Original subtitles

[Susan Malman Altman] Robert promised Stacy

that she would have everything she wanted.

[Jan Goldenberg] He's a good looking guy, well-educated.

They made each other laugh.

She was happy, so I was happy.

This one night, the doorbell rang.

This one night, the doorbell rang.

There's a woman there that she doesn't know.

She said that she was looking for Stacy's husband.

[Susan McBride] My involvement with everything that happened...

I didn't know it could have such a devastating impact on so many people's lives.

It was the beginning of hell.

[phone ringing]

[dispatcher speaking]

[Robert Feldman speaking]

[Altman] My sister Stacy had the best personality of anybody I know.

She was the life of the party.

She just really wanted to have fun.

Funny is an understatement.

She was there to make people smile

and feel happy around her.

She would do anything to make you laugh.

She would do anything to make you laugh.

[Altman] It looks like she has a doily on her head.

This is the kind of stuff she did all the time.

You see that smile?

It's in every picture. It's contagious.

I felt like a sister to her.

And because of her incredible family,

they allowed me to feel like a sister.

Stacy's life dream was to have children

and to be a mom.

and to be a mom.

It was almost a given that that was her life path.

I mean, she...

She was incredible with children.

[Altman] Right after college,

she was working in marketing.

Every job she had was for a fundraising organization.

Anything to help the greater good and help people.

[Altman] She did meet a guy

that she ended up falling in love with

and getting engaged to.

Um, he was a wonderful man, and, um...

As the wedding date got closer,

it was clear that, um, something wasn't right,

and that wedding got, um, cancelled.

Stacy was devastated.

She thought that this was the love of her life.

Her biological clock started ticking very, very early.

This was not part of her plan.

Her plan included, um, being married before she was 30,

having kids before she was 30,

and it threw her for a loop.

and it threw her for a loop.

She needed a change of scenery...

...and wouldn't it be fun to move to Boston

and take care of her niece?

And she became our nanny...

...and it was magical.

When I first met him,

it was at our house.

He was coming to pick her up for a date.

He was very charming,

very likable,

and seemed to be enamored of her.

and seemed to be enamored of her.

[Goldenberg] On paper,

he looked great.

He's a good looking guy, well-educated.

They made each other laugh.

She had high hopes for a change.

I think she really loved the idea.

She met him at the right time in her life, so...

[Altman] They went to Boston on their first date

and drove around looking for a parking meter.

And he had this little trick

that will jimmy the parking meter

so that you don't have to put money in it.

And Stacy thought, "Wow, isn't that kind of cool?"

And I thought, "I don't think that's cool at all.

I think that's stealing."

I didn't like that, and that was their very first date.

He came from a Jewish family, a close family.

His parents divorced when he was a child,

and he had promised her

that divorce would never be in their future

because of the trauma that it did to him.

Stacy's heart was broken

when her first engagement was broken,

when her first engagement was broken,

and she was guarded...

...and he was gonna be her forever.

He promised her that she would have everything she wanted...

...that she would be a stay-at-home mom,

that he was gonna provide for the family,

that she wasn't going to have to work.

I never knew how that was gonna happen,

because he never really had a job.

because he never really had a job.

He was a bit of a scammer.

He always had ways of scamming the system.

One of the things he did while he was in Boston,

I'll never forget this.

He went to an electronics store

and took the electronic out of the box,

and took the electronic out of the box,

filled the box with heavy bricks

and returned the box,

got his money back.

He did seem like a freeloader.

I wasn't sure about his motivation

to find something to support a family,

so I was a little bit concerned.

[Altman] Looking back on it...

...the red flags were there.

One night, I had invited Stacy and him to come out for dinner with us,

and Stacy really wanted to come out with us,

and he refused.

He wanted to stay home and cook.

I knew that what that meant for Stacy

is that he would use every dish in the kitchen

and then leave all the dishes for her,

because he never wanted to do dishes.

because he never wanted to do dishes.

Whatever he wanted, he got.

Whatever he said, we all followed his rules.

It wasn't about what Stacy wanted that night.

It was really only about what he wanted.

They decided they would move to Denver, Colorado.

They decided they would move to Denver, Colorado.

[Altman] If he was to be her Prince Charming

and give her what she wanted in a marriage,

being a stay-at-home mom,

Robert needed to have a job.

We have lots of family in Denver.

So, Stacy thought,

"Well, maybe he'll just come to Denver with me.

My relatives will help him get a job,

and at least, you know, he'll work.

and at least, you know, he'll work.

He'll have income."

Stacy was so excited.

She was really ready to move on to the next stage.

[Goldenberg] I think my gut told me,

"He's not deserving yet to make this move with her

and to be so immersed in her incredible family."

And I was worried that if he did go with her,

she was never coming back.

[Altman] About a week before they were set to move,

[Altman] About a week before they were set to move,

she and I went out for dinner together,

and this is probably the one and only time

I ever put myself out there like this with her.

I said, "Are you sure you want him to come with you?

You are moving to a new place.

You have so many opportunities.

Are you sure this is what you want?"

And she said to me, and I will never forget it,

she said,

she said,

"Susan, he told me that he had a tough childhood

and he had to take care of himself,

and so, he's number one in his book.

He's always gonna be number one,"

and I said, "Stacy, is that the kind of person

that you wanna marry?"

And she said the typical, classic, textbook response.

"He will change for me."

This is one of my greatest regrets.

I think this is one of all of our greatest regrets,

is that we didn't know what was, what was happening.

We didn't put it all together.

[phone ringing]

[dispatcher speaking]

[Feldman speaking]

[Altman] They were moving in together.

They were setting up the kitchen.

They had a huge fight about where to place a garbage can.

He made it clear how he wanted things

and how they were gonna be.

Stacy had a mind of her own. She spoke back.

But he wanted things a certain way.

When he wanted something, he wanted them...

...his way.

Stacy actually ended up leaving him

and moving into my parents' house.

Robert apologized and promised,

Robert apologized and promised,

"It won't happen again."

[Goldenberg] I was hopeful that this was it.

But it was maybe a few days,

and then they got back together.

[Altman] Stacy was just too invested at that point

and was looking for her happily ever after.

When she told me that she was engaged...

...my heart dropped.

While she was thrilled about her dreams coming true

of getting married and having babies,

my stomach sunk.

My heart sunk.

I wasn't happy for her.

I wasn't happy for her.

I pretended. I put on a show. Um...

I never shared my true feelings with her

about her future.

That's something that I regret, to this day.

[Goldenberg] So it was a lovely wedding,

and it coincided with the Oscar awards

and it coincided with the Oscar awards

that were broadcast around, it was around the same time.

He had a really great speech...

...and he used the terms from the Oscar awards.

For example, producer...

The director was his whatever.

He would thank people and acknowledge them,

the people in his life and his family,

by giving them titles.

by giving them titles.

And so, we all assumed his leading lady...

It was, it was there.

It was there for the taking, [chuckles] leading lady.

It didn't, it never happened.

He never mentioned Stacy.

It was devastating. It was embarrassing.

She was mortified.

She was mortified.

Directly affected her,

and that was, uh, yeah, it was sad.

It's a hard way to start. [chuckles]

[Altman] Yep.

See her crown?

She wanted to be a princess.

That's her wedding day.

Do you notice her smile is not quite the same smile

that we saw in earlier photos?

I wonder about that.

[Goldenberg] Uh, they got married in March,

so the following June, they had their daughter.

Beautiful girl, and, um,

within two years of that, they had their son.

Becoming a mom was her greatest joy,

Becoming a mom was her greatest joy,

and she was the best mother ever.

Stacy stopped working

and started living a life

that she always dreamt of.

[Goldenberg] His job was commission-based,

[Goldenberg] His job was commission-based,

so you really had to be motivated and work hard.

Um, he didn't.

If he was home, I remember him sitting.

That's the truth.

I have visions of him just sitting on the couch in a bathrobe.

He was never working.

[Altman] Stacy eventually went back to work.

She got a great job, again, in the nonprofit industry,

and she was doing exceptionally well.

[Altman] She did it because she needed to provide for her family.

[Altman] She did it because she needed to provide for her family.

Her dream of being a stay-at-home mom was crushed.

[Goldenberg] We knew he was...

...a lowlife and wasn't gonna provide, you know?

But then, there was this whole other chapter that started.

A girlfriend and I went down to Denver

to celebrate my birthday,

and the day we got there,

and the day we got there,

we needed to use her computer,

so we went to their family computer.

We sort of just moved the mouse,

and, uh,

we were immediately faced with the open page of a dating app.

Jan called me right away

and said she saw a dating website

and that Stacy's husband had a profile.

and that Stacy's husband had a profile.

[Goldenberg] Well, at first, we were confused,

and then we saw that there was correspondence,

and, whereas we were told

that he had a meeting that night

and he wasn't coming home for dinner,

um, he, in fact, had a date,

uh, that evening.

I was...

...shocked.

I was scared. I...

I didn't understand how it was open on their family computer

and I didn't know what to do.

and I didn't know what to do.

I was, I was really upset.

I was, uh...

...very upset.

At that moment, we did nothing.

We didn't tell her.

Neither of us knew what to do.

We did nothing.

If we had to do it over again...

...I would've done it differently.

What if she turned on us?

What if she alienated us?

[Altman] I talked to Stacy every evening

after she put the kids to bed,

and there was this one night

that we were doing our daily call,

um, and the doorbell rang.

[doorbell rings]

She wasn't expecting anyone.

So, she goes to the door.

There's a woman there that she doesn't know.

There's a woman there that she doesn't know.

She said that she was looking for Stacy's husband.

It turns out that it was somebody that he had met on a website,

and she came to the door looking for him.

It came out that he was with her, um, sexually.

Stacy was shocked and surprised and disgusted.

That's when chaos started.

[Altman] Stacy confided in me

that she had found out about her husband's affair.

He claimed he needed to get this sex

wherever he could find it.

As miserable and sad as she was,

she was more forgiving than maybe she should have been.

I talked to her about it,

and she point-blank said,

"I don't want to be a single mom."

I don't think our society is supportive of single moms.

I think she felt shame

in the situation that she was in.

She didn't have any friends that were divorced.

She insisted that they seek therapy.

And he would start at her insistence,

and he wouldn't finish,

or he wouldn't continue to go.

There would always be an excuse.

He didn't like the person.

He didn't need the help.

[Goldenberg] He was making excuses for himself.

But it was mean. It was hurtful.

He told her that he needed her to lose weight

so that he could be attracted to her again.

so that he could be attracted to her again.

How he spoke to her, it was shocking.

He was rude. He was mean.

I couldn't believe it.

They tried every avenue.

Nothing worked. Nothing helped.

And it didn't stop.

[Altman] We talked about her leaving him.

I talked to her about what she wanted to do about that,

and we had made a plan

that, that she was gonna leave.

But he said to her,

"I will never divorce you.

I will never let you divorce me,

because I am a product of a broken marriage,

and I will not do that to my children."

She was crying and crying and crying.

[sniffles]

And I was listening to her.

I wasn't saying a lot.

I was just listening to her,

and I had this thought,

and I said to myself...

..."If she ends up dead,

..."If she ends up dead,

it's because he's gonna kill her."

[McBride] I had been, uh, divorced for many years.

I had used several online dating sites.

Um, didn't have a whole lot of success with anything,

and I thought I would try something new

and I thought I would try something new

and try the Tinder app.

His profile picture, he had a big smile on his face,

um, he was laughing,

and he just looked like a very happy person.

So that's what drew me to his photograph,

and so, I swiped right on Bob.

We met for coffee.

We talked about everything.

He had told me he was just separated.

He had been separated for two years,

and they were both seeing other people.

I also opened up about my life.

I told him about my divorce situation.

We talked about our careers, about our kids,

what we were looking for in terms of relationship,

what we were looking for in terms of relationship,

and we talked about what we liked to do for fun.

Both of us loved to go antiquing

and just hang out in the city or go to the mountains.

Bob and I really seemed to click.

On Thursday, we were planning to get together at a wine bar,

uh, after work.

It was blizzarding that night.

It was a really snowy night.

And he said, "Why don't I just come to you?"

And he said, "Why don't I just come to you?"

That evening, you know, I asked a lot of questions

about his situation with his wife.

Uh, he had explained to me

that the reason that he separated from her

was because she was an absentee mother.

Uh, Bob had said, "I'm always taking the kids skiing

and to the mountains and camping,

and to the mountains and camping,

and she's really not involved,

and I didn't sign up for that."

I thought,

"Bob must be a really dedicated father."

We ended up sleeping together that night.

I was feeling good about him.

But 15 minutes later,

he sat up in bed and said, "I gotta go."

he sat up in bed and said, "I gotta go."

I thought, at that point,

"He's lying to me. He's married or something."

From then, I started googling "Bob Wolfe,"

and nothing came up.

So at that point,

I decided to do a reverse look-up

on the phone number he gave me.

I found a LinkedIn profile,

and it had a big picture of him.

It said, "Robert W. Feldman."

I started googling his wife, at that point...

...and what I found was that she was the president

of the PTO of the kids' grade school.

of the PTO of the kids' grade school.

So not only was she not an absentee mother,

but she was a really dedicated mother

who volunteered her time.

I was really angry.

Bob had disparaged her and lied to me.

I felt she had the right to know.

I wrote her an email,

I wrote her an email,

and I said, "Stacy, you don't know me,

but I'm trying to find out if you and Bob are separated.

If you're not, he's cheating on you.

We slept together once,

and he blew me off after that."

She wrote back at 8:30 and said,

uh, "No, we are not separated.

I'm done with him now. I've had it."

I said, "Are you gonna be okay?"

I said, "Are you gonna be okay?"

and she said, "I have a really supportive family and lots of friends.

I'll be fine.

But I really do appreciate you reaching out."

It was a good conversation. It was, you know...

I was feeling like I had done the right thing.

I didn't know it could have such a devastating impact

on so many people's lives.

[phone ringing]

[phone ringing]

I was getting ready to go out, and the phone rang,

and one of my kids answered the phone,

and said, "Grandpa's on the phone."

So I get on the phone, and my dad says...

..."Stacy's dead,"

and I said, "What?"

and I said, "What?"

and he said, "Stacy's dead."

I screamed.

Um, I broke into tears.

I sort of felt like...

...I was up in the clouds looking in,

and that this really wasn't happening.

I remember my 11-year-old daughter holding me

while I was screaming.

I don't, I don't remember much.

[Altman] Stacy's husband told the detective

that she wasn't feeling well

and she didn't get out of bed that morning,

and, um, he took the children to school,

and when he came home later in the afternoon

is when he found her dead.

They asked him if he wanted an autopsy done,

and he, um, said that,

and he, um, said that,

"We are Jewish, and Jewish people, um, don't do autopsies,"

and he did not want to have one done.

But it is just customary

that when, um, a young person dies

without a history of illness

that an autopsy has to be done.

It's mandatory.

[McBride] I had had another bad internet date,

didn't go well, and I got home

and I was just lying in bed on my phone,

and I thought, "I wonder if they got divorced."

So I googled, and...

...her obituary came up,

pretty much immediately.

[sighs] Ugh...

My stomach just turned.

My stomach just turned.

Um, I looked at the date of her death,

and I realized that that was around the time I spoke to her.

And so, I went and looked at my email to her,

And so, I went and looked at my email to her,

and I realized it was the same day.

I couldn't believe it.

I looked up the number for Denver Homicide,

and they were very interested in what I had to say.

I told them the whole story.

I told them the whole story.

He told me in the interview

that the medical examiner had ruled her death undetermined.

They were continuing to follow leads.

I'm a researcher,

and when the detective told me

that the cause of death was undetermined,

um, I wanted to see it for myself.

um, I wanted to see it for myself.

I left the detective's office

and I went to the medical examiner's office,

and I got a copy of the autopsy.

I read the details...

...and it said she had bruising about her head and upper body.

She was found with her tongue clinched between her teeth.

I knew from reading it that something...

Something very wrong had happened.

[Dr. Bill Smock] I'd wanted to closely examine the evidence,

looking for clues that may have been not appreciated

or missed as part of the initial investigation.

Robert Feldman told the police that he came home

and found his wife naked in the shower.

Didn't know whether she had drowned, fallen,

Didn't know whether she had drowned, fallen,

had a heart attack...

He didn't know.

The detectives and the first responders

felt there was something unusual

about his demeanor.

[Dr. Smock] I listened to the 9-1-1 call.

He sounded over-hysterical,

very dramatic.

[Feldman speaking]

Being found dead in the bathtub

is highly suspicious of a staged scene.

When I looked at the location of Stacy's injuries,

it was not what you would expect to see

from a fall in a bathtub.

Too many. Way too many.

There were, we call them "pattern imprints,

pattern abrasions,"

which tells me that when those injuries were sustained,

that she was clothed.

that she was clothed.

Yet, she is found naked in the bathtub.

When I analyzed the photographs

from the bathroom,

I saw an imprint of some sort.

That is what you would expect to see

with the sole of a shoe.

Why would your boots be inside of the bathtub?

The only reason is if you were trying

to pull someone into the tub.

She had injuries to her eyes

from increased pressure

that you see during strangulation,

more than 50 in each eye.

She had bruises on the arms

consistent with her arms being held down

while she's being assaulted.

This was, in fact, death from strangulation or suffocation.

This was, in fact, death from strangulation or suffocation.

It was clear to me

that one, this was a staged crime scene,

and two, that Stacy Feldman had been murdered.

[McBride] I walked up on the witness stand.

They asked me to identify Bob,

and I pointed straight at him.

I said, "He's right there,"

and I looked him right in the eye,

and he just stared at me, a very blank stare.

There was no emotion, no nothing.

[Goldenberg] Prosecutors said Stacy confronted him

about the latest affair

and told him that she's done,

and told him that she's done,

and the marriage is over.

It's one thing to react

and get upset.

But there's that piece,

that evil piece,

that allowed him to hurt her the way he did

and kill her.

Dr. Smock pointed out every single mark

that she had on her body,

that she had on her body,

and he pointed out that it was, um, a violent death...

...and that she fought back.

And all I could think about, that whole time...

...is, "What is Stacy thinking?

Is she thinking about me?

Is she thinking that she's gonna die?

Is she thinking about her kids?"

I have no idea how I managed those seven years

between him killing her and the verdict.

between him killing her and the verdict.

Because of delays that his lawyer was able to get for him,

because of financial delays, because of COVID,

we had years of being in limbo.

Every time we thought we were gonna get close,

um, we would get our hopes up

and think that it was gonna come to an end,

and then we would be crushed again.

After the verdict,

we were shocked.

we were shocked.

We were stunned.

We were speechless.

We were elated.

I felt, I felt free.

I felt...

...that I could breathe again.

The fog was lifted.

I am very, uh, grateful

that Susan McBride came forward.

It put the pieces together to make it make sense.

[Altman] Susan McBride is my hero.

What she did,

how she came forward,

I will forever be, um,

indebted to her and grateful.

[McBride] This whole situation

and my involvement with Robert Feldman

really made me take a hard look at my life.

I needed a change.

So, I moved to an area of Northern Tuscany

So, I moved to an area of Northern Tuscany

called Lunigiana in Italy.

I wanted to live a simpler life

in a quieter place where, oh, knock on wood,

these kinds of things don't happen so much.

A place to really think and, you know,

plan the next chapter of my life.

[Altman] I can't even tell you

how many times a day I think about Stacy,

how many times a day I want to pick up the phone

how many times a day I want to pick up the phone

and call her.

I, I'm not whole without her.

It's such...

...a hole in my heart,

in so many people's hearts.

You know, I hear her.

It sounds weird. [chuckles]

But she had a very distinct laugh.

I hear it a lot.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry there wasn't more we could do.

We didn't know what to do.

We didn't know what to do.

I don't know what we would've done,

or could've done, but...

[sniffles] I miss her tremendously.