Donnah and Mark Winger - Part 2

0:00 When Donna Winger was brutally attacked inside her Springfield, Illinois home in 1995, her husband Mark walked in on the beating. He shot and killed the perpetrator, Roger Harrington. Mark was cleared of any wrongdoing and the case was closed. For nearly four years after Donna's death, there seemed to be little reason to question what had happened that afternoon inside the Winger home. But someone close to Donna was harboring a secret, and she was finally ready to break her silence. I am rich. And I'm Tina. Welcome to Love, Marry, Kill. Hey, Rich.

0:48 Hey, Tina. How are you? I am anxious to find out who this mystery person is. Were you up all night? I was. I couldn't sleep. So can we just get right to it? Oh, well, let's have a little chat first. It's a beautiful day here in Southeast Michigan, and you are wearing your winter uniform already. I'm a little surprised. I get chilly. That's just how I am. It's a little weird. I rib you a lot, but you literally have a summer uniform and a winter uniform. Yeah, pretty much. Tell everyone. Probably a lot of people already know this, but what's your winter uniform? My winter uniform is blue jeans and a fleece, like a quarter zip or a half zip type fleece from North Face or Patagonia.

1:31 This one is from Patagonia. Yeah, it is. And you have a white Costco t-shirt underneath it. Yes. Right? I do. Yeah. Some fellows would wear like a button down underneath their sweater, their half-sips, but you never do that. It makes me feel too constricted. I don't know why, but button downs just feel a little bit too much to me. Okay. But this half-sip is nice because it's very lightweight. That one is really, I like that one a lot. I think I got it for you for Christmas last year and I almost kept it because I liked it so much myself. Interesting. But you tend to be cold and you had a really tragic thing happen today. I don't know if I would call it tragic, but it was the first day I decided to turn on my space heater. It didn't work.

2:13 Oh, it didn't work. September 23rd and we're already going for the space heater. Wow. I am not ashamed of it. No, I'm not. I'm not trying to shame you. I'm always just surprised because I tend to be warmer. It is funny because I think most couples, this is just anecdotal. I could be completely wrong. But I feel like most couples, the guy is the one who is always hot and wants the windows open and the woman is more like, I'm cold. But we're kind of opposite in that way. Well, a lot of times I'm either working on the couch or in a comfy chair and I just put a blanket over me. So, you know, but a lot of couples have a war with the thermostat. We really don't touch the thermostat a whole lot. Sometimes at night in the summer, I will.

2:55 I touched it today. Oh, did you? When my space heater was working. Did you make the heat come up? I turned it up a couple of days. I think that's the first. That's what I was leading into because a lot of people have like, we can't turn the heat on until October 1st or whatever. So I didn't know you did that. I'm a rebel. I just, you know. What did you put it at? Just moved it up a couple of notches. Right. But I don't even know. I think it was at 66 and I put it to 68. Wow. I made an executive decision. Well, you're totally entitled. I'm just surprised that you did that, but it's okay. We have an Ecobee thermostat and it's programmable. So- It decides when it's going to put the air on or. Put the heat on. I honestly don't normally touch it because I'm like, yeah, it's pretty smart. It knows what it's doing.

3:36 Yeah. Well, hey, so right now, are you warm? I'm pretty comfortable now. Okay. I promised you a good snack today. I am looking forward to it. It smelled good. Do you want to unveil it right now? I sure do. Oh, that looks really good. I made you an Oreo brownie. Well, I think it's like a cookies and cream brownie. I know there's not enough frosting on that. It looks very decadent. Yeah, that's really thick. I gave you two and I challenge you to try to eat both of them. I honestly don't think I could. That looks like a lot. Yeah, it's a lot. What do you think? That was awful.

4:16 Really? No, I'm just kidding. That was... Really good. Incredibly decadent. Like I really honestly couldn't even eat one of them. The frosting was really thick and the Oreos on top. Well, you know, I have a problem with following a recipe. I doubled the frosting. You definitely don't need to. No. But I did because I'm a rebel. And there are a lot of Oreos. Like that's like a whole package of double stuffed Oreos in there. Yeah. Not a healthy treat, but a good one. We really do need to hire someone to come eat food for us because a lot of times we end up throwing some of our snacks away. That'll make me really sad if we end up throwing some of this away because it's really good. Maybe I can freeze them until our children come home. Anyway, are you ready to get to part two of Donna and Mark Winger?

5:00 I sure am. Could you read the recap of part one for us? Sure. In part one, we learned that just days before Donna's murder, she had a frightening encounter with Roger Harrington. a shuttle driver who brought her and her newly adopted daughter home from the airport. Days later, Mark walked in on Roger attacking Donna with a hammer. Mark shot Roger twice, killing him, but he was unable to save Donna's life. Detective Doug Williamson noticed several discrepancies. A piece of paper with a time and Mark's address on it suggested that Roger appeared to have had an appointment at the Winger home that afternoon. There were no signs of forced entry, and weapons found in his car had been left behind. Williamson wanted to investigate further, but his superiors considered the case closed. Within 14 months of Donna's death, Mark had married his daughter's nanny and started building a new life. He converted to Christianity and left many old friends behind, including his former in-laws, Sarah Jane and Ira Drescher, who had considered him a son.

6:06 Nearly four years later, Williamson and his partner Charlie Cox were finally given permission to subpoena Mark's phone records. Then they got another break. An attorney contacted them on behalf of an unidentified woman who said she had information about Donna's murder. The woman who had arranged to meet with Cox and Williamson was Donna's old friend, Deanne Schultz. In the nearly four years since Donna's death, Deanne had been struggling greatly. Deanne arrived for her meeting with detectives Cox and Williamson with her attorney by her side. She was extremely nervous, but agreed to sit down for a two-hour interview. Deanne shared with the detectives that she had been in therapy since Donna's death. She had lost a significant amount of weight, developed dependency on alcohol, had suffered from debilitating migraines, struggled to sleep, and had suicidal thoughts. She had no one to talk to, and the secret was killing her. Deanne and Donna had been the best of friends and confided in each other about the most private parts of their lives.

7:10 Deanne and her husband, John, often spent time with Donna and Mark. In the spring of 1995, Deanne shared that she and John were having intimacy issues in their relationship. Donna breached her trust and told Mark this information. A few months later, he called Deanne and propositioned her. He complimented her profusely and told her that he'd always been attracted to her. He said all the right things, then asked if she wanted to meet him that weekend at a hotel in Indiana where he'd be on a business trip. On Saturday, July 22, 1995, against her better judgment, Deanne drove 200 miles to the Comfort Inn in Mount Vernon, Indiana and spent the rest of the weekend with Mark.

7:52 It was the beginning of an intense affair. They quickly said I love you and started planning their future together. Mark began confiding in Deanne. He told her that he was angry about Donna's infertility and wanted to leave the marriage. But then he added, things would be easier if Donna was dead. He asked Deanne if she would help him. He'd arranged for an intruder to come into the home and kill Donna. She'd just have to find Donna's body. She firmly refused. But after Donna's incident in the airport shuttle with Roger Harrington, Mark saw that as an opportunity. Deanne revealed that he wanted to get the driver into his house. She said, quote, My impression was that he was going to do what men do, give him a hard time and make sure he never messed with his family again. Deanne agreed to write the letter detailing the distressing ride from the airport, posing as Donna. The incident was real, but Mark told Deanne to exaggerate the details.

8:53 If you remember back to this episode, Deanne had come and stayed with Donna after the incident, and she kind of helped her take care of Bailey, and Deanne was the one who insisted they call the police. Okay, interesting. On the day of Donna's murder, Deanne said that Mark called her at work and asked if she'd love him no matter what. After Donna's murder, Deanne said that she initially thought Mark had something to do with it, but she quickly dismissed her doubts after the police cleared him. Mark cautioned her to stay as far away from the police as possible and not to say anything about their affair to anyone. Deanne promised to keep their secret, and she had for four years. After Donna was out of the picture, the relationship between Deanne and Mark intensified. They even exchanged secret wedding rings. Deanne gave the detectives evidence that corroborated her story. The faux wedding ring, a calendar with rendezvous dates … She told them to check with hotels they'd stayed in and to check their phone records.

9:55 She hadn't come forward sooner because she was afraid of what Mark would do, that he'd kill again. Deanne now thought that Mark had killed his wife and Roger Harrington, who knew what else he was capable of. She hadn't spoke with him in three years. He'd abruptly broken off their relationship after he returned from his trip to South Africa, which is when Rebecca started working for him. Deanne's therapist encouraged her to tell someone who she could trust. She chose to tell her husband, John. He was very supportive, securing an attorney for her and coming to the detective meeting with her. Cox and Williamson were thrilled to have this new information. Although it was all circumstantial evidence heavily based on Deanne's account, could she be trusted or was she seeking revenge against Mark because he dumped her? Was Deanne's account enough to convince a jury that Mark had murdered both Donna and Roger?

10:50 Wow. Yeah, that's a lot. I'm a little bit in shock at this whole thing. First of all, that she sat on this for that long. I mean, she's kind of an accessory to murder, I sort of think, right? You sort of think. I mean, she maybe didn't know he was going to kill her, but it sure sounds like she helped him with his plot. Yeah, I guess you're right. I do give her a little benefit of the doubt because she had been having, you know, such a hard time with her mental health. Yeah. Interesting, too, that her husband came with her and supported her and all this. I don't know if that was the first time he found out that she had had an affair or if maybe she had told him that a while ago. But that's pretty.

11:32 Yeah, it was pretty surprising. But she was seriously struggling. Everyone around her was like, yeah, she lost a lot of weight and she just wasn't doing well. Yeah, I can imagine. The detectives decided that they needed to revisit the evidence they'd gathered in the case, especially the blood evidence. When they went to the evidence locker, they made an alarming discovery. The evidence from the case was gone. Years earlier, it had been turned over to Mark's attorney, who believed he might need it for Mark's civil lawsuit. And this wasn't just a few items. The hammer, the clothing worn by Mark, Donna, and Roger, the note from Roger's car, the handwritten account of Donna's harrowing shuttle bus ride, crime scene photographs, shell casings, and other evidence was all turned over. And remember, a few years before, Mark had gone and gotten the gun from the police, too, so they didn't have that either. Right.

12:23 Detectives Cox and Williamson hoped that the evidence hadn't been lost or destroyed. Williamson called Mark's attorney and, without revealing too much, told him they were looking into other aspects of the case and they needed the items back. Fortunately, the attorney agreed without hesitation and returned the evidence. They brought it all to forensics expert Tom Bevel in Norman, Oklahoma. Bevel had worked in law enforcement as a crime scene reconstructionist and bloodstain analyst since 1972, even writing a textbook on the subject. His analysis would change the trajectory of the investigation. Detective Doug Williamson called Roger Harrington's family before the news of the reopened investigation reached the newspapers. The Springfield Police Department had treated the Harringtons poorly during the original investigation. The Harringtons had always maintained that their son was innocent, but after all these years, it was still a relief to hear that his name might finally be cleared publicly. Doug Williamson then called the Dreshers in Florida.

13:26 They were surprised by the news of the affair. It had been about a year since they'd spoken to Mark, but they still loved him, thought of him as a son, and hoped for the best for him and his new family. Williamson told them investigators had learned that Mark had been having an affair with one of Donna's friends. Sarah Jane and Ira both immediately blurted out the same name, Deanne Schultz. Somehow they knew. So I guess Donna must have taken this and, you know, kind of told a few people about Deanne's secret. The truth was they'd had their own suspicions about Mark over the years, but they had never allowed themselves to seriously consider that he could have been involved in Donna's death. It felt like a betrayal of Donna, who had loved and trusted her husband so completely. Williamson told them where the investigation was now leading. He believed Mark may have killed Donna himself and framed Roger Harrington for her murder. Even more disturbing, investigators suspected that Roger hadn't arrived at the Winker home by chance. Investigators believe Mark may have deliberately lured him there, setting Roger up to take the blame for Donna's murder.

14:32 By December 1999, Mark's lawsuit against Bootheel Area Rapid Transit, or BART, had still not settled or gone to trial. With the murder investigation quietly reopened, the civil case had stalled. Mark still had no idea that Deanne Schultz had come forward. The attorney representing BART and its owner, Ray Duffy, asked the court to hold Mark in contempt, accusing him of lying to police during his depositions. The forensic expert had also completed his review of the evidence. His conclusion was damning. The physical evidence is consistent with a staged domestic homicide by Mark Winger. Roger Harrington's murder was used to explain Donna's death. Winger lured Harrington to his home to make it look like he was an intruder who killed Donna.

15:20 In reality, Winger killed both victims. That report, along with a sworn statement from Deanne Schultz, effectively destroyed any chance Mark had of collecting the multi-million dollar settlement he'd been hoping for. But was it enough for him to be charged with murder? In 1995, the Springfield State Journal-Register had portrayed Mark as a hero after he killed the man believed to have murdered his wife. Now, his name was splashed across the front page again for a very different reason. The headline read, Another front page story announced, There was more than one woman in husband's life. It was a bad day to be Mark Winger, but his day was about to get even worse. Roger Harrington's parents filed a wrongful death lawsuit against him. Their attorney, speaking to the media, said, As you can imagine, this has been a nightmare since the first reports came out four years ago. They've always known their son was innocent. With all the new allegations swirling around Mark, his attorney, Michael Metnick, told the media, I was blindsided, hit over the head, sucker punched, whatever cliche you like. He had never considered Mark a suspect in Donna's murder. Mark withdrew his lawsuits against Bart and against Roger Harrington's estate. He hired a criminal defense attorney from Chicago at Metnick's suggestion, Thomas Breen. He was known as one of the best. He had decades of experience handling serious criminal cases and had developed a reputation for

16:53 taking on difficult, high-profile cases. Most notably, he had been part of the defense team for Rolando Cruz, who spent years on death row for the 1983 rape and murder of 10-year-old Janine Nicarico before being acquitted at his third trial in 1995. Breen had also represented Gary Dotson, whose rape conviction became the first in the United States to be overturned with the help of DNA evidence. Mark's family were paying his legal bills. Bill Pittman, head of the Springfield Police Department's investigative division, said, There's always been unanswered questions. The detectives on this case have never been satisfied with the way it concluded. That's about all I can say.

17:36 We don't know if there will be charges in this case. We're actively investigating and reviewing the statements and evidence, and we've been continually working with the state's attorney. That's an interesting statement that he made. They're basically saying, well, there have always been unanswered questions, but at the same time, we closed the case and said it was done. And that's what the detectives said from the beginning. Well, there's always some things that we're not sure about, but we're going to go ahead and close this anyway. When forensic expert Tom Bevel submitted his eight-page report in early December, he laid out a reconstruction based on his interpretation of what happened inside the Winger home on August 29th, 1995. Mark had arranged a meeting with Roger Harrington at his house, offering him the opportunity to apologize to Donna and to save his job. Roger walked inside expecting a conversation, but when he arrived, Mark pulled out his gun, forced Roger onto his knees, and shot him at close range. Donna heard the gunshots and came running from the bedroom, leaving Bailey behind on the bed, which Mark had been counting on.

18:40 Mark picked up the hammer and struck Donna seven times, sending her to the floor. He then used the hammer on Roger's chest, helping create the appearance that the two men had struggled before Mark called for help. Tom Bevel found none of Donna's blood on Roger Harrington's clothing. If Roger had violently bludgeoned Donna with a hammer, as Mark claimed, the complete absence of her blood on his clothing was difficult to explain. Mark's clothing, however, was covered in blood. When police arrived, Mark had been holding Donna against his body, explaining the blood transfer. but Bevel identified two stains on Mark's shirt that he believed were much harder to explain that way. Blood stain number seven was an elongated cast-off stain, the kind of blood that can be flung from a bloodied object as it moves through the air. Blood stain number eight was consistent with impact spatter, droplets created when force strikes a source of blood and sends it outward.

19:40 In other words, Bevel believed some of the blood on Mark's shirt was consistent not simply with Mark holding his wife, but with being close to her when she was struck and possibly being her attacker. In addition, a bullet, discovered by paramedics under Harrington's head, showed that he was supine or laying on his back when shot, not kneeling over Donna as Mark had claimed. If the case ever reached a courtroom, a jury would be faced with two very different versions of what happened inside the Winger home. The original conclusion reached by the Springfield Police Department, which had cleared Mark of any wrongdoing, and Tom Bevel's reconstruction of the crime scene, which told a very different story.

20:22 So that's problematic for the investigators because the jury might tend to believe the initial findings of the investigation, right? Yeah, I mean, it makes Mark's defense pretty easy saying, look, the police investigated this. Yeah, they cleared him for four years. Don't you trust the police? Like they made that, you know, call. Among the evidence were three Polaroids Officer David Berenger had taken before Donna and Roger were transported to the hospital. I remember you mentioned this in part one, right, where he just remembered that he hadn't taken any pictures. Right. And he had three pictures left in his polaroid. Yes, he only had three left. And so I will show you those pictures in just a second. Okay. The detectives had never seen the photos before. They showed both victims lying on their backs, their legs pointing toward the kitchen. But Roger's position didn't match Mark's story. Mark had said Roger was kneeling over Donna when he shot him from the hallway. If that were true, Roger's feet should have been closer to Donna. Instead, his head was closer to her, while his feet were less than five feet from the refrigerator. Williamson believed Roger would have collapsed immediately after being shot in the head. Based on where his body landed, Roger would have been near the kitchen when Mark fired, not kneeling over Donna.

21:37 So I showed you the picture, and what do you think of that? They're very far apart, first of all, and both their bodies are parallel to each other, so it doesn't really add up. No, it doesn't. We'll be back after a break. In the photos, Roger's hands appear to be clean. Surely they'd be covered in blood if he'd hit Donna seven times with a hammer. To the detectives... Those three photographs were powerful evidence that Mark had lied about what happened inside the house. Cox and Williamson were embarrassed that they'd missed the significance of the body positions four years earlier, especially since the Polaroids had been sitting in the evidence box all along. So looking at the picture, I would think when the detectives would walk into the house when they're investigating the crime initially, they should have tagged that.

22:32 Yeah, I would think so, especially if they were seasoned homicide investigators. If they've been in that type of crime scene before, it's part of the job of a detective is when you look at a scene like that, you have to kind of mentally reconstruct what could have happened to have led to that scene. Roger Harrington's friend and roommate, Susan Collins, was re-interviewed once she was tracked down. She retold the same story that she had five years earlier. Mark called and set up a meeting with Roger. He'd asked her for a piece of paper to jot down the address. She gave him a deposit slip from her checkbook. He went to the Winger's house with no ill intent. He was trying to save his job. Later on, detectives, they had that note, and they confirmed that the account number on the deposit slip was Susan's account, so she was telling the truth.

23:23 As Christmas rolled around and the world prepared for a new millennia, Mark was as self-satisfied as ever. Rebecca's brothers tolerated Mark only for their sister. He was full of bravado and somehow the conversation often veered toward how he'd killed Roger Harrington without ever talking about the pain of losing his wife. He would even draw diagrams of the incident. Rebecca, due with her fourth child in January, stood firmly by her husband's side. If anyone tried to talk to her about the news reports regarding Mark's possible connection to Donna's death, she became defensive and cut them off. Mark may not have realized it yet, but investigators were closing in. Whenever he left the house, he had a tail. His pattern was predictable. He typically only went to work, daycare, and church.

24:12 They weren't ready to arrest him, though. They were still building their case and hoping their patience would pay off. Among Detectives Cox and Williamson, there was a sense of urgency. They were afraid that Rebecca might not be safe. Ira Drescher, too, was reviewing all of the evidence in the case. 48 hours in an attempt to entice him and Sarah Jane to be included in their episode, gave him the phone records from Donna, Mark, and Deanne in the days before Donna was murdered, when Mark was in Tennessee. He talked to Deanne 20 times for more than 7 hours, while he only talked to Donna 8 times that week for less than an hour in total. New to the case was Detective Jim Graham, 28, who had taken Doug Williamson's place.

24:56 He and Charlie Cox had both been promoted. Jim and Ira had talked frequently on the phone and Ira had taken a liking to the young man and appreciated his enthusiasm. When Jim had to go to Florida to interview a gunshot wound expert, Sarah Jane and Ira invited him to stay with them and even offered to pick him up from the airport. Ira later said, he surely doesn't look like a detective. That's what a detective looks like. And he was just really young. Yeah. Detective Jim Graham began interviewing friends and neighbors of Donna and Mark. some of whom had never been questioned during the initial investigation. Deanne's husband, John Schultz, told Graham that Mark's story seemed to change each time he told it.

25:39 In one version, Mark said he nearly beat Roger to death and then shot him to finish him off. So you're probably getting a sense of Mark really likes to talk about how he killed a man. Well, he was a hero, so of course he wanted to talk about it. A neighbor remembered hearing a single gunshot at about 4.30 that afternoon, followed by another several minutes later. That caught investigators' attention. Roger could be heard moaning in the background of Mark's 911 call, but by the time police arrived, he'd been shot twice. Investigators suspected that Mark fired the second shot after hanging up with the dispatcher. During the 911 call, Mark actually said, yes, he's lying there on the floor with a bullet in his.

26:21 Head, not plural bullets. Several of Donna's friends said Mark had made inappropriate comments to them after her death. He would say things like he wished he could, quote, make love to Donna one more time. The women were left with the impression that Mark was playing on their sympathy while testing the waters to see if they might be interested in a fling. The more I learn about Mark, the less I like him. I hate him. In August 2001, six years after Donna's murder, a grand jury was convened to review the evidence against Mark. Investigators tipped off Sarah Jane and Ira, hopeful for an indictment they flew to Springfield to be there for a potential arraignment. On August 24th, Jim Graham was parked outside of Mark's house, ready to tail him to work, when Mark unexpectedly pulled up behind him. Graham, unsure what to do, drove back to the police station with Mark following closely behind him. Once there, Mark confronted him, quote, I don't appreciate you following me. You're scaring my family. Graham told him that he would stop. What Mark didn't know was the investigators no longer needed to follow him. Later that day, they presented their evidence to a grand jury, which would decide whether there was enough evidence to charge Mark with murder.

27:38 During the proceeding, grand jurors had questions. One asked Doug Williamson whether the hammer had ever been tested for Roger Harrington's fingerprints. It hadn't, an embarrassing omission from the Springfield Police Department. Another juror asked Jim Graham how the police had gotten the case so wrong the first time. Graham explained that Mark had told a believable story and investigators hadn't yet known about his affair with Deanne Schultz. Despite those uncomfortable moments, the grand jury found there was enough evidence to indict Mark Winger on two counts of murder. Soon after, five police cars raced to the Illinois Department of Nuclear Safety. Mark happened to be standing outside the building.

28:19 When he spotted several familiar detectives, his eyes grew wide and he took off running inside. The detectives followed with their guns drawn, unsure where Mark had gone. Where is Mark Winger? Jim Graham demanded of the receptionists. Mark was hiding in an office with the door closed. I'm in here, he answered meekly. Come out with your hands up. Mark Winger, 38, father of four, was handcuffed and read his Miranda rights. Jim Graham later told 48 Hours correspondent Richard Schlesinger that when Mark was taken into custody, he initially saw a flash of fear in his eyes. but it quickly disappeared, replaced by what Graham described as a cocky smirk, as if Mark were thinking, you'll never convict me. At his arraignment, Mark's bail was set at $ 10 million. He pleaded not guilty.

29:10 Rebecca, 27, was at a McDonald's play area with her children when she got the news. She had grown increasingly anxious over the last two years, fearing that an arrest was imminent. She wasn't sure what to do. The only job she had ever worked was as a nanny, and now she had four children to care for on her own. She went to the police station and asked them how things looked for Mark. They told her that the case against him was solid. They suggested she move their money into a new account. Mark's family firmly believed in his innocence and were fully behind him, although they didn't have the funds to pay his exorbitant bail. Speaking to 48 Hours, Jerry Winger, Mark's father, said, His mother Sally said, Deanne Schultz has a real agenda. She was a woman scorned.

30:03 Richard Schlesinger asked, You don't doubt that your son had an affair with Deanne, do you? Jerry responded, Well, if you want to call it an affair, I think it was more like a dalliance. Sally shared that one night Mark ran into Deanne and she said, I will make you pay for what you did to me. Can you explain to me the difference between an affair and a dalliance? I really can't. These parents. I know. I guess the implication is that a dalliance is like a one-time thing or something that just happened. Right. But yeah, I understand. They're his parents. They're going to back him up. Before the start of his trial, Mark's attorney, Thomas Breen, fought to limit what prosecutors would be allowed to present to the jury... First, he argued that Mark's original statement to police should be thrown out because he hadn't been read his Miranda rights. Prosecutors countered that Mark was being interviewed as a witness that day, not a suspect.

30:59 The judge agreed and allowed the statement. Breen also tried to prevent Deanne Schultz from testifying, arguing that her extensive psychiatric history made her incompetent as a witness. Deanne had been treated for chronic major depression. had attempted suicide four times, and had undergone 19 sessions of electroconvulsive therapy. The judge ruled that Deanne could testify. It would be up to the jury to decide whether they believed her. The trial was set for May 20, 2002. Sarah Jane and Ira Drescher, along with Donna's sisters, came to the trial believing Mark was probably guilty, but still hoping some new piece of evidence would exonerate him. They still loved him. In all the years Mark and Donna had been together, they had never seen anything that made them question his love for their daughter. Sarah Jane and Ira thought that Donna and Mark had a wonderful marriage. Battle lines were drawn the first day of the trial. Mark's family sat behind him while Donna's and Roger Harrington's families sat behind the prosecution.

32:04 Mark's old best friend Rabbi Mike and his wife Jo sat with Sarah Jane and Ira. Mark sat next to his attorneys, looking more like a member of the legal team than the defendant. He gave off a smug, confident vibe. On the first day, after opening arguments, nine witnesses were called by the prosecution. Ray Duffy, owner of BART, was the first. He testified that Mark Winger had asked for Roger Harrington's phone number so he could speak with him directly, saying he wanted to handle the matter privately. Susan Collins, Roger's roommate, was called next. She clearly remembered Roger setting out for the meeting with Mark Winger. He told her it shouldn't take long. He was looking forward to clearing the air and getting back to work. The defense tried to discredit her character by pointing to her history of cocaine use. First responders testified that when they arrived to treat Donna, they found her lying face down. That raised the question, if Donna was face down, how had Mark cradled her body as he had claimed?

33:07 Remember the forensic investigator had examined Mark's shirt and the lower half of the shirt was like covered in blood. It was just like one solid bloody stain. But then there was the two smaller spots on the top of the shirt that he thought were cast off from when he was hitting him with the hammer. But the thought of her being face down, it must have been really, he was really trying to get his shirt covered in her blood. Yeah, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Sarah Jane took the stand the next day. She said she had believed Donna and Mark's marriage was perfect. Doug Williamson and Charlie Cox were grilled over the many flaws in their initial investigation and their decision to take Mark's story at face value. The neighbors also provided important testimony. One recalled seeing Roger Harrington's car parked outside the Winger home at about 3.50 that afternoon, 40 minutes before Mark called 911.

34:03 If that timeline was accurate, what had been happening inside the house during those 40 minutes? Another neighbor's testimony raised an even more troubling question about the timeline. She remembered hearing a gunshot at about 4.30 that afternoon, followed several minutes later by another. That mattered because Roger had been shot twice, and during Mark's 911 call, Roger could still be heard moaning in the background. investigators believed it was possible that Mark fired the second shot after he hung up the phone. If that was true, Mark hadn't simply called 911 after shooting Roger. He had called for help while Roger was still alive, ended the call, and then shot him again. Deanne Schultz, now divorced, took the stand.

34:50 She had been given immunity for her testimony, and she was the witness everyone had been waiting for. She talked about how badly her mental health had deteriorated after Donna's death. She had attempted to take her own life four times. When asked why she hadn't warned her best friend after Mark told her it would be easier if Donna were dead, Deanne said she never believed Mark would actually kill his wife. She didn't think he was capable of murder. In fact, even as she sat on the witness stand, she admitted she still wasn't entirely sure of his guilt or innocence. Sarah Jane and Ira watched the trial like a tennis match, point won, point lost. As they listened to Deanne's testimony, they worried that the prosecution was losing ground. A psychiatrist who reviewed Roger Harrington's medical records also testified. He said Roger had a personality disorder and a history of chronic marijuana use, but found nothing in his records suggesting that he was dangerous. Roger was eccentric, he said, and believed that his alter ego, Dom, and his other fantasies were more about getting attention than signs that he posed a threat to anyone. Forensic expert Tom Bevel testified about the blood evidence. The defense offered its own expert, who disagreed with Bevel and said the evidence supported Mark Winger's version of events. The competing analysis of the blood evidence took days.

36:17 I always have so much empathy for jurors when they have to listen to forensic experts for days. I feel like that would be really hard to process all that information. Yeah, especially when there are two competing experts with different opinions on things because it comes down to, well, who do you trust? Who seems more trustworthy because the details can be so deep that it's just hard to follow. Yeah, that's a very good point. The defense also pushed back on the prosecution's interpretation of the blood found on Roger and The prosecution argued that Donna's DNA could have been transferred to him by the EMTs during their attempts to resuscitate her. The defense only called a handful of witnesses, including a forensic psychiatrist who had also reviewed Roger's medical records. He disagreed with the state's expert, describing Roger as delusional, with serious substance abuse problems, and an explosive personality that could make him dangerous. Roger's ex-wife Terry also testified. She described three frightening incidents during their brief marriage. Roger once pointed a shotgun at her and told her to say goodbye. On another occasion, he struck her in the chest, and another time he tried to handcuff her. But Terry said he was generally pleasant.

37:32 Over the 10 days of trial, the jury heard from 51 witnesses. Mark Winger was not one of them. I find it a little contradictory that Roger's ex-wife said He did these things like pointed a shotgun at her and hit her, but then he was generally pleasant. I have a hard time with Roger, I'm not going to lie. The book that I read on the case, I have great empathy for his family, but it sounds like Roger really did make some mistakes and he was a domestic abuser, so I have a hard time forgiving him for that. He didn't deserve to die, but he wasn't the best guy. We'll be back after a break.

38:16 During closing arguments, the defense maintained that the state simply hadn't proven its case. Mark's story had been believed from the beginning. Roger Harrington attacked Donna, Mark shot Roger to protect his wife, and the Springfield Police Department initially agreed. Holding up a photograph of Donna, young and vibrant, Thomas Breen asked the jury, for what reason on earth would Mark Winger kill this beautiful woman? The prosecution focused on Roger Harrington. State's attorney John Schmidt placed a pair of clean white sneakers and blue socks in front of the jury, a reminder that Roger's clothing had none of Donna's blood on it. These are not the shoes and socks of a killer, Schmidt told them. Then it was in the jury's hand. Years later, 48 Hours correspondent Richard Schlesinger asked Mark what he remembered thinking as he waited for the verdict.

39:09 I'll be home for dinner tonight, Mark was very, very confident. As they began deliberations, the jury decided to dismiss all of the expert testimony, believing it canceled each other out. They asked the judge to hear the 911 call again. Then at 10 p.m., they went home for the night. The next morning, the jury announced that they'd reached a verdict. They deliberated for 13 hours. The judge read, what do you think? I think they're going to find him guilty. It is a little bit of a tough one. The judge read, as the charge of murder in the first degree against Donna Winger, the judge finds Mark Allen Winger guilty. The jury also found Mark guilty for Roger's murder.

39:50 After nearly seven years of being blamed for Donna's murder, Roger's name was finally cleared. Mark slowly turned to find his wife and mouthed, His mother could be heard crying. Spectators had sensed something had changed during the trial. Rebecca seemed to have disengaged from Mark, thinking of her and her children's futures without him. The other side of the courtroom embraced one another, satisfied to have justice for Donna and Roger. The three detectives who had poured their hearts into the case, Jim Graham, Charlie Cox, and Doug Williamson, all had tears in their eyes. The jury said they came to their decision based on a few facts. They found Deanne's testimony credible, the placement of the bodies visible in the three Polaroids, and they believed that Mark had lured Roger Harrington into his house. A holdout juror later told Ira that replaying Mark's 911 call changed his mind.

40:45 Mark had told the dispatcher that he needed to hang up because Bailey was crying. But when the jurors listened carefully, none of them could hear a baby crying. What they could hear was Roger Harrington moaning in the background. And likely that's when Mark shot him dead. The Winker family were led from the courtroom out of private exit. Always classy, Sarah Jane said, quote, I felt sorry for them. They were wonderful people, wonderful to Donna, and I loved them for loving her. She's talking about Mark's family there? Yes. Speaking about the detectives and prosecutors, Iris said, quote, My family will never forget their dedication to this case, but this is no victory as we still mourn the loss of our beautiful Donna. The part of our heart that was ripped out on August 29, 1995 will never heal, and that's the way it is. Donna loved everyone and was loved by everyone. Barbara Howell, Roger's sister, said on behalf of her family, quote, Today justice has been served, finally.

41:46 My parents are doing wonderful. It was the greatest news they could have gotten. Two months later at his sentencing, Mark said, quote, Roger Harrington killed my wife. I was there and he did it. I don't personally need to be convinced by any evidence. He went on describing his marriage to Donna as happy and insisted that Deanne had, quote, literally thrown herself at me and that he had never loved her. He also lashed out at the Dreschers and several former friends blaming them for turning against him. At one point, he claimed Donna would be horrified by what her family had done to him. Mark continued to maintain his innocence and asked the judge to set aside the verdicts and allow him to return home to his family, but Mark Winger was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. After his sentencing, 48 Hours' Richard Schlesinger was given just one hour to interview Mark, so he knew he had to keep things moving. He asked Mark what had first attracted him to Donna. Her body, Mark answered. When the conversation turned to Deanne, Mark smirked and launched into a crude description of their encounter in a motel room. At one point, he described his own arousal by saying, quote, As I was standing up, my pants looked like a pup tent. It was an astonishing way to talk about an affair with his murdered wife's best friend, and Mark didn't seem embarrassed or uncomfortable. If anything, he seemed to enjoy the storytelling.

43:14 That's just shocking that he would say this right after being sentenced to life in prison. I know. Then the conversation moved to Roger Harrington, and Mark calmly began describing the wounds to Roger's head in graphic detail. Initially, Mark wrote letters to Rebecca and the children almost daily. Rebecca had called Charlie Cox after her husband was sentenced. She still had doubts and questions, and he helped her realize that her husband was in fact a murderer. It took Rebecca a little time to process everything, but eventually she filed for divorce and changed her and the children's last names. She said, quote, Mark fooled us all. I'm so sorry I did that to my family. Rebecca has worked hard to keep her children's name out of the headlines. She lost her house and had to file for bankruptcy and left the state, but she's done a beautiful job raising her children. Mark is no longer in their lives. Bailey eventually reconnected with Donna's family. Years later, when Bailey visited Sarah Jane, she saw her baby picture on the kitchen counter alongside pictures of their other grandchildren, and it meant a lot to her that they'd never stopped loving her. Rebecca summed up what both families had survived simply by saying, We'd been hurt a lot by the same person, but it didn't break us.

44:28 Now, Rebecca kept custody of Bailey the whole time, like. She adopted. Her right after they got married. This is my favorite part right here. When asked what they thought Mark's motive was, Sarah Jane said she wasn't sure, but Ira, never at a loss for words, said, quote, Mark liked to control everything. If he would have had to get a divorce, he wouldn't have control. He would have child support and everything else. He also mentioned that Donna's infertility likely played a part. After he was safely tucked away in prison, Ira taunted Mark on holidays and birthdays, sending him dear Marky letters, their former pet name for him. Quote, You look great on your latest ID picture. Isolation agrees with you. I want to wish you well on celebrating your fourth anniversary of being arrested and losing your freedom for the rest of your life, in all capitals. Yesterday was Thanksgiving and we had 15 over, and Mom really did a great job with the turkey and all the Thixons.

45:27 In another letter, I was wondering how you were going to celebrate New Year. Is Bubba going to stop by or are you going to his place? Here in Italy, I'm thinking of you and wondering if you've tried to commit suicide yet. Well, that's a little mean, Ira. The beach and the sun are terrific here. In another letter, you are a powerless sucker. Your life is over. Wow. It's funny. You always hear about the families of victims saying, I forgive the person. Yeah. You don't often hear about. Someone taunting him from prison. I kind of like it. In the spring of 2005, Terry Hubble, a convicted murderer serving time at the state prison in Pontiac, Illinois, contacted a private investigator about another inmate at the prison that he had concerns about. Hubble claimed the man was looking for someone to kidnap and murder a witness from his trial.

46:16 He believed the man was serious. That inmate was Mark Winger. and the witness he allegedly wanted killed was Deanne Schultz. Hubble had covertly recorded Mark in the prison yard saying, quote, I'd like to cut her fucking tongue out and put it in a jar. I don't care where she's buried as long as it's fucking 30 feet deep. According to Hubble, Mark wanted Deanne kidnapped and forced to make an audio recording and write letters admitting that she had lied about their affair and fabricated her testimony against him. Once she cleared Mark's name, she would be killed. and her death would be made to look like an overdose. Mark had no money, but he had a workaround. He planned to orchestrate the kidnapping of the wife and children of a wealthy childhood friend and demand a ransom. After collecting the money, the entire family would be killed, and if there was enough money left over, Mark wanted Ira Drescher killed too.

47:10 Hubble turned over 19 pages of handwritten notes that he said Mark had given him to type. The pages included letters Deanne would be forced to write, a five-page statement she would be forced to record, and detailed instructions for making her disappearance appear voluntary. Mark even specified which belongings should be removed from Deanne's home, including her purse, makeup, car keys, phone, and medication. The instructions warned whoever carried out the plan was to wear gloves. Mark was charged with two counts of solicitation of murder and transferred to Tams, Illinois' only Supermax prison. a facility reserved for inmates considered especially violent, disruptive, or unable to function in the general prison population. In June 2007, Mark again faced a jury trial.

47:57 Although he was charged with only the two counts of solicitation of murder, if his plan had worked, six people would have been killed per his wishes. Mark testified on his own behalf during his trial. He said, quote, I never had any intention for it to be carried out. It was an interactive process for Terry and I, just talking BS, you know, fantasizing. I sit in my cell 23 hours a day. It is cathartic. I write things. I just fantasize. I got a lot of anger and bitterness. I should not be in prison. Should never have been convicted. Mark was found guilty and sentenced to two 35-year sentences. The judge called him, quote, a very dangerous individual and a threat to the public. Ira came to the trial and sat with Mark's now ex-wife, Rebecca, who he and Sarah Jane had befriended. Ira yelled out to Mark, Have a good life, but let's face it, yours is over. Boy, did that make me feel good, Ira said. If anyone still had doubts about Mark's guilt after his first trial, those doubts were now erased. Mark has continued to maintain his innocence and challenge his convictions. He sought newer touch DNA testing on the hammer and Roger Harrington's clothing, arguing that the results could support his claim that he did not kill Donna. The courts rejected the request, finding that even favorable DNA results wouldn't significantly change the evidence against him, all of his attempts to overturn charges. his convictions have failed donna loved country music and romance novels she loved her job and helping people but most of all she

49:28 loved her daughter bailey she was a bright light that was extinguished too soon Sarah Jane and Ira raised nearly $ 50, 000 for a playroom to be named in Donna's honor at the Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital in Hollywood, Florida. They thought it was a fitting tribute to their daughter, who loved children and wanted to use her life to make a difference. The bright, playful center reflected Donna's personality. Sarah Jane and Ira continued their charitable work in Donna's name, raising additional money for the hospital. and establishing Donna's Fund through Women in Distress, an organization that helps victims of domestic violence. In announcing the fund, the Dreschers wrote that they had learned too late that Donna had been a victim of spousal abuse. They believed that she would be proud to know that a fund bearing her name was helping women who left their abusers to make a new start. It was a touching way to honor their daughter and make sure good continued to be done in her name. After Mark's conviction, Sarah Jane also changed the epitaph on Donna's grave.

50:27 Mark had originally chosen the inscription, but Sarah Jane replaced it from words by Maya Angelou. Nothing can dim the light that shines from within. Roger Harrington was also a victim of Mark Winger. He took advantage of a man using his troubled history to make him a scapegoat. For years, he was blamed for Donna's murder, causing his family great distress. It worked for nearly six years, but his family finally got to see his name cleared. Rest in peace to Donna and Roger. Also rest in peace to Sarah Jane, who passed away in 2023, and Ira, who passed in July 2026. And there you have it, another story of a mediocre man who had it all and threw it away in the name of lust and greed. Instead of just getting a divorce, he took the lives of two innocent people. Mark Winger, you disgust me.

51:15 Very well said. Do you agree with the verdict? I certainly do. Do you think the state proved their case? I think there was enough convincing evidence to prove the case, yes. Was there any evidence that stands out to you? The one thing that caught my attention early in the case was when they found the note in Roger's car. Because, I mean, I suppose he might have written that down, like, oh, I'm going to go and murder this lady at this time. But that didn't make sense from the beginning. Like, it seemed very clear that he was writing down something. He had an appointment that he was going to keep and his roommate. Testifying to that same thing, that all made sense to me. I agree. Are you surprised that the police didn't do a better job with the initial investigation?

52:00 A little bit. I mean, I can understand that the scene seemed fairly obvious at the beginning. And I mean, really, Mark got very lucky finding this guy, Roger Harrington, that he was able to make this plan and execute it and really almost got away with it. I don't think Mark even knew that he had this history of mild mental illness either. Yeah. So I can sort of understand from the detective's perspective that it seemed like kind of a cut and dried case. Should they have gone deeper? Should they have asked more questions and looked more closely? Yes, definitely in hindsight. But even like. The two-page letter that Donna had allegedly written, her friend Deanne wrote that. And you would think if they had showed that to Sarah Jane or Ira, they would have been immediately like, that's not her handwriting.

52:50 Yeah, there were a lot of things I think they could have or should have caught early on. I just feel like the positioning of the bodies, they should have, as soon as they walked in, said that does not look like Mark had shot him in self-defense. Right. Mark filing the lawsuit, do you think that without the lawsuit he would have been found out? I'd like to think he would have eventually. Yeah, I think he would. Because Deanne was coming forward at the same time. But that's pretty bold of him to do that. I mean, just it shows you how arrogant he is. Just, you know, very much, very overconfident in his ability to get away with this because it certainly wasn't a good idea filing the lawsuit if he wanted to get away with it.

53:30 Do you think the police found him credible because he was a nuclear engineer and, you know, just presented as this, you know, nice family oriented fella? Probably. Yeah. I mean, it probably also was whatever his demeanor was. They found him credible. But yeah, I'm sure that contributed to it. If Donna had come into the living room holding Bailey, what do you think he would have done? Oh, gosh, I don't even like to think about what would have happened there because he was committed at that point. you know, he was going to go through with this. So yeah, it's scary to think about that. What did you think of the jury deciding to dismiss all of the expert testimony during their deliberation? Yeah, that was interesting. I mean, we talked about it a little bit, right? It is challenging for a jury when you're faced with two different experts who are giving different opinions, but I don't think you can just say it cancels each other out. You have to, one of them is accurate and one isn't, and you have to look at it and determine which one you think was you know, the accurate one, I guess.

54:29 Well, I feel like with blood spatter evidence, and this case was over 20 years ago, blood spatter evidence is really hard. It's not a definitive science. Yeah, for sure. Do you think that Mark almost committed the perfect crime? I mean, it was not far off from it. He had no way of knowing. The part that I think was very risky on his part, he had no way of knowing if Roger was Yeah. Yeah. Where do you think his dog was?

55:11 He had a 180-pound dog. I don't know if they had a crate or something that he locked him up in. No, I don't think so because the police never reported hearing a dog or seeing the dog. So maybe he put it in a kennel for a day or so. Maybe he gave him some Benadryl or something and knocked him out. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. And this is just my final commentary, but to me, there's something particularly chilling about a man like Mark Winger. He didn't look like someone capable of murder. He looked like a loving husband, a devoted father, and a successful professional. And he played the role so convincingly that the people closest to him believed it too. I saw a lot of videos of him with Donna, playing with Bailey and his other children, and with Rebecca, and even his 911 call.

55:54 He was a frighteningly good actor. He really seemed like an authentic, loving family man. That is scary. People like that that are, I mean, it's almost psychopathic or sociopathic behavior when you can just convince other people. Put your mask on for your whole life. Yeah. It is really chilling to me. Yeah, it is. And did anyone know the real Mark Winger? Has anyone ever known the real Mark Winger. Well, it seems like it slipped out a little bit when he was like, you know, propositioning these women and also bragging about killing Roger Harrington and stuff like that. It seemed like there was a little bit of a glimpse into, you know, this guy who was very arrogant. But yeah, overall, it seemed like he fooled people. Well, and if you had any doubt, once he got to prison and he was trying to get people killed from prison and he was like, oh, I was just play acting or whatever. It's like he had an excuse.

56:44 For everything, but. It's really disturbing that he did that from prison because here he's serving life in prison already. There's nothing to stop him from trying to harm Deanne or other people involved in this case. Well, I think Ibra and Sarah Jane were really happy when he was convicted the second time because if there was a mistake in his first trial, at least they had that second conviction and they knew it was very, very unlikely that he would ever be released from prison again. One thing I have a hard time wrapping my head around is why, what his motive was, why he needed to get rid of Donna. That is a great question. She really was a lovely, lovely woman, and she was totally in love with him. Yeah, and they just went through this process of adopting a baby, too. So, yeah, what was his motive?

57:31 The infertility issue, which really saddens me. I think that might have been it, because he really wanted to have children. And remember, he even lied to Rebecca about Right. And she became pregnant before they were married. And then, you know, they quickly went on to have three more children. I think he really wanted a son too. I saw a video of him talking about how he was hoping like the next one and their fourth child was a son. But also the brutal manner in which he killed Donna. Again, it's just really chilling to me. It really is, yeah. Because it's such a brutal attack. I just can't imagine. I think you'd have to be Really a sick person to be able to do that to someone you once must have loved.

58:15 I know. Yeah, I can't even imagine. I can't understand it. So I read a book for this case. It was called Invitation to a Murder, a 48 Hours Mystery by Gail Abbott Zimmerman. It's the only time I've ever seen a 48 Hours Mystery book, but it was really, really well done. Interesting. There's also an episode of 2020 from 2021 that features Rebecca and her children and even Sarah Jane and Ira. And I have linked that in show notes. And I recommend watching that if you have access to it's on Disney Plus now. It cracks me up. That happens in every episode. There's one word that we can't say. And this special word, this episode.

59:01 Schlesinger. Schlesinger. Schlesinger. We both sound like we might have been intoxicated. I feel a little bad for Richard Schlesinger because. You nailed it that time. People probably have a hard time with that regularly. Yeah. And sometimes it's not the word, but it's the word in the sentence that trips us up. But I promise you, we try our absolute best. Yeah. It took a few takes. We have spent two episodes in Springfield following a nuclear engineer with a surprising amount of discussion about something named Bart. So before we leave this case behind, I feel like we should talk about The Simpsons. Okay. I'm going to give you a few questions. I think you probably know most of these.

59:45 Okay. When did The Simpsons first appear? The Tracy Ullman show. Yes, in 1987. Yeah. And they got their first show in December of 1989. What.... What state is Springfield in? I don't think they've ever said the name of the state. I think it's an imaginary state. Yeah. Matt Greinig has said that the name Springfield was inspired by Springfield, Oregon, where he grew up. Well, he grew up in Portland and he watched Father Knows Best as a kid, which was set in a fictional Springfield. He assumed they met the Springfield in Oregon. Years later, he realized the location had intentionally been left vague. So he did the same thing. You probably don't know this one, but what is the Simpsons' home address?

1:00:30 I have no idea. 742 Evergreen Terrace. Matt Granig grew up on a street in Portland called Evergreen Terrace. He borrowed a lot from his own life when he created the family. Homer, Marge, Lisa, and Maggie were all named after members of his family. Oh, interesting. I didn't know that. His father's name was Homer. His mother was Margaret or Marge. And his sisters were Lisa and Maggie. Matt apparently decided not to name Bart after himself. What does Homer do for a living? He works at a nuclear factory. I'm not sure what he actually does at the nuclear plant. He's a safety inspector. It's kind of funny because Mark Winger also worked in the safety department too. Who owns the Springfield power plant?

1:01:13 Mr. Burns. And what is his catchphrase? It's really not a catchphrase. It's more of one word. I am drawing a blank. Excellent. Okay. Yes. What is Homer's favorite catchphrase? You did it very well. Thanks. That word is actually in the English dictionary now. Is it spelled just D-O-H or is there an apostrophe? D-apostrophe-O-H. How old are Bart and Lisa? I have no idea. Really? Yeah. Ten and eight. Okay. Bart is the ten-year-old. And they've been that age since 1989. They've never aged. Although it's interesting, they have had some episodes where they've flashed forward to the future, where Bart and Lisa are adults, which is interesting.

1:01:54 How many episodes of The Simpsons are there? So many. I don't know. Just wild guess. 412. 809. Wow. So you could watch one episode every day, and it would take you more than two years to get through. How many seasons has it been on? 37? 38? That's just mind-blowing. You can only invite one Simpson to dinner. Who do you invite? What Simpson? Maggie, I guess. I would invite Marge for sure. I don't know. That's a tough one, I guess. You have to answer. Okay, I'll go with Bart. Bart's going to be fun to have over for dinner. All right. Well, this has nothing to do with the episode whatsoever, but, you know.

1:02:37 Sounds like it has a lot to do, yeah. You know, one of my favorite memories of us, not favorite, but a fun memory is we were traveling on Halloween. We were in Pennsylvania and it was raining. And so I guess we spent like a whole afternoon watching the Simpsons Treehouse of Terror editions. And that was really fun. That was a fun trip. I remember going to a really weird bar and talking to some weird guy who I was talking about redheads. Yeah. Yeah. I remember him just looking at me like, redheads are trouble. My wife, remember the wife's name? Lafette. Lafette. It's so funny. I'll never forget that. It's just like the oddest, not oddest, but most unusual name I've ever heard.

1:03:21 It is so funny that that stuck in both of our heads so vividly. Yeah, he was very funny. Good times. Thank you all so much for listening. We love and appreciate you. Find us on social media or visit our website at lovemerrykill.com. Send us an email at lovemerrykill at gmail.com. And consider supporting us on Patreon. Go to patreon.com slash lovemerrykill. For just $ 5 a month, you get early ad-free access plus a monthly bonus episode. Until next time. Don't kill your husband. And don't kill your wife. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.