- I'm Craig Melvin, and this is
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
- This is the entrance
to the park
where Richard was killed.
The gunman lay in wait
in this secluded, dark place
at night.
- One way or another,
that's an execution.
- Absolutely.
- They were
a busy married couple
meeting up for a romantic
Valentine's night rendezvous,
but, that night,
someone had other plans.
- Before she even arrived,
her husband was dead.
- I could see him
laying on the ground.
- I couldn't think of a soul
that would wanna hurt the man.
- Then someone
let a secret slip.
Soon, police were questioning
a suspect with a motive
who had suddenly
changed his looks.
- And, in fact,
when he showed up at work
that morning,
he was beardless.
- There was only one problem.
He had a rock solid alibi.
- Where did that leave you?
- Worried about my case.
- That's when the phone rang--
a tip, a tire track,
and a case one detective
will never forget.
- It was a shot in the dark,
but I took it.
**
- Hello, and welcome to
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
It was Valentine's Day.
Richard and Stacey Schoeck
planned to celebrate
with a secret rendezvous
at a secluded spot,
but their evening of romance
quickly turned terrifying.
Now, one was dead,
and police would soon discover
that their meet-up
was not the only secret
in this couple's lives.
Here's Keith Morrison
with "A Perfect Spot."
**
- A winter's night
in a southern forest,
the ink black darkness
parted briefly
through their headlights
and closed around them
like a shroud
as they made their way
in separate cars
through the foggy overcast.
And then, here it is,
the ragged clearing,
the muddy patch
of sand and dirt,
here away
from the whole world.
What a place for
their Valentine's tryst,
as if they could see without
the artificial light
so much as a hand
in front of their faces
or the fate lurking out there
in the dark, waiting.
But, what a way to begin
a love story.
Better, probably,
the hot air balloons
the man so loved
and the motorcycles
on which together in daylight
they discovered
their own special place,
the remote forest clearing
in a place called
Belton Bridge Park.
Though park
is much too grand a word
for their little pullout
beside the
Chattahoochee River
north of
Atlanta, Georgia.
- I knew them both
very well.
- They were Richard
and Stacey Schoeck,
and it was another love,
their love of scouting,
that won the admiration
of Greg Gogler.
How'd you meet 'em?
- Both of our sons
were Cub Scouts.
- With kids,
boys especially,
they were naturals.
- Stacey was a ball of energy,
full of ideas,
would literally
drag us to do things.
- The go-getter.
- The go-getter and we also
jokingly called her
"Mama Spreadsheet."
[laughing]
Because everything
that she did
had to be laid out
in a spreadsheet.
- What a planner, huh?
- She was.
- Scouting is how Bill Fanning
got to know them, too.
- Richard was
a good motivator,
and I saw how much fun
he was having,
and so I kind of asked
if I could tag along
and got involved
with Scouts myself.
- Mm-hmm.
Stacey was a den leader
for the Cub Scout pack.
She pretty good
with the kids, too?
- She was pretty good
with the kids, too.
Yeah, she was.
She and Richard,
they worked well together.
- As they did
with her three sons.
Greg was surprised,
he said, when they told him
that biologically
the kids were Stacey's.
- I just naively thought
that they were his children.
- Because it-
it looked like that.
- It looked like that.
- In the way he treated them
and they treated him.
- Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
- So, when Richard
officially adopted
the younger two
of the three boys,
cousin Connie
was thrilled.
- My heart melted.
Like, I was just--
I was like that is,
like, the best thing.
- He wanted
to adopt those kids
because he loved
those children,
and those children
loved him.
- Richard himself
marched to the beat
of his own drum.
- My brother
was always a big kid.
- And, said his sister,
most certainly not a
suit and tie sort of person.
Could not sit down
behind a desk.
- He had to be
out and about.
He was a very good athlete.
- Kind of like a pied piper
to his niece.
- He would
roller skate with us,
or throw a ball with us,
or color with us.
He was our cool uncle.
- No wonder.
How many uncles
take their five-year-old niece
and seven-year-old nephew
for a ride
in a hot air balloon?
- I could barely see
over the edge,
so it was just cool seeing
just skies and clouds
all around you.
- Pam Martin was one of
his balloon buddies.
- People would fight over him
and say, "Can-can I have
Richard today?"
And he was just
the best crewperson,
and we just liked
being around him
'cause he's just very
eccentric and very funny.
- And Stacey?
- I liked her.
She was friendly.
She was nice.
- A happily blended family
far as anybody could see.
Stacey was primary
breadwinner.
She administered a sizable
medical practice.
Richard was
a maintenance manager
but remained the main
caregiver for the kids.
And together,
the two of them were--
well, people noticed.
- They always gave
each other kisses, hugs,
um, so they seemed
wonderful together.
- All of which
may explain why,
on Valentine's night 2010,
Richard and Stacey
decided to meet,
maybe even
make out a little,
at their special place
here in the woods.
To say that what happened
next was shocking
was, of course,
an understatement.
- The voice on the 911 call
was Stacey's.
The victim of whatever
happened here
was her husband,
Richard.
He had arrived
at their rendezvous first,
and when she got there later,
he was lying on his back
on the ground
beside his truck.
- Dan Franklin of the Hall
County Sheriff's Department
got the call,
and so there he was,
Valentine's night,
all but groping
as he drove a dark
and winding road
in search of that
muddy clearing by the river.
- It's in-- it's in
the middle of nowhere,
and so that creates
a-a special kinda dark
that you just can't--
you can't appreciate
until you're
in the middle of it.
- Detective Franklin
was an experienced man.
And this?
- This was one of
a very few cases
where the more I dug,
the less sense that it made.
- No, nothing made sense
about this.
- Coming up...
Tire tracks in the mud
that belonged to neither
Richard nor Stacey.
- You could see Richard's
impressions pass over those,
and then you could see
those pass back over Richard's.
That let us know
that that vehicle was here
before Richard got here
and then likely left
after he was dead.
- It had to be the killer.
**
- If there is such a thing
as a perfect spot for murder,
then this just might be it.
Wow, this is remote.
Oh, my God, it's--
- Yeah, it's-it's
pretty secluded
and, uh--
- You could-- if you were--
if you didn't know
what to look for,
- You would miss it.
Right.
There's just a void
on the side of the road.
It's just a dark void.
- It was going on 11 p.m.,
February 14, 2010,
when Detective Franklin
found the place.
- And so, this is the
entrance to the park
where Richard was killed.
- That night, the cops
lit up the crime scene
surrounded by a clearing
of bare soil,
sand, and muddy dirt.
- We got this place lit up
like it's Christmastime,
but, uh, but if these
lights weren't on...
- You can't see your hand
in front of your face.
- And it was like that,
that night.
- Yes, sir, it was.
- We will spare you
the gruesome images
of Richard Schoeck
lying dead beside his truck.
Suffice to say,
he had been shot five times,
three times through his body,
twice in the face.
He lay on his back
near the open door
of his truck.
Sounds like it was probably
a pretty ugly crime scene.
- Yeah, it's--
- I mean, in-in terms
of what happened to him.
- It was, yeah, it was
particularly gruesome.
- What did it say to you
right away?
- Uh, that there--
that's overkill,
especially with
the placement of the shots.
- Also, it was pretty clear
from the get-go
that this was not
a robbery.
- The fact that
Richard had his jewelry--
he had his wedding ring on.
He had a fairly expensive watch
that he still had on.
Uh, there was cash
on the center console
of the truck
that was undisturbed.
Uh, the truck itself
was still here.
I mean, it was
ripe for the taking.
It was running and on,
and the door was open.
- Something else
the detective could infer
from the track
of the bullets
that went through
Richard's body--
he must have gotten
out of his truck
and approached
whoever shot him.
- When, uh,
Stacey found Richard,
his truck was running.
Uh, the driver's door
was open.
The headlights were on.
So, it appeared that he had
just simply pulled up
and got out of his truck
to approach the person
that shot him, which was
a compelling thing for us.
It was somethin' that-
that really got our attention.
- Who was it?
Who did Richard approach?
Whoever it was,
was long gone
by the time
Stacey arrived.
So, not much to go on,
except when a police
technician trained his lights
on the clearing
from the side just so,
a whole new picture
suddenly emerged,
a story in tire tracks
including a set of tracks
that belonged to
neither Richard's truck,
nor Stacey's SUV.
- You could see Richard's
impressions pass over those,
and then you could see those
pass back over Richard's.
- Okay.
- And so, that let us know
that that vehicle was here
before Richard got here
and then likely left
after he was dead.
- Had to be the killer...
but how could
common tire tracks
help them find
whoever did this?
Having seen what he could,
Detective Franklin headed back
to the sheriff's station
to meet Stacey
and record her statement.
It was after midnight
by then.
- This feels unreal.
- Stacey explained
it was her weekend
to care for
her grandparents,
and Richard planned
to come by on Sunday,
Valentine's Day,
to cook dinner.
He arrived about 5:30.
- And I had my Valentine stuff
for him sitting on the desk.
When he walked in
the back door, he was like,
"Oh, well, mine are
out in the truck,
"but I thought we would
do that at the park."
- Because they'd already planned
a brief romantic rendezvous
at Belton Bridge Park
on the way home
to see their kids.
- He was like,
"Come meet at the park.
You know,
it's all secluded."
- Right.
- "You know, it'll be--
"I mean, we'll exchange
our Valentines,"
and then he gave me a kiss.
He was like, "And maybe
even make out."
You know, I mean--
- Day or dark night,
she said, they both knew
the way intimately.
- We'd ridden by that park
gazillions of--
I-I don't know--
lots and lots of times.
- So, after dinner,
Richard left for the park first,
she said, and she
followed a bit later
when a night nurse arrived
to look after the grandparents.
- I think I probably
pulled out of the driveway
at about 9:20 or so.
- Okay.
- I called Richard,
and it went to voicemail,
and I didn't know why,
and I didn't leave a message.
I left.
- And when she got there...
- I knew something
was wrong.
I could see-- I saw his
truck immediately, I mean,
'cause the lights were on,
and so I pulled down,
and I headed right towards
his truck, but as soon as I--
my-- I could see him.
I could see him
laying on the ground.
- Ah, but life is
a complicated business,
as everybody knows.
Even lovers aren't always
straight with each other.
These, however,
were investigators
Stacey was talking to.
She knew they'd ferret out
her secret sooner or later.
So, right away,
she came clean.
- I-I was having--
have been having an affair
for several, you know,
six, seven months.
[sighs]
- An affair.
His name was Juan Reyes.
He worked in Stacey's office
in a job she had gotten for him.
- You know,
I'm in deep with Juan.
I know that.
- Sure.
- I-I'm telling you.
- Oh, yes,
she certainly was.
Stacey and Richard owned
the house Reyes lived in
with his family.
She met Juan for sex at
an apartment Stacey rented
for the purpose.
She paid for
the truck he drove,
paid his cell phone bills
and, she admitted,
had just taken him
to Vegas
and disguised it
as a work trip.
- Did Juan know that you were
supposed to meet Richard
at the park up here?
- He did.
- How did he know that?
- I mean, I had told--
I had told him.
I had-- probably
Tuesday night.
Um, it-it was either
Tuesday or Thursday.
- Was Stacey saying Juan
may have been the killer?
- No, I-I-I just--
I can't im--
I mean, I've-- I guess
I've seen enough TV
to know that
strange things,
you know, things happen.
- Right.
- But I can't--
I can't imagine him
doin' that.
- But the detectives
certainly could.
- And so, we start gettin'
some direction,
and we have this unknown
set of impressions,
so we have a third party
at the scene.
So, now we have to ask
ourselves, is it Juan?
'Cause he was looking
really good, at that point.
- Time to go
and have a little chat
with Mr. Juan Reyes,
even if it was
4 o'clock in the morning.
- We knocked for a while.
We knocked on windows.
We walked around the house
and never could get
anybody to the door.
- Where would someone be
at 4 a.m. if not in bed?
- Richard Schoeck,
46 years old,
had been escorted suddenly
from this life
as he waited for his wife
in a secluded Georgia park
on Valentine's Day.
There was an outside chance,
of course, that it would
turn out to be a simple case
of murder by mistaken identity.
Maybe Richard showed up
at the wrong place
at the wrong time, or maybe
he witnessed something
he wasn't supposed to see.
But when Stacey told the
story of her affair
with this guy
named Juan Reyes,
the cops knew they were
listening to a motive
as old as time.
Jealous boyfriend gets
rid of competition.
The cops showed up at
Juan's house that very night.
- We knocked for a while.
Uh, we knocked on windows.
We walked around the house
and never could
get anybody to the door.
- When you say you knocked
at the door, just,
what, politely or--
- No, no, no.
- Bang, bang, bang, bang.
- No, a-a law enforcement
banging on the door
and banging on
the side of the house
and that kind of thing.
- Had he fled?
Run away?
Later that morning,
the detectives went
to his workplace to see
if he'd show there.
He did, all right, but...
- His appearance had changed
from the information
that we had gathered, uh,
from, uh, different sources,
uh, that showed
that he had a beard.
- Woodrow Tripp was chief
of detectives at the time
and worked the case
with Franklin.
- And, in fact,
when he showed up at work
that morning,
he was beardless.
- Or at least he'd removed
his formerly full beard
and shrunk it to
an appearance altering goatee.
Now, Juan found himself
at the sheriff's station.
He agreed to talk
without a lawyer.
He sat in
the interrogation room
for more than four hours
with several detectives
having a go at him,
including Franklin and Tripp.
- Now, it's my understanding
that you and Stacey
are romantically involved.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Okay.
- He spilled all of that,
the affair, the love nest,
the extra goodies
Stacey showered on him.
Then they caught him
on something.
Stacey had already
told the detectives
that she informed Juan
on Tuesday
or possibly Thursday about
the plans to meet Richard
that Sunday night
of Valentine's Day.
- When did she
tell you that?
- She told me Friday-Friday
after work.
- Would you find it odd if
I told you that she's made
a statement that she told
you earlier than Friday?
- Um, no, I wouldn't.
I mean, I remember
the conversation on Friday.
If she mentioned it
before that, I wasn't--
I wasn't thinking about it
or didn't pay attention to it.
So, there's-- I'm just
forgetful sometimes.
- Was he forgetful,
or was he hiding something?
- Okay.
Well, let me ask you this.
Did you have anything to do
with what's happened to Richard?
- No. No, I'm not.
No, no, definitely no.
- Do you know who did?
- No, uh-uh.
- And so, they asked him.
Where was he before and after
dinner on Valentine's Day?
- Me and my son
went up to Blockbuster.
We ate dinner about--
I wanna say about 7:30.
And by 10:30,
I was in bed.
I don't sleep much,
so three or four hours later,
I'm up tossing
and turning.
- Wait a minute.
If he was up
and tossing and turning,
how did he not hear the cops
banging on his door?
- I don't know what
you tell you, man.
I was in my bed.
- We were there.
- Well, I didn't hear you.
- We ran the doorbell, like,
eight or ten times.
- We were for 15 minutes.
- We knocked for 15 minutes.
- All right.
Well, I didn't even--
we do sleep with fans on,
as I said prior, box fans.
I did take Tylenol PM,
as I stated to you.
- But then you also that
you're a light sleeper.
You tossed and turned last night
and maybe get three,
four hours,
and that's it.
- Right, I was up about
4 o'clock tossing and turning.
I looked at the clock
again at 5.
- We were there.
- I didn't hear you.
I-I don't know
what to tell you.
- Juan Reyes was like
a brick wall about the murder.
Didn't do it.
Didn't know who did.
Really?
The polygraph, said former
Chief of Detectives Tripp,
told a different story.
- The polygraph results
indicated that he was
not telling the truth,
or he was not being truthful
to those relevant questions
posed to him about the homicide.
- Questions such as,
did you shoot Richard Schoeck?
Do you know for sure of anyone
who shot Richard Schoeck?
Were you present when
Richard Schoeck was shot?
- You know, he knows
where Richard is gonna be.
He's in an affair
with Stacey.
He's not at home
at 3, 4 in the morning
the night of the murder.
Uh, he shows up
the next morning--
altered his appearance.
So, when you put of that
together, uh, yeah,
there's a lot
of ringing bells there.
- Will Juan's wife
back up his alibi
when she finds out
he was cheating on her?
- If she wanted to throw
him under the bus,
that was the time
to do it.
- She had
a great opportunity.
- Welcome back to
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
I'm Craig Melvin.
After her husband
Richard's murder,
Stacey Schoeck told police
she had been having an affair.
Now, they were taking
a hard look at her boyfriend,
Juan Reyes, but could it
be that simple?
One detective was determined
to explore every clue
and force the secret
behind this crime
to reveal itself.
Here's Keith Morrison
with "A Perfect Spot."
- There can be few things
in life as shocking,
as disorienting
as the sudden death
of a loved one,
especially one so affectionate,
so enduring,
so apparently happy.
And when
the dreadful news came
with the word
"murder" attached...
- I couldn't think of a soul
that would wanna hurt the man.
I couldn't
think of anyone.
- Richard and his
scouting buddy, Bill Fanning,
spent the evening together
the night before
Richard was killed,
and so Bill heard him
get the phone call from
Stacey about their plans
for Valentine's Day.
- And he said, "We're making
plans to get together
"up near her grandma's."
- 'Cause she was staying
up there for the weekend
or something, right,
looking after her?
- That's correct. She was
looking after her grandmother.
- So, was he happy
about that or--
- He thought that's great.
- A week later, he was
at Richard's memorial.
Stacey asked Bill
to give the eulogy.
- It was one of the most
difficult things I've ever done,
was to get up
and talk about him.
I-I-I remember looking down
at the honorary pallbearers,
and they were all scouts.
There was not
a dry eye there.
- At the end of the service,
everybody wrote messages
to Richard on balloons
and released them
into the air.
All fond memories
said his nephew, Brian.
- Everybody had their own
personal little story.
Richard helped me tie, you know,
my first knots in my tent.
Richard helped me
build my first fire.
You could tell the Cub Scouts
he was working with,
that he touched
their lives like he had,
um, me and my sisters.
- Meanwhile, the Hall County
Sheriff's Department
was working
on their only lead.
- We were focusing
pretty hard on Juan
in the very beginning.
- Juan Reyes,
the boyfriend.
- Though we thought
that he was the shooter,
at the same time,
um, he deserved
for us to, uh,
verify his story.
- Remember, here's
where Juan said he was
late in the day
February 14th.
- Me and my son went up
to Blockbuster.
We ate dinner about--
I wanna say about 7:30.
And by 10:30,
I was in bed.
- There were ways
to check, of course.
They talked
to Juan Reyes' wife,
ex-wife actually.
She was living with him
in an effort to reconcile.
- The first thing
that I told her was
that Juan had been having
an affair with Stacey
for quite some time.
Uh, she wasn't happy
about that.
- No, she wasn't,
but listen to this.
The woman scorned
still confirmed his alibi.
- He had gone to
Blockbuster, um,
while I was cooking,
so between 6 and 7.
He had taken--
6 and 7:30.
Then he came home.
He ate dinner in the room.
I laid down.
We went to bed.
- What time was that?
- Um, I know we were
watching the 10:30 news.
- Okay.
- The 10 o'clock--
I think it was the 10--
10 o'clock.
The last time I looked
at the time,
it was, like, 10:37.
- If she wanted to
throw him under the bus,
that was the time
to do it.
- She had a great
opportunity.
- Yeah.
- She didn't take it.
- So, maybe Juan was
not your guy after all.
- Correct.
- Even though he failed
to answer the door,
even though the polygraph result
was not in his favor,
Juan Reyes was innocent.
He didn't do it.
Well, where did
that leave you?
- Worried about my case.
- A case that had
become personal
for Detective Franklin.
He felt like
he knew Richard,
like he was
mourning him somehow.
- I would sit at the scene,
stand at the scene,
reflect, and just
kinda sit there
and try to go over things
in my head,
um, and-and try to figure out
what direction to take.
- What could he do?
About all Franklin
had to go on
was this picture
of tire tracks
left in the soft soil
at the clearing.
Could he use this
to find his killer?
Not so easy.
Didn't even know
the make of the tire.
- We looked on the Internet,
but we're-we're
coming up empty.
Um, we went to
car dealerships.
We went to retail
tire establishments.
We would pull up next to
cars at traffic lights
and look what kinda tires
they had on 'em.
- And you weren't
seeing 'em.
- No, and anybody-anybody
that we talked to,
we looked at their tires
just to-just to be sure.
- Then one day at
yet another tire store,
a colleague called him
to a stock area out back.
- He pointed at this tire,
and I looked at it,
and immediately
I said, "That's it."
And I said, "Okay."
So, we pulled it, and it was
a Goodyear Integrity.
- Well, that
whittled it down.
Couldn't be more than,
what, millions of cars
with Goodyear Integrity tires.
But just about the time
Franklin was contemplating
that little problem...
- Got a phone call
from an I.T. technician
at the DeKalb Medical Center,
um, and this was--
- Just, like,
out of the blue?
- Yes.
- That's where the office was
that Stacey managed.
The guy's job there
was, in part,
clearing the junk from
employee email accounts.
- And he noticed that
Stacey's inbox for
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
had been completely
cleaned out.
- Curious.
That was the very weekend
of the murder.
- So, he thought enough
to give us a call.
- Was Stacey, Mama Spreadsheet,
the Cub Scout den leader
actually hiding something,
or did she just
accidentally hit delete
too many times?
Of course,
all those deleted files
had been backed up.
So, they got a warrant,
collected all of
Stacey's emails,
not just from that weekend,
4,000 emails in all.
- It was quite a task.
- And a lot of it
was spam,
except two emails seemed--
well, they stood out,
requests from Stacey
to her bank
to transfer money
out of something called
a real estate account.
- So, a few weeks
before the murder was
the first transfer, $8,902.
The second transfer was
the Friday before the murder,
on February the 12th
of 2010,
and that was for $1,100.
Both times, the money
went into the account
of somebody named
Lynitra Ross,
who turned out be
Stacey's friend
and work colleague
and tenant.
She was renting
a house from Stacey.
So, they went to have
a talk with Lynitra.
How did she react?
- Very calm, very cool.
- Didn't seem to
be hiding anything?
- Not based on
what I was looking at.
She just seemed
very-very collected,
and so, um, I asked her
about the money transfer.
He made an audio recording
of the interview.
- Why did Stacey
give her $8,900?
- She said that they
had redone the roof,
um, the-the interior of
the house, carpet, flooring,
and that kinda thing.
- And the $1,100?
Still more repairs.
- But the story made sense.
- It made sense, and she
was always cooperative.
- A simple
business transaction.
Detective Franklin was
right back where he started.
- Yeah, it-it gets
to a point
where you're-you're
still, you know, looking
for-for ways
to-to move forward.
- It was March by then,
close to a month
since the murder,
and they seemed
to be going nowhere.
What to do now?
How about grasp at straws?
- It's called a tower dump.
- A tower dump?
- It was a shot in
the dark, but I took it.
- Coming up...
A killer with a gun
and a cell phone
about to make
a big mistake.
- My way of thinking was,
if he's sittin' there
waitin' in this secluded,
dark place at night,
is he gonna sit there
and twiddle his thumbs,
or maybe he'll make
a phone call.
Had no idea.
- One month into
his investigation
of the murder of
Richard Schoeck,
Detective Franklin
was stuck in the weeds.
- I would sit down with
my supervisor, and I said,
"Look, I'm worried
about this case."
And he would tell me,
"Just hang in there.
All it'll take, is a very
small piece of information,
uh, to break
this thing loose."
- And sure enough,
what do ya know?
The detective
got a phone call.
- The caller was
Stacey's cousin, Connie.
She'd been troubled
by something,
she told the detective.
- It took me a good
three weeks contemplating,
you know, should I call?
Should I not?
- After all, Stacey was
like a big sister,
said Connie, but there
was just something wrong,
like the strange business about
her grandparents' 2009 Impala.
- Stacey was supposed
to sell it for them
because they were
having problems,
and they needed money
for medical bills.
- But after Stacey
took the car?
- A couple weeks later,
it'd be back at her house.
And then a couple weeks
later, it wasn't.
Then it got to the point
where she said
that she sold it
for $16,000.
- And yet, Stacey
never produced the money.
- The family was persistent
about this car.
And so, finally,
we're like, you know,
it's likely that
it was used.
We don't know where it's at.
Let's find this thing.
- So, they ran
the VIN number.
Found the car.
Stacey had sold it
by then.
- And lo and behold, it's got
Goodyear Integrities on it.
So, at that point,
I was confident
that I had found the car
that Richard was killed from.
- Which was great,
except, who was in it?
No idea.
Detective Franklin
was still stuck.
So, he took a longshot.
He asked for something
called a tower dump,
information dump that is,
from this cell tower
on a farm
near the crime scene.
- I subpoenaed all calls
that generated
from the tower that services
Belton Bridge Park
for the night of the murder
from about 7 p.m.
until about 9:30.
- Until 9:30 because
that's when Stacey arrived
and found Richard.
Why start looking
at 7 p.m.?
- It was apparent
that, to me,
that the gunman lay
in wait for Richard.
And so, my way of
thinking was,
if he's
sittin' there waitin'
in this secluded,
dark place at night,
is he gonna sit there
and twiddle his thumbs,
or maybe he'll make
a phone call.
Had no idea.
- If the killer
called anybody,
it should show up
on the tower's record
of outgoing cell calls.
Four major carriers
on that tower,
thousands of calls,
but what number
should he look for?
Why not play a hunch
he'd had all along?
- Stacey is
involved somehow.
You have this third vehicle,
uh, at the scene.
You have overkill with-with
the way Richard died.
So, based on
all those things,
a murder for hire starts
crossing your mind.
- Franklin's idea was
to compare the numbers
from the tower dump
to the phone numbers
on Stacey's
personal contact list.
- The best source of
information I felt I had
was Stacey's contact list.
It was 258 contacts,
I think.
- So, if you could find
any phone call
coming from the crime scene
that happened to be
on her contact list,
that would give you
a big link.
- Yes, that-that would
give me some direction.
- A lot of numbers
to compare,
but then he got lucky,
really lucky.
Maybe 150 numbers
into his search,
there it was, a match.
- It said Reggie.
- The call was placed
at 8:40 p.m.
- And it was
a 28-second call.
- So, Richard left
the grandparents' house
at about 8:15.
It's about
a 15-minute drive
from the grandparents' house
to the park.
- Would have got there
around 8:30.
- He would've
got there at 8:30,
and we felt he was killed
as soon as he stepped out
of his truck.
So, you're looking
at him dying
sometime right around
8:30 to 8:45.
So, here's a call from Reggie
in Stacey's contact list
at 8:40 p.m. on the night
of the murder.
- But who was Reggie?
- And under
Reggie's company name,
it said Mr. Results.
- So, Franklin's next step,
naturally...
- And I simply
Googled Mr. Results.
The first link was
Mr. Results Personal Training.
- His name was
Reginald Coleman,
personal trainer and former
semiprofessional boxer,
and he held workout sessions
at Stacey's office.
Then Detective Franklin
looked at
the number Reggie called.
- And I should've
already recognized it
because I already
had it in my notes
because it was
Lynitra Ross.
- Lynitra Ross, the woman
who claimed she received
$10,000 from Stacey
for house repairs
within three weeks
of the murder.
Now, the trail
was warm, very warm.
He pulled phone records
for all three,
Reggie, Lynitra,
and Stacey.
Combed through hundreds
of calls and texts
until...
- A very interesting
sequence of calls
actually emerged
from that.
- A sequence on February 14th,
it went like this.
At 6:42 p.m.,
Reggie called Lynitra.
At 6:45, Lynitra
called Stacey.
At 6:48, Lynitra
called Reggie back.
- In my mind, Reggie
called Lynitra and said,
"Are we still doing this?"
And Lynitra called Stacey,
and Stacey confirming,
"Yes, he's here,
I'll have him at the park,"
and then Lynitra
calling Reggie back saying,
"Yes, go up there."
- And after that,
no more calls until 8:40 p.m.
when Reggie's call to Lynitra
was captured by the tower
near the crime scene.
- The call at 8:40 p.m.
to Lynitra Ross
was Reggie calling her saying,
"It's done."
- And then get this.
At 9 p.m.,
Lynitra sent Stacey a text.
Happy Valentine's Day,
it said.
Is that a code?
- It was.
- Code for it's done.
He's dead.
Almost there now.
All he needed was a money trail
to prove murder for hire,
so bank records this time.
- It was the same tedious work
as the cell phone records.
- And guess what?
That $10,000 that Stacey
transferred to Lynitra
supposedly from
a real estate account
for home repairs,
only $1,800 went into that.
The rest went to
Lynitra for cash.
Lynitra wrote Reggie
a check for $700.
- All within three weeks
of the murder.
That's the whole thing.
It had come together
at that point.
Reggie is my triggerman.
My middle person
is Lynitra Ross.
- And the mastermind?
Stacey.
- Three months after
the Valentine's Day murder
of Richard Schoeck...
- Your charge is
malice murder.
- Lynitra Ross.
- I'm gonna read you that.
Make you aware of the charge is,
and it's malice murder.
- Reggie Coleman and
Stacey Schoeck were arrested
and charged with murder.
But then...
- I told Stacey
we can fight this.
- A surprise was coming.
Check that--
surprises, more than one.
Stacey had a story to tell.
- Arrested for murder.
Stacey Schoeck prepares to
tell police
exactly what happened
and why.
Coming up...
Is there ever an excuse
for murder?
- Having lived through that,
I was never gonna
let it happen to my kids.
**
- Three months
after Stacey Schoeck
found her husband's
bullet perforated body
at Belton Bridge Park,
she and her alleged confederates
were under arrest for murder.
It was just crazy.
Didn't make sense.
A mother of three,
Cub Scout leader.
Surely, she'd come up
with a defense
when she met with her attorney,
Max Hirsch,
but, no, that's not
what happened, far from it.
- She laid it all out.
She didn't hesitate.
She didn't minimize.
She told me exactly
what the plan was.
- The plan for murder.
Her lawyer, no surprise,
had his own plan.
- I told Stacey I already know
how we would defend this case.
She looked me
straight in the eye,
without hesitation,
and said, "No, the gig is up.
I did this.
What I did was wrong.
No more lies."
- Stacey wanted to confess.
It took a while to arrange it,
but seven months
after the murder,
with the recording running,
confess she did.
- I'm not gonna keep lying.
I'm done.
I'm-I'm done, you know?
- It all started over lunch
with Lynitra, said Stacey,
when she told her friend
she wished her husband was dead,
and Lynitra
offered the services
of her sometime
boyfriend, Reggie.
- And then I was like,
"Reggie, really?"
And she was like,
"Yeah," and she said,
"Yeah, that's what he did.
That's what he does.
That's how he supplements
his income.
You know, he does jobs."
- So, said Stacey,
Lynitra arranged for
the three of them to meet,
and Reggie agreed
to kill Richard.
- Then I was like,
"Well, how much cash?"
And he was like,
"Well, you know,
I was thinking around $10,000."
I was like, "Okay."
- That was the $10,000
Stacey transferred to Lynitra.
She gave the money to Reggie.
Stacey also agreed to give him
her grandparents' 2009 Impala.
Yes, that Impala
and the house Lynitra
was renting from her.
A week later, all three
went to scout the crime scene.
- So, he was like,
"Yeah, this will be--
this is a perfect place."
And, um,
and he even made a comment that,
you know, "I might have to
use this place more often."
- But the night of the murder,
said Stacey,
Reggie botched the plan.
- That was-that was gonna be
my next question.
- It was supposed to be
a robbery.
- Right.
- That's what he had said.
It was supposed to be
one shot to the head.
I said, "I don't
want him to suffer.
I don't want him
to see anything."
- But why would she possibly
want to have Richard killed?
For that question,
Stacey offered this story.
- Things started clicking
in my brain
of what was happening
with my kids
and my family, and, um, um,
and I was convinced that,
um, my kids were being harmed.
- Stacey said she believed
Richard was molesting her sons.
They were acting out,
and there was something
one of them told her.
- "You don't know
what happens to--
he does to me
when you're not here."
That kinda stuck.
You know, that stuck
in my brain for sure.
- To her, there was
just one solution.
- I didn't want police.
I didn't want a divorce.
I just wanted him-him dead.
- And so, here it was,
her reason for murder.
Stacey said she had been
molested as a child repeatedly,
and she knew what it was like.
- Having lived through that,
I was never gonna let it happen
to my kids.
- Did you ask the boys?
- Not-not direct--
not-not directly enough,
not then.
I have since.
- It was after her arrest,
her sons asked her why.
What would make you
want to hurt him?
And she explained.
- People touched me
in a bad way when I was a kid,
and I reacted in certain ways,
and sometimes your behaviors
made me worry that
you were getting touched
in a bad way.
- And the son who made
that earlier statement
to his mother responded,
devastated.
- He said, "No."
He said, "No."
He said, "I'm sorry.
I exaggerated.
I'm sorry that
I said those things.
I-I-I blew things
out of proportion, mom."
- Stacey was wrong.
There was no abuse.
- Now, that's a hard thing
to deal with, too,
because now he has guilt.
- But was the motive
she admitted real,
or was a more venal truth
still withheld?
There would be an answer,
just not quite yet.
We asked for an interview
with Stacey,
but prison rules
wouldn't allow it,
so her attorney spoke
on her behalf.
- She understands
completely what she did.
She understands
it is her fault
Richard Schoeck is dead.
She doesn't have excuses.
- Stacey Schoeck
pleaded guilty to murder.
Reggie Coleman
did the same.
Lynitra Ross stood trial
and was found guilty,
and all of them
were sentenced to life in prison
without parole.
The case solved.
Three convictions
for the detective
who poured through
reams of phone numbers
and sniffed out
a murder for hire case.
- You know, when your gut
tell you somethin',
you should go with it,
and if it makes sense,
then-then that's-that's
probably what it is.
- Pretty obvious
if I ask you
where this fits in your, uh,
in your catalog of cases.
- Uh, uh, there will be--
never be another one like it.
I'm pretty sure.
I hope not.
- And now, finally,
the last admission.
A few days
after Stacey was sent away,
Richard's sister, Carol,
went to see her.
Glared at Stacey
through the glass partition.
She didn't buy Stacey's story
about her reason
for killing Richard.
- I said,
"Okay, Stacey, this is it.
I wanna know."
And I said,
"No bull. No lies.
I wanna know
why you had Richard killed."
- There was a long pause,
and then out it came.
- She said, "Because of
my actions back then
and because of the way
I was living my life,
I knew that
I couldn't divorce Richard
'cause if I divorced Richard,
he would have enough of a chance
to get custody of my kids,
which he had adopted legally,
and I couldn't
let that happen."
And I just looked at her,
and I said, "Thank you,"
and I hung up the phone.
- But if the answer satisfied
some need to know,
the pain was
and is no different.
Richard Schoeck is dead.
His quirkiness,
adventurous spirit,
devotion to
those Boy Scouts, all gone.
- We had a thing.
It was called
a Richard fire.
If it wasn't stoked up
and burning bright
and the flames
almost licking the treetops,
it wasn't a good fire.
[laughing]
So, if you want
a Richard fire,
that's the fire
you gotta have.
And when we're at
scouting events,
and we see
the big fire we built
and the smoke coming up,
we all talk about Richard.
- And that's all for
this edition of
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."
I'm Craig Melvin.
Thank you for watching.