it's a dream come true. and this man took the most important thing in my life. i can't let him take anything else from me. you don't want daniel to be forgotten. yeah. what do you want people to leave with? you know, i want people to remember daniel for what he was. he was pure joy. he was pure love. he was a boy who thought of everyone before himself. that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm andrea canning. thank you for watching. i'm andrea canning, and this is dateline on mynetwork-tv.e. what she had was charisma. [sirens] she said, i love you. in my heart, i knew those were her last words.

andrea canning (voiceover): two sisters with a single purpose-- solve the mystery of their mother's death. we can't let this go. it's heartbreaking. andrea canning (voiceover): she left for hawaii, a new life with a new husband. but the sunny paradise soon grew dark. something was very wrong. it was horrible, being so helpless. andrea canning (voiceover): what was behind their mom's strange death? they set out together to discover the answer. and they were about to get some help from their mother herself. there was evidence she left for you to find. yes. andrea canning (voiceover): a possible clue hidden in an envelope marked "baby pictures." but tucked inside, a journal that painted a different picture entirely. i pulled out that envelope. and that was like, wow. andrea canning (voiceover): could their mom help them solve her own mystery?

we can't quit. we are her voice. we made a promise. we made a promise to our mom. hello, and welcome to "dateline." shirlene van gundy was popular and unpredictable, long before she had her little girls, tammy and tiffany. as children, they adored their mother. as adults, they made a troubling vow, promising charlene to investigate if she ever came to harm. then it happened. shirlene was dead, and her daughters were suddenly detectives pursuing a mystery that would upend their lives. here's keith morrison with "the vow." keith morrison (voiceover): here they were again, two sisters on a holiday in paradise-- or so the other vacationers must have assumed here in america's mid-pacific garden, in the lush resort

near honolulu. but they would be wrong. this journey has more to do with a personal hell than any paradise. that, and a long ago promise to their mother. could you have believed that you would be sitting here in this hotel room, talking about this subject in the year 2014? no. it's pretty crazy. i-- i could have never seen this coming. keith morrison (voiceover): perhaps it is pretty crazy. but there is apparently no stopping them, these tenacious sisters, tammy cocard and tiffany young. there is no halfway when it comes to a promise. it's either all or nothing. keith morrison (voiceover): bizarre story? oh, yes, it is. at the center of it is a woman named shirlene van gundy, a beauty queen once back in colorado. my mother was an incredibly beautiful soul.

she taught both my sister and i that there was nothing that we couldn't do. hi. i love you. my earliest memories of her are her singing to me. she loved to sing. and she played with me. she was a big kid. my mother was a free spirit, in many ways, and didn't have a lot of rules. i didn't have to do things like normal kids had to do, like brush my teeth all the time. but i liked it that way. keith morrison (voiceover): and so it was often tammy and not her mother who took on the responsible role with little sister tiffany, which was the other side of shirlene's manic exuberance. she was unstable. and she had a hard time taking care of herself, much less than anyone else. mm-hmm. unstable, um-- uh? she would have the highs of highs and the lows of lows. keith morrison (voiceover): moods--

very dark ones, sometimes, said the girls. she didn't want to really admit that there was an issue. it was a hot button. and it wasn't something that you wanted to bring up unless you were ready for the fight. keith morrison (voiceover): when shirlene left the girls' father, tammy refused to go with her. i said, "i'm not going. i can't leave. i can't leave my dad." what did that feel like? like my heart was being ripped in two. keith morrison (voiceover): the girls lived apart for years after that, until their father won custody of tiffany, too. and then the girls watched and loved and worried about their mother, mostly from afar. and then, late '80s, shirlene finally found real happiness when she met and married a man named ken wakisaka. she goes, "i've never been with a man who really got me. he gets me." she and her whole life, i think, had never felt so quite thoroughly and utterly embraced by someone who

loved her just the way she was. keith morrison (voiceover): and just because shirlene had dreamed of living in hawaii, ken got a job here and moved here to this condominium complex by a golf course on the pacific. he was a very likable guy. sure. very much a gentleman, always opened the door for you. keith morrison (voiceover): the sisters grew up, made lives of their own. tiffany moved to arizona. tammy settled in northern california. and for a whole decade, shirlene seemed so happy with ken. when did it change? it seemed to start to change in 1998. keith morrison (voiceover): shirlene told the girls that she and ken were fighting. mid 1999, she called them very upset. and when they went to hawaii to see what was wrong, she said the strangest thing-- asked them to promise her something. and she said, "promise me, if anything ever happens to me, you will investigate." and we said, "mom, what are you talking about, if anything happens to you?"

"just promise me," she said. keith morrison (voiceover): shirlene left ken soon after that, moved to the mainland. the girls thought the break was permanent-- were relieved, actually. but seven months later-- she said, "i'm back in hawaii. and i'm back living with ken, and everything's fine. i don't want you to worry." keith morrison (voiceover): but worry they did. she would call me, and we would talk about things. and then she would call me again an hour later. and she wouldn't remember anything we talked about. keith morrison (voiceover): it got so that tammy sometimes didn't pick up when her mother called. but of course, she had no idea what was about to happen, least of all, one april night in 2000. my mom had started calling my house. and i was letting her go to the voicemail. and all the messages were pretty much the same. that she loved me, she found god, everything was fine. keith morrison (voiceover): tammy waited until morning to call back. it was april 5th.

and ken answered the phone. and he said, "i don't know what's wrong with your mother. here, you talk to her." i said, "hi, mom. it's tammy." i said, "are you ok?" and she said, "i love you." her words were very drawn out and slurred, like i'd never heard before. what was that like, that conversation for you at your end? oh, i was in a panic. keith morrison (voiceover): in a panic, tammy called tiffany to tell her. and still frantic, tammy then called the honolulu police department. it was 6:00 am there. she got an ambulance dispatched to the condo. my sister is the hero. she's saving my mother's life right now. and it's the ambulance. like, they're going to-- they are the professionals. they're going to-- keith morrison: they'll fix it. they're going to fix it. keith morrison (voiceover): but the paramedics didn't notice much to fix. the report states, "patient was conscious, but under emotional distress. she appeared calm, but would not acknowledge our presence. her spouse informed us she may have taken some aleve

aspirin with two beers." the report continues, "there were no empty containers of beer, no odor of alcohol on the patient. we were also informed by spouse that patient had said she was dying." very unusual indeed. but the emts did not take shirlene to the hospital-- left her at home with ken instead. how is it possible? how is it possible? it was horrible. it was horrible, being so helpless. keith morrison (voiceover): tiffany was so far away on the mainland, in a panic, trying to reach her mother, calling repeatedly. ken finally answered the phone. "here, i'll put you on with her. you can talk to her." she said, "i love you." and and it was so hard for her to say it because the mere effort of moving her lips took so much. keith morrison (voiceover): eight long hours passed. and then at 2:00 pm, ken called 911.

they rushed her to the emergency room, did what they could. nothing worked. ken called tammy from the hospital. tammy broke the news to tiffany. it went from, you know, just being in this place of such utter desperation and helplessness and despair and uncertainty, like-- and knowing in my heart, that she was gone. keith morrison (voiceover): though still barely hanging on, on life support. and that's when it began, with that first rush to their respective airports for flights to honolulu. no idea how long that journey would be, how hard that promise to keep. what had happened to tammy and tiffany's mom? the sisters start their own investigation. coming up, a possible clue from their mother herself. she said, "if anything ever is to happen to me, i want you to ask for your baby pictures. remember that, ok? just remember that."

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183337354495 or visit homeserve.com. >> all of. >> this can be overwhelming, but it is important to remember there are. >> still checks. >> and balances. >> there's a. >> lot being thrown at the american people right now and. >> it is really. >> important to pay attention. >> to it. >> but it is just as important to recognize how many of those things are getting announced. but they're not happening at all, or at least not yet. just try to remember we are not looking at the final score. we are still in the first quarter. are still in the first quarter. keep your pads on. the keith morrison (voiceover): six anxiety-filled hours. on the long plane ride to hawaii, all sisters tammy and tiffany knew was that their mom was on life support. they weren't sure why or even exactly what happened to her. but during those six hours, they had plenty of time to reflect on what she said to them nine months earlier.

promise me you'll investigate if anything happens to me, you'll find out what happened. keith morrison (voiceover): they promised, of course. so even before they got on the plane for hawaii, they called the police to report that they already had their suspicions. and those suspicions, even then, were all about shirlene's husband, ken wakisaka. i heard from tiffany before i even went to st. francis west. i was assigned the case by my lieutenant. and he said, "before you go, call this girl." keith morrison (voiceover): tiffany told detective nick cambra about her pre-flight conversation with the hospital. i asked the emergency room attendant. i'll never forget this. i said, "where's ken?" and he said, "he went home to feed the dogs." i said, "so she's there by herself?" well, who does that? keith morrison (voiceover): by the time

detective cambra got to the hospital, he'd been told what tammy and tiffany suspected-- that shirlene had taken or had been given an overdose of pills. he also heard from medical personnel. they thought ken's behavior seemed strange, though no one, including the ambulance driver, could quite say why. he also related that the husband was acting suspicious. did he say how? he said just the way he spoke and the way he acted. suspicious. yes. keith morrison (voiceover): when detective cambra heard that ken left the hospital while his wife was lying in a coma in the icu, he wondered, was ken going home to cover up a crime scene? and when cambra checked to see if ken had a record of any kind, he discovered, yes, he did. i did pull police reports of ken. ken had been arrested for abuse. keith morrison (voiceover): it gave cambra pause, made him consider what he'd already heard from tiffany. that her mom had said she would never commit suicide

and that she was afraid that ken was trying to kill her prior to this incident. keith morrison (voiceover): now, in hawaii, at their mother's bed in the icu, tammy and tiffany vowed to find out exactly what happened to their mother. you know, most people would just leave it to a police department to do the investigating. not you two. no. keith morrison (voiceover): first target-- ken and shirlene's condo. must be evidence there, they decided. so they made up a story for ken, told them they needed a rest after their long flight. could they borrow a bed in the condo? and sure enough, he gave them the keys, while he stayed at shirlene's bedside in the hospital. when he was there, what did you guys do? we went to the house in [inaudible].. keith morrison: to do what? to see what we could find. just kind of looking cupboards and under beds and in closets, for what kind of stuff? for things that we thought that might help us figure out what happened that day.

keith morrison (voiceover): because shirlene sounded so out of it on the phone and ken mentioned pills to the emt, tammy wondered if her mother took pills. in fact, the hospital was treating it as an overdose. but the sisters did not believe she would do it deliberately. so they went looking for those pill bottles. we had looked through the house and couldn't find them. and so we were out in the backyard, just looking. and sure enough. keith morrison: in the backyard? tammy cocard: underneath the bush. as if they had been hidden there or what? yes. keith morrison (voiceover): in their minds, only one person could have hidden them-- ken. later, as tiffany and tammy were about to drive away from the condo, having thrown in the backseat a sealed envelope ken had left out for them, suddenly, tiffany remembered something else her mother told her. she says, tiff, i have to tell you something. and it's important. and she said, if anything ever is to happen to me, i want you to ask ken for your baby pictures.

remember that, ok? just remember that. keith morrison (voiceover): and sure enough, that appeared to be what ken had just given them. they tore open the envelope. and inside, most definitely not baby pictures. andrea canning (voiceover): coming up. keith morrison: there it was-- mm-hmm. --evidence she left for you to find. yes. andrea canning (voiceover): what could be a revealing clue from their mom, when "dateline" continues. with dupixent, stay ahead of moderate-to-severe eczema. as you welcome the feeling of touch with clearer skin and less itch. the #1 prescribed biologic by dermatologists and allergists, helps heal your skin from within. severe allergic reactions can occur. get help right away for face, mouth, tongue or throat swelling, wheezing or trouble breathing. tell your doctor of new or worsening eye problems, like eye pain, vision changes, or blurred vision, joint aches and pain, or a parasitic infection. don't change or stop asthma or other medicines without talking to your doctor.

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>> reporting from philadelphia. >> el paso. >> and. >> the palisades, virginia. >> the palisades, virginia. >> from msnbc keith morrison (voiceover): sisters tiffany and tammy read, transfixed, the contents of an envelope prepared by their mother for them and clearly marked "baby pictures." but that is not what was in the envelope. instead, they found notes written by ken, apparently an assignment for an anger management class. it was actually a journal about all the different ways that he had abused her. keith morrison (voiceover): "i have spit at shirlene. i have yelled at shirlene. i have pushed shirlene." there it was, in his own hand-- evidence she left for you to find. yes. keith morrison (voiceover): and suddenly, their sisters truly believed their mom was sending secret clues that almost screamed, open in case of death. attempting to solve the mystery, they found a willing ally in detective cambra.

one plan they came up with together-- secretly recording a phone call with ken. tammy made the call from the police department. the strategy was for tammy to act friendly, supportive. keith morrison (voiceover): ken told tammy he was deeply concerned for shirlene. keith morrison (voiceover): but ken also said he was suspicious of tammy and her sister. keith morrison (voiceover): still, he spoke with tammy at length about the day. he said shirlene told him she took pills and seemed suicidal. keith morrison (voiceover): and then, after a pause,

he volunteered something that shocked them all. die. she said that? yeah. die. she said that? yeah. >> she sai keith morrison (voiceover): but then he returned to the point he made before. what a strange thing for him to say. he said a lot of strange things. keith morrison (voiceover): now the girls believed they had to move very fast while shirlene was on life support. as long as she was alive, they decided, they had the legal right to rummage through a garage in a house in california shirlene had kept, looking for evidence to use against ken. so they flew to the mainland. and that's where they were when ken gave consent to take shirlene off life support, and she died.

i remember thinking, i'm just bawling my head off again. so i was mortified, and i was devastated again that i wasn't there. keith morrison (voiceover): at shirlene's funeral, according to detective nick cambra, ken's eulogy sounded like a well-prepared criminal defense. well, he started with that shirlene initiated sex the night before, that she was happy that they were together. and then he started-- he went on to the next day and how he tried to prevent her from dying. keith morrison (voiceover): shirlene's daughters were horrified. now they were really determined to keep their promise to their mother they'd need to ensure that ken was charged with her murder. next to look at the case, prosecutor dan oyasato, who found ken's remarks about strangulation very disturbing. and here's why. this was viewed as an overdose. that's how this case went to the hospital. that's what tiffany and tammy were thinking.

that's what the police department was thinking. keith morrison (voiceover): and yet, as oyasato began to dig deeper, he found that ken talked about strangulation more than once. he brought it up with the medical examiner's investigator and was basically telling them this is not a strangulation case. keith morrison (voiceover): in fact, said the prosecutor, ken tried to persuade the examiner not to do an autopsy. but of course, there was one. the result took months, but sure enough, cause of death, said the medical examiner, brain damage due to ligature strangulation. when an arrest warrant was issued, detective cambra served it personally. how did he react? he said, "nick, you know i didn't kill my wife. i didn't kill my wife." keith morrison (voiceover): in 2002, two years after their mother's death, tammy and tiffany came back to hawaii, this time to the courthouse, where ken wakisaka went on trial for murder.

he took the life of another human being, and that human being was our mother. this was a murder by strangulation. it was domestic violence at its ultimate. keith morrison (voiceover): in his opening statement, prosecutor dan oyasato quoted from ken's own statements to accuse him of murder. can you tell if a person has been strangled during autopsy? these are the words of the defendant to an investigator from the medical examiner's office. keith morrison (voiceover): in court, the medical examiner repeated her opinion that shirlene was strangled, said she found ligature marks on her neck. and in court, the prosecutor played a tape of that recorded phone call with tammy, in which, sure enough, ken brought up the idea himself. i really believe this was ken's subconscious talking out. no one, not a soul, was thinking this was a strangulation case.

until he opened his mouth and-- until he brings this up. keith morrison (voiceover): that made everybody suspicious. every witness who testified as to having some contact with ken spoke about his unusual behavior. his focus was not on his wife. it was on other things. keith morrison (voiceover): but there is always a but. ken's defense attorney mal gillin accused the police and prosecutors of jumping to the wrong conclusions, rushing to judgment against ken. that ligature mark must have been made by the tube that lay on her neck while she was on life support. this wasn't a strangulation, he argued. it wasn't a murder at all. as ken had said all along, shirlene took an overdose. mrs. wakisaka, because of her various mental disorders or defects, committed suicide. keith morrison (voiceover): the trial lasted two weeks.

the jury heard detectives, doctors, shirlene's daughters, of course. ken himself chose not to take the stand. how did it seem to be going? it seemed to be going well. keith morrison (voiceover): as if here, their promise would be kept. but life, as everybody knows, is full of surprises. andrea canning (voiceover): coming up, the verdict would be swift, but the real stunner was what came after. nobody stood up and said, "i object, your honor"? it's amazing. andrea canning (voiceover): when "dateline" continues. billy: one second, grandma. this guy is going to buy my car. okay? grandma: you need carvana... entering plate number... grandma: no accidents, right? billy: no. grandma: generating offer... carvana can pick it up tomorrow! billy: that's an amazing offer. announcer: sell your car the easy way with carvana. i got this wow skin from olay body wash. it's new super serum: sink into my skin with 5 powerful ingredients. 5 benefits in 1!

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general election. >> the far. >> right alternative for germany party praised by president trump party praised by president trump and elon musk that welcome back to "dateline." i'm andrea canning. months before shirlene van gundy died, she asked her children to investigate should anything happen to her. now shirlene's husband, ken wakisaka, was on trial for her murder. prosecutors argued ken strangled his wife. the defense insisted she overdosed. ken was about to learn his fate. then a chance meeting would turn this case upside down. here's keith morrison with "the vow." keith morrison (voiceover): two tenacious daughters made a promise to their mother and were hoping to keep it. but now, it was up to 12 other people-- a jury. keith morrison: were you in the court when the verdict was read? yes. tell me about that. what a huge relief to hear those words--

"we, the jury, find ken wakisaka guilty of murder in the second degree." is-- it was amazing. keith morrison (voiceover): ken was, well, surprised would be an understatement. i didn't expect this at all. keith morrison (voiceover): but these two? i was a really happy girl. you know, i'm like, the system worked, you know? it worked. keith morrison (voiceover): ken, who still maintained his innocence, was sentenced to life in prison. and that would be it, end of story. except coincidence is such a strange and powerful thing, isn't it? it's a curious story the way you encountered this case, hm? yes, i was visiting another client who had been charged with murder. keith morrison (voiceover): defense attorney john edmunds doesn't normally find new cases in prison. but something seemed very credible about this particular client referral. he turned to me, and he said, you know, my cellmate, who's out in the rec yard right now, doesn't belong here. there's something really odd about his case.

would you look at it and see what you think? keith morrison (voiceover): so edmonds agreed to at least have a look at the record, a thick file of transcripts, hundreds of pages. and late one night, he was sitting up in bed beside his wife, reading every word said at ken's trial. and suddenly, there it was. eureka. and i get to the final argument. and the prosecutor makes a direct comment on mr. wakisaka's failure to take the witness stand. keith morrison (voiceover): this is what edmunds read. it's in prosecutor dan oyasato's final argument, his own words. "who was alone with her? he was alone with her. he was there. he would know. if he doesn't tell us, we can only look to shirlene and see what her body tells us." the fifth amendment privilege against self incrimination is a constitutional right that can be rendered meaningless if the prosecution gets to comment on it. and nobody stood up and said, "i object, your honor"? it's amazing. the trial lawyer said nothing.

the judge said nothing. keith morrison (voiceover): those five words, "if he doesn't tell us," would be the basis for edmunds appeal. the most serious offense is commenting on the failure to take the witness stand. but we're supposed to be professionals, and we're not supposed to make those kinds of mistakes. did you write your closing argument? i write an outline. i commit it to memory. so how did that line come out? keith morrison (voiceover): prosecutor dan oyasato said it was a mere slip of the tongue. what i was trying to do with that statement was actually transition from if he doesn't know, then we need to look at her body. we need to look at the rest of the evidence to tell us the story. keith morrison (voiceover): none of this seemed like such a big deal to shirlene's daughters. people file appeals all the time, i understand that. but i wasn't paying attention anymore because it was done. keith morrison (voiceover): oh, but it wasn't done. in 2003, a year after the trial and three years since shirlene's death, hawaii supreme court

handed down its decision. i got the call from dan oyasato, the prosecutor. and he said, "the verdict's been overturned." keith morrison (voiceover): overturned-- the guilty verdict the daughters so desperately wanted pulled out from under them, just like that. he goes, "it wasn't the evidence of the case. it was on the fifth amendment. it was prosecutorial misconduct. that's my fault." so he took responsibility for it right away. oh, instantly. instantly, the pain-- the pain that he felt because he worked so hard. it haunts me. i'll tell you right now, it haunts me, you know, that i did this. i have apologized i don't know how many times to the girls because of my error. keith morrison (voiceover): still, said the sisters, the ruling didn't mean ken was innocent-- far from it. even though the verdict was overturned, it was overturned on technicalities and not on any evidentiary issues. keith morrison (voiceover): and they found a small silver lining the supreme court

said ken could be retried. and so that left the door open for us to bring it back to trial. and we just needed to try again. keith morrison (voiceover): and so they took it upon themselves to pick up right where they left off. after all, a promise is a promise. i just remember thinking, ok, so we need to keep pushing. you can't quit because there is no other option because you can make a difference. keith morrison (voiceover): ken got out on bail but was still under indictment for murder. and they all waited for the new trial. and then once again, john edmunds put on his reading glasses. and what i found again stunned me. andrea canning (voiceover): coming up, a possible new witness. i couldn't believe it. i still don't believe it. andrea canning (voiceover): when "dateline" continues.

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mean, what was the reaction do you think about ice coming to knock on your front door team. >> for president trump's first 100 days? alex wagner travels to the story to talk with people most impacted by the policies. >> were you there on january? >> i was. >> there on january 6th. >> did it surprise you that you were fired, given how resolutely nonpartisan you have been? >> and for more in-depth reporting, follow her podcast, reporting, follow her podcast, trumpland with keith morrison (voiceover): ken wakisaka, convicted of killing his wife, shirlene, was out on bail, guilty verdict overturned thanks to an error discovered by ken's new defense attorney, john edmunds. but edmunds wasn't finished digging. and pretty soon, he found another error, a big one, that occurred even before the trial. there was a witness that the grand jury had asked to be called whom the prosecution didn't call. keith morrison (voiceover): thing is, it's an ironclad rule. if a grand jury asked to hear from a witness,

then prosecution must comply. didn't in this case. it wasn't a minor witness either, said edmunds, but someone in the position to know a great deal about what really happened to shirlene. the wakisakas had an upstairs room that they rented out to a guy. and he had been there and seen a lot of what went on that morning. keith morrison (voiceover): though the grand jury didn't hear from the roommate, detective nick cambra did. cambra asked him, what did shirlene say to ken on the day she died? the defense provided us with an excerpt of detective cambra's interview with the witness. she was asking ken to come here, you know, be by my side. she did say she wanted to die in peace-- testimony that seemed very much in ken's favor, testimony the grand jury that indicted him never heard. defense attorney edmunds again went to court. and again, he won. so tell me from a practical point of view,

what did those victories mean for ken? well, from a practical point of view, it meant that indictment got dismissed. keith morrison (voiceover): dismissed as if he'd never been charged in the first place. ken was no longer free on bail. he was simply free. and now we're back to a point as though the case never was brought in the first place. and-- and that's frustrating. how do you get your head around it? how do you process all of it? how do you move forward every day? keith morrison (voiceover): and how would they make the case against ken and persuade the state to start from scratch? ken's story had never changed, that shirlene killed herself accidentally or on purpose with an overdose of pills. of course, the state still had evidence, like that pill bottle the sisters said they found stashed in the backyard of the condo, as if ken fed the pills to shirlene and then tried to hide the bottle from the police. but defense attorney edmunds could show ken didn't try to hide anything, that, in fact, he took paramedics to the medicine

cabinet himself. they counted down tablets in a bottle of pills to see how many were left and how many-- tried to figure out how many she'd taken, which is what she said she had done. keith morrison (voiceover): and there was a potential new defense witness who knew shirlene well, didn't like her at all, in fact. and she has her own strange theory about what happened to shirlene. you get to know the people who are living in your building. yeah, that's true. keith morrison: yeah. keith morrison (voiceover): marjorie collier managed the condominium complex where shirlene and kent lived. unlike the daughters, marjorie considered shirlene the dominant, even abusive force in the marriage. she used to tell me that ken was the complete opposite of her, that he was very quiet and he would never argue with her or get into a fight with her. he'd leave the building. he'd just go for a walk. how did she feel about that? she didn't like it. keith morrison (voiceover): marjorie was on the scene april 5, 2000, after tammy called 911, urging emts to check on her mother. i went over to talk to the emt.

and he said, well she's awake and she's coherent enough to tell us that she's not coming with us. and i said, oh, ok. keith morrison (voiceover): remember in the official emt report, it was ken who said shirlene didn't need to go to the hospital. but marjorie insisted an emt told her it was shirlene who refused to go. so your memory of that's pretty clear? i'm positive. when you heard that ken was accused of strangling her-- i was absolutely shocked. i couldn't believe it. i still don't believe it. keith morrison (voiceover): but what does she believe about how shirlene died? well, just her speculation, of course, it was based on an incident that began, she said, when shirlene was making a fuss in the condo office. and she was being very pushy. and i went to shut the door, just to get her to go home because i wasn't even open yet. and the door hit her arm, and she spilled her cup of coffee. keith morrison (voiceover): next thing

marjorie knew, a police officer was threatening to arrest her. and i said, for what? and he says, for abuse. and i said, excuse me? and i looked at shirlene, and from her thigh, mid thigh all the way down to her feet, was burned, severely burned, more burned than you get laying out in the sun all day. was it from that coffee? that's what she said it was, but the police officer told me one cup of coffee won't burn both those legs like that. both legs were burned? yeah, but she burned her own legs. keith morrison (voiceover): in that case, marjorie believed, shirlene was willing to hurt herself just to frame marjorie. so when shirlene died-- what i thought, honestly, was that it was another ploy. and she had tried to make it look as if he was trying to kill her. and she went too far and accidentally killed herself. i think that that's marjorie's perspective.

do i think that she is correct in her opinion? no, absolutely not. keith morrison (voiceover): to shirlene's daughters, there was still no doubt about what really happened and what to do about it. i think your mother had a word, didn't she, that she liked. what was that word? tenacity. i just had to keep going. and here's the thing about keeping going. by doing something, in the process, i was honoring her. keith morrison (voiceover): tiffany filled a suitcase with documents that some prosecutor might find useful, hauled it back and forth the prosecution meeting, pushing for action for years. well, i kept going to hawaii for sure. i'm like, "pardon. hi, it's me again. my mom, what's going on with my mom's case?" keith morrison (voiceover): by this time, dan oyasato no longer worked at the honolulu county prosecutor's office. and the prosecutor who took over the case seemed reluctant to go forward.

but that wasn't going to stop shirlene's daughters, not for one minute. we had a guilty verdict. we need to move forward. we need to recharge. we need to indict. we need to go back to trial. keith morrison (voiceover): but it turned out a big surprise was coming, this time from the prosecution. andrea canning (voiceover): coming up, a whole new theory of the case, a change for prosecutors, a challenge for that promise. how long were you prepared to keep going with this? as long as it takes. we made a promise. andrea canning (voiceover): when "dateline" continues. for extra hydration. now there's blink neutral tears. it works differently than drops. blink neutral tears is a once daily supplement clinically proven to hydrate from within, helping your eyes produce more of their

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stores. just text mind keith morrison (voiceover): april 2014, tiffany and tommy returned to hawaii, where they marked a painful anniversary-- 14 years since their mother, shirlene, died. it's heartbreaking. why do you say heartbreaking? we've spent all these years trying to get justice. we made the promise to my mother that we'd investigate. therefore, it has to be. therefore, you can't quit. keith morrison (voiceover): the daughters thought they'd made good on their promise to find justice for their mother if anything happened to her when shirlene's husband was convicted in 2002 of murder by strangulation. but that verdict was overturned in 2003. and then ken's original indictment was thrown out two years later. you thought maybe a few months, and he would be back in court.

not a few months, i thought within a few years. keith morrison (voiceover): but the years just kept passing. ken moved on, though he still lived in the same condo. but tammy and tiffany said they couldn't move on. and they acknowledged it's been hard on them. tiffany young: i felt really bad for my family because it's not their mother. they didn't make the promise i did. because every time, i'm not there someone else has to cover all the things that i normally do. keith morrison (voiceover): tiffany especially made the trip to hawaii repeatedly. and kids and husband knew they were on their own whenever she rolled out the suitcase stuffed with case papers. still, they pushed on. we will get a conviction. and i will do everything i can possibly do in order to make that happen. keith morrison (voiceover): the case has dogged detective nick cambra, too. he's retired now, but he counts the years and wonders. do you perceive enthusiasm in the prosecutor's office to-- not at all. keith morrison: --go after this? not at all.

they would do so reluctantly. yes. keith morrison (voiceover): but why? if prosecutors won a conviction once, why not just do it again? at this point, it's not my decision. but what i can say is, provided the evidence was not suppressed and is still available, there is more than ample evidence to prove his guilt. keith morrison (voiceover): anticipating a new trial, defense attorney edmunds hired renowned forensic pathologist michael baden. and asked him, what is your opinion? was it strangulation or not? he said, absolutely not. he said, this is just wrong. keith morrison (voiceover): so the new prosecution hired its own experts. and well, it didn't go as planned. the new prosecutor on the case said that they had one or two forensic pathologists who agreed with dr. baden. keith morrison (voiceover): they agreed that shirlene wasn't strangled. these are prosecution experts. did that surprise you? it did. keith morrison: yeah. i don't think that they provided all the information that the expert need in order to make that determination.

keith morrison (voiceover): the prosecution announced in court in 2010, it was abandoning the strangulation theory, the very theory that got ken convicted in the first place. keith morrison: what did you think when they just dropped that theory? i was shocked. honestly, i was shocked. keith morrison (voiceover): the prosecutor declined to talk to us or share any information about the case. but in an email to the daughters from january 2014, he said his boss, the chief prosecuting attorney, referred to here by his initials, kmk, gave the green light to go forward. but go forward with what? a whole new theory they called murder by omission. keith morrison: what's your understanding of what murder by omission is? my understanding is that it's a duty of a spouse or a parent to get medical help for someone who can't get help for themselves. and if they die because of that, then you've

effectively committed murder. keith morrison (voiceover): in the email, the prosecutor told the girls, he just needed one or more experts to give the opinion that wakisaka's failure to perform his duty to provide timely medical care for shirlene caused her death. despite abandoning the strangulation theory, the prosecutor, in his email, now said he might actually bring it back, along with murder by omission, for a possible new trial. keith morrison: do you really think they will? have they? have they? no, they have not. they've done nothing. so what stage have you got to? believe it when you see it? absolutely. prove me wrong. show me that you're going to do something. quit leading us on to believe that you're going to move forward with a case that we've been hanging on to for 10 years. keith morrison (voiceover): defense attorney edmunds said he would knock down the prosecution's new omission

theory by pointing out that ken did try to get help for shirlene by calling 911. so far, there has been no move to charge ken. and it's not clear when or if there will be. by 2021, the wakisaka case file had been assigned to the maui county prosecutor's office. ken has maintained his innocence all these years, even as shirlene's daughter's quest to prove him guilty goes on. he's very troubled by it. is he living under a cloud now? he feels he is. he'll never really be at peace. now more people recognize him on the street. that's embarrassing. i miss her so much, tammy. tammy cocard: me, too. keith morrison (voiceover): call it a promise, a quest, an obsession. her daughter's journey isn't over.

keith morrison: how long are you prepared to keep going with this? as long as it takes. i mean, you could be sitting here an old lady. and years and years from now, nothing will have happened. we made a promise. we made a promise to our mom. it is with such purpose and such passion and such love that i do this. it is an honor of my mother. and i don't care if it's labeled obsession or crazy. i'm doing this because i love her. and she deserves it. that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm andrea canning. thank you for watching. ♪♪ ♪♪ this sunday, russian reset. president trump refuses to blame russia for the war in ukraine,