All language subtitles for Very Scary People s06e04 A Family to Fear.eng

[Jeff Shriner] 19 months
into the investigation

looking for these children

and David Matusiewicz
and Lenore Matusiewicz...

[phone ringing]

...I get a call
from Galveston, Texas, Police Department,

and they'd found a deceased two
year old child in the Galveston Bay.

-[phone ringing]
-They were thinking

it may have been
Christine's missing child.

-[phone ringing]
-And so I had to call Christine.

That was one of
the hardest things I've done in all my years.

[theme music playing]

Welcome to Very Scary People.
I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

From the outside looking in,

the Matusiewicz family
seemed like a tight knit clan,

pillars of the community,

and completely devoted
to each other,

but in reality,
a dark and twisted drama was playing out,

one that pitted an outsider
against the family,

a drama that included
stalking, kidnapping,

and, ultimately, murder,

leaving a trail of carnage
in its wake.

This is
The Courthouse Killers.

I'm on my way into work...

[engine roaring]

-[gun cocking]
-[gunshot]

...and I hear
across the police radio...

[officer on radio] I'm in the courthouse,
in the Wilmington courthouse.

We've got shots fired here.

I'm heading in that direction.

[sirens wailing]

[police radio chatter]

[Bill David] I get there
and immediately I find Detective Shriner

who said to me...

[Shriner on radio]
I got two hit the lobby, two hit the lobby.

The first thing that hit me
was the smell of gun smoke.

There were two victims
on the floor,

and at that point,
I went into policeman mode.

[reporter]
Two women were shot. Gunman opened fire

at the New Castle County
courthouse this morning.

The Matusiewicz's
are a psychotic family

that'll do whatever they want
if it'll meet their objective.

[Jill Matusiewicz]
I don't even wanna say sick. It's not an illness.

They're crazy,

twisted, evil people.

So, the Matusiewicz family
is made up of

Thomas Matusiewicz,
who's the father,

and then Lenore Matusiewicz,
who's his wife,

and then David
is the oldest child,

and then their youngest
was Amy.

-[cassette player clicking]
-[button clicks]

[Donnie] For the Matusiewicz's,
it was always family first,

after Lenore's
troubled childhood.

[AJ Marsden]
Lenore's upbringing,

we know that she lived
in a chaotic house.

One thing about her childhood
really stands out,

and this is the claim
that she made

that she suffered
from sexual abuse.

As far as Tom's background,

he was the golden child,
he was the favorite.

[Jill] Growing up,
Tom's mother and his father spoiled him,

and anything that Tom wanted,
Tom got.

[Marsden] Having that type
of upbringing

really causes you to develop

some sense of entitlement,
some narcissistic tendencies.

[sirens wailing]

Myself and Tom, we were hired
at the same time

for the City of Vineland
Police Department.

We got to know each other
pretty well.

He was more or less quiet.

I mean, he wasn't
outgoing at all.

He really kept to himself.

He was always really
enthusiastic about guns.

So, we would go out
shooting on our days off.

He was a good shot.

Lenore felt like, at first,

Tom was a good provider
for the family,

but throughout
their years together,

she saw that wasn't
exactly the case.

[Jill] As a family,

they were dysfunctional
at best.

The kids were kind of unkept,

and basically
they were undisciplined.

For a period of time, though,
they lived in a motor home,

and it was loaded
with roaches and such.

He would say that,
"Well, Lenore says I gotta get another job.

Lenore says I gotta
get more money."

So he started
doing landscaping work

and he called in sick,

but one of the captains
seen him

cutting the grass
when he was off sick.

They told them that
they were gonna fire him

or he'd have to resign,

and he resigned.

But Tom thought
he had to do those jobs

in order to survive,

and that they didn't
want him to survive.

[Marsden] Because of
the bad things

that Tom perceived
happening to him,

he also passed along the belief
that the government shouldn't be trusted,

family comes first,

"We need to
take care of each other."

All of the things that Lenore
hoped her husband would be,

be a good provider,
be good father to the children,

she realized
he was not those things.

So she shifts her focus
from Tom on to David.

David was always
the favored child

in every way.

David could do no wrong.

He was the one
that they expected

to go on and do
great things for them.

He excelled in school.

He went to
Glassboro State College

and he became an optometrist.

Those parents
really admired him

and were really proud of
everything he had done.

[Donnie] After graduating,

David starts his career
as an optometrist in Delaware,

where a fellow employee
catches his eye.

[Cris Barrish]
David Matusiewicz and Christine Belford

met in the late '90s

at the Vision Center,
where she worked,

and he was
a young optometrist,

and they got along
really well.

[Jeni Pugliese]
Christine was super bubbly, very talkative,

liked people, liked a lot of
activity around her,

just a a genuinely
nice person.

[women laughing]

David was, by all appearances,

a solid citizen.

You would say that
he's a pillar of society.

He appeared on
the local PBS affiliates weekly news magazine

talking about Vision Care,

was involved in
Special Olympics,

he provided eyeglasses
to some of the participants.

David eventually bought
the optometry practice

and it thrived
under his leadership.

Christine admired that,

and they sort of
fell in with each other.

Before Christine met David,

she was married
to another man.

She did have a daughter
with that man.

[Jeni] Christine was
my sister-in-law, but also my friend.

She was married
to my brother Bill

and they had my niece, Katie.

[Katie] I was little
when they got divorced,

and then we lived with
my grandfather, me and my mom.

[Marsden] Christine
and her daughter Katie

were on their own,
trying to find stability,

and she found it in David.

I don't remember the exact
first time I met David,

but I do remember
living with David, and he was fun.

He would play with me outside.

He put in a pool for me.

He taught me how to swim.

Christine and David married
in the fall of 2001...

[flash bulb pops]

...and they bought a house.

She thought she was, like,
living like a queen.

[Katie] He was a good stepdad.

He took care of me.
He gave me everything I wanted.

[Donnie] Christine and David
have their first daughter together

a few months
after their wedding.

A year later,
the family welcomes another little girl,

I think they were
happy at first, when she had my sisters.

[child laughing]

The oldest was like
his prized possession.

She looked like his family.

Yeah.

[Donnie] Four years
into the marriage,

they welcome a third daughter.

The couple now has four kids,
three still in diapers,

David's parents,
Lenore and Tom,

move in with the young couple
to help out,

but right away,

there is tension
between Christine and Lenore.

Almost immediately
upon their arrival,

Lenore thought that
she ran the house.

She questioned everything
that Christine did,

from what the children ate,
to how they were dressed,

to what time they went to bed,
to baths.

[Marsden] I think that abuse
that she suffered when she was younger

really affected her
later on in life

in that strong sense
of family comes first

and I have to
protect my family

and I have to keep them safe.

In Lenore's mind, it wasn't,

"I just wanna
be there for Christine

and help her
with these grandchildren."

In Lenore's mind, it was,

"I need to make sure
that they are taken care of.

Christine clearly is not doing
a good enough job.

These are now my children."

[dog barking]

[Donnie] Now living with
their son and his wife,

Lenore Matusiewicz
is driving a wedge between the couple,

questioning Christine's
parenting at every turn.

David remained more loyal
to his mother

than he did to his wife.

Christine was just saying,

"No, we need to decide this
as a couple,

and without Lenore
inserting her opinion in,"

and she kept losing,

and it was frustrating

and created
a layer of friction.

[Marsden] Lenore has never
viewed Christine or Katie

as part of the family,

so she sees this
as her opportunity

to permanently get rid
of Christine and Katie

and slide in as the girl's
maternal caretaker.

There are a couple of
different, odd dynamics

that we see in this family.

Lenore was the one in charge.

[Jill] Lenore has always
ruled that family.

If she said, "No,"
it didn't happen,

and if she said, "Yes,"

they all did
whatever they could to make it happen.

[Donnie] With tensions rising
between Christine and David,

Christine's daughter, Katie,
is in the line of fire.

[Jeni] Lenore was very

overtly mean to Katie.

Part of it was to make Katie

feel uncomfortable
in the house.

It sort of kick started
some other angst in Katie.

[Katie] So, my sister
was probably one and a half

and she was getting
a lot of attention

because she had finally
learned to walk,

and I was not getting any,

so I just tripped her
when she walked by,

and I got sent to my room.

When I went up to my room,
Dave came up with me

and he told me not to touch
any of his kids ever again.

[Jeni] David said,

"If you touch my kids again,

I'll throw you
out this window,"

and Katie really
took that to heart.

[Katie] That's when
it became clear to me that I wasn't his kid

and I wasn't
a part of "the girls,"

so that wasn't my family.

[Jeni] Things really
started to get bad,

and Christine said,

"David has been saying some
really awful things to me."

[glass smashes]

[Barrish speaking]

[Christine speaking]

That was really
the clincher for her. Like,

"Oh, my God. This guy
could do something to me."

[Jeni] It's difficult
to describe David.

David seemed to me
to be a person

who was uncomfortable
in his own skin.

I don't know that he was
trying to cover for something

or that he was truly
just living a life

that he was afraid
was going to fall apart at any moment.

She just decided that
the marriage was not working,

and she decided
to divorce David.

It was so insulting to David.

-[woman screams]
-He was an eye doctor,

successful, well liked
by his patients,

and he was definitely
angered by the fact that

this woman would leave him.

[Timothy Hitchings]
David fired her from her job at his clinic,

and she very quickly got a job

at another clinic
for more money.

[Marsden] She's making him
look bad,

and that pisses him off

because he doesn't wanna
look bad to other people.

He's built his reputation.

[Hitchings] David did not
wanna cooperate with the process.

He wanted the children
living with him full time.

He wanted sole custody,

meaning he makes
all the decisions.

It was "my way of the highway"
kind of an attitude.

He has in his mind
that she's an unfit mother,

so he wants the court to have

psychological evaluation
done on Christine

and the court ended up having

psychological evaluations
done on both of them.

While the psychologist
found no issues with her as a mother,

they found
that David, at times,

seemed to be at risk
of losing touch with reality.

The psychologist
said that David

would do the same thing
over and over and over again

and think he was gonna
get a different result.

Doing the same thing
over and over again,

that's the definition
of insanity.

[Hitchings] We had
the custody hearing in February 2007.

They got joint custody.

[Hitchings] Christine was
really happy with it,

but it didn't go
the way David wanted.

[Donnie] That's not enough
for David, Tom and Lenore.

They're all still under
the same roof

and they want the kids
to themselves.

David is now the person
who's been wronged.

Lenore said at one point

that Christine had annihilated
David's character.

David's wanting to get revenge

for what Christine
is doing to him.

[Katie] After the divorce,

my mom went down
to the Middletown house.

I think it was to
pick up the girls or drop them off.

And David was there,
and Tom and Lenore.

When David left the room,

Tom grabbed my mom by her arm

and drug her out back through
the sliding glass door

in front of all of us.

I followed her
outside, crying.

He was yelling at her outside
and calling her names.

That was probably
the first time I've ever seen Tom violent.

[Donnie] Despite
the escalating tensions,

Christine still believes
it's good for the girls

to spend time
with their father,

so she gives David permission

to take the three daughters
on a trip to Disney World,

even though Lenore
is also going.

[Barrish]
It was supposed to be a two-week trip.

-[numbers dialing]
-Christine called the oldest daughter

for the first couple of nights
and talked to her,

and the girl said
she was a little tired,

"We're doing
a lot of driving,"

which made sense.
They were driving to Florida.

[numbers dialing]

The third night, she called...

[cell phone snaps]

...and the phone kept
going to voicemail.

She said,
"I have been calling...

[numbers dialing]

...and I can't
get ahold of the girls."

She said, "Jeni, I don't think
the girls are coming back."

I was the missing persons
investigator

for New Castle County Police
in 2007.

My first inclination was

it was a father
taking his kids on vacation

and they failed to return

on the exact time they're
supposed to be returned.

But you could tell
in her voice

she thought
something was wrong,

and now I'm thinking,

"Is he late coming home
from Florida,

or did something worse happen?

Did he just try to take off
with these children?"

I was able to obtain
a search warrant

for the residence
in Middletown.

It was vacant,

which was very unusual to me
because Thomas lived there.

The house, for somebody
who's an eye doctor

was very disheveled
from the outside alone.

We didn't have a key.
We had to force entry into the house.

[glass smashes]

There was just
a bunch of trash.

The most interesting
thing I found

is when I went
to the fireplace

and it was nothing but ashes,

except the only thing
that did not burn

was David and Christine's
divorce papers.

There was
something bitter with this. You could tell.

At that point, we figured
it was a full on abduction.

The number one thing
that concerned us,

he had over a two-week
head start on us.

[reporter]
The children's mother reported them missing.

Law enforcement
have determined

Matusiewicz got away in an RV
with his mother Lenore.

The thing about people
doing crazy things,

you don't think about
a solid citizen

running away from their house.

He had a nice house.

He had a very
successful practice.

So it never occurred to me

and probably, presumably,
never occurred to Chris

that these boxes were
things he was packing

to get out of there.

He's not a vagrant.

He's not a drifter.

He's not a drug dealer.

He's not a fugitive from law.

He didn't have the profile for
somebody who'd cut and run.

[Shriner] We started pulling
credit card information

and the last of anything
we could find

was in North Carolina
where they stopped

and got fuel
with a credit card.

[David] From that
point forward,

there were zero transactions
on that credit card,

there were zero
ATM withdrawals,

there was no financial trail
for us to look at

to try and determine
where they went.

It's not making
a lot of sense to me.

Then I end up
catching a break.

Prior to departing Delaware,

David took a lot of steps

to liquidate a lot of assets.

He had a very successful
optometry business.

He sold that business
for a profit.

He cashed out his individual
retirement account, his IRA,

and then committed
wire and bank fraud

by doing an illegal refinance

of the home that he owned
in Middletown, Delaware.

So when the bank got upset,
the FBI got interested.

David had upwards of
a million dollars in cash when he took off.

[David] I know,
from my experience,

that someone with
a million dollars of cash

is extremely difficult
to track.

We had no idea where
this guy was running to.

I was starting
to fear for these kids.

The outcome could not be good
if we don't find them,

and find them
as fast as we can.

[David] One thing that I've
learned as a fugitive investigator,

for the most part,
people are creatures of habit.

So we were trying
to interview people that we thought

maybe David would reach out to
or keep in contact with.

[Donnie] Investigators
start by reaching out to David's sister, Amy.

Myself and the marshals,
we drove over to New Jersey

and met Amy face to face,

and she gave
the similar type answers.

Didn't know
how they got there,

wasn't concerned about them.

I was trying
to explain to her that,

while she loves her brother
and she wants to protect him,

she also has three nieces

that she needs
to look out for.

I thought she was
ready to break

and tell me
what I needed to know,

and then very quickly,

she composed herself,

became a stone,

and gave us nothing else.

[Donnie] Next,
detectives tracked down David's dad Tom,

who now lives
in Smyrna, Delaware.

His answers were really vague.

He didn't know
how they got to Florida,

didn't know when
they were coming back.

A lot of didn't knows.

Now, we're talking
a month or two into this case.

Had had no concern at all
about where his wife,

son and grandkids were,

and that part didn't sell.

At that point, in my mind,

I was thinking,
"You're complicit in this."

You could tell
that this family,

A, they were smarter
than everybody else,

B, they were
kind of narcissistic.

Lenore thought
she's the only one

who could raise these kids.

That was her mindset.

You know, obviously,
David it was her son,

and she's gonna
stick with her son through thick and thin,

so, "If it takes us
grabbing a Winnebago and taking off

so Christine can't have 'em,
we're gonna do it,"

and it was as much as her plan
as it was David's.

I never saw Christine cry,

but as time went on,

she would become
more and more worried.

Her biggest concern
was that she would never see them again.

[David] During the course
of the investigation,

we learned that Thomas
moved from Smyrna, Delaware,

to Edcouch, Texas.

Initially, it was just
Thomas living there.

A ranch style home

with a small bit of land
around it,

pretty close
to the southern border,

but then later,

Amy ended up moving
to that same location.

So I reached out
to our office in Texas

and I asked them
to help me out with confirming

that David and the three girls
are nowhere in that area.

Weeks are going by.
They're spending significant amount of time...

[camera shutter clicking]

...checking on that property,

researching,
interviewing people, things of that nature,

with no results.

Becoming extremely frustrated.

[Donnie] And then
a grim discovery

leads investigators
to another location in Texas.

Galveston, Texas,
Police Department

found a deceased
two-year-old child

in the Galveston Bay.

Christine Belford is in agony.

Her ex-husband,
David Matusiewicz,

and David's mother Lenore,

have abducted
her three young daughters.

Now a two year old's body
is found in the Galveston Bay,

leaving the mother
to fear the worst.

[Shriner] I get a call from the National
Center for Missing & Exploited Children.

They requested me
to get hold of Christine

and get a DNA sample,

and so I had to call Christine

tell her why I needed one.

[Ed McAndrew] She had to wait

to find out if that was
her youngest child.

That was one of
the hardest things I've done in all my years.

You know, I've been around
murderers and all that.

That was tough.

But thankfully,
it was not heraldry.

[Donnie]
Tragically, that little girl

turns out to be
Riley Ann Sawyers,

who'd been killed
by her mother and her mother's boyfriend.

I think those things

brought that
into her mind, like,

"Maybe he would
harm the girls,"

and that became
her biggest concern,

that they would kill them.

[Barrish speaking]

[Christine speaking]

[Barrish]
Christine said she couldn't even go into stores

'cause she would just
remember being with the girls.

She couldn't watch a TV show
with children in it.

She was fully focused
on finding them,

like any mom would.
You know, the flyers.

[Barrish speaking]

[Christine speaking]

She was just distraught.

I told Christine that,
you know,

I'm gonna do
everything in my power to find her daughters.

It's what police officers do,
you know?

I'm trying to figure out
how I can generate new leads,

another angle to take.

I started focusing in
more on Amy.

I need to know,
if she is in touch with David,

how are they talking?

I went to
the state AG's office

for subpoenas
and court orders,

and that response
is a half a ream of paper of records.

It's a needle in a haystack.

I'm trying to find
that one piece of information

that will be my next lead,

and what that
ended up being was

a call that came
out of Panama to Amy,

and when I started
to do a little bit of research on that,

it turns out to be
a hotel in Panama.

That gave me the indication
that there was potential

that David and the three girls
were in Panama.

Well, now,
what do I do with that?

Since that's
a foreign country,

I have no jurisdiction there.

The Marshals Service has
a diplomatic Security Service liaison agent...

-[phone clicks]
-...so I reached out and said,

"I need someone
to go over to this hotel

and just to get an idea
as to how this occurred."

Unfortunately,
everything at that point

needed to flow through
a certain bureaucratic red tape.

That was a slow process.

A couple of months,

I still didn't hear anything.

Things were thrown
across the office

because I knew
what this meant to Christine

and I had a bad feeling
about the Matusiewicz family.

It was over a year
since this kidnapping

before I finally
got confirmation they were in Panama.

David had purchased a house

in a community where
a lot of North Americans had settled.

But my gut tells me
the wrong person was interviewed

that either was untruthful
with the investigator

or David had
a stronger relationship

with that person
that was interviewed.

But whatever it was,
David was tipped off

that we knew
they were in Panama,

and they ended up
fleeing out of Panama.

He still had the RV,

had it packed
and ready to go at a moment's notice,

so he threw everybody
into the RV,

and the chase was on again.

[Donnie] David and Lenore
get away,

but investigators
are closing in on where they are

and who's been helping them.

One of the things
that we were able to do

is target an email address

that we knew was being used
by Amy Gonzalez.

Amy is reaching out
to the Bank of Montreal...

[keys tapping]

...to facilitate
a wire transfer down to Nicaragua.

I find a RE/MAX realtor
being contacted.

Now I'm pretty confident

that Amy is facilitating
another purchase.

Now I'm at a point where,

do I go through the same thing
that I just went through

for 16, 17 months?

No. I can't let these girls
continue to go through that.

So I take a trip
to my headquarters,

and it was a very spirited conversation
I had with my international branch.

I don't know what was said
to the foreign investigators,

but the foreign investigator
that was in Nicaragua did a fantastic job.

I couldn't have done
a better job myself.

That investigator went out,

conducted the interview
with a RE/MAX agent,

got the piece of property
that David had purchased,

went there,

-put eyes on David...
-[camera shutter clicks]

-...put eyes on Lenore...
-[camera shutter clicking]

...and, more importantly,
put eyes on all three girls.

-[camera shutter clicks]
-[Christine] About 11:30 pm,

a US Marshals
and a New Castle County police detective

-came to my door...
-[knocking on door]

...knocking on the door,
very excited. "We found them."

And when they told me
they were in Nicaragua, I was quite surprised.

[Shriner] When we went out
to Christine's house

and told her we had
a location of children,

she hugged me
and she was ecstatic.

She needed to immediately
make flight arrangements to get down there.

[engine roars]

[Donnie] Christine heads
to Nicaragua

for what she hopes is
a reunion with her children.

Meanwhile, local police
make sure

David and Lenore
can't slip away again.

[birds chirping]

They watched David leave
with the oldest daughter,

taking her to school.

They end up
stopping the truck,

arresting him,
recovering the one child.

They then have a team
that goes back to the RV.

They arrest Lenore

and recover
the other two children.

[reporter] The three girls
were found safe

and reunited
with their mother,

something a New Castle County
Missing Persons detective

had promised what happened.

I told the mother
that I'm not gonna give up,

so that's what we did.

After 19 months,

I finally have the kids
back with their mother.

We met our objective.

When the girls came back,
Christine was ecstatic.

She was just
happy, happy, happy.

[Marsden] The girls
were unfortunately told

that Christine not only died

and was no longer there,

but that she
committed suicide.

The girls had nothing
to run away back to,

and there was no one
around them

that spoke their language,

that they could
go to for help.

They probably fell in line
pretty easily

just because
they felt trapped.

[Katie] When my mom did
finally bring my sisters home,

they didn't
look like my sisters.

They were skinny.

They looked dirty.

They had haircuts
that Lenore had given them,

so they all had a mullet.

[Jeni] And then
the little one,

she had the worst case
of pinkeye

I think that I have ever seen.

[Katie] I don't know why
you would take the girls

and not want to actually
take care of them,

you know, mentally,
emotionally, physically.

[Marsden] This gets back
to David's idea

that these girls
are his property,

and if he and Lenore
want them to be neglected, then that's fine.

He's their father. He dictates
what happens to them.

He loves them,
but it's a very empty love.

I visited Christine within
a week after their return.

They all seemed happy
to be around her.

Literally, they were
crawling all over her,

the house was happy,

filled with three
laughing children,

and it just seemed like,

"Wow, this awful story
is gonna have a happy ending,"

and that's when, really,
the reign of terror started.

[thunderclap]

[McAndrew] There are
certain types of criminals

who really are committed

to their criminal objectives.

The Matusiewicz family
was fueled by grievance,

grievance at the system,

grievance at the government,

and grievance
at Christine Belford.

The law is not
going to stop them.

It may slow them down
for a while,

but unless they
are incapacitated...

-[thunderclap]
-...it will not stop them.

[Barrish] Lenore was charged
in state court

for endangering the kids,

and David was being
charged federally,

with kidnapping
and with bank fraud,

but the news of the hearing

was the fact
that David's lawyer,

suggested that the reason
he had fled with the children

was that Christine
was sexually abusing them.

Supposedly,
this make-believe abuse

had been going on
for a long time.

Never once had he
ever said anything about that.

If you can make
an accusation like that and make it stick,

you win the case.

I'd spoken to Thomas
and it never came up.

I spoke to Amy in person,
and that never came up.

As the lead investigator
on the case,

you'd think somebody
in this family

might wanna give me a clue
why David might be running.

If he's using that excuse,

why wouldn't they
get in touch with me?

It was something
that I believe

that Lenore cooked up
as a backup plan

to somehow try
to justify his actions.

Lenore telling these stories

is a way of her
expressing the abuse

that she suffered as a child.

The worst type of abuse
that can happen to a child is sexual abuse.

Lenore never dealt
with that trauma,

and this was her way
of trying to deal with it,

even though she would
never admit to that.

I think Lenore, when she first
made this claim to David,

David didn't believe it.

However, he also
agreed with Lenore that,

if you could convince the jury
that this happened to the girls,

there was no way that they were
gonna give those back to Christine,

and then Lenore
and David would win.

[Jill] You would think
that one would learn their lesson that,

"You did wrong.
You've kidnapped these children,

and you paid the price for
kidnapping these children,"

but Lenore, obviously,
she had no limits.

[Hitchings] We have
an institution

where children at risk
in Delaware

are interviewed
by psychologists

to try to ferret out
any evidence from the child

on whether they've
been abused or not.

The girls went through
that kind of process,

and, of course, there was no
corroborating evidence.

[McAndrew]
These false narratives,

it's one thing to say them
out loud in public,

it's quite another thing
to try to prove them in a courtroom.

[Barrish] The judge took pains
to point out that,

you know, "I find
none of this credible."

Both David and his mother
pleaded guilty.

They didn't want a trial.

Lenore got 18 months
in state prison

and David got four years
in federal prison

on charges of parental
kidnapping and bank fraud.

[Katie] I remember my mom telling
me that they had been sentenced

and that they were gonna
be away for a little while.

It wasn't forever,
but it was like a...

We could just sit and breathe
because they were gone.

[Shriner]
After David and Lenore were sentenced,

I just felt that the case
was never gonna go away.

It was just a gut feeling.

This is a psychotic family

that'll do whatever they want
to meet their objective.

This was about retribution.

This was about vengeance.

This was about annihilating
Christine Belford

for what she did,
in their minds,

not just to David
but to their entire family.

I knew my mom
was scared of them.

She didn't have to say it.
I just knew.

[David] Years after David
was sentenced,

I'm on my way into work

and I hear across
the police radio

that there was a shooting
in the courthouse.

[police radio chatter]

[officer on radio] I'm in the courthouse,
in the Wilmington courthouse.

We got shots fired here.

I got two hit in the lobby.
Two hit in the lobby.

I immediately
reached out to my team...

[police radio chatter]

...and asked if any of them

could respond
down to the courthouse.

[sirens wailing]

I'm heading in that direction.

Get there and immediately
I find Detective Shriner,

who had been reassigned

as the New Castle
County police liaison officer for the courthouse.

Detective Shriner said to me,

"Christine's in this building
for a custody hearing."

-[engine roaring]
-[siren wailing]

Even with David and Lenore
behind bars,

the Matusiewicz family
is still dangerous, unpredictable,

and laser focused
on Christine and her children.

They wanna get revenge

by making Christine's life
a living hell,

and take away
everything she's ever loved.

They'll do anything
to get her out of the way,

including taking
the three girls from her permanently.

Lenore is in prison,
David is in prison,

but Amy and Tom
are not in prison.

So they still had
two people on the outside.

The Matusiewiczes
believed that the court system

had wronged them.

At the same time,

those beliefs
were being fueled

by some of the groups
they were getting involved in.

[AJ] Tom,
from an early age,

felt like the world did
not give him what he deserved,

and so he went seeking
answers elsewhere.

And that's when he found

the sovereign
citizenship movement.

[crowd clamoring]

This is an
anti-government group.

It does not recognize the
authority of the government

to govern its citizens.

So they don't believe
that they have to follow

the same laws
that citizens would follow.

They feel like the best thing
that they could possibly do

is take matters
into their own hands.

[narrator] Lenore doesn't let
prison bars stop her

from escalating her vicious
campaign against Christine.

She began
writing the false narrative

that would become the story
that they would tell

over and over
and over again for years

in an effort
to destroy Christine

and repossess the girls.

[AJ] When you tell a lie
so many times,

the lie becomes
a reality in your brain.

She started that

as a way to save
her grandchildren, right?

Because I think
she really did feel

like she was a better mother
than Christine

and her and David knew
what was best for the girls.

David's got access to email,
and he emails Amy

and says, "Hey,
no more Mr. Nice Guy.

I want you to do whatever
you can to spread the word

that she had sexually abused
these children."

[Ed] Amy Gonzalez
was the dutiful sister,

daughter and communicator.

She really functioned
within the conspiracy

as sort of
the communications hub,

the person who connected
different people online,

the person who
moved different tactics

or conduct they
were engaging in forward.

In Amy's mind,
her mother has always been

somebody that she's wanted
and needed affection from.

So when Lenore goes to Amy
and asks Amy,

"Hey, can you set up a website

that explains
all of these different things

that I think
happened to the girls?"

So Amy views her as
almost a god, in some ways.

She's going to do what
her mother asks her to do

to get that praise.

The next thing that happened

is they created this website

called Grandmother's
Impossible Choice.

[Ed]
The impossible choice being

"Do I take my grandchildren
away from their mother

and leave my family behind
and flee the country

to save them
from sexual abuse or not?"

Some of the allegations
on the website

talked about
Christine telling Lenore

that she can get $50,000

for each one of David's
little blonde girls,

and she's going to be
happy to do it,

and that they found the
rap sheet of a child predator

under her bed.

It's all these
crazy allegations.

It doesn't
take a leap of logic

to think this
was the plan all along

to get custody.

[Ed] Lenore would embellish,

and then other family members
would add to the embellishment

with their own embellishment,

and the story
became more outlandish

in terms of the allegations.

And some of those allegations
included things like

"We knew something was wrong

when the oldest daughter said

Mommy told her about
the G-spot.

And she had
to do things to Mommy

to make Mommy feel good."

[Jeni] I would rather someone
call me a murderer

than call me
a sexual predator.

I mean, they know
that that's the worst thing

that you can say.

[narrator] In September 2010,

Lenore is released from
prison early

after serving only 12 months.

Days after she gets out,

the attacks against Christine
escalate.

The family had really launched
this coordinated campaign

to tar and feather Christine.

[Jeni] Lots of people had been
getting handwritten letters.

They papered the town
with them.

Her neighbors got them.

The schools got them.

The doctors' offices got them.

Christine said,
"It's not true,

and I can't do
anything about it."

Christine just seemed
almost numb to it.

This idea of
harassing Christine

was designed
to get her to give up,

to remove herself
from the situation,

maybe by suicide.

Maybe just to give them
custody of the children.

[Jeni] They were watching her.

They knew where she was

and they were
predicting her moves

and they were just...

just making her life
very, very difficult.

[Katie]
My mom wasn't in contact

with anybody
from the Matusiewicz family,

but we would actually
get cards in the mail from Amy

for all holidays
and the girls' birthdays.

It was scary because it meant
she knew where we were.

[Millard] I have relatives
that send me greeting cards

for holidays and stuff,

but nowhere near to the volume
that Amy was sending

communication
to these children.

They sent my boyfriend a card
when our daughter was born,

saying that every baby's birth
deserves to be celebrated,

with a $5 check.

I don't know how they knew
that I was even pregnant.

They're always
around every corner.

They know what you're doing.

What makes them so scary

is just knowing that
they're not going to stop.

Christine had made
serious efforts to stop it.

We found a copy of a letter

that she had sent
to Amy and her parents,

requesting that they stop
sending the cards

and the letters.

It didn't work.
They continued to come.

Christine even went so far

as to speak
to the victim's advocate

at the US Attorney's Office
here in Wilmington

and expressed her concerns
about what had happened.

[Katie] So my mom
still tried to update David

about the girls

and let them know things
that they were doing.

She was trying
to meet him halfway.

But eventually she wanted
to cut off all contact

between David
and the children.

So we filed a petition for
termination of parole rights.

Once the parental connection
is severed by the law,

then the grandparents
and the aunt,

they're no longer legally
array to the children.

[Ed] Once she fought back

and terminated
their parental rights

in a family court proceeding,

they escalated
beyond harassment.

[Ed] As the Matusiewiczes
build out their scheme,

they clearly understood
that they were going to need

to involve other people.

So they were finding people
who were sympathetic

because they believed...

they were going to be part

of helping
protect these children.

[Millard] I'm not really sure
how a family that was so crazy

was able to lure all of these
people into their scheme.

High-school sweethearts,

people who were school
teachers from their childhood.

They included past friends
of the family,

as well as perfect strangers
who got to know them,

in one way or another,

and just
thought they were helping

do something good to
protect children.

[Millard] One of the characters
who emerged was Cindy Bender.

Cindy had befriended
Christine online,

and expressed sympathy for her

and explained
that she had grown up

in the same town
with the Matusiewiczes.

She just wanted to make sure
my mom was okay

and check in on the girls.

And my mom thought
she was just being friendly.

And they would send emails
back and forth and pictures.

What Christine didn't realize
is that David had email access

while he was in federal prison

and had been communicating
with Cindy Bender.

David Matusiewicz was
a high-school sweetheart of hers.

What Cindy did
is she acted as a spy.

She would feed David
information she was getting

from Christine's
private Facebook account,

pictures of the girls,
things they were doing,

what was going on
in Christine's personal life,

that he could use in
their stalking campaign.

I would describe Cindy Bender
as a double agent.

[Jeni] Christine was
hyper-vigilant, I would say,

very aware of what was
going on around her.

She wanted to know
where her kids were.

If they went outside to play,

they had to have an adult
with them all the time.

We actually got cameras
on the outside of her house

and the monitor was
in her bedroom,

and it just ran
and you could watch them.

We also got
three German shepherds.

[Millard]
This house was fortified.

There was a baseball bat
beside her bed.

There was a knife
on the bedstand.

There was a ladder
that could be deployed

out of an upstairs window.

[Katie] My mom had always said

if the Matusiewiczes were to
ever come to the house

while we were there,

that she would try
and hold them off downstairs as long as possible,

and I was supposed
to help the girls

get out of
the second story window

then go next door
to our neighbor's house.

He was a state trooper.

Yeah.

What's really heartbreaking
about the escape plan

is that it involved Christine
sacrificing herself.

[narrator] It's a plan
that is put into action

on one fateful afternoon.

So while David
is still incarcerated

and Lenore has been released,

Lenore and Tom drove to
Delaware from Texas,

they contacted
a private investigator,

and asked him to escort them
to Christine's house

under the guise
of returning a afghan

that supposedly would have
sentimental value

to the children.

I was coming home
from school one day...

and I recognized their car.

It was the same car they had
when they had lived

in Middletown with us
when I was younger.

[Millard]
But the audacity that,

after kidnapping
these children,

after going to prison,

after having
parental rights terminated,

that they would actually go
to her front door

is mind-boggling.

There was no court order
that was going to keep them

from continuing
on their mission

to take her kids away.

[Katie] When I saw Tom, I knew
we had to get to the house

and get the girls
and make sure they were safe.

I was with my mom's boyfriend
and my mom was not home.

So we locked the door

and here they came,

Tom knocking on the door,

saying he was just
dropping off some blankets

that were knitted for
my sisters.

I didn't tell my sisters
they were there.

[dog barking]

When Tom went
to the house that day, he was armed.

We can tell from Christine's
own home video surveillance

that there was a gun
underneath his shirt.

I personally believe
that they came

to murder Christine Belford
that day.

[Jeni] I was
concerned for the girls.

I felt like when David
got out of prison,

that he might make
a random appearance.

[Katie] I remember my mom
talking about him getting out of jail soon.

She was worried.

[Cris] David gets released
from prison,

he goes and joins his parents

at their little ranch house
in Texas,

where Amy is living nearby.

She's got a young child.

And sends her an email
and says,

"Prepare yourself to have four
children under your care."

Does he think that he's
miraculously going to convince

the Delaware courts
to give him custody?

What does he know?

David was imprisoned
for two and a half years,

and he spent every minute

seething with hatred
for Christine,

a hatred fueled
by his mother's delusions.

But no matter what
the Matusiewicz family says or does,

Christine never breaks.

Now, with David out of prison,

this twisted family has
an even more horrifying plan,

to get rid of Christine

and get custody of the girls
once and for all.

[Ed] After David's
release from prison,

he has to report to
the US probation office.

And the first thing
he asks for

is permission to travel
from Texas,

where he was released,
to New Jersey,

which happens to be
right next to Delaware.

He wanted to get
back here immediately.

But David is denied
permission to travel

because the probation office
had a policy

that nobody who was released
can leave the state

for at least 60 days.

With every tactic
that David tried

and was met
with either resistance

or was met with failure,

he was going to escalate it
to the next level.

In the fall of 2012,

there was a mediation
in Family Court

to deal with the issue
of child support.

He owes support
payments to Christine,

and he can't pay them
because he's not working.

There's a mediation where
he participates in by phone.

The mediator says,

"Just tell us what
you can pay per week,

and we can make arrangements."

[Timothy] He said he couldn't
pay any child support at all

because he's disabled.

He never said
what his disability was.

[Ed] He understands that if
he doesn't agree to something,

there will have to be
a hearing before a judge.

He wanted to have a reason
to come to Delaware.

Better yet, now he had
a reason to make Christine

come to a particular place
as well.

What he did not
tell the probation office

is that he's not coming alone.

Christine said,
"David wants this thing

and, you know,
I'm just going to go,

and it's going to be done,

and we're just going
to move on."

[Millard] There's also
a lot of security.

It's all keycard access.

So the building was safe.

Beth Mulford was
a family friend,

and she came to the court
to provide some moral support.

[Katie] The night before court,
I remember I came downstairs

and, um, she was just up
and watching TV and laughing.

She wasn't sleeping.

And I asked her
what was wrong,

and she just
said she wasn't tired.

So she never let us know

how scared she was.

And I said, "How do you feel
about Monday?"

And she said,
"I'm scared to death,

but I'm going."

[Millard]
David and Tom Matusiewicz

had driven into Wilmington
that morning.

They parked in a parking
garage across the street.

Something unusual
about that is

there's a parking garage
attached to the courthouse.

They did not use
that parking garage.

They walked across the street
and went into the courthouse.

David got in line
for going through security.

Tom did not get in line.

He stayed outside in
the public area of the lobby.

According to a witness.

at one point, he came
back over to David,

they embraced.

Tom said, "Everything's
going to be all right."

However, he doesn't leave.

He stays in the lobby
for quite some time...

...until Christine Belford
and Beth Mulford arrive.

[gunshots]

Both women dropped
right where they were.

[officer over radio]
I got two hit in the lobby. Two hit the lobby.

[siren wailing]

[officer] I'm in the courthouse,
in the Wilmington Courthouse.

We've got shots fired here.

[police chatter over radio]

[Jeff] It comes across the
police radio about a shooting

in the New Castle County
courthouse.

I was only a mile away,

so of course I came.

There was mass chaos.

There were police cars
everywhere.

When the shooting occurred...

[gunshots]

...armed law enforcement
inside the lobby of the courthouse

started to return fire
on Thomas.

Thomas, in turn,
started to shoot at them.

He struck at least one of them
in their bulletproof vest.

But Thomas was also struck.

As he's trying
to make his escape

out the side revolving door,

the building
goes into lockdown.

And that door locks.

He's now stuck
in that revolving door.

And as a result of that,

he ends up
taking his own life.

[Jeff]
I went inside the courthouse.

The first thing that hit me
was the smell of gun smoke.

There were two victims
on the floor.

One of my captains
walked up to me,

and he said,
"That's Christine Belford."

And my heart just sank.

It hit home real quick.

And at that point, I went
into policeman mode.

Where's David?

[Millard] By the time
the shootout occurs,

David has gone
through security

and been cleared
to enter the courthouse.

I got to know some of
the family court judges

who worked on their
parental rights termination

and the divorce.

And I was in fear that David
was in the courthouse,

was going to
go looking for them.

[gunshots]

[Millard]
Once the shooting began,

court personnel began
herding people into courtrooms

and David did end up
in that room.

As luck would have it,
there was a court bailiff

taking people's names

because they were all
potential witnesses

that may be needed later.

I said, "Is there
a David Matusiewicz?"

And he said,
"Yeah, I just had him.

And they just released him."

So we run over the elevators

and there's David Matusiewicz
at the base of the elevators,

getting ready to go out the
back door of the courthouse.

We yelled to him,
"David, get up here."

And he turned.
He turned right around

and walked through the crowd,
came right back upstairs.

He was calm,
cool and collected.

I told the sergeant of
our SWAT team,

I said,
"Put him in handcuffs."

The focus turned
to three Matusiewicz girls.

Where are they?
And are they safe?

The Delaware State Police
identified all three schools

where the children were,

had confirmed
that they were there

and we had school
resource officers en route

to pick the kids up.

[narrator]
Investigators detain David in an empty courtroom

and begin
processing the scene.

At the same time,

details about the crime
make their way to the public.

I remember I was
sitting there watching TV...

[reporter on TV] Two women were
shot to death when a gunman opened fire

at the New Castle County
courthouse this morning.

At this time,
the shooter is dead

and two capitol police
officers were wounded.

It said shooting at
the Wilmington courthouse.

And I said,
"Well, that's that."

No, no. But I just knew.

I knew that they
weren't going to stop.

And I knew that
David was there that day,

and my mom was there.

It just wasn't a coincidence.

I wanted to go get my sisters.

I wasn't allowed to get them.

They had already been taken
into the police station.

Yeah.

Preliminarily, this was the
result of a custody dispute

that has lasted
in our court system

for several years.

[Jeni] When I found out
that Christine was a victim,

it felt unbelievable to me.

But, at the same time,
it wasn't a surprise at all.

Because it was
all coming to a head.

After I found out that Tom had
been the one to shoot her...

I remembered one of the things
that Christine had said to me.

She said,
"Tom is an excellent shot.

If he wanted to kill me,
he could."

[gunshots]

[Millard] Christine Belford
and Beth Mulford

were murdered in the lobby
of the courthouse.

And you want to bring the
person responsible for that to justice.

Well, on the surface,
that was Thomas Matusiewicz.

You could say,
"This is a murder-suicide.

We'll document it
and we walk away from it."

We couldn't do that.

Tom pulled the trigger,

but these women were killed
by the Matusiewicz family.

[Ed] Tom is the violent force
that runs through the family,

but he is very much
someone who is doing

what Lenore and David
have provoked him into doing.

We need to find Amy Gonzalez
and Lenore Matusiewicz

as fast as possible.

[police radio chatter]

[Bill]
Now the real work starts

of trying to piece
all of this together.

I immediately start asking...

"Where's Lenore?"

I felt it was imperative
to quickly try to get

some type of
interview with David.

He eventually did invoke
his Miranda rights

and requested an attorney.

But by that time,

he was able to tell us
where his mother was.

She was in Elkton, Maryland,

at the residence of
David and Peggy Mitchell.

Mr. Mitchell was a former
employee of David Matusiewicz.

They had actually spent the
night before the court hearing

in Elkton with the Mitchells.

[narrator]
One team focuses on Lenore,

while the second
searches for the car

that David and Tom
took to the courthouse.

[Millard] When detectives
located the car,

they could tell there was
a lot of items inside the car.

So much so that you really

couldn't see well
into the car.

So there was a concern that,
is there a bomb in this car?

They used a robot
to open the vehicle

and remove all the contents

before we were able
to thoroughly go through it

for evidentiary value.

What we find is
evidence that makes clear

that this was
not a random act,

that this was planned.

It was premeditated.

Bulletproof vests, handcuffs,

three handcuffs
in successively smaller sizes

down to tiny handcuffs

that could be put on
a small child.

A cattle prod
and lots of ammunition.

From the parking garage,

The investigation moves to
the house in Maryland

of David Matusiewicz's friend,

where the Matusiewiczes stayed
the night before the shooting.

The marshal's task force
confirmed that Lenore

was at the residence

and she willingly
came back to Delaware.

[Ed] He asked those friends
specifically,

"How did Lenore react

to the news that
there had been a shooting

at the courthouse?"

And the answer we got

was not "Oh, my God,
my husband's dead.

Or maybe David's dead."

It was "We have
to get the girls now.

We have to go get the girls
right now."

[Bill] They end up seeing
a car in the driveway

that has Texas plates on it.

They ask whose that is,

and Lenore indicates that
that's the vehicle

that she brought from Texas.

David, Lenore and Tom
drove in two cars.

And that other car
was full of weapons.

Assault rifles, handguns,
tons of ammunition,

gas cans, shovels.

Lots of stuff
that could have been used

for a variety of things.

The Matusiewiczes
likely had multiple plans

for how they were going
to deal with Christine Belford

and the girls.

We found a note that
Tom left for Amy.

It included instructions like,

"Amy, take my guns.
Keep them."

It also included
funeral instructions

through the VA Cemetery.

And he wrote,

"When your government
takes your granddaughters away from you,

it ceases
to be your government."

[Millard] Amy was contacted at
work in a hospital in Texas,

and she...

played like she knew
nothing about this.

Eventually, we executed a
search warrant at Amy's house.

And she had communications

from private investigators
in Delaware.

She had documents related
to the custody battle

for the children.

[narrator] However, it's not
enough for authorities to charge Amy.

Back in Delaware,

investigators continue
combing through the evidence

from David and Tom's car.

They find something
that chills them to the bone.

[Ed] Found in the vehicle
was a red notebook

that had all kinds of notes
that we later found out

was largely written by
Tom Matusiewicz.

[Millard] I would refer to
the red notebook as an index.

It documented
years' worth of stalking

and cyberstalking.

A handwritten document was
located in that notebook.

Had the letters "HL"
at the top

and a list of last names.

Ultimately, we determined
that that "HL"

stood for "hit list."

[Ed]
The hit list that we found

included the names
of various judges

and lawyers and witnesses
and doctors

who had been involved
in the prior criminal cases

and in the family court
proceedings.

It was just a who's who
of who they felt

was responsible
for them losing the rights

to have anything to do
with the Matusiewicz girls.

Christine Belford's name
was on there.

Timothy Hitchings' name
was on there.

[Timothy] I will never forget
hearing that

on the phone
from the police

that... confirming that I was
an intended victim as well.

I assume they probably thought
I'd be at the courthouse.

You know, it's kind of spooky.

You know,
you think about grief

and you think about fear.

I had both of them
at the same time.

And I was worried.

I was more worried for my kids
that could be found

and harmed in some way.

And, um, that's pretty scary.

A conspiracy to murder
would require the state

to prove that Amy, David,
Lenore, and Tom agreed

that they were going
to kill Christine.

We knew it, but
we didn't have the evidence

to bring a murder charge.

Lenore, Amy,
did not simply stand down.

The day after the shooting,
Amy Gonzalez from Texas

filed a petition to assume
custody of the three girls.

[Millard]
This campaign would continue

regardless of
where these children were.

Whoever's custody they were in
was in imminent danger.

We can't just let
these people go free.

[Ed] David was in custody

for violating
his federal probation.

His probation authorized him

to travel straight to Delaware
for his hearing

and straight back to Texas.

The fact that he had
traveled with someone

and the fact that he had
spent the night

somewhere other than Delaware,

that was enough
for him to be held.

[Ed] He had been sentenced
to six months,

and it was in
that six-month window

where we had to pull

all of the investigative
threads together

and knit that into a case

before he would
be out on the street

and released.

Lenore and Amy, in particular,

continued to use the Internet

to propagate their false
and defamatory lies

about Christine Belford.

And they did it in a way
to try to justify

what had happened.

They didn't talk
so much about Tom,

other than to say,

"Tom had a brain tumor,

and that must have
caused him to do this."

"And he was acting alone."

They made that clear, right?

They wanted to
get that out there.

[Millard] At that point,

it's clear we're not
going to get

to charge these people
with murder.

We just don't have
the evidence

to prove the conspiracy.

[Ed] And with regard to Amy,
in particular,

she was behind a keyboard.

She was in Texas
when this murder occurred.

She wasn't even here.

How do you prosecute people

for using the Internet
to foment violence?

There is a statute on the
books at the federal level,

cyberstalking
resulting in death.

And it carries a possibility,

a possible sentence
of life without parole.

The holdup was
it had never been prosecuted.

Nobody had ever
gone to court with this.

It looked like it would be
a tall challenge.

But we have to try it.

The facts set forth
in the indictment alleged that beginning

in December of 2009,

David Matusiewicz with
the assistance of his mother,

father, and sister,

orchestrated
a three-year campaign

designed to defame,
harass, intimidate,

and frighten Christine Belford
and her children.

The cyberstalking trial
began in June 2015.

[Katie] I testified
on behalf of my mom

and how scared she was.

When I saw David
in the courtroom,

I actually started to cry.

It had been a long time
since I had seen him,

since before the girls
were actually kidnapped.

I tried not to look at him.

After I saw him
and started crying,

I knew that I had to
get it together.

And the way to do that
was not to look at David.

[Ed] We started with
the shooting itself.

And then we walked
the jury through

everything that we found.

And a critical
component of that

was the Grandmother's
Impossible Choice website.

That really sort of brings
into focus their tactics

in using the Internet
to destroy Christine.

But of the more than
70 witnesses

who testified at the trial,

none were more important

than the oldest of
the three girls.

[narrator] Christine's
8-year-old daughter

bravely takes the stand
and sets the record straight.

She got up there

and said,
"It's all a bunch of lies.

My mother never hurt me.

My mother never hurt
any of us."

This was the moment of truth
for the Matusiewiczes

as the person they were so
committed to saving

dismantled their falsehoods
in front of a jury.

[AJ] This child was not going
along with the plan,

and they probably felt like
this was a sign of Christine,

one of Christine's traits
coming through

on this particular child.

In closing,

one of the lines
that we used for the jury

was to make clear

that they killed the person
they hated the most

in the place
they hated the most.

[gunshots]

When Tom decided
that he was going to do

the courthouse shooting,

it was symbolic
in a couple of ways.

He was not only going
to take care of Christine

and make sure that she was not
going to get those girls,

but he was also going
to make his stand

against the government
in a government building.

All they needed to find
was all the hate

that had been built up
over the years

between the Matusiewicz family
against Christine Belford

that this was the natural
and probable outcome

of their actions.

[Ed] The Matusiewiczes
were each found guilty

of cyberstalking
resulting in death.

And in February 2016,
three years after the killing,

Amy, David, and Lenore

were all sentenced
to life in prison

without the possibility
of parole.

[Ed] David had no reaction
to his sentence.

There was a real question of
whether David felt the things

and how he felt things.

Lenore Matusiewicz

after the trial became ill.

She had terminal cancer.

The defense wanted to
put off the sentencing,

and the judge said "No.
I'm going to the hospital.

She's going to hear her
sentence before she dies..."

[machine beeping]

...and sentenced her
to life imprisonment

on her deathbed.

This family has destroyed
a lot of lives.

Katie was like
a second mother to the girls.

They lost her.

[Katie]
The day of the shooting,

I was actually able
to go into the police station

and meet with my sisters
in a room.

My sisters were little,

and I don't know if they
even knew what happened yet.

I didn't know
it was gonna be the last time

that I would see them.

By that afternoon, those kids
were in protective custody.

Unfortunately, those kids will
have to be forever hidden.

Even into adulthood.

Everybody saw
how far the reach was

from Texas to Delaware.

So you don't know what kind
of contacts these people have.

[Katie] There's always
the constant wondering.

Are they okay?

Are they together?

Where are they?

What they're doing
at that point in their life,

and you don't know, and...

It's hard.

My daughter
doesn't know my sisters.

She doesn't know
anything about

my mom's side of the family.

So...

[narrator] It's a hard life,
living anonymously,

but it keeps them protected
from the twisted evils

this family could still
concoct from behind bars.

As a family, they feed
into each other's delusions.

They manipulate one another
to get what they want.

When their goals align,
such as with the girls,

they can do
some really scary things.

[Ed] They moved along
a pathway of violence,

and they did it together.

They supported one another.

They were like-minded.

It took a long time before
I could go to the courthouse

without thinking about it.

Every once in a while, I get
a glimpse of somebody in the-

you know,
out of the corner of my eye

who looked-
who looked like Christine,

and I do a double take.

This case was supposed to end
on that lot in Nicaragua.

It wasn't supposed to end

with her laying
in a pool of blood

in the lobby
of the courthouse.

And it's something
I'll take to my grave

and just be angry about
and hurt about, and...

pissed off about

that this was not
supposed to happen.

I don't even want to say sick.
It's not an illness.

They're- they are...

crazy, twisted, evil people.

What makes the
Matusiewicz family so scary

is that they are hiding
in plain sight.

You could fall in love
with somebody that you don't really know

and...

end up in a situation where...

you cross the family
and you end up dead.

Christine's children are free
from David and his family,

but that doesn't mean
they're out of danger.

As they've shown,

the Matusiewicz family have
people all over the country

willing to help them
in their bizarre quest.

The family's terror
knows no bounds.

They are driven by vengeance,
obsessed with control.

That is why, even today,
the Matusiewiczes remain

a family to fear.

I'm Donnie Wahlberg.

Thanks for watching.

Good night.

Next time on
Very Scary People...

When you first meet Marjorie
Diehl-Armstrong

you remember it.

[Marjorie over the phone]
I'm not going to go quietly,

and I will make mincemeat
out of their lives.

Man: I thought I had seen a lot,
but I had never seen that.

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