- I'm kate snow, and this is "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
- I have pictures in my head that will never go away.
I'm never gonna have my son back,
I don't get to go to his high school graduation,
Or see him go to college.
I had no idea what had happened.
- A small town, a seismic crime.
- It was like a meteor hitting.
- Potsdam rescue, I need an ambulance...
- A twelve-year-old kid,
Loved to ride his scooter everywhere,
Lost his life at the hands of a killer.
- I, honestly, was in shock.
- Police were swift to nab a suspect:
The local hero, a soccer coach, her ex.
- Fingers were being pointed.
They are all lined up against me.
- Why was he under scrutiny?
- There's absolutely nothing connecting him to this case.
- They don't have the fingerprint,
They don't have blood, they don't have the witness,
They think he's being railroaded.
- Then came the videotape.
- You're watching the last moments of his life.
- Gives me chills.
When you see who else is there.
- I'm gonna prove that he did this.
- A hunt for justice?
Or the hounding of an innocent man?
- You believe nick hillary killed your boy?
- Yes.
- There's a darkness that's at work here.
- People call me a murderer.
I'm 100% innocent.
- A champion and coach, a chilling crime.
What would the verdict be?
- You could have heard a pin drop in that courtroom.
♪♪
- Hello, and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
Tandy cyrus was a single mom raising two energetic boys
In a quiet town.
Then one day, her oldest son, garrett, was murdered.
Tandy was convinced the killer was someone
She'd welcomed into their lives, then pushed away.
The investigation would spark a firestorm of controversy
And make headlines nationwide.
But would it lead to justice for garrett?
Here's dennis murphy with "the accused".
♪♪
- Potsdam, way upstate new york, a small speck on the map
On the road to the canadian border.
- They like to joke up there
That there's more cows than people,
And I don't think they're joking.
- In the sleepy place with a main street from the 1950's,
You'd think nothing happens that could possibly interest
The outside world.
But an epic story has unfolded here,
A murder case for sure.
But so much more than that.
- It's a little bit "fargo". - It is a little bit "fargo".
- Jesse mckinley, a reporter for the "new york times",
Was drawn to it.
- It's got a small town, it's got love triangles,
It's got faded love.
And those elements, for a writer, are irresistible.
- The woman in the middle of it all, tandy cyrus.
- Very pretty woman in a town where pretty women stand out.
- One of her lovers stood out too, nick hillary,
As a black man in a predominantly white town.
- Still have people who will not accept
Interracial relationship.
- What happened between tandy and nick would tip the balance
In a political campaign,
Give rise to a controversial lawsuit,
And lure high profile, big city attorneys,
To confront each other in a murder trial
That attracted national attention.
- This has become a story that kind of echoes
Beyond st. Lawrence county, and even beyond new york.
- Except when you drill down, it's as local as it gets.
All about a small town boy, this one,
Twelve-year-old garrett phillips, tandy's son.
Garrett was a blur of a kid,
Perpetually set on fast forward, according to his mom.
- He was very energetic, uh, always on the go,
Always had to have something to do.
- People here remember him tearing around town
On his ripstik, a little bit skateboard,
A little bit snowboard, all hip action and balance.
There goes garrett
Sidewalk surfing his way home in 2011.
- Did you think, "wow, my kid is really
"an awesome little athlete"? - Yes.
Soccer, lacrosse, football, hockey,
He was very good at everything.
- His bedroom wall,
A poster shrine to his sports heroes,
Including quarterback tom brady.
- He was never really inside, wasn't much for video games.
- So it's gotta be pitch black before he's ready
To come in for the night, huh? - It does, yes.
- But when he was still a toddler,
Garrett was dealt a devastating blow:
The death of his father robbie.
Garrett was nine months old when his dad had
A brain aneurysm that ruptured.
Um, and then he was two when-when robbie passed away.
Tandy, a single mom, picked up the pieces as best she could.
She studied at the police academy,
But eventually gave up law enforcement
For a job in a credit union,
Where she became a loan officer.
She also had a brief marriage,
Which gave garrett a kid brother, aaron.
- Did garrett, like, mess with him?
- All the time.
- He liked to play jokes a little bit, didn't he?
- Yeah.
April fools was his, uh, favorite day of the year.
- Then tandy moved in with a sheriff's deputy
Named john jones, but it didn't last.
- How did the breakup go? - Not well.
At one point she said that john shoved her, um,
During an argument,
And that that was the last straw in that relationship.
- So in 2010, tandy was alone again,
Making ends meet by moonlighting as a bartender
In a joint on potsdam's main drag.
That's when nick hillary walked in
And pulled up a stool.
- So he's just a customer who comes in?
- Yes.
He came in on evenings after he was done work
And coaching.
- They came from different worlds.
She was local to the frozen north,
He was from lush jamaica.
- What's a happy memory from jamaica for you, nick?
- Going to the rivers.
Just swimming all day, um, coming back home,
Mom has a great home-cooked meal
Waiting for you.
I mean, you-- that's a fantastic day.
- He moved to brooklyn as a teenager
And found his niche as a soccer star,
Earning a scholarship to nyu.
But the kid from jamaica was still searching,
So he ditched school for the army,
Just as the first gulf war was winding down.
- I said, "let me serve a greater purpose for a while."
- Three years in the army, all stateside,
Forced nick to grow up,
And now he was ready for college.
Soccer was his ticket to st. Lawrence university
Near the canadian border.
Here's a jamaican guy
Who used to swim all day in the rivers,
And you're gonna be in fields of snow
For six months a year. - Exactly, exactly.
You know, but in the summertime,
It brings me back right back to jamaica again.
- Weirdly, had you found something in upstate new york
That worked out very well for you?
A good fit? - Yeah, it-it sure was.
- He felt most comfortable on the soccer field,
Where his respectful teammates gave him a nickname.
- Nick was the general he was a leader, the general.
- So that was a tip of the hat both to his career as a vet--
- Yeah, absolutely.
- --But also his traits as a person.
- Yeah, his leadership traits for sure.
I mean, they fit him to a t.
- In 1999, nick led st. Lawrence
To an undefeated season and a national championship,
Cementing bonds of friendship that remain tight today.
- Just a great person on and off the field,
A great role model.
- Yeah, he was our brother. He was our big brother.
- He was the glue that kept us all together.
He brought us together,
He-he arranged dinners at his house,
He cooked for the whole team.
- Is that that rasta pasta nights?
- The rasta pasta, absolutely.
I mean, it was-it was a staple of who we were
As a-as a group.
- After the championship season and graduation,
Nick kept leading.
He became a coach, and in 2009 landed a plum job:
Head soccer coach at clarkson,
Just minutes from his alma mater.
Life was good.
It got even better when nick, a father of three
Who'd drifted from his kids' mother,
Met tandy at that bar.
Him, drinking guinness
And diagramming plays on a cocktail napkin.
- What do you think the attraction was, tandy?
- Conversation was just, it was easy.
- The one thing that I liked about tandy,
She had goals and ambition.
- Things between the two heated up quickly,
As these emails attest.
- From nick..
From tandy...
I love you.
They were sharing a house, blending families,
And going on vacations as a couple;
Nick took her to jamaica.
But as they say in the islands,
It wasn't a cool breeze
Being an interracial couple in potsdam,
Which is over ninety percent white.
Andy said it was particularly hard on garrett,
Tandy's boy.
- Garrett was being teased at school
Because his mom is dating a black man.
- So he's getting schoolyard aggravation, huh?
- Exactly.
- But whatever tensions garrett was feeling,
It didn't keep him from his sports.
They were always a welcome distraction,
Even on the fateful afternoon of October 24, 2011.
- He was playing basketball with his friends in the gym,
But I got upset with him because he knew the rule was
He had to go home and do his homework first.
- Do your homework and then go play with your pals.
- Right. So I made him go home.
- Garrett blasted home on his ripstik
On what seemed like a nothing special
Rain-dreary Monday in potsdam,
Where community safety was a given.
So no worries he'd be home first, home alone.
What could possibly go wrong?
As it turned out, a lot.
A little after 5 p.M., a neighbor called police.
- Coming up... What had happened
In that apartment?
- They get the key, they open the door,
And they go inside.
- Potsdam rescue, I need an ambulance...
- Someone had been in my apartment,
But I had no idea what had happened.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- That October Monday in 2011,
Garrett phillips was supposed to be the first one home
To his second floor apartment at 100 market street.
He apparently arrived just before 5 p.M.
- It's on a very busy street.
Uh, market street is basically the--
- Right off the main drag.
- Right off-- it is the main drag,
It's a kind of rundown apartment building.
- Sean hall and marisa vogel
Didn't know tandy cyrus or her sons,
But they were very familiar with
The boys will be boys activities across the hall.
- You could hear running or roughhousing sometimes,
Or something rolling down the hallway
Like a skateboard.
- But that afternoon, as sean and marisa
Were watching the drama "dexter" on tv,
The sounds coming from next door were different, scary different.
- I heard a loud crash,
And after that it was silence for a few seconds,
And then in a low voice I heard--
It sounded like moaning, "help", "ow", or "no".
- At that moment I didn't think it was two little boys
Roughhousing anymore.
It felt more dangerous, it felt wrong.
- Concerned, marisa walked down the hallway
And listened in.
- I knocked on the door and waited a moment,
And then I definitely heard a click, like a lock.
I had the feeling that there was somebody
On the other side of that door.
- She called potsdam p.D.
- A patrol officer arrived at the second floor apartment
Around 5:15 p.M.
No one answered his knock,
So he waited for the building manager
To bring a key.
- The patrolman hears what he thinks is footsteps
Moving inside the-- - inside?
- --Inside the apartment.
And then they get the key, they open the door,
And they go inside.
- Everything appeared to be in order.
The living room was tidy, garrett's stuff all in place,
Ripstik propped against a wall, backpack in the corner.
- They walked to the back, they turned the corner there
And then they find garrett.
He's lying there, they think at first he's sleeping,
Perhaps he's fallen,
Perhaps he's knocked himself out.
But at that point he's pretty much in physical distress.
- The patrol officer called in the distressing details.
- Jones was a sheriff's deputy, so police knew tandy
And tracked her down.
She raced to the canton-potsdam hospital.
- And garrett's in a very bad way in the hospital?
- Yes. - What has happened?
Is there any information about this?
- When I got there the doctor told me that
He was in full cardiac arrest when they brought him in.
I had no idea what had happened and couldn't understand
How my twelve-year-old had a heart attack.
- Did you think at first that
Maybe this had something to do with his dad's problem?
Maybe there was something genetic,
An aneurysm or something had happened to him?
- I, honestly, was in shock
And couldn't wrap my head around anything.
- And I don't really wanna take you back there,
But you're there when he finally gives up?
- Yes.
- They can't bring him back? - No.
- How awful for you.
- Garrett phillips, unstoppable in life,
Was dead at age twelve.
- What happens in the next few hours, tandy?
- Uh, it was kind of a blur.
We were at the hospital for a while,
We got sent home,
And I slept in aaron's room with him.
- At the hospital, tandy had been joined by
Some of the men in her life.
Her ex-husband, casey collins,
And john jones, the sheriff's deputy.
But no one notified nick hillary.
Turns out, he and tandy had split up the month before,
And he was no longer in her loop.
So lieutenant mark murray of the potsdam p.D.
Called nick.
- Minutes later, lieutenant murray
And two other investigators were at nick's door.
A courtesy notification, they said.
- It's-- we're gonna reach out to all the people
Who are connected to this kid. What do they know?
Do they know anything about where he was
Or who he might have been with?
- Attorney tom mortati represented the potsdam police.
- So, mr. Hillary, we have some bad news for you.
- Yes, you know, mr. Hillary expresses shock,
"I can't believe this.
"oh my goodness." puts his hands on his head.
- Nick hillary says he remembers the moment well.
- I'm still broken up over the situation.
He has lived with me.
How could I not be affected by what has happened to garrett?
- Nick wasn't dating tandy anymore,
And he told police he hadn't been in her apartment
Since she moved in two months earlier.
The officers didn't stay long.
An autopsy was scheduled for the next day,
But police didn't wait for the results
To reveal their suspicions to tandy.
- When was it that you started to get this awful news
That there might be foul play? - The next morning.
- How'd that happen?
- We had gone down to the police station,
And that's when they had made a comment
That someone had been in my apartment.
- Somehow garrett's made it home and there's somebody there,
Or follows him, or something's happened
And he's attacked. - Yes.
- Is it now a homicide investigation?
- Yes.
- Coming up, an urgent hunt for suspects begins.
- Who were the people connected to his life?
- Tandy's partners and husbands.
- Absolutely.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- October 2011, Halloween was less than a week away.
But the good folks of potsdam, young and old,
Were learning that a monster had arrived early.
A child killer was in their midst.
News this bad traveled fast
In a town where so many people knew the emts,
The nurses, and docs at the hospital,
The cops.
Lieutenant mark murray is a lifelong potsdam resident.
- At the hospital, someone said he looked like
He had been beat up, or he had injuries on his body.
- The boy had a rug burn on his knee,
What's that tell ya?
- The injuries on the knees indicated,
Along with other injuries,
That there was a significant struggle.
There was a violent struggle, this boy fought for his life.
- What do you think it is?
Like a chokehold, or hands, fingers around the neck?
Or what?
- It's a combination of being sat upon,
And-and smothered, and asphyxiated.
So it was a long process, it wasn't an instant death.
- A chilling headline summed it up:
"boy's death is ruled a homicide.
"police tell family twelve-year-old garrett phillips
"was strangled; no suspects listed."
- From every indication, this was a very tense scene.
This is a crime that does not happen in a place like this.
- Is there a break-in maniac out there?
- Yeah.
- An intruder who kills children?
- Absolutely.
Is there someone who is going to kill again,
God forbid?
- In the vacuum of hard information,
Rumor took flight.
- But in the fog,
A story that was gaining traction early on:
An unsubstantiated report that garrett had been killed
By one or more kids.
Attorney for the potsdam police, tom mortati.
- Who was he with recently?
Did he have any, uh, issues with other kids?
You know, who was he playing with that afternoon?
- Calls continued coming into the police hotline.
Townspeople begging for reassurance
From a school principal.
- Back at the crime scene, police were beginning to
Pick up clues that suggested another possibility:
That the killer had to be an adult.
- The police kind of descend en masse,
And one of the things they see is that in a back bedroom,
There's a window that apparently has been pushed outward.
Um, the screen is ajar.
- So whoever is in there has to leave,
And there's only one way out and that's a second story window.
There's no fire escape,
You're kind of up off the ground.
- The developing theory was that
When a cop knocked at the door,
That window became the killer's only exit.
Police surmised that only a fit adult, not a kid,
Could make such a dangerous leap.
- There's kind of a shed structure beneath the window?
- Yeah, about ten feet down. Not an easy jump.
- A cracked tile was a big clue
That the killer ricocheted off the shed
On his way down to the ground,
Where police picked up another clue.
- They find a skid of kind of a gash
In the-in the grass below. And keep in mind,
It was a little bit muddy down there.
- So this is describing whoever the intruder was's
Exit from the property.
- Yeah, what-- basically what they're arguing is
That he jumped out of the window,
Down to the shed, off the shed,
Into the grass, and ran off.
- Police wondered if the killer had injured himself
On the way down,
Possibly limping away from the crime scene.
But no one reported seeing someone flee.
So police combed the area, looking for fingerprints,
Shoe prints, dna.
Evidence was collected and sent to the crime lab.
Meanwhile, investigators began talking to
Those who knew garrett best.
- Who were the people connected to his life?
- So tandy's partners and husbands--
- Absolutely, yup.
- The list included: Ex-husband casey collins,
Former boyfriend john jones,
And her most recent ex-lover, nick hillary.
Collins and jones had been with tandy at the hospital,
And they even sat next to her during her interview
At the potsdam p.D. The next morning.
John jones is to tandy's, left holding her hand.
Casey collins was quickly eliminated as a suspect
Because he had a solid alibi that placed him
Nowhere near garrett's apartment at 5 p.M. On October 24th.
But john jones, the local sheriff's deputy,
Got a deeper look.
So it's early hours,
But something might be going on with john jones,
You just don't know what it is, huh?
- Potentially, yes.
- He told police he got home about 5:00,
And he lives just two blocks from garrett's apartment.
Police say this is jones on a very grainy security video
Across the street from where garrett passed
On his skate ride home.
In a police interview room, jones was asked to
Roll up his shirt and pants
To check for possible wounds and a leg injury.
Meanwhile, tandy was talking to police,
And she had some thoughts. Strong thoughts.
- Coming up...
- They had asked if there was anybody that I could think of
That would want to hurt garrett,
And there was only one person that came to mind.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm kate snow.
When sixth grader, garrett phillips,
Was found strangled to death, investigators quickly focused on
The men in his mother, tandy's, life.
They cleared her ex-husband,
But two former boyfriends remained potential suspects.
Now, tandy was about to call one of them a killer,
And share ugly secrets from their relationship.
Back to dennis murphy with "the accused".
- Tandy cyrus had lost her twelve-year-old son.
Now she had to pull herself together
To talk to the potsdam police.
Did they ask you who could possibly have
Something in for little garrett?
- Yes.
- What'd you say? - Nick.
- Nick hillary, the soccer coach,
Her most recent ex-boyfriend.
- There seems to be some discussion
Of who would want to harm garrett,
And the name nick is raised.
Early on, it sounds like.
- The name nick was raised almost instantaneously
From-from most indications.
And whether or not that was justified or not,
Of course, is at the heart of the case.
- The videotape of tandy's interview with police
Is difficult to hear.
But when she talked to "dateline",
She described a different side of the general,
The nickname adoring teammates gave nick in his glory days.
She came to believe it reflected
A more controlling nature,
And that's what she was telling the cops.
- He was very regimented.
Everything, his day started and ended with his planner.
- Like, "9:30 tomorrow morning
"I'm gonna be doing thus and such,
"and eleven o'clock I'm gonna be doing this."
- Yes, very structured.
- Did he bring that into your life, into the family?
- He tried. - He tried?
- It wasn't well received.
- Especially not by garrett,
A spontaneous ants in the pants kid.
But according to tandy,
Nick was increasingly acting the drill instructor
With both the boy and his mother.
- If I didn't get garrett under control,
Or get him on a more strict schedule,
Then when he got older
I wasn't going to be able to control him.
He was just all about control.
- Was that too much? Was he asking you too much?
- Very much so.
That's not how I am, that's not how my kids were.
And he wanted them to change.
- Tandy said nick's inflexibility
Brought it all crashing down.
She said garrett had told her about one incident
With one of nick's children.
- There was, um, kind of an argument
Between garrett and his daughter
That turned into an argument between the two of us.
He took his daughter's side and, obviously,
I took garrett's side. I chose my son.
- As tensions escalated, and with nick out of town,
Tandy had a heart-to-heart with garrett.
He didn't hold back.
- He didn't like being in the same house with nick
And his kids, and he just, he wasn't happy.
- That was it.
Tandy told nick she was moving out.
Then, according to tandy,
It was nick's turn to be unhappy.
- There was an argument, um, he told me that
I was letting garrett make my decisions for me.
And he was standing in front of the doorway blocking me.
And then he picked me up and carried me away from the door
And wouldn't let me leave.
- Was that a scary moment? - It was.
- Was that a side of nick you hadn't seen to that point?
- Yes.
And he ended up putting me down and he just--
He put his hands up and stepped back and I left.
- Tandy says soon after that incident occurred,
She and her two boys moved into that second floor apartment
At 100 market street.
And nick helped them move. - We'd ended up having
A couple different conversations, you know,
Trying to make it work but living in separate households.
And I had talked to garrett,
And he said he was okay with it,
He just didn't want to live in the same house with him.
- But according to tandy, nick wasn't okay
With the new living arrangements.
- He showed up at my apartment in the middle of the night.
- Middle of the night? - Mm-hmm.
- When you're asleep? And then--
- Yes, because he had a key.
- Where is he? You're-you're in your bed.
- I woke up and he was standing in my bedroom.
- That was it.
The final straw in what tandy saw
As nick's scary transformation.
- I was angry.
And so I told him that that made me want my key back.
I didn't want him to have a key anymore.
- When you give a girlfriend a key back,
That's really the end of it, that--
- Right. - Over and out.
It was September, garrett had one month to live.
The unwelcomed drop in,
As well as tandy's other stories about nick,
Made police suspicious.
But what to make of her account?
- She tells a story about looking up from her bed
In the middle of the night, midnight or later,
And there's nick. - That's what she says.
That is not a substantiated account,
That is her saying that this happened.
- Investigators started knocking on doors
All over potsdam to get the lowdown on nick.
Tandy's side didn't pull any punches.
Attorney for the potsdam p.D. Tom mortati.
- Family, friends, relatives, they all immediately thought,
"well, there's only one person that we can think of
"that might do something, uh, to garrett",
And that was nick hillary.
- That he has reason to have a grudge against garrett.
What, for breaking up this relationship?
- Essentially, yeah.
- Still wants to be with the mom?
- Yup.
- Tandy's parents gave statements to police.
Her mother wrote, "he kept telling me
"it was tandy's fault they broke up,
"and that garrett was a factor."
- Nick had gone to her parents to basically lobby them
To help-help me get back in tandy's good graces.
I'm good for garrett, I'm good for her, you know,
Help them see the light.
- As investigators continued targeting nick,
They say they still had the other ex-boyfriend,
Fellow cop john jones, on their radar.
- He provided a dna swab, uh, fingerprints,
Let us photograph his shirt up and his pants up,
And uh, pretty much whatever you need me to do
I'll do it.
- Besides his eagerness to cooperate,
Police say his timeline,
With corroborating security video, checked out.
He's seen walking his dog around 5:13,
About the time the officer arrived
At garrett's apartment.
- I'm sorry, but nobody goes over to somebody's house
To strangle somebody with their dog,
And then jumps out the window with their dog.
- So police dropped jones as a suspect.
And even though tandy had had a bad breakup with jones,
She told police garrett and jones were very close.
- What about john jones? - Absolutely not.
- Wasn't possible? - No.
- For tandy, it always was nick, and only nick,
In the frame for the crime.
Police would continue investigating,
But by day two, pressure seemed to be mounting
For a quick resolution.
- Even the next morning, uh,
The chief of police there in potsdam
Indicated to another investigator that
They had a pretty hot suspect, and that they were lining up
Whatever evidence they could to try to make an arrest.
- That conversation was recorded by the potsdam p.D.,
A routine procedure for calls in and out of the department.
- So 24 hours after the murder, lieutenant mark murray,
Working his first homicide as lead investigator,
Went to observe nick on the sideline
At clarkson's soccer game against suny potsdam.
Remember, police believe the killer
May have sustained a leg injury
Jumping from that second floor window.
Would nick be limping?
- Coming up...
- Were you aware that the cops were running a camera on you
As you coached the team? - I had no idea.
- Coach hillary secretly taped
And strongly questioned.
- A man was treated like an animal,
And that's not allowed in the united states.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Not long after garrett phillips
Had been strangled, his mother told investigators,
"nick hillary is your killer."
And now police were urgently investigating
The soccer coach.
The night after the murder,
A team led by lieutenant mark murray,
Aimed a video camera at nick, as he prowled the sidelines
While coaching a soccer game.
They were looking for a limp,
Which would match their theory
That the killer may have been injured
Leaping from that second story window.
- The police had interviewed some other individuals
At this point, and he's known to be
An active guy on the sidelines.
He's not doing that here.
- After videotaping nick throughout the game,
Police were convinced they saw what they came to see.
- Did you think you saw a hitch in his gate that night?
- Definitely, I put it in my search warrant affidavit.
"I observed a significant limp.
When he went off at halftime,
I observed what I observed to be a limp."
- Were you aware that the cops were running a camera on you
As you coached the team?
- I had no idea.
- Nick said he was focused on beating crosstown rival
Suny potsdam, a big game.
- You're gonna be seeing these guys around town.
This is a game that we must win.
- He said he had nothing to do with garrett's death,
So he had no reason to think he was a suspect that night,
Or the next morning when police asked him
To come down to the potsdam p.D.
And help their investigation.
- For what purpose?
- To see if I could identify
A list of g-garrett's friends.
- But then the conversation veered away
From the list and kids.
- Nick seemed surprised by the cops' line of questioning.
- Nick now realized he was being accused.
He shut down.
- Jesse mckinley covered the story
For the "new york times".
- I think at that point, uh, his argument would be,
I was scared, this was a scary situation.
I seemed to be being singled out
For a crime that I didn't commit.
- But lieutenant murray had a different take.
He believed nick was not cooperating,
And for no good reason.
- When he said, "no comment",
I remember thinking to myself,
You know, "everyone else here is giving us
Any information whether it's relevant or not."
If the roles were reversed,
I-I would be doing anything in my power
To help figure out what-what happened to garrett.
- Nick was then read his miranda rights.
- The two officers got up and barred the door,
And told me that I'm not allowed to leave.
- But you hadn't been arrested.
- I was never arrested.
I'm being held against my will.
- Police were zeroing in on nick,
And they were asking tough questions
To his assistant coach, ian fairlie,
At the same time.
- Fairlie told them he had seen nick
Shortly after 5 p.M. The afternoon of the murder,
And he was acting normally.
- And this was supposedly ten minutes after
He'd strangled someone to death.
- Meanwhile, nick had asked for a lawyer.
He was detained, but still hadn't been arrested.
Police took his phone, wallet, and car
While they were waiting for a judge
To sign a search warrant.
For a proud army vet,
And prominent member of the college community,
Nick said his treatment was humiliating.
- They took my clothes.
- Took pictures of you naked?
- As the day I was born.
- Looking for what? Scratches, cut marks?
- Only they would know.
- So how long did this day last?
- Seems like an eternity.
- Then, after about nine hours inside,
Police released him.
- This was from early in the morning
'til about after five,
When I was released in a hazmat suit.
- You didn't get your clothes back?
- Nothing.
Didn't have keys to go into my apartment,
Didn't have my wallet
With any kind of identification
If I should get stopped in the street
To identify who I am.
It's an inhumane way to be treated.
- The next day, he felt branded in his own community.
- And there was a big spread in the newspaper
Clearly stating that police had questioned me.
- Realizing he was the prime suspect,
And perhaps the only suspect,
Nick started to fight back with the help of a good friend,
Who happened to be a lawyer,
Former teammate mani tafari.
- Yeah, this was tunnel vision.
Um, the powers that be that wanted
To get mr. Hillary for this,
Um, always had that intention.
- Nick told us that he wasn't
At garrett's apartment that day.
And he denied the accusations tandy had made to police.
- Saying that there was bad blood
Between you and garrett.
- That's very, very shocking and surprising.
- Did you ever have a butthead moment
With him, nick?
- No, an issue of do the homework or--
- No, no, no. - --Do the chores?
October 2011,
How were things with you and tandy?
- Things were great between tandy and I.
- But not boyfriend girlfriend?
- Not boyfriend and girlfriend.
- Did you want to get back with tandy?
- No.
- Did you have a key to her house still?
- No, I didn't.
- And by this point, nick and his lawyer
Had also seen that sideline video
Police had shot of nick the night after the murder.
To them, it was eye opening.
They said it didn't show what police said it did:
A significant limp.
- Uh, that turned out to be untrue.
- Watch as nick strides off the field at halftime.
He doesn't appear to be limping at all.
- I had no limp.
I was myself that night on the sideline,
With the exception of a heavy heart
Because of what had happened to garrett.
- And like the soccer champions they were,
Nick and mani were not only playing defense,
They went on offense too,
Blasting police for what nick says
They did to him at the station.
- A man was treated like an animal,
And that's not allowed in the united states.
- So they vowed to sue the village of potsdam
And its police department
For violating nick's civil rights.
- We live in a country where, when rights are violated,
Citizens can stay silent
And continue to have those rights violated,
Or you can stand up.
- Coming up,
A startling new videotape clue:
Garrett on his way home.
And whose suv was that seeming to follow him?
- Is that nick hillary in his car,
In that parking lot?
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- A little boy was dead, and potsdam was in mourning.
Schools emptied out for a memorial service
For garrett phillips, that sixth grader
So exuberant in his twelve years of life.
Then, later that week, the funeral at this church.
For his mother tandy, it was all a blur.
- I remember being at the church.
I remember being at the funeral home.
Um...
It was just a lot of people.
- Garrett was laid to rest in the nearby town
Where his mother grew up.
He's buried next to the father he barely knew.
- Is it true that you buried him with the ripstik?
- Yes.
- That was mom's decision?
What do you think that says about
Who that little boy was?
- Well, that and his lacrosse stick
Were his most prized possessions,
So I wanted him to have them.
- She said goodbye to her boy,
But now as police continued to zero in
On nick hillary,
She hoped to get answers for him.
- Did you know that they had brought nick in
For questioning?
- Yes.
- Do you think there's gonna be an arrest
At that point, tandy?
- I had thought there was going to be one very quickly.
- But nick hillary was just as adamant
He was an innocent man.
"hounded", he claims,
By a blinkered rush-to-judgment investigation
That didn't turn up any evidence
Because he didn't do it.
- Why did they believe that you were their person of interest?
- I wish I knew.
- Police were trying to make a case against him.
Though in the months that followed,
Search warrants on nick's home, phone, and car
Yielded nothing.
Forensics came back and did not match nick
For hair or fibers.
Techs did find fingerprints around that pushed out window,
But they matched no one known to the case.
And the imprint in the slushy grass below?
Useless.
Even initial tests on dna scrapings
Taken beneath the boy's fingernail
Proved inconclusive.
And what's more, two people were vouching
For nick's whereabouts
Around the time of the murder.
- I was with my-my daughter and my assistant coach
During this time period.
- So they are, what they call in criminal investigations,
Your alibi witnesses.
- Exactly.
- Nick's teenage daughter would say in a deposition,
That her dad was with her at their apartment
Here on leroy street from 5:00 to 5:15 p.M.
Assistant coach fairlie said nick came to his house
Here on garden street around 5:21.
Their accounts would seem to make it impossible
For nick to have been here on market street
About 5:00 p.M. When garrett was being attacked.
- There were no arrests, there was no grand jury,
There's no indictments, there's nothing.
Um, they really were kind of at-at, um,
At their wits end in a sense.
- Police did pull up security video around potsdam,
And they noticed a car that looked like
Nick's honda cr-v
Creeping through the high school parking lot
Around the time garrett was to skate by.
But the camera shots were too far away
To I.D. Plates or the driver.
Despite the continuing lack of hard, physical evidence
Against him, in the court of public opinion,
Nick was a marked man.
- Being out and about in the community,
Fingers are being pointed,
Conversations are being whispered,
People will drive past our house
And call me a murderer.
My house has been egged.
- That's something he maintains to this day,
That he has been made a pariah in that community,
Which he felt a part of.
- This black male being singled out
In this mostly white part of the world?
- Absolutely. And I think to some extent,
Nick's case fits into that narrative.
Um, of a-of a black man falsely accused.
- But unlike the stalled criminal investigation,
Nick's lawyer, mani tafari,
Was moving ahead with the civil lawsuit
Against lieutenant murray and the potsdam police.
A suit filed for detaining nick all day,
Without arresting him,
And, allegedly, degrading him
By taking photographs of him naked.
- Mr. Hillary could have held his head down
And ran away.
He believes in civil rights.
Um, he believes in his rights as a man,
And he's gonna stand up for those rights.
- I did not violate his rights in any way, shape, or form.
I executed a lawful search warrant of his person
While he was, uh, at our station.
- Lieutenant murray and the potsdam police department
Deny the allegations in the civil suit,
And potsdam's insurance company
Hired tom mortati to defend the police.
Believing that the best defense is a good offense,
Mortati decided to turn the tables
On nick and his lawyer.
- So what's your strategy?
- To prove that nick killed garrett phillips.
- And therefore your clients, the cops,
Were justified in doing everything they did
That he thought was a deprivation of his rights?
- Bottom line, yes.
- A preliminary step in these cases
Before the lawsuit is actually filed,
Is a preceding called a 50-h hearing,
In which the defense attorney, in this case tom,
Gets to question the plaintiff, nick hillary.
- Does he have to answer?
- No, he can assert his fifth amendment privilege.
- April 2012, tom purposefully picked
A nondescript conference room
In potsdam's municipal building for nick's deposition.
He chose not to videotape it.
- I wanted to keep it low key,
'cause in the event he's talking,
I want him to keep talking.
- How did it go?
- Well... [sighing]
Mr. Hillary was talking.
- Tom's main goal was to get nick to admit
That he was in the car
Seen on that security camera video.
Up until then, police had suspicions,
But no proof.
- Unlike the movies, you can't zoom in on the license plate
Or let's-let's zoom in on the guy's eyeglasses
And oh, that's-that's so and so behind the wheel.
It doesn't work that way.
So the number one question at that time was
Is that nick hillary in his car
In that parking lot?
- So tom asked a series of questions,
And to his surprise, nick readily answered them.
- Mr. Hillary, at any point on October 24th of 2011,
Were you at potsdam high school?
- Yes.
- How did you get there? - I drove.
- Did you drive the honda? - Yes.
- And why was nick at the high school
On that rainy day?
He said it was to watch a soccer game.
But notice the yellow school bus.
It's blocking his view.
- His vision of the soccer field is obscured
By a giant yellow school bus, the concession stand,
And the stands next to the field.
You can't see the soccer field.
- Coming up.
An admission under oath.
- He didn't take the fifth and the police are-are ecstatic
With what we've got.
- And...
- It was the thing I had prayed for.
- Make way for a new da.
- She was gonna do everything she could
To bring justice for garrett.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm kate snow.
Investigators were convinced nick hillary
Murdered garrett phillips,
But had no hard evidence tying him to the crime.
Now, nick was suing police,
Claiming they'd violated his civil rights.
In sworn testimony, the suspect did
What the cops could not,
He placed himself near garrett
Shortly before the murder.
But if you think nick was about to be arrested,
Think again.
Back to dennis murphy with "the accused".
- Attorney tom mortati was defending
The potsdam police department in a civil lawsuit
Brought by nick hillary.
At a preliminary hearing,
Nick had just confirmed that it was him in this car
Seen on security camera video at the high school.
Nick said he was there to watch a game.
But in the footage,
A school bus seems to block his view.
The honda slowly moves, settling into this parking spot,
Red taillights on.
But from there, nick still can't see the game,
Nor does he try to get a closer look.
- He never gets out of his car,
He never shuts the vehicle off.
- So why was he really there?
The answer, according to tom, was about to skate into view.
At 4:52 p.M., here comes garrett
At the bottom of the screen,
Cruising down the sidewalk on his ripstik,
Blissfully unaware that in just a few minutes
He'll be viciously attacked and left for dead.
After about sixteen seconds on camera,
He skates out of frame,
Turning left on his way home.
- Nick's brake lights come on
Within a second of garrett going out of view,
And he backs his vehicle out.
- But nick did not admit to following garrett.
He didn't admit to even seeing garrett.
Instead he told tom, "I went home.
"I went straight home. I didn't stop anywhere else."
- Which nick acknowledged, should be with a right turn
Out of the parking lot.
But when his honda reached the "t" intersection,
A crossroads for this case, nick didn't go right.
Instead, he turned left,
Going in the same direction as garrett.
Six months after garrett's death,
This civil lawyer had breathed new life
Into a dormant murder investigation,
Extracting what seemed like powerful new evidence
From the prime suspect.
- He didn't take the fifth, and the police are-are ecstatic
With what we've got.
- But the person he needed to convince was nicole duve,
The then-district attorney for st. Lawrence county.
So tom sent her the transcript of nick's deposition,
Wherein nick admits to being in his car
In the high school parking lot,
Which police said seemed to be tailing garrett
Shortly before he was killed.
But the da said it still wasn't enough.
- She believed that there was simply
Not enough evidence to-to convict nick hillary,
Let-let alone arrest him.
- Not a winnable case?
- Not a winnable case.
- The da met with tandy and told her the same thing.
- She used, uh, like a scale as an example,
And it was one little pebble at a time,
And that they just didn't have enough yet.
- She couldn't get enough pebbles to tilt it this way?
- Right.
- The case went into a deep freeze,
And it seemed like it might stay there.
- In that town, this sort of crime
Is so out of the ordinary, so unheard of,
That the fact that they were not able
To find someone quickly, and make a case quickly,
And convict them quickly, and put this behind them,
Has been enormously frustrating.
- Tandy, frustration,
What is your word about how you feel?
- I don't know if I can say it on camera.
Just, the level of frustration is--
There's no words really.
- Out of frustration and sorrow,
Garrett's family, led by his uncle brian,
Put up "justice for garrett" signs
All over the county.
The message from a smiling garrett
Was both subtle and direct: Do the right thing.
- Brian was very close with-with
His brother robbie, garrett's dad.
Um, so he lost robbie,
Um, and then losing garrett the way that we did,
Um, brian's never stopped.
- He wouldn't let this become a cold case?
- Never.
- And then in 2013, mary rain,
A former cop and public defender,
Decided to run for district attorney.
- Politics has raised its head here.
- Absolutely, and her-her prime campaign theme,
If you will, is there's a murderer running around
And nobody's done anything about it.
- The only thing I would promise is,
That would be my top agenda
As soon as I got into office.
So I spoke with tandy the next day,
And we talked for about two hours.
- You didn't promise her results,
You promised her your professional interest?
- Exactly, I promised her I would put
A lot of work and energy into it.
- Tandy took to the stump to campaign for mary.
- She was interested in your case?
- Yes. - Passionate about it?
- Very.
She was gonna do everything she could
To bring justice for garrett.
- Ten days before election day,
Mary knew she still had ground to make up
If she had any hope of becoming the new da.
- And you needed something.
- You know, help from up above, that never hurts.
- She calls it her campaign miracle.
- I was in church one morning,
I sat there and I said, you know,
"god, I need some help."
- And help came that same day,
When according to tandy, the incumbent da,
While out campaigning,
Unwittingly walked up to her house.
- She had no idea that she was doorbelling--
- Well, she looked-- - --the mother of the boy.
- Yeah, she saw my sign in the-in the yard
And she was trying to change their minds,
Or their opinions to vote for her,
And then she realized where she was
And she left.
- Tandy was incensed because she said the da refused
An invitation to speak with her,
And instead just walked away.
Tandy took to facebook to vent.
- "someone just paid a visit to my house
That left me feeling like my family
Is very unimportant."
- How did it feel to hit send?
- Good and a little scary.
I'm not the type to rant on facebook,
I generally stay away from the-the drama side of it.
But I was angry.
- And once I read that facebook post,
I thought, "who does that?"
And I immediately private messaged tandy
And I said, "this just makes me cry."
And she said, "there is no crying."
But that's hard to get past.
- Tandy let mary repost the incident
To her facebook friends,
And from there, it went viral.
- It was the thing I had prayed for.
- A big newsflash in the county.
- Kind of a political stumble, you know.
It makes nicole duve look like
She didn't have a handle on things.
If-if she didn't even know where the victim's mother lived,
How could she find the victim's killer?
- On election night, the voters spoke.
Mary rain came from behind
To win the da's job 52% to 48%.
The two potsdam voters with perhaps
The greatest rooting interest in the outcome,
Had opposite reactions.
- I felt relief.
Um, I felt like something was finally going to happen.
- I was alarmed a little bit,
Not surprised.
- The new da, as promised,
Immediately plunged into this confounding case.
And she'd soon get lucky again,
And come up with something her predecessor never had:
The prime suspect under oath, but this time on video.
- Coming up,
Nick hillary's hazy memory.
- I cannot recall.
I cannot recall. I cannot recall.
- People remember why they broke up
With their high school girlfriend.
You can't remember why this relationship broke up?
- Investigators wanted to know
Did he have something to hide?
- Can you describe for me your relationship with garrett
Up and to the point in time where
You and ms., uh, cyrus broke up?
- Objection, relevance.
- Do you know if garrett liked you?
- He never said he disliked me.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Mary rain took office as the county's new da
In January 2014.
And the first file she cracked open,
As she'd promised in the campaign,
Was the garrett phillips case.
- And I'm disheartened to see a folder,
A lone folder sitting in the office,
Which is about this thick.
And I realize, "this is a murder investigation.
It's deficient."
- But the file was about to get a huge addition.
Tom mortati was just weeks away
From putting nick hillary under oath again
In the civil lawsuit nick brought against police.
- I prayed honestly, um, for some guidance
And to-to just to be able to do my job
And to help in whatever way that I can.
- This time, lieutenant murray and his chief,
Who both happened to be defendants in the lawsuit,
Would be sitting in on the deposition,
Taking notes for their criminal investigation.
And nick would be on video.
- How are you going to advance your story?
What's the strategy?
- Well, I want him to reaffirm all of the things
That he's previously told me under oath.
- Yes, that is my car. I'm driving it.
- Right, I want him to be saying it on camera,
Because the whole purpose of videotaping this
Had nothing to do with the civil case at all.
This is totally about this video
Is going to be played in front of a grand jury someday
And a criminal jury someday.
- Acting as de facto prosecutor,
Tom would be mary rain's best chance
To get justice for garrett.
- Good morning, mr. Hillary--
- Tom, heard off camera, asked the questions.
Nick hillary's attorney, mani tafari, also off camera,
Was raising objections to protect an appeal.
Still, nick did go on to answer almost everything.
- At some point did that relationship
That you had with ms. Cyrus end?
- Objection, relevance.
- Yes.
- But when the questions turned personal,
Nick seemed to get a case of amnesia.
- Um, did you approach ms. Cyrus and, uh, discuss
With her the possibility of breaking up?
- I cannot recall.
- Did ms. Cyrus ever, uh, discuss with you
Her two boys' relationship with you
As a basis for ending the relationship?
- I cannot recall.
- If she had told you that that's why she wanted
To end the-the relationship,
Is that something you think you would have remembered?
- Cannot recall.
- People remember why they broke up
With their high school girlfriend.
You know, you can't remember why this relationship,
With a woman you lived with
For seven or eight months, broke up?
- Tandy had said she broke up with nick
Because garrett hated his rules.
- This is the heart of the theory of motivation
In this crime.
- Exactly. - That garrett is dead
Because nick hillary believes that he was an obstacle
In the way of him ever being with tandy,
That the boy had caused the breakup.
- Right. It goes to motive.
It goes to what's his underlying, uh, state of mind?
- Can you describe for me your relationship with garrett
Up and to the point in time where
You and ms., uh, cyrus broke up?
- Objection, relevance.
- We had a positive relationship.
- Um, do you know if garrett liked you?
- He never said he disliked me.
- Tom also probed nick about his behavior
After tandy moved out.
- Did you ever show up in ms. Cyrus' apartment
In the late evening hours,
Letting yourself in on your own?
- No.
- If ms. Cyrus has provided a sworn deposition
To the police indicating that that did, in fact occur,
Was she lying when she gave that testimony?
- Yes.
- Police had a theory that the killer was injured
In the escape leap,
And they claimed they had video of nick limping
At the soccer game the next night.
- When tom asked him about it,
Nick admitted he had injured his ankle,
But said it happened before garrett was killed.
- Mr. Hillary, at any point prior to October 24 of 2011,
Did you suffer an injury
To either one of your lower legs?
- Objection, relevance.
- Yes.
- Can you tell me the circumstances
Under which that occurred?
- I was moving furnitures around in my new apartment.
- Approximately when did that occur?
- Objection, relevance. - I cannot recall.
- What kind of piece of furniture was it?
- Objection, relevance. - I cannot recall.
- Did you trip over the piece of furniture,
Or drop something on you, or something else?
- Objection, relevance. That's been answered.
- I cannot recall.
- Mani tafari maintains nick's ankle injury
Had no connection to the crime or the crime scene.
- If there were abrasions, we should have some dna
That's linking mr. Hillary to this.
And we do not.
- As in the first deposition,
Tom asked nick to describe his route home
On the day of garrett's murder.
But this time, nick suggested that if he turned left,
It would have been to visit his assistant coach.
- Typically, if I make a left out of the parking lot,
I would be checking on my assistant coach
Who lived on garden street,
Which is what I would normally do.
- Is that what you did that afternoon?
- I cannot recall.
- You don't recall whether or not you stopped in
To mr. Fear-- fairlie's apartment
On garden street that afternoon?
- That is correct.
- And I interrupt him and say,
"well, wait a minute, you've already told me
Previously under oath, a year and a half ago,
You didn't go anywhere else."
- You didn't make any stops anywhere on your way
Between leaving potsdam high school
And going to your apartment that afternoon.
Do you recall giving that testimony
At your 50-h examination?
- If that's what I said, that's what I said.
- If you turned left out of the parking lot
To go home to your apartment,
What route did you take?
- Objection. - I cannot recall.
- When it was over, tom mortati had a gift
For the new da, mary rain,
More than six hours of nick on tape under oath.
Everything he said, everything he couldn't recall.
So rare from a prime suspect
Who was not talking to police.
- I've always described this, uh, as the oj case backwards.
You know, when oj had a criminal trial,
And then there was a civil case.
And here, the exact opposite happened.
- You have regrets about going the civil route
In the midst of this criminal case?
- I regret that mr. Hillary, um, was targeted
Due to his race,
Um, and I have no control over that.
That is the only regret I have in this entire situation.
- Da rain, who had campaigned on getting
Justice for garrett,
Now believed she had enough evidence
To take to a grand jury.
But in a perplexing case that still had gaping holes,
No dna, no forensics, no eyewitnesses,
This road to indictment would hit
An unexpected pothole.
- Coming up.
A bold new strategy.
- You take samples of dna
That previously would have been cast aside,
And attempt to make sense of them.
- Prosecutors wondered could nick's dna
Really be at the crime scene after all?
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- May 2014,
2.5 years after garrett phillips
Skated home for the last time,
Da mary rain was finally putting the case
Before a grand jury.
Her key piece of evidence?
- If I make a left out of the parking lot--
- Nick hillary's own words from his video deposition
For his lawsuit against the potsdam police.
- No one can talk about grand jury arguments,
But the civil deposition, safe to say,
Was very important.
- Extremely important.
We couldn't have put him in the places where he put himself.
- On may 15th,
Nick hillary was indicted and arrested.
- 100% innocent.
- Charged with second-degree murder,
He was led away in handcuffs
By lead investigator mark murray.
- No ruckus? No to-do?
- No ruckus, no to-do,
Just us walking nick into the station.
- Nothing, however, has been ordinary
In this extraordinary case.
Five months later, a judge threw out that indictment
On the grounds of prosecutorial misconduct.
- The judge in the case decides that mary rain
Acted inappropriately, that she injected opinion,
That she obviously was not pursuing justice, per se,
But was pursuing nick.
- The judge read transcripts of the proceedings
And determined that the da bullied nick's daughter,
An alibi witness, asking her
The same question thirteen times.
- It's cross-examination. There was no bullying.
He's not there.
He doesn't know my tone of voice.
So he's surmising something that just didn't occur.
- Mary rain had taken a legal roundhouse blow
To the chin,
But she got up to fight again.
- There was no question you were gonna re-file it?
- Absolutely no question at all.
- Using the same evidence, but toning it down,
The da won another indictment, and this one stuck.
Tandy felt finally vindicated.
- You believe nick hillary killed your boy?
- Yes. - For what reason, tandy?
- He, for whatever reason, did not like my son.
He was a problem for him.
He was in his way.
- Meanwhile, nick hillary was gearing up
For his biggest match ever.
His very freedom was at stake.
- I have stated that since day one.
I'm 100% innocent.
- Nick's old friends and supporters
Had helped him make bail.
Although in potsdam, he faced visible reminders
Of the strong feelings against him at every turn.
- Lawn signs are everywhere in your town.
"justice for garrett".
What do you think? They're everywhere.
- They're everywhere.
I mean for my own sanity, I have told myself,
"justice for garrett" sign is a good thing
Because I need justice for garrett.
- But justice of any kind was grinding slowly,
And the case was attracting attention.
Two legal heavyweights from new york city
Joined nick's team.
Norman siegel, a civil rights lawyer,
And earl ward, a celebrated criminal defense attorney.
- For people like that to be involved in the case
Shows you that the case is echoing beyond.
- Is this shaping up as-as another test
Of racial justice in the criminal justice system?
- I think for the defense team,
They don't believe that nick did this,
And they think he's being railroaded,
And they feel that part of that has to do with his race.
I think for mary rain and the prosecution team,
That is the last thing that they want.
They want this to be a murder trial,
And they want this to be about a twelve-year-old boy
Who lost his life at the hands of a killer.
- Nick's supporters, including his former teammates,
Remained adamant that their friend was innocent.
- It's not possible.
I mean, he's just such a caring and compassionate,
Loving person.
He's been around kids his entire life.
- Even on the worst day of his life,
Something happened, you can't get there?
- Not a chance.
- These teammates are among countless friends
And supporters behind the website
"truth for nick hillary".
They dipped into their pockets and helped fund his defense,
And also paid his everyday bills
Once he was fired as soccer coach after his arrest.
- And you're now putting your money
Where your sentiments are?
- Uh, yeah, all these guys are.
- Yeah, we've had hundreds of people
On the donation site itself, uh, contribute whatever they can.
- A trial date was set for September 2016.
Nick's teammates would stand by him in open court.
- So it's the championship season again?
- This is-this is-- - this is more than a ring though.
- This is more than a ring, you know, this is-this is--
This is life and death.
- But first, both sides braced for a summertime fight
That could tilt the balance.
It was over dna.
Did it exist? Was it nick's?
And whatever it was, was it even admissible?
No hair, tissue, or fingerprint
Belonging to nick was found at the crime scene,
And testing on that tiny mix of dna under
One of garrett's fingernails had been inconclusive.
- The initial sampling of this, the initial testing of this,
Showed that it could neither include
Nor exclude nick hillary.
- So with traditional dna chemistry
Not implicating nick,
Prosecutors opted for something revolutionary,
A new kind of computer-driven dna analysis
From a company in new zealand.
- Whereby you take samples of dna
That previously would have been cast aside
Because they were too small, they were too difficult
To analyze properly, you take those samples
And attempt to make sense of them
Using a computer algorithm.
- Prosecutors said the new tests came back
A match for nick.
Not so fast, argued the defense,
Too unorthodox, too unreliable.
- After every reputable, um, uh, organization
Or test insights told 'em,
"look, there's nothing connecting this guy",
They went to a different continent,
To new zealand, uh, to try to get something to stick.
And it didn't stick.
- In the end, the judge agreed with the defense.
Pre-trial he ruled that the prosecution
Could not use the newfangled dna analysis.
A major setback.
- Do you still have a case absent that science?
- We still can do it based on the other evidence that we have.
- To be determined, as they say,
Setting the stage for nick hillary to at last
Have his day in court.
The trial finally was about to get underway.
- I think that it has taken so long to find
Justice for garrett, as it were,
That this has become one of those stories
That people will talk about for a very long time,
Regardless of how the verdict turns out.
- The soccer coach and his ex are about to face off in court,
And all eyes are on the former lovers.
- I will continue to fight.
- The showdown begins.
- You're gonna be going up to the stand,
And inside the rail will be nick hillary.
Are you ready for that moment?
- I am.
- You could have heard a pin drop in that courtroom.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Five long years after garrett phillips was killed,
The case of new york state vs. Nick hillary went to trial.
Nick and tandy, former lovers,
Would be together in the same courtroom.
- You're gonna be going up to the stand,
And inside the rail will be nick hillary.
Are you ready for that moment?
- I am.
- As tandy readied to face her ex-boyfriend in court,
Nick came face to face with the possibility of a conviction.
And there you'll be given another jumpsuit,
Put in a van, and taken away.
- I will fight.
And I will continue to fight
Until I don't have anything left inside of me to fight.
Just the same way I'm fighting right now.
- The trial was shaping up as a battle between seasoned,
Successful attorneys.
The venerable team of earl ward and norman siegel
For the defense.
For the state, d.A. Mary rain asked bill fitzpatrick,
A renowned prosecutor from another county,
To take the lead in court.
- So you bring in fitzpatrick from down in syracuse
For what reason?
- Well, bill fitzpatrick has over 75 homicide, um,
Prosecutions himself.
He's been a prosecutor for over 24 years,
And I've been a prosecutor for over two.
- Almost immediately, a courtroom bombshell.
Ten jurors had been quickly selected, all white,
When nick and his defense team made a shocking announcement.
They were opting for a bench trial,
Letting judge felix catena decide nick's future.
"new york times" reporter, jesse mckinley.
- I think their calculation was,
We're better off going with a legal mind,
Someone that knows the law.
- So they're arguing it to the judge,
He will be the judge and the jury in this.
- Absolutely. [gavel pounding]
- Good morning, everybody. Please be seated.
- Mr. Fitzpatrick, your opening statement.
- Thank you very much, your honor.
- Bill fitzpatrick laid out the state's case,
Painting a portrait of nick hillary
As a scorned lover and a liar.
He said nick's own words from his video deposition,
Given under oath, would nail him.
- The only reason he has to lie
Is because he was killing garrett.
- But long-time civil rights attorney siegel
Said nick is an innocent man,
And could prove he was home at the exact time
Garrett was being attacked.
- You can't be in two places at the same time,
And nick hillary went home.
- It was all part of a rush to judgment by police,
Argued siegel.
- There's naturally a cry for justice,
A cry for someone to be held accountable.
But it must be the right person.
Nick hillary is not the right person.
- After opening arguments, cameras were removed
For all testimony.
The prosecution called the victim's mother
To the stand as its lead-off witness.
Tandy told the judge what she'd told us,
That nick was unhappy
About her breaking up their relationship.
- She was absolutely cool as a cucumber.
She rarely let emotion get to her,
She was a very controlled, very competent witness.
- And she testified about the time, she said,
Nick let himself into her apartment uninvited.
- I was getting very annoyed with the fact
That he wouldn't leave me alone.
- He obsessed about the breakup.
- Next, the prosecution presented evidence
That garrett died from a chokehold,
A ghastly combination of strangulation
And asphyxiation.
Rug burns on garrett's legs and red marks on his neck
Pointed to a desperate struggle.
"it was a crime of passion", insisted fitzpatrick,
Pointing to nick as the only person
Hostile to garrett.
- This is somebody that chokes the life,
With a high degree of hatred of a twelve-year-old boy.
- He talks about an amicable breakup.
- It was not amicable at that point
Because he was not happy.
Tandy was amicable, but he was not.
He was very, very angry.
- Prosecutors used video to try to prove their case,
A one-two punch of nick hillary on camera.
They played for the judge the security video
Of nick's honda in the high school parking lot,
As they saw it, stalking garrett.
- That's the most important witness in this case,
A neutral camera
Sitting on top of a school.
- The state also presented that critical video of nick,
Under oath, from his deposition
In his civil case.
- Something happens,
Which I will affectionately refer to as the gift
That keeps on giving.
That person is telling lies, frankly,
Too numerous to catalog.
- One lie, according to the state,
Involved nick's damaged ankle.
Remember, during his deposition,
Nick said he hurt it before garrett's death.
- Mr. Hillary, at any point prior to October 24 of 2011,
Did you suffer an injury to either one of your lower legs?
- Objection, relevance. - Yes.
- Can you tell me the circumstances
Under which that occurred?
- I was moving furniture around in my new apartment.
- Prosecutors attacked that story
When the medical examiner took the stand.
He commented on photos police took of nick's ankle
Just two days after garrett was killed.
- His ankle is swollen, it's got a very fresh cut.
Uh, dr. Sikirica m.E.
Said the cut is, uh, 24 to 48 hours old.
- A fresh cut, prosecutors theorized,
Caused by nick's desperate escape leap
From garrett's second floor apartment.
And then, what prosecutors called another lie,
The big one at the heart of their case,
When nick talked about where he went
After driving out of the school parking lot,
Just minutes before garrett was choked to death.
- According to him,
At least a dozen times under oath,
"I went straight home,
"back to my daughter.
"straight home."
- You went straight home, uh, after you left
The potsdam high school that afternoon, correct?
- Yes.
- Straight home would have meant turning right,
But nick turned left, just like garrett.
Prosecutors laid it out with dramatic flair.
Here was nick, under oath,
Caught in a lie confirmed by the video.
- Mr. Hillary doesn't turn right.
He turns left because he's hunting garrett phillips.
- Maybe the prosecution's best evidence
Is this video tape.
The journey to the field to look at the soccer team.
- Yeah, prosecution says
It's their most conclusive piece of evidence.
- Rainy day in potsdam, the last few minutes
Of garrett's life. - Yes.
And when they were playing that tape,
Which was about five minutes long,
In that courtroom, you could have heard a pin drop.
- The state argued that when nick wasn't lying,
He had very suspicious lapses in memory
About the day garrett was killed.
"a convenient forgetfulness", said prosecutors,
"highlighted by three simple words."
- I cannot recall.
I cannot recall. I cannot recall.
- Watch him as he answers, "I cannot recall"
Without even the slightest reflection or effort
To try to recall.
- If you start to take these things in sum,
In total, that you have a guy who is not telling the truth,
You have a guy that does not have an ironclad alibi.
- And the proof is beyond compelling,
It approaches mathematical certainty.
Every single fact in this case points to him.
And at some point, coincidences stop being coincidences,
And they start being proof of guilt.
- It was a circumstantial case, but prosecutors were confident.
Now the defense would get its turn,
And they would aggressively make the case in court
That nick hillary had been making for himself from day one.
- I'm 100% innocent
Of the accusations that I'm facing.
- You searched his house twice. What did you find?
Nothing. You searched his car.
What did you find? Nothing.
You searched his office, what did you find?
Nothing.
- No evidence, no case.
- This theory is simply not credible
On its face.
- The defense comes on strong.
- Nick hillary is not a murderer.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Nick hillary's high-powered legal team
Of norman siegel and earl ward
Began their defense by aggressively cross-examining
The prosecution's witnesses, starting with tandy cyrus.
The defense now acknowledged nick had, in fact,
Visited tandy twice in her new apartment.
But they got tandy to admit those visits
Weren't so scary after all.
- Those two episodes, prosecutors tried to portray
As some type of nefarious behavior
On nick's part.
But tandy made it clear that they-that these episodes
Were nothing more than an inconvenience.
She testified that on one occasion
They slept together.
- The defense's argument, tandy's breakup with nick
Was hardly the drama she made it out to be.
- They tried to portray it as if nick was
This, you know, demon, this-this-this awful person
Who snuck into this woman's bedroom,
As I said on my summation, like something
Out of a horror movie and hovered above her
In the dark as if he was about to do something,
You know, evil.
When, during the cross-examination,
It came out that-- that's-that wasn't the case.
- And tandy and other family members also conceded
That nick had never laid a hand on garret
While they lived together.
- There was nothing between the two
That could be considered hatred.
Nothing between the two that would lead,
Or could lead, to murder.
- They have kind of picked away
At the prosecution's witnesses enough,
It would seem, for them to try
To create reasonable doubt, which is all they wanna do.
That's the game, they want-- - reasonable doubt?
- Reasonable doubt wins their case.
- Nick hillary is not a murderer.
He is not a violent man.
Violence is inconsistent with who he is
And what he has done in his life.
- Now the defense started to paint a different picture
Of nick hillary.
Not the man accused of a heinous crime,
But the army vet, adored soccer captain,
And loving father who could never, ever harm
A twelve-year-old, let alone kill him.
- He's been around kids his entire life.
I've seen him interact with twelve-year-olds constantly.
- Brendan murphy, the goalie
On nick's championship soccer team,
Was one of the character witnesses
Who testified about the nick he knew.
- He was always there to pick me up and never blamed me
And never, you know, yelled at me
Or made me feel bad about letting a goal in.
- And his lawyers dismissed the prosecution-suggested motive
That he killed for revenge.
- This theory is simply not credible on its face.
- There has always been this question
As to what this would possibly gain for him.
What would be the upside of hurting this kid?
- The defense's biggest point was very simple.
There was no physical evidence, none,
Linking nick hillary to the crime.
- There was no hair, there were no fibers,
There was no fingerprints, uh, linking nick to this crime.
- And there was testimony from investigators
About those unknown fingerprints
That were found around that pushed out window screen.
- You have to ask yourself, whose print was on that window?
Whose print was on the window that that perpetrator
Climbed out of to escape the building?
Again, it wasn't nick hillary's.
- In an unusual move, the defense called to the stand
Mark murray, the lead cop on the case,
Getting him to admit his nearly five-year investigation
Had failed to turn up any physical evidence
Against nick in any place.
- Brought him forward and said,
"you searched his house twice. What did you find?
"nothing.
"you searched his car. What did you find?
"nothing.
"you searched his office two times.
"what did you find? Nothing."
- Which made it clear, the defense argued,
That police had tunnel vision starting with the night
Of the murder when lieutenant murray
And two state cops came to nick's house.
- Within hours, as you have heard,
I was targeted.
Would it be fair to say there was a rush to judgment?
Yes.
I cannot recall.
- The most damning prosecution evidence against nick
Had been those videotapes.
First, his deposition in the civil suit.
- I cannot recall.
- The defense argued that his inability
To answer questions then was just a memory lapse,
Nothing more.
- The statements he made at that deposition
Were made 27 months after the death of garrett phillips.
It is true, he often said,
"I can't recall",
But does that make him a murderer?
- And as for the state's centerpiece evidence,
That security camera video where nick appeared
To follow garrett out of the high school parking lot,
It didn't actually show much of anything,
Argued the defense.
- The prosecution wants you to make much of this video.
But the prosecution wants you to jump to conclusions.
- Camera doesn't record the end of this.
- Yeah, there is no videotape that exists anywhere
That shows nick hillary pulling up to 100 market street,
Getting out of his car, and walking up those stairs.
- Nick's assertion that he went to his home,
And not garrett's, was bolstered at trial
By two alibi witnesses.
- The focus was to show that nick was somewhere else
From the period of 5:00 to at least 5:23,
And have two alibi witnesses that would hold up.
- The first was assistant soccer coach ian fairlie.
He testified that nick stopped by his house at 5:21 p.M.,
About twenty minutes after garrett was attacked,
According to police estimates.
- Did fairlie stick to his guns,
To his same story he's told over and over?
- Absolutely.
And said, as he said to me and other people,
That that afternoon,
When nick hillary walked in that apartment,
He wasn't limping, he wasn't sweating,
He didn't seem discombobulated, he didn't seem upset,
He just seemed like the same old guy.
- But it was shanna-kay hillary,
Nick's daughter, whose testimony would be make or break.
She testified he was with her at their house
In the critical time period of 5:00 to 5:15 p.M.,
Which is the same time young garrett was losing
That struggle for his life.
- Judge, there is nothing about shanna-kay's testimony
That was false.
She is a strong witness,
And she is reasonable doubt.
- In cross-examination, prosecutor bill fitzpatrick
Went after nick's daughter with gusto,
And got her to admit she didn't remember
Very much else about that day,
Except for the time her dad was home.
- It will all come down to whether or not
The judge believes whether nick was
Where he said he was.
- Which is the gamble nick had taken
When he waived a jury trial.
His fate would soon be in the hands of one man.
Judge catena would decide.
- I'm never gonna have my son back.
- My family and I have been living underneath this cloud.
- We're talking murder two, you know,
We're talking 25 years to life.
- The judge's verdict, what would it be?
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Welcome back.
Nick hillary was on trial for the murder
Of twelve-year-old garrett phillips.
The prosecution portrayed him as a scorned lover
Who blamed garrett for his breakup
With the boy's mom.
The defense countered that there was no evidence
Tying nick to the killing, and fingerprints found
At the crime scene weren't his.
This case was hurtling toward its end,
And soon one man would determine nick's fate.
Here's dennis murphy with the conclusion
Of "the accused".
- We're talking murder two, you know,
We're talking 25 years to life.
This is not shoplifting, this is a very serious charge.
- The awful question before the court was this.
Had nick hillary choked the life out of a twelve-year-old boy?
- He's been lying about it ever since!
- Lead prosecutor, bill fitzpatrick,
Had thundered outrage during his closing argument,
Channeling the emotion of tandy and her family.
- Garrett phillips wasn't killed by someone
Passing through town who hates little boys,
He was killed by nick hillary.
He wanted to be twelve years old,
And not be dictated to,
And that cost him his life.
- Convicting someone because...
- The defense team had spent three weeks
Arguing there was simply no evidence against nick.
- I know, judge, that you'll get it right.
I know, judge, that after considering
All the evidence in this case,
You will find mr. Hillary not guilty.
- The defense had wagered an unusual high stakes gamble,
Bypassing a jury and asking a judge to decide.
Judge and jury in one man, felix catena.
A week went by with no decision,
An excruciating week for both sides.
Then the judge called everyone back to the courthouse
To hear his verdict.
For forty-two-year-old nick hillary
And his unwavering legion of "truth for nick hillary" supporters,
It had been a five year old slog to clear his name.
- We've been here since day one supporting nick
And, you know, stayed in his corner.
I'm not gonna stop standing by him now.
- For tandy cyrus, cocooned in a huddle
Of supportive friends and family, the agonizing wait,
With all its fits and starts, was finally over.
The moment was at hand.
- As to the charge of murder in the second degree as charged
In the indictment, the defendant,
Oral "nicholas" hillary, is found not guilty.
[applause] - not guilty.
A quick burst of applause and a cry
From nick's side of the room.
- Thank you, jesus!
- Garrett's uncle shouted out in nick's direction,
"karma will get you!"
Nick hugged his attorneys,
Then dissolved in a flood of tears.
Tandy, a bundle of nerves while waiting for the verdict,
Was inconsolable.
D.A. Mary rain said she was devastated,
And spoke of tandy's pain.
- I just simply expressed my condolences,
And that was about it.
And she said, "I know you guys tried."
- Tom mortati, the attorney for the potsdam police,
Addressed the issue of race,
Which had been hanging over the case from the start.
- Race had nothing to do with this investigation
And, uh, if any of you actually had an opportunity
To meet with some of the investigators involved
You'd know that, but I can tell you affirmatively
That race had nothing to do with this from the get-go.
- Defense attorney earl ward.
- There's a family that even after five years still grieves.
So we're not oblivious to that.
But nick hillary did not kill garrett phillips.
Nick hillary's an innocent man.
- Love you, man, all right.
We're here for you, bro.
- Yes, brother.
- Just a few hours after the verdict,
Nick told us he felt a sense of relief.
- Without reservation.
- But would feel the scars of his ordeal for years to come.
- I am very happy, don't get me wrong,
But for five years my family and I
Have been living underneath this cloud,
And the focus right now is to start putting this
In the rearview mirror.
- Maybe the people in potsdam will try, too,
To put this case behind them.
But it won't be easy.
Nick's civil suit against the police is still pending,
And small towns don't pivot so easily to normal
After an epic drama like this one.
- This case has had a lot
Of the great elements of fiction.
And at the heart of it you have this terrible,
Terrible tragedy, which is the death of a child.
- And that raw hurt never goes away,
Not to a mother with a broken heart.
- I have pictures in my head that will never go away.
I had to watch as people tried
To resuscitate my son and failed.
I'm never gonna have my son back.
- Had he lived, had he gotten extra years,
Who do you think he would have been?
- Still the fun loving kid that he was,
And joking and teasing,
And I think he would be looking to have
A-a very bright future somewhere
As an athlete.
- But the boy is buried now with the artifacts
Of his brief childhood, including that ripstik.
Garrett exits, forever, frame left.
The mystery surrounding his killing still abides.
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm kate snow, thank you for watching.