career when you know that something is done. it's okay. because you know you've done -- you've gone as far as you can and that door closes. >> and another door opened. dave became a high school biology teacher, coach, and athletic director. >> and he was even better at being a teacher and a coach than he was even throwing. >> if dave missed his former

glory, his family said, he never showed it. and of course remained a legend to his niece and nephews. >> i think one phrase that could best describe him is a gentle giant. yeah. >> yep. >> he had so much patience, so much kindness. >> at home dave and jane struggled to have children. >> she wanted to have a family really bad. i felt bad when i would get pregnant. >> and then in 1999 they adopted a baby boy from south korea, named him michael. >> they were happy. i mean, i have tons and tons of pictures of them, the three of them together. they were happy. >> moments in time. inspiration on a garage wall, which these days is about all that's left. >> this doesn't make sense. no. it's not right. it doesn't make sense. >> ever since that august night in 2009 --

when a superman fell to earth. >> coming up -- did a run-in with a prowler prove deadly? >> how many pops did you hear? >> three. >> describe them to me, how fast they were. >> pop, pop, pop. >> when "dateline" continues. er) breathe right strips open your nose up to 38% more than cold medicine alone. (deep breath) breathe better, sleep better. breathe right. they're out there. thousands ofr allergensyes know sleep better. in each cubic yard of air. no wonder you rub your eyes hundreds of times a day. but now, relief is just one drop away. introducing pataday® full prescription strength pataday works right in your eyes. right on the cells that make them itch. fast. just one drop, once a day means relief that lasts all day. so turn your day, into a pataday. now get pataday

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august 28th, 2009. oxnard, california. >> 911 emergency. >> something over there. >> the woman in full panic. >> what did the person look like that was in your back yard? >> i didn't see him. but he was shot. >> you heard shots being fired? >> yeah. >> the woman on the phone was jane laut, the wife of the hometown hero. >> oh, my god. >> dave was still outside, she said, where she heard shots fired. >> the officers had to lock down

and call in a homicide team to investigate further. it was a brutal scene. >> ventura county d.a.'s investigator mike palmieri said by the time first responders arrived there was no sign of a prowler. but they did find dave laut. >> he had been shot multiple times. he was on the ground face down with very obvious gunshot wounds to his back and to the back of his head. >> jane was a mess. she told investigators she had no idea who would do this. >> is there anybody that -- >> son michael, 10 at the time, slept through it all, and jane's brother took charge of him while jane went down to the oxnard police station to offer a more complete statement. it had been a perfectly normal evening, she said. they were in bed by 10:00. dave in the master bedroom. she in michael's room.

where she often slept because dave had a bad back. and then it was about an hour later, she said. about 11:00. dave came down the hall, she said, worried about the dog. so 11:15, she said, she and dave crept over to a sliding glass door, to a side yard.

and the gunshots?

as jane talked to investigators into the early morning hours, the awful news was getting around. >> we got a call about 5:00 in the morning. >> what happens to a person? you go to bed at night and everything's fine. and then the phone rings at 5:00 in the morning, suddenly your life is a very different thing. >> yeah. it's like an earthquake. it just shakes your whole foundation and being. and things are never the same after. it was awful. >> he just fell to his knees. you know, he was on the phone and he just began sobbing and saying no, no. >> yeah. >> it was horrible. >> you don't believe it, but it's -- how do you kill superman? how is superman dead? ♪ i once was lost

>> a few days later dave's friends and family held a candlelight vigil. >> he was so loved. and every step we take we take because people like you reach out to us and are here to support my mother-in-law and my husband and our family, and we just really truly appreciate that. thank you. >> lift up our candles for dave. >> reporter: but they didn't know then, didn't know what the police had discovered. a key piece of evidence. almost overlooked at first. >> a lead investigator in this case walks in. he's just looking around. and i mean, you've got a dining room table. you've got a hutch. you've got a grandfather clock. so he opened up that clock and it was an oh, wow moment. >> now, why would a prowler leave something so important in there? >> if the intruder was outside, how did a key pes of evidence

get ints? and something else seemed odd. jane's behavior. coming up -- >> she actually tried to kick one of the police officers out of the laundry room. she tried to close the door with her in the laundry room and him out. >> when "dateline" continues. t. >> when "dateline" continues

jane laut told the police a harrowing story of a back yard prowler and gunshots right

outside her door. and now her husband, olympic bronze medalist dave laut, was dead. but some things seemed a little off. for example, said investigator palmieri, when police were still questioning jane at the house, she stepped into the laundry room. >> she actually tried to keep one of the police officers out of the laundry room. she tried to close the door with her in the laundry room and him out. >> why? well, said, palmieri, jane was wearing pajamas when police arrived, but in that laundry room they found her jeans rolled up in a towel tucked between the washer and dryer. her top was lying there as well, inside out. looked like they had been removed quickly, stashed away. and when an officer tried to administer a gunshot residue kit to jane's hands, standard procedure in a shooting investigation -- >> when the officer doing the test began getting the test ready, she did go into the bathroom and either wash her hands or wipe her hands on a

towel, one of the two, before coming back to the table and before the test was done. >> reporter: so odd things. anyway, police scoured the place, didn't see any murder weapon lying around. and they were about ready to take dave's body off to the morgue when some instinct told the lead detective to look here. he cracked open the doors of the grandfather clock in the dining room, looked down inside, and there it was. >> this is more than likely the murder weapon. >> reporter: a ruger six-shot revolver. surely no prowler would have dropped a weapon right here in the dining room clock. >> the prowler theory did not make any sense whatsoever with a hidden gun inside the house. >> and so it wasn't long before investigators shifted their focus from unknown prowler to the woman who'd reported one,

jane laut. remember those clothes they found in the laundry room? when they tested them, they found gunshot residue. so did jane shoot dave, then change into her pajamas before she called 911? and you'll remember, jane specifically mentioned a red flashlight. so police bagged it, tested it, and found gunshot residue as if she was holding the flashlight while shooting her husband. and if jane was the killer, this was about as cold-blooded as it gets. investigators said dave had been shot six times. >> we came one a fairly logical explanation of how it was done. >> shot one appeared to have been fired from a distance of seven feet, grazed his head, deposited pieces of scalp on a garbage can, and then the bullet hit the wall. that shot brought him to his knees where the killer fired shots two and three into his face at close range. >> we find the one that goes through his cheekbone.

it goes down the side yard. it bounces off the concrete. it nicks the fence. and that bullet we matched out on the sidewalk. >> shots four, five, and six hit in the upper arm and back and back of dave's head. >> we believe shot 6, the final shot, was the final shot to the back of the head. >> from the very beginning jane denied she had anything to do with it. but they didn't believe her. especially when they found out that the bullets that killed dave matched the gun in the grandfather clock. and now don and rebecca laut began to look at a lot of things differently, things jane had told them through the years, which maybe didn't add up either. >> i honestly felt like she was family. so i'm going to dismiss the

strange feeling i get sometimes. >> like, said rebecca, the time jane told her two men put a knife to her throat and demanded money. >> and i said, well, did you call the police? did you yell? she says, oh, no. i just -- i just came home. i just wanted to get home. and i said, and this was in the middle of the day and nobody else saw? and she said no. >> and then there was her claim that somebody was leaving threatening notes on her car. >> but then you'd ask her and probe her, like what kind of notes, but she wouldn't really tell you. >> the implication is somebody's after her, somebody's out there, she's in some danger. >> right. >> and now when they look back at the things they'd noticed over the years, it was like something fell into place for them. >> there was a separation. it was like jane was the parent and michael was the child and dave was in the way. >> you got the sense that she was pushing dave away? >> mm-hmm. yeah. i think that was a stress on the marriage. >> that there was stress was pretty clear, said rebecca. >> for a while every time she would call me it seemed like she

was -- to vent about something she didn't like about what dave was doing. >> so evidence was carefully sifted for months. and then in february 2010 jane laut was arrested and charged with first-degree murder. and the story, said investigators, was chillingly clear. >> this was an execution. she lured him out, shot him from behind, and then aggressed on him, shot him a second, third time, stepped back, shot him a fourth time, came up super close and shot him two more times, one to the back of the head. >> there seemed to be plenty of evidence. jane's odd behavior. her lie about a prowler. and on top of it all the gun in the grandfather clock. so jane hired a lawyer and pleaded not guilty. and the story that came out then

turned the whole case on its head. >> mr. laut was a monster. he was despicable. >> coming up -- what had been happening behind closed doors? >> she's got one of two choices at that point, run or fight. she decided to fight. >> when "dateline" continues. dear freshpet, tank was overweight and had no energy. until freshpet... put the puppy back in my dog. ♪ and beverages that are very acidic. it can soften the enamel. pronamel repair, what it's doing is driving more minerals deep into the enamel surface, that's going to help actively repair. pronamel is taking it to another level.

hello. i'm dara brown. here's what's happening. the centers for disease control is warning the death toll in the u.s. due to covid-19 is likely to surpass 100,000 by june. the cdc director cited a dozen forecasting models that make that grim prediction. meanwhile, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the illinois capitol on saturday in response to the governor's stay-at-home order. the governor has been facing building pressure within the state to lift the order, including multiple lawsuits. now back to "dateline." welcome back.

i'm craig melvin. dave laut was murdered outside his home, and then police found the gun that killed him inside. calling the story his wife told detectives into question. but what she told them next would send the investigation hurtling in a whole new direction. a stunning allegation points to another explanation for dave's death. here again is keith morrison with a hometown hero and the homecoming queen. >> sweet jane laut now accused murderer. and dave? now that dave was dead, stories emerged. >> it seemed like she was controlled, in my opinion. >> an across the street neighbor. >> i mean, he's there standing there while she's, you know, pulling weeds, cleaning out gutters, washing his truck. and he's not lifting a finger to help her? come on. >> well, jane seemed, what, nervous? >> like a scared little rabbit. >> i was always a little leery

about what was actually going on in the home. >> close friends said jane's fear reminded her of another vulnerable creature. >> jane looked like a scared cat. constantly doing like a twitch, looking over her shoulder, kind of looking to see if someone's behind her. >> and this from jane's former co-worker. >> he was very aggressive. he was very demanding. and when he said jump, she would go how high? >> how strange it was, she thought, that jane always wore long sleeves, even when it was hot outside. but more disturbing. >> there were times when she would come in and i noticed on her face it looked swollen. and she would never comment how it happened. >> there were several times that i saw bruising on her.

one time on her face. her arms, her legs. several places. >> he's a monster. he's just a monster. >> ron bamieh is jane's defense attorney, and according to him dave laut is far from the hometown hero so many believe him to be. the real truth about dave laut, said bamieh, for nearly three decades he subjected his wife to horrific abuse. >> like all abuse it's power and control. we have verbal abuse. the names he called her over a repeated long period of time. the emotional abuse. the way he treats her. we have physical abuse. that's everything from the punching to the kicking to the slapping to the hitting. throwing her down, pulling her hair, spigot on her. >> and jane wasn't the only victim, said bamieh. dave was angry that his adopted son, michael, was not athletic. >> we have neighbors who'd hear him call michael names like [ bleep ], racial names to mike that will are just horrible.

we have him yelling at him in the street about how he can't ride a bike or catch a football or play baseball. >> all those years jane was afraid to report dave, said bamieh, afraid of what he might do to her loved ones. and so she covered up his abuse and her injuries. we obtained this summary of a police report from the 1980s in which jane reported that an intruder attacked her while she was alone at work. at the time police found the injuries consistent with jane's story. in fact, said bamieh? dave inflicted those injuries. then ordered jane to lie and blame a non-existen intruder. a pattern of covering up dave's abuse. abuse which by the summer of 2009 was getting worse, said bamieh. >> from june of '09 to august it was escalating. >> but jane continued to take it until that particular august night when something changed. that night according to bamieh for the first time dave

threatened michael's life. >> she really believed he was going to kill michael? >> yeah. so she made the decision to fight. >> jane had taken michael to the beach that day, said bamieh. they were late getting home. >> dave was upset. started screaming and yelling, "nobody respects me." you know, "i don't get any attention around here. nobody cares about me." jane put michael to bed, said bamieh, got into pajamas herself and waited for dave's anger to subside. >> but he wasn't coming down. about 10:30 or 11:00 he comes out of the room and he's upset and he's angry. >> and that's when she saw the gun, said bamieh. >> he's holding it and he starts talking about michael and how they don't respect him and he's going to blow his [ bleep ] head porch he grabs her, throws her against the wall, she falls down. she kind of crawls backwards with her hands and her feet crab walk toward the back door. somehow she gets him out of the patter.

she's like calm down, calm down. >> then out in the darkness dave stumbled on the patio. >> and he loses his balance. and that's her opportunity. he goes out and tries to grab the gun and they go to the ground. there's a struggle for the gun. the gun owes off. and then she eventually gets the gun and she empties it. >> and then she said she ran back into the house, put the gun inside the grandfather clock, and called 911. >> she has no idea he's dead. he's down, but she thinks he's getting up. women in these relationships have this superman complex they give their abusers. >> so yes, she lied about the prowler, said bamieh, did it laujtly, her conditioned response to his abuse. but once the sxwlienktsd bamt spt ieh, their minds were made up that she was a cold calculating killer. so when police found those clothes shoved in the laundry room, they believed it must have been jane's attempt to hide evidence of their crime. but those clothes when tested

only had a tiny fragment of gunshot residue, and police never bothered to test the pajamas jane was wearing when she showed up. but bamieh did. and the tests revealed the pajamas were covered in gunshot residue, proving, said bamieh, that jane was wearing those pajamas when she fired the gun. >> so it all supports her story? >> it all does. >> and as for the claim jane jumped up to wash her hands before a gunshot residue or gsr test, that never happened, said bamieh. that was just the police covering up a major mistake. >> the cop lost the gsr sample test. they searched for it, they couldn't find it. >> anyway, said bamieh, investigators looked to the crime scene evidence and just plainly got it wrong. once they concluded she was a murderer, he said, they actually distorted the evidence to fit their story. zbla bullet that glanced off his head and went at about a 90 degree angle and hit the wall and then deposited two pieces of scalp matter on the garbage can.

>> and you're saying that's physically impossible? >> yes. it's ludicrous. it violated the laws of physics. >> and what's more, he said, the dna on the gun was dave's, once again supporting jane's contention that he had the gun and then they struggled for it. >> his dna's on the trigger. i mean, there's no getting around that fact. >> and one more thing, said bamieh. one more bit of evidence that the police missed even though it was right under their noses. bruising on jane's upper left arm. photographed the morning after dave was killed. zbluk at the bruise closely you'll see there's basically a little hand print. >> a hand-shaped bruise that helps prove, said bamieh, this wasn't murder. it was self-defense. >> if you're fighting for your life reasonably, i think you reasonably have to conclude that if you're fighting for a gun, you get to use lethal force. >> and now looking back, said jane's childhood friend helen,

things began to make sense. >> we saw her less and less. >> more than two decades passed. helen had a long career as a social worker and gradually lost touch with jane. >> i would always send her christmas cards and say call me, whatever. and i would never hear from her. >> and then helen heard about dave's death. >> everybody was pointing to jane. and like a light bulb went off. and i'm like oh, my god. she was a battered wife. and you didn't get it. you didn't see it. >> but the very idea that jane was an abused spouse, that she killed dave in self-defense, absolutely ludicrous, said the lauts, and an outrageous allegation about dave. >> i know my brother. he's just a good man. he'd give you the shirt off his back. that's just the way he was. >> can you see him losing his

temper at the woman he's married to and abusing her, hitting her? >> no. >> never. >> no. >> never. >> no. >> no, said the lauts. no, said the police. besides, they said, maybe jane had quite another motive for killing dave laut. a financial one. >> coming up, borrowed money. >> thousands and thousands of dollars. >> and even more money if dave was dead. >> sometimes she would say things like "i'd be better off if dave wasn't around." >> when "dateline" continues. 14 key nutrients to help feed your cells, nourishing your body inside and out so you can focus on what matters most. centrum. feed your cells. fuel your life.

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♪ olympic glory does not always translate into material wealth. in fact, said detectives, as they sifted through dave and jane's financial records, they found evidence they were struggling. >> the lauts' finances were -- they were just living beyond their means. it was poor bookkeeping, poor management of the bills. it didn't happen just before the shooting. this has been going on for years and years and years. >> after dave was killed, said don and rebecca, they found out jane had been borrowing money from her mother-in-law. >> jane asked her for a lot of money, gave her different

excuses why she needed money. >> to pay mortgages or something like that? >> mortgages. >> right. >> doctor bills. school tuition, school supplies. >> how much money are you talking about here? >> it was a lot. it was thousands and thousands of dollars. it was a lot. >> and when they found out dave had three life insurance policies? >> i believe we totaled it all up, and i think it came to $300,000, $350,000, somewhere in that neighborhood, that she was likely to see if a prouder had done this. >> was there ever any indication she was capable of violent acts or the sort of person who could be violent? >> she said some things to me, and i dismissed them because i maybe didn't want to believe that she was capable. but sometimes she would say things like "i'd be better off if dave wasn't around."

meanwhile, justice crawled. a year passed. then two, three. four. jane remained free on bond. and dave's niece, megan laut, fumed. >> she caused my family so much pain, and it's horrible. it's just -- i hate it. >> nephews aaron and cody took it out in the garage weight room. >> i have a way of bottling and condensing it, and i get it out when i lift. >> you get your emotion going, get your anger going, get your adrenaline going. >> in september 2013 don laut pleaded with a judge to get the case before a jury. >> i just wanted the court to know that there is a family and there's friends behind my brother and it's been four years and it's been very difficult. >> and then, in january 2015,

more than five years after dave's death, in a move that shocked jane's veteran defense attorney, the prosecution indicated it would be open to making a deal. >> and i was blown away. >> a plea deal? yes, and what a deal it was, said bamieh. if jane pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter, she'd be sentenced to just six years and would most likely serve only three. seemed like an admission of weakness frurkts sbamtd sptom t said bamieh, and an opportunity for a woman facing murder and 50 to life. so -- >> i gave her my strong recommendation she take it. and she said no. and i was just like stunned. i said, jane -- i kept saying do you understand it? she department saying i understand fully, it's trournths my decision.

>> by then jane had some powerful moral support from her old friends helen kaluris. >> she rose that night. i mean, she didn't sfliemts. and you know, became a very strong powerful woman and defended the life of her son. >> and then at last in january 2016 jane laut went on trial for murder. her friend helen sitting right behind her. >> do you think she'll go to jail? >> i don't. >> really? >> i absolutely do not. >> you believe the jury will believe her story and see it as a case of self-defense? >> i do. i believe that. i believe that. >> i sincerely believe her. and i don't say that about many people. i sincerely believe her. >> do you usually get this personally invested in a case? >> i am always invested in my cases, yes. but do i care as much about clients like i do about jane laut? no. that's -- i'd be lying if i said

i did. >> but could he persuade a jury to believe in jane too? >> coming up -- jane takes the stand. >> to get not guilty which is what we're shooting for she has to testify. >> and a gun takes center stage. >> pulled back the hammer, fired. each and every time. >> when "dateline" continues. people are surprising themselves the moment they realize they can du more with less asthma. thanks to dupixent, the add-on treatment for specific types of moderate-to-severe asthma. dupixent isn't for sudden breathing problems. it can improve lung function for better breathing in as little as 2 weeks and help prevent severe asthma attacks. it's not a steroid but can help reduce or eliminate oral steroids. don't use if allergic to dupixent. serious allergic reactions can occur, including anaphylaxis, which is severe. tell your doctor right away about signs of inflamed blood vessels,

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welcome back. facing 50 years to life for the murder of her husband, when prosecutors offered to cut jane laut's sentence to just six years if she'd plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter, she said no. would she regret that decision? here's keith morrison with the final chapter of the hometown hero and the homecoming queen. >> dave laut was a son. he was a father. he was a colleague. he was a friend. >> more than six years after the death of olympic bronze medalist dave laut the murder trifle his wife, jane, finally began in this ventura, california courtroom. prosecutor ramin manui told the jury jane was a calculating killer. >> if you look at each of the six shots, they were administered by this defendant as she was executing her plan to murder her husband.

there is only one reasonable conclusion, is to find the defendant guilty of murder. >> i'm about to talk to you for quite some time. >> defense attorney ron bamieh countered the real victim was jane laut, who suffered the utmost cruelty at the hands of her husband. >> he is not the hero of the olympics. he is the monster who abused her for 27 years. >> the defense called family and friends and neighbors who all testified jane was an abused spouse. but attorney bamieh said the most important witness was the defendant herself. >> not guilty which is what we're shooting for. she has to testify. >> the judge would not allow cameras to roll when for the first time publicly through tears jane told her story. she said she took dave's abuse for nearly three decades until the night he threatened their son. >> i think she could live with the fact he could till her. she could not live with the fact

he could kill michael. >> on the stand jane admitted that she lied in her 911 call. >> 911 emergency. >> and later to the police about a prowler. but she denied she had any financial motive for killing her husband. after all, she did not ask for nor did she receive a penny of dave's life insurance. >> jane would never be about finances. absolutely not. >> why do you say that? >> because that's not her values. jane is about relationship. she's about family. she's about children. she's -- it's never been about money for her. >> of course the prosecutor got his turn to cross-examine jane. there were a lot of "i don't remembers" about the night of the murder. she simply couldn't recall what happened after she fired the first two or three shots, she said. but she did admit she was quite familiar with the gun, in fact had used it several times

before. >> this single action gun in the hands of this defendant required her to pull back that hammer, fire, pull back the hammer, fire, each and every time for the six times as she aimed that weapon at her husband and shot him. >> like this, said the prosecutor, as he played a video of a woman firing that very gun. but, said the defense attorney, that's not the only way to fire the gun. >> you hold the trigger down, you can pull the hammer back and fire. >> this is called fanning the gun. the sort of thing you'd expect to see in an old western. but a prosecution expert countered that a movie is the only place he'd ever seen that. >> every expert that came up said that that is absurd. the accuracy of firing a gun six times and hitting your target six times in the dark is

astronomical. >> after seven weeks of testimony, final arguments from both sides. defense attorney bamieh made an impassioned plea to the journey. >> why would jane laut do this? why would she do this? when you think about it, there's only one real reason. only one. it's what anybody would do to protect their child. any one us. >> you do not have the right to kill your husband -- >> while prosecutor manui urged the jury to look past the emotion and focus on the evidence. >> the defense testimony is false. it is untruthful. it is unbelievable. it is a story conjured up to raise her battered woman self-defense claim in a murder case. it is plan b because plan a doesn't work. and it's a lie. >> jurors deliberated for 3 1/2 days. and then finally, march 30th, 2016, announced they were ready.

jane, supported by helen and other friends who'd stood by her all along, walked to the courthouse and what waited there. >> it all appears to be in order. so i will read the verdict. we the jury in the above-entitled action find the defendant jane laubacher laut guilty of of the crime of first degree murder. >> guilty of first-degree murder. a shock ran through the room. ron bamieh who so fervently believed in her innocence, looked distraught. and jane comforted him. the woman who flat turned down a deal to do six years for voluntary manslaughter received a mandatory sentence. 50 years to life. jane laut is appealing her conviction. it was a victory for dave's family, yes, but not one to celebrate. >> our faith calls us to forgive, and we do. we forgive her. >> but forget? no. not the lauts. not their superman.

>> it's very difficult. i miss him every day. i miss him every day. >> i think i'll always grieve. i know i'm always going to miss him. he's always a part of me. i'm craig melvin. >> i'm natalie morales. >> and this is "dateline ." a sprawling southern family farm with a pair of church going grandparents at its heart. >> they were most loving individuals i've ever met in my life. >> there was no way it was supposed to end like this. >> she took out a hand and said sugar and charlie have been murdered. >> the former church deacon and his wife, who on earth would want them dead?