Original subtitles

[ominous chord strikes]

[ominous music playing]

The person calling us, finding that SD card

and calling us was a tremendous help to this.

[reporter] It linked to remains found on the highway,

and ultimately to 30-year-old Kathleen Henry.

[theme music playing]

The thing inside of me, it's like...

the appetite, it's like a wolf that's...

feeling... the hunger.

At first glance, Smith seems to be

a typical run-of-the-mill resident in Alaska.

He holds down a job, he's married, he's immigrated

from South Africa, and he seems to be keeping his nose clean.

It's important to remember,

everyone in that interrogation room knows

the graphic nature of what's on that SD card,

that there's a murder that's been captured

and a very sadistic sexual assault.

And instead of admitting guilt, talking about the crime,

he remains calm. He remains nonplussed.

He doesn't seem to be exhibiting any signs

of outward stress.

And so this is likely just his attempt at

impression management. He's trying to get ahead of it.

He's trying to minimize the fallout on himself.

♪♪

So what he opts for is the, "I don't remember" defense.

I think everything that the police are asking him about,

I think is a manipulation strategy.

'Cause he can hardly even say, "We went to the hotel,

yeah, we had sex."

He has to, like, soften his voice

and kind of go, "Screwing."

But to add that little touch, I think, is part of that

manipulative strategy of how I'm gonna present myself.

He's gonna be as controlled as possible

to see how he's gonna manipulate.

He doesn't know yet what he can manipulate

as they keep providing more data.

But he's not gonna be threatening.

He's gonna be matter-of-fact or soft-spoken.

An individual who finds themselves in this situation

and can talk about it in this calm, cool, and collected way

as detectives continue to turn up the temperature

and confront him with more and more details

is only something we see in psychopathic individuals.

There's a callousness about how they regard their crimes.

There's a lack of remorse in how they look at their victims.

And with Brian Smith, it's -- it's no different.

This is an individual who has a very shallow range

of emotions or shallow affect.

There's an unwillingness to take responsibility

for his behavior.

And he doesn't express any concern.

He doesn't express regret or remorse

for this person who has died.

♪♪

The detective tells Smith that indigent people

and homeless people are, you know, perfect victims.

And Smith seems to acknowledge that that as being a truism.

And it absolutely is that they are more vulnerable

to people like Smith.

Why would he say something like this?

Why would he, kind of, give himself away that he's more

criminally minded than he is presenting so far?

Because he can't help himself.

The truth is, is that if you just gave him

every opportunity, he would eventually reveal

the truth about what he actually thinks

about these individuals.

They're just a toy to play with, just, uh,

an object, another star in a video

that is nothing more than a snuff film.

There has been a nonchalantness this entire time.

This isn't shocking or anything.

And it just seems as though nothing fazes him.

Does he ask the video to stop?

Yeah, he does, but it's not like he looks away.

He has one hand on the table,

and he has the other hand on his lap.

I think he puts his hand on the table to prevent himself

from putting his hand in his lap.

And so he asked to stop,

probably because he's becoming aroused.

It does come across as a tactic that the police are using

when it comes to how do you deal with a psychopath.

The idea is that his emotional and physiological arousal

will override his intellectual state.

He'll become so distracted by looking at the things

that he likes looking at that eventually he'll just admit

to all of this.

And they're not far away from getting what they need.

[Dr. Sahni] For a sexual sadist and a narcissistic psychopath,

power and control are where they live.

Staying in control,

being in a place where they can restore

their narcissistic view of themselves

and ignore that narcissistic injury,

that wound to their ego,

comes from torturing their victims,

because now they're back in control.

"You live and die when I decide you live and die."

And that's really what is captured on this SD card.

He wants to try to convince detectives

that it was the smell that was the problem.

I think what happened was whatever smell that she had,

I think that was kind of a turnoff for him.

The point here, though, is that he always knew

he was gonna kill her.

He wanted to have depictions of violating her,

but he didn't wanna deal with the way

that she was smelling while alive.

He is making a choice. He is choosing when to do this.

But the underlying catalyst for it is

because he can, he will.

[Dr. Morgan III] The way he's describing

that he has permission to do anything,

we refer to that as the view of oneself

as being unconstrained,

um, which is very common in people with psychopathy.

They're free to act on their impulses

and their wishes. Getting away with it,

I think, is what gives him a sense of empowerment, like,

"Where I am now, I can do things

"and people won't catch me.

I can kill people, dispose of the bodies."

Once he realized he could do it and get away with it,

it gives him permission to do it more.

Brian Smith, no doubt, has issues with women.

Where it comes from exactly, we don't know.

He acknowledges that there was anger that lived inside of him

and frustration, and he talks about his wife as being

a stubborn human being.

But instead of taking it out on his wife,

he began to look for women who were throwaways

in society in his mind.

Taking over power and control of those women

helped him to release some of that anger.

We know that sadistic offenders like Brian Smith have massive

issues and needs for power and control.

[Dr. De La Torre] The reason why he took the photos of the victim,

of Henry, was so that he could remember, right?

He wanted to remember which one this was.

At no point does he show any kind of emotionality

other than arousal.

At no point does he actually say their names and say,

you know, "I'm sorry I did this."

He was always constantly minimizing

everything that he did.

Smith is the kind of guy that brings

urban legends to reality.

He is the psychopath that goes to extremes

to see it, like, actually unfold

and to witness the detectives have to interact with this guy,

you really get the sense that there are victims

all over this world,

and there will never really be closure

for the amount of cases

I expect Smith to have engaged in.

♪♪