All language subtitles for Accident.Suicide.or.Murder.S06E01.1080p.WEB.h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

♪♪

-A devoted family man makes
an unsettling discovery.

-Normally, his wife would
have been up when he got home,

but he couldn't get her
to wake up.

-EMS tried to revive
Diana Burrow,

but no success.

She is pronounced dead
at the scene.

-That morning I got a call.
It was my dad.

He said, "You need
to come to the house.

Your mom is -- is dead."

-But in this small town,

rumors don't stay buried
for long.

-The Burrows were
well known in the community.

-Sometimes rumors are true.

It made me feel kind of uneasy

because we assumed that
she had died of natural causes.

She's buried.

I wanted to get past this.

-Exhuming the body
was not an easy task.

-I couldn't believe it.

They wanted to pull her body
out of the ground

and find something?

I didn't think so.

-Was this a cruel twist of fate

or the perfect cover for murder?

-[ Crying ]

-I thought she had died
peacefully,

but I don't think it was
peaceful at all.

♪♪

♪♪

-On a Friday in March of 2011,

a call came in to the
St. Pauls Police Department,

where a man was reporting
that his wife was unresponsive,

that he could not wake her.

-My main function was
to investigate all crimes

inside of the town.

So I rushed on over
to the residence.

-When Officer Seago arrives,

the scene immediately
feels different.

After nearly a decade
protecting this town,

these aren't strangers.

They're people
he's known for years.

-When I walked up
to the front door,

Ms. Diane Burrow was laying
on the floor.

63 years of age.

And Steve Burrow,
which was the husband,

was trying to do CPR.

Steve was 57 at the time.

It's a small town,
so I knew both of the Burrows.

They had been living there
for a long time.

At that time, the EMS from
St. Pauls arrive on the scene.

I'm noticing Steve Burrow
is very frantic.

He's very upset.
He's very shaking.

He doesn't know exactly
what happened to his wife.

He stated several times that
she has some medical conditions.

I'm looking at her

as the medical team
are trying to resuscitate her,

and as she's laying
on the floor,

you can see that she has
a small cut

to her left upper eye
above her eyebrow.

That kind of raises my suspicion
quite a bit.

-EMS tried to revive
Diana Burrow,

but no success.

She is pronounced dead
at the scene.

♪♪

-I'm thinking
of what might have happened.

It could be foul play.

Did someone
come into the house,

or did something happen
where she had a fall?

Or was it her husband, Steve?

You have to look at everything.

I speak with Mr. Steve Burrow
in depth.

He stated
that he worked night shift.

-He had been working
up in Fayetteville,

about 30-plus minutes
up the road,

working the night shift
as a clerk up there

at one of the motels.

-He had just got home
from work,

came home around 7:00 a.m.
in the morning.

That's when he noticed that his
wife was sleeping on the couch.

-Normally, his wife would have
been up when he got home,

but she was just laid
in a very relaxful,

peaceful state
with a blanket over her.

And that's when he noticed
that she was cold.

Then he could not revive her.

He couldn't get her
to wake up.

-Mr. Burrow then called 911,

and the 911 dispatcher
advised Mr. Burrow

to do chest compressions on her.

That's when I arrived.

I asked Mr. Steve Burrow

who had done that scratch
to the top of her head.

-He had responded by saying

that his wife had had
some health conditions.

She had heart-related issues.

There was some pain issues
she was having with joints.

She had been on a number
of medications,

and she had been
pretty unsteady at times.

She had fallen several times.

It could have been her falling,
hitting something.

-I said,
"Did she have it last night?"

And he says, "I don't remember."

-Police lean toward believing
the cut on Diana's head

came from a fall brought on
by her failing health,

but they continue
searching the home,

looking for any other signs
of foul play.

-We look around the house,
look around the property.

-They found
absolutely nothing.

The only thing that was noticed

was that abrasion
above her left eye.

Usually when you have something
such as domestic violence,

that one abrasion,

you're gonna also see
maybe some other signs.

You're gonna see some disarray.

There was nothing else there.

And there's absolutely
no prior reports

of domestic violence
involving Mr. and Mrs. Burrow.

-You always have to consider
the husband,

but looking at Steve Burrow,
with him being so upset

and being very distraught at
the time when he finds his wife,

you can pretty much tell people
that are playing the part

instead of being
what they really are.

-But suspicions linger.

If not foul play, then what?

-Steve advised me that she's
on several medications.

He shows me a few
of the medications

that she was taking
at that time.

-They looked into the
possibility she took an overdose

of the medication.

Maybe this was an attempt
on her part to just go ahead

and end her life because of
the multiple issues she had.

-Steve said
that there was no way

that she would commit suicide.

-Everybody,
not only within the family,

but other people
in the community,

supported the fact
that she was very happy.

-The Burrows, they were
well known in the community.

-I had been over
at the house several times,

just speaking in general.

Diana always helped
other people, no matter what.

She was a good Christian lady.

-She had still been active,
out helping people.

She did not seem to be
any different in her behavior.

So there was no red flag
there either.

-This beloved wife and mother
of three is gone,

her death leaving behind
a broken family,

including her 37-year-old son
Ronald.

-That morning I got a call.
It was my dad.

He said, "You need
to come to the house.

Your mom is -- is dead."

So I go down there
and the cops are there,

and, um,
she was laying on the floor.

It was unreal.
I mean, it was really unreal.

And probably five minutes
after that,

my sisters, Tiffany and Crystal,
come over.

They were really distraught,

but we thought
she died peacefully.

Mom's name was Patricia.

Most people called
her Diane or Diana.

Mom and Dad met
when Dad was going to school.

They were married right before
I was born in '73.

We moved to St. Pauls
my kindergarten year

of elementary school,
which was '79.

Then Tiffany was born
four years later.

Crystal was born
four years after that.

-By all accounts,
it was a happy marriage

and raised three children,
lived, you know --

mind-their-own-business people

that looked out
for their neighbors

and people knew and liked.

-Dad was gone a lot.
He worked full-time,

went to school full-time.

So, really, growing up,

you didn't see Dad a lot,
other than Sundays.

So Mom -- she took care
of everything on the home front.

Her father had passed away.
He was fairly young.

He died of a heart attack

and was in fairly good health
up until the day he died.

So based off her health,

we thought it was heart disease
or a heart attack.

We just thought it was
natural causes.

♪♪

-Preliminary investigation
revealed

that Ms. Burrow had extensive
medical problems and issues.

-Steve said no autopsy
would be done.

So heart disease is
what they ruled her death as.

If an autopsy was not completed,

it's not always looked at.

-When you have somebody
with medical condition,

if you've got a long history,

it's real easy to just write it
off as just a medical situation.

Oftentimes, the doctor
will sign off on it.

-Law enforcement determined
it to be natural causes.

So it was closed out
at that point.

There was nothing else
more done.

-And we just started
preparing for her funeral.

-Two days later, the community
gathers to say goodbye.

-The church was packed
that day.

To see the outpouring
of support from the community

at her -- at her funeral,

I didn't expect that many people
to be there.

At the funeral,
I really hadn't grieved any

until I heard my --
my nephew behind me.

He started crying,
and that's when I lost it.

Yeah.

♪♪

And then life went on.

-Nearly two weeks pass

after Diana's
apparent natural death

before a terrifying rumor
is brought to police.

-On March 22nd,
a local mail carrier

comes forward with some
very interesting information

that really does turn
the death of Ms. Burrow

in a completely different
direction.

♪♪

-These items were stolen out of
Ms. Diana Burrow's house.

-Sounds like a fantastic story.

It sounds almost too good
to believe.

♪♪

♪♪

-Two weeks
after Diana Burrow dies,

the local mail carrier
delivers a shocking rumor.

-The mail carrier delivers
in the area

not only of where
Mr. and Mrs. Burrow lived,

but also
in the surrounding area as well.

-The mail carrier relays
to the police department

that she's heard a rumor

that Ms. Diana
was actually smothered.

She doesn't know many
more details other than that,

but she said
that is a rumor out there.

-As much as anyone knows,
living in small communities,

rumors fly about everything.

-Rumors are always
a part of an investigation.

It can come apart.

But sometimes rumors are true.

And so I made it a point
that I was going to investigate

and figure out who
would want to hurt Ms. Diana.

-A large hurdle stands in the
way of a proper investigation.

-The difficulty
that presents to law enforcement

is no autopsy was performed.

They didn't do any type
of crime-scene work,

things such as photographs,
swabs, samples.

So law enforcement decides
they need to follow up

on every avenue
and every possible path.

-Police start by looking
at Diana's husband,

Steve Burrow.

-You always look
at the family members,

and you always look at the
closest person to Ms. Diana.

But Steve was squeaky clean.

He had nothing
in his background,

no history of violent crime
nor domestic violence.

-Police look closer at
Steve's alibi for the evening.

-Steve was a clerk at a motel.

-He stated
that he worked night shift.

So I went to his workplace,
spoke with the supervisor,

where they advised
that he was at work,

that he had been there.

So it ruled him out.

So you look at
the grandchildren,

you look at the son,
you look at the daughters.

All of them
had been ruled out at that time.

-Everybody had an alibi.

Everybody was somewhere else
that was verified.

-The investigators did look into
her life-insurance policies,

and there was nobody gonna
gain financially on her death.

Steve had no motive whatsoever.

-Police felt comfortable
at that point

clearing Mr. Burrow as well as
any other members of the family.

-At that time,
my daughter said,

"Are they thinking you had
something to do

with Mama's death?"

It kind of made me feel
kind of uneasy

because, first, I knew
I hadn't done anything,

and secondly, we assumed that
she had died of natural causes.

She's buried.

I wanted to get past this.

She was well-liked.

She didn't make any enemies.

The farthest thing from my mind
was that someone had killed her.

-After police complete
a canvass of the neighborhood

around the home
and questioned Diana's friends,

they find the rumors
regarding the beloved neighbor

and mother go nowhere...

...until two and a half
weeks after Diana's death,

when another 911 call comes in
from the Burrow house.

-I was on the road,
so I respond to

a breaking and entering
at Mr. Burrow's house.

When I arrive on the scene,
Steve was very upset.

He was going through a lot.

We start speaking,
and Mr. Burrow explains to me

he had just come home
from night shift.

-When I came in the house,

first thing I noticed
was a cabinet was open,

and I knew that
I never opened that cabinet.

And then I started
looking around

and I seen
her wedding ring was stolen,

her mother's ring was stole,

her cellphone was missing,
and her medication.

-Macaroni and cheese, also,
out of the 'frigerator.

I start looking at how

the person
came into the residence,

walked around from the back
of the house.

The grass hindered
any kind of footprints.

All of his windows
had screens on them except one.

The screen was taken off
from it.

-The person gained entry
into the home

through a rear window
in the bedroom.

That screen was found
after a neighbor commented

to one of the police officers
at some point

that she had found a screen
beside her house,

but they did not find any
forensic information in the area

that is helpful for the case.

-Steve mentioned that the screen
was possibly missing

the time that Ms. Diana
had been found deceased.

-I knew the screen was missing
because my daughter

and my daughter-in-law
was talking to each other

through the window
on that Monday,

and the screen was missing then.

But I still didn't
put anything together.

-At this time, I'm thinking,
what's going on here?

It could have been two separate
items that had occurred,

but as a detective,
you look at every aspect

from the break-in
and her death

to see if it was correlated.

-Why is this happening,
you know?

My wife died.
My house gets broke into.

You know, what else
is gonna happen?

-Just hours later,

a violent incident
close to the Burrow home

forces detectives
to rethink everything.

-Ironically, on the same day
that Steve reports

the break-in at his house,
another 911 call comes in

reporting two men fighting

in the neighborhood
around the Burrow home.

-As I arrive, I see two men
in the front of a house.

It's Daniel Johnson --
he's 27 years of age --

and his brother Jason Johnson,
28 years of age.

They live at the residence.

Daniel Johnson and Jason Johnson
are very well known

to the St. Pauls
Police Department.

-They were well known
for stealing anything.

Honestly,
if it wasn't nailed down,

the Johnson boys were
gonna steal it.

-At that time,
I see Daniel Johnson

punches Jason Johnson,

and he starts running
into the house

as he sees me going after him.

I was able to get the suspect
in custody.

Then at the patrol car,
after patting Daniel down,

I reached into his pocket

and found a pill bottle

with Diana Burrow's name
on it.

♪♪

♪♪

-Police in North Carolina
have just witnessed

Daniel Johnson assault
his brother Jason.

After placing Daniel in cuffs,
they discover items connected

to his deceased neighbor,
Diana Burrow.

-In his front pants pocket
is found a pill bottle

with the name
Patricia Diana Burrow.

-He also dropped a ring,

and he had a cellphone
in his hand.

These items were the exact same
things recently reported stolen

out of Ms. Diana's Burrow house.

So the first thing I'm thinking
of is that Daniel is the suspect

that broke into this residence.

-Daniel is also the one

who Officer Seago observes
hit Jason.

And because of that,
Daniel is taken into custody,

and his brother Jason
is free to leave at that point.

-Daniel was charged
with breaking and entering,

larceny after breaking
and entering,

and possession
of stolen property.

He is also charged with
the assault on Jason Johnson.

My mindset is that he has
just broken into this house,

but I'm looking at every avenue
that came about in that case.

Maybe this was a connection
with the rumors

that were going around about
what happened to Ms. Diana.

-As a result
of the arrest of Daniel Johnson,

law enforcement contacts Steve
and tells him

that they want him to come down
and to look at some things.

-We identify some of the items
that were stolen.

At that time,
we knew that Daniel and Jason

was known
for breaking and entering.

They'd been in trouble
so many times,

we figured it wasn't gonna be
a whole lot done about it.

Daniel and Jason --
they lived next to us

since they were young boys,

and they had been in trouble
from a very young age.

Diane was very kind.

She would do anything
for anybody she could.

She would give 'em some money
to buy food with.

She would help out
even Daniel and Jason's mom.

Jason was always
very polite to us.

Daniel kept much to his self.

-Mom -- she would refer to
Daniel and Jason as "them boys."

"Them boys did this,"
or, "Them boys did that."

They didn't have a lot,
but she tried to help out.

Give them her cellphone
all the time.

I'd go down there
and she'd be like,

"I gotta get my cellphone
back from them boys."

I said,
"Who's got your cellphone?"

She said, "Jason and Daniel.

I let him use it and they
haven't brought it back."

I said, "Do you want me
to go get it?"

She said, "No, I'll get it.

I'll get it later on.
It's fine."

My mom --
she was always nice to 'em,

never said anything bad
about Daniel and Jason.

To find out that one of these
kids has my mom's jewelry

and a pill bottle of hers,

I-I couldn't believe it.

-We learned
Daniel and Jason Johnson

would always come by the house,
and Diana would give them money.

She would give them food.

-Any link between
the boys next door

and the rumors about
Diana's death seems far-fetched.

Still, police sit down with
Daniel for a formal interview,

intent on learning why
he would steal from a neighbor

who had shown him nothing
but kindness.

-Daniel was asked the reason
why the fight occurred,

and he stated
that Jason had ripped a chain

off his girlfriend's neck,

and that's where the fight
occurred.

I asked where he got
these items,

but he would never
tell me exactly

where all the items came from.

-With Daniel refusing to talk,

all police can point to
are a series

of unsettling coincidences
involving the Burrow family.

But just a day later,

an unlikely person steps
forward with information

that could link
the recent incidents.

-Another interesting twist
comes into this investigation

hen Daniel and Jason's
mother, Melinda Harding,

shows up
at the police department.

-She comes in
real cordial, polite.

I could tell
that she had a lot on her mind.

She said that she was the mother
of the two young men

who oftentimes got into trouble.

And she said
she just had some stuff

that was heavy on her heart.

She wasn't sure
if it was true or not,

but she has information
on her son.

♪♪

♪♪

-Melinda Harding
has approached police

with troubling information about
her sons and their connection

to their recently deceased
neighbor, Diana Burrow.

-Melinda recounts
that her youngest son, Daniel,

was really sensitive,
and Daniel drinks all the time.

She described him
as an alcoholic.

He was drinking one night,

and she said that when
he drank excessively like that,

he would want to talk
and just bare himself.

That's when Ms. Melinda knew
what he was trying to get to.

-So Melinda proceeds
to tell law enforcement

that Daniel told her that his
brother Jason confessed to him

that he had murdered
Diana Burrow.

-Melinda explains
that Jason sold the jewelry

to Daniel's girlfriend,

and it was this transaction
that triggered the fight

that ended in Daniel's arrest.

-To have someone's mother
come in and to actually say,

"No, it's not Daniel.
It was Jason.

Daniel told me he confessed,"

absolutely shocks
law enforcement.

She would not have come in
to do that

unless she believed, number one,

that Daniel was being truthful
with her, and number two,

that her son was capable
of doing that.

-After Agent Williams wraps up
with Daniel's mother,

he turns his attention back
to Daniel,

hoping the secrets she revealed
will finally compel him to talk.

-After my interview
with Melinda Harding,

her younger son, Daniel Johnson,

he comes in my office
and I interview him.

He agreed to talk to me,
but he really didn't want to.

And I kept going at him.

I said,
"I know you know something

because you told your mother.

Tell me what you told
your mother."

And finally he began
to talk to me.

-Daniel finally broke down
and confessed to them

what Jason had confessed to him.

-Daniel said he and Jason
were drunk or high.

Jason, when he gets high,
he starts to,

you know, run his mouth a lot.

And he mentioned what
he had done to Ms. Diana.

-Daniel tells law enforcement

that Jason held his hand down
over her

until she stopped breathing.

[ Daniel crying ]

-Sounds like
a fantastic story.

It sounds almost too good
to believe.

-Police hold off
on interviewing Jason,

despite the fact
that both his brother and mother

have accused him of murder.

-It's very calculated not to go
to Jason Johnson at this time.

-You want to gather
as much information as you can,

because when you do sit down
and talk to him,

you want to have
all your ducks in a row.

So even if it means not talking
to that particular suspect

for a long time,
you just take your time

and gather your information.

-One of the things
we continuously considered

was that Daniel was
not telling us the truth.

His credibility was
very suspect.

And so most of everything
that we heard,

we needed corroboration.

-For those who knew Jason,
he was a petty thief.

He wasn't known to be violent
or aggressive in that nature.

So we really still weren't sure

if he was capable of doing
what we thought he may have.

-Still, the issue, though,
looming out of all this

is the fact that we still
don't know how Ms. Burrow died

and whether or not
it's a result of natural causes

or it's a homicide.

-Detectives are now zeroing in
on two suspects,

Daniel and Jason,
but without proof

that Diana's death was anything
more than heart failure,

they make a bold decision.

-We still have no way of
knowing what happened to Diana.

So at that point in time,

the decision was made
from us meeting

that we needed
to exhume her body.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-In the months
following Diana Burrow's death,

law enforcement have decided to
exhume her body for an autopsy.

They want to know
if she died of natural causes,

or was it something
more nefarious?

-We did know exhuming the body
was not an easy task.

It can take a long time.

-If we were able to get
the exhumation approved

and ordered by the court.

At that point then, we reached
out to the Burrow family,

brought them up to speed
on everything that had happened.

-And they told me
that they had heard rumors

that Jason had killed my wife.

It was a shock to me,

and I was kind of, you know,
taken back.

The police said, you know,
they really had no evidence.

So the only way they could do it
is exhume her body.

I wanted to find out the truth,

to find out
if she died of natural causes

or if she was murdered.

So I want her body exhumed.

-When I first heard that they
were exhuming her body

for a possible murder,
I couldn't believe it.

At that point, I still believed
she had died of natural causes.

Are they going to pull
her body out of the ground

and find something?

I didn't think so,
not from what I saw.

But I'm not
a medical examiner either,

and we never questioned it
at the time of her death.

So I said, "If that's what
you want to happen,

I'll support you 100%.

But I don't see why
they're exhuming her body."

-So on October 24th, 2012,

the body of Ms. Diana Burrow
was exhumed

from Gardens of Faith Cemetery
in Lumberton, North Carolina.

-My family was there.

Now, going to get
her body exhumed --

that was harder than a funeral
for me.

-When the body came up,
we did open the vault

and actually opened the casket
right there on scene.

We wanted to do it
as quickly as possible,

make it as compassionate
as you can.

But her body was
in pristine condition.

You would not think
it had been in the ground

for almost two years, going on.

-When they opened up the vault
and took her body out,

put it in a body bag,
it was very emotional.

That was [stammers] reliving
everything over again,

or worse.

But it was, uh...

it was something
that was necessary to do

to get justice for Diana.

-They transferred
the body to a body bag,

and from there, it was taken

to the chief medical examiner's
office for autopsy

in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

-The chief pathologist
performed the autopsy,

and during the course
of the autopsy,

she noticed a number of things
that had not been noticed prior.

-After they removed
the makeup from Ms. Diana,

they found scratches
on her ears,

her nose, on the left side
of her face.

-And it was unclear where
the scratch marks came from.

-The pathologist found her
to have soft-tissue injury

to her neck,
and also found there to be

teeth impressions in her tongue,
which indicated

that her teeth had been
closed down on her tongue

at some point
prior to her death.

-Somebody had pushed
her mouth together.

-A series of x-rays showed
that Ms. Diana had

one fractured rib
on her upper-left side.

-She also had
a fractured hyoid bone.

The hyoid is a small
U-shaped bone

that's situated in the middle
of the neck, just below the jaw.

And it was cracked.

It takes a significant amount
of pressure to break that bone.

These are injuries that we would
not have been able to see

had we not had the exhumation
and the autopsy.

-To investigators,
that's what we were looking for.

That would indicate
a lot of pressure

around the neck,
the throat area.

That's not a bone
that just breaks naturally.

You have to exert pressure
on that one.

That was basically
all we needed to hear.

The examination also revealed

that she did have
some heart disease,

but she did not die
of a heart attack.

-The cause of her death
was actually

asphyxiation by smothering,
or suffocation.

So as a result of this,

the medical examiner
revises the cause of death

for Ms. Burrow from
natural causes to a homicide.

-This was now officially
a murder investigation.

-The autopsy ends
over a year and a half

of rumors and speculation,

forcing the Burrow family
to question everything

they believed
about Diana's death.

-I would never have believed
in 100 years

that Diana had been murdered.

She was just kind to everybody.

-It was a punch in the gut.

I had a rage about it.

I thought she had died
peacefully.

But then to have someone
break a bone in your neck,

I don't think it was
peaceful at all.

♪♪

-Now armed with clear evidence
of murder,

detectives waste no time sitting
down with the prime suspect,

her neighbor Jason Johnson.

-At that point,
Jason is in a state prison,

having been sentenced
for violating his probation

for some prior break-ins.

-We set up the interview
in prison,

and Jason agrees to talk to us.

At first, Jason was like,
you know, "What's going on?"

He's not really sure.
But he was just playing coy.

-We tell him why they're there

and that the death
of Ms. Burrow --

that it's been ruled a homicide.

-He was just adamant
that he did not have anything

to do with her death.

-Jason also at the same time
indicates

that he doesn't believe
his brother had anything

to do with it either.

-In the end,
we ended the interview.

We thought we had enough
to go after him,

but he didn't break,
so he was sent back to prison.

-At this point,
it's a disappointment.

Until we had that confession,

we were basically pitting
one person,

one witness
with very little credibility,

against another person
with very little credibility.

Without some direct statements
that indicate

that he was involved
in Ms. Burrow's death,

law enforcement will
not be able to move forward.

♪♪

♪♪

-Jason Johnson is
the prime suspect

in the recently discovered
murder of Diana Burrow.

But he's not admitting
to anything.

-We still don't have
any direct evidence

that he committed this murder.

We're gonna have to have
some sort of confession

on the part of Jason.

So the decision is made
to take another attempt at him.

-Approximately
five days later,

the second interview
was conducted.

It's kind of unconventional
because a lot of times

you get one shot at somebody

and if they're not gonna break,
they don't break.

But we wanted to give it a shot
with Jason one more time.

New tactic this time was,

I'm gonna charge
you family members.

-He takes a very hard line
to get a confession from Jason.

Police say, "Since it's not you,
it's your brother, Daniel,

because he had the property
on him.

And that's who
I'm gonna charge.

And you know what?

I'm gonna charge your mother
because she knew about this."

-At that point,
to our surprise, Jason broke.

Jason claimed that
when he broke into the house,

he was just looking
for something to steal

so he could go out
and buy more drugs.

-And he just grabs her,

puts his hand on her face
over her nose,

and proceeds to smother her.

-He said he looked away
and basically just smothered her

until she didn't move anymore.

He said he didn't know
what he was doing.

He had no intentions on harming

or certainly not killing anyone.

-Jason goes on
to tell law enforcement

that Daniel knew nothing
about this.

He was not present.
He was not part of the break-in.

He was not there
when he killed Ms. Burrow.

-Jason is already incarcerated

in North Carolina
Department of Corrections,

but immediately after
the interview,

he also formally charged
with first-degree murder

and first-degree burglary.

-When initially we found out
that Jason was the one

who had murdered my wife,

it was very surprising
to the whole family

because she was always kind
to these boys,

and Jason -- he act like
he respected Diana enough

to be more of a protector
to her than harm to her.

-Approximately seven months
later, in June of 2013,

Jason is formally indicted
for both of those charges.

We are now two years plus
from the date she passed away.

At that time, the state then
designates it as a capital case,

which means Jason
could be sentenced to life

without possibility of parole
or death.

-The first thing
you want is death.

But given the track record

of the death penalty
in North Carolina,

it was highly unlikely
that was gonna happen

because it wasn't premeditated.

So I wanted as many years
as he could get,

possibly without parole.

-This case continues
over the course of several years

for different hearings

and trying to schedule
a potential trial date.

-The wheels of justice
turn pretty slowly

in Robinson County,

and the reason is
they don't have resources.

There's a long line
of people waiting trial.

-And eventually,
the suggestion was made

to see if we could try
to resolve the case.

-The D.A. talked to me
about a plea bargain.

He suggested a minimum
of 40 years,

a maximum of 50.

-Obviously, he's gonna be
in jail for quite a long time.

-The Burrow family agrees
to the plea deal,

and five years after
Diana's murder,

Jason is sentenced
to 50 years in prison.

-The first time we'd seen Jason

since the murder was
in the courtroom at that time.

It was challenging
for my whole family

to see him face-to-face.

I spoke to Jason.

He did say he was sorry,
apologized.

And I told him that it was hard,

but I-I forgave him.

But I hoped
that God would forgive him.

-Mom was a very caring lady,

and I know in my heart
she's in a better place.

That's how I deal with it.

-Hardly a day goes by
that I don't think of her.

I miss Diana's companionship,
her honesty, her love.

I could never find anyone to
even come close to replace her.

Lots of things my wife did,
I probably took for granted.

So for anyone
who's listening to this,

I hope that you take it
to heart,

if nothing else,
that you love the ones

that you love and let them know.