[phone ringing]
At the point I had made this phone call,
um, I've already heard multiple gunshots,
and I knew I was next.
There was nothing I can do to protect myself and my kids.
I was shot point-blank range in my face.
[voice breaking] I just wanted to be a good mother.
I just wanted to be a good wife.
And I felt like I did everything I could, even
sacrifice my own happiness, just thinking about
everybody else, just trying to keep the family together.
And it was just all crumbling.
And I was just -- I just totally lost who I was.
How did I get here?
It wasn't supposed to be like this.
Nathan turned into
a murderer.
[The Paper Chase's "What's So Amazing About Grace?" plays]
[strings continue playing sinister tune]
[static crackling]
-[knock at door] -[creaking]
-[banging on door] -[creaking]
[water dripping]
-[banging on door] -[creaking]
[sinister chord strikes]
This is a picture
of Nathan and I in my parents' home heading to go to prom.
This is my friend.
This is the one that I could talk to about anything,
the one I shared my secrets with.
I didn't have to hide anything.
Like, I could literally be myself.
This is the Nathan that I fell in love with,
my high school sweetheart.
But this Nathan turned into a monster.
This Nathan turned into
a murderer.
What happened
to that young man?
How did we get here?
That's the question.
I grew up in Wendell, North Carolina.
I grew up in a Christian home, and faith played a big part
in our lives.
My mother was the pastor of Zion Hill Holiness Church,
and my dad was the deacon at the church.
And so they served in ministry.
My dad and my mom worked as a team.
They did everything together.
I met Nathan Holden in middle school, and he lived in
the community where our church was located.
And so I met him in the neighborhood, and we hung
out a couple of times, and it was just like,
we kicked it off.
The chemistry that Nathan and I had, it was like, he gets me.
He understood me, and I understood him.
I kept him laughing.
You know, he would say, "You are crazy."
Like, I was just silly.
And he was my best friend.
And then our friendship turned into love.
We became more than just friends.
But at that time, my family felt like
I did not need to be hanging out with Nathan,
because they knew about his lifestyle,
his parents, their home.
Everybody wanted to go and hang out and do things.
And his parents, you know, were cool with that.
Nathan's mother, she struggled with alcohol.
And then also, his dad was physically abusive
to his mother.
My dad in particular was so against
the relationship Nathan and I had.
[distant thunder]
Look, we should get going.
Oh, right.
LaTONYA: I remember a time where it was
a really bad storm that was coming,
I think it was a hurricane.
[thunder crashes]
Nathan's mom was like, "Hey, you can just stay here."
So before the storm came, Nathan and I went back to
my home to grab some clothes and things like that.
[as LaTonya laughing]
AS LaTONYA'S FATHER: What do you think you're doing?
LaTONYA: Me and my dad, we had this fallout.
-Mr. Allen. -LaTONYA: He was yelling
and screaming and was like, -Now!
"You're not going over there."
My dad, he did not like Nathan.
He felt like he had an attitude.
I don't like that boy. He's no good.
LaTONYA: Why are you chasing behind him?
He's not worth it, and you're just going down
this wrong path.
He's using you, and you're falling for it.
And he was like, "He's gonna end up leaving you."
My dad just automatically assumed Nathan, you know, is
just like his dad.
I'm like, "No, he's not like that.
"He's not his parents. He's not the abusive guy.
He's like, he loves me."
AS LaTONYA: He's not like the others!
LaTONYA: But my dad saw the control
in the beginning, because
I was changing.
AS LaTONYA'S DAD: Don't you dare.
LaTONYA: I wasn't being myself.
And to see Nathan had that much
power and control over me at
such a young age that I would disobey my parents,
and I've been, like, this good girl all this time.
And then now all of a sudden, I'm in love
and things like that, and so it's all about him.
Looking back now,
I think my dad saw that this is not going to turn out good.
And he really tried to stop that.
I wish I had listened to my dad.
At 15 years old, my life changed.
I find out I'm pregnant.
AS LaTONYA: Nathan?
LaTONYA: I remember calling Nathan and letting him know,
"Hey, I went and had a test done,
"and I find out I'm pregnant,
and, you know, you're the father."
And he was like, "Wow, are you sure?"
Why would you say that?
LaTONYA: He tells me that.
My parents told me, "Don't do anything
"until we get a blood test.
We're not doing nothing."
-Hello? -He turned his back on me.
-Nathan? -Completely cut me off.
AS LaTONYA'S MOTHER: What's wrong?
LaTONYA: And I was just so hurt.
I'm sorry. [crying quietly]
LaTONYA: Nathan missed the opportunity
to prove my dad wrong because
he did exactly what my dad warned me that he would do.
I felt like he betrayed me, because now I'm doing
this without him.
And so I went through the whole pregnancy.
Nathan wasn't involved, his family wasn't involved.
It was just my parents, my family, that rallied
around me and supported me during this time.
We took a paternity test.
I said, "It's your baby."
And then Nathan accepted Jeremy being his son,
and we felt like a little family.
I was glad that he finally came around and stepped up.
When Jeremy was about three years old,
we made a decision to get married.
And a month later, we were at the altar.
My dad walked me down the aisle.
My mother officiated the wedding.
-To be my lawful... -To by my lawful.
...and wedded wife. -And wedded wife.
Nathan vowed to be the best husband and dad he could be.
Everything was just -- seemed like
it was just falling in place.
[scattered applause]
Nathan had just finished barber school.
I was in college, and things were going pretty well.
And three years later, I have my first daughter.
And then a few months later, I get pregnant with
my second daughter.
At the time, he had to work two jobs,
and I knew it was a lot of strain on him.
And we just really started kind of drifting apart.
Nathan began exerting control around our home in a way
I have never seen before.
Nathan would come in, and he'd see toys on the floor.
He would be like, "Hey, what's going on with this?"
And he's so upset because the house is messy.
It just really, like, ticked him off.
And he was like, "Okay, y'all gonna learn today
"how to clean up.
These are your responsibilities, and this is how you clean."
Trash goes out on Thursdays.
"This is how you properly make your bed
or properly clean the bathroom."
Got it?
Hey!
And literally had them acting it out, writing down steps,
how to do it.
Recycling goes in what color can?
Black?
No! How many times do I have to tell you?
I just remember him just -- he lost it.
And he goes and gets a trash bag,
and he throws their toys away.
They were crying, they were upset -- it broke my heart.
[child crying]
Something's going on -- it didn't look right,
it didn't feel right.
It got to a place to where whatever I said,
it did not matter.
It was his way or no way.
I could see his temperament changing.
I was afraid of the environment that he was creating
in our home. -[child crying distantly]
His behavior was just spiraling out of control.
Nathan became very controlling.
I remember being invited to hang out with some friends
and kind of fixing myself up, put on some tight jeans,
a cute shirt.
He's like, "Where you going?"
Where do you think you're going?
Out with friends.
LaTONYA: "Oh, no, you need to take that off.
Them jeans is too tight."
Not dressed like that, you're not.
LaTONYA: He felt like I was just
trying to get attention from guys.
There ain't nothing wrong with the way I look.
LaTONYA: He did not like for me to wear makeup.
He did not like for me to dye my hair or cut my hair.
He wanted me to cover myself.
I was property to him because he would always say,
"You can't go nowhere."
You know, like, he owned me.
And then he would lay his gun out beside the table,
made sure it was seen.
I was scared.
For one, I'm like, why do you have a gun?
Why do you need a gun?
Like, what's going on for you to start carrying a gun
and having it out?
And then I was just scared for the kids.
I didn't want them to see it or find it.
And, you know, I didn't want anybody to get hurt.
We good?
Nathan's point in making sure that I knew that gun was there
was to keep me in line or to control me.
Being in a relationship where it's
very controlling or manipulative,
it crushes your self-esteem.
You lose your identity.
Nathan had been working as a barber in a barbershop.
And to save money, he decided to start working in the home.
That was just, like, a big no,
because we had small kids.
And I just didn't want people in and out of our homes.
There were people showing up all times of the day, night.
The people he was hanging around at that time, I knew
that he didn't need to be hanging around
these types of people.
When he's cutting hair, he's like, "You need to go
in your room -- go in your room, you need to stay in your room."
Hold up.
LaTONYA: He didn't want guys, you know,
looking at me, and I'm walking
around the house or doing things.
I told you, stay upstairs.
LaTONYA: He would smell like weed.
So I knew that he had been getting high and drinking
and things like that.
And I told him how I felt about it.
They can't be coming around here this late.
And he was like, "This is how it's going to be.
"I'm saving money.
"It doesn't matter how you feel about that.
This is what I'm gonna do."
I felt like he was no longer the person that I had married.
He was no longer my best friend, the one that I used to
talk to about everything.
Our whole dynamics, our relationship had changed.
2009, it was just this downward spiral where it was getting
out of control.
One day, I get a phone call from Nathan.
He says, "Some guys just jumped me and beat me up.
You need to come home right now."
And he hung up the phone.
I walked inside my home.
And our house was just, like, in disarray, like,
pictures off the wall.
Everything's torn up.
Nathan!
And Nathan's bleeding,
and he had been beaten up.
AS NATHAN: They snuck up on me.
LaTONYA: And I'm like, "What happened?" You know,
and he was like, "Some guys came in here,
"and they jumped me and beat me up.
It was like they were looking for something."
And I'm like, what? What happened to the kids?
-Mom. -The kids were in a room.
They had them under a cover.
He said a guy had a gun and holding them in a room.
My son was like, "I thought we was gonna die.
I thought they was gonna shoot us."
Nathan eventually tells me that they were looking for
some drugs, but they couldn't find it.
And he said, "Because I had it in the attic."
I didn't know he was selling drugs.
And I had no idea he was storing drugs in our home.
He caused this to happen to our family
because of his choices.
I started thinking of, like, I can't continue to stay
in this relationship.
And I needed to get out.
It's not safe anymore, but I didn't know how.
LaTONYA: This was definitely a turning point
for me and for Nathan.
He thought I was gonna leave him, and at that point,
he started changing.
He started coming to church every Sunday.
Nathan had started working back in the barbershop,
and so I reconsidered walking away from him
and giving him another chance.
I started back working.
Nathan was still cutting hair and kids growing up.
He didn't have as much control over me.
I'm at work, and I got a phone call from Nathan.
And he says, "You need to come home now.
I just beat your son."
And I said, "What are you talking about?"
He was like, "You need to come get your son right now."
I'm like, "This your son too."
And he just kept saying that,
"Your son, you need to get your son."
Almost like he just disowned him or something.
And he hung up the phone.
When I saw Nathan, when I came in the home, it was a anger.
It was a hatred.
It was something I had never seen before on him.
And I see the broom, and it was a metal broom
that had literally broke in half.
And then Nathan said, "I come home, and Jeremy's playing
basketball, and he's supposed to be at home."
Your boy don't know how to follow direction.
LaTONYA: "And I beat him with this broom."
This is on a whole 'nother level.
Like, this is like out of control anger.
Jeremy was hurt.
He had several bruises from that beating,
on his back, legs, and arms, all over his body.
It won't happen again, I promise.
LaTONYA: He was just like, "What'd I do to deserve this?"
I remember him saying, "I don't even want to play ball anymore."
AS LaTONYA: It's okay.
LaTONYA: Jeremy was 14 years old.
-He loved basketball. -Go on.
And to see him shut down, he was crushed, he was crying.
Don't think about putting that jersey on, boy.
LaTONYA: It broke my heart.
Nathan had no remorse for what he did to Jeremy.
What is wrong with you?
There's nothing wrong with me.
It crushed something in me to where I had to stop this.
I had to make a decision.
I need to get out
and protect the kids.
I said, "I'm moving out.
I'm moving in with my parents, me and the kids."
We'll see about that.
I don't think he believed that I was actually leaving him.
I don't think it registered.
December of 2013, I left Nathan and moved in
with my parents, the children and I.
And then New Year's Day, I get a call from Nathan.
And he is cursing me out.
Hello?
LaTONYA: "You need to bring your ass home."
AS LaTONYA: You need to relax.
LaTONYA: He started threatening me.
"If you don't come home now," he said, "I'll come over there.
I'll show you what I do." I was like, "Nathan, calm down.
"What's going on? Like, what are you talking about?
I'm not coming back. I'm not coming back."
Who you talking to?
LaTONYA: He said, "I'm coming over to get my kids,
and you're not gonna stop me."
He's in a rage, and it was very scary for me.
He said, "You don't know what I'm capable of doing."
So much anger and so much hatred, how he was
disrespecting my parents.
My dad was like, "I'm calling the police,
because I need to know my rights."
When the police arrived, Nathan was still on the phone,
arguing with us.
And so we put him on the speaker so that
the officers could hear the conversation.
AS NATHAN: Those are my kids!
LaTONYA: The officer told Nathan and I the best way to handle
the arrangement of the children is to do it
through the court system.
Go together downtown the next day
and file for joint custody.
AS NATHAN: All right, fine. I'll be there tomorrow.
When we get off the call with Nathan, the officer tells me,
"You need to go and file a restraining order the first
"thing in the morning, as soon as they open.
"File that restraining order before you all go and file for
joint custody," because it would put me in more favor of
the kids being with me if I filed the order first.
So my plan was to get up, get the kids to school, and to go
to the courthouse and file the restraining order.
While I'm on my way, I'm getting a call.
You know, Nathan's calling my phone, and I just ignore it.
When I got to the courthouse, I started filing the papers.
[phone notification tone]
When I walk back to my car,
[phone notification tone]
I'm getting calls from my mother.
I'm getting calls from my father.
My brother was calling me.
I'm not answering the phone.
I get a text from Nathan that says, "What floor are you on?"
And my heart just, like, I literally just froze, um,
right where I was at, couldn't move, couldn't do anything.
I'm at my car, and I put the key in the door,
and he zooms in and blocks me in.
I immediately get scared and panic.
He gets out of his truck, in my face.
-You liar! -And he just cursed me out.
You think this is a game?
Threatening me, calling me every name in the book,
and I was so scared.
And then he puts his hand up against my head,
pushing it up against the car.
He says, "I don't know what I'm capable of doing right now.
"I could punch you right now.
I can do anything."
And at that moment, I didn't know what he was capable of.
And nobody could help me.
I haven't seen Nathan act this way towards me.
And I knew that I had to remain
as calm as possible and try to
de-escalate and try to calm him down the best way I could.
We can work it out.
I said, "I'm willing to sit down and have a conversation,
but you need to calm down."
I said, "Please, just let's sit down and eat,
and let's talk about it."
And I said, "Just follow me."
I don't know where we're going. I just said, "Follow me."
And then he agrees.
All I knew was that I needed to get to a place
where it was a lot of people.
[heavy exhale]
He ends up following me down the road, and my phone
goes off again. -[phone notification tone]
And it's the school police officer.
-Hello? -And he says,
"Is Nathan with you?" And I was like, "Yes.
He's behind me, following me."
He said, "You need to get away from him right now.
"He's trying to kill you.
"You need to get to a safe place right now.
"Nathan communicated to your brother that he's gonna
hurt you all."
Nathan texts my brother saying, "It's over.
"It's over today.
"It ends today.
"If I can't have the kids, nobody will.
I'll kill them today. I'll kill them.
My brother immediately reached out to my dad.
They contacted the schools.
I drive so fast to that police station.
I pull in front of that police door, left my door open,
ran out, and ran inside
and said, "My husband's trying to kill me."
They took me to the back to get me to a safe place
while they searched for Nathan.
But they couldn't find him that night.
After a few months, Jeremy ended up living with his dad
while the girls lived with me.
One day, I'd been sick.
I haven't been feeling well.
I had no energy.
Like, I could not move.
I could not eat or anything.
I tell my mom, I said, "Mom, I'm not feeling well."
She said, "That's fine. I'll take the girls."
[phone buzzing]
I'm laying in bed.
-Nathan calls my phone. -[phone buzzing]
And of course, I ignored it.
[phone buzzing]
And he's calling my phone throughout the day.
[phone buzzing]
I have a restraining order in place.
He's not supposed to be calling me.
-[phone buzzing] -And then I hear my mom.
AS LaTONYA'S MOM: Come on, now, let's let your mama sleep.
And I hear the girls in the kitchen.
And I can hear them talking.
I'm just laying in the bed, still not feeling well.
AS JEREMY: Hi, grandma.
LaTONYA: But then I hear Jeremy talking to my parents.
AS JEREMY: Is she upstairs?
On that night, Jeremy was staying with his dad.
And he was like, "Hey, Mom."
I was like, "What are you doing here?"
And the next thing I hear
is Nathan come in the house and says,
"Y'all don't want to talk to me?
Somebody gonna talk to me today."
[two gunshots blast]
And I hear gunshots.
-[one gunshot blasts] -Pow, I hear another gunshot.
-[one gunshot blasts] -My youngest daughter
runs in the room with me.
-I hear some more gunshots. -[two gunshots blast]
I'm trying to get the kids in the closet, and I was just
like, "Go, go, go, go."
I know that he's shooting at my parents, and I call 911.
I said, "My husband is here. He's shooting."
I need help.
And I lay the phone down, because I knew I was next.
I knew Nathan came to kill me.
I knew that he came there for me.
I get my kids in the closet.
I told them I loved them.
And the next thing I know, Nathan was coming in the room.
The look in Nathan's eyes, it was cold.
It wasn't him.
It was like he was possessed.
It was so scary.
And he starts beating me.
And he was punching me in my face.
"You don't want to talk to me, you're gonna talk
to me today, you're gonna talk to me today."
I'm crying,
I'm begging him, "Please don't do this.
Please don't kill me in front of my kids."
And I hear my kids screaming and hollering.
And the next thing I know, he has a gun in my face.
Staring down that barrel of that gun in my face,
I couldn't move. I couldn't fight.
[gunshot blasts]
And then I hear gunshots going off.
[gunshot blasts]
I lost my eyesight in one of my eyes, and my ears shattering.
I remember yelling out, "Jesus!"
And another gunshot, pow.
And then I went out.
[child crying]
Um, that was the, um, 911 call, um, that my son made.
Jeremy was so confused.
It was like he was still kind of protecting his dad.
Like, he didn't want to tell them that his dad did it.
My youngest daughter, she was so scared,
because she says, you know,
"Nathan did it, but don't tell the police,
because he's going to come back and kill us."
And that's how she was thinking that
um, she didn't want to die either.
And that's how scared they were.
It just breaks my heart.
I found out Nathan shoots me and then hugged the kids
after doing it like nothing happened.
"I love y'all, you know, give your daddy a hug."
And then hands Jeremy a phone and says, "Now you can
call the police," and leaves.
And Jeremy calls 911.
And my son remembers stepping over my body trying to get to
the front door to meet the officers.
He thought I was dead.
LaTONYA: I was in a coma for seven days.
I wake up, and my aunt is on the side
of me, and my uncle on another side.
And I remember mouthing, "Where's my mom?
My mom, mom." My aunt says,
um, she didn't make it.
And I remember, um,
I said, "Dad?" "They didn't make it."
And I remember
saying, "My kids," and they said, "They're safe."
And I remember saying, "Nate?"
And they said, "They caught him."
And I just cried.
Just tears came down.
I didn't know that I had suffered
two gunshot wounds.
I was shot in the face
and point blank range in my heart.
[clears throat] The doctors said that
[sighs] um...
that it was nothing but a miracle that I survived
um,
being shot in the face because the bullet went
through the side of my cheek, and it hit my front teeth,
but it deflected outward instead of going straight
through my head.
But with my heart, the way
that they described it was that the bullet enters the top
of my heart and it exits out the bottom of my heart,
but my heart was still intact.
I couldn't believe I even woke up.
I find out later, you know, they had planned my funeral.
They didn't expect me to wake up.
It's a miracle.
Right then I knew that, you know, there was a purpose
for my life, that I --
There was a reason, you know, that I was still here.
[quietly] Yeah.
[normally] It's a picture of me and my brother...
the day I left the hospital.
We have the best relationship.
He's my best friend.
And, uh, he stepped up.
This picture
always remind me of,
there is nothing too hard that
I can't do.
Like, it's nothing
that can stop me.
It only had been about two or three days, you know,
since I woke up from the coma.
I'm leaving this day against medical advice
to attend my parents' funeral and say goodbye.
I said, "Whatever I have to do, I'm going to the funeral."
And I did.
My son held me the entire time,
and he would not let me go.
I got a chance to say goodbye.
My mom suffered a gunshot wound to the heart.
The type of relationship I had with my mother,
um, we literally was best friends.
Like, we talked at least three times a day.
My mother was amazing.
She loved the young people in the church.
And so she always took time for everybody.
Being at the funeral, you know, when I viewed the bodies,
it was just like, "Ma, I love you so much.
"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
And just, um,
"Thank you for everything."
Um, just saying, I'm just going to really miss them, you know.
My dad suffered multiple gunshot wounds to the back,
to his chest.
He protected me,
and he tried to protect me and the kids.
And he died doing that.
He served in the Vietnam War, and then he volunteered to go
back a second time and serve and fight in the war.
My dad survived that to end up being murdered
by his son-in-law.
This is a picture of Nathan.
I think this is the picture,
um, that night when they arrested him.
The gun that he used to kill my parents was the same gun
that I saw, you know, laying on a nightstand
and, um... years prior.
His eyes is cold,
um, evil.
Uh...I can see
the hatred in his eyes.
I can feel it in my body right now.
I never thought I would see a mugshot
of the love of my life.
This is not the man I married.
I don't know who this person is.
Years later, I still --
I'm still reminded of that day
because of my scars, I have, um,
a scar from here all the way down to the end of my stomach,
from the open heart surgery,
I have scars all over my stomach
and the exit wound of the bullet,
the hole in the middle of my back is a scar.
I can feel the scars on the inside of my jaw, I mean,
in my cheek, the inside of my cheek.
Like, I can still feel those scars.
I carry so much guilt and shame.
I could not forgive myself.
I felt like I put my parents in this position.
Through therapy and through going through that trial,
it really opened my eyes.
It's not my fault anymore.
You know, he did this.
And I learned how to put that blame back on him
and free myself.
April 9, 2014, does not define me.
It's a part of my story, but it's not my final story.
It was the day before April the 9th, the last conversation
I had with my mother.
And she said, "Tanya, I had a dream about you last night.
"I saw you speaking in front of thousands of people.
"And people were just so drawn to you.
And you was just so inspiring."
I am walking that out right now.
And I've spoken at so many domestic violence events,
and I've spoken in front of judges,
and I've shared my story on panels.
And people see the smile, and they see you doing
these great things.
And they really don't know every single day is a fight.
And I choose to fight for my life.
I just try to live my life to the fullest.
I want to maximize my life and do --
and do what my mama said.
♪
Sometimes it feels like it happened so long ago.
[woman screaming]
Real evil absolutely exists.
The worst kind of evil
is when it comes from somebody you thought you could trust.
♪