- I'm kate snow, and this is "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Deep in the woods, a family lives in fear.
- "what are you gonna do if they come back?"
- Of a threat from strangers.
- "daddy will protect us.
"daddy won't let anything bad happen to you."
- So, when the strangers arrive,
A father takes matters into his own hands.
- I hear a crack, crack, crack, gunfire.
- The terror, the bullets--
This was, like, shooting fish in a barrel.
- Glass is exploding-- just complete chaos.
- The crime scene caught on camera.
- Anybody in the vehicle, let me see your hands!
- It was bad.
Worse than anything you would see in a movie.
- Sometimes I've cried for my dad.
- Was this a murder?
- Every day, I think of that.
- Alls I could think of, is my kids.
What about my kids?
♪♪
- Hello, and welcome to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
It was supposed to be a relaxing 4th of July
In the sierra nevada mountains, but one fateful night,
A family getaway turned into a holiday horror.
A father, determined to defend his home,
Chased down a carload of strangers.
The deadly showdown that followed
Would divide a town
Until one man's battle for justice
Exposed a stunning secret.
Here's keith morrison with "miles from nowhere."
♪♪
- It was in the dark that the fear began,
In the dark, with the sounds of the black night around them
That had grew and grew.
- They terrorized our family, our friends.
- Who was out there in the dark,
Here, miles and miles into primeval woods,
So far from safety, from civilized protection?
- They could just come onto our property
And invade our lives.
- But on a summer night deep in the california sierra,
The terror came out of the dark,
Came after them, to take everything.
[crying, whimpering]
- The terrible, desperate chase,
Its awful end, and now the question--
What really happened out there in the dark?
- Stand up!
- I still feel like I need to go help him.
- It looks so innocent now, closed up, dead quiet, empty,
Here in its place at the end of a 100-yard dirt track
That snakes off this lonely country road
Deep in the sierra nevada,
But this was not how it was or was ever meant to be.
No... Before it happened,
Before that summer night in July 2011,
This was... Well, let them tell it.
- She said, "magical place." - very-- it's fun.
It's awesome. It's fun.
- Mostly, at winter,
We would do a snowball-ball fight,
And then we would come inside and eat
And have some hot cocoa.
- These are the wallin-reed children.
Darlin is the eldest, then georgia,
And little gregory.
Mostly, they lived in reno, nevada,
But this-this at the end of a two-hour drive into the woods,
This was the place they lived.
- We'd go on hikes, and there is, like, a lake
That was very close. - And we would fish.
- And we'd swim. - And we'd fish,
And we'd go up there, and we'd fish and swim.
It was pretty much awesome.
- Here, they discovered a world far more magical
Than any city could ever be.
It was their father's cabin, really-- chad wallin-reed.
Chad's grandparents built the cabin the '70s
When he was just a baby.
- My children were definitely, "daddy, we love the place."
They've all grown up, in diapers,
All the way through, goin' up there.
- Mind you, this was truly remote.
Their only electricity came from a generator.
There was no cell phone service, no phone at all,
Which was just fine with chad's wife, kerri.
- It was very enjoyable to be away from the phones,
And traffic, and, you know, work.
[laughing] - yeah.
This is where chad taught his children how to exist
In the natural world, how to catch a fish,
Swim in a mountain lake, feel safe in the dark.
- He's an amazing father. He loves his children so much.
- The children saw the world
And certainly their retreat here in the country
As a safe place for them, just as it should be,
And keeping it that way was chad's particular preoccupation.
Chad worried a lot about safety, about security,
Which may have come, in part at least,
From his time in the military.
He was, he said, an army ranger,
One of the elite few.
Though, like a lot of vets,
He seemed to carry some baggage.
- There's just some things I'd rather not talk about
And-and things that I've tried to, uh, get over.
I guess. - Right.
Kerri didn't pry.
Let him deal with it his own way.
- Between himself and the lord.
He loves this country. - Mm-hmm.
- He, you know, fought for our freedom,
And it means a lot to him.
- And now, between the children
And whatever was out there in the woods
Were only their parents.
The nearest sheriff's office almost an hour's drive away.
Had to be your own policeman.
That was how you felt? - Yes.
We had to protect ourselves.
There was nobody else there to protect us.
- And out here, that was no idle worry.
Break-ins are not uncommon in the isolated cabins
Up here in the wilderness. And theirs?
- Oh, the cabin has been broken in,
You know, numerous times.
- There's something very invasive about that, too,
When somebody goes into property that's yours
And takes something of yours.
- It is. It's not just invasive.
It robs you of security.
- Security was why chad gave kerri a revolver,
Taught her how to use it,
And stocked the cabin with guns,
Including a favorite, his ar-15,
A lot like his military weapon,
Security and pleasure.
What's the attraction of those?
- I think it's just the fun in shooting 'em.
It's just... [laughing]
You know, being able to put a-a 30-round magazine
And then set up a target and just go at it.
- Chad planted signs at the edge of his property
Out by the road,
Stern warnings to would-be vandals and thieves,
And he watched, vigilant, didn't rest easy,
Especially because one of those break-ins
Had been just that very year.
- And if-if you did fall asleep, it was very lightly,
And every-every noise would wake you up very easily.
- Then, the 4th of July weekend, 2011,
The wallin-reeds were joined by some friends
Who set up a little campsite on the property
Near the road.
- Just enjoying each other's company
And hanging out.
- But early on the Saturday morning,
About 2 a.M., chad was jolted awake.
- All of a sudden, I heard all this yelling and commotion,
And it sounded like somebody was fighting,
And I looked out, and I saw this spotlight
Being shined all over the place,
And I was like, what the heck is goin' on?
And then I walk out, and, uh, as I'm lookin' down,
This car goes speeding away.
- Chad hopped in his truck.
Drove to the end of the driveway.
- And that's when I noticed one of the solar lights
Had been taken.
- A solar light,
One of several attached to metal poles
Marking the edge of the property,
A cheap item, but still...
Why would somebody want one of those?
- I don't know.
- When morning came,
Chad inspected his friend's campsite
Near the bottom of the property.
Were those footprints of strangers
Around their trailer?
- It put us on-on edge, you know, basically high alert.
- I remember asking my dad and mom,
"what are you gonna do if they come back,
"and what would happen if somebody got hurt?"
- To witness your children scared like that and insecure,
And you, as a parent, have failed,
You know, and that's how I felt was,
As a father, as a-- as a person that,
You know, supposed to protect your family,
And alls I could do was offer words.
"honey, if they come back, daddy will--
"daddy will protect you. Daddy will take care of it."
- A promise he intended to keep.
- What happened the next night
Would change their lives forever.
- I picked up the pistol that was in my cup holder
And pointed it out the window.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Saturday morning, July 4th weekend, 2011--
Chad wallin-reed and his family were on edge.
Strangers had come very close, middle of the night,
Strangers who stole a solar light
And may have been tramping around
On their property.
And suddenly, the cabin felt more remote,
The woods less like home, and the children...
- They asked, "what if they come back
And come all the way up to the cabin? What if...?"
- So, what did you say? - "daddy will protect us.
"daddy, you know, daddy won't let anything bad happen to you."
It was-- it was scary. It was scary to me.
- Then, that afternoon,
While chad was away on an errand,
Kerri looked out the window,
And there was a jeep heading up the long driveway
Driven by a young man she did not know.
- He sat there for a while
And like he was lookin' around for somethin'.
I had the kids stay down, out of sight,
So-so they wouldn't be seen.
- Was he lost? Looking for help?
She took no chances.
She reached for the gun chad had taught her how to use.
- I had my revolver,
And I was headed towards the door.
- And then whoever it was backed up and drove away.
So, what did that do to your level of anxiety
That weekend? - Oh, it-it was high.
- Ramped it up some more. - Oh, yes.
- That evening, still on edge,
Kerri and the kids watched a movie
And fell asleep on the couch.
Chad sat outside with his visiting friends,
Who had set up camp on his property.
- We were just sittin' there on the porch,
Kickin' back, relaxin', bsin'.
- The story of what happened next
Is both complex and, as you'll see, disputed,
Which is why we have shot our own video
To help us illustrate events.
It was 9 or 10 p.M., said chad,
When his friends noticed a car.
- And then they said,
"it just shut off his headlights
"and pulled up into the driveway."
- What was going on? That car the night before,
The jeep that came up the drive that very afternoon,
And now strangers were out there, again.
- I picked up the ar that was sittin'--
It was sittin' right there next to me.
- His ar-15 bushmaster.
[gunshot] he fired a warning shot.
- And then, uh,
I just remember seein' some guy runnin' away.
- But would a warning be enough?
These had to be the same men who came the night before.
Now, here they were a second time.
These guys were bad news.
I said, "I'm gonna try and catch up to these guys.
"you know, go get 'em. You know, catch 'em."
Get their license plate or get their information
Or somethin', you know,
Because it was apparent that this was more than
Just we're here to play and joke around with you.
- Chad jumped in his truck and gave chase,
Barreling up the twisty mountain road
At up to 50 miles an hour.
- As I was comin' up behind 'em, somebody leaned out the, uh,
The passenger side of the vehicle
And was shining a million power spotlight.
I mean, it was just blinding.
And then, uh, next thing I know, as I'm lookin' up,
I see these three flashes,
And then I hear crack, crack, crack, crack.
It was, uh, the sound of, you know, gunfire.
- A sound chad knew very well.
He'd been in the army, remember.
So, what'd you do?
- I, uh, picked up the pistol that was in my cupholder,
Chambered a round,
And pointed it out the window,
And let, you know, let off a few rounds and...
- Did you hit anything? - Not that I could tell, no.
- Someone in the car ahead threw solar lights out the window,
Then waved something.
- Like a piece of plastic, somethin' shiny flyin' out,
You know, or hanging out a window,
And, uh, we kept on proceeding.
- Back in the cabin, kerri lay tense on the couch.
Her three kids sleeping beside her.
- I was just, like, in my mind, thinkin',
Where are you?
[laughing] come home.
You know, is everything okay? I hope everything is okay.
- Chad was still in hot pursuit.
Seven point six miles they went,
Careening up the windy country road,
Until the car took a quick turn
Onto a remote dirt road. Chad right behind.
- They did some fishtails,
You know, like they had slid the car,
And at one point, the passenger door
Just started to open up,
And I thought, you know, these guys are gonna get out.
They're gonna, you know, they're gonna come at me.
- The dirt road emptied into a meadow,
And the car suddenly made a 180.
And it looked like they were comin' straight at you.
- Yeah, I mean-- - like an--
Looking like an assault. - Right.
- Were they gonna shoot him? Ram him? What?
- In military and in police,
That's what we call an escalation of tactics
Until somebody, you know, either backs down,
Or the threat is neutralized.
- The other car kept coming. Chad grabbed the ar-15.
- And I just shoved it out the window and fired off.
- Where were they compared to you?
So, they were coming this way.
- They were right-- - right beside you.
- Right, right.
- How many shots did you--
- I don't recall. I just--
- Just let it go. - Right.
- Chad watched his enemies' driver's side window blow out.
Glass rained down on the meadow.
The strangers' car veered across the grass
And came to rest on the dirt road.
- I just drove over to 'em, and I was yelling at them,
And, uh, I just remember this-this young voice saying,
Uh, "I give up. I give up. I give up.
"we're sorry, but, you know, please don't kill me."
It, uh, it doesn't make you feel very good
"to have somebody pleading and begging for their life."
- Chad's protective fury lessened for a moment
And then... - I remember him yelling,
Um, "I have a three-month-old daughter."
And alls I could think of was my kids.
Thinking you're-you're yelling at me about your daughter
And look what you just did.
You know, what about my kids?
Did you ever consider my kids?
- Who were these men in the car?
What did they want?
Here in the dark, miles from nowhere,
What had just happened, and what was about to?
- Back home, chad faces the reality of what's happened.
- I just remember this lost look on her face,
And I was just saying, "I'm sorry."
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Late evening, a remote mountain meadow
In california's high sierra,
His ar-15 at the ready,
Chad wallin-reed approached the car
Full of men he believed had been terrorizing him--
Him, and his wife, and his children,
And his peace.
He carried his rifle just like the army trained him.
- I was at the ready.
Hey, if-if they came out of that vehicle
And made any-any movements,
You know, I could see their hands, and, you know,
I'd approach the vehicle.
- This is the car chad shot at.
As he checked out the inside, clearing it,
As they say in the military,
He saw the driver had been hit.
- He was hunched over the steering wheel,
And then, uh,
When I got into the driver's side of the vehicle,
He was laid back, and, uh, his head was-was down.
I mean, I didn't check for a pulse
Or anything like that,
But, uh, there was a bullet, you know, wound in his neck.
- Were they-- some of the others
Were wounded, also, right?
- At that point in time, I didn't know.
- Nor did chad know any of the men in the car,
Who they were,
Why they'd approached his home,
But once he saw they no longer posed a threat,
He said, he told the men
He'd do what he could to find help for them.
- I said, "I'm gonna go call the sheriff."
- And he drove the seven and a half miles
Back to his cabin.
As you're driving back,
As you're now trying to figure out
What the hell you've done,
What was going on in your heart,
Your mind, your soul?
- An assessment. - Uh-huh.
- Somebody is either dead or dying.
Something very serious has happened here.
What steps do we go through?
- None of that drive was occupied with the,
"oh, my god, what the hell have I done?"
- No, no, uh-uh.
- When he pulled into the driveway,
Chad was greeted by his friends.
They had seen him race off into the night.
Now, he told them what happened.
- And I said, "I caught up to 'em.
You know, they shot at me, I shot back,
And I think I killed one of 'em."
And at first, everybody was like, ahh, you know,
Just laughin' and stuff like that.
And I said, "no, I-I-I think I killed one of 'em."
- Chad's wife, kerri, up in the cabin with the kids,
Couldn't tell what chad was saying outside.
- It felt like much longer than it actually was
For him to get out of the truck
And to-to come inside the cabin,
And then he came inside.
- And she's like, "well, what, you know, what happened?"
I said, "you know, I took off after 'em,
"and, uh, I think I killed one of 'em."
- He was so upset.
He-he looked as if he continued to talk,
That he would just not be able to maintain
Any composure whatsoever.
- And I just remember-- I just remember her looking at me,
And, uh, I couldn't tell what the look was about,
Whether, you know, it was a relief from her,
Or it was a, uh, who are you?
I mean, it was some kind of look of accusation, I guess,
And, you know, I just remember just this lost look on her face
I've never, ever seen in my entire life,
And I was just sayin', "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
- But what should he do? Chad wasn't exactly sure.
He turned to his friend, jason.
- I was thinking, well, maybe I could go back,
And one of us could go and make a phone call,
And one of us could go back and help,
But jason was like,
"no. Going back would be a terrible idea."
And he said, "we need to go and call 911."
- Remember, their cabin didn't have a telephone.
So, kerri got dressed, and then she, and chad,
And their friend drove the winding road down the mountain
Toward the main highway, perhaps nine miles down,
Hunting for a spot with cell phone reception.
- I called out, and I'd gotten through,
And right as, you know, I was talking to the lady,
The call dropped,
And then I had to drive down a little bit farther.
We were able to make a call out there.
- He was concerned, he said,
About getting help for the wounded.
- In my mind, was how are they gonna find
These, you know, individuals?
How are they gonna get there to help them?
I mean, they're out in the middle of nowhere
On a dirt road.
- This northern stretch of the sierra nevada
Is an up and down world of river gorges
And mountain peaks, difficult to forage,
And far from any towns or resorts.
The few deputies on patrol
Are scattered over a vast wilderness,
And so it's not altogether surprising
That one of the first lawmen to respond to chad's 911 call
Turned out to be a game warden.
What is surprising, is who was riding with him,
A photographer of all people,
One of the first to reach the scene of the shooting,
And the images he captured...
- It was bad.
Worse than anything you would see in a movie,
I'll tell ya that.
- The horrifying real life scene
That first responders found.
- I just remember seeing this hand come up out of the grass.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow.
Chad wallin-reed opened fire on a car full of men
He believed had been threatening
His wife and children.
Chad told family and friends he may have killed one of them
And injured several others,
But officials were about to find a crime scene
With its own secrets to reveal.
Back to keith morrison with "miles from nowhere."
- In the high sierra,
The life of a game warden is a solitary one,
Hours of driving along back country roads alone.
Wardens hunt everything from bear poachers to pot farmers
And its prey that sometimes shoots back.
That lone justice angle attracted a reality show,
Which sent a photographer named ben staley
To the little town of quincy, here in plumas county.
- I'd been in-in the quincy area for a couple months,
Gettin' into all kinds of trouble
With the california game wardens.
- It was the 4th of July weekend,
Late on a Saturday night.
Staley had been taping with the game warden since daybreak.
He was ready to pack it in.
Then an urgent call went out over the radio.
Shots fired.
- We're speeding to get there,
Um, to perhaps break it up, perhaps stop it.
Perhaps save lives. You don't really know.
- They didn't know, in other words,
That they were responding to the 911 call
From chad wallin-reed
After his armed confrontation with six men
On a dark road running through a meadow.
While racing to the scene, staley and the warden
Met up with a sheriff's deputy.
Then, over the radio, came a new twist.
Two men, possibly wounded, had been found wandering
Through a campground.
- So, we go to this campground,
And, sure enough, you know, we all hop out,
And then there's-there's, like, two guys
In the middle of this campground
With blood on 'em.
One of the sheriff takes them.
They-they cuff 'em up and take 'em right there.
And then these guys are like, "look, our friends are hurt,"
And they give us directions to where
The incident occurred.
- The meadow, that is,
The dirt road where the shooting took place,
A place so remote that without those directions,
They might never have found it.
As they drove through the night,
They listened to the chatter on the two-way.
- It was very chaotic.
Nobody knew exactly what was happening.
Nobody knew if there was, you know,
Multiple people shooting at each other,
If it was two people shooting at each other.
There was all these conflicting reports
Coming in over the radio.
It's really scary.
- Staley and the warden were now joined
By a total of three deputies.
The makeshift team convoyed to the meadow,
Geared up for a possible shootout.
They found a lone vehicle, its windows blown out.
- I want you to stand up! Stand up!
- Staley shot this footage of the encounter,
Which later became part of the official public record.
- Right away, there's two guys comin' towards,
With their hands up.
One guy is limpin' really bad.
Um, he was shot through the leg.
They're both bloody and cut up.
They both look really freaked out.
- Then staley saw something strange
Poking out of the meadow floor.
- I just remember seeing this hand come up
Out of the grass.
- I got one off to the right here, one hand up.
- Okay.
- All right. Keep your hands up!
- And everyone was like, "whoa, we got a hand."
- Staley recorded everything, the warden,
The deputies arresting the wounded men,
The hand poking out of the grass,
And then the young man who was connected to that hand,
His right calf shredded by a bullet.
- Had tourniqueted his leg,
But the sheriffs and the wardens
Right away saw that he had it on too tight,
And he'd had it on too long,
And it was very painful, and they took it off,
And, uh, he was bleeding a lot.
- This badly wounded man plus the others made five,
But there was one more.
- And then there was another guy in the backseat,
Who was, I guess, the driver.
Uh, he was a lot worse off.
But he was talking, he was moving his mouth.
I could hear sounds. I couldn't make--
I couldn't make any words out, you know,
But it-it didn't look good.
- The driver had been shot in the head.
- It was worse than anything you would see in a movie.
This was so violent and so gory.
- What happened here?
Sorting it out fell to detective steve peay
And chris hendrickson.
- It was very confusing for all the officers responding.
They were all under the impression that
The suspects were in the meadow,
In the car, and maybe armed,
And officers treated 'em as such.
- Adding to the confusion, the remote location,
Multiple locations.
- We had two gentlemen at the campground.
We have four gentlemen down at this potential crime scene,
And then I had mr. Wallin-reed
With another detective at another spot.
Officers, ambulances, helicopters comin' in.
It's very chaotic-- very chaotic that night.
- Deputies, led by sergeant peay, met chad
A few miles from the meadow,
Listened to his account of the chase.
- But while sergeant peay was talking to chad,
Some of the other detectives were out here in the meadow
Looking for the weapon or weapons
Those young men must have fired at chad.
They searched the car, they searched around the car.
They looked all around the meadow.
They found nothing.
But then, it's a big meadow,
And those are very deep and very dark woods.
Some of those young men did run.
They could've dumped a gun out there somewhere.
But they didn't all run.
- I got one off to the right here, one hand up.
- Remember the one shot in the leg,
The one cameraman ben staley documented
With his hand sticking up,
Who was found bleeding out in the meadow?
He didn't bleed out. He survived.
His name is justin lewis smyth,
Lewis, and he's about to give us his account
Of a July 4th weekend on a dark and lonely road
In the high sierra.
- Coming up...
Confusion and terror, a very different story
Of those shots in the dark.
- The next thing I know, glass is exploding.
It's just complete chaos.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- This is where it ended, in an ink black meadow
In the high sierra
Barely illuminated by a pair of headlights.
Here is the actual video of the sheriff's deputies,
Guns drawn, approaching the car,
Preparing for a possible shootout with gunmen.
Instead, they found shooting victims,
Three of them, severely wounded.
- Somebody makes their way over towards the car and says...
- Let me see your hands!
- Lewis smyth can be seen in the footage here,
Shot in the right leg, bleeding profusely.
The belt he used as a tourniquet
Placed just above his knee possibly saved his life.
- At that point, it's pretty obvious to me
That I'm gonna lose my leg.
I-I mean, I'm not sure how long had gone by,
Maybe an hour and a half.
- And there were other victims,
A bloody and baffling scene for the deputies.
Who were these men?
How did they provoke a violent confrontation
With army vet chad wallin-reed.
Chad and his family said they'd been terrorized,
But that was not the story lewis smyth had to tell.
Lewis' version began
An hour's drive away in susanville, california,
Population almost 18,000,
Home to two state prisons, two movie theaters,
And, on July 4th weekend, 2011,
To restless young men in search of fun.
There was lewis, of course, and his very best friend,
A 20-year-old junior college student
Named rory mcguire.
- He was the center of attention wherever he went.
- All eyes were on rory,
In fact, right from the start.
That amazing shock of red hair at birth
Surprising even his own mother, carol.
- His named was gonna be colin,
And then he came out with the red hair,
And I had to look through a baby name book,
And I found the name rory, which means red king in irish,
And so hence rory colin mcguire.
- And that red hair came with a personality to match.
- There was only one rory, and everyone knew who it was.
He was vivacious. He was creative.
He was exciting. He was funny.
He was the life of the party.
- We would talk every day.
I'd tell him almost every detail,
Laugh about little things.
I told my mom I wanted a brother,
And, uh, I felt like I kinda got that with rory.
- Anyway, that Friday night, July 1st,
Rory and lewis were joined by four other young men
In search of a party they'd heard about.
- We were looking for a friend of ours' brother
Who was having a gathering up by antelope lake.
- Girls up there, somebody said.
So, here's what the did.
And once again, we prepared special video,
This time to illustrate lewis' story
In which they all squeezed into rory's sebring,
Drove to the lake, but couldn't find the party.
So, they got up to a little mischief
Up there by the lake
With a spotlight one of them brought,
The kind that plugs into a cigarette lighter.
- We stopped at the top of a canyon,
And we're shining the light down on a campsite,
And a bunch of people came out yellin'.
They were mad, and anyways, uh...
Everybody kinda got a kick out of that.
- Then, one of them remembered some crazy warning signs
They'd seen by the roadside, wanted to show his buddies.
They found them, trained the spotlight on them.
- And one of 'em says "warning: You are entering r.O.C.,"
The r.O.C., something to do with
This red-blooded christians only.
Others will be--
Deadly force, uh, will be used.
- Deadly force? Red-blooded christians only?
Were they kidding?
Seemed almost like a dare.
One of them hopped out of the car.
- He grabs a solar light
And ripped down one of the smaller of the two signs
And comes runnin' back in,
And then we-we took off from there.
- Cheap light, maybe four or five bucks,
Still...
Why did he take the solar light, did he say?
- No, I think it was assumed it was just
Some sort of random act of vandalism
That, I guess, young kids would do.
- And then the noisy car full of young men
Rolled back home,
And they all went to bed.
The following evening was Saturday, July 2nd,
And, sure enough, there was a second chance,
Same lake, new party.
So, again, a bunch of young men
Piled into rory mcguire's chrysler sebring.
- And went and met up with two others
At the chevron gas station
Where we bought, I think, a bottle of blueberry vodka
And a couple 40-ounces of beer to take with us.
- Okay.
- And we get about halfway up the grade,
And we approach the property, again.
- The wallin-reed property.
Suddenly, rory stopped the car.
And again, one of the group jumped out and stole
Two more solar lights.
- Ten seconds passed or so,
And right as caesar was getting into the car,
I heard a-- what sounded like a gunshot.
- Rory hit the gas.
"was somebody shooting at us?" they asked each other.
Lewis, a little freaked out, looked out the back window.
- I turned around just to see
A truck behind us.
- Gaining on you.
- Yeah, I could pretty much tell that
That meant business.
And right after that, I remember seeing
A green laser traveling around in the car with us.
- A green laser?
A laser from a gun?
- We assumed, yes.
It's like you-you can't believe it.
No, they're not gonna shoot us.
Uh, that's absurd.
- People don't shoot other people, yeah.
- No, not for this.
And right after that, I hear pow-pow-pow,
And then, every once in a while,
You'd hear a ding on the trunk or somethin' like that.
- It's hitting the car. - Yes.
- They tried blinding the shooter
With their spotlight.
Didn't seem to help.
- Meanwhile, this whole time, we've been trying to call 911,
And there's no service,
And somebody suggests we wave
My white tee shirt out the window.
- Let's wave this. Maybe he'll stop.
- Exactly, yeah.
We were trying every technique we could
To have them stop. - Yeah.
- So, he was-- - and this guy just kept firing.
- Oh, throughout the whole rest of this trip,
There's flurries of shots being taken at us.
- Desperate now, rushing along a road he did not know,
Rory suddenly took a wrong turn.
- So, we were on this dirt road, still taking fire
At different points in time,
And he's still chasing us, and, uh...
Eventually what I hear rory say is,
"this road just came to an abrupt stop."
And so, he's trying to flip around.
- Trying to get away, said lewis,
Get around the truck.
Get out of the meadow they were trapped in.
- The next thing I know,
Glass is exploding everywhere,
Hitting us in the head.
- Was the car still moving, at that point?
- Yes, and it's just complete chaos.
At that point,
That was when, uh, when I got shot.
It felt like a heat kinda came over my leg.
- When the car finally came to a stop,
Those who could ran.
- I said, "come on, rory. Let's go."
And I looked up, and rory had his face in his chest,
And I'm pretty sure he said, "I can't."
And right at that moment, I saw the laser light again.
And at that point, the gunman approached.
- Coming up...
Was the shooter coming to finish the job?
- He starts to circle around the car.
The whole while, he's pointing the gun at us.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- In a remote forest meadow, in the dark,
A tiny green dot probed the interior
Of rory mcguire's immobilized chrysler sebring.
The laser site was back,
Its green dot a roving bullseye.
Lewis smyth, crouched, wounded and immobile
In the backseat,
Watched the green dot move across his body,
Waited for the gunman to finish him off.
- He kinda starts to circle around the car.
The whole while, he's pointing the gun at us.
Lookin' like a swat team
Or somethin' like that had come in.
When he comes up, he says,
"you mother----ers shoot at my house.
I got kids," or somethin' like that.
And we said, "we didn't shoot at your house.
We wouldn't do that."
So, the gunman points the gun right at me,
And I said, "look, we didn't shoot at your house.
Please just call an ambulance."
And he took off.
- Suddenly, relief.
Some of the friends had run for cover
During the shooting.
Now, they returned to the car,
But to what?
They were alone in the dark,
And their friend, the driver, rory
Was clearly in bad shape.
- My friend has just been shot in his head.
I'm shot.
We just assume we're gonna get back in the car.
We're gonna get outta here and go get help.
- Somehow, they managed to move rory
To the backseat of the car,
But when one of them turned the key...
- The car wouldn't start.
It just kept getting worse and worse.
- No car, no cell service,
No idea exactly where they were,
No idea where help might be,
No idea if they'd survive the night
Or if the gunman was gonna come back.
Two of them volunteered to run out
Into the blackness for help,
See if they could find a cabin or a ranch house
Where they might find a working landline.
Question was, would their friends still be alive
When and if they got back?
- So, I decided it's time probably to check on my leg.
When I pulled my pantleg down,
It sounded like somebody had poured
A ton of water on the ground, just splat.
My calf was basically exploded
In a few-- like, numerous pieces.
- Stuck in place, easy targets, if the gunman returned.
- We had fear that he was gonna come back
And finish the job.
- Some of the young men decided the car
Was more target than refuge
And hid in the tall grass of the meadow.
- They didn't feel comfortable staying at the car,
And I don't blame 'em.
- And now, the two best friends, lewis and rory,
Were trapped in the dark.
Lewis laid down on the ground,
Propped his wounded leg against the car,
Tried to keep talking to rory,
Who was lying in the backseat.
- Rory was shot in his head.
He could barely talk, but when he did,
It was jumbled, it was horrible.
He would call out my name a lot.
Um, I told him--
I guess, uh, just naively,
That I feel your pain.
He was able to reply, uh, something, "you have no idea."
My whole leg had become numb from my knee down.
And then shortly after that,
My left leg started going numb
And then the rest of my extremities
Until eventually it reached my lips,
And then it got to the point where I was like,
Well, maybe-maybe I'll die.
- And just about then,
Lewis saw headlights appear in the distance.
- And eventually, somebody makes their way
Over towards the car and says...
- Let me see your hands!
- It was the sheriff's deputy,
And you can see in ben staley's video
Documenting the scene, that's when lewis
Weakly stuck his left hand up
Out of the meadow grass.
- I laid there on the ground for a while,
And somebody was holding onto my leg,
Trying to stop the bleeding,
And so they were sticking their hand in my wound,
And I'm surprised I could still feel pain
Because my leg had gone numb so long ago.
All that remained, was the pain.
So, what I remember was, I got loaded into a paramedic.
And at this point, it's just major relief.
- Rory was airlifted out to a hospital in reno.
He was barely alive, no longer conscious.
Telling the story was not easy for lewis.
- Give me a minute. Sorry if that was--
- It's okay.
- His anxiety was not hard to understand.
But what didn't make sense?
How his account differed on some very key points
From that of chad wallin-reed,
The man who confronted them.
For example, chad accused the young men
Of firing first during the car chase.
- Next thing I know, as I'm lookin' up,
I see these three flashes,
And then I hear crack, crack, crack, crack.
- But according to lewis, that never happened.
What's more, he said, chad didn't seem worried
They had a gun when he approached their car.
Did he, at any point, say, "are you armed,"
Or, "do you have a gun," or, "throw your weapon away,"
Or anything like that? - Nothing like that,
Which is kinda confusing
Seeing as he accused us of shooting at his house,
But he was pointing the gun at us
Like we were armed.
- So, he came up to the car and said,
"were you the one shooting at my house?"
- Yes.
- He didn't say, "shoot at me in the car."
- No.
- Odd.
Remember, chad told the police
The young men shot at him during the chase.
Did he ever, that night, say,
"why were you shooting at me in the car,"
Or, "you shot at me in the car,"
Or anything like that?
- Nothing like that, no.
- Did you have a gun? - No.
- Did anybody in the car have a gun?
- No.
- Did you own a gun? - No.
- The police were looking for a gun, of course,
Couldn't just take somebody's word for it,
But neither could they, nor could we,
Ignore one more big discrepancy
Between lewis' story and chad's.
Remember, in his interview, chad said he told
Lewis and his friends when he left 'em in the meadow
That he was going to get help.
- I said, um, "I'm gonna go call the sheriff."
- But that's not what lewis heard.
No, he said, he remembered quite clearly
What their assailant said
Just before he got into his truck to leave.
- He said, "if I ever see
Any of you mother----ers up here again,
I'm gonna kill all you guys.
- Coming up...
Police try to figure out who is telling the truth
About the confrontation,
And they soon find chad's account is changing.
- I think it finally sunk in
That he was gonna get caught in his story.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Here again is keith morrison.
- There is, safe to say, no way on this earth
A mother can be adequately prepared
For the news carol starzer was about to receive.
It was Sunday morning, July 3rd.
She had just gotten a message.
"call back, now."
- I knew something was wrong. Something was wrong.
And I call back immediately,
And I just couldn't believe it.
- "come quickly," they said, "to the hospital."
- All we knew was, he was in critical condition,
And we needed to get there as soon as possible,
And that's all they would tell us.
- So, carol, heart in her mouth,
Raced along the highway to reno
And her son, rory.
That same Sunday morning,
Chad and kerri's children woke up to the sound
Of strangers rummaging through the cabinet.
- And, like, searched through our stuff,
And, like, they took all of the guns.
- They are police. - And I was--
I was crying when I woke up.
- Yeah.
- Because I didn't know who they were.
- Must have been terrifying.
- Yeah.
- And then the strangers told them
Their parents were explaining things to the police
And...
- I knew my dad had it under control.
He is very smart and thoughtful.
- In fact, all night,
Chad had been in deep conversation with detectives
From the plumas county sheriff's office.
- I told 'em. I explained to 'em,
You know, what had happened,
And he was very upset.
- Going over again and again what happened at the cabin,
On the road, in the meadow.
Here, chad explained what was in his mind
When those men seemed to be terrorizing his family,
How he decided he had to do something to protect his kids.
- Chad told detective steve peay
How the men in the car had fired at him,
How, in self-defense, he fired back.
- He talked about that was training
That he had received from the military,
To continue to follow the threat,
To neutralize the threat. Got into a zone
And needed to neutralize the threat, he felt.
- Got into a zone. - A zone.
- Like a military term. - Yes.
- Then detective peay decided to take chad on a tour
To recreate the almost eight-mile chase
And the shooting on location and on videotape.
- You come out of your driveway.
And we drove with mr. Wallin-reed
From his cabin in my vehicle, uh, videotaping,
And he took us right back here to the meadow here.
- Chad made it quite clear
He used a small pistol, .380 caliber,
To return fire during the chase.
- And he told us he knew exactly where he shot from.
Um, so, we-- I'd get out, and I'd mark that area,
So we could back and search that area for casings.
- Then the cops took chad down that dirt road,
Which led into the meadow, and there they could plainly see
That other officers had already marked
Several shell casings in the meadow.
And abruptly, chad's story changed.
- I had spent many hours with him that night,
Questioning him,
Asking him if any other firearms had been used,
And he continually said, "no."
And then, at the very end of the-the interview
And the drive, then he finally did tell us
That there was another gun used.
- That's when he saw on the ground,
As they all did, .223 caliber casings,
The kind that would come from an ar-15 assault rifle,
Which chad finally admitted he used here in the meadow.
- But then his story changed, again.
He admitted he fired the ar-15
Just before he got to the meadow.
- I think it finally sunk in
That-that it was all gonna come back to him,
And he was gonna get caught in his story.
- Chad isn't the only one feeling the heat.
Rory mcguire's friends face tough questions from the police.
Coming up...
- Oh, I-I pushed them. I said, "listen.
If there was a gun, uh, you need to tell us."
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- As rory mcguire clung to life in the hospital,
Detective steve peay had chad wallin-reed
Take him on a tour,
Following the path of the car chase from the cabin,
Down the dirt road,
Into the meadow where the hot pursuit ended.
With a video camera rolling, chad recounted every detail.
- Problem was, his story kept shifting.
At first, he said he only used a small pistol
During the confrontation.
But after driving through an area littered with
.223 caliber shell casings, chad admitted
He had also fired his ar-15 assault rifle.
- Why the initial reluctance?
Well, perhaps because the ar-15,
Which chad bought legally in nevada,
Was illegal in california.
Though chad said he didn't know that.
At any rate, now chad detailed how he used the rifle again
When he saw rory's car make a sudden u-turn.
- So, perhaps still in self-defense mode.
- And so, there it was, chad's story.
But as detective peay listened, something seemed off.
- Just somewhat odd, the-the story,
And as it unfolded,
Each-each time we talked to him, it kind--
It somewhat changed.
- Then, that morning, detective peay heard from
His colleague, chris hendrickson,
Who had spent his night talking to those young men.
Rory mcguire, now in surgery, wasn't able to talk,
But the other five, said detective hendrickson,
He talked to them separately, told exactly the same story,
How they stole the solar lights, were chased,
Tried to surrender, and then made a wrong turn.
- Rory mcguire didn't know this area that well,
And the kids realized after they passed it
That they'd missed this turn right here
That goes-goes down to, um, antelope lake.
- Why antelope lake?
Because, the men told detective hendrickson,
There were cabins there, people, safety.
But the main thing
Those young men told detective hendrickson
Was they did not shoot at chad wallin-reed.
In fact, they assured him, they didn't have a gun.
Did you ask them? Did you push them on that?
- Oh, I-I pushed them. I said, "listen.
If there was a gun, uh, you need to tell us.
I mean, if you had a gun and were shooting back,
You would be in your right as defending yourself
'cause you're being shot at."
They would always say, "no, no, there was no gun.
I guarantee you."
- Later that morning, detectives went out
To the meadow and discovered some fascinating evidence,
For one thing, shards of broken glass
Which clearly marked precisely where the car was
When chad blew out the windows.
Curious, it wasn't exactly where chad said it was.
And something else-- rory's car must have hit a rock
During its rush through the meadow
Just after it made the u-turn farther out in the meadow.
- And it started, uh, draining the oil out of the car.
- And left, clear as a giant magic marker,
A brownish-black trail
Through the long grass of the meadow.
Interesting.
By now, it was something like 12 hours
Since chad ran off to chase those men.
He was exhausted. Had been, he said,
Entirely cooperative with the cops,
Told them everything he knew.
He was ready now to go home to his wife, kerri,
And their three kids.
So, what happened next was something he did not expect.
- He was arrested for attempted murder
And also, um, assault with a deadly weapon.
- As the 4th of July approached,
Chad wallin-reed was booked in the local jail.
Could any outcome be worse? Well, yes, it could
And was about to be, for everyone.
- Coming up...
Grief and shock as a mother finally finds out
What happened to her son.
- It's horrible. The nurse immediately--
Her face-- she looked at me.
I knew.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Here's why people move to the high sierra,
To get away from the city, its constant pressures,
Its regular explosions of violent crime,
Or at least that's how it was for plumas county
District attorney david hollister,
Who moved to his new job in the county seat
Of little quincy, california after years of prosecuting
The worst that oakland had to offer.
He came for the quiet, the family values.
And now, here he was fielding calls
From the local sheriff's office about an extremely violent act,
Which the shooter himself freely admitted to.
- We're small enough where any type of homicide that occurs
I get called right away.
- So, how much did you have to do
With the decision to charge him? - Everything.
- And from what the detectives told him,
What happened seemed pretty clear
To d.A. Hollister.
- He chased those boys 7.6 miles,
And he shot to kill.
- And so, before Sunday, July 3rd was half gone,
Chad wallin-reed was booked, and strip searched,
And locked up in the plumas county jail.
The charge? Attempted murder.
What was that like when they took him?
- It's very, very hard for them to take my husband away.
- Didn't expect it? - No.
I never envisioned being away from my husband.
- Back in the woods at chad's cabin,
The detectives who arrested him prowled the property
Still decorated in 4th of July bunting,
Looking for evidence.
- The ar-15 was inside on the-- on the gunrack.
There was also a closet inside the cabin that contained,
Uh, large amounts of ammunition for various guns, shotguns.
- And out on the edge of chad's property,
Out near the road, the detectives found
That unusual no trespassing sign.
You are entering the r.O.C., the sign said,
Which meant the republic of chad.
This is a restricted area.
Only red-blooded patriotic christian americans
Are authorized for access.
The use of deadly force is authorized for use
On those found in non-compliance.
The young men in the car thought it was
Some kind of joke. Doesn't seem that way now.
At the very same time, still July 3rd,
The driver of the shot up car, rory mcguire,
Was in a reno hospital.
His mother, carol starzer, by his bedside in the icu
As he lay with a bullet in his brain.
- It was horrible.
I didn't know what critical condition meant,
So I really didn't know
Critical meant probably not gonna make it.
And the nurse immediately-- her face--
She looked at me. I knew.
- But it was weird, said carol,
When she saw rory lying there unconscious.
- And he actually looked perfect.
I was very shocked.
Except for the plate that they placed over his head
Where the bullet went in, um,
I-I just remember him as looking like he was asleep.
- It's a sight you can't probably get outta your head.
- Every day, I think of that.
I think of that every single day.
- Rory's father, carol's ex-husband,
Dave mcguire, came, too.
Tried not successfully to hold back his soaring rage.
A soldier did this?
- I put myself in that same scenario,
And-and if I needed to, I would defend myself,
But once it's over, it's my responsibility
To-to render aid.
This is not a battle zone.
This isn't some hick town in-in california.
- Around the same time, at the jail in quincy,
An hour and a half away,
Chad placed a telephone call to his father.
The call, of course, was recorded.
- But as the hours stretched through the night
Into July 4th,
Chad began to see more and more clearly
That he was not to blame. Those men shot at him,
And he never set out to hurt anyone.
- I can honestly sit there and say
I didn't get in my vehicle.
I didn't sit there at the moment I had the ar-15 sayin',
"I'm gonna pick this weapon, and I'm gonna go down there,
And I'm gonna kill these guys."
Heck no. No way. - Yeah.
- There ain't no way.
- In fact, thought chad, it was really he and his family
Who were the victims here.
- If they had never shot at me-- - uh-huh.
- There would be no reason for a gun.
There would have been no reason for me to fire,
To shoot, to use the firearm.
You know, in my mind frame,
These people are trying to kill me.
- Kerri visited her husband in jail to tell him that
She was in his corner and would always be, no matter what.
Do you wish that he'd just kind of stopped
Along the way somewhere and said, "oh, to hell with it,"
And just let them go and come back?"
- No.
- 'cause you wouldn't have this problem now.
- Yeah. I guess, to a point,
As far as a problem being that my husband is not at home,
But we would still be in fear
That these people would come back to our--
To terrorize us more. He was protecting us.
He was making sure that we were safe.
- And then, as the long holiday weekend wound down,
It got even worse for all of them.
Rory mcguire died.
- He hemorrhaged a couple hours after we got there,
And that was-- that was the end.
He was gone.
He was brain dead, at that point.
- How do you get used to a thing like that happening to ya?
- I still feel like he's in the meadow,
In the car, in the meadow.
I still feel like I need to go help him.
- It changes life forever. - Forever.
We'll never be the same.
- And a few hours later, the loving husband,
Doting father, army ranger chad wallin-reed
Was now an accused... - Murderer.
They took me back down to the booking area.
"you're being charged with first degree murder."
- What did that feel like? - I can't describe it.
When you look at the word "murder,"
And it describes heinous, premeditated, malicious,
Aforethought, that's pretty, uh,
That's pretty grotesque.
- Bail was set at a million dollar,
Money chad and his family did not have.
But out there, out in the wider world,
A new issue was emerging called "stand your ground,"
And, also, a certain attorney discovered,
There were some tiny specks of evidence
At the crime scene that just might set chad free.
- Coming up...
The evidence that chad's attorney says backs him up.
- They found the three .380 casings
That were not from chad's gun.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
Welcome back. Rory mcguire was dead,
And chad wallin-reed was now charged with his murder.
The army vet continued to insist
He pulled the trigger in self-defense,
And an unexpected ally was about to
Help him make his case.
When it was time for the trial, the defense would be
Armed with evidence they said showed chad's accusers
Were not as innocent as it seemed.
Here again is keith morrison with "miles from nowhere."
- For most of two years, often twice a week,
Kerri wallin-reed drove back and forth
Through the high sierra
To visit her husband in the plumas county lockup.
Not easy, any of it. - It's horrible.
It's just the worst, um, being without my husband,
And-and, um, the children being without their father
Is just-- it's-it's unimaginable.
- And the children stayed home and worried mostly.
- Sometimes I've been frightened and cried for my dad.
And when he's sick, I cry hard
Because I don't know if-if he might die
From if he's sick or if he'll be okay.
- At the very same time, rory mcguire's mother, carol,
Cried for a son, the future, an expectation gone forever.
What do you think is the appropriate thing
That should happen to this man?
- Never step foot outside of prison ever again,
Not be able to see-- have--
Not have conjugal visits with his wife,
Not-not be able to see his children
Go through birthdays and marriages and--
'cause I now am cut short of all of that with my son.
- And in little quincy, stuck in his cell,
Chad had all the time in the world
To think about what he did.
- There's this triple effect of, well, if you never had a gun,
This never-- woulda never happened.
But then I-- somethin' just drives me inside
To say they were wrong.
They scared your family.
- Chad found himself fuming about
The first degree murder charge against him--
Felt his alleged victims were the ones in the wrong.
- Did they deserve to be stopped?
Absolutely.
They don't deserve the right to do that to people.
- Fuming is possibly all chad might have done
Except a prominent defense attorney
Named john ohlson heard about chad's predicament
And saw a way, he believed, to set him free.
This sort of stand your ground idea?
- Yeah, yeah.
- California doesn't have a stand your ground law per se
Like some states do,
But there is a state jury instruction that says
A person under threat has a right
To stand his or her ground and even pursue an assailant.
Chad wallin-reed, said attorney ohlson,
Is just the sort of person
For whom that defense was intended.
- He's not a gangbanger.
He doesn't have a criminal record.
He has a-a good, clean military record.
- Chad began looking forward to a trial--
Turned down a deal from the d.A.
- There's a story to be told.
There's thing that need to come out.
I think that a trial will, um, be a rather awakening.
- But first, they had to choose a jury,
Which would be a fight in pretty little quincy,
A place composed of gun-owning country folk
And liberal big city transplants.
- There were a lot of letters to the editor
Of the local paper,
And I think they were pretty evenly divided
Between people saying that
The state ought to reimburse chad
The cost of his ammunition and people saying, you know,
I moved up here from the bay area
To get away from all this, and people shouldn't have guns,
And they shouldn't shoot guns.
- When the trial began, ohlson seemed satisfied
With the jury he got. Could go either way but...
- My desire is to walk him out of that courtroom.
Take him by the elbow and lead him out of the courtroom.
Turn him over to his family.
- Here is how ohlson presented his stand your ground defense
In his opening to the jury.
- Ohlson told the jury his client was
A protective family man doing what he felt
He had to do as a father
After those menacing visits to his house.
- After this Friday night incident,
They were afraid, and I think it sets the tone
For his state of mind.
- He wanted to protect those two sweet little girls.
- Yes.
- And you wanna show the jury the sweet little girls
He wanted to protect. - Sure.
Fair enough, huh?
- And some of the jury wept as 12-year-old darlin
Repeated the story she told us about the night
The men came to their property.
- And I remember asking my dad and mom,
"what are you gonna do if they come back,
And what would happen if somebody got hurt?"
- What'd they say?
- They said that everything was going to be okay
And that, um, my dad is here to protect us.
He can protect us.
- Then kerri, chad's devoted wife,
Took the stand determined to protect her husband
Just as she believed he protected her that night.
- It scared us tr-tremendously.
- "and that's the reason chad chased those men,"
Said kerri. "he was no monster."
- Distraught.
No.
He was.
- The whole case, of course, would boil down
To whether chad was fired upon and shot back in self-defense.
Ohlson said the evidence backed chad up.
- I think we'll pretty well prove
That there was a gun in the victim's car
And that they fired at chad.
- "the young men in that car not exactly boy scouts,"
Said ohlson.
- Well, the police asked these people if they had guns.
- Mm-hmm. - And they said, "no,
"we wouldn't carry guns. We would never carry guns."
And one of 'em we have a facebook page
Displaying a-- both a gun and a knife.
- "and they must have had a gun that night," said ohlson,
Because on the route of the chase,
Investigators found three shell casings,
Casings that did not match any of chad's guns.
- The interesting thing now is, he said,
"they shot at me three times,"
And they found the three .380 casings
That were, um, together that were not from chad's gun.
- Mm-hmm.
- Corresponding with the three shots.
- And there was another truly stunning clue
Collected on the night of the shooting, said ohlson.
According to his forensic expert,
There was gun residue inside the young men's car
And even on some of their hands.
- Somebody shot out of that car.
- Because?
- Because of the gunshot residue in the car,
The lack of bullet strikes on that side of the car,
And the gunshot residue on the hand
Of the person who was riding shotgun, if you will.
- And why did chad keep shooting at the car
After it made a u-turn?
"very good reason," said his attorney.
- If they turn around
And were coming back out of there,
Those two cars would be on the same track
With the car coming right at him,
And he's been fired on already coming back on--
Back towards him.
He thinks they're firing on him, again.
- Chad declined to take the stand in his own defense,
So the jury didn't get to hear him say
He did the right thing.
He did what he had to do when he squeezed the trigger.
Is it possible you were wrong, though?
- No.
- So, a case for self-defense
Any jury would have to take seriously,
And thus prosecutor david hollister's
Big challenge.
Time to bring out a little ammunition,
A literal trail of evidence through the grass,
A sticky, brownish-black mess
That told a fascinating story.
- Rory's best friend comes face-to-face
With the man who shot him.
- When I looked at him, my heart kinda jumped.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- The old plumas county courthouse,
Solid and lovely in the autumn sun,
Has pride of place here on main street
In quincy, california.
Inside, up on the top floor, is an overworked d.A.'s office,
All too accustomed to the limited funding abilities
Of a small county,
A fact of life david hollister had to consider
Very carefully as he prepared to prosecute chad wallin-reed
For first degree murder.
- We better do this case right, and we'd better do it once
Because that's about, uh, our-our only shot at it.
- Trouble was...
- This was a difficult case, uh, from the start.
- The defendant, after all, was not just a family man,
The father of these three adorable children.
He was, as he told the detectives, ex-military,
Once an army ranger.
You don't get to be one of those
Without good judgment and real character.
And on top of that, there was that wild card jury,
People who needed to be persuaded
That chad showed bad judgment
And very poor character.
- Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,
The evidence is gonna show
The defendant was not in imminent danger
When he fired those shots.
He was angry,
And he was mad that they were trying to get away.
- To set the scene, so to speak,
Prosecutor hollister showed the jury the video
Shot by that reality show cameraman
Now part of the public record.
- I'll cover this guy here. - This was graphic stuff.
Right there, in living color, the bloodied bodies
Of injured and apparently terrified young men.
The officers trying to attend to their medical needs.
- Breathe through your nose.
- How important was that video?
- It gave the jury a true understanding
Of the horror that happened that night.
I mean, you've got lewis smyth with, uh, his leg propped up
And the tourniquet there,
And you've got rory mcguire in the backseat
With-with a horrible head injury.
I mean, that's something I can't capture in words.
- Lewis smyth, the young man you met earlier,
Was a key witness for the state.
Remember, that bullet from chad's ar-15
Shredded lewis' leg.
He was frankly lucky to keep the leg
And survive the night.
Did you see the defendant
Sitting over there in the courtroom?
- I only looked at him once or twice.
My heart kinda jumped, and I knew it was him.
- Lewis had been a nervous wreck
Since all this happened he told us,
And in court he was no less nervous
As he told the jury
About seeing the green lasered gunsight,
About the flurries of shots fired by the defendant,
About the young men's efforts to end the car chase.
- First of all, they fled.
They drove as fast as they could.
They threw out the solar lights.
They held a white t-shirt out the window.
If you wanna look at a textbook definition
For doing everything you can in your power to withdraw,
To say, "no more, we're done," they did it.
- "but yet," said the prosecutor,
"chad kept right on shooting."
- He told the detectives, "you know, I-I think
"that might have been a white flag."
I don't think there's any question those kids
Did everything they could to give up.
- But here's the thing.
If the young men fired at chad first,
As the defense went to a lot of trouble to prove,
Then maybe chad's reaction was reasonable.
But did they fire a gun? Did they even have one?
Remember those three non-chad shell casings
Found on the road
That the defense made such a big fuss about?
"couldn't have been from the young men,"
Said the prosecutor. And how did he know?
Simple law of speed versus gravity.
- You're telling me--
These kids are fleeing at 50 miles an hour.
You're telling me that they fired three shots.
The casings are a foot and a half apart.
At 50 miles an hour, that's outrageous.
That's crazy.
- But remember, the defense forensic expert was clear
There was gunshot residue in the young men's car
And on some of their hands
Proving they must have fired a gun, must have,
To which david hollister replied, "nonsense."
That defense expert must not have been privy
To all the evidence.
- The gunshot residue really wasn't gunshot residue.
Uh, it was elements that could make up gunshot residue.
Any time a car is hit with that many high velocity rounds
From-from an ar-15,
You're gonna expect to see lead.
- Ahh, yes, but expert versus expert?
Matter of opinion? How would a jury know?
What the state needed, was something that would prove
Beyond a reasonable doubt that chad was lying
About what happened out there in the night.
And seemed like maybe they had just exactly that.
Remember chad's insistence
That the car came straight at him
Through the meadow, as if for a final showdown?
And it looked like they were coming straight at you.
- Yeah. I mean, yeah. - Like an--
Lookin' like an assault. - Right.
- Looked like they were attacking you.
- Right. It was just... My...
My frame of mind was that these people
Were coming back to shoot at me.
I had swerved my vehicle out of the way of their vehicle.
I mean, they were coming straight back at me.
We were nose-to-nose.
- But, as the prosecutor told the jury,
Evidence found in the meadow told a very different story.
The detectives took us there to show us.
Remember how the young men's car hit a rock,
Cracked open the oil pan?
The dripping oil left a distinctive trail.
- And then we could see the oil
That had been laid down by rory mcguire's car.
- Using that trial of oil,
The prosecutor had an animation created,
Which showed the car was not heading toward chad's truck
But instead was heading around it,
Away from chad.
- And where detective hendrickson is standing,
Is about where they traveled past,
And then he started shooting at their car.
- How do they know where the car was
When it was hit?
By the shattered glass of its window,
Some of it still here marking the spot,
And the glass told the story, too, they said,
About the true intentions of chad wallin-reed.
- His shot placement was very, very well-placed.
It was head height,
Shooting at the windows of the vehicle.
One went low into the rear passenger door,
Which then went into justin smyth's leg,
But most of the shot placement
Was all high, head height.
- "in other words, chad wasn't shooting to disable the car,"
Said the prosecutor.
"the evidence suggested
"he was shooting to kill the occupants,
"even as they were trying to get away."
- Was the defendant in imminent fear
Of death or great bodily injury,
So that he immediately had to use deadly force?
Unequivocally, the answer is no.
- So, what attitude, uh, in your mind, did he have
When the-- when he took out after those kids?
- The last words he said before he got in the truck
Was, "I'm gonna go get those sons of bitches."
And I think he meant it.
- The prosecutor felt confident.
But in a town divided over guns and self-protection,
Who could be sure what the jury would decide?
This is exactly the kinda case that leads to hung juries.
- Absolutely. Absolutely, and that's a fear.
- In that case, chad could walk
Since little quincy couldn't afford to try him again.
And then just as the trial came to its end,
A long sought bit of information
Finally landed in d.A. Hollister's mailbox.
Oh, my...
- I was shocked.
I don't think there's any other way to put it.
- Coming up, the twist no one saw coming.
- It was very clear the defendant had lied
About something you just don't lie about.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
- It's not often that a gift drops in a person's lap,
Manna from heaven, exactly when it's most needed,
Which, in this case,
Just as the trial was wrapping up,
Was a carefully sealed official looking package
Addressed to plumas county d.A. David hollister.
- Candidly, I give credit to the detectives.
- He'd asked them to track down
Chad wallin-reed's military records,
Just to confirm his background.
- It was something that we simply felt like
We had to follow through on.
- Remember, throughout chad's interview with police,
He talked again and again about his army career.
- Implying that what he did in that meadow
He had first done under enemy fire overseas.
- Maybe even that he'd been having some sort of flashback.
- It took nine months,
Many of them ensnarled in military red tape,
But now here were the records,
And what they revealed was nothing short of shocking.
In here was conformation that chad was in the army all right,
But that's about all that was true.
- He was not a ranger.
He had not fulfilled his commitment.
He had not served overseas.
He had not been in combat overseas.
He had not killed people on the other side of the world.
He had not done any of those things.
- In fact, the army asked chad to leave.
Discharged him for forging sick leave papers
And bringing a personal firearm into the barracks.
And this was perhaps the worst--
For wearing a combat infantry badge and a ranger tab
And other such badges, when all of those things,
Which the jury had been made to believe
About chad's military service
Based on his own statements to police,
Were all lies.
- It was very clear the defendant had lied
About something you just don't lie about.
- Sure. And if he's gonna lie about that...
- Absolutely.
His talk about, "I only fired three shots,
I used the pistol," all these other lies added up.
- "the liar," said hollister, "who shot those young men
"out of anger, pure and simple."
- You don't get to chase a person down and kill 'em.
That's not self-defense.
- But defense attorneys stuck to the heart of their case.
"it was," said john ohlson's partner
In his closing argument,
"a clear case of self-defense."
- He was placed in reasonable fear of imminent danger
Or death by the actions of the occupants
Of the mcguire vehicle
On the road when they were shooting at him
And then when they turned in the meadow
And came back at him.
- Self-defense or murder?
To wait for a jury's decision,
Is a kind of agony for both sides.
Rory mcguire's dad still struggling
With an inexpressible anger.
- The justice system can't give him
What I feel he has coming. And...
No amount of jail time will-will fix it.
- Those sweet, sad, innocent little kids...
- I like that he is always funny
And, um, uh, he's always loving.
He protects us a lot and-- - okay.
And you miss him.
- Yeah. - Yeah.
That part is pretty obvious.
Before the jury even got the case, chad's wife, kerri,
Told us she already knew what the outcome would be.
I mean, in your heart of hearts,
Do you think the jury will say, "not guilty?"
- I know that the lord has told me
That chad will be home.
- But then any other thought?
- Can I imagine him being away from us for-- no.
No. It hurts.
It-- that-that-that thought, those words, hurt my heart.
- Surprising then when kerri heard what chad told us
When we interviewed him before the trial.
What do you think?
Are you going to be, uh, acquitted?
- No. - No?
- I'll end up spending the rest of my life in prison.
- You believe that? - Absolutely.
- Why? - I think that, uh...
[sighs] I don't--
My faith in the legal system
Has seriously been shaken.
I think the majority of the people
Have a negative opinion about me.
- Of course, no one could know the way the jury would go,
Especially in a town divided like quincy.
- You're holding your breath the whole time,
Whether it's your-your first trial or your 50th.
- They didn't have to hold their breath very long,
Less than a day.
- We, the jury, in the above entitled cause,
Find the defendant,
Gregory chad wallin-reed, guilty of a felony
To whit murder first degree of rory mcguire.
- Guilty of first degree murder.
Out of the cameras reach in the gallery,
Rory's mom began sobbing,
Two years of pent up heartbreak.
- I knew we couldn't fix what had happened,
But maybe we give her just a little sense of justice.
- I'll never have a friend like that again
Or somebody I considered a brother.
- That's a sweet picture.
- Lewis told us it's his duty now
To keep rory's memory alive for himself and for carol,
Who is in his life now for good.
- This might be the last. Yeah.
- I love carol, and I-I think she-she loves me back.
There's always a place for me in her home,
And we can't stop talkin' about him.
She's happy that I was a front row seat
To rory's life,
And I'm able to tell her about it.
- At his sentencing hearing, chad addressed rory's family.
- We had already asked kerri what she would do
Without her chad, if she had to,
And now his sentence, 84 years to life.
You know, I mean, there are, god knows, countless families
Of people who are in prison who wait, and wait, and wait,
And then, it's, oh, I can't wait anymore,
And they have to go on with their lives,
And they kinda make a new plan.
Would you ever think about doing that?
- No. - Not a chance.
- No.
- Why is it so important to you?
- 'cause he's my husband.
He's my soulmate, the love of my life.
- Their little cabin,
That piece of paradise, was sold to pay legal bills.
- We have fond memories.
We do.
And now, there's-there's no good memories to be had,
But we can hold onto the ones that we have.
- And 7.6 miles away,
Out there in the mountains, snow blanketed the meadow,
Hiding the only remnants of what happened,
A few shards of glass,
And a little rock to mark the spot
Where a young man with so much potential was wasted.
- Part of me feels that rory is fine.
- Why do you say, "rory is fine?"
- He's not in the meadow,
And he's not in that hospital bed,
And he's not on that road
Trying to get away from the shooter.
He's not afraid anymore.
So, he's-he's fine.
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow. Thank you for watching.