- I just knew something horrible had happened.
- She was a small town girl with big time dreams,
and they were all coming true in Vegas.
A career at a casino and a fiance.
Then, she vanished.
- I remember going to church everyday and saying
"Please let us find her."
- Days later, police did.
Murdered. Blood on her car.
A struggle at her house, and clues from a camisole.
What had happened?
- We can't rest until it's solved.
- Her friends will not quit.
Her parents will not stop.
- I am a pain, and I am a nuisance.
But I am a mother.
- Can Dateline's old team of investigators help?
- Nothing is missing from his house. - Nothing from his house.
**
- Hello, and welcome to "Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
Theresa Insana was determined to make it big in Las Vegas.
She fell hard for the city and for a new colleague.
Then, suddenly Theresa vanished.
Police quickly found her body,
but the secret of who killed her and why
would be tougher mysteries to crack.
Here's Josh Mankiewicz with "Lost in Sin City".
Las Vegas,
every year these bright lights draw millions.
[slot machines ringing]
Some come looking for the promise
of any easy fortune.
Or for those secrets
that supposedly never leave here.
And some come to get lost.
If you want to disappear in America,
the shadows thrown by those bright lights
can hide you.
And then there are those who don't wanna disappear here,
but they do anyway.
People like Theresa Insana.
Here one day and gone the next.
- She was gonna make the big time.
- Theresa's parent's Joe and Ann-Marie.
- You guys ever worry about this little girl
so far from home?
- Me and my sister were very worried about her.
- Sure, I was worried.
But I also knew she was gonna do good things.
- Doing good things.
It was a lesson Theresa Insana had learned well
as the second of three children
in a deeply religious, tightly knit family
in Niagara Falls, New York.
And from those earliest days of childhood,
Theresa's best friend was always her doting father.
Their love was deliciously obvious,
spelled out in whipped cream and icing
on the extravagant birthday cakes he made for her
nearly every year of her life.
- She used to love it.
She was of course my sweetheart.
- He was her friend. - I was her friend.
- Right. But I was the disciplinarian.
Not that she was bad.
- She was the disciplinarian
and you were what, her co-conspirator.
- No! - I was her enabler.
- No. - Okay. [chuckles]
Put it that way. - No...
- The enabler fed Theresa's love of beauty and fashion,
giving daddy's little girl everything that she could want
and that he could afford.
And then more.
- She loved shopping
and I think probably spent a lot of money buying clothes.
- Theresa's friends from childhood,
Jennifer Silvilato and Grace Carducci.
- She never left her house without looking perfect.
Had the nicest clothes and she always looked great.
- Theresa bought many of those clothes herself
working several jobs as a teen.
And beauty and fashion were but small facets
of a much larger and meaningful life.
- She was friendly, loving, kind,
incredibly smart.
- An A student, she studied psychology in college
but she was also an excellent dancer
and coupled with her size, she was barely five feet tall,
that skill made her perfect for another of her passions.
- We tried out for the cheerleading team together,
and Theresa felt so bad
that she made the team and I didn't.
She told me that she wasn't going to partake in the team.
- She was a loyal friend. - Yeah, she was.
- Volunteer to give up something like that.
- Yes, she was not gonna be a cheerleader
'cause I couldn't be one, so... very loyal.
- After college,
Theresa returned to Niagara Falls
and a post-graduate life of leisure.
- She was home and she was living with me,
but she was going out at night,
coming home real late, sleeping until noon.
I says, "Honey, it's not gonna happen.
"You're gonna do something."
- So Theresa did.
She packed her bags and headed for Las Vegas.
And along with her went Melissa Madge,
who'd grown up next door to the Insanas
and remained the best of friends with Theresa.
- We both fell in love with it.
As soon as we got there.
So we immediately started on the job hunt
when we got there.
- Within days, Theresa had a job in the electric city.
Not dancing on a chorus line,
but working in sales at the Rio.
Melissa soon found work at Harrah's.
The two girls from Niagara Falls
got their own two bedroom apartment.
Theresa's parents came to visit.
Did she like Las Vegas?
- She loved it. - She loved it.
It was excitement. We says "Wow."
- I'll never forget it 'cause Theresa was so...
so Theresa.
And here she is with a cigarette in her ear,
and her Starbucks coffee,
and she's runnin' down the-the hallway at the Rio.
And I says, "Oh, my God, she was so happy."
- Theresa's career at the Rio was off and running.
And soon, she met a guy. His name was Jeff.
He bought her a dog.
They moved into this house together
and they got engaged.
But then he broke it off just before the wedding.
Theresa was crushed but had moved on,
reuniting with her best friends
in the summer of 2004.
Standing up for her friend Grace
at her wedding.
- We just really were so happy to be all together
and it was a good day.
- But a couple of months after,
by the fall of 2004,
Vegas seemed to have lost some of its luster.
Theresa was thinking hard about moving back home
to Niagara Falls,
and maybe going to grad school.
Then, the Rio offered Theresa a bigger job
with better pay.
- It absolutely changed the course of her life.
I was really, really upset
because I wanted her to come back home
and I thought it was going to be the best thing for her.
- And going home might have been.
Staying in Vegas clearly was not.
Because a month after her promotion,
on October 27th, 2004,
Theresa Insana failed to report for work
at the Rio.
She was gone for a day, then for another.
So co-workers, including her childhood friend Melissa
went over to her house.
Inside, no Theresa. Just her dog and her keys.
Her cell phone, her purse, and her car.
And on the car's bumper and unmistakable spot of blood.
- I think at that point is when I became panic-stricken
and was like something is wrong.
Something is definitely wrong.
- Where was Theresa? What had happened?
And was she still alive?
The investigation begins.
Police find more blood in the bathroom.
- Analysis of those two blood droplets
from the same person?
- Same person, full male profile.
- So not Theresa Insana. - Not Theresa Insana.
**
- In a quiet suburb less than ten miles
from the Las Vegas strip,
concern and confusion suddenly ruled.
For two days, 26-year-old Theresa Insana
hadn't shown up at her job
as a sales executive at the Rio.
- Back home in Niagara Falls, New York,
her father with whom Theresa spoke nearly every day,
hadn't been able to reach her.
- I'd just call and get the message machine, you know?
- She didn't call you back?
- Didn't call me back and I says,
"What the heck's happening?"
- Coworkers, including her friend
Melissa Madge, had finally gone to Theresa's house
to check on her,
and found Theresa's dog, cell phone, purse, and car.
And that frightening spot of blood
on the bumper of Theresa's car.
- You've known her all your life,
and you show up at her house
and she's gone,
but all her stuff is still there.
- I think at that point it was like in complete shock,
you know, where was she?
- Las Vegas Metro Police responded,
and patrol quickly made a call
that reached Vegas homicide.
The squad that included Detective Marty Wildemann
And Detective Sergeant Mike McGrath
was soon on the scene.
We looked at the blood smear on the rear bumper of the car,
and then we said,
"Everybody out. We're taking this."
And we started to go through the house methodically.
- Processing it as a homicide scene basically.
- It looked to detectives as if Theresa had been attacked,
and the clues found throughout the house
supported that.
On the stairs, A footprint, too large to be Theresa's.
And this...
- We saw a small little brass or metal ring.
- Steps away in a half bath,
detectives found a towel rack
missing from the wall.
And two more spots of blood.
One near the base board. Another on the mirror.
Analysis of those two blood droplets
from the same person?
- Same person, full male profile.
- So not Theresa Insana. - Not Theresa Insana.
- Then, there was that blood
on the bumper of Theresa's car.
That would later turn out to be Theresa's blood
not an assailant's.
Detectives prepared themselves
for what might be in the car's trunk.
But when it was opened,
they found only a bit more blood and... mud.
Then inside the car,
police found the driver's seat in an unusual position.
- The seat is pushed all the way to the back.
And she's like barely five feet tall.
- She's a very small woman.
- Based on this evidence,
a theory was beginning to take shape.
A theory that involved an attacker entering the home
possibly through the unlocked back sliding door.
Some kind of struggle on the stairs.
A struggle that then spilled into that half-bathroom,
where a towel rack was torn from the wall.
And where Theresa's attacker lost blood.
But no matter what exactly had happened in the bathroom,
detectives believed the struggle had ended
with Theresa's murder.
Then the loading of Theresa's body
into the trunk of her own car.
The body's disposal, somewhere.
And then, in a bizarre twist,
the killer returning Theresa's car to her own house.
It's extremely unusual, is it not,
for a killer to return to a crime scene like that?
- Yes. - 'Cause, usually,
people commit the crime and then they wanna get away.
- Absolutely.
You obviously had thorough knowledge
of what she was doing, who was living there,
and the fact that you'd be safe to come back.
- By-- removing her body buys him time.
So, that's the time that we believe that
he can do all the things that he needed to do in the house.
- And what he apparently did in the house
was to start cleaning up,
as evidenced by paper towels, trash bags,
and spray bottles left in Theresa's kitchen.
How often are you at the scene of a homicide
where the killer tried to clean up after himself
or herself? - It's not that often.
And when it does occur, it's very bush league.
- This was different? - Yes.
- This was different. It was methodical,
it was slow. It was thorough.
- He spent a long time cleaning up.
- But who would know so much about Theresa
to know that no one would discover him
if he took the time to clean the house?
And when had all this occurred?
Detectives learned that Theresa had been last seen
at work at The Rio on Tuesday,
two days before friends had gone looking for her.
A good citizen, she'd gone to vote
at this church just a few blocks from her house
at about 5:30 PM, then made some calls,
speaking to her mom back in Niagara Falls
about 6:30 PM.
And what'd she say to you in that conversation?
- She said, "Ma, I'm tired
"and I'm gonna have my macaroni and cheese,
"and I'm gonna rest."
And, um, "I'll talk to you tomorrow."
- But an hour later, at 7:30 PM,
when Theresa's cousin Angela called,
the phone went unanswered.
- So, we had, basically, an hour window
between the mother's phone call
and Angela tried to call her and not getting her.
- So, there really wasn't an explanation
other than she'd already been attacked
for why Angela's phone calls weren't being answered.
- So, police believe Theresa Insana was attacked
between 6:30 and 7:30 Tuesday evening.
It was now Thursday.
Her attacker had a nearly 48 hour head start.
As word spread, Theresa's best friends
couldn't believe what they were hearing.
- I think, at that moment, I just knew something happened--
horrible happened.
- Friends talked with police, hoping to provide clues
in Theresa's disappearance.
Investigators started reading Theresa's diary,
which was found in the house.
And Grace Carducci remembered something
Theresa had told her, when Grace was visiting
six months prior.
- One morning we got up and we were drinking coffee
and she was like, "I can't put my finger on it,
"but sometimes, Grace, I'll go to work
"and I'll come home and my DVD player will be on.
"Or there'll be a different station
"on the television than from what I left it on."
- She say anything was taken?
- Nothing was taken. And she was like,
"I-I just have this feeling that somebody's in my house."
- Do you know if she had her locks changed?
- I don't believe that she did.
- Detectives followed up every lead.
K9 units were called in. As police put it,
the whole zip code was turned upside down.
But experience told the detectives that
any news they received about Theresa
was unlikely to be good news.
- We were just waiting for the call.
- That someone had found a body? - Yes.
- Days dragged by.
- I remember going to church every day
and saying, "Please let us find her."
I don't know what I was hoping for.
But I just wanted us to find her.
- And then, nearly a week after detectives believed
Theresa Insana was killed, came the news
police were waiting for
and that Theresa's family and friends were dreading.
- A painful discovery sends the investigation
into overdrive.
And puts detectives on the trail of a killer.
Dateline's Unsolved Case Squad with a dramatic theory
of the crime. - Once I saw the bathroom,
there was a towel rack that's been removed.
Turn around, if you don't mind. Then I attempt to grab you
and you're holding onto that towel rack.
When "Dateline: Secrets Uncovered" continues.
- Six days after Theresa Insana failed
to show up for work at The Rio in Las Vegas,
her father, Joe, was reciting Catholic prayers,
marking All Saints Day.
- I'll never forget it, 'cause I'm sitting there,
praying this litany of the Saints.
And I turn to Amber and I said,
"Theresa's gonna be found today
"because today she became a saint, too."
- And that very day, Theresa's parents
and her best friends received a call from
Las Vegas Metro homicide detective,
Marty Wildemann. - He called me and said,
"Grace, we have Theresa. Um, I know it's sad news and--
"but we have her body and I just didn't want you
"to suffer anymore. - It was just awful.
The most awful thing.
- Theresa Insana's body had been found
just three and a half miles from her home,
near a golf course.
Her killer had wrapped her body in towels and blankets,
carried Theresa down a steep, rocky embankment,
and left her in a large culvert, in standing water.
An autopsy showed Theresa Insana had died by strangulation,
and possibly she'd been sexually assaulted.
Although the medical examiner said the evidence
was not conclusive.
- But we thought that, hey, maybe this is, you know,
it's an act of anger by someone that-that was mad at Theresa.
Was it staged?
- Was somebody trying to make it look like a rape?
Even though the point of it was something else?
- Very good possibility.
- And with the discovery of Theresa's body,
three things were immediately clear to detectives.
First, that tiny piece of metal found on the stairs
of Theresa's apartment, it was apparently
torn from the camisole she was wearing
at the time of her murder.
Secondly, the blankets around her body
came from her home.
But police believe the rope and duct tape
used to bind the body did not.
It had been brought to the house by her killer.
And finally, that blood in the bathroom
matched a new spot of blood
found on Theresa's camisole.
It also came, police believe,
from the killer.
- We've got a bad guy and we've got a bad guy that,
you know, left a print.
- This has to be left by the person who attacked Theresa.
- Yes. - Absolutely.
- But whose blood was it?
With a backlog at the Vegas crime lab,
DNA test results were still months away.
So, in those first days after Theresa's body was found,
detectives began looking at what they could learn
from other evidence, like where her body was dumped.
And whether they were looking for a killer or killers.
How many people committed this crime?
- I believe, just from our investigation,
that it was a one-person crime.
Where we found Theresa makes that a little bit iffy,
only because it was rough terrain.
- I believe that it was more than one person.
I think that, based upon where the body was found,
twenty five feet of rocks walking down, that--
- You'd have to have some help? - I would think.
'Cause we walked down there to-to view the body.
And it was iffy walking down there
with a notebook in our hand during the day.
And this is the night time. - And carrying a body.
- Theresa Insana had been dead for several years
when Las Vegas Metro homicide granted unprecedented access
to Dateline's Unsolved Case Squad,
sharing information from the files of an open case
with our experts.
**
Dwayne Stanton, retired homicide detective
from Washington DC.
investigated Chandra Levy's murder.
Yolanda McClary, then a crime scene investigator
in Las Vegas, and a model for the character
on the hit series "CSI,"
and John Lewin, Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney,
specializing in cold case murders.
How many people you think committed this murder?
- I think by where the body was located
in the ravine with all the rocks,
I'm gonna support two.
- I think it's one person committing the murder,
and then I agree, clearly someone had help.
- What happened inside that house?
- One possibility.
We know for a fact that Theresa,
at some point, on these steps.
I think what Theresa attempted to do
was to secret herself inside of the bathroom,
away from her attacker or attackers.
Once inside of the bathroom,
there's a towel rack that has been removed,
and as you can see, the bracket is missing as well.
Yolanda, turn around if you don't mind.
Act like the towel rack is on this wall,
and I took and grabbed you, and you're holding on
to that towel rack, and then I think
when the towel rack probably came out of the wall,
the person that was-- - Behind her.
- Behind her, pulling on her-- - Gets hit in the face.
- Gets hit.
Or in the head, or wherever.
Someplace on their body.
- Thus causing the blood splatter
on the mirror and on the baseboard.
- And our team agrees, the elements of the crime,
as well as moving Theresa's body out of her home,
using her car for transport,
and returning to clean up the crime scene together
strongly suggests this was no random murder
by a stranger.
Has this person ever committed murder before?
Because clearly some of the things that they do
show some sophistication.
- I don't think that the person has committed murders before.
I think they watch a lot of murder movies,
and they think they know how to do it.
- And unfortunately for them,
they thought of things that were much more advanced.
Let's move the car.
Let's make sure that we get the body out of the house,
but they forget the basics.
Her purse and cell phone are sitting there.
- Well, and we know that there's not another crime involved,
for instance, let's say robbery,
because nothing is missing from this house.
- Nothing's missing.
- Nothing is missing other than Theresa.
- It really limits your pool of potential suspects.
- You have to look at, who has a grudge?
Who stands to benefit?
- Who doesn't like her? - Who doesn't like her?
- Police have a date with the ex,
Theresa's former fiance.
- Welcome back to "Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
I'm Craig Melvin.
Police found Theresa Insana's body dumped in a ravine.
The autopsy showed she'd been strangled, but why?
Detectives were about to take a hard look
at Theresa's ex-fiance, Jeff Fenton,
and uncover a secret.
Here again, is Josh Mankiewicz with "Lost in Sin City."
- Four days before Theresa Insana's body was found
on that terrible Monday morning in November 2004,
it was her coworkers from the Rio
who first went to her home to check on Theresa
and then, when they couldn't find her, alerted police.
Among them, Theresa's life-long friend
and former roommate, Melissa Madge.
- I couldn't wrap my mind
around who would really want to hurt her.
- Police asked you if she was involved in anything illegal.
- Right. No. - Did they ask about boyfriends?
- They did. - And, in fact,
Theresa's former fiance was one of those coworkers
who were the first to enter the home that day.
His name is Jeff Fenton,
and he once lived in that house with Theresa,
but he also broke her heart just months earlier
by breaking off their engagement
right before the wedding.
When questioned by Las Vegas police,
Jeff Fenton said he had played no part in Theresa's murder.
He said he tried not to touch anything in the house or garage
where Theresa's car was still parked.
Police needed to know as much as possible about Jeff,
a man who seemed to be a bit of a mystery to most,
a then 30-year-old divorced market analyst
for Caesars Entertainment Properties,
which included the Rio.
He and Theresa had gotten engaged
just two months after they started dating in 2002,
shocking to many of her friends and family members.
Jeff seem like a good guy to you?
- I-I really believe at first,
he was quite a nice, wonderful man.
It's who she wanted. He asked for my blessing.
I gave it to him.
- But those closest to the couple
saw something odd in Jeff.
He seemed to be constantly under the weather.
- He came for a week, and he had--
Every day, he had an ailment. God-God can strike me dead.
- He had always complained a lot of headaches,
and that he was stressed,
and he had suffered panic attacks
a couple of times.
He stayed around home a lot.
- And Theresa, who'd been very social,
would stay around home to take care of him.
- She's certainly not gonna go out socially if her--
if her fiance is home sick.
- Jeff and Theresa were engaged for a year.
Then just five weeks before the wedding was set to be held
back in Niagara Falls,
Jeff had abruptly called it off.
- He basically came to her on one Sunday morning
and said, "I can't do this,"
and Theresa was very taken aback
and completely devastated at that time.
- Theresa was heartbroken,
as evidenced by this entry in her diary.
- I think she was just so sad,
and, you know, that was when she shared
that may there were some signs
that she should have seen before.
- What'd she say the signs were?
- She said that there was a girl's name on her caller I.D.,
someone that she had worked with,
and I think she-- There was some thought there
that maybe there was something going on.
- And, apparently, there was.
Shortly after Jeff Fenton broke up with Theresa,
he began dating that very woman
whose name had been found on the caller I.D.,
another coworker at the Rio named Melissa Ball.
Theresa ever express how uncomfortable it was
to work with both her ex-boyfriend
and her sort of romantic rival in the same office?
- It wasn't an easy situation for her.
Every day, she had to go into work
and see the man that broke her heart
and then have to look at Melissa.
She always would say to me,
"I'm trying to be a better person
"and not allow it to bother me."
- And as the months passed,
Jeff and Theresa were at least civil to one another.
One weekend, just two weeks before the murder,
Jeff agreed to take care of Theresa's dog,
and he slept over at her house
when Theresa had to work overnight at the hotel,
but on the day police believe Theresa was murdered,
she did tell her friend something
that made investigators pay close attention.
- She had come to my office that day,
and we were chatting, and she had mentioned
that she had exchanged some words with Jeff,
like, "I confronted him, and, you know, I said this to him,"
and that was really it. - What was the argument about?
- I-- honestly, I don't really recall.
I just sort of, you know,
tried to be the supporting friend
and say, you know, "Don't worry about him.
"Just ignore him. Just move on with your day."
- When he was questioned by police,
Jeff said that tiff never actually happened.
There was another reason detectives were suspicious.
Theresa's body had been found
just two miles from Jeff Fenton's apartment.
Police soon learned he had an air-tight alibi.
That evening, Jeff and his new girlfriend were buying a car,
and police believe they were at the car dealership
during the exact hour when Theresa was murdered.
Still, detectives thought Jeff Fenton,
the man who'd had panic attacks
and was described as highly stressed
didn't seem stressed at all
by the murder of his former fiancee.
One possible reason for Jeff Fenton's flat affect?
He was taking anxiety medication.
Another-- He had just lost his former fiancee
and was confused by all the questions,
because he was not involved in her murder.
Still, police kept looking at those close to Theresa
as they searched for answers.
- The new girlfriend makes an entrance
and a dramatic exit.
- How many people have you seen get up
in the middle of a polygraph
and run out of the room?
- It's unusual to do what she did.
- What will the Unsolved Case Squad make of this?
- November 2004.
Theresa Insana came home to rest
in Niagara Falls, New York.
Her friends and family
were living with equal measures of agony and bewilderment.
Who had killed Theresa and why?
- Theresa was such a good person.
She didn't do anything bad to anybody.
There would be no reason to kill her.
- And as their grief settled in,
Theresa's former fiance, Jeff Fenton,
was being questioned about the murder.
- Also questioned was Fenton's new girlfriend, Melissa Ball.
She was 23 and worked with Jeff and Theresa at the Rio.
First, Melissa Ball confirmed Jeff's alibi,
saying they were both at that car dealership
the evening Theresa was murdered.
But Melissa Ball also admitted to police
that she did not exactly favor Jeff's decision
just two weeks before the murder
to sleep over at Theresa's house
to watch the dog while Theresa stayed at work.
- I think the fact that Jeff came over
and watched the dog
and stayed and slept at Theresa's house
was definitely upsetting to, uh, Melissa.
- Even though she's not there at the time?
- I mean, that's what she's told.
- You think maybe she thought Theresa really is there?
- Or she's using an excuse
to get Jeff back in the picture.
You know, "Stay over at the house.
"Here's the key."
- It's just still a tie between Jeff and Theresa
that we believe Melissa didn't want.
- Especially, thought detectives,
a new girlfriend who, as Melissa had days before,
learned she was pregnant with Jeff's child.
If most murders involve love or money,
detectives thought Melissa Ball had reason to worry.
After all, Jeff's first marriage ended in divorce.
He'd left Theresa just weeks before their wedding,
and now Melissa was pregnant and wanted to get married.
What woman wouldn't worry?
But when Melissa talked to police,
they felt her demeanor
was not that of someone who was shocked
by the apparently random and senseless killing
of a coworker.
- Here's a woman that she sees every day at work,
and she's unconcerned at all.
- Generally, people are pretty upset.
- Yes. I mean, I-- You can imagine
the amount of people from the Rio that were callin',
wondering if it was someone that was stalking her
at the hotel, and she had none of that.
- She wasn't worried about that?
- She wasn't worried about anything.
- Four months later,
Jeff and Melissa would return to Vegas Homicide
for polygraph tests.
Although the tests are not admissible in court
and do not prove that someone committed a crime,
here are the findings:
When asked if they caused Theresa's death
and if they knew Theresa was dead
before her body was found,
the examiner found both Jeff and Melissa showed deception,
but just as interesting
was what Melissa did toward the end of the test.
- She got upset and grabbed her stuff,
and she was crying and was out of there.
- How many people have you seen
get up in the middle of a polygraph
and run out of the room? - Most people stay.
It's unusual to do what she did.
- Tell me if I'm wrong, but, generally,
innocent people want to stay and answer every question.
- They want to clear up all the answers.
- Whatever it takes to convince you I didn't do it.
- Though Melissa did at one point seem to sympathize
with Theresa's having been jilted by Jeff...
...our team was also interested in how, at another point,
Melissa referred to Theresa not by name
but as "that woman."
- This is somebody who worked with Theresa,
and, obviously, they were both romantic rivals
at points in time for Jeff's affections.
- And, okay, she didn't like her.
Doesn't mean she killed her.
- But what's fascinating, you don't say "that woman."
It shows a level of detachment,
and, to me, of anger and hostility
that we would think
might have existed while she was living,
but this woman's brutally murdered--
- And yet, it still exists. You see it.
- Yeah, that's your-- That's your response?
- Of course, people do react in different ways to polygraphs
and to news as stunning as that of a murder.
As for Jeff,
it's what happened after the interview
that got our team's attention.
There's a point during Jeff's interview with police
where they leave the room,
and Jeff is sitting there like this.
- I love it. - What's that say to you?
- I-I love it. - The ending.
- What it says is, "Oh, my gosh."
- "What have I gotten myself into?"
- Exactly. - Actually, it's the--
- That is classic. - It's the first sense
of emotion out of him. Of all-- It's like--
- Emotion. 45, 50 minutes, nothing.
- That's not necessarily a sign of guilt.
- Maybe what he's concerned about is he's saying,
"You know what? I didn't commit this murder,
"but the more I'm hearing,
"I got a terrible feeling who might be involved."
- Who did. - Right.
- Does Jeff Fenton know who killed Theresa?
A development from the crime lab
suggests a new theory about the case.
- Could this be a murder for hire?
- Absolutely. - Very well.
Absolutely, it could be. - Well, it very well could be.
- Because of a backlog of cases,
it took more than a year after Theresa Insana's murder
for word to come back from the crime lab
to Vegas Homicide.
The DNA from that blood found in Theresa's bathroom
and on the clothes she was wearing
at the time of her murder
did not come from her former fiance, Jeff Fenton.
It also did not come from the woman
who, a month after Theresa's death,
became Fenton's wife, Melissa Ball.
- When you get the DNA results back,
were you guys surprised?
- I don't think we were necessarily surprised.
We thought it was a possibility
that it wouldn't be him.
It kind of made us lean towards more that,
uh, Melissa was callin' the shots,
and Jeff might have found out after the fact.
- You believe Jeff Fenton has something to do with this?
- I do. I do.
- That's not his blood at the scene.
- He knows something,
and, uh, his new wife knows something,
and we just need to find that one person
that they know or somebody else knows.
- Maybe he's not involved. - It's a possibility.
Just the actions, the interviews--
we have a hard time really swallowing that,
that he's not involved.
- It may well be that neither Jeff nor Melissa
had any involvement, and, to this day,
neither has been charged with any crime.
Through his attorney,
Jeff Fenton declined our repeated requests
for an on-camera interview,
and Melissa Ball-Fenton
did not respond to Dateline's requests for comment.
The one thing we know
is that there's no prosecutable case right now
against Jeff or Melissa.
They had an alibi,
and somebody else's DNA is at the crime scene
and on the victim's body.
- There's not enough probable cause at this junction.
- You have a very interesting case
with a lot of evidence that points certain ways,
and then a giant missing piece.
- I completely buy that there was some tension
between Melissa, Jeff, Theresa.
There's a big jump from that to murder.
- I've been on enough homicide cases, Josh,
that there is no real good reason for any of 'em.
- I think the mistake sometimes that people make
is when they try to look at motive
as being always reasonable, always apparent,
always clear. It's not - It's not.
- Could this be a murder for hire?
- Absolutely. - Very-very well.
Absolutely, it could be. - Well, it very well could be.
- The most obvious scenario here
is that this is somebody that either knew her
or was employed by somebody who knew her
and wanted her dead.
- What's it gonna take to solve this murder?
- It's gonna take, uh, probably a DNA hit
on this, uh, profile,
or if somebody actually starts talking.
- I think Dwayne'll tell ya, as a homicide investigator,
you wanna be good. You wanna be thorough.
Sometimes your best friend isn't hard work. It's--
- It's luck. - It's luck.
Luck. Someone comin' forward with information.
Someone making a mistake.
- Detectives have run the DNA through the national database.
No matches, yet.
But detectives are still waiting.
- You guys fantasize about the moment
that you're gonna be able to call the Insana family
and say, "We've made an arrest"??
- That'll be a tremendous day.
It would be a day that I hope, uh,
is before I retire.
- We'll get what we call a full loaf,
that means a full confession, outta this guy.
He'll have no reason
that his blood should have been there.
He'll confess.
We just need to know who he is.
- Detective Wildemann retired in 2017,
and the question of who killed Theresa Insana
remains a mystery.
When we sat down with her,
Ann-Marie Insana was still faithfully placing calls
to investigators,
refusing to let her daughter's murder be forgotten.
- How often do you talk to police?
- About every couple weeks,
and-and I am a pain,
and I am a nuisance, but I am a mother.
I don't know if it's gonna happen in my-my lifetime
or Joe's, but I-- I believe it will happen.
- High school graduation.
- Theresa's friends, too,
live for the day when an answer will come,
and until then,
they'll remain as loyal to her memory
as she always was to them.
- We know that it's not in our hands at this point.
It's in God's hands
to bring this person to justice,
but I will never give up,
and I truly believe in my heart of hearts
that this case will be solved.
- Theresa's best friend, her father, died in 2021,
never having received those answers.
It was clear when we last spoke
that there would always be a hole in his heart.
- God, she was my lifeline.
I loved her so much. I love her now.
I feel her essence and presence was so strong,
she's still with us today,
but I can't talk to her.
I can't hold her. I can't kiss her.
That's what saddens me the most.
- That's all for this edition
of "Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
I'm Craig Melvin. Thank you for watching.