All language subtitles for How.It.Really.Happened.S03E07_English

Hernandez:
You can't come here and act
reckless and do your own stuff.

You get changed
by the Patriot way,

and now that I'm a Patriot,
I have to start living like one

and making the right
decisions for them.

♪♪

♪♪

Welcome to
"How It Really Happened."

I'm Hill Harper.

At the beginning of 2013,
NFL star Aaron Hernandez

is living the American dream.

He has a $40-million contract
with the New England Patriots,

a devoted fiancée, and
a brand-new baby girl at home.

But his seemingly perfect life
is shattered

when a brutal murder
takes place

and Hernandez
is the prime suspect.

Could the NFL superstar
with everything to lose

really be the killer,

or was there
another explanation?

The answer, as it turns out,

was far more complicated
and tragic

than anyone could have imagined.

This is
"How It Really Happened."

♪♪

♪♪

A teenage boy is running through
an industrial park

in North Attleborough.

He was training for track.

As he's running through
the park,

he sees a body lying faceup
riddled with bullets.

Man: Kid came up
knocking on the window

saying he saw somebody
laying down, not moving.

My boss and I went down there,
and we saw a guy dead there.

Man 2: He was not buried.

He was just lying there
as if he was either

dropped there
or killed there.

It was just a shocking scene.

Altimari: The body had been shot
five times.

The police get called in.

Cramer: He's wearing
a Boston Red Sox cap.

He also still has his wallet,

so right away they know
that this is not a robbery.

This is something else.

Investigators pretty quickly
determined who it was,

a guy named Odin Lloyd.

♪♪

Cramer:
Odin Lloyd was a 27-year-old man

living a pretty unassuming life
with his mother.

He had a girlfriend
he was very close to.

He was very close to his family.

He was a semiprofessional
football player.

Ward: I answered the phone,
and he says...

"Are you Ursula Ward?"
and I said, "Yes."

I said, "Is my son okay?"

Sweet: There's people I know,
people I know

that this could have
happened to,

and it would have been,
like, I seen it coming.

You know, Odin,

never seen anything like this
happening ever.

Hold on.

♪♪

[ Sniffles ]

He still has his phone, and he
also has two sets of keys.

They went about trying to figure
out who these keys belonged to

because there was a body
and two sets of keys but no car,

and they very quickly were able
to track down the keys

to a rental car.

The car was registered
to Aaron Hernandez,

so that was like, "Whoa.

You know,
what's going on here?"

Aaron Hernandez,
the football player?

Tight end for the Patriots?

Woman:
At 23, playing as a tight end,

he has a contract
reportedly worth $40 million.

The guy who played
in the Super Bowl

and has his whole career
ahead of him?

♪♪

Aaron Hernandez was special.

Montgomery:
Every once in a while,
you get this player,

every 10 years,
every 20 years, every 25,

and Aaron was that
every-25-year player.

The family is well-known
in Bristol.

His dad was
a high-school star athlete.

Willis:
When Aaron and his brother
came along,

he basically tried to live his
athletic career through them.

He pushed them to be
good athletes.

That was his dream, and they
followed along that path.

They adored their father.

You know, they were
the kinds of kids

who did whatever
he told them to do.

Ragali: Aaron's dad was always
at the games, somebody you knew,

and he would, like, you know,
put his arm around me

and, you know, give me advice
and everything.

Not only did Dennis want them
to be good athletes,

but he wanted them
to do well in school,

as Aaron and D.J. both did.

He wanted them to be,
you know, well-respected people.

And then Aaron,
as it turned out,

probably the best
of the Hernandez clan.

Ragali:
And the fact that he was so big,
yet he could still --

was, like, faster than everybody

and just agile
was just ridiculous.

He didn't spend his time,
you know, messing around.

He was working hard every day.

He was one of the best players
that Connecticut has ever seen.

As a senior,

he was the Connecticut state
player of the year.

Broke all kinds
of state records.

He was clearly talented enough
to play college football.

He was heavily recruited.

Hernandez: Half the family
is telling me to go here.

Half my family
is telling me to go to

Notre Dame, Michigan, Miami.

Florida is just, you know,

the top-five college
football program,

and if you want
to exceed expectations

and reach the NFL,
that's the place to go.

I just had heard from a friend

that he was going to be
leaving school early,

and he was going to
the University of Florida.

Ragali: It was pretty surreal,
seeing him on TV,

you know,
playing with these guys.

He won the John Mackey Award
after a dominant junior year

at the University of Florida,
and that award goes to

the nation's best collegiate
tight end.

His future is kind of limitless
at this point.

Woman: A Pats fan growing up,

Hernandez came out
of the University of Florida

a year early
to enter the draft.

The Patriots invested in him,

giving him a long-term
lucrative contract.

It's a lifelong dream
and still kind of surreal,

but I'll take it in
over the next few days,

months, years,
and just, it's a blessing,

and hopefully I make
the right decisions with it

and have a good life.

News of Aaron Hernandez

even being questioned
in connection

with this case
was obviously huge.

Woman: Detectives were met
with a strange reaction

from the former star
tight end

after discovering
Odin Lloyd's body.

And that was the "wow" moment.

Woman:
Aaron Hernandez is keeping
a very low profile.

Man: As investigators
search for answers

to a mysterious murder...

...police sift through the woods
for clues,

clues that could shed
some light

on what happened
to 27-year-old Odin Lloyd,

a victim of homicide found dead
in this industrial park

less than a mile away

from the 23-year-old
star football player's home.

Wilson:
So when police first found
Odin Lloyd's body,

they found keys to a car

that Aaron Hernandez had rented
in his pocket.

Cramer: So naturally they go to
his house to speak with him...

...and what they find there is
a pretty uncooperative person.

Woman: Detectives were met
with a strange reaction

from the former star
tight end

after discovering
Odin Lloyd's body.

Mr. Hernandez became
argumentative,

the documents read, and asked,
"What's with all the questions?"

Police learned that Odin Lloyd

had the keys to the car
that Hernandez had rented

because Hernandez
had loaned him the car

to let him use it.

So one of the first questions
in the investigation was,

how did these two men
know each other?

Daniel:
Lloyd was dating the sister
of Hernandez's fiancée.

Cramer: So Odin Lloyd
and Aaron Hernandez

met through the sisters.

At the very least, they had
a casual friendship.

Woman: According to police,
officers told him

it was a death investigation,

and, "Mr. Hernandez
quote slammed the door."

You would think that
he might have some questions

or might be
a higher level of concern.

Cramer:
News of Aaron Hernandez

even being questioned
in connection

with this case
was obviously huge.

Man:
Media, neighbors, and tourists
flood the streets

outside his
North Attleborough home.

You had probably
25 cameras that were stationed

in this nice neighborhood,

positioned looking
right at his house,

just waiting for any type
of activity.

I think people thought that,
"Hey, maybe this was

just some sort of mistake,

and this was just
some weird connection."

Man: This is the first time
we're seeing

the New England Patriots
tight end Aaron Hernandez

outside
his Massachusetts home.

Wilson: The public didn't know
exactly why Hernandez

was being questioned.

They did know that a dead body

had been found
not far from his house.

Daniel: The biggest piece
of information that we had

was from
a law-enforcement source

who told us that Hernandez
was driving this Nissan Altima

that he had rented the night
that Odin Lloyd was killed.

Four guys were in this car,
including Odin Lloyd.

That car is out
for a couple of hours.

When it returns
to Aaron Hernandez's home,

only three guys
are in that car,

and Odin Lloyd
isn't one of them.

That piece of information
really got everyone thinking,

"Okay, what's going on here?

What happened in this time frame

where Odin Lloyd
was with these guys,

then all of a sudden
he's not there?"

People were very careful,

'cause he was a member of the
revered New England Patriots,

not to start making him
a criminal or a suspect.

No one was thinking
he was the murderer.

But then another twist.

Sometime the next day
is when Aaron Hernandez

returns the rental car

to this Enterprise dealership
near his house.

Wilson: Police learned
after talking to the employee

at Enterprise who had cleaned
out the car after Hernandez

returned it that she had found
some items in the car

that perhaps were cause
for concern,

items that the woman
at Enterprise

subsequently had thrown
in the dumpster.

Authorities were able
to go dumpster diving.

Altimari:
Found the bullet casing.

The bullet had traces
of blue Bubblicious gum on it.

The shell casing matched
the shell casings

that were found at the murder
scene near Odin Lloyd's body.

So the police was
piecing together

what might have happened.

Wilson: And then it was
one Wednesday morning

that several police cars
came up.

A lot of officers,
all in business attire,

knocked on the door,
and Hernandez opened the door,

did not appear
to be expecting them,

had just rolled out of bed.

They went inside the house,
cuffed him.

Daniel:
And within 10 minutes,

Aaron's coming out
in that picture,

you know, you can't forget,
in the white t-shirt

and the handcuffs
behind his back.

That was the wow moment.

Altimari: And he was at the top
of the world, really.

So to, all of a sudden,
be a suspect in a murder...

[ Camera shutters clicking ]

...I think, for a lot of people,
it was pretty surprising.

Within hours of his arrest,
the Patriots released him.

It's really a sad day
on so many levels.

Having someone in your
organization that's involved

in a murder investigation
is a terrible thing.

After consultation
with ownership,

we acted swiftly
and decisively.

Wilson: Aaron's fiancée,
Shayanna Jenkins

was seen carrying
a big, heavy trash bag.

Man: Did he indicate to you
what was inside?

No.

Cooper: The story
we're following tonight,

Aaron Hernandez
is being held without bail,

charged with
first-degree murder.

It wasn't an accessory charge.

They were saying, "No, Aaron is
the guy that pulled the trigger.

He's the murderer."

♪♪

Woman: Hernandez remains here
in the county jail,

locked up in a cell
similar to this one.

Aaron Hernandez, when he
came into our facility,

could interact with anybody
to a point where you go,

"Hey, I want to go out
and grab a beer with this guy."

And within a matter of a day,

he acclimated and
transitioned seamlessly

as though it weren't
a big deal.

Police had I.D.'ed
the other two guys

who were in the car
with Aaron Hernandez that night,

and they were also charged
with Odin Lloyd's murder.

Carlos Ortiz and Ernest Wallace
were friends of Hernandez.

Both these guys had
criminal records

from various charges
back in Connecticut

where they had met
Hernandez.

That was back
in his high-school days

when then 16-year-old Hernandez
was hit

with this unexpected
family tragedy.

Hernandez was very close
to his father.

Montgomery: As a father,
Dennis was the best.

There was a special
closeness they had.

His dad was
a football player also.

Altimari:
His father had gone into the
hospital for a routine surgery.

There were complications.

He bled to death
and shockingly died.

Willis: And all of a sudden,
he loses his father

who had been his guiding light
and his mentor

and the person
he looked up to most.

All of a sudden, he was gone.

That was the one thing
that really impacted his life

in a very difficult way.

McMillan: Everyone was sad
for Aaron and D.J

and the rest of their family,
and it was just heartbreaking.

Montgomery: It's a pivotal point
in your life, 16.

In high school, you need dad
there for support and guidance,

and he lost that.

His mother remarried
maybe a year later.

You might expect when
the father passed away,

that she would
grow closer to Aaron,

but they actually began
to grow apart.

Wilson:
Then Hernandez started staying

at this cousin's house
in Bristol,

and it was there that he met
Carlos Ortiz and Ernest Wallace.

Some of his friends were,
you know,

not guys you want
a potential

professional football player
hanging around with.

There were some that had been
arrested on drug charges.

Right now,
as his former NFL team

prepares to play
in the Super Bowl,

Aaron Hernandez goes
on trial for murder.

Opening statements
are scheduled for today.

Fee: We are here because
the police and the prosecutors

targeted Aaron
from the very beginning.

As soon as they found out
that Aaron Hernandez,

the celebrity football player,
the New England Patriot,

was a friend of Odin Lloyd's,
Aaron never had a chance.

In June of 2013, Aaron Hernandez
had the world at his feet.

Aaron Hernandez was planning
a future, not a murder.

Daniel:
In this day and age, there are
surveillance cameras everywhere,

and that was extremely
evident in this trial.

Woman:
Investigators say they built
their case against Hernandez

using cellphone tower tracking,
text messages,

and surveillance tapes
at Hernandez's home

and elsewhere.

Wilson:
The prosecutors' strategy was
very painstaking, very thorough.

They put each piece of
the puzzle together for the jury

and thread this timeline

to prove that Hernandez
was the one that killed Lloyd.

Daniel: First,
Aaron texts his two friends

to come to his house
in North Attleborough.

Altimari: They were friends
from back in the Bristol area.

It was not unusual for them
to come,

you know,
just spur of the moment.

Daniel:
Then he sends Odin Lloyd a text

telling him
he's going to come pick him up.

Altimari: The three of them
get into the rental car.

It's all on the video from the
security cameras at his house.

They were leaving to go
pick up Odin Lloyd.

On the way
to pick up Lloyd,

Hernandez had stopped
to get gas at a gas station

not too far from
Lloyd's house.

Hernandez is seen
filling up the car.

He buys the gum, the same
kind of Bubblicious gum

that was found in the dumpster
and on a piece of the bullet.

There was a camera that caught
a car going down the street,

picking Odin Lloyd up.

Woman:
In the wee hours of the morning,
investigators say

Lloyd was last seen leaving
his Boston home with Hernandez

in a silver
Nissan Altima.

Altimari: So they could
put Lloyd with Hernandez

within hours of his murder.

They also had surveillance
from cameras

around the industrial park.

Wilson:
Footage that showed headlights
going into the industrial park

where Lloyd was found,
but you couldn't identify

the car itself
from the headlights,

but that was where other
crime-scene evidence came in --

tire tracks that they found
in the industrial park

where Odin Lloyd's body
was found.

And through
the crime-scene analysis,

they managed to match those tire
tracks to the Nissan Altima

that Hernandez
was driving that night.

Altimari: And then there's video
of the car

leaving about four minutes

after it had gone
into the industrial park.

And then picks up again
when Aaron returns home.

And that's when you see him
walk into his house

with Wallace and Ortiz,
no Odin Lloyd.

♪♪

Evidence that Aaron
was at the scene

is not enough to prove.

Mere presence is not enough.

In our system, we cannot be
convicted of a crime

just because you hang
with the wrong people

or are in the wrong place
at the wrong time.

So to prove first-degree murder,
prosecutors had to show

that Hernandez actually
participated in the crime,

not solely that
he was just there,

and so they had
to introduce evidence

that he probably
got out of the car.

Wilson:
There was a marijuana blunt
found close to the victim,

and Hernandez's DNA
was identified on that blunt.

Cramer: The police already had
very compelling evidence,

but what, ironically,
ended up helping them the most

was the evidence found
inside Aaron Hernandez's home.

So through a search warrant,
investigators were able

to obtain footage
from surveillance videos

that were located
throughout Hernandez's home.

Woman: Minutes later,
surveillance video

from Hernandez's
home security system

shows the former NFL player

arriving back at his house
with two other people.

Where he walks into his house,

and you can clearly see
he's holding something.

Man: You will see,
ladies and gentlemen,

the defendant standing outside
of the entrance

to his basement
holding a gun.

The defense tried to say that
it might have been an iPhone.

It might have been
a remote control for a TV.

iPhone or iPad or Blackberry
or TV remotes

or a gun or something else.

Then, subsequently,
Aaron's fiancée,

Shayanna Jenkins
was seen carrying

a big heavy trash bag
out of the house.

Police think that the murder
weapon was in the trash bag.

Because the gun used in
the murder has never been found.

He told me to go downstairs
in our storage room

and remove a box
from our home.

Man: And did he indicate to
you
what was inside the box?

No.

Did you look inside?

I did not.

What prosecutors said was that
that was when

she carried the murder
weapon out of the house.

Willis:
We know four guys went into
that industrial park

and only three guys came out,
so somebody pulled the trigger.

If he beats the case,
America loves a comeback.

Welcome back to
"How It Really Happened."

I'm Hill Harper.

Investigators had plenty of
circumstantial evidence

suggesting Aaron Hernandez
was with Odin Lloyd

the night he was killed,
but did they have enough

to prove
that he was guilty of murder?

So many questions remained.

Why was Hernandez there
that night,

and why would he want
his good friend dead?

McCann:
Well, from a legal standpoint,

there were questions
about the prosecution's case.

One was why?

Why would Aaron Hernandez
execute someone

who defense lawyers argued
was a friend of Aaron Hernandez?

Woman: Here's how the prosecutor
described it.

He said that Aaron Hernandez
was upset,

angry about something
that the victim in this case

had said when he was
at a nightclub

just a few nights ago,
where they were in Boston,

and this angered Aaron Hernandez
so much that he told people

he couldn't trust
the victim anymore.

That apparently is the motive,
according to prosecutors.

Daniel: The defense
tried to establish that,

"Hey, Odin Lloyd
was a part of the family.

These guys spent time
in the man cave.

They were buddies."

Odin Lloyd stayed over
Aaron's house several times.

Odin Lloyd was Aaron's friend.

Daniel: How could Aaron go ahead
and kill this guy?

It's not possible.

Aaron Hernandez's
defense team felt

that they had
a pretty good case.

♪♪

Hodgson: He showed no signs
of real nervousness.

Seemed pretty confident,
just sort of,

"Okay,
I'm in a different place,"

and saying,
"I'm not really in jail.

I'm in training camp.

I'm going to be back playing
with the Patriots

because they're
going to find out

I didn't have anything
to do with this."

If he beats the case,
America loves a comeback,

and there will be nothing
to stop him from doing that.

But then something
really unexpected happens,

and Aaron Hernandez's name
gets tied

to another
criminal investigation.

Daniel: In July of 2012,

there's this drive-by shooting
in Boston's South End

where two guys, Safiro Furtado
and Daniel de Abreu,

had been shot in a car.

The men had been at a club
and with their friends.

The only real evidence
that the police had was footage

of a car that had pulled up
alongside the vehicle

driven by Abreu and Furtado,

and they knew that
that was the car

where the bullets
had come from.

That was really all they had.

There were no
immediate suspects.

Cramer:
It was just one of those cases
that was gonna be very hard,

if not impossible, to solve.

Camerota: So then investigators
get this big break.

While they're investigating
Aaron Hernandez's connection

to the Odin Lloyd murder,
investigators find this car.

It matched the make, model,
and color of the getaway car

that witnesses say
they'd seen fire the shots

that killed
those two guys in South Boston,

and it was owned by none other
than Aaron Hernandez.

Police impounded a silver SUV

that's registered
and owned by Aaron Hernandez.

Boston police believe
that the car

could be linked
to an unsolved murder.

The Boston detectives went and
pulled the surveillance video

from the club the night
that these two were killed.

Aaron Hernandez is seen
going into this nightclub.

Cramer: Investigators in
the South End murders realize,

"Oh, my God, Aaron Hernandez
was there that night."

Camerota:
Finding out that Aaron Hernandez
was connected

to more than one murder
was shocking,

but as it turns out,

if you look at his track record
of violent behavior,

it goes all the way back
to his college days.

Woman: There was also a shooting
incident of two men

in Gainesville, Florida,
in 2007

while Hernandez was playing
for the University of Florida.

Gainesville police confirm

Hernandez was questioned
for information,

but they say
it was only briefly,

and he was not a suspect
and never charged with anything.

So while on the field he was
clearly a brilliant player,

there were signs of issues
off the field in Florida.

When he was in Florida,

several of his coaches
have said that they were wary

when he went back home
to Connecticut

'cause then he would
go back home

and hang out with these guys
who had drug arrests

or they had had problems
with the cops.

They were afraid
something bad would happen.

Jackson: But the jury
wasn't allowed to hear

about any of his
potential crimes

because he wasn't convicted
of anything yet.

It could have swayed
their judgment

in what he was
accused of doing here.

Man: The judge will block
any mention

that Hernandez was indicted
for two other murders in Boston.

♪♪

Wilson:
When the verdict came back,

people had been waiting
for a week.

It was a very high-stress moment
for all parties involved.

Man: What say you,
madam foreperson?

Is the defendant not guilty,

guilty of murder
in the first degree,

or guilty of murder
in the second degree?

Woman: Guilty of murder
in the first degree.

Wilson: Hernandez shook his head
and sat down

and I think mouthed,
"You're wrong," to the jurors.

His mother and Shayanna Jenkins
were in the front row

and started sobbing.

Odin Lloyd's family
was crying, as well.

Woman: The verdict is in
for NFL star Aaron Hernandez,

guilty of cold-blooded murder.

The sentence --
life without parole.

Man: You're committed to
the MCI-Cedar Junction

for the term
of your natural life

without the possibility
of parole.

Woman: It's a shocking ending
for a one-time superstar.

But then something really
unexpected happened

that added a whole
'nother dimension to this story.

Woman: Authorities are now
investigating

whether Aaron Hernandez
might have been involved in

an unsolved double murder
in Boston last summer.

That relative quiet
would be shattered suddenly

by the crackle of gunfire.

"What's up now [bleep]"
and he started firing shots.

Woman: Authorities are now
investigating

whether Aaron Hernandez
might have been involved in

an unsolved double murder
in Boston last summer.

Man: This is
a separate incident, folks,

from what he's been charged
with already for murder

in the shooting death
of his friend, Odin Lloyd.

We are following every lead,
as we always do in these cases.

Eventually,
the district attorney's office

gathered enough evidence
to prosecute Aaron Hernandez

with the charges
in this double homicide.

When this case came about,
I was asked to join his counsel.

So my first thought was,

"How is Aaron
going to get a fair trial

when virtually everyone
in the state

has formed an opinion
about Aaron?"

♪♪

Monday, July 16th,
the year 2012.

It was a warm summer night

in downtown Boston,
the theater district,

and it was relatively quiet
that night.

That relative quiet
would be shattered

suddenly by
the crackle of gunfire.

The night
of the South End shootings,

Aaron Hernandez was with a man
named Alexander Bradley.

Alexander Bradley would be
the star witness of the case.

Alexander Bradley
was always described

as Hernandez's right-hand guy.

Cramer:
Was a lot like many of the other
men in Aaron Hernandez's life.

He's a drug dealer,
he has a criminal background,

and he knew Aaron
from the old neighborhood,

and the two of them
liked to party together.

Leontire:
The basic theory of the case
involved Alexander Bradley

testifying that
while they were in the bar,

one of the deceased
bumped into Aaron

and spilled a drink on Aaron,

and as a result
of that spilled drink,

Aaron went into a rage.

He was agitated.

I mean, it just --
it was heightened.

We left right away.

Cramer:
That was the motive,

that Aaron felt insulted and
slighted, and he just went off.

If somebody, he felt,
disrespected him...

...insulted him
in some kind of way,

when things didn't go his way,
he could become angry.

Man: What happened next?

I rolled the window down,
reclined the seat,

and he leaned across me
and extended his body

out the window
with the firearm in his hand.

He was like,
"What's up now [bleep]"

and he started
firing shots.

So Bradley takes you inside the
car when the shooting happens,

and unlike the first trial where
you didn't have an eyewitness,

you have Bradley
with every single detail

of how these guys were killed.

But the defense had
another theory,

and that theory put the gun
in Alexander Bradley's hands.

Ladies and gentlemen, this did
not happen over a spilled drink.

This happened over a drug deal.

Alexander Bradley had issues
with Daniel de Abreu,

and that's why we're
all sitting here today.

Alexander Bradley is not
just a drug dealer.

He's a legitimate
drug trafficker.

Dealing drugs is a violent,
dangerous business.

Now, allegedly,
you had these two people,

and allegedly one of the two
committed the crime.

It was Hernandez
versus Bradley.

-Yes.
-And it was one hell of a fight.

Cramer: Jurors had to believe
Alexander Bradley

in order to convict
Aaron Hernandez.

Willis:
And it was a very tense moment

when he walked
into the courtroom.

Everybody knew if he was found
guilty in the Boston homicide,

his appeal in the Odin Lloyd
case was basically useless.

You find the defendant
not guilty,

guilty of murder
in the first degree,

or guilty of murder
in the second degree?

Woman: Not guilty.

He literally broke down
and cried.

It was emotional for all of us.

Cramer:
Maybe in that moment,

he forgot that he was already
serving a life sentence,

and now you had 12 people

who believed that you hadn't
done something horrible.

Leontire: And needless to say,
he was elated,

but I think more
he was relieved.

He was thanking us
all profusely.

Once they won the acquittal,

all systems were go on the
appeal in the Odin Lloyd case.

Leontire: And we told him
we looked forward

to taking on the appeal
on his first conviction.

He was very hopeful.

Altimari: So for the first time
in quite a while,

it would appear that things,
on some level,

are looking up
for Hernandez.

♪♪

Willis:
The guard is making his rounds.

He gets to cell number 57,
notices that he can't look in,

that there's a curtain
blocking the view.

Leontire: It was surreal.

It was so shocking.

I just remember thinking,
"How could this possibly be?"

Ex-NFL star Aaron Hernandez
wiped away tears

when a jury acquitted him
of two more counts of murder.

He was accused
of killing two men

in a drive-By shooting in 2012.

So after his acquittal in
the Boston double-murder case,

Hernandez planned
to appeal his conviction

in the Odin Lloyd case.

There was a chance that Aaron
would regain his freedom,

so everything was upbeat.

♪♪

Early that morning,
a guard is making his rounds.

He gets to cell number 57...

...notices
that he can't look in,

that there's a curtain
blocking the view.

He knocks on the door,

knows it's Aaron's cell,
gets no response.

Tries to open the door,
and it's jammed.

Several correctional
people come,

finally come and assist him
opening the door.

They see Aaron naked,
hanging from a rope...

...that he had wrapped around
one of the bars in his window.

There's a gurney brought in.

They get him into the ambulance,
close the door,

and he's off to the hospital.

And they tried to do
everything they could,

the medical personnel,
to save his life.

♪♪

-This is CNN breaking news.
-All right,

the Massachusetts Department
of Corrections confirming to CNN

that former New England Patriots
tight end Aaron Hernandez

committed suicide in prison
just hours ago.

Man: Hernandez was found
in his Massachusetts jail cell

early Wednesday morning,

hanging from a bedsheet
tied to a window.

It was surreal.
It was so shocking.

Five days after a verdict
of not guilty.

Oh, I just remember thinking,
"How could this possibly be?"

♪♪

Aaron's fiancée,
Shayanna Jenkins, told Dr. Phil

that she was probably the last
person to speak to Hernandez.

And the last words
he said to you were what?

I remember him saying,
"Babe, I've got to go.

They're shutting
the doors."

And I honestly don't think
that we said "I love you"

to each other,
and that was it.

Willis:
Basically he must have decided
at some point

that life wasn't worth living.

He also left a note to Shay,
expressing his love for Shay

and how she had always been,
you know, his girl.

In the note to his daughter,
he talked about

that he would always
be there for her

even though he might not
be there physically.

We'll never know
why he committed suicide.

His letters don't
explicitly state a motive.

Leontire:
When you have just had a client
acquitted of a double murder,

and for the first time
in several years

he had the potential
of seeing the possibility

of his conviction overturned,

it is difficult to rationalize
how that could occur.

But, obviously,
one of the things

that people are trying
to figure out is why.

Camerota: One theory is that
Aaron Hernandez killed himself

because he had
severe brain damage

after years
of playing football.

In football, every play is
sort of like a car crash, right?

You'll receive in one game
of football

about 60 blows to your head.

These blows to the head
can cause CTE,

and that is the form
of brain damage

that was discovered by
Dr. Bennet Omalu,

and it can radically
alter your behavior

and your way of thinking.

Once damage is done,
it's permanent.

Willis:
Aaron's family made arrangements
to donate Aaron's brain

to Boston University
to have his brain researched.

Daniel: The CTE center
at Boston University

is recognized
as the top in the world.

Cramer: What they found was
what they described

as the worst case of CTE they'd
ever seen in somebody so young.

This would be the first case
we've ever seen

of that kind of damage
in such a young individual.

Cramer:
This was a man whose brain
was profoundly damaged.

With CTE, you begin to lose your
ability to control yourself.

You are more likely to engage
in violent behavior.

And more likely
to commit suicide.

A lot of NFL players,
Dave Duerson, Junior Seau,

Andre Waters, they all committed
suicide, and they all had CTE.

Omalu:
If his brain was not exposed

to thousands of violent blows
of his head,

I guarantee you Aaron himself
would have been alive today.

And there was also speculation
at the time

that Aaron Hernandez's sexuality
could have played some role

in his decision
to take his own life.

Cramer: There had been rumors
of Aaron Hernandez's sexuality.

It's only recently that
that's been confirmed

by people
close to Aaron Hernandez.

Leontire: Aaron was gay.

He said he was gay.

He's told other people
that he was gay.

♪♪

Leontire: The bottom line is
that he was a gay man

who was uncomfortable
with his sexuality,

but frankly beginning
to deal with it.

Was he secretly gay?

The Aaron that I know,
no.

I had no indication or any
feeling that he was such.

He was very much a man
to me.

Willis:
There was going to be publicized
reports that he was gay,

and that hadn't really
been out there before.

He might have been
terrified about that.

Maybe he wanted the pressure
of not having to hide that.

And it does make you wonder
about how much that played

into what happened
inside that jail cell.

♪♪

I think that one of the things
that's happened

since a lot of this information
has come out,

at least people are beginning
to see Aaron

in a multidimensional way.

Cramer:
He had lost his fortune.

He had lost his career.

He had lost his freedom.

Just the realization
of the waste that your life

had become
had to have been profound.

♪♪

No one will ever know
exactly why Aaron Hernandez

ended his life when he did,
but those closest to him place

some of the blame
for his suicide

and his erratic behavior
on the brain damage

he clearly suffered
from the game of football,

And here's an ironic twist --
in Massachusetts,

if a convicted felon dies before
his appeal has been heard,

then his original conviction
is thrown out.

So in the eyes of the law,

Aaron Hernandez died
an innocent man.

I'm Hill Harper.

Thanks for watching.

♪♪