- I'm craig melvin,
And this is "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
- It was just such a shock.
Not even for a second did it even enter my mind
That he would be in danger.
It's hard to even imagine that someone could be so evil.
- At last, his dream had come true.
New wife, new stepdaughter, a whole new start.
- Almost an instant family for him.
It just seemed perfect.
- And that's what made what happened so baffling.
Suddenly, he was dead on the floor.
- Otherwise healthy 41- year old men
Usually do not drop dead. - Correct.
Some things just aren't adding up.
- Could this be murder?
There were suspicions from the start.
And they came from his wife.
- Poisoned?
Who could have wanted him dead?
Police zeroed in on someone at work.
- He was pretty angry about that accusation.
- Yeah, he was initially very angry about it, yes.
- Angry enough to kill?
- Who knows.
- Was his new wife in danger too?
- Brace yourself, because this killer
Was stone cold evil.
- Wow, this has-- this has gotten me shaken.
♪♪
- Hello, and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
Frank rodriguez always tried to see
The best in people.
When he died unexpectedly, the stunning news
Came with a revelation:
Frank's death was anything but natural.
As investigators unraveled the secrets of this mystery,
A possible motive for murder emerged.
And to solve the case, they would need to figure out
Not just who killed frank,
But also how he died.
Here's josh mankiewicz with "the devil in disguise".
♪♪
- In this world,
We like to think that we can tell the difference
Between good and evil.
But sometimes evil puts on a mask
And comes to life's party as its opposite:
A loved one, a friend,
Someone we think we can help.
And by the time we figure out that we're wrong,
It's too late.
And so with that in mind, meet frank rodriguez,
A guy who went looking for troubled souls.
- He was very drawn towards people that were broken,
Even though I don't have a lot, I just want--
You know, what I have I want to give.
- Frank gave a lot,
Did a lot of good in his life,
Until he ran across another soul
Who was not just troubled or broken,
But pure evil.
- Oh, god!
- Frank grew up in rural illinois.
One of six kids,
He'd played football, loved baseball.
His sisters, carmen and shirley,
Remember most that he loved kidding around
With his siblings.
- Dry sense of humor.
He'd say somethin' and you're not sure
If you're supposed to laugh at it,
But he was joking.
- You know, funny jokes
And-and little tricks and things.
Prankster is what the word I'm going for.
- After high school, frank joined the navy.
It was around that time that he married a local girl.
But that line about the sea
Being a jealous mistress is true.
- His first wife was tired of him traveling all over
And being gone for six months at a time.
After he got out he was really kind of a lost soul,
He just really didn't know what he wanted to do.
And then she ended up leaving him anyway.
- After the divorce, frank was at loose ends.
Different jobs, different relationships.
He felt as if he were floundering
Until he found, first, religion.
- Is there any questions?
- No. - No, sergeant!
- And then, a place called angel gate academy.
- He just loved that job, he loved working
With the kids. - Mm-hmm.
- Angel gate was run by the california national guard
From its base in san luis obispo
On california's central coast.
It was a military academy where city kids
Who were headed in the wrong direction
Learned order, discipline, and respect.
- How was frank with the kids?
- Frank was awesome with the kids.
- Chad holloway was frank's supervisor and friend.
- If they were acting out, he would kinda like get--
Say things to get them to do the right thing.
Plus, he kinda, like, used me as a bad guy.
- Good cop, bad cop.
- Exactly, frank was always a good cop.
- As rewarding as it was for frank
To help his students learn skills
For a successful life,
He also found it thrilling to take these city kids
Kayaking or camping,
Or just to hang out by the ocean,
Which many of them had never even seen.
It also left him wanting kids of his own.
- I remember him talking a lot about,
He wanted to have kids.
I mean, he wanted kids really bad.
He wanted to start a family.
- His sisters say frank thought his faith
Would guide him there.
- He was big into believing that, um,
God was gonna give him signs
Of what was good for his life.
- And then one day at church, frank ran into a woman
He worked with at angel gate.
- He called mom to tell her that he had met this woman,
Angelina, and that she was his soul mate.
And my mom-- our mom was excited.
Oh, my goodness, she called me up,
She was so excited. "frank's-frank's met someone."
- Her name was angelina morales.
She had also been in the military.
She was as devout a christian as frank.
Their romance was a whirlwind.
They met in February and married in April.
Angelina had a nine-year-old daughter named autumn,
So instant family.
- I liked frank. Frank was a really good guy,
Seemed very down to earth.
- And good for her.
- Seemed very good for her.
- Tom fuller is autumn's dad, and angelina's ex.
- Usually a guy in your position,
Not too crazy about the husbands who come after him.
- With frank, it was different.
- At the wedding, frank vowed to be a good husband
And he made a promise to autumn to be a great stepdad.
Then, frank, who loved working with kids,
Was offered a teaching job in los angeles.
Frank's life seemed to be coming together
The way he had always prayed that it would.
At least, that's how it seemed.
- When was the last time you saw frank?
- I saw frank
The Tuesday after labor day 2000.
- Frank wanted to earn some extra money,
And he agreed to chaperone a group of new students
On their way to angel gate.
He rode with them on a bus from l.A. To san luis obispo,
Where he met up with his old friend and boss, chad.
- How did he look?
- Frank looked absolutely terrible.
- Four days later, frank rodriguez was dead.
- Frank rodriguez was living his dream,
Then suddenly, he was gone.
Did his wife sense danger?
- Coming up...
- Who could possibly want to do him harm?
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- It was September of 2000.
Frank rodriguez was finally coming into his own.
A new bride, a new family, a new job.
But then, at 3 a.M.,
After just five months of marriage,
Frank's new bride, angelina, found him unconscious
On their bedroom floor, and called for help.
It was too late.
Frank rodriguez was dead. His family was stunned.
He'd been a healthy man.
- My mother called me after angelina called her
On the day that frank died,
And mom just said she lost it.
She started screaming and slammed the phone.
It was-it was horrifying.
- He was only 41.
Frank left behind a widow and a nine-year-old stepdaughter,
To whom frank had become very close.
- How'd your daughter react to frank dying?
- She was devastated, but she was also very confused.
- She wasn't the only one confused.
The coroner's office found no obvious cause of death,
Natural or unnatural.
No heart attack, no trauma, nothing.
Toxicology tests found a little vicodin
In frank's system, but not enough to kill anyone.
His family was at a loss, especially his wife, angelina,
Who seemed to be groping for answers,
Trying to make sense of what happened to frank.
- She called me almost every day to talk about it.
She thought he was killed and she thought he was poisoned.
- The idea seemed, on the face of it, crazy.
Who would wanna kill frank?
- I just didn't know what to think.
It was just such a shock.
- Homicide detectives were called in,
Even though there was zero evidence of a homicide.
- Any chance that this was gonna turn out
Not to be a murder
And that what frank died of was either natural causes
Or food poisoning or something like that?
- Absolutely. Absolutely.
- L.A. County sheriff's homicide detective,
Brian steinwand, says his job
Was just to keep moving forward.
- We were dependent upon
What the coroner's office was doing.
What they would find or wouldn't find.
But in the meantime, you can't stop investigating.
- So a few days after frank's death,
They spoke with angelina about her suspicions.
- Okay, so... - Angelina had a lot
To tell the detectives about frank's final days.
About what she thought had happened to him
And why.
- Angelina said that after his trip
On the bus to angel gate,
Frank got sick with what they both thought,
At first, was stomach flu.
- But then frank got so sick
That angelina took him to the e.R.
The doctor said all frank needed was rest and fluids,
And he'd get better.
But two days later, frank was dead.
And angelina now told detectives
She didn't believe it had been the stomach flu at all.
She thought that something happened to frank
On that trip to angel gate.
- Angelina told detectives she had urged frank
Not to chaperone those students,
And specifically not to go back to angel gate.
- She was worried that frank, who was so trusting,
Wouldn't be safe.
- Angelina then said why she was afraid.
It turned out that when she and frank
Worked together at angel gate,
They became involved in something potentially dangerous.
- The situations?
Angelina said she and frank became convinced
A person working at angel gate
Was engaged in inappropriate behavior
With some of the students.
Angelina said she'd reported the man to authorities,
And he now had a motive to hurt her or frank.
- Despite her fears, angelina said
That night when frank returned from angel gate,
He told her everything seemed fine there.
- But now she wondered,
Was there something in that gatorade?
Did that friendly welcome hide something
Much more sinister?
Because the man angelina said had offered frank
Food and drink
Was the same man angelina had accused.
The same man, she said, had threatened frank
Months earlier.
- Sergeant holloway, chad holloway,
Frank's former boss, frank's friend.
- Coming up...
- I was beyond mad.
I can't even describe how angry I was.
- Chad holloway, from friend to suspect?
- Did you say you would like to put your gun
To the head of the person that was doing this?
- Something to that effect, I did.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Ten days after frank rodriguez died,
He was honored like a fallen soldier
At the military cemetery in riverside, california.
- It was very hard to come out here for the funeral.
- Angelina's daughter, autumn,
Who was in the house when frank died,
Said goodbye in a way only a child could.
- Autumn put a teddy bear in frank's coffin.
She-she was a sweet little girl, she really was.
- That last goodbye was a struggle for frank's family.
- It was very hard on mom.
She did go into a very deep depression after that.
- As the people who loved him mourned,
Detectives with the los angeles sheriff's department
Were trying to find answers.
- They drove 200 miles north,
To the rolling hills and small town charm
Of san luis obispo, to angel gate,
To check out angelina's unsettling story,
That she had accused frank's friend, chad holloway,
Of misconduct with students,
That chad was furious over that,
And that all of it might be
The reason behind frank's unexplained death.
- They were asking us our opinion of, uh,
Who had access to frank.
- Richard ronzon worked at angel gate at the time.
Ronzon told police he hadn't noticed chad
Talking with frank,
But he did remember how upset chad was
About angelina's charges.
- Chad was beside himself.
I have never seen him that angry.
- Chad holloway was pretty angry about that accusation
And expressed to some people
That he would like to deal very harshly
With whoever had done that do him.
- Yeah, he was initially very angry about it, yes.
- Angry enough to kill? - Who knows.
And we don't know chad holloway very well yet.
We get to know him. And that's what we needed to do
In this particular case.
- What detectives call, "getting to know you",
Doesn't feel quite so friendly
When you're a potential murder suspect.
- I was under the impression, before they talked to me,
That they were so convinced I did this
That they had stopped at the sheriff's department,
Had basically told them to prepare to book me.
- You're in the crosshairs. - I'm in the crosshairs.
- How'd that conversation go?
- They came up and asked a lot of questions.
- Before they ever met chad,
Detectives had already learned something important,
That the misconduct allegations against him
Had been thoroughly investigated by local law enforcement
And found to be completely baseless.
But the detectives also knew a false allegation
Can still be a very good motive for murder.
- That's one of the worst things that
A teacher or instructor can do to a kid
Under his or her tutelage
Or control. - Yes.
- And it's also one of the worst things
To be accused of if you didn't do it.
- That was probably the...
Scariest thing that had ever happened to me in life.
I-I'd been to war. I was in desert storm.
A lot of things happened in combat.
I had never in my life
Been that scared.
- Scared, and, he admitted, angry.
- I was beyond mad. It's-- I--
I-I can't even describe how angry I was.
- Did you say you would like to put your gun
To the head of the person that was doing this to you
And pull the trigger?
- Something to that effect, I did.
- Detectives asked him about that.
- Something along the lines of,
"you were the target of false allegations
"from the wife of a guy who's now dead.
"and you were pretty angry at the time
"those false allegations were made."
- I-- it-- I-I don't remember--
- Nearly ruining your life over some phony allegations.
That's enough to make a lot of people
Angry enough to do violence.
- I guess it could be, yes.
- But chad holloway insisted,
To detectives and to us,
Whatever threats he made
Were out of anger and frustration.
And he would never have followed through.
- When you said that you wanted to take a gun
And put it to the head of the person
Who made those accusations against you...
You didn't know it was angelina you were
Talking about at the time? - I did not.
- But once you found out it was
Angelina who made those accusations,
I'm guessing you probably thought about putting
Your gun to her head. - Absolutely not.
- No? - No.
- Chad also said that what angelina told detectives
About frank's last visit to angel gate
Never actually happened.
- Were you working in the office?
- No, I wasn't working in the office.
- When you last saw frank, did you offer him
A gatorade or anything to drink?
- No.
- Clearly, someone was lying.
The question was, who?
- Coming up...
- All I heard was, um...
- Who and what had killed frank?
Investigators have a secret mission
For sergeant holloway.
- And you say, "I'm in." - you better believe it.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm craig melvin.
Frank rodriguez died under mysterious circumstances.
Had he been killed deliberately
Over a false accusation,
Or was this even a murder at all?
Police were looking into a range of possibilities.
Their investigation had just taken them
Up the california coast,
But secrets were about to emerge,
Pointing them in a surprising direction,
One much closer to home.
Here's josh mankiewicz
With more of "the devil in disguise".
- Angelina rodriguez, this is...
- When her husband died suddenly,
Angelina rodriguez quickly shared
Her suspicions with detectives that frank had been poisoned
By a former coworker who carried a grudge.
- But so far there was no solid evidence against chad,
So detectives also looked at everyone who was close to frank,
Including his new wife.
- You talked to other people about
Frank and angelina's marriage?
- Yes. - And?
- We find some interesting things out.
- For one thing, frank was angelina's fourth husband,
But not necessarily her first choice.
People who worked with angelina and frank at angel gate
Said angelina initially had her eye on a different guy.
- She was interested in a gentleman
That worked there also that was somewhat of a cowboy,
Wore cowboy boots and a hat.
All of a sudden she showed up with like
A "cowboy up" bumper sticker on her car
And, you know, a hat in the back seat.
- All of a sudden she's a cowgirl?
- And now she's a cowgirl.
And then when he didn't want anything to do with her,
She had recognized, uh, frank was a religious man.
- And the next thing you know...
- She's got a bible in her back window of her car
And "I love jesus" bumper stickers.
- To a lot of people, it seemed angelina
Was shopping pretty hard for a man and would
Do what was necessary to get one.
- She was pretty much like a chameleon,
Based on some of the behaviors we learned about her
When she was working up at the angel gate academy.
- They learned that after meeting angelina,
Frank had become less close
To many of his friends at angel gate.
Then, when the couple moved south,
Frank seemed to cut off his own family.
- He called me in may on mother's day and said that,
"I can't talk long, you know, she's monitoring my calls."
- None of that fit the profile of a loving wife,
Or later a grieving widow.
When soon after frank's death,
Angelina moved back up north
And left behind some of frank's things.
- We found it very odd that she took his dress shoes
From the service, some of his uniform stuff,
Some of his medals and stuff like that that he had
And, uh, they were all in the trashcan.
- She threw them away?
- The things in the trash were-were really shocking.
Things that you think you'd keep from your husband
That you loved.
- All that was curious,
But there was one thing above all others
That made detectives suspect angelina might be involved
In frank's death,
Something straight out of homicide 101.
It was the way angelina kept bringing up
Frank's life insurance.
- How long after frank died did angelina
Call the insurance company to enter a claim?
- Roughly within eight hours.
- So the same day? - Same morning.
- As the days went on
And the coroner still didn't rule,
Angelina grew more and more impatient.
- Angelina kept calling,
And steinwand kept recording those calls.
- Detectives saw an opportunity.
Remember, they needed the same thing angelina did,
Just for different reasons.
- Well, we need a cause of death,
And at this time we're thinking that she knows
What that cause of death is.
- They thought angelina might be telling the truth
About one thing,
That frank had been poisoned.
And they also knew what frank's sister had told them,
Something very strange that angelina had said to her.
- She says, "oh, there are lots of ways
You can poison someone."
She said, "for instance", she says,
"we have a flower out here called oleander."
- Oleander thrives in warm climates
Like southern california.
The leaves and flowers are toxic,
But only deadly in large quantities
Or if the poison is somehow concentrated.
And angelina seemed to know how to do that.
- She said, "you can make a tea out of that,
You can make a soup out of it.
And, you know, it's a poison."
When we were riding in the limousine,
She pointed right out and says,
"those are oleander bushes."
- Detectives found oleander bushes
In another place,
Angelina and frank's back yard.
Now, they wondered, since angelina was so eager
To get a death certificate and collect the life insurance,
Would she slip up
And tell them oleander was what killed frank?
They spoke with her again and again,
All the while telling her they were gathering evidence
Against frank's coworker, chad holloway.
- We keep asking her, "well, angelina, what poison
Would chad holloway have given frank?"
- At this point we believe she knows exactly what it is,
There's no doubt.
- But she's trying to get you to say it?
- She would rather, I think, have us say it.
And of course, we'd rather have her say it.
- Try as they might, they couldn't get angelina
To say the word "oleander".
Still, she kept calling them about chad,
And one day delivered another clue
Straight to investigators,
Someone had called her, she said,
And told her something big.
- Antifreeze? Not oleander?
- Not oleander this time.
- Had antifreeze even been on your radar screen
At this point?
- At this point, no, I don't believe it had been.
- But naming a new poison
Was only one interesting detail in this conversation.
Remember, angelina had said the anonymous informant
Called her shortly after 8 a.M.
- You got her phone records?
- I got her phone records, yes.
- And?
- Lo and behold, there, uh, had not been, uh,
Any calls anywhere near, incoming or outgoing,
To angelina's phone at that time.
- In trying once again to implicate chad holloway,
Angelina had implicated herself.
Now, detectives, again, went to see chad,
This time, to talk about angelina.
- Angelina rodriguez, that was the last person
That I ever wanted to see, ever wanted to hear her name,
Have anything to do with whatsoever.
- And then the investigators say to you,
"we want you to help build the case against her."
And you say, "I'm in."
- You better believe it.
- Chad holloway gets a chance to clear his name
And turn the tables on the woman
Who tried to pin frank's murder on him.
But, will angelina take the bait?
Coming up...
- He befriended her, we went in her house.
- Detectives devise a plan to trap angelina.
- But angelina has a plan of her own.
- Wow, this has-- this has got me shaken.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- For three months, detectives had been talking with angelina,
Who was so eager to collect on her husband's life insurance
That she'd let slip
Some tantalizing bits of information.
First, that her husband may have been poisoned
And that the poison might be what she called,
"that flower in the road",
Or possibly antifreeze.
Finally, the corner's report came back.
The finding?
Frank rodriguez was killed by ethylene glycol,
The key ingredient in antifreeze.
The tox screen also found oleander.
Now detectives felt they knew for sure
Frank had been murdered.
They knew how, and they thought they knew who.
Not chad, but angelina.
But to make this case stick, they'd need a little more.
So they kept angelina talking.
- We befriended her, we went in her house,
And first thing she did was offered us coffee.
And my partner and I kept kicking each other
Under the table, "oh, no, no, no, we're good.
"thank you. No, we're good."
- My instincts are usually right.
- From the beginning, angelina had tried to cast suspicion
On frank's friend and coworker, chad holloway.
- Sergeant holloway.
- Chad, she said, was the killer.
But detectives didn't believe her,
And instead enlisted chad to help
Set a trap for her.
- And the idea is what here?
- See what kind of mistakes she may make.
- They asked chad to call angelina
While they listened in.
She had done her best to put chad in the gun sights
Of law enforcement.
Now came his chance to return the favor.
- At one point you say,
"angelina, you're gonna ruin my life."
Which, actually, although it's maybe
Part of the script for that call,
It's kinda true
Given what she tried to do to you before.
- It was.
But inside I knew that it's the other way around.
You're not gonna ruin my life anymore,
It's your life that's gonna be ruined
Because of this.
- Then, within a minute of chad hanging up,
Angelina called the cops
And gave them quite a different version
Of the call they had just listened to.
- What angelina should have been scared of
Was that the cops were on to her two obvious lies,
This one, about what chad supposedly said to her,
And the previous phantom call about antifreeze.
But angelina still hadn't admitted anything,
At least not to detectives.
Then they found a good friend of angelina's,
A confidant named palmira.
She told the cops that just months after the wedding,
Angelina was already bored with frank
And cheating on him.
- They were sitting around, I guess like girls do,
And talking about killing their husbands and how--
You know joking around, how they would do it.
- As girls do. - As girls probably all do.
My wife's probably doing it right now.
- The friend quoted angelina as saying
That she didn't wanna divorce frank
Because he'd just bought life insurance.
- There's another conversation on the telephone with palmira.
Angelina told her she was making
A, uh, milkshake for frank
And-- a special milkshake for him,
And palmira questioned if frank was sick,
And angelina told her, "not yet."
- "not yet." - "not yet."
- Of course, angelina had no idea what the cops knew.
She thought they were still investigating chad,
And she was still happy to help them do that.
For example, detectives told angelina,
They couldn't figure out how chad knew
When frank was coming to angel gate.
"he would've had to have known when", they told her,
"so that he could have his poison ready."
- And then, miraculously...
- Miraculously, a fax shows up.
It was an angel gate roster for the day of frank's visit,
With frank's name conspicuously written in.
- This is a fax that, what,
Came right to sheriff's homicide?
- Correct. - Well, that was convenient.
- Very convenient.
- The fax did not include the sender's name,
But it did send a clear message.
- This is the cover sheet to the fax
That was received anonymously at sheriff's homicide.
"why is chad still free?"
- Chad never knew how hard angelina had pushed the cops
To arrest him.
- Wow, this has-- this has got me shaken.
- Five months after her husband's death,
Police dropped in at angelina's house.
- Good morning, how are ya? - Morning.
- Angelina thinks their next stop
Will be chad's place.
It won't.
- For the next 35 minutes, steinwand and his partner
Try to get angelina to give it up.
They lay out the facts.
- They tell her the poisons were still in frank's stomach,
Which meant he ingested them
Days after his return from angel gate,
And within hours of his death,
Meaning angelina was the only one
Who could have given them to him.
And detectives tell her that all along,
While she thought she was playing them,
They were playing her.
- Angelina told them they were wrong.
- We also have a search warrant for your apartment.
- Angelina rodriguez might seem beaten,
But she had a few more punches left in her,
Just wait.
- Please, I didn't kill my husband, I swear.
- Coming up...
- A secret plan from inside prison.
- This is angelina inside the county jail
Trying to set up a hit on palmira outside?
- Correct.
- And another undercover sting.
[gasps]
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Angelina rodriguez was charged with the murder
Of her husband, frank.
It turned out that might not be the worst thing
She'd ever done or ever would do.
- What you're hearing is the wheels of a mind turning.
That's angelina in jail,
Speaking through the air vents
With her neighbor in solitary.
- Angelina apparently believed the statements
Of her friend palmira,
About how angelina was bored with frank
And wanted a life insurance payout,
Were the most damaging evidence against her.
So it seemed angelina made a decision,
Hire someone to get rid of her friend.
- This is angelina inside the county jail
Trying to setup a hit on palmira outside?
- Correct. - To keep her from testifying?
- Correct.
- The inmate angelina was talking with
Turned her in,
And soon detectives were recording
Angelina's conversations.
- If that sounds cold-blooded, consider this:
Angelina made clear she'd help care for palmira's children,
After that is, she had their mother killed.
- Police told palmira what angelina was up to,
And asked for her help.
This time, they got really creative.
- We basically staged her death.
We have her on her bed, in her house,
With a fake bullet hole and fake blood.
- That picture's pretty convincing.
- It was very convincing, yes.
- They sent an undercover cop, posing as a bad guy
With pictures in hand, to visit angelina in jail.
[gasps]
- Angelina's initial response was, "oh my god.
"oh, my god, I was only kidding."
- Shortly thereafter it was, "oh, my god, I'm going home."
- You believe she killed her husband?
- No doubt.
- And she tried to kill a witness against her?
- Correct.
- Anybody else?
- Her baby.
- In the course of their investigation
Into frank's death,
Detectives found out that in 1993,
Angelina's daughter, alicia,
Choked on her pacifier and died.
They also learned that angelina sued
The pacifier manufacturer
And settled for more than $700,000.
What's more, she collected life insurance
On her 13-month-old baby,
Just as she had tried to do with frank.
Detectives reviewed the evidence
And came to believe alicia's death
Was no accident.
- You were confident, after an investigation,
That that pacifier was tampered with?
That that baby didn't do it
And it didn't come apart naturally?
- Absolutely.
- Tom fuller, angelina's ex,
Was alicia's father.
- I went ten years thinking that
Alicia's death was an accident,
So it was like re-living her death
All over again.
- Angelina says she did not kill her baby,
And she was never charged with that.
She did stand trial for the murder of frank rodriguez,
Where a prosecution expert testified that
Angelina poisoned frank at least twice.
First, with oleander, which made him sick enough
To go to the er, but not to kill him.
Then, when she was giving him those fluids
The doctor ordered,
She was dosing them with antifreeze,
Which was fatal.
The jury found angelina guilty of first-degree murder
For financial gain,
But couldn't reach a verdict on whether she tried
To kill that witness.
And in the sentencing phase, the judge allowed the jury
To hear evidence implicating angelina
In her daughter's death.
Then, the jury agreed on a sentence.
- She shall be put to death.
- Even while facing a death sentence,
Angelina seemed unfazed.
She addressed the court,
But admitted only to some errors.
- I broke, and made a few terrible, stupid mistakes,
Which I regret very much.
We all make mistakes,
I just picked the wrong time to make mine.
But murder is not on that list.
- Frank rodriguez thought angelina was
The god-fearing woman of his dreams.
He was wrong.
Tom fuller thought she was a nurturing mother
Who would protect their daughter.
He'll never know for sure if he was lured
Into a terrible mistake.
But chad holloway understands.
He knows now just how close pure evil came to him.
He says he's let it go, with the gratitude
That, unlike his friend frank,
He at least survived with his reputation
And his life intact.
- People need to know how evil angelina was,
How many lives she ruined
To try to get a little bit of money.
And she wasn't gonna stop at nothing
Until she got what she wanted.
And I want angelina to know you didn't ruin me.
You didn't ruin me at all.
- In "the bible", we are warned that satan
Disguises himself as an angel of light,
And sometimes he's pretty good at it.
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered".
I'm craig melvin. Thank you for watching.