(phone ringing)
(operator speaking)
(kandy speaking)
Operator: Where is he shot at, ma'am?
(dramatic music playing)
(kandy speaking)
If a man's coming at you, saying he's going to kill you over and over again,
What choice do you have?
What choice do you have when you fire a gun and he just keeps coming?
Melanie: The prosecution says
That kandy planned to kill mark, that it was premeditated.
Prosecutor: You shot and you shot and you shot and you shot.
You weren't scared. You were angry at him.
Kandy: I did it, but it was my life or his.
Female reporter: Kentucky state police says 51 year old mark bennett
Was shot and killed on clinton court.
40-year-old kandy bennett was charged with his murder.
Neighbors say they didn't know the husband and wife very well,
But this was unexpected.
My name is melanie lowe,
I'm a criminal defense attorney and I represent kandy bennett.
Kandy is charged with murder,
Over the shooting of her husband,
In an incident of domestic violence that occurred in the garage.
If she's convicted, she faces up to life in prison.
Kandy was a single mother of two when she met mark bennett.
They married and were together for five years.
There had been domestic violence
In kandy and mark's relationship for years.
About a month before the actual shooting,
Mark began to more frequently beat kandy,
To strangle her,
And to control everything she did.
Kandy suspected that mark was having an affair.
On the day of the shooting, she decided to look at his car
To try to piece together exactly what he'd been doing with his time.
She found a gun in his car.
He came home while she was in his vehicle and was extremely irate.
The last thing he said to her is, "I'm going to (bleep) kill you."
And kandy believed that he was capable of it.
Kandy said, "leave me alone, don't come near me."
But he kept on coming toward her
And that's when she shot him multiple times.
(gunshot)
Melanie: The prosecution says that kandy planned to kill mark,
That it was premeditated,
But kandy's the victim in this case.
I know that she was right under the law,
And morally, to do what she did.
We do feel like her chances are very good, given the facts,
And I don't know of another case of...
That's this strong on self-defense.
She just knew that it was either him or her.
Kandy: The last five years have been tough.
They took everything from me when they arrested me,
Um, the shoes off my feet,
Undergarments, everything.
I was picked up and thrown in jail, naked, basically.
My kids, they were having real life issues
And I'm stuck, you know, behind bars
Touching my son's hand through the glass, you know,
Um, watching tears fall from his eyes
And not being able to comfort him,
Was the hardest thing ever.
I just wanted to hug him and I couldn't.
Living through this
And trying not to let it really bother me, has been tough.
I've heard, "you're a cold-blooded killer." "you're a murderer."
Which is not true. I'm not a murderer, you know.
The man was trying to kill me
And I did everything in my power to save myself.
So kandy, tell me that morning, how were things at home?
He was, uh, being very abusive, earlier that morning.
We're fighting and arguing.
He grabbed me
And started choking me and there was a lot of struggle going on.
So I went on in the garage.
I wanted to look in his car and see if I could figure out what was going on,
Why he was acting so weird, what, you know,
Where he was disappearing to.
Sometimes he would write numbers in his planner, um...
And I thought...
Did you find anything else in the car other than the planner?
Um...Under the seat, there was a gun.
And then he caught me,
And um...He was as upset as I've ever seen him.
At some point, he grabs a shovel and starts like charging at me,
And it's like, he's going to jab it in my throat.
Then he said, "I'm going to get my gun,"
'cos I knew he had shotguns and stuff in the house.
And said, "I'm going to kill you."
-Does he see you have the gun? -Yes.
Did he react to that at all?
Well, I shot it once, he said, "you (bleep) bitch,
"I can't believe you shot my gun, I'm going to (bleep) kill you".
-Okay. -It wasn't toward him,
It was just, towards the stairs.
And he came around and lunged towards me,
Like he was going to take the gun from me.
And then, I unloaded the gun on him.
Okay. (exhales) that's a lot.
Yeah.
I know it's really hard to go through that story.
I know that's probably the most traumatic thing you've ever been through, um...
And we'll work on...
Um, making sure that you're comfortable with it in front of the jury,
But I think this is exactly what they're gonna need to hear about.
It's really important in a self-defense case
For a jury to hear from kandy.
To hear what her life was like, and how it led to that...Incident,
What led up to that, the amount of domestic violence
And coercive control that she had to experience,
That got her to a place,
Where she had no choice but to do the action that she did,
To fire that gun.
(solemn music playing)
He was very like charming and very like, "sweep you off your feet."
But at the same time, he was very,
I've never gotten so much attention from somebody.
He portrayed himself as like a really good family guy.
Nobody else had really shown interest in my kids.
Two weeks into the relationship, he wanted me to move in with him.
So we moved in and, uh, everything was perfect.
It was like prince charming, or something.
And then, um, as soon as we got married,
His demeanor started to change, like, almost overnight.
He had been having an affair, and then, when I found out about it,
That's when he started becoming physically violent.
He grabbed me,
Uh, up, several times in front of my children.
He would slam my head on the concrete,
Hit me with golf clubs, beat me with coat hangers.
I mean, there wasn't anything that man wouldn't do to me.
(sobbing)
Nobody knew him.
Nobody.
Nobody saw that side of mark bennett.
Nobody saw the jekyll and hyde.
Melanie: Kandy is charged with murder over the shooting of her husband,
But we believe it was self-defense.
We are meeting with jake green,
Who is our forensic electronic specialist.
I think jake is really key to kandy's case
Because the jury may not understand
The extent to which an individual
Can monitor another individual through electronic means.
-How are you this morning? -Jake: Good.
All right. (exhales) so, um, aaron is primarily gonna be
Doing your testimony at trial.
I probably want to know a little more from you,
How much you think you could testify about surveillance,
In terms of what mark might have been doing.
Yep. Got it.
Mark was using something called google takeouts.
What is that?
So google takeout is a way of archiving the user's account.
You're getting everything from messages,
To location history, internet history.
I mean, it's what we use if we want to see where someone was.
There are so few people that know about, where... How to do google takeouts.
That's something that requires a much higher level of computer understanding
Than a novice or an average person.
So when we saw that, it's like, that's a red flag.
It's not taking someone's phone and looking at their phone,
It's using their account from a remote location like another...Like a laptop,
And being able to look at where she had been, right?
Yeah.
If somebody knew every place you'd been,
That would seem extremely scary.
-Oh, that is so creepy. -I agree.
We were looking for, uh, the proof of the abuse, which jake was able to find.
Also, mark was accessing her google account.
He could tell where she'd been, who she had talked to,
What she had said in those conversations.
So that was all part of the coercive control,
That she was subjected to as part of the abuse.
He was very computer savvy,
And he knew exactly what to do and how to do it,
To spy on me.
Mark had cameras in the house in a few different locations.
He was always watching what I was doing.
You know, if I'd walk across the room, the camera would follow me.
I was just under surveillance 24-7, and it made me feel crazy.
Nobody wants to be controlled, and...
Manipulated.
So, jim, my private investigator, is coming in today,
And we're going to sit down and look at kandy's interview with the police,
To understand how they reached to the conclusion
That they reached, in their investigation.
Hey, how are you?
Busy, as always. (exhales)
So, um, I want to look at the video
To see what jumps out
He doesn't seem to be taking too many notes.
So the very least, you know, you'd want to note something,
'cause you wanna come back to it.
She said, "he's threatened to kill my kids."
Tell me about the incidents, what happened around those things,
-Where, he said those things-- -when did he say that? Do you remember dates?
Especially now, you're talking about,
It's not between just the two of them now,
-Now he's bringing her kids into it. -Melanie: Mmm-hmm.
So, she turned off these cameras in the house, right?
Yeah, yeah.
Melanie: I 'm afraid it looks suspicious.
Jim: It's troubling. I can't deny it.
Melanie: The prosecution is going to hammer this at trial.
Kandy told the police
That she had turned off the surveillance camera that was in the garage.
The prosecution is going to claim that that indicates a plan to kill mark
Because it shows some sort of premeditation or plan.
This could be hugely damaging to the case.
If the jury believes the prosecution,
Kandy could spend the rest of her life in prison.
Melanie: So now that we've found out
That kandy did in fact turn off the surveillance camera in the garage,
The prosecution is gonna claim that she planned to kill mark.
It's made our job to prove that kandy acted in self-defense,
Even more difficult.
Melanie: Paul is an important witness in this case
Because he is the only witness other than our client
To what happened in the garage.
(phone ringing)
Did you ever see any of the conflict between kandy and mark?
No, I've never seen it personally.
She called me and tell me he'd been hitting her, you know, just different things.
Melanie: So you were left not really knowing for sure.
Paul: Well, I mean, with the bruises and stuff,
-What I knew, she wouldn't have put it on herself. -Melanie: Right.
Melanie: What do you remember her telling you?
Well, she said he had choked her
And, you know, that's probably why she was talking
The way she was talking rough. You know?
At that point, I was like, "you know what?
Why don't we just take you to a motel room?"
And that's what I wish I would have done.
I wish to god I'd have took her somewhere.
It's hard for you, I know.
Melanie: So you took her home, to her house?
Kara: How did she seem when you dropped her off?
Just scared, nervous, you know.
She got out.
I mean, you know, I was like, "you're gonna be okay?"
And she said, "yeah."
Melanie: She went on into the house
-And you guys headed home. -Paul: I'm sorry.
Melanie: No, you're fine. You want to take a break?
Melanie: Paul is definitely an asset for kandy's case.
-Appreciate you coming over. Really do. -Paul: Yeah, thanks a lot.
-Paul: Nice meeting you. -Melanie: Yes. Trial is a stress on everybody, no doubt.
He's a witness to the fact that her voice was damaged,
That she had clearly been strangled in the time period
Leading up to when he had contact with her the day of the shooting.
I think the jury will put a lot of credence in what he says.
-Oh, it looks so good. -Kandy: Yeah.
Yeah. Pepperoni.
They've seen a lot and they've been through a lot.
And despite everything they've been through,
They have turned out really good. (chuckles)
But you never said anything.
Yeah. Well, he's looking at his phone now he's like, "I swear I did."
Whitney: Sometimes it's hard to talk about mark.
Just like thinking about the things that you know he did or just how he was.
When I found out that he died, the very first thing I said was,
"we'll never get to prove to him that I'm not worthless
And that I'm gonna make something of myself."
Because every day he would just basically put me down
And tell me I wasn't gonna be anything.
It really makes me angry inside because a lot of people really looked at mark like
He was this really amazing guy and he wasn't.
I don't know, it was like, kind of like what...
What did they say? Like the wolf in sheep's clothing,
Because he would come off with a smile and then just be so evil.
It's not easy to leave an abuser
Because they have so much control.
There's so many reasons you stay.
You want things to work out.
You know, he promised to go to counseling.
He promised to go to anger management.
He promised a lot of things.
I tried to leave,
But he said so many horrible things
That he would do to me...
I was scared.
Okay, so let's talk about mark's ex-wife.
Jim: Her statement is powerful.
-I think the jury will... Will be eye-opening. -Melanie: Yeah.
What I found important with her statement that she gave was,
-How much it was like this stuff that kandy had told us. -Melanie: It's parallel.
It's exact same to the point where he says,
"it takes everything I can not to kill you right now."
-Melanie: With my bare hands. -With my bare hands. Yeah.
Remind me again, the last time you went to try to interview her,
What specifically she said, if you can remember exactly
Yeah, I mean, she opens the door and tell her who I am, and um...
She says, "we're not talking to you."
To which I say, "well, I'm not trying to make you say anything.
"I just want to hear your story."
And she said, "we are done." and she shut the door.
Melanie: It is absolutely essential that mark's ex-wife agree to testify.
She was so terrified of him, she ended up pointing a gun at him,
Which backs up our claim that kandy acted in self-defense.
Her testimony could be the difference between winning or losing this case.
We're heading to see mark bennett's ex-wife.
The wife has turned us down once already in person,
So we'll see if time has helped us any on that.
I'm hoping it's not a problem,
But it's a cat and mouse game sometimes,
And I understand why people don't want to get involved in these things.
It's a horrible thing that happened to her.
Getting her to tell her story is important.
So we've arrived at the house.
Hopefully, somebody's home.
(car door slams)
Jim: Well, it took a while, but she's there.
She's our witness.
Her testimony is potentially a huge deal.
Those same horrible things happened to kandy as well for years.
Gonna be an interesting day when she testifies.
-Anna: Pull these blooms off of them, too, kandy. -Kandy: Okay.
-After they bloom, you got to take them off. -Kandy: Yeah.
Anna: We put up our house and our land and everything we have.
We just knew in our hearts that she was innocent.
And so we did what we had to do.
Dale: Mark was a weird person to me.
I didn't like him the first time I met him.
He put on a facade really.
They act one way and do another.
He would try to convince me that it was her,
You know, that she was doing all these different things.
If she would call me crying or upset or something,
Next thing I know, about ten minutes later,
He'd call and say, "oh, well, she didn't take her medicine today."
Or, you know, "she didn't do this" or "she didn't do that."
Somebody hitting on my kid...
That tore me apart.
That's rough.
She didn't deserve it, and I wish it hadn't happened,
But I'm glad she is standing here instead of him.
Kandy: Mark always wanted to try ecstasy.
So we did.
And then after that it just became a snowball of drugs.
He would get mad at me if I didn't do them.
He would say, "you don't love me. Now I know you don't love me
"because you don't want to do drugs with me."
I felt like he was drugging me a lot. Um...
'cause he was making my drinks.
Would feel drugged at times when I wasn't taken anything.
I'd wake up
Like I'd been laying there for two, three days, and I just couldn't move.
And I'd be bruised up from my ankles, and my wrists, where...
Maybe he had picked me up and moved me around or something.
So I don't know what was going on.
What was happening to me.
Um...
I still don't know.
Logan: Coercive control is a pattern of behavior
Where one person dominates and the other is forced to comply.
People become entrapped within these relationships.
How do drugs play into this framework
Of coercive control and domestic violence generally?
A lot of times it is a forced or coerced drug use,
So it's just additional avenue of control.
Tell us a little bit about what you learned
About her relationship with her husband, mark.
One of the things that struck me was how quickly
He became very controlling,
Even after their first date,
What she could do with her time, how she could do it,
When she could sleep, how she could sleep,
The position she was gonna sleep in...
He has all the control. She has none of the control.
And in this case, there was escalating violence
And there were a lot of threats to kill.
You're not just listening to kandy bennett
-And taking everything she says at face value. -No.
There were multiple interviews that corroborated different incidents.
There were police reports that corroborated... Those elements were there.
So one of our big concerns is, even though the law does not require anybody to retreat...
-That's always the question, but... -Yes. Why didn't she just leave?
Coercive control in general makes you feel like you can't escape.
But he made it very clear
Through multiple kinds of messages that she can't escape.
There were threats that her car was gonna blow up,
That there were snipers, that he could find her wherever she went.
On top of that, she tried to reach out to the police,
And the police were not helpful at all.
So how would she get away?
So, based on your review of this case and your research generally,
Was there coercive control was an element in this situation?
Logan: Probably more so than I've heard in any other case.
Melanie: This is always a time where clients kind of struggle a little bit.
She faces life in prison or the prospect of getting her life back.
We believe that this trial will turn on how effective she is as a witness.
She has to testify clearly and coherently
To tell her side of the story.
So that's why we're putting a lot of effort
Into getting her ready to go in front of a jury.
I'm just nervous about going on the stand,
But I just hate reliving it over and over.
I feel like I'm back there on the floor
Or being choked or being bit or...
It's just hard.
I just want it to be over.
Todd: Miss bennet.
You felt like mark was falling out of love with you,
Didn't you?
Yes.
Todd: You were pissed off with him, right?
-No. -Do you agree with me that you told the police,
-"I was so mad." -thinking back about it,
Probably, but I don't know. I was just hurt.
-Todd: Let's talk about the day you shoot mark. -Right.
Todd: This day you've gone back to the house, into the garage.
You get there and the first order of business
Was you're gonna turn off the garage cameras, right?
I don't remember.
Kandy: I'm not sure if that was the first thing I did,
But I did it before I got in his car.
And what is it you're looking for?
Kandy: Clues to what he's doing.
Okay, what are we looking for?
I guess I just wanted to feel like I wasn't losing my mind.
Todd: You felt like he was doing something else,
And cheating would naturally be one of those things, right?
Yes.
How many handguns did you have in this whole house?
Kandy: Two, I think.
Okay, so the one we saw on evidence
Was the one you located under the driver's seat, right?
Yes.
And then after you got it out from under the driver's seat,
You put it on a shelf?
Kandy: Yes.
Todd: At this point, the garage door came open or...?
It's, um... Yes.
Did he pull all the way in?
I'm kind of...
At some point, he went into the house
-And you think he's going to get a gun, right? -Yes.
And his parting words are?
It's like "I'm going to (bleep) kill you, bitch."
Okay, when he re-enters the garage, by this point
You've retrieved the gun from the shelf.
Wait...
This gun that was under the seat,
That was the one he normally sort of walked around the house with on his person.
Yes.
Todd: So if you ever had a fear of a gun, it would be that one. Right?
So you pulled the gun up, hold it out and you pull the trigger once,
And you pull it a second time, and he didn't pull a gun on you.
No.
And then you pull a third time and you pull it a fourth time.
I kept firing until it didn't fire anymore.
In fact did you keep pulling until the gun went click, click, click?
Yes.
Todd: Okay. Nothing further.
What todd just did is to turn your statement to be something
Maybe different than what you intended
And definitely different than what we would want it to look like.
Kara: If the prosecutor is telling you something
That you're like, "no, that's not how it was,"
Don't be afraid to say, "you're saying this, but it was this."
Melanie: Where we are as a team is, there's a lot of anxiety.
Kandy has been incredibly traumatized by what happened that day.
So it is hard for her to focus on what we believe the jury needs to hear.
We can present all the facts in the world
And build the strongest case possible.
But the reality is, if kandy falls apart on the stand,
It's going to make her look guilty in the eyes of the jury,
And she could go to prison for the rest of her life.
(phone ringing)
Kara: Hey, how you doing?
Um... (exhales)
Okay. Yeah.
Yeah, I don't think she's ever going to agree to that.
Let me talk to melanie about that real quick
And give you a call back in a few minutes.
Melanie: So kandy, we're talking about an offer for probation.
The offer is five years on a reckless homicide,
And then two years on the possession, for a total of seven years.
That would be probated.
That is a guarantee that you don't go back in
Unless you violate your probation.
Do you want that?
-I won't have to go to jail? -You wouldn't have to go to jail.
Okay, so I'd have to be a convicted felon
-For how many years? -Forever and ever...
The only decision that you have to make right now is...
"do I want to risk trial or do I want this probation?"
So it's lots of risk over here,
But also the possibility that you could walk out with a full acquittal.
And over here, we have the lowest level charge
That the jury could convict you on and probation.
You have to decide the value of that.
I don't want to be a convicted felon,
I don't want to be on paper for seven years.
If you're going to turn it down, make sure that's what you want
And that you're okay with that uncertainty.
It's just hard because we care about her...
What I really want to give her is an acquittal...
And we can't give that to her with an offer, um...
But we could give her the rest of her life with her kids.
Kandy: Basically, I can go to trial and take my chances with 12 people,
Or I can take a deal and be on probation
And not have to go back to jail.
If I take the plea I'll be convicted felon.
I'm 45 years old.
It will have an effect on employment.
It's a big decision.
Kandy: I think I like that one better.
Me and my mom are going over some dresses that melanie had donated
And just looking through them.
I mean, I didn't have anything to wear, really...
Nothing really presentable for court.
-Anne: I've got this. Try that on. -Kandy: Oh, cool.
Anne: I think that would be cute.
It's just been overwhelming, all this time has passed and it's finally getting here.
This is it.
I do want to be able to grieve,
And I do want to process these things and I do want to let it go.
And I do want him to rest in peace.
I want to move with my life.
-(kandy sniffles) -anne: I know.
Everything is going to be okay, honey.
(kandy sniffles)
I know it's hard, but it is.
So I'm feeling nervous, I hate being in the courthouse.
I know I was the victim.
That's what I know and that's what I'll always know.
Nobody can take that away.
Bailiff: All rise.
Yes.
Yes, sir.
Guilty.
Kandy: Not being able to clear my name, that's disheartening to me.
It's a little bittersweet because I would have loved to get an acquittal.
Kandy: But I feel relieved.
Like the weight has lifted.
I don't have to worry about being tied up in a jury trial for three weeks
And then not knowing the outcome.
So I'm glad things are resolved
And I can move on now.
I can spend more time with my kids.
Being a mom is... It's a love you can't describe.