- I'm craig melvin,
And this is "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
- All I could see was a dark hallway
With a light coming out of a door.
What am I gonna see? How bad is this gonna be?
Worst case scenario was going through my head.
- Lisa and kevin, they married.
Blending their lives and children.
- It was one big, happy family over there.
- With enough love to welcome a foster daughter
With a troubled past, sabrina.
- When she was told about being placed with the knoefels,
She was ecstatic.
- A happy home,
Until it was ripped apart in a single night.
- Lisa stabbed.
- The blade was actually bent.
It takes a lot to bend a knife blade.
- The killer? None other than sabrina.
- I couldn't believe it.
- A loving mom murdered by the foster daughter
She'd opened her home to.
What no one could understand was why.
- Something else had to have been at play, here.
- Indeed, this case
Was about to get a lot more complicated.
Stories of a diabolical plot brewing behind closed doors.
- This was really just betrayal
On top of betrayal on top of betrayal, isn't it?
- And an obsession that would not be denied.
- It was like, "I want this,
"this is how I'm gonna get it."
♪♪
- Hello, and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Lisa knoefel and her husband, kevin,
Found room in their hearts and home
For a foster daughter named sabrina.
But the teenager would repay that kindness
By taking lisa's life in a savage attack.
Though detectives knew who did it,
Sabrina's motive remained a mystery.
Their investigation would unlock a deep secret
And a darker plot than anyone involved could fathom.
Here's josh mankiewicz with "deadly betrayal."
- There comes a time in most cops' careers
When they see something so horrific,
They'll do just about anything to forget it.
Even though deep down, they know they never will.
For officer randy mullenax, that moment came
In November, 2012,
On a call to chagrin drive
In willoughby hills, ohio.
You ever had a scene like this, before?
- Never, I've never seen a crime scene like that,
And I hope I never have to again.
It was bad.
- Finding out what happened
That night on chagrin drive and why
Would ultimately lead investigators on a journey
That would reveal accusations of a diabolical murder plot
And a series of betrayals
That tore apart an american family.
That journey would begin when this house of horrors
Was still the loving home of lisa and kevin knoefel,
A couple whose friends describe as
Destined to be together from the moment they met.
- I remember her talking about him,
And she had nothing but great things to say.
- Lisa's close friends, kayleen and karl lessmann,
Were the unofficial chaperones of lisa and kevin's first date.
- We got along right away. - I mean, he fit right in.
Seriously, I can totally see why she was drawn to him.
I mean, you really can.
- Kevin was just as drawn to lisa,
According to kevin's sister, chris ann sutton.
- I remember kevin telling me
That he met somebody, and, uh, "her name is lisa
And I think I really like her."
- Both kevin and lisa had been married before,
And both had children.
Lisa had megan, kevin had cody.
- Kevin was always good with children.
- Linda cover is a knoefel family friend
Who's known kevin all his life.
Good father? - Good father.
- Dedicated father? - Absolutely, absolutely.
- Kevin was a jack of many trades.
A truck driver, a school bus driver,
An emergency medical technician.
Lisa dedicated her life to social work,
Helping and caring for sexually abused kids.
Kayleen was one of lisa's coworkers.
- She just wanted to help people.
We work in a sex abuse unit,
And, um, that's a very difficult subject
A lot of people can't deal with,
But she really prided herself on helping these families,
And being able to help, um, you know,
Make a difference.
- Everyone admired lisa's selflessness.
Her friend, carrie ward, also worked with lisa.
- She took in foster kids
While she was a single parent
And, uh, was raising her own daughter by herself.
- That feels like sort of
Going the extra mile and then some.
- She did.
She was always there to help anybody that needed it.
- Admirable. - Yes, very much so.
- One year after kevin and lisa met,
They married.
A year and a half later, lisa and kevin announced
The arrival of a baby of their own, hailey.
Lisa was on top of the world.
- Megan she loved like crazy, of course.
But she really wanted another child.
- But lisa felt she had more to give.
Two years after hailey's birth,
She decided to invite 16-year-old foster child
Sabrina zunich into her home,
And to make sabrina part of the family.
- I met sabrina almost immediately
When she came to the house.
I remember her saying, "I finally have a family."
- Everything was going really well.
She fit right in to the family.
Lisa, I mean, couldn't talk highly enough about her.
- But the happy times
For the knoefel's blended and now extended family
Would come to a catastrophic end
On that November night back in 2012,
When lisa knoefel was brutally stabbed in her home.
- When I heard it was lisa
And who did it, I couldn't believe it.
I was like, "y-you're kidding me."
- A devoted mom attacked in her own home,
Enough to stun any family. But a crime this vicious?
The first responding officer arrived to a frantic scene.
- The blade was actually bent.
I just started shaking my head,
Because I couldn't--
It takes a lot to bend a knife blade.
- Who could have felt enough rage to do that
And why?
When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- The love and hope that marked
The knoefel's newly blended family
Vanished forever
On a cold November night in 2012.
At about 1:00 am, the willoughby hills police
Received a 911 call from the knoefel house.
The caller was the knoefel's 13-year-old daughter megan.
She said her mother lisa
Was being brutally stabbed right before her eyes.
- Megan was screaming,
Yelling at someone to "stop, you're killing her,
"stop, you're hurting her, why are you doing this?"
- In the background,
Lisa can be heard pleading for help.
- It's really chilling to listen to.
- First responding officer randy mullenax
Arrived at the knoefel home
And found megan frantic at the front door.
- She's waving her hands,
"you need to hurry, hurry, hurry!"
- Mullenax learned kevin knoefel was away on business,
Leaving lisa, megan, hailey,
And their foster daughter, sabrina, at home.
- Worst case scenario was going through my head.
"what am I gonna see?
"wha--how-how bad is this gonna be?"
- It was far worse than he could have imagined.
Out of the master bedroom came the knoefel's
18-year-old foster daughter, sabrina, holding a knife.
- It looked like she-she'd literally showered in blood.
- Mullenax ordered sabrina to the ground,
Where she was cuffed.
He then went to the bedroom,
Where he found lisa knoefel on the floor.
- I could barely even see flesh color,
It was-- there was that much blood on her.
I knew there was nothing I could do.
- The coroner would later determine
Lisa had been stabbed and cut at least 178 times.
Sabrina's weapon was a 15-inch bread knife.
- The blade was actually bent.
And I just started shakin' my head,
Because I couldn't--
It takes a lot to bend a knife blade.
- With sabrina zunich now booked and in the lock-up,
Detective ron parmertor began the investigation.
This wasn't a case in which you had to wonder
Who was responsible? - That's correct,
We knew right away it was the foster daughter.
- This looked like a case that could be shut
As quickly as it opened.
But if that were true,
We wouldn't be telling you this story.
This turned out to be one of the most unusual cases
We've ever come across.
Police would end up investigating
Not just who, but why.
Well, the answer's as stunning as they were disturbing.
As dawn broke that cold November morning,
Detective parmertor began with his perpetrator,
Sabrina zunich.
- I first noticed
That she was a very small girl, a very frail girl.
- Sabrina started describing the moments
Leading up to the murder.
She'd had a migraine, she said.
While everyone else slept,
She'd walked into the knoefel's master bath
To get some ibuprofen.
And that, she said, is where her memory went blank.
You didn't think anybody could stab someone that many times
And not remember any part of it?
- No. I mean, I tried all different ways of, you know,
Get her to come out and tell me what really happened,
And she was not giving it up.
- And then, sabrina asked for an attorney,
Bringing parmertor's interrogation
To an abrupt and frustrating halt.
You thought, "whatever else we're gonna get,
"it's not gonna come from her."
- Exactly.
- So, parmertor consulted those who arguably knew
This teenaged ward of the state better than anyone,
Sabrina's social workers.
- She had some issues with her family growing up.
Her grandma took custody of her about the age of three.
- Case manager nicole corbett
Said sabrina struggled with having been abandoned
By her parents at a very early age.
She ended up in the juvenile system
After stealing from her grandmother
To pay for drugs and alcohol.
- She worked a lot in counseling,
How to cope and how to manage
With everything she was going through.
- Eventually,
Nicole helped place sabrina in the knoefel home.
- She just wanted to be a part of something,
A part of a family.
I know that's what she wanted more than anything,
So when she was told about being placed with the knoefels,
She was ecstatic.
- It turned out the knoefel's love and care
Was just what sabrina needed.
- She was going to class, getting good grades.
I think sabrina really was thriving in their home.
- Which made the news that it was sabrina
Who had brutally stabbed lisa all the more baffling.
- I still can't see the sabrina that I know
Being violent towards anyone, let alone what she did.
Something else had to have been at play here.
- Detective ron parmertor was thinking the same way.
He wanted to talk to kevin
About what that "something else" might be.
But he held off.
- I was giving him his space,
Because I thought that he needed time
To, you know, deal with, uh, the tragic death of his wife.
- According to his sister, chris ann,
Kevin was an emotional wreck when he heard what happened.
- I'm sure that there was some guilt,
Because he worked nights and he wasn't home.
He's like, "I never thought this would happen."
- Did you think he had anything to do with this?
- No.
- And you could definitively prove
That kevin wasn't even in the house at the time?
- Absolutely.
Kevin was on the ohio/michigan border at the time.
- Still, parmertor felt kevin might hold the key
To solving the riddle of this case.
Why keep going? You've got your suspect.
I mean, she's got the weapon in her hand.
- Just doin' my job as a detective.
I was trying to find out why.
- It was the one central question
That continued to plague detective parmertor
And drive him forward.
You were crossing your fingers and thinking,
"we really need a break." - yes.
- And then one day, it arrives.
- One day, sabrina decides
That she wants to tell us what happened.
- And the story sabrina ultimately told
Was far more complicated and twisted
Than anyone could have imagined.
- Investigators hear stories about tensions
In the knoefel's seemingly happy home,
Triggered by sabrina's odd behavior.
- It made lisa uncomfortable.
- Lisa wasn't happy with it, no.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- News of lisa knoefel's bloody murder
Cut through willoughby hills, ohio,
Like a blistering winter wind.
- I was shocked. Lisa was a nice person.
She was a good mom, she was a good wife.
- For someone of that much beauty
And that much...
Giving of herself
To just be taken from us just like that.
It's just- just too much.
- Finding out that the foster daughter
Lisa welcomed into her home
Ended up committing lisa's murder
Only added to the collective pain and suffering.
- Betrayal is-is-is the perfect word
For, um, what happened. - Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm. - I mean,
Somebody hurting her that she had taken in--
I just can't even imagine
What she must have been going through.
- As detective ron parmertor worked the case,
He learned there'd been growing tension
Within the knoefel home right before the murder.
And the source of that tension was sabrina.
- She got along great with kevin,
And she did not get along well at all with lisa.
- Parmertor discovered lisa had become frustrated
With sabrina's behavior toward kevin.
- She was fascinated with kevin.
She seemed a little vivacious, uh, in my eyes.
Um, flirty. - Mm-hmm.
- Like, flaunting herself.
- And parmertor learned from texts on lisa's cell phone
That sabrina's flirty behavior
Had begun to take its toll on lisa and kevin's marriage.
Sabrina was demanding kevin's time,
And kevin was making himself available--
Too available, as far as lisa was concerned.
- You have one actual text from lisa to kevin
In which she's saying,
"you're getting too close to sabrina."
- Yes. - In fact, lisa wrote...
Lisa also became concerned about the relationship
Sabrina had with her daughter, hailey.
- She acted like a mother to hailey on a regular basis.
- It made lisa uncomfortable.
- Lisa wasn't happy with it, no.
- It sounds like one of the things
That everybody agrees on
Is that sabrina was fixated on--
Fascinated with hailey.
And-- - she was,
I think she was infatuated with the whole family,
And she wanted to be biologically in that family.
- Parmertor learned that just weeks before the murder,
Tension between lisa and sabrina
Had reached the breaking point.
After 17 months under the knoefel roof,
Sabrina was told it was time to pack up and get out.
- Sabrina got very upset,
Knew that lisa was
The one initiating
That action.
- And what, snapped? - Yes.
- But right now, all that was just a theory.
Then, six months after the murder,
The investigation took another turn.
Parmertor learned sabrina was ready to talk.
- She starts telling her story, she starts sobbing,
Tears are coming down her face.
- Sabrina told "dateline" the same story she told police,
The story of a young girl
Bouncing through the foster-care system.
Always dreaming of a better life.
- I wanted a new beginning,
And to put all the past behind me.
I wanted that-that picket white fence,
The dinner on the table with siblings and, you know,
Something I never had.
I wanted that structure of a family.
- So, when the knoefels opened their door to sabrina,
It was a dream come true.
- My first impression of kevin was caring father.
Somebody that was willing to, you know,
Get to know me and want to know me.
- And then there was lisa.
- My relationship with lisa,
It was at first good.
We would all spend time together,
We would go swimming in the backyard.
I felt a part of the family.
- Then sabrina confirmed
What parmertor had already heard.
The good times quickly came to an end
When sabrina and lisa started arguing.
According to sabrina, lisa began thinking of her
As more foster than daughter.
And sabrina didn't like that.
- I felt like the outsider.
I felt kind of, um, abandoned
In a certain type of way, and not accepted.
- Sabrina admitted her close relationship
With both kevin and hailey
Had become a major source of friction with lisa.
- She doesn't like the fact of how I'm acting with hailey,
And wouldn't let hailey come around me,
Not even give me a hug at night.
It really-- it hurt me. - And then came the moment
When sabrina said lisa told her it was time to go.
- She was very blunt about it.
And she was like, "I'm sorry,
"but I don't want you here anymore."
My life was shattering before me.
The betrayal, the abandonment.
All that came to surface.
- Two weeks later,
Sabrina says she quietly, carefully walked
Into lisa's darkened bedroom, a knife in her hand.
- I was in the room for a good 10-15 minutes,
And it was a constant, like, battle in my head.
Just do it, don't do it, just do it.
- In the end,
It was sabrina's darker side that won out.
- She wakes up, and she thought I was megan
And was like, "megan, go to bed."
I completely froze,
And then she sits up in her bed,
And she was like, "megan, g--"
And she realized it wasn't megan,
And that's when I did it.
I remember her shouting, "'bri, stop!"
And I remember megan coming in and setting a--
Setting a hand on my shoulder
And saying, "'bri, stop!"
And I just nudged her off and told her, "megan, don't."
- Anger triggered by a troubled teenager's
Feeling of abandonment leading to murder.
For ron parmertor, sabrina's story
Made perfect, if tragic, sense.
You believe sabrina. - Absolutely.
- But sabrina was not done.
What she was about to reveal would send this investigation
Hurtling in a completely new and alarming direction.
Sabrina told detective parmertor she didn't act alone.
- I couldn't have done something like this
If I didn't have an outer influence.
- Sabrina drops a bombshell,
Claiming that getting rid of lisa
Was actually someone else's idea.
When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: "secrets uncovered,"
I'm craig melvin.
Sabrina zunich had confessed to the brutal murder
Of her foster mother, lisa knoefel.
From the beginning, detectives believed
There had to be more to the story.
Now, sabrina had more to say.
And the staggering secret she was about to reveal
Would turn this investigation on its head.
Continuing with "deadly betrayal,"
Here's josh mankiewicz.
- Detective ron parmertor
Always knew who killed lisa knoefel,
And now he thought he understood why.
Sabrina had told parmertor
Lisa was about to crush her dream
Of remaining part of the knoefel family.
- She hated lisa.
- That feels to me like a motive.
- Absolutely.
- I hated lisa,
But it was only because she was triggering
A lot of past issues.
- But there was more.
There was, said sabrina, someone else.
- It's not all my fault.
Now, I take responsibility, because I did what I did,
And I know it was wrong.
But if it weren't for him, it would not have happened.
- If it weren't for him.
Sabrina was referring to her foster father, kevin.
- I was doing what kevin told me to do.
That's what it comes down to.
- It was an astonishing accusation.
Sabrina told parmertor
Kevin had grown to hate lisa even more than she did.
It was a feeling she said kevin shared with her slowly
Over several months.
- He started to text me
"I wish she-- I wish she was dead."
Or "I can't stand her. She just needs to go."
According to sabrina, kevin also revealed
That lisa had multiple life insurance policies
And that she was worth more dead than alive.
- You had sensed for a long time
That there was something going on
That sabrina wasn't talking about.
- Mm-hmm. - Did you think this was it?
- Didn't think it was this involved.
- But just as it seemed sabrina's story
Couldn't get any more twisted,
She dropped a second bombshell.
- Her story was that
Kevin and her were having a sexual relationship,
And it was going on
For probably about 6-8 months
Prior to the homicide.
- I absolutely fell in love with him.
- Kevin, sabrina said, promised her the world
And played on her love of 3-year-old hailey.
- He promised me we were gonna have our own house.
And, um, I could, you know, take over the role for hailey,
You know, a mother figure.
And I'd go to college,
Do everything that I ever wanted to do in life.
- And then, she said, kevin finally convinced her
The only way to realize that picket fence dream
Was to kill lisa.
- It just started getting more concrete,
More of... "do you wanna do it?"
You know, "this is what we could have
If, you know-- if we do this."
When you're in love,
You will do anything for that person.
- According to sabrina,
They first discussed the idea of sabrina shooting lisa.
Then they considered hiring a hitman.
Then after several months,
They finally settled on sabrina stabbing lisa
In her sleep.
- Kevin picked out this bread knife,
And it was about a foot long.
And it had a rigid blade.
And, um, he said to use this one
Because it would do more damage on the-on the inside.
I was supposed to take her ring, her necklace, all of that,
As if somebody came in and, you know, burglarized her.
- Are you kidding me?
- When kevin's friend linda cover got wind
Of sabrina's story, she was dumbfounded.
- I thought that it was absolutely crazy.
There was no way. I can't even believe
That he would even begin to do anything like that.
- Neither could kevin's sister, chris ann.
Kevin, she said, loved lisa too much to want to harm her,
Nor would he ever do anything
To risk the safety of his children.
- He would not put his kids in harm's way,
And I include megan in that.
He thought of megan as his own daughter.
- No one, she said, could be manipulated
Into committing such a violent act.
- This is the act of one person
And one person only.
According to linda cover,
Sabrina's story was a web of lies,
Woven together by a deranged and troubled teen,
Whose fantasy of having a life with kevin and hailey
Pushed her over the edge.
- I think she imagined a relationship
That didn't exist.
It was like, "I want this,
So this is how I'm gonna get it."
- As for the alleged affair?
Did you ever see any hint of anything inappropriate
Between kevin and sabrina?
- Absolutely not.
- No. No.
That's not my brother.
- Sabrina, they said, turned on kevin
And blamed him for everything,
Hoping for a plea deal.
- So what's going on here?
Sabrina lying to save her own skin?
- Absolutely. Absolutely.
- Not according to detective parmertor.
Your convinced there really was a plan between her and kevin.
- Yes.
- And that there was an affair,
Despite the lack of hard evidence.
But you had no proof. There's no love letters.
- No.
- There's no photographs. There's no videotape.
- No.
- How do you know it happened?
- I took sabrina on her word.
Every time we interviewed sabrina,
She always told us the same story.
- And it rang true? - Absolutely rang true.
- And parmertor said he was suspicious of kevin
Even before sabrina came forward.
Several weeks after the murder,
Parmertor asked kevin to come to the station for an interview.
Kevin brought along his attorney.
- He would only answer the questions
About his wife's work.
- And nothing about the murder.
- Nothing about the murder.
- Parmertor also became suspicious
Of how kevin began filing claims
For lisa's $800,000 in life insurance
Within hours of lisa being pronounced dead.
And then he started spending the money.
- He was buying cars. He was buying a camper.
He was remodeling his house inside.
- All with lisa's insurance money?
- All with lisa's insurance money.
- All of that was enough for detectives.
Three months after sabrina accused kevin
Of manipulating her into killing lisa,
Detective parmertor arrested kevin
And charged him with plotting the murder.
Sabrina agreed to testify
As the state's star witness.
In exchange, the district attorney's office
Agreed to recommend that sabrina receive a reduced sentence.
You're taking the word of an admitted murderer here.
- Correct.
- Even though she's clearly got a reason to lie about this.
- Yep. I believe what she was telling us is the truth.
- But would a jury agree?
- Testimony that kevin had talked about divorcing lisa
And wanting sabrina to live with him.
- I thought it was a little odd
That he wanted to take a 17-year-old girl
Alone in a home with just him.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- In the spring of 2014,
Kevin knoefel's trial began in lake county, ohio.
The charges: Complicity and conspiracy
To commit aggravated murder.
Kevin was also charged with sexual battery
Relating to sabrina.
- She was the perfect patsy.
- Young, impressionable, and-- - idealist.
- And anxious to have a guy love her.
- Yes. - And so he manipulated her.
- Yeah.
- But this was no slam-dunk. Kevin denied all charges.
And prosecutors acknowledged
Their case was based primarily on the word of sabrina,
A young woman with plenty of reason to lie.
This put you in a difficult situation, it seems to me.
I mean, you are defending the character
Of this cold-blooded murderer,
And the fact that she committed this murder
Is all on someone else.
- Not necessarily on someone else,
But together with somebody else.
She would never have done this by herself.
- Without any direct proof of the alleged affair,
Prosecutors began by calling those
Who say they saw signs of inappropriate behavior
Between a foster father and foster daughter.
Sabrina's teacher, willie smith,
Describes spotting kevin with sabrina
At the school one afternoon.
- She, uh, moved toward sitting in his lap,
Inside his legs.
- What did-what did you do at that point?
- I did a double-take, kind of, really.
- Then nicole corbett,
Sabrina's social worker case manager,
Testified about a strange call from kevin
Just about a month before the murder.
Kevin, she said,
Admitted his marriage to lisa was in trouble
And said they were considering divorce.
- What was your reaction to that statement?
- I was surprised.
I didn't know they were even considering
Splitting up or divorce.
- Kevin, she said, asked whether in a divorce
He would be able to take sabrina with him
As opposed to her staying with lisa.
- I just thought it was a little odd
That he wanted to take a 17-year-old girl
Alone in a home with just him.
- Prosecutors next showed jurors cell phone activity,
More evidence, they said, that indicated
Kevin and sabrina were having an affair.
Kevin was texting sabrina
Way more than he was texting his wife?
- Substantially more.
- Within a 2-week period,
Kevin and sabrina texted and called each other
Almost 1,500 times.
That compares to just 200 calls and texts
Between kevin and lisa.
Prosecutors then turned jurors' attention
To kevin's behavior after lisa's murder.
David strunk was one of kevin's close friends.
Strunk testified that kevin seemed desperate
To visit sabrina in jail
Just one day after the murder.
- He told me that he just wanted to let her know
That, uh, he was still there for her.
This was the person that had just killed his wife,
And I was shocked that he would want to have
Any sort of contact with her.
- According to karen kowall,
Kevin's real reason for wanting to see sabrina
Was to keep her from talking to police
And telling them about kevin's involvement
In the murder plot.
- The trip to the jail was certainly huge.
- As pleased as prosecutors were with their case so far,
They knew it would stand or fall
On how the jury responded to their next witness.
Were you guys worried? - I was worried.
- They listened. Everyone listened
As sabrina told of the night she took lisa's life.
- I started to stab her.
I just raised the knife up and went down on her.
- Why is it you can violently and brutally
Stab her repeatedly 178 times?
- Because... [sniffling]
I was manipulated to do it.
- By who? - Kevin.
- What did you think?
- Sabrina was a strong witness.
- I felt she did a-a-a good job.
- Maybe so, but without anyone to corroborate sabrina's story,
Prosecutors feared
The jury still wouldn't believe it or her.
Enter the next witness,
Sabrina's high school friend autumn pavlik.
Autumn testified she had firsthand knowledge
About the murder plan and kevin's involvement in it.
- There was a phone call
That we had.
She had asked me if I was able to get her a hitman.
- Could you tell if there were any other people
In the room at the time. - Yes.
- And how could you tell that?
- I could hear the defendant in the background talking.
- Autumn then testified she and sabrina
Discussed the idea of paying the hitman
By delivering drugs for him.
That's when she said
Sabrina handed the phone to kevin.
- What did he ask you at that time?
- "do you need me to take you to go run drugs?"
- Okay, and what was that in reference to?
- Uh, the hit.
- Autumn said she ultimately backed out
Of the plan altogether.
- Finally I said, "sorry, I can't help you.
"I don't want anything to do with it."
But autumn was willing
To later help detective parmertor
With his investigation.
After hearing autumn's story,
Parmertor asked autumn to call kevin
And talk about the hitman,
Thinking kevin might implicate himself.
Prosecutors played that recorded phone call in court.
- On the call, kevin never admits
To knowing anything about a hitman,
But to detective parmertor, his calm manner
And apparent lack of surprise
Suggest a prior knowledge of the plot.
- He never says, "what are you talking about?
"I never-- we never had any conversations.
"if you have any information about the murder of my wife,
"please go to the police."
Never says anything like that.
- In fact, when detective parmertor
Called kevin just two days later,
Kevin made no mention of autumn's call
And claimed only to have a vague recollection
Of who autumn was,
Even though he'd just spoken with her.
- As prosecutor kowall saw it,
Kevin was trying to keep police from finding
The one person other than sabrina
Who could link him to lisa's murder.
- Clearly a lie, very damaging.
- Prosecutors were now confident
Jurors had all they needed to convict.
But now it was the defense's turn
To make its case.
And kevin knoefel's attorneys
Weren't about to let sabrina leave that courtroom
Without a fight.
- The defense tries to undercut the prosecution's whole premise,
Arguing there was nothing going on
Between kevin and sabrina.
- There were maybe 12 witnesses
That if they see any form of abuse
They have a mandatory duty to report it.
- And none of them did.
- And all of them testified that they didn't do it.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back.
Kevin knoefel was on trial
For plotting his wife lisa's murder.
Prosecutors said he had been having an affair
With his foster daughter sabrina and encouraged her
To carry out the awful crime.
Much of their case hung on sabrina's word,
And that's exactly what the defense
Was about to question.
It promised to be a showdown.
In the end, which story would the jury buy?
Here's josh mankiewicz
With the conclusion of deadly betrayal.
- Kevin knoefel's defense attorney
Mike connick felt pretty confident
As he prepared his counterpunch
Before the lake county court.
Did kevin have anything to do with lisa's murder?
- No.
- Did he have any sexual relationship with sabrina?
- No.
There was not one scintilla of physical evidence
To tie kevin to any of these crimes.
- Connick began trying to dismantle
The evidence the state did present.
He challenged the county employees
Who had testified they believed
Kevin was acting inappropriately towards sabrina,
Asking why they didn't report such behavior
Before the murder.
- At that time, if you had a serious concern,
You would have filed a report, wouldn't you?
- I would have filed a report
If I felt it was a serious concern.
I did not file a report on this.
- There were 8, 10, maybe 12 witnesses
That are mandated reporters.
If they see any form of abuse,
They have a mandatory duty to report it.
- And none of them did.
- And all of them testified that they didn't do it.
- No one reported inappropriate behavior,
Said connick,
Because there was nothing to report.
Lisa, ironically, was a mandated reporter.
She never reported it.
- Connick then addressed the large number of texts
Between kevin and sabrina.
- I don't find that shocking.
- Neither did kevin's sister, chris ann.
- There's more texts between my husband
And one of my daughters than my husband and me.
It-it doesn't mean anything.
- But what about those who testified
Kevin acted suspiciously immediately after the murder?
- I don't think I'd want to have to come home
And find out my wife was butchered
And then have other people criticize
What my emotional response to that situation was.
- Kevin's friend linda cover agreed,
Even if the emotional response
Was to try to visit sabrina in jail
Just one day after she'd murdered kevin's wife.
- I thought about that. And I'm thinking,
He might've wanted to say, "why in the hell?
"what's the matter with you?"
Linda cover also believed kevin was unfairly judged
For filing the life insurance claims
As quickly as he did.
Kevin, she said,
Had to think about the welfare of his children.
- "now I have to be the so-sole support.
"now what am I gonna do?"
- A great deal of the state's evidence
Were witnesses said he's not acting the right way,
He's not acting normal.
As soon as somebody can tell me what normal is,
I'll be happy to adopt it as a notion.
- Connick applied that same argument
To the criticism of kevin's muted response
To the mention of a hitman
On autumn pavlik's recorded phone call.
- What was he supposed to do? Was he supposed to be angry?
Was he supposed to be, um, defensive?
- I think what he was supposed to be was something.
That's kinda kevin's demeanor. You can't pass judgment on that.
- But what about autumn's testimony
That she spoke directly to kevin
About hiring a hitman to kill lisa?
Connick dismissed that testimony
As being inconsistent and unreliable.
During cross, connick asked autumn
To read a transcript
Of her initial interview with police,
When she was asked if kevin was ever
A part of her conversations with sabrina
About trying to hire a hitman.
- Why don't you read me your answer
On page 32 at line 3.
- "no, well, no, we were on the phone,
"and she didn't really talk about it
"in front of him,
"and I don't think he knew that I knew."
- Thank you. Nothing further.
She ultimately acknowledged
That kevin was never present
Or on the phone during those conversations
About killing lisa.
- But mike connick knew
It would be his cross-examination of sabrina
That would determine kevin's fate.
- Ms. Zunich, my name's michael connick,
And I represent kevin knoefel.
- I know.
- Sabrina is a seriously disturbed human being.
- The murder itself, he said,
Was all the proof the jury would need of that.
- Do you recognize this knife?
- Yes.
- And when you began slaughtering lisa knoefel,
This knife was straight, wasn't it?
- Yes.
- And you attacked her with such vigor and force,
Anger and rage,
That you managed to put a 20-degree bend
In a stainless steel knife, correct?
- Connick continued pressing,
Hoping to show that sabrina was motivated
Not by manipulation from kevin,
But by her hatred for lisa.
- You used the abandonment as a rationale
For it to be okay for you to murder my client's wife.
Correct? - No, I did not.
- You don't know that-- - no, it was a factor
That came into it, yes.
A justification, a rationalization, no.
- In the end, sabrina never wavered from her story.
Still, connick felt he'd damaged her credibility.
- By the conclusion of her testimony,
There should have been no question
That she was not reliable.
- But that was for jurors to decide.
It took them just under ten hours to deliberate.
- We have a verdict. - Guilty on all counts.
- Guilty of sexual battery as charged in the indictment,
Guilty of conspiracy to commit aggravated murder,
Guilty of complicity in aggravated murder
As charged in the indictment.
- Kevin knoefel was sentenced to life in prison,
And at the time, linda cover had this to say.
You think an innocent man is in jail?
- Absolutely. Absolutely.
I mean, I'd-I'd about stake my life on that.
- Sabrina also received a life sentence,
But will be eligible for parole after 30 years,
As recommended by the state.
Prosecutors feel justice was served,
But lead prosecutor karen kowall is quick to point out,
Cases like these bring little satisfaction.
This is really just betrayal
On top of betrayal on top of betrayal, isn't it?
I mean, you've got kevin betraying lisa,
Sabrina betraying lisa,
Then you have kevin betraying sabrina
And ultimately sabrina betraying kevin.
- Yeah. It's a perfect circle.
- That's all for this edition of "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm craig melvin. Thank you for watching.