we were like sisters. i have a picture of her. she's laughing. that's how i picture her -- laughing. >> where is melissa? >> that's the million-dollar question. >> first she disappeared. >> i knew right then that she absolutely never made it into her house. >> then her wealthy boss did. >> we three kings be stealing the gold. >> melissa had had a three-week, you know, thing -- >> fling with the boss? >> a billion, billion and a half dollars. >> he told me he had gotten in over his head with not-so-nice people.

he said, if i don't get this taken care of, these people will put a beullet in my head. >> what was he afraid of? >> that he was next. >> no leads. couldn't connect the dots that she was in the garage with her friend? >> absolutely not. >> two shocking crimes. one for money, one for love. was there a connection? >> this had a twist to it. >> it's just so utterly -- so ugly and so wrong. >> she's dead because she was my friend. >> if you ask someone in town where the buzziest part of town is, they'll probably steer you to los alos boulevard. in the district is a penthouse office suite that once upon a time was home to a high-powered law firm. the boldest, brassiest bunch of politically connected lawyers in florida. the rothstein law firm.

view out to the ocean. >> from a few guys with law degrees to a juggernaut by the mid 2000s, with more than 70 attorneys led by scott rothstein. mike mayo was a columnist for the "ft. lauderdale "sun sentinel." >> he probably thinks i'm king of the world. >> and the firm is where melissa lewis, a by-the-book attorney found great success for herself and her clients. she was by all accounts a workaholic who loved what she did. no shrinking violet either. melissa loved these boozy, splashy office parties just as much as the other lawyers. she'd found herself a nice slice of the american pie. and that's the thing about 38-year-old melissa lewis. even as she raised her voice and glass with the senior partners, her sad end wasn't far off. and her unexpected death would get caught up in a chain of events right out of a john grisham novel.

in fraud. melissa lewis at the start of everything awful that followed. >> it ended up being the beginning of the end. >> missy, as her family called her, had some so far. penthouse lawyering wasn't likely for a restless high school dropout. her mother, lisa lapoint. here was a kid who didn't really finish high school. she got the ged ticket. >> correct. she didn't plan to be a high school dropout. she was in a hurry to get on with life. >> and focused enough finally to finish college, and in her late 20s, go for a law degree. she breezed past the younger students to become the prestigious editor of "the law review." she caught the eye of one of her professors, scott rothstein, who took her on as an intern. office manager debra vegas met her on the first day of work. what did melissa bring to the party? >> she was smart. capable. she was everything you would want in an associate attorney.

>> she was also one of the nicest people debra says she ever met. they were fast friends. >> we were like sisters. she knew all my faults and flaws. and she loved me anyways. >> reporter: debra and melissa saw the firm grow tenfold in just a few years. their greg aiarious boss, scott hob-nobed with big names in sports, politics, and business. even future presidents. fundraisers -- scott was your man. >> once your name gets out, you truly cannot imagine how many people knock on your door. >> the door scott knocked on was melissa's. >> melissa was the one, he knew she could handle it, she wouldn't let anything fall through the cracks. >> melissa specialized in employment law but volunteered her time for battered women and victims' rights. she also worked on building a memorial garden for crime victims. >> she was always a champion for the underdog. >> melissa eventually met a

lawyer from a different firm and married. debra was a bridesmaid. after five years, her best friend's marriage had come undone and ended in a messy divorce. >> that divorce just devastated her. >> after melissa's divorce, she took a second full-time job -- best aunt offer. carrie is her sister. she didn't want children? >> no. she didn't want to have children. she wanted her career. >> when her marriage was in trouble and hitting the rocks, separation, melissa was there for her, too. playing the same great aunt role for debra's four kids. the two became inseparable at work and outside the office. >> she's cooking for me and the kids, and we have movie nights on saturdays. >> after her divorce, a still-shaky melissa started dating a little, but work, not relationships, would occupy her front and center. eventually her diligence paid off.

firm, the former intern was made the first female partner. >> she shared with me early on that she hoped to be a judge one day. >> and debra had done well for herself, too. after all those years working ads as -- working as a paralegal and keeper of the supply cabinet, her boss promoted her to chief operating officer. not bad for someone who never finished college. things were going really well at the rothstein law firm. >> yes. yes. >> then came march 5th, 2008. just one week after melissa had been made partner. it was a wednesday night. debra tried to call her several times but got no answer. the next morning when melissa was a no-show at work, debra called her friend repeatedly but to no avail. then she got ahold of her sister, carrie. >> carrie was like me, oh, no, something's wrong. >> debra told her boss, scott, well-connected attorney that he was, he called a police officer he knew in plantation, florida,

where melissa lived. the officer agreed to meet debra and carrie at melissa's house. when they got there, everything seemed to be normal. nothing was tossed? >> no. the only thing amiss was in her garage. >> melissa's car, her caddy suv, was gone. they all clued to something bizarre -- a fine mist of what looked like orange spray paint throughout the garage. whatever the stuff was in the garage affect you? >> yes. i started coughing really bad. i said, that's pepper spray. >> pepper spray. like many women, melissa was known to carry a canister of it for self-protection. had she been attacked? had she used it? >> i knew right then that she absolutely never made it into her house. >> something had happened in that garage, something very disturbing. and it wasn't looking good for rising attorney melissa lewis. police find melissa's car, but melissa is isn't in it. where is melissa? >> that's the million-dollar question at this point.

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ft. lauderdale attorney melissa lewis was missing, and her friends and family were in a panic. she hadn't responded to phone calls and didn't show up for work. she's not one to take a mental health day. >> no. huh-uh, no. >> this is going to be a high-profile case. melissa's boss, scott rothstein, was a local attorney who had extra juice with police. plantation detective brian kendall -- >> he was our union attorney. they knew him. they were friends of his. >> at melissa's house, the mysteries piled up. her car was gone. and there was pepper spray all over her garage. melissa also had a dog, and there was pepper spray on the dog's face, as well. you're in foul play country with this investigation? >> our concern is raised greatly at this point that she is in some sort of danger. >> detectives wanted to know

the previous day at work. debra knew exactly -- a new brown pantsuit with pink pinstripes. sure enough, there she was captured on security cameras in her office lobby talking with another lawyer at 7:00 p.m. after leaving work, her sister carrie said she went to the supermarket. how do you know she'd gone to the supermarket? >> she actually called my daughter that night. she was the last one to speak to her. she said, "i'm going to publix." >> on video, there was melissa in the cosmetics aisle reaching for something on the shelf. later the cameras showed her leaving. documenting the start of her pathway to doom. you got a timeline and know what she's wearing? >> we have a timestamp and when we believe she arrived home based on the distance of the publix and distance of her house. >> it was probably around 8:30. from the pepper spray on the walls and floor, it appear the melissa came home and was attacked inside the garage. detectives also found a small button on the garage floor.

pantsuit. then one detective had an idea -- use the gps and security system in melissa's vehicle to locate it. >> it's a cadillac. cadillac has onstar. they're able to activate the onstar. tell us the location of the vehicle through gps. brought us right to this parking lot. >> the car was about a half mile from melissa's house in this medical office parking lot that melissa never went to. and through onstar, you can remotely open the vehicle? >> they were able to unlock the vehicle for house. >> inside the suv, disturbing clues. what do you find? >> we find a suit jacket that she was wearing the night before. on the suit jacket, there was a missing button. that's significant because the corresponding button was found on her garage floor. >> the jacket smelled of pepper spray, too. there were two shoes found in the car, but nothing else. melissa had been wearing a sterling silver ring, diamond earrings, and a $5,000 watch.

handbag and an iphone. could well be a target of some opportunistic grab and run. >> at the point we find her vehicle, we have no clues, no leads, and we don't have any suspects identified. >> police did find a tiny drop of melissa's blood in her car and on a tile in her house, but there were no fingerprints other than melissa's in either place. dna testing would take longer. now the question is, where is melissa? >> that's the million-dollar question at this point. >> two days after she went missing, a worker made a gruesome discovery as he was clearing debris from a water pump at a nearby canal. he's poking around with his rake? >> the first thing that comes to his mind is that's just a mannequin. then you realize it's a body. >> it was 38-year-old melissa lewis. the missing persons case was now a murder investigation. >> it's still a whodunit. we have no idea. >> workers discovered lewis' body in this plantation canal -- >> the news media quickly picked

he saw it on the news -- >> how did he tell you? >> he came to my work and told me. i just broke down. i couldn't believe it. >> police called the victim's best friend, debra. >> when they told me that they had found her body, i collapsed to the ground. >> your friend, melissa, was dumped in a drainage canal? >> this beautiful, wonderful person who was nothing but kind. >> when the medical examiner's report was completed, it showed she had been strangled. >> that is such a personal thing to do to somebody -- to have to look them in the eyes and do that. >> an up close and personal killing, no question. but those timeless questions of all investigations went unanswered -- who and why. a person of interest very close to home. >> i said, oh, no, he better not have done anything to her.

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hunt was on for a suspect in the strangulation murder of melissa lewis. the lawyer's body was found floating in a canal two days after she went missing.

look at the circles she moved in. was there something in the background of my victim here that accounts for what's happened to them? >> we don't think so. she doesn't live a high-risk lifestyle. she's a prominent attorney. she's safety conscious. you know, she carries her pepper spray. >> melissa specialized in people with gripes -- employment lawsuits. detectives couldn't find any history of bad blood between melissa and her clients or people she had sued. detectives talked to the ex-husband, but his alibi was solid. and then they looked at the current men in her life. what about boyfriends? she was a single woman who had been dating some guys. >> we assigned detectives to go out there, talk to them, and they were alibied out pretty quickly. >> of course, they also wanted to talk to melissa's co-worker and best friend, debra. >> who better to talk to than someone's best friend to find out their habits, what they liked to do. did she have strange men come to her home?

detectives. most nights melissa was at debra's house cooking for her and her kids or home with her dogs, george and gracie. still, they continued to pick debra's brain. >> annoying. you can't imagine the questions that they ask you. >> detectives also talked to melissa's sister, carrie. when asked who she thought might have done this, her reaction was immediate. >> i said, oh, no, he better not have done anything to her. >> who is he? >> my ex-husband because we had just gotten divorced. and he knew my sister -- he got served by her firm. >> you thought he -- if she's gone missing, he might have something to do with it? >> yep. she said that he had come to her house just -- kind of scared her. >> detectives found out he had a record, so they checked out the sister's ex. >> he was a subject of interest early on in the investigation. he came in. he consented to any type of questions we asked of him. he voluntarily answered them.

in the past. >> you haven't ruled him out yet? >> not yet. >> with a list of possible suspects shrinking, detectives shifted their focus to something that might provide their first break in the case. with melissa's iphone missing, detectives put in an emergency request to the phone company to see if it could help track her cell. when he got the report, detective kendall couldn't believe what he saw. melissa's iphone had been active after the murder, and someone had actually gone into her voicemail and played back messages, read texts. >> it makes sense as to why he would want to do something like this. >> police were dumbfounded that someone would know that a smartphone was a detective's best friend. and police could track them using cell towers. it was either bold or stupid or both. people know this concept. pinging off towers. it's the -- the cell phone is telling the towers here i am? >> yeah. it's giving us a -- a general

>> and the phone records showed that person had been on the move from the believed time of the murder into the next day. how important is the story told by the cell phone? >> very important. cell phone's like someone dropping pieces of popcorn, leaving a trail. >> the trail was a wide one. cell phone towers don't pinpoint exact locations. >> we know from the cell tower there is maybe a three, four-mile radius in the tower that we're looking for to figure out where the phone is. >> investigators believe miss was killed in her garage around -- melissa was killed in her garage around 8:30 p.m. from then, she went south from plantation eventually stopping in an area in miami gardens. >> from midnight until 5:00 a.m., the phone's in one location. >> thursday morning the phone went northeast to ft. lauderdale, then further north to pompano beach. shortly afterwards, it turned back toward ft. lauderdale. somewhere along the way, the signal was lost. either the battery died,r

killer dumped the phone. all told, by thursday, the day after the murder, the phone or whoever had it traveled a distance of about 60 miles. >> obviously who's with the cell phone was most likely the last person that was with melissa. >> detectives also focused on those five hours the phone was stationary in miami gardens. was the killer home in bed? >> to identify if melissa knows somebody who lives in this area. >> does anything come up at that point? >> no. we have no reason to believe anybody she's dating, anybody she knows lives there. >> melissa's family confirmed that. police asked everyone remotely involved in the case, and the answer kept coming up no. by now, police had also cleared the ex-husband of melissa's sister. didn't have a connection to the area either. but when they asked debra if she knew anyone who lived around there, her jaw dropped. she said she did know someone. >> i was like, i just do not think it was him. >> cops are funny -- they don't

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melissa lewis's cell phone was looking to be the key to unlock the miss tree of what happened to her -- mystery of what happened to her the night of the murder. >> the phone stayed with the person that we believe took melissa. >> now they were focused on miami gardens where the phone had been stationary for several hours after the murder. police ask ed melissa's best friend, debra villegas, if she knew anyone in the area. >> she says, "my husband tony, who i'm going through a divorce with." >> he was dumbstruck -- >> he'd have no reason to do anything to melissa. she had nothing to do with him.

he had met her a few times over the years, but we weren't social. >> debra told police she and tony had been married for 17 years and had four children. they had separated more than a year earlier. tony had then move into a house in miami gardens with a friend. for 20 years, he'd worked for florida east coast railways hauling freight. >> he basically drove a train for a living. >> police checked hip out on their computer. has he any priors? >> none. no priors. >> detectives went to talk to tony and recorded the conversation. >> how well did you -- do you know this -- debra's friend? >> i don't know her from her. i've seen her a few times. >> did you guys ever have problems maybe? something like that. >> never, never. i don't think i ever spoke to her more than two words. >> do you know if she's had anything to do with what you're going through now with debra? the divorce? >> i don't know. and i really don't care. i mean --

>> it wouldn't bother you if she did? >> the thing is i just want to get away from my wife. i just want to be at peace. >> then they asked him the question -- >> did you have anything to do with melissa's death? >> no. >> what tony didn't know is that before detectives spoke to him, they had obtained a copy of the train route he drove the day after the mother's day. guess what -- it match head the route travel -- matched the route traveled by melissa's phone. detectives confronted him with the evidence. >> her phone after it was stolen goes to the area of your house and stay thursday overnight and came to work with you the next day. traveled north with the train because the train has gps on it, doesn't it? >> uh-huh. >> it was on the train. okay? and unless someone else here knows melissa lives in your house, comes to work with you, you had the phone. >> okay. >> okay? listen, this -- i'll be honest

>> but i don't even know her. >> detectives searched tony's house, his car, and his train, but never did find melissa's phone. and there was still a missing motivational piece to this puzzle. why in the world would tony kill someone he barely knew? and yet, tonight said something during his interview that opened a window into a private side of his character. she was capable of intense jealousy when talking about his estranged wife. >> a few times i picked up my kids, she has guys in there. so -- i always told her, i don't like that -- flies on my meat. i love her. >> it wouldn't bother you if she was spending a lot of time with melissa? that wouldn't bother you? >> no, no. >> despite what tony said, detectives thought the crude comment had a broader meaning. speaking to the bff relationship of debra and melissa. does he feel like he's been tossed out because melissa has

>> i think he definitely believes that miss was a catalyst to enable debbie to go forward with the divorce. he kills melissa lewis to get back at debra for divorcing him. >> if you're lethally angry about an impending divorce, why not kill the wife? >> if he kills melissa and he's caught, debbie's still there to raise their kids. >> although tony would later deny it, debra told detectives he had been violent with her and her kids in the past. because of that, debra said, she had decided on her own that tonighty had to go. -- tony had to go. you thought he was going to physically hurt the kids? >> he was already physically hurting them. i was afraid he would go too far. >> why would he harm melissa? >> he couldn't connect the dots and put him in the garage with her friend? >> absolutely not. >> maybe senseless to the wife, but those dots were starting to connect for detectives. th e

suspicions with debra and how the evidence of the traveling iphone pointed to tony. >> i remember that i couldn't stand up, wasn't able to stand on my feet. >> melissa's murder was devastating and frightening for everyone at the law firm -- especially it seems for scott rothstein. only the week before rothstein was toasting melissa after making her a partner. now she was helping her family with funeral arrangements. melissa's aunt, lynn haverill, spoke at the memorial. >> i could look out from the podium and see a sea of lawyers out there -- >> including scott rothstein? >> including scott rothstein. >> who paid for the service? >> he came -- he came to the funeral home and paid for everything. >> three days after the funeral, detectives arrested tony villegas. he was charged with first-degree murder. >> he denied involvement in this. >> tony's attorney is bruce fleisher. >> they sought the death penalty. >> police and prosecutors were confident they had a solid case

something happened that threw the whole investigation into free fall. that's because new crimes were about to be revealed, and new questions were about to be raised about who really killed melissa. and in the midst of it all, scott rothstein, like melissa, would disappear. >> we three kings be stealing the gold. >> the dark secret buried beneath the rothstein riches. >> he set, "if i don't get this taken care of, these people are going to put a bullet in my head. " nders that can pass as mine, which is nice because i've got better things to do. peggy! i've finished his shoulder! millennials, am i right? no... oh, no. yes. dinner! introducing mcdonald's buttermilk crispy tenders. juicy, and made with 100% white meat. they're not grandma's... i'm ok with that! but she's ok with that.

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debra villegas' world had been turned upside down. her best friend, melissa lewis, had been murdered. and debra's estranged husband tony was charged with killing her. >> the people thought debra's psycho ex-husband has murdered melissa, you know. just overwhelmed with guilt and shame. >> melissa's murder weighed heavily on debra's mind, as well as the mind of her boss, scott rothstein. scott seemed to be rattled by something more than just melissa's murder. for some reason after tony's

arrest, rothstein beefed up his own security. who was he afraid? >> obviously that he was next. >> but if melissa's murder had been solved, why was scott still worried? debra knew it because she was privy to a secret that threatened to send even more people to prison and could destroy scott rothstein's reputation as a high-profile mover and shaker. >> he could pick up the phone and call and make things happen. >> a walk through his office left no doubt. his hero wall was plastered with him and pictures with politicians, movie moguls, and more. it had been a heady ride for a boy from the bronx, by no means shy about his success and how he got there. >> that's right, we're breaking [ bleep ]. we're not going to break it, who is? >> he had his trophies for sure. a waterfront mansion with an 87-foot yacht out back. his fleet of cars included a

maserati, and lamborghini. his wrist always flashing an expensive watch from his collection. why did he want all that stuff? >> he wanted people to look at him and say "that's a successful guy, and he knows everybody." >> rothstein's success and bling had caught the eye of "senty sentinel" reporter mike mayo. >> i asked how is the firm making the money? he said, is we came one a formula where we're settling before trial. >> the cases were age and sex discrimination lawsuits. rothstein figured out a way to file the cases without the firm paying to do it. instead he found investors willing to fund the lawsuits. they were promised a fantastic return for their investments once the cases were settled. attorney sam raybin represented a business that invested in scott. >> the investor would give $5 million to rothstein. he in turn would tell the investor i'm going to give you $6 million in six months.

big problems, as debra learned about a week before melissa was murdered. >> told me he was in trouble. he had gotten in over his head with some not-so-nice people. he said, if i don't get this taken care of, these people are going to put a bullet in my head. >> scott then asked her to cross the line and forge signatures on documents. >> i knew this was not supposed to be going on, but it was going to be a one-time thing. >> it wasn't. scott asked debra, his chief operating officer, to do it again and again. the reason -- the cases were made up, phonies, and the forged documents were used to fool investors. >> the settlements were not real. >> there was no client. >> the cases were fabricated. >> it turned out it was all a ponzi scheme. mr. high-flyer scott rothstein didn't use investor money to file lawsuits. instead he used money to fund his champagne-and yachts lifestyle. >> we three kings be stealing the gold. >> in the end, it would be the largest ponzi scheme in florid

how big did it get? >> ballpark, a billion, billion and a half dollars. >> and then halloween eve, 2009. more than a year had passed since melissa's murder with tony villegas still sitting in jail awaiting trial. and another twist to the story. >> scott rothstein has disappeared. >> unlike melissa, scott was not a murder victim, but he was a fugitive. a bernie madoff figure on the run. he'd left the country in a private jet for morocco with $16 million in cash and his collections of watches and jewelry, fleeing after learning on happy investors had gone to the fbi. one week later he was back in florida but not under arrest. what no one knew was that scott had cut a deal with the fbi to act as an informant. >> this is scott rothstein, november 16th, monday, 1:43 p.m. >> he wore a wire and helped convict 26 people involved in his ponzi scheme.

and despite his cooperation, in 2010, he was sentenced to 50 years in prison. but one big question emerged -- speculation about that woman in the firm who had been killed. >> whether melissa knew about the ponzi scheme is one of those great mysteries. >> scott had started his ponzi scheme three years before melissa was murdered. >> is it time to take a fresh look at the whole melissa lewis murder? is there something more sinister? >> detective brian kendall now had a whole new problem with his fairly straightforward case against tony, the jealous treen engineer. is there woman melissa killed because she knew too much? >> we thought we had the solid buttoned up case. then the scott rothstein, ponzi scheme comes into play. >> the fbi combed through the files looking into a melissa rothstein-ponzi link. >> they spent a week going through every inch of the case

connection to scott rothstein. >> with all these messy complications, tony's defense attorney, bruce fleisher, thought about two words -- reasonable doubt. >> a lot of people thought that because of the rothstein ponzi scheme, that he had something to do with the murder of melissa lewis. >> and debra villegas was back in the hot seat herself, being grilled by homicide detectives who bluntly asked her about scott, the ponzi scheme, and melissa's murder. she had her lawyer with her this time. >> is melissa aware of anything that scott was involved with -- i'm going to use the term "ponzi scheme"? >> no. >> then the questioning got more direct. >> any discussion between you and scott about having melissa killed? >> absolutely not. >> are you aware of any discussion or conspiracy to hire tony for melissa lewis' murder? >> no. before i would have let him kill miss ai would have let him move -- melissa, i would have let him move back into my house. that's the biggest regret i have in all of this. >> detectives learn one new thing about melissa and scott -- so

>> she had an inappropriate relationship with -- >> with scott? >> melissa had had a very, very brief, like a three-week, you know, thing -- >> fling with the boss? >> god, melissa, that so doesn't matter. >> but it had been years before when melissa was first hired out of law school. detectives discounted it saying it had nothing to do with melissa's murder and was not relevant. and of course, rothstein himself was grilled about melissa lewis' murder during depositions and civil suits brought by the investors. >> we asked him directly whether or not he was involved in any way in the homicide, and he vehemently denied it. >> how did he take it? >> he was igdignant, but he was always a great actor because he was a sociopath. >> in the end, neither the police nor the fbi could connect melissa's murder to rothstein and his ponzi scheme. so what happened to his loyal aide debra? she pleaded guilty to money laundering, and the judge came down hard. you went away to federal prison? >> i did. with a ten-year sentce

>> the sentence was later reduced to four years. meanwhile, years had gone by, and debra's ex-husband tony still hadn't gone to trial for murder. he sat in jail all but mute. his lawyer claiming a malady that might prevent him from ever seeing a judge and jury. finally, eight years after melissa's death, a trial. but what would a jury make of such a strange murder? >> you have the domestic homicides all the time. but this had a twist to it.

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a funny thing happened to tony villegas on the way to the courtroom. he'd exhibited bizarre behavior and stopped communicating with his attorneys and was declared mentally incompetent to stand trial. still in custody, he was in and out of treatment facilities for years until doctors found him competent again. finally in the summer of 2016, eight years after the murder, tony went on trial.

>> tony villegas, the defendant in this case -- >> prosecutor shari taitt argued in a jealous race, he followed melissa into the garage and launched a brutal attack on his wife's best friend. >> it is a hands-on, personal murder. it takes sometime. it takes premeditation. and why? because she was a friend. >> but the residue of pepper spray all over the garage was evidence that melissa had fought back. and some had apparently gotten on the killer. tony's housemate testified the night of the murder he saw his roomy scrubbing his arms. >> he said that he got pepper is spray on him and that his hands were burning and itching. >> an expert on cell phone tracking told the jury tony had melissa's phone and his own personal phone with him the night of the murder, and the next day when he was driving his train.

back south along the railroad. >> but now prosecutors had to tackle the head-scratching question of motive. why would tony kill melissa in the first place? debra villegas testified thy ei tony became very jealous and angry with melissa because she'd virtually replaced him in the household. >> was melissa helping you through this difficult time in your life now through this divorce? >> yes, ma'am. >> and that was the theory -- in order to get back at debra, he killed her best friend. >> you have the domestic homicides all the time. but this had a twist to it because he didn't kill debra. >> then tony and debra's 23-year-old son caleb was called to testify against his father. the usual blank stare on tony's courtroom face changed as the son recalled how his father blamed melissa for the divorce. >> did he tell you that it was melissa's fault? >> he believed that she had a part in it, yes. >> okay.

did he tell you that he was mad at melissa about this? >> yeah, he was mad about the whole situation. >> oh, and there was one more thing. remember melissa's jacket, the one found in her suv? tests showed tony's dna on the jacket. prosecutors believe tony wiped his nose with it after being pepper sprayed. >> the odds of finding an unrelated individual with that profile are rarer than one in 30 billion. >> you couldn't have better evidence than if you had a movie of him killing her. >> right. >> the defense had been dealt a poor hand to play. attorney bruce fleisher chipped away at each state witness, starting with tony's housemate. the guy with the "scrubbing away pepper spray" story. the defense said he had 250,000 reasons to make his story up. >> there was a reward offered -- >> yes. >> who offered that reward? >> scott rothstein. >> how much was the reward in the case? >> $251,000. >> ironically, he never got the reward

ponzi scheme put an end to that. and as for the prosecution's theory of motive, fleischer argued it was as thin as it was nonsensical. >> you would think that if you were so enraged that your wife were doing this that you would want to harm her and not someone else. >> as for debra villegas, defense attorney fleischer surprised everyone when he didn't ask her a single question. but he did go after the son, caleb, challenging him as to why he sat for so long on this story about his father badmouthing melissa. >> you didn't tell your mother about that when you first heard about that, did you? >> no. i didn't see any relevance. >> and when you spent time with him, things were good? >> yes. >> okay. you love your dad? >> yes. >> would jurors notice the tear rolling down tony's cheek? so on to the scientific evidence, the cell phone first. lawyer fleischer found a mistake in a chart the state's expert had used.

was the expert analysis, in fact, sloppy? if you're such a hot-shot expert -- >> right. >> how does this error -- >> he said mistake. >> the same for the dna evidence. attack the credibility of the analysis. the defense said that dna results returned within a few days were rushed through the police lab because of rothstein's connections. attorney fleischer also suggested there could have been cross contamination to tilt the scale so the results pointed at tony. >> our goal was to educate the jury on the rothstein connections and the rothstein influence. >> had meddled with the physical evidence? contaminated it maybe? >> we can only speculate, but when a man is as powerful a guy as rothstein was, people would think that they could do things. they could conjure up dna. >> and use it to frame tony villegas. before the defense rested, the judge asked tony villegas if he wanted to testify.

silent? >> silent, sir. >> in closing arguments, prosecutor tate said all the evidence pointed to tony. the pepper spray, cell phone records, and the dna. >> there is not one other person on the planet earth that could leave the doona on this jacket. >> the defense reminded jurors that the pepper spray evidence was weak and that dna and phone records could be manipulated. >> the pieces of the puzzle do not fall into place because reasonable doubt prevents them from falling into place. >> the jury now had the case. outside the courtroom, debra villegas so melissa's family for the first time in eight years. >> all these years later, and it washed over me like it had just happened. you know, that -- that i caused these people a kind of pain that's unimaginable. >> later that afternoon, the jury sent out a note -- verdic

sat with melissa's family, consoling her niece. >> tony villegas is guilty of murder in the first degree. >> tony's face was blank. before sentencing, melissa's aunt, lynn haberill,ed the co a the court and said directly to tony -- >> we forgive you because we must and release you into god's hands for all eternity. >> sentencing was immediate. >> spend the rest of your natural life in state prison. >> after tony was led out of the courtroom, melissa's family went to his people and hugged them, then all cried together. >> my heart broke for them. it is a legacy for their family. >> melissa's own legacy is something called the garden of reflection. before her murder, she'd worked for victims rights and raised money to build it. now her name is inscribed there, too. the victim, as prosecutors told it, that in the end had nothing to do with knowing too much aba

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