[water whooshing]
- Carolyn Avdeef was a single mother,
divorced several years.
- And with the divorce, she had gone
from an affluent comfortable life to one on the edge.
Everything was a struggle.
- Carolyn had to take in tenants
to keep her house afloat.
- I leave and I have an overwhelming feeling
I'm never gonna see her again.
- Roughly two weeks, Carolyn's not been seen or heard from.
- It's an ongoing investigation.
Our main focus today is finding Carolyn.
- Not only do we have a critical missing case,
we are starting to work it as a possible homicide.
- Investigators started thinking
we have to look at this cul-de-sac
not just as a place that we find witnesses,
but this might be a place where we find a suspect.
- The renters stood out.
They were not wholesome people.
- When speaking to Carolyn's neighbors,
one, in particular, was quite upset with the two new tenants.
- Both persons of interest,
they should be considered armed and dangerous.
- Officer pulls over a blue Honda Accord
that looks a lot like Carolyn's car.
[dramatic music]
- He hits the gas.
[tires squeal]
There's a high-speed chase.
- Both suspects begin to shoot pursuing officers.
[gunfire rings]
- Literally, like, the whole scene exploded.
We just were in shock.
- At that point in time,
we still didn't know where Carolyn was.
- It's a grisly scene and grim ending.
- Evil came to our town,
and it all started in Orange County.
[mysterious rock music]
* *
[seagull squawks]
- Lake Forest in Orange County is a planned community.
It's a lot of subdivisions and gated communities.
It's got nice schools. It's got nice parks.
- Lake Forest is special because it's
a family-oriented community.
It was a safe community,
and we knew people who were coming in and out.
- In Lake Forest, we're in a community that's planned.
It has an HOA. We have, I think,
over a thousand homes in that Homeowners' Association.
The association patrols the streets regularly,
which is nice.
- HOA is kind of a protection
for the homeowner in that you have to comply
with the rules to keep your property up.
And it's important in that community
to keep the property going, you know, upkeep.
- It was very easy to grow up there.
The streets were almost desolate after 6:00.
narrator: Safe streets after dark
are one of several things that draw families
to the idyllic serenity of Orange County.
But even amongst the carefully manicured parks
and pathways of communities like Lake Forest,
that feeling of security can disappear as easily
as the sun below the waters of the Pacific.
- My name is Brian Sutton,
and in 2005 I was an investigator
with the Orange County Sheriff's Department,
assigned to missing persons.
On June 22, 2005, I received a call from John Bower.
John had a payroll check for a woman named Carolyn Avdeef.
He thought it was odd that she wasn't responding
to any of his calls.
I had deputies respond to John Bower's business,
and they took a missing persons report
for Carolyn at that time.
Deputies alslso did a welfarare check
on Carolyn at her residence.
Her roommate, Joyce Miller, told the responding deputy
that Carolyn went off the previous Saturday,
the 18th of June.
We considered her a missing persons
when we took that formal missing persons report
from Mr. Bower.
- My name is Dan Salcedo.
I was a full-time homicide investigator
with the Orange County Sheriff's Department.
Carolyn at the time was 62 years old.
She was divorced, lived in the city of Lake Forest
in a single-family home that she owned.
At one time, her son and daughter lived with her.
They had since moved out.
- My name is Eric Avdeef, and I am Carolyn Avdeef's son.
My mom was--she always tried to be in good spirits.
She was happy.
narrator: On June 27, 2005,
five days after Carolyn is reported missing,
her son has a disturbing premonition.
- I had a dream I was at the house,
and my late grandfather and my mom were in the house.
And they were just sitting
around a water cooler drinking.
And I remember I woke up the next day and I was perturbed.
And I have that overwhelming feeling
I'm never gonna see her again,
and I was telling my wife,
and she says, you need to call her.
And that's when I found out.
There was no answer.
We made a special trip down there.
[tense music]
* *
- My name is Salvador Hernandez.
In 2005 I was a reporter with the "Orange County Register,"
where I covered the Carolyn Avdeef case.
Eric thought that this was absolutely
unusual behavior for his mother.
He was worried.
- I went down to the house.
I saw the house. It was a mess.
My mom's car was gone.
My mom's master bedroom, which was normally,
she had a lock on there, that was wide open.
There was paperwork strewn everywhere.
It had also looked like there was a lot of spending
that had happened, because it seemed like
there was a lot of boxes and, you know, unopened--
unopened new items.
narrator: With no sign of his mother
and her house in disarray,
Eric alerts Orange County Sheriff's detectives
to let them know what he has discovered.
Investigators begin to piece together a timeline
of when exactly Carolyn disappeared.
- They handed me the police report with the suspicion,
and I was like, oh, boy, this is not gonna end well.
- When we talked to Eric Avdeef,
he advised us he had gone to his mom's house on June 27th.
Her roommate, Joyce Miller, was home.
Again, Joyce saying that, "I haven't seen Carolyn.
"The last time I think I really saw her physically
was on Saturday, June 18th."
After that, no one had any contact with her.
- Eric said that he would keep in contact with his mother,
and even though she maybe she had gone on a trip,
he would have expected her to at least let him know
before she had taken off.
narrator: After learning from Eric
that Carolyn's home was in an unusual state,
investigators show up with a search warrant.
- We did not see anything that was obvious
as to an area of struggle.
There was no apparent blood on the carpet or on the walls.
narrator: While detectives can't rule out
that something more sinister is at play,
for now, they must consider this a missing persons case.
- So the big question is where is Carolyn Avdeef at this time?
[dramatic music]
- The first thing detectives do
is put out an all-points bulletin
for that blue Honda Accord that Carolyn had just bought.
narrator: Detectives soon learn
that kind of extravagance was rare for Carolyn.
As a divorced single mother of two children,
she often struggled to make ends meet.
- My mom was the kind of person who always saw
the good in everybody and wanted to--
always wanted to help individuals.
But there were times that, you know, she--
she would run into financial troubles and, you know,
her parents were more than willing to help her out.
And that helped everything stay afloat.
- Carolyn Avdeef, she finds herself
in a very nice neighborhood with a very nice house,
but she's struggling to pay that mortgage.
To keep up with appearances
she had to make some tough decisions,
and one of those decisions was to bring in tenants.
narrator: And because keeping up appearances
is an inherent Orange County obligation,
detectives learn some of Carolyn's Lake Forest
neighbors didn't appreciate her means of extra income.
- In speaking with Carolyn's neighbors,
they certainly weren't pleased
that she had so many tenants over the years.
- A lot of the neighbors were saying the same thing,
which was that Carolyn Avdeef wasn't
controlling her tenants, that they were loud,
that they were coming in at weird times of the day,
and most importantly, they were outsiders.
So for the neighbors, having an outsider coming
into their neighborhood, that was--that was a big no-no.
narrator: Detectives begin to wonder,
could a growing feud between Carolyn and a neighbor
have escalated into something more?
- There was a real animosity growing
between Carolyn Avdeef and her neighbors.
It's a situation that was fraught with frustration,
and it's also a situation that probably was not gonna last.
Something had to break.
- There were some people that she chose to be tenants
that probably weren't the best people that should be there.
- The question investigators are asking at this point is,
could all this neighborly strife rise
to the point of foul play?
- It really does start to show
a very ugly side to Orange County.
The ugly side of paradise.
- The HOA, it enables people
to get into their neighbors' business,
and a lot of times,
it doesn't end well.
[water whooshing]
narrator: It's been ten days
since Carolyn Avdeef was last seen
in her upscale Lake Forest neighborhood.
Investigators turn to her neighbors,
hoping to get a clearer picture of Carolyn
and the circumstances surrounding her disappearance.
- Yeah, usually when you have
a missing person investigation,
one of the biggest sources of information
is what we call a neighborhood canvas.
- We'll do a neighborhood canvas to go and see
what the neighbors have seen.
Were there any problems in the neighborhood?
Were there any problems that this person specifically
had with anyone?
- My name is Jean Duffy.
Carolyn was my next-door neighbor for some years.
There were differences in our circles,
because I had been there a number of years earlier
and knew a lot of the people there.
She was also a single parent, which came with, you know,
a difficulty because the rest of us were couples.
- My name's Greg Roulinavage.
I was a neighbor of Carolyn Avdeef.
Carolyn was a little bit more reclusive.
We didn't know why in the beginning.
- She was not inclined to be social with the rest of us--
not that we extended either.
We were busy, and she was working,
so there was not a lot of interaction.
narrator: As detectives speak
with neighbors, a picture of Carolyn's uneasy role
in this neighborhood dynamic begins to emerge.
- Carolyn Avdeef is kind of an outsider,
certainly in her neighborhood.
She was the unmade bed of the street.
- The property kind of, you know, deteriorated some.
Her backyard, it wasn't watered, it was overgrown.
- There is an intimate relationship among neighbors,
as far as keeping their homes looking nice,
because it reflects on the entire neighborhood.
- In Lake Forest, we're in a community that's planned.
It has an HOA-- Homeowners' Association.
Our association abides by what is known as CC & R's,
which is Community Codes and Regulations,
trimming your trees, having your lawn mowed.
- When you have a home that's maybe not up
to the rest of the neighborhood's standards,
the neighbors sometimes get a little irate
about the condition of the home.
- The HOA started trying to see if there was a rule
that Carolyn Avdeef was maybe breaking,
so that they can kind of reign her in a little bit.
- My mom really didn't always agree
with the way they saw things,
as far as landscaping and as far as image
of the outside of the house.
She felt like well,
you can't tell me what I can do to my own house.
- There's an old saying, "the tyranny of small minds."
In Southern California, specifically in HOAs,
this has now become a de facto local government
that can fine the neighbors for the way
that their yard does or does not look.
It enables people to get into their neighbors' business,
and lot of times, it doesn't end well.
[water whooshing]
narrator: Investigators soon discover
the outside of Carolyn's house
wasn't the biggest source of friction with neighbors.
It was what took place inside that drew the most concern.
- Carolyn had to take in tenants
to keep her house afloat.
- Technically, Carolyn Avdeef was not
violating the HOA rules.
You know, she had a right to have tenants,
of having visitors, having them,
you know, stay in her home.
But it was starting to raise eyebrows from the neighbors,
because they were taking up, you know, extra parking spaces,
they were making noise at night.
- The tenants that she brought in
were obnoxious, to say the least.
Clearly, she didn't really have
much of a screening process.
I think she just let anybody in that could pay the rent.
- In some neighborhoods, you have crime watch,
where people are vigilant
and will watch out for suspicious activity.
If that was the case on this cul-de-sac,
that crime watch was all aimed at Carolyn's yard.
- I recall particularly one group of tenants that moved in.
One would sit out there all night long and drink
and smoke dope and sing,
and it was just over the top.
- My mom was extremely nice,
and there were some people that she chose to be tenants
that probably weren't the best people that should be there.
Some of the tenants I believed were taking advantage of her.
- The renters stood out.
They were not wholesome people.
They weren't family people.
- The neighbors were upset about there was so many people
in and out of Carolyn's house, it seemed, as tenants.
- The question investigators are asking at this point is,
could all this neighborly strife rise
to the point of foul play?
narrator: As detectives continue
to canvas the neighborhood,
they learn Carolyn's luck had recently changed
and so did her lifestyle.
- Times had been tight for Carolyn Avdeef,
but investigators found out
that she had hoped that that was changing.
She had just had a windfall, an inheritance.
- We all got a small piece
of the inheritance from my grandfather.
Obviously, she got more, because she was the child.
- When you get something like that, that becomes suspicious.
This person has some money.
That's when it starts to become more critical.
- That inheritance, it allowed her to spruce up her house,
clean up the front yard, to get the HOA off her back
for a while, to maybe stop taking in tenants.
And the one big purchase that she did
was that she bought a brand-new Honda.
- She got herself a--
it's practical car, a blue Honda Accord.
But now that car is missing and she is too.
[dramatic music]
[water whooshing]
- 99% of missing person cases are self-resolved.
Person returns home, the loved one who initiated the report
just didn't have an idea where they had gone.
narrator: Unfortunately for her loved ones,
the case of Lake Forest's Carolyn Avdeef
seems to be among the tragic 1%.
It's been a week and a half since she or her brand-new car
have been spotted by anyone.
- When you start getting somebody who,
like Carolyn, 62 years old,
hasn't talked to any family members,
hasn't talked to any coworkers
to say that she's up and leaving to go somewhere.
There's no vacation. There's no romantic interest
that we're aware of that she went to go off with.
So when you get something like that, that becomes suspicious.
- Hoping that they might get lucky,
somebody might have seen a car,
somebody might have seen a face,
somebody might remember a name
that they can give investigators to check out.
[dramatic music]
narrator: As detectives search for clues,
they continue to keep a watchful eye
on Carolyn's tenant, Joyce Miller.
- Any missing person case, critical missing person case,
you always do background checks
on the parties involved, so we looked
into Joyce Miller's background.
Lot of times what leads to someone's downfall
is you invite people into your house
that you really have no idea who they are.
In this particular case, we knew that Carolyn Avdeef
was acquainted with Joyce Miller.
So that seemed to be okay with Carolyn.
- We learned through the investigation
that Joyce was living locally in Lake Forest,
but at some point, she became displaced
and had nowhere to go.
I believe Joyce was introduced to Carolyn
through another friend who was the previous tenant of Carolyn.
Joyce had been with her for one year at her house.
- I did have a number of different encounters
with Joyce that were not friendly words, unfortunately.
She had a very, let's say, foul mouth.
narrator: Keeping in mind the large sum
of money Carolyn had recently inherited,
Orange County Sheriff's detectives look
to her finances for any signs of usual activity.
What they uncover tells them
that Joyce may know more than she's been letting on.
- The broker for Carolyn's brokerage account
enlightened us to the fact that three checks
that he had seen were extremely unusual.
He had a $3,200 check that was written out to Joyce Miller,
which they honored.
And then he also received two other checks,
one for $800, and one for $4,800.
And those checks were not honored.
And on all three of the checks
that were presented to her broker,
they had "loan" in the subject line at the bottom.
- When you start now getting
suspicious financial transactions,
and this person has some money to be lost,
that's when it starts to become more critical.
narrator: Investigators question,
was Carolyn's tenant, Joyce, stealing her money?
And what, if anything, did that have to do
with Carolyn's sudden vanishing?
- Joyce Miller, every time we talked to her,
she had no idea where Carolyn was.
And certainly, was very suspicious in having no idea
how Carolyn's money is being transferred
into her own account.
So we have suspicious on Joyce Miller's end,
and so, is she financially defrauding Carolyn?
Is she actually involved
in Carolyn's disappearance as well?
[water whooshing]
- Joyce was a difficult woman.
When investigator Salcedo and I pushed her
on maybe inconsistencies in her account
of Carolyn's disappearance,
she would become very defensive.
At that point, we learned from her
that she also had a daughter and her daughter's boyfriend
were living with her at the house at the time
close to Carolyn's disappearance.
- After Joyce moved in, her daughter and boyfriend,
which is Nick and Debbie, wanted to stay there also.
And my mom refused and said,
"No, my daughter's coming back,
and she needs to stay here."
Joyce was not happy that her daughter
and boyfriend couldn't stay in the house.
narrator: The eventual solution
to the living arrangement at Carolyn's house
didn't sit well with her neighbors.
- One of the neighbors noticed that the recent tenants
had erected a tent in Carolyn's backyard
and were living in the tent,
which is entirely out of place for Orange County.
- We didn't know what to make of that initially.
We just thought it was odd that he was pitching a tent
in the backyard and not living inside the house.
narrator: Could the appearance of Joyce's name
in Carolyn's financial statements be tied
to the appearance of Joyce's daughter and her boyfriend
in Carolyn's backyard?
Detectives follow the money trail for answers.
- We dug deeper into the financial aspect of the case.
We learned that Carolyn had a Wells Fargo account
with an associated debit card.
[dramatic music]
Her card now is being used throughout Southern California.
- I get hold of a grocery store
where Carolyn's debit cards that are being used,
and actually meet with the security director,
who was able to tell me that there's about 18
separate transactions on Carolyn's debit card
at local grocery stores.
This person's able to download all these surveillance images
of who these people are using the card.
We have a male,
and we have a female.
[water whooshing]
narrator: 62-year-old Lake Forest resident,
Carolyn Avdeef, hasn't been seen
or heard from in ten days.
But when detectives are notified
that Carolyn's debit card has just been used
at a grocery store in a neighboring county,
they're anxious to see whether the surveillance footage
will reveal the culprits.
- We're able to not only follow these people into the store,
where they're going and what they're buying,
to the checkout stand for points of sale.
We actually are able to watch them go out
into the parking lot and get into
what we believe is Carolyn's missing car.
narrator: Detective Salcedo returns
to see Carolyn's son, Eric,
and Carolyn's tenant, Joyce Miller.
- I showed Joyce the downloaded images
from the grocery store surveillance cameras.
Joyce's reaction is silence,
and then followed by, "Oh [bleep]."
- They were just looking to at least get an ID
on one of the two.
And I saw the one, and I said, "Yeah, that's Debbie."
- Eric and Joyce Miller identify the female
as her daughter, Deborah Miller,
and the male using the credit card
and driving Carolyn's car as Nick Vovos.
- Joyce Miller tells investigators
that her daughter, Debbie, had left around the same time
that Carolyn Avdeef had gone missing.
- Joyce tells them that her daughter
doesn't have a cell phone number.
She tells them that she's moving around a lot,
and she can't even say where they are.
She didn't know their whereabouts.
narrator: This new information
makes detectives wonder what else
Joyce isn't telling them.
- There may be a possibility Joyce Miller's involved.
So now we have another potential suspect.
Is she actually involved
in Carolyn's disappearance as well?
I'm still looking at Joyce Miller,
saying, "Your daughter and her boyfriend
"are using Carolyn's cards and driving Carolyn's car.
How is that?"
No response.
So we're not backing off of Joyce whatsoever.
But in the meantime,
our priority is to find where's Carolyn Avdeef
and where Debbie Miller and Nick Vovos are.
narrator: When police do a background check
on Nick Vovos and Deborah Miller,
they learn the two are no strangers to trouble.
- What really caught our attention is the background
of Deborah Miller and Nick Vovos.
Deborah Miller had criminal welfare fraud
in her background, so she was on probation for that.
And she worked as a loan processor,
so we believe she was involved in identity theft
and skimming monies from clients
while she was also supposedly processing loans.
Nick was a parolee at large,
had not reported to the parole office in San Bernardino.
He had been in jail since he was a juvenile
for burglary, possession of stolen property,
possession of a stolen car.
He was only 22 years old at the time,
had an extensive background for his age.
- We learned that Deborah met Nick
while he was in custody in San Bernardino,
and that they developed a relationship.
When Nick got out of jail,
they moved into Carolyn's residence in Lake Forest.
- All of a sudden, for investigators,
this woman wasn't just missing,
but there was a person that was extremely dangerous
with a criminal record that was involved in this,
and the safety of Carolyn Avdeef was in question.
narrator: The question detectives need
answered next is alarmingly clear.
- Where is Nick and Debbie?
[dramatic music]
We have a law enforcement bulletin out
asking for additional information
about Debbie Miller, Nick Vovos,
and certainly giving us a call
if that car or both of them are located.
- We were just trying to locate
any information that we could.
We updated the information in the computer system nationally
to show that Nick and Deborah were wanted
for questioning in Carolyn's disappearance.
narrator: With Deborah and Nick nowhere
to be found, investigators make a tactical decision.
- Most of the tips that we get in investigations
come from the public, so it's very beneficial
to get the media's involvement in a case.
- Somebody out there has to know what happened to Carolyn.
- The media attention is huge.
There's TV trucks outside of Carolyn's house.
It's nationwide news.
So we're doing everything we can through the media
to help in getting additional information
about Debbie Miller, Nick Vovos,
and certainly giving us a call
if that car or both of them are located.
- Literally, like, the whole scene exploded.
We just were in shock. We couldn't believe that,
you know, something had happened,
and it looked like it was something very bad.
- Unfortunately, we do not know the whereabouts
of Carolyn Dunn Avdeef.
Certainly, as time passes, the likelihood
that she's been a victim of foul play increases.
- I had one interview, and it was really tough,
because based on everything that had happened,
I figured she was already gone.
It's just so sad.
I have no idea why she'd disappear like this.
It's tough, but there's not much you can do,
just go day by day.
And that was probably one of the roughest things I had to do
was to be able to go on camera and talk like there's hope.
[somber music]
- This had started out as a missing persons case.
And all of a sudden, there were a lot of things
that seemed wrong, a lot of things
that seemed amiss and sketchy,
so all of a sudden, we were digging into this story
and trying to find out more about Carolyn Avdeef.
- So now, not only do we have a critical missing case,
we probably have foul play suspected,
and now we are starting to work it
as a possible homicide.
Was that murder isolated to that residence
or is there actually a killer on the loose?
[water whooshing]
narrator: Twelve days after the disappearance
of 62-year-old, Carolyn Avdeef,
detectives now fear that what began as a missing person case
has taken a very dark turn.
They've zeroed in on the couple seen camping
in Carolyn's backyard as prime suspects
and work with urgency to locate them.
- The Avdeef case, the media attention
that was garnered really helped us outreach
to the public, and because of that outreach,
we got a lot of calls into the office
that turned out to be very valuable information.
- This person who gave us this information,
his name was Darrell Martinez,
and he lived out in the city of Hemet,
and Deborah and Nick had been staying
in his residence for several days.
And this would have been
after the disappearance of Carolyn Avdeef.
We interviewed Darrell on the 30th of June, 2005
at his residence.
- He advised us that he had known Nick Vovos
via his-- Nick's mom for several years.
Interesting information that Darrell made us
privileged to is, well, he's helping Nick
install a couple speakers in this blue Honda Accord,
There's two shovels in the trunk.
[dramatic music]
He asked Nick, "Why do you have those shovels?"
He said, "Well, I had to bury a dead dog, a big dead dog."
Takes the shovels out, puts them in Darrell's garage.
Darrell, now he suspects the worst,
and to make things worse, he says, at one time,
Nick's high on meth, he's walking through Darrell's house
with a sawed-off shotgun, and fires a round into the floor.
So now we have Nick and Debbie,
potential suspects in Carolyn's disappearance,
and Nick's armed.
narrator: Darrell provides investigators
with one more frightening detail:
Nick's standing warning
to anyone looking to capture them.
- Nick tells Darrell, he's gonna do whatever it takes
to avoid contact with law enforcement
and that he's not gonna be taken alive.
Nick is now tweaking, and he's got a sawed-off shotgun,
and he's getting the hell out of Dodge,
'cause he thinks people are following him
'cause he's tweaking.
- Now, police issue a APB,
and there are two criminals to be on the lookout for,
Nicholas Vovos, Deborah Sue Miller.
They are to be considered armed and extremely dangerous.
- Nick and Debbie are now on the run,
we just don't know where.
Usually, in cases like this, we have a cell phone to ping.
They don't have cell phones that we know of.
And our victim didn't have a cell phone either.
narrator: What detectives can track
is Carolyn's debit card,
which was recently used 70 miles north of Lake Forest.
- Based on financial transactions,
we had information that there was purchases made
at a hardware store up in the Crestline area,
San Bernardino County.
It's up in the mountains.
They were for padlocks, chains, and bolt cutters.
narrator: Investigators track down two
of Deborah Miller's friends who live in the area.
They reveal some very disturbing information.
- Deborah Miller had come to their residence,
and she asked where a nice, private area
where they could bury a large dog.
[dramatic music]
This led us to believe that Carolyn was possibly deceased,
and that they buried Carolyn up in the mountains.
So that prompted us to look
into the San Bernardino Mountains in the area
near Crestline for possibly a burial location for Carolyn.
narrator: Police enlist the help
of search and rescue teams to cover the area,
but they are unable to locate Carolyn's body.
Then on July 2nd,
two weeks after Carolyn Avdeef went missing,
investigators get the big break they've been hoping for.
- Outside of Laramie, Wyoming,
there's a routine traffic stop.
Officer pulls over a blue Honda Accord.
In the course of taking the driver's information,
something doesn't add up.
The license plate on the car doesn't match
the car's identification number, the VIN.
So the officer runs the VIN through the system.
What comes back is that APB and the alert at the top--
"armed and extremely dangerous."
* *
- When they check the VIN number independently,
they find out that the car is linked to Carolyn Avdeef,
the woman who's been missing from California.
- Nick panics. This is the man
that's already said he's not gonna be taken alive.
He guns the engine, takes off.
narrator: The couple flees heading south
on Interstate 8, but it doesn't take long
before Carolyn's blue Honda Accord is spotted again.
- I get a call on my cell phone at home
from Wyoming State Troopers.
A state trooper in a marked vehicle
sees a blue Honda Accord pass him.
He activates his overhead lights and siren.
The car fails to yield
and goes about 120 miles an hour down the interstate
and eludes the state trooper.
And he believes that most likely went
into Northern Colorado.
narrator: Once again, Nick and Deborah have dodged police,
but the following day, July 3, 2005,
investigators get a tip from one of Deborah's friends
that the couple is at a gas station in Colorado.
- I contact their dispatch center in Wiggins, Colorado.
[incoherent speech over radio]
They do a drive-by where this gas station is,
and they actually do see a blue Honda Accord,
male, female in the car.
[suspenseful music]
They activate their overhead lights and sirens.
[police siren wails]
And Nick takes off.
[tires squealing]
- The Honda Accord starts tearing across Colorado.
It's going upwards 120 miles at this point.
And a high-speed chase ensues.
You have helicopters.
This is a full-on pursuit.
This is big news.
- My name is Steve Davis.
I'm the Chief of Police currently
at Mountain View Police Department in Colorado.
In 2005, I was the Chief of Police
of the town of Lochbuie, Colorado.
At that time, we were listening to the radio,
and it was an exceptionally scary situation.
These suspects were driving very reckless
at very high speeds,
causing all kinds of danger on an interstate highway.
I-76 is the major thoroughfare from Denver to Nebraska
and is heavily traveled.
The suspect vehicle continued westbound on I-76
until he came to the Lochbuie exit,
at which time he exited into my town.
Once he exited, we have a small gas station
that is kind of the epicenter of our town.
As the suspects pulled up into the gas station,
both suspects began to shoot at pursuing officers.
[dramatic music]
[water whooshing]
narrator: Nick Vovos and Deborah Miller
are both suspected of killing 62-year-old mother
and Lake Forest, California resident, Carolyn Avdeef.
After evading capture for two days
and leading police on a high-speed chase,
Colorado State police corner the couple
at a local gas station and prepare for the worst.
- The scariest part is when we heard
that these criminals said,
"They are not going to take us alive."
- Now there's an exchange of gunfire
between the pursuing deputies and Nick Vovos.
Nick's leaning out of the window of the driver's side,
firing rounds at the pursuing deputies.
- Deborah Miller was in the passenger side
and came out of the vehicle to shoot at pursuing officers.
She was struck immediately by gunfire,
and at that point, Nicholas Vovos,
who also had a weapon and was armed,
threw his weapon down to the ground
and surrendered to police.
[dramatic music]
When we approached that vehicle,
Deborah Miller was seated in the passenger side.
We saw that there was a large pool of blood
and that her injuries were fatal.
Even though we did attempt medical response to her,
it was futile.
- I stay on a open phone line with dispatch,
so I actually hear the pursuit is being terminated.
There's one in custody, the male,
and Debbie Miller, who is deceased
from apparent gunshot wound to the head.
narrator: In Colorado, Nick is charged
with the attempted murder of a police officer.
Orange County detectives are now eager to speak with him
about the disappearance of Carolyn Avdeef.
- After the pursuit, both Dan and I got flights to Colorado
and flew out and interviewed Nick Vovos at that time.
He did not admit to any criminal activity
involving Carolyn Avdeef and her disappearance.
Dan and I were really frustrated because,
at this point, we really wanted to know where Carolyn was.
narrator: Although investigators have
evidence that Nick was in possession
of Carolyn's debit card and her car,
what they don't have is evidence that he was
directly responsible for Carolyn's presumed death.
- Almost a month later since Carolyn went missing,
July 31, 2005, a woman is walking her dog
in Crestline, California, and makes a grisly discovery.
narrator: Police discover Carolyn's body
in a rugged, mountainous area
70 miles north of her Lake Forest home--
a short distance from where they previously searched
just two weeks earlier.
- The body was bound, hogtied,
in the grave, and covered with tarps.
[dramatic music]
One of the identifying items
that was located on the body was--
Carolyn had a leg brace.
So at that point, we were fairly certain,
pending positive identification,
that we did in fact locate Carolyn's body.
- They have a victim. They have a body.
What they don't have is the answers
to how she was killed and who did it.
- I got the call from the detective,
and I had an idea that this was where it was gonna end up.
So when it did happen, when it did turn out this way,
I wasn't too surprised.
[somber music]
- In October, 2006, Nick Vovos, he's found guilty
of attempted murder of a police officer in Colorado.
He is sentenced to 38 years in prison.
narrator: Two years later,
Nick Vovos is extradited to California on charges
in connection with Carolyn's stolen vehicle and debit card.
- We went out to Sterling, Colorado,
got Nick out of custody,
remanded him to Orange County, pursuant to the warrant,
and brought him back to Orange County Jail.
I have everything wrapped up except the murder.
I know who did it. I just need to hear it
from Nick.
narrator: Later that night,
detectives get a break they never saw coming.
- Get a call at my house
from custodial staff in Orange County Jail
saying there's a person by the name of Nick Vovos
that needs to talk to me.
June 15th is what starts everything.
Nick says, on the 15th,
Carolyn receives a call, and she's upset.
Now we know it's her portfolio manager saying that,
"Carolyn, there's suspicious checks
being written on your account."
At that time, Nick and Debbie were living
in a tent out in the backyard.
So Nick says, when Carolyn hangs up,
she's now accusing Debbie Miller of--
of accessing her accounts,
moving monies around, writing checks.
They get in a heated argument,
and he comes up behind Carolyn,
with his bicep and forearm,
starts to compress her neck from behind,
taking her to the ground.
He said as soon as they hit the ground, she goes limp.
She's laying there.
They're seeing if there's any signs of life,
and they don't see any.
[dramatic music]
He says he now decides what our next step is.
"We have to get rid of Carolyn."
So they get a blue tarp from the garage.
They wrap her up in a sheet in the blue tarp.
Both he and Debbie take Carolyn's body out,
and they put it in the trunk of the car.
They get two shovels out of the garage.
And off they go.
They're driving around up in San Bernardino,
because that's where Debbie's familiar with.
He finds a spot that he thinks is appropriate to dig a grave.
It took us literally three years
to get the truth out of him.
And on January 15th of 2009,
he pleads guilty to Carolyn's murder
and receives 25 years to life in a California state prison.
narrator: Nick Vovos must serve out
his 38-year sentence in Colorado
before his California sentence for the murder
of Carolyn Avdeef can even begin.
- We did the best we could to prove
that Joyce Miller was possibly involved
in the manipulation of Carolyn's funds.
We were not able to because--
to the best of our knowledge,
even though the monies were in her account,
Joyce never withdrew any monies.
So our DA decided that we didn't have enough proof.
[somber music]
- Carolyn was a very nice lady,
very giving, and it seemed like she was willing
to give the shirt off her back to help people.
- It was more than trust. My mom had the desire to help.
- If Joyce Miller was a true friend of Carolyn Avdeef,
that would have never happened,
Carolyn would be alive today.
- I know she's in a better place.
The last dream that I had,
she came to me, and she said
she just wished me well and said she had to go.
* *
That was it.
That's when you realize life is fragile,
and things can happen permanently, quickly.