First Comes Love, Then Comes Murder

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Speaker 6 Walking through the house, it was clear that there was a struggle.

Speaker 8 Like she was running for her life.

Speaker 9 Running.

Speaker 6 Who on earth would want to do this to your mom?

Speaker 4 The stunning court case that just wrapped up.

Speaker 12 She was in the shower stall in the master bathroom. There was water running over her body when the police found her.

Speaker 14 You walked right up to Sandy and said, sir, your wife is dead.

Speaker 15 And he screamed, like, screamed, screamed.

Speaker 16 Who would want to murder such a wonderful person?

Speaker 17 The most violent I ever got was I'd grab her and just say, you know, you got to snap out of her.

Speaker 22 When you first heard that Leslie Preyer had been murdered in her home, what went through your mind?

Speaker 24 Who and why?

Speaker 12 Whose DNA is this, and why is it in the house? Why is it under her fingernails? Who is this person?

Speaker 25 You've got to do the right thing, man.

Speaker 25 You've got to.

Speaker 18 I think I am.

Speaker 26 The only thing I thought of was: did they have an affair?

Speaker 27 And then my mom tried to cut it off and he murdered her.

Speaker 28 The unknown DNA under her fingernails in the blood on the scene. You can't ignore that.
And that really was the crux of the case.

Speaker 29 What?

Speaker 30 Was that your aha moment?

Speaker 31 It's Chevy Chase, Maryland. It's a really nice, upscale, quiet neighborhood.

Speaker 32 It is a family community, well-manicured, launched. It's a beautiful community.

Speaker 34 It really made no sense that there would be a crime like this in that area.

Speaker 35 The idea that that bubble could be punctured with something so brutal inside of somebody's house shocked people.

Speaker 38 The body of Leslie Prier was discovered inside her home on Drummond Avenue.

Speaker 39 There were signs of a struggle, but no forced entry.

Speaker 32 This woman was strangled and she was beaten.

Speaker 33 People were stunned. They were afraid by what had happened to their neighbor.

Speaker 35 If I were to describe this case in three words, I would call it brutal, intimate, and cruel.

Speaker 41 Police are asking residents of this community to be on the alert to report anything suspicious that might lead to an arrest.

Speaker 44 I knew someone knew something, so I just never gave up.

Speaker 47 Who in the world would want to kill Leslie? She didn't deserve that.

Speaker 48 It was a beautiful Wednesday morning in May.

Speaker 53 Leslie Prier should have left her home and walked down this quiet street in Chevy Chase, Maryland to catch the bus and go to work.

Speaker 4 But on this day, for some reason, Leslie never showed up.

Speaker 14 I'm Brett Reedy, and I was the operations manager at Specialties, and Leslie Prier was one of my employees.

Speaker 14 Leslie was supposed to be at work at 10. When she didn't show up at 10.15, I just assumed she had a doctor's appointment or something held her up in the bus or something like that.

Speaker 14 Then it was about 10.40, 10.45.

Speaker 47 He said, darn it, you know, where the hell is Leslie? Finally, he called her husband.

Speaker 14 I said, Sandy, Leslie's not here. Did she have a doctor's appointment? And he goes, no.

Speaker 14 Very quickly, and he goes, that's not good. Now

Speaker 14 something's really wrong. And he was very, very concerned.
I said, okay, look,

Speaker 14 she's only a mile and a half down the road. Why don't I just drive down there? I'll meet you there.

Speaker 20 So you were born and raised in this area.

Speaker 23 You grew up here.

Speaker 14 I had about

Speaker 14 probably six friends that lived on this street from elementary school. When I said to Sandy, you know, I'm going to go over there, the reason why I went over there was I'm so familiar with the area.

Speaker 57 You're thinking, Sandy's on his way.

Speaker 58 What else is going through your mind?

Speaker 14 Something's wrong.

Speaker 14 She must have been in an accident. Somewhere is an accident.
She fell, a bus, a car.

Speaker 14 Something has happened.

Speaker 49 Leslie Prier's husband, Carl, who went by Sandy, pulls up to the home not long after Brett arrived.

Speaker 56 As soon as the two men step inside the front door, there are signs something's very wrong.

Speaker 35 There was dried blood in the foyer. There was a knocked over table.
There was a moved rug. And her husband started calling out for Leslie and got nothing back.

Speaker 14 I looked to my right, and there's a significant amount of blood. Sandy started walking around and he went upstairs.

Speaker 14 And when he went upstairs, I noticed on the wall was an area that had been rubbed out. Looked like someone had cleaned it or tried to clean it.
I noticed something move down the hall.

Speaker 14 That door was slowly opening. I was like, oh no, you know,

Speaker 14 it was the dog.

Speaker 30 At that moment, the Preer's family dog, a black lab named Boomer, comes up from the basement.

Speaker 14 I said to Sandy, look,

Speaker 14 you might want to check the basement. Sandy comes back up

Speaker 14 from the basement and says she's not there. We went into the kitchen.
The back door was ajar a little bit. It wasn't fully closed.
I started pointing out to him, Sandy, look at this.

Speaker 14 Look at this on the wall. Look at this.
Look at this blood all over the place.

Speaker 14 And he goes, she must have fallen. My reaction probably was, it's a hell of a fall.
So I decided to call 911.

Speaker 19 Hello, what's emergency?

Speaker 63 I'm Matt Drummond, Debbie Chase. I work for a company, and we didn't hear have a call from an employee.

Speaker 63 We just walked in the door, her husband and I, and there's blood in the foyer, and it looks like something possibly happened.

Speaker 19 Are you not in the house anymore? Are you in the house?

Speaker 63 We're in the house right now. Uh the husband's looking around.
You're with the husband?

Speaker 19 I'm with the husband, yes.

Speaker 63 When was the last time anyway? The last time the husband saw her was

Speaker 63 7.45 this morning.

Speaker 19 Did she have a car or anything?

Speaker 63 No, she was gonna walk to the bus.

Speaker 63 Is there a lot of blood?

Speaker 63 But it looks like there's possibly a struggle, a couple things knocked down.

Speaker 19 Can I ask you guys to step out of the house? Sure.

Speaker 31 Their house was in Chevy Chase, Maryland.

Speaker 33 You might describe it as the Beverly Hills of Washington, D.C. It is a wealthy area.
Restaurants, shops, big homes, some very prominent country clubs in the area.

Speaker 31 The house is located on a cul-de-sac, so not a lot of traffic.

Speaker 36 Just a really nice, calm, quiet neighborhood.

Speaker 28 It's kind of tucked away. It's like a little haven.
It's a place where you would want to raise your family.

Speaker 11 How long have you lived here?

Speaker 35 40 years.

Speaker 4 40 years, the same house on the same block.

Speaker 64 Yes.

Speaker 11 How did you first meet the Priers?

Speaker 16 It was Leslie I first met.

Speaker 23 What was your impression of Leslie?

Speaker 65 She was really pretty.

Speaker 16 And her prettiness was also her personality. She was lovely in every way.

Speaker 4 Leslie's husband went by Sandy.

Speaker 16 He was very thoughtful and very kind.

Speaker 22 I really liked him.

Speaker 57 And they only had one child.

Speaker 16 One child, Lauren.

Speaker 12 How was life growing up in Maryland with your mom and dad?

Speaker 2 They were the best of the best.

Speaker 67 We had dinner together every night.

Speaker 40 My dad always cooked breakfast on Saturday.

Speaker 68 And my mom and I would plant tulips in the front of the house.

Speaker 31 Lauren and I met in high school and became inseparable.

Speaker 12 Her parents were amazing.

Speaker 31 They were just super sweet, very welcoming, very open.

Speaker 20 Who's in this photo?

Speaker 29 Well, that's me.

Speaker 69 Oh, I know.

Speaker 45 So we're talking, and I was, this must have been 1977.

Speaker 67 when I was born.

Speaker 27 So we were a happy family, the three of us.

Speaker 31 Lauren's father could be described as like the life of the party.

Speaker 65 Very, very involved in Lauren's life and

Speaker 31 they had a really great relationship. He was a really great guy.
Lauren's mom was one of a kind. She was just so warm and so sweet.
She was gorgeous. I mean, she just had these beautiful eyes.

Speaker 31 She was like a second mother to me, really. And she was just very caring and loving.
And Lauren was definitely the apple of her eye.

Speaker 59 On May 2nd in 2001, Lauren Prier is 23 years old, living in her own apartment not far from her parents' home.

Speaker 68 Walk us through what happened that morning.

Speaker 43 My mom and I talked on the phone every single day. Every morning.

Speaker 44 That was our routine.

Speaker 68 I called my mom in her office and her friend Gail was like, oh, she's not in yet.

Speaker 66 But I was told to tell you that if you called to call your father, and then I knew something was weird.

Speaker 57 With signs of a violent struggle and police on the way, the question now is,

Speaker 23 where is Leslie Prier?

Speaker 14 They pulled their guns.

Speaker 15 And they screamed, like, screamed, screamed.

Speaker 70 It was horrifying.

Speaker 12 It's terrifying.

Speaker 2 It's haunting.

Speaker 72 Okay. So we got speed and we're up.

Speaker 41 Interview with Brett Reedy.

Speaker 64 All right, so I'm gonna play this for you and then the talk after.

Speaker 19 Hello, we're wondering what you emergency.

Speaker 63 Um, I'm at uh Drummond, Debbie Chase. It looks like there's possibly uh, you know, um, maybe a struggle, a couple of things knocked down.

Speaker 63 Wow.

Speaker 14 I'm shaking. My voice is definitely I'm shaken.

Speaker 14 That call is haunting.

Speaker 59 After Leslie Preer's boss, Brett Reedy, calls 911 on the morning she failed to show for work, he and Leslie's husband, Sandy, do as they were instructed and wait outside for police to arrive.

Speaker 14 Five, ten minutes went by, and when they showed up, Sandy, he kind of greeted them and they pulled their guns. And Sandy goes, whoa, you guys mean business.
Like kind of in a joking way.

Speaker 14 You know, that was a little odd. I think my gut was somebody hurt somebody and tried to clean it up.
Sandy's reaction was, she must have fallen down.

Speaker 14 Sandy was somewhat, I believe, in denial of what was probably in front of him.

Speaker 12 Brett was of the opinion that something bad had happened and that it wasn't just an accident. If Leslie's hurt and she's going to the hospital, why would it be cleaned up already?

Speaker 14 I asked him directly, I said, Sandy,

Speaker 14 you were upstairs awfully quick. Did you check everywhere?

Speaker 14 And as soon as I said that,

Speaker 14 he puts his hand to his head and he goes, oh, I forgot to check the bathroom.

Speaker 12 That's when they ultimately found Leslie. She was in the shower stall in the master bathroom.
There was water running over her body when the police found her.

Speaker 14 The police came back out and the policeman was wearing gloves

Speaker 14 and he was taking them off and I knew

Speaker 14 right then and he walked right up to Sandy and said, sir, your wife is dead.

Speaker 33 I remember arriving at that scene at some point later on in that day. It was still a crime scene.
Police were still there.

Speaker 55 At 11.45 a.m., police found Mrs. Prier dead upstairs.

Speaker 38 There were signs of a struggle, but no forced entry.

Speaker 55 In addition, police report no previous problems in this quiet community.

Speaker 33 This was an unusual place to be responding to a homicide. This happened in a residential community of very nice homes.
It really made no sense that there would be a crime like this in that area.

Speaker 49 Leslie and Sandy Prier's daughter, Lauren, only knows that her father wants to speak with her.

Speaker 61 She has no idea what's happened to her mother.

Speaker 75 At this point, it's just Sandy and Leslie residing in the house, right?

Speaker 12 Yes, Lauren lived in an apartment in Silver Spring, which is just a few miles away.

Speaker 29 I looked out the window and I saw a police car pull up.

Speaker 44 And I saw my dad and a police officer get out of the car.

Speaker 29 And I said, oh God, what the hell's happening?

Speaker 44 My dad was like talking. He was just talking, but everything was in slow motion.

Speaker 70 He's like, Lauren, your mom has been in an accident.

Speaker 29 I think seeing like a bus accident or she got in a car.

Speaker 26 Like, you know, I wasn't thinking the work

Speaker 46 that.

Speaker 46 And then he goes, um,

Speaker 70 she's no longer with us anymore.

Speaker 15 I was like, what?

Speaker 15 And so I ran into my bedroom and he screamed, like, screamed, screamed. Like what you hear on like the horror movies, like deep down into your stomach scream.

Speaker 76 And I said, I don't understand.

Speaker 14 It shook the office. I had to make that phone call.

Speaker 47 Rhett calls the office. He said, you're not going to believe this, Linda, but Leslie's dead.

Speaker 47 And he couldn't tell me anymore because he didn't know anymore.

Speaker 16 I saw a number of police cars. I saw an ambulance.
I was just shocked. Who would want to murder such a wonderful person?

Speaker 11 Investigators begin canvassing the neighborhood, searching for answers, and they're looking to see if any similar crimes had occurred in the area.

Speaker 28 They looked at any other burglaries in the area, any other assaults that happened, and there just, there wasn't any clear indicator that any other crimes were related.

Speaker 56 Nothing like this had ever happened in that area.

Speaker 40 A murder like this.

Speaker 12 Not a murder like this.

Speaker 12 There were a couple of assaults on women throughout the county that a lot of people did think were related, but the police department did their due diligence and compared all the cases and they determined, no they're not related at the time a lot of women were very fearful of what was going on that there was a killer out there that in their quiet neighborhood had come into this house and killed a woman and as detectives start digging into the case a crucial detail comes into question It was hard to pinpoint Leslie's actual time of death.

Speaker 28 She may have been dead for longer than just the hour or two that we believe she was there.

Speaker 23 There was a theory that Leslie could have been killed the night the night before.

Speaker 65 Yes.

Speaker 4 So investigators bring Leslie's husband in for questioning.

Speaker 30 They want to know exactly what the couple had been up to the night before.

Speaker 25 Just be a man and tell us what happened.

Speaker 78 I told you exactly what happened.

Speaker 25 But you haven't told us the truth.

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Speaker 55 It was Wednesday morning, about 10 a.m., when Leslie Jennings Prier's colleagues became concerned. She hadn't come to work.
At 11:45 a.m., police found Mrs. Prier dead upstairs.

Speaker 24 The autopsy has been completed. The cause of death is one force trauma.

Speaker 41 Beyond that, police are being tight-lipped about what they know.

Speaker 55 Reporting from Chevy Chase, I'm Brad Bell, ABC7 News.

Speaker 14 Brad Bell, take one.

Speaker 33 It was obvious that a struggle had taken place on the first floor. Leslie Prier was choked, and the belief was that her head was slammed into the floor of the foyer of her home.

Speaker 52 Was there a question about the time of death and why?

Speaker 12 When Leslie's body was put in that shower, the heat, the humidity and the hot water over her body can change the rates of decomposition.

Speaker 12 So none of that was ever able to be pinpointed to a direct time of death.

Speaker 8 It's literally a horror story.

Speaker 43 We went back and there was still luminol all over the hallway, blood in the kitchen, all the way up the stairs,

Speaker 45 through the bedroom.

Speaker 43 And I stopped at their bed.

Speaker 68 I couldn't do it. I couldn't go in the bathroom.
I couldn't do it.

Speaker 5 Walking through the house, it was clear that there was a struggle.

Speaker 44 Like she was running for her life.

Speaker 82 Running.

Speaker 6 Who on earth would want to do this to your mom?

Speaker 43 I couldn't think of one person.

Speaker 28 The neighborhood canvas was really crucial. A lot of the neighbors were pretty observant.

Speaker 28 One neighbor mentioned that he woke up in the middle of the night and he saw that there were lights all on in the Prayer household and the shades were drawn, but he could tell that all the lights were on.

Speaker 28 And he thought that was very strange.

Speaker 4 Then another neighbor reported to police that something unusual happened that morning when Leslie's husband Sandy left for work.

Speaker 56 He was standing in his doorway, appearing to say goodbye to someone in the house, but then he also made a point to greet that neighbor, something she said he never did.

Speaker 10 She told detectives, it was almost like he wanted her to notice him leave that morning.

Speaker 32 You begin to think, does that play into someone trying to cover up, develop a timeline, and things like that?

Speaker 32 If you're a woman, more than 50% of the time, the person who's responsible for taking your life is your intimate partner.

Speaker 32 So it's a logical place for any investigator to begin with.

Speaker 25 Kate's day is May 4th, 2001, and we're talking with Carl Prier.

Speaker 4 Leslie's husband is interviewed by police just two days after her murder because they're not positive when Leslie was killed.

Speaker 49 They want to nail down what Sandy was doing the night before Leslie was found dead.

Speaker 18 Tuesday, it must have been a regular day. Went to work and got off.
I was taking some computer stuff to the dump.

Speaker 18 Got there before 8 o'clock, took everything off, then left, and I think I went to a couple stores.

Speaker 4 After the stop at the dump, Sandy Prier says he went to three different stores before finding the battery charger he was looking for.

Speaker 56 He didn't get home until about 9 p.m.

Speaker 4 Tuesday night.

Speaker 28 All of that was just a little bit suspicious. It seemed like he was trying to create an alibi for himself.

Speaker 17 I don't recall anything out of the norm on Tuesday. Okay.

Speaker 17 And when you arrived home, you all didn't have supper together after 9?

Speaker 38 I went right to bed.

Speaker 17 She stayed up.

Speaker 84 Do you have any idea when she came to bed?

Speaker 19 Nope.

Speaker 55 I could guess, but I don't know for a fact.

Speaker 84 Okay. You indicated that at some time during the night you recall her being

Speaker 84 in bed.

Speaker 4 Then Sandy says something that catches the detective's attention.

Speaker 21 He admits that his marriage had been under tremendous strain.

Speaker 30 Both he and Leslie were feeling pressure at work.

Speaker 4 They were struggling to keep up with their bills.

Speaker 49 And Sandy says that Leslie was drinking.

Speaker 17 She pretty much just had a glass of wine as soon as she got in.

Speaker 19 Just one?

Speaker 86 No.

Speaker 84 How many?

Speaker 17 Is this important in terms of?

Speaker 17 She would have a lot.

Speaker 17 She would have a lot. And in all honesty, it's one of the reasons why I kind of come home late, because I

Speaker 17 just really, I was kind of, it was getting hard to deal with.

Speaker 17 Leslie was an absolute love, beauty, when she, when she didn't drink. Were these a source of arguments between those two? Sure?

Speaker 83 Sure.

Speaker 84 Definitely.

Speaker 12 At that point, they started to realize more details are coming out and it's conflicting with how he originally presented things.

Speaker 17 Since we're on the subject,

Speaker 17 how would she act? The sign was always the personality. You could tell immediately.

Speaker 34 Happy, argumentative.

Speaker 17 Argumentative,

Speaker 18 not happy.

Speaker 17 Just

Speaker 17 chill out, you know, every little mountain out of a mohill and everything.

Speaker 25 She

Speaker 17 just keeps bam, bam, bam, just keep coming at you, just keep coming at you. And it was, it's, it was, uh,

Speaker 18 it wasn't fun.

Speaker 21 Sandy tells detectives there was one time when an argument escalated.

Speaker 17 The most violent I ever got was I'd grab her and just say, you know, you gotta snap out of.

Speaker 17 Like grabbing her by her shoulders.

Speaker 17 Her shoulders, but I did that one time and it you know really and she you know hit the wall I'm nothing you know smashing or anything it hit the wall and she's burst in tears and I'm thinking God what am I doing

Speaker 17 so

Speaker 17 so I pretty much controlled myself to where I just was not going to go there

Speaker 17 did either of you ever discuss divorce or separation

Speaker 17 We never seriously discussed it because we loved each other dearly

Speaker 18 There were times where I'd say, screw you, I'm divorcing you.

Speaker 18 To me, that's not a discussion. It's not when we sit down like this and talk about seriously getting a divorce.

Speaker 30 After almost two hours of questioning, the interview wraps up.

Speaker 4 But it's clear Sandy Prier has done little to ease the detective's suspicions or eliminate himself as a suspect.

Speaker 84 Well, I assume you've been totally candid with us about this and you're not holding anything back. No, hold on any information.

Speaker 18 Leslie and I had our arguments and we had some pretty nasty ones at times.

Speaker 37 But there's nothing that I am consciously thinking now that I'm holding back.

Speaker 60 Holding back or not, detectives are determined to get more out of Sandy Prier and they strap him to a lie detector.

Speaker 12 The police think that he killed his wife.

Speaker 58 Then, two months into the investigation, there's some surprising news.

Speaker 48 Could there be a new suspect emerging?

Speaker 12 Detectives look at a lot of theories. They interviewed a lot of people.
They looked at all of the relationships. Whoever this person was, they had never been arrested for anything.
Who is this person?

Speaker 12 What would make someone want to kill Leslie?

Speaker 12 Detectives did go to follow up with Sandy and it was ruled a death by homicide.

Speaker 12 His first reaction was, okay, I know where this is going because usually when there's a death of a married woman, it's the husband is the suspect. He volunteered to take a polygraph test.

Speaker 47 Sandy told us he failed a lie detector test. He was very open about it.
I thought, well, I wouldn't be.

Speaker 71 Is that common for someone who is innocent to fail a polygraph test?

Speaker 12 It happens, but I wouldn't say it's common.

Speaker 36 Polygraphs are tricky.

Speaker 12 They're not admissible in court.

Speaker 4 It's not just police who found Sandy suspicious.

Speaker 51 There were people who knew the Preers that were asking, could Leslie's husband have killed her?

Speaker 22 When you first heard that Leslie Preer had been murdered in her home, what went through your mind?

Speaker 24 Why, who and why?

Speaker 24 And it all unfortunately started coming back to Sandy.

Speaker 61 What did the neighbors make of hearing that Sandy had been interviewed?

Speaker 21 Sandy was considered a suspect.

Speaker 16 I was really shocked because at no time did I ever think he was guilty. At no time.
But I do know that a number of neighbors felt that he was guilty.

Speaker 14 I talked to the police quite often for the next couple weeks.

Speaker 63 I'm with Mr. Brett Reedy, referenced a death investigation on Drummond Avenue.

Speaker 14 They thought he did it. And one of the reasons was that the coroner believed this happened in the early hours, but they couldn't really determine it because it was not an exact science.

Speaker 51 On May 24th, just over three weeks after his wife's death, Sandy Prier meets with investigators again.

Speaker 78 How you doing? All right, how about yourself? Not bad, not good.

Speaker 57 Good.

Speaker 23 This time, the conversation takes a different turn.

Speaker 25 Cancer machine at home.

Speaker 37 Have you erased that or any of the stuff that was on there for the past few weeks, is it still there?

Speaker 78 You guys, I don't mean to show any disrespect,

Speaker 33 but I've been cooperating with you since day one,

Speaker 78 and I think I've answered enough questions.

Speaker 25 I don't understand.

Speaker 78 My attorney said not to answer any more questions.

Speaker 78 And again, I don't mean to show any disrespect to you guys at all.

Speaker 12 Sandy volunteered to give them whatever they needed. They took his watch to see if there were any blood traces in it.
They took his glasses.

Speaker 12 They took pictures of his hands and his face and tried to see if there were any scratches or anything on his body. And he was totally cooperative with all of that stuff in the beginning.

Speaker 12 And it got to a point where they had kept interrogating him.

Speaker 25 You got to do the right thing, man.

Speaker 25 You got to.

Speaker 18 I think I am.

Speaker 18 In fact, I know I am.

Speaker 18 And I'll just tell you one thing.

Speaker 87 You've got the wrong guy.

Speaker 78 I've told you everything

Speaker 87 exactly how it happened.

Speaker 18 And I don't have anything else to say. We can prove that you have told us the truth, Sandy.

Speaker 25 We have physical evidence that shows Leslie was dead before 7 o'clock in the morning.

Speaker 25 And that don't lie.

Speaker 9 People lie.

Speaker 9 Sir, I don't have anything else to say.

Speaker 12 That made the detectives even more suspicious of him.

Speaker 61 But two months later, test results on forensic evidence collected at the scene reveal a clue left behind that doesn't fit with the theory that Sandy Prier killed his wife, Leslie.

Speaker 35 At the crime scene, there was DNA found in blood and under Leslie's fingernails, which was a sign that she tried tried to fight off her attacker. That DNA was not a match to Leslie Preer's husband.

Speaker 12 Whoever this person that left blood and their DNA on the scene was, they had never been arrested for anything that would have put them in the system.

Speaker 14 The police said we would like to take swabs of all the males in the office to eliminate you all. All right, well, my first thought was, they probably want to eliminate me only because I was there.

Speaker 30 And I said, fine.

Speaker 12 At that point, they were eliminated as suspects. So

Speaker 12 whose DNA is this? And why is it in the house? Why is it under her fingernails? Who is this person?

Speaker 49 A little over a year after her mother's murder, Lauren Prier meets with detectives for an update on the case.

Speaker 48 What they tell her isn't easy for her to hear.

Speaker 25 I see.

Speaker 51 Well, I know this has has got to be rough on you.

Speaker 88 And it's frustrating for us because

Speaker 88 my gut feeling is that your dad had something to do with this.

Speaker 88 I've just been a cop too many years. I've worked too many cases.

Speaker 88 It is so bizarre to

Speaker 88 think

Speaker 88 that

Speaker 88 this could be.

Speaker 9 somewhere else.

Speaker 49 Detectives spend the next two hours telling Lauren Prier that they believe her father killed her mother and how they think it unfolded.

Speaker 88 My theory on this,

Speaker 88 as it were, something happened after he got home that night.

Speaker 88 They had some sort of a real argument.

Speaker 88 He was pinced out, stressed out, had a hell of a long day, and then it got out of control.

Speaker 69 And

Speaker 69 what happened happened.

Speaker 88 I think your dad just lost it.

Speaker 22 How is it possible?

Speaker 12 First thing, you need to say that you found some evidence of another person being there.

Speaker 22 But that's like, to me, that's like the most bizarre thing.

Speaker 88 I mean,

Speaker 88 the only thing that I can think of is someone else was there when Sandy arrived home late at night. There was some interaction between Sandy and that person, and then that person fled.

Speaker 12 If my mom was having him afraid, he's not the kind of person that, like, he wasn't a possessor to the guy at all. I mean, he would have been fine, but he wouldn't have like gone berserk.

Speaker 78 I can tell you that much.

Speaker 12 I can't imagine my father, like, I just, I just can't imagine him like actually like murdering her and staring at her face while she died in his hands.

Speaker 35 That just totally seems unfair to me.

Speaker 27 I knew my dad loved my mom so much.

Speaker 90 I mean,

Speaker 44 I had my moment where I questioned, could he really go that far?

Speaker 56 I'm like, no.

Speaker 29 My dad loved my mom, loved, adored her.

Speaker 45 There's no way in hell that my dad looked my mom in the eyes and strangled her.

Speaker 85 That's impossible.

Speaker 58 If Sandy Prier didn't kill his wife, then who did?

Speaker 49 Detectives need a new strategy, and that unknown blood found at the scene just might give them one.

Speaker 26 I knew she was flattered by him. The only thing I thought of was, did they have an affair?

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Speaker 76 I had this like perfect

Speaker 62 world.

Speaker 76 before this all happened. Perfect.

Speaker 21 I mean, everything was great.

Speaker 40 I became a different person, and my world changed completely.

Speaker 77 In the aftermath of her mother's murder, Lauren Prier is grappling not just with her immense loss, but also the lack of answers as time goes on, with the identity of the killer remaining a mystery.

Speaker 6 I'm sure those were very difficult years for you without your mom, without your best friend.

Speaker 40 It was almost impossible.

Speaker 40 I said, Lauren, Lauren, someday, somehow, this is going to be resolved.

Speaker 12 There weren't any new leads or information coming in. 2010, another group of cold case detectives picked up on it, and they still focused on Sandy quite a bit.

Speaker 7 So he was the strongest suspect despite his DNA not being found at the scene.

Speaker 12 Yeah, I think that they were trying to find, you know, is there a reason where he could have hired someone to kill her?

Speaker 4 Lauren Prier had her own suspicions about a neighbor living in the area.

Speaker 4 She said he'd made comments about her mother, Leslie's good looks, and even invited Leslie to walk their dogs together in the neighborhood.

Speaker 26 I knew that she was flattered by him.

Speaker 44 He was very handsome.

Speaker 26 The only thing I thought of was: did they have an affair?

Speaker 27 And then my mom tried to cut cut it off and he murdered her.

Speaker 6 You thought it was a neighbor and he had gotten away with it?

Speaker 44 Yes, 100%.

Speaker 12 She mentioned him numerous times. And in 2010, detectives did speak to that individual and got his DNA and he was also eliminated.

Speaker 85 They swapped him and it was negative.

Speaker 6 That had to drive you nuts going right back to zero and not having anyone.

Speaker 26 I thought I was going to die without knowing. I really truly thought that.

Speaker 4 In 2017, Lauren's father Sandy passes away after an illness, dying under a cloud of suspicion that never fully cleared.

Speaker 43 My mom's family believed he killed her.

Speaker 46 Not all of them.

Speaker 67 Some of my uncles and some of my cousins were like, there's no way.

Speaker 29 And so they were out of touch with him.

Speaker 71 I mean, I think my dad died of a broken heart.

Speaker 30 The case remains cold in the years that follow.

Speaker 31 It makes you paranoid in a way to think that there's somebody that could commit this brutal crime and then just be walking free.

Speaker 31 And the decades just went on and on and I knew to kind of wonder this is never going to be solved.

Speaker 47 It bothered us a lot. I mean, every time we would get together, we would talk about it.

Speaker 14 For many years after this happened, when we got together around the proverbial water cooler, someone would always come up with one other revelation or one other, oh, maybe this happened, and we just couldn't put it together.

Speaker 38 I would check with my sources in the police department periodically.

Speaker 39 I would say, hey, what was up with that Drummond case?

Speaker 38 And they never had anything new to tell me. They said it remained a mystery.

Speaker 65 Finally, one day, on my phone, Tara called.

Speaker 61 In 2022, Detective Tara Augustin joins Allison DuPois in in the Montgomery County Police Cold Case Unit, where every box on these shelves represents an unsolved mystery.

Speaker 12 Ever since I joined the police department, I think my career goal was to get into the cold case unit because these are all major crimes, and I like the challenge of trying to look at everything with fresh eyes and not take the same viewpoints that the previous investigators had.

Speaker 12 And when it's successful, it's a huge satisfaction that you're able to do something for the families and give closure.

Speaker 52 And her first assignment, the Leslie Prier case.

Speaker 28 It was one of many boxes that are sitting on our shelves and when Tara joined our unit, she just picked right up on it.

Speaker 12 I just dug right in and

Speaker 65 I dragged her along for the ride.

Speaker 68 And she was like, we're calling about your mom, Leslie Prier. And I said,

Speaker 29 what?

Speaker 49 So in 2022, you reach out to Lauren and you tell her, we are on this.

Speaker 28 It was very, very emotional for Lauren.

Speaker 28 She was just so grateful that somebody was looking at this and thinking about her mom again.

Speaker 71 Were you concerned at all that you were raising her hopes?

Speaker 28 It's always a concern. You want to temper expectations.

Speaker 12 We have some ideas of things that we can do now that had never been done before,

Speaker 12 but it's a very long process, so we had to...

Speaker 65 really urge her to be patient with us.

Speaker 26 She's like, Lauren, this is going to take a long time.

Speaker 43 I said, I understand. No problem.
I said, take your time.

Speaker 48 What was your initial thought when you looked through the case in 2022?

Speaker 28 The main thing was the unknown DNA under her fingernails, in the blood, on the scene. You can't ignore that.
And that really was the crux of the case.

Speaker 28 We had been using the forensic genetic genealogy to some success at that point. And that was, I think, probably the biggest technological advance in the DNA that we've had in a while.

Speaker 4 In forensic genetic genealogy, DNA from the crime scene is compared to DNA that has been entered into public databases, a powerful way to find relatives, close or distant, of the unknown suspect.

Speaker 49 So DNA from Leslie Prier's fingernails is sent to a private lab.

Speaker 4 And this genealogy technique didn't exist in 2009.

Speaker 51 It wasn't around.

Speaker 12 Not even in 2010.

Speaker 61 Or do you both have training in genetic genealogies?

Speaker 12 We've taken courses for training for that, but we're both kind of beginners at it.

Speaker 61 So you've submitted this DNA to see where it matches.

Speaker 49 What results are you now looking at?

Speaker 28 We had some pretty low matches that we were working with at first because they were U.S.-based. There was a lot of public information on the family trees.

Speaker 28 So there were some very high matches that were coming back to outside of the country.

Speaker 4 Low matches have less shared DNA with the suspect, making it more difficult to trace back the family line to identify them.

Speaker 12 It had been about a year and a half of working on these low matches, and I just wanted to explore these higher matches.

Speaker 49 When the detectives finally delve into the overseas matches, they find a person in, of all places, Romania, who shares enough DNA to be a promising lead, suggesting their suspect could be an American with Romanian ancestry.

Speaker 28 So this high match, and that's an awesome shared match.

Speaker 85 What did you think?

Speaker 28 This is it. That was really where we needed to go.
This was the one that was overseas.

Speaker 28 So it was like another level of a challenge, but it was really worth trying because otherwise we were just spinning our wheels and we weren't getting any closer.

Speaker 12 So you would make a family tree basically showing any possibility of aunts and uncles, first cousins.

Speaker 30 Was that your aha moment?

Speaker 12 I remember I said, Allie, come over here and look at this. I think I really have a break.
Like, oh, this is serious.

Speaker 57 What she finds?

Speaker 30 A name closer to home than Lauren could have ever expected.

Speaker 40 Hey, it's up!

Speaker 43 I said, Are you sure?

Speaker 85 And she said, Yes, it's him.

Speaker 8 He almost got away with it.

Speaker 12 Any your DNA was in the crime scene for this.

Speaker 33 This is one of the crimes, homicides, murders that I never forgot about.

Speaker 70 It was horrifying.

Speaker 12 It's terrifying.

Speaker 2 It's haunting.

Speaker 28 Only two people know what happened that day, you know, he and Leslie, and Leslie can't speak for herself.

Speaker 75 Based on all of this evidence, what do you think happened to Leslie that morning when she was killed?

Speaker 35 That DNA could have matched to somebody else in that family.

Speaker 12 She didn't have any specific evidence to point to he's the killer, but she just got a weird feeling about him.

Speaker 36 I ended up leaving that house that night.

Speaker 93 I did not stay there because I was afraid of him.

Speaker 58 She was afraid of something.

Speaker 30 She thought he might go after her.

Speaker 14 Murdered someone? I want to know what snapped in you.

Speaker 68 I almost fainted.

Speaker 82 What goes through her mind?

Speaker 44 I was in shock. I totally, I'm still in shock.

Speaker 27 This is a family photo from my 15th birthday.

Speaker 45 There's my beautiful mother.

Speaker 48 For Lauren Preer, sifting through memories of life before her mother's murder is bittersweet.

Speaker 45 It's one of the last trips I went on with my mom.

Speaker 48 A family destroyed.

Speaker 60 Her father, once a suspect, dying without knowing who killed Leslie Prier inside their Maryland home on Drummond Avenue.

Speaker 6 When you see photos like these, it's what memories come rushing back.

Speaker 27 They were the best parents, and then I missed them so much. We were just such a tight-knit family and loved each other very much.

Speaker 48 Today, Drummond Avenue is as idyllic as it was when Leslie Prier lived here, with no hint to the tragedy that took place.

Speaker 20 And for decades, there were no answers to this murder mystery that rocked this community.

Speaker 41 Police are asking residents of this community to be on the alert to report anything suspicious that might lead to an arrest.

Speaker 55 I remember clearly.

Speaker 34 I remember standing in front of that home.

Speaker 33 It troubled me that this woman's killer hadn't been found. But nearly a quarter century went by before we heard anything more about it.

Speaker 4 What made you think you could find the killer?

Speaker 12 We knew that there was DNA evidence, and that is huge for cold cases. We can use genealogy to try to identify a suspect.

Speaker 49 By 2024, detectives Augustin and DuPois have spent a year and a half searching public genetic genealogy databases for any connections to that unknown male DNA found at the crime scene.

Speaker 30 Their most promising lead, a person in Romania, who appears to be a distant relative of the killer.

Speaker 12 So just doing basic Google searches, I was able to find out a lot of information.

Speaker 12 And so I started going through a lot of old historical information about their family line.

Speaker 28 Grave sites, obituaries, marriage documents, census records. So it's a little bit of like history detective as well as regular detective work.

Speaker 12 Then I came across the name Virgil Glegore, and that kind of clicked in my head because I remembered the name Glegor and I knew it was in the case files.

Speaker 49 Glegore.

Speaker 4 Eugene Glegore is the name in the case file.

Speaker 30 Lauren Prier's high school boyfriend.

Speaker 7 The two were high school sweethearts who met up at the Zachevy Chase High School.

Speaker 48 They shared a tight-knit group of friends despite their two-year age difference.

Speaker 67 he's a little younger than me but we just were attracted to each other and started dating so what was it about eugene that

Speaker 6 he was just

Speaker 2 he was extremely attractive he was very charismatic he was a ladies man like he was and he all the girls loved him but i got him so we just became a thing What was he like during those years when you were together?

Speaker 67 Popular, had a lot of friends.

Speaker 24 He was very outgoing, very sharp individual, you know, very witty. You know, he could carry a conversation, whether it be with her parents or anyone.

Speaker 35 Eugene's mom was a consultant for the World Bank and then left that job to raise her boys. And his dad was a tenured professor at the University of Maryland.
He had one brother.

Speaker 31 He had a pretty, I would say, relaxed, easygoing personality. His parents' house was kind of like the central hangout spot.

Speaker 31 So,

Speaker 31 you know, we used to spend a lot of time over there just kind of hanging out, doing what kids do.

Speaker 53 Eugene Glegore lived just about a 10-minute walk from the Prier house in an upscale community called Kedwood, known for its luxury homes and cherry blossoms.

Speaker 48 This trail runs between their two neighborhoods.

Speaker 23 All you had to do is cross the street, walk down the bike path.

Speaker 68 My parents' house was like three houses up.

Speaker 2 That's it.

Speaker 21 The friend group also also often spent time at the prayer house.

Speaker 31 Lauren's parents, her mom in particular, just welcomed everybody with open arms and made sure that they were fed.

Speaker 31 So I have a lot of very vivid memories of Eugene and Lauren and I at Lauren's parents' house.

Speaker 43 My mom was just open door, totally took him in.

Speaker 44 He came to my parents' house when I wasn't even home yet.

Speaker 45 She loved him.

Speaker 4 She adored him.

Speaker 15 Dinners, barbecues, breakfasts.

Speaker 68 We went on vacation together with all of us.

Speaker 21 And so he was at some point part of our family.

Speaker 89 So here you are.

Speaker 68 This is a night of prom.

Speaker 2 Correct.

Speaker 90 That's me.

Speaker 35 That's Eugene.

Speaker 45 We had a great evening. We had fun.

Speaker 26 We stayed up all night and it was a beautiful evening.

Speaker 85 How serious was that relationship?

Speaker 24 There were couples and then there was Eugene and Lauren type of couple. They were on like a different level.
It was Eugene and Lauren, not just Eugene. It wasn't hanging out with Lauren.

Speaker 24 It was, let's go hang with Eugene and Lauren.

Speaker 46 I mean, I loved him back then. I really did.

Speaker 75 He was gentle with me.

Speaker 24 If like we got a scuffle with any guys from like a different school and like there was any kind of altercation,

Speaker 24 he would be one of the last people you want to have your back.

Speaker 61 Not really a fighter?

Speaker 15 No, not a fighter at all, you know.

Speaker 52 Eugene and Lauren dated throughout high school and then continued dating when Lauren went to college.

Speaker 48 After five years together, they broke up.

Speaker 6 And when did you guys break up?

Speaker 43 We were so young. We'd been together for too long.

Speaker 23 We just had a talk and we both kind of agreed like

Speaker 6 in touch after that?

Speaker 97 No.

Speaker 60 About two years after their breakup, Lauren's mother was killed.

Speaker 4 Fast forward to 2024, when detectives determine that Eugene Glegor is a first cousin twice removed from the genetic genealogy match in Romania.

Speaker 30 But for the police, that doesn't necessarily make him the killer.

Speaker 26 Why would he do this?

Speaker 12 There wasn't much to make him a suspicious person.

Speaker 26 Nothing raised flags to say, hey, this guy's a killer.

Speaker 11 But when detectives look back at the case file, something in there catches their eye.

Speaker 28 And it just is one of those loose ends that was never tied up.

Speaker 59 As detectives look into the history of Eugene Gleibor, a particular day stands out to them from over two decades ago.

Speaker 48 Leslie Prier's funeral.

Speaker 24 Beautiful day outside, big church.

Speaker 24 Just the amount of people there, the amount of friends from high school that were there and support for Lauren.

Speaker 24 It was very well attended.

Speaker 49 But not present among the throngs of people, Lauren's long-term ex-boyfriend, Eugene Glegore.

Speaker 24 I remember asking Lauren specifically, I was like, where is Eugene? And her saying to me that it was too much for him to handle. And I just remember being so upset, just being, are you kidding me?

Speaker 24 That's the excuse. That's the most selfish thing I've ever heard.
It just rubbed me so wrong. I was like, why the hell is Eugene not here?

Speaker 4 The detectives discover a traffic ticket Glee Gore had received during that time and find out that a few days after the murder, at the same time as the funeral, he took a long, unplanned road trip to see a friend in Portland, Oregon.

Speaker 12 Eugene decided he didn't want to go and instead took a cross-country trip all of a sudden to Portland, Oregon? It made no sense.

Speaker 49 As part of their investigation, detectives would later interview Eugene's brother Andre and learn that he and his parents did attend the funeral.

Speaker 61 Andre also knew the Prier family. Did you ever meet Lauren's parents, Leslie Carl? Yes, yes.
Had you ever been to their house? Yes.

Speaker 61 The only times I went to their house was in the context of pet sitting. Okay.
Do you remember the dog?

Speaker 61 I do. I do remember to see that movie.

Speaker 61 Yes, yes. Do you went to the memorial service? Yes.
Okay. Did you mention that he was in town or out of town or anything like that? I didn't mention anything because I had to talk to him.

Speaker 61 We know that he was out of town, and we thought that was a little bit peculiar because, you know, Drew's girlfriend's mother got murdered. That's very

Speaker 61 curious. I would definitely want to, you know, be there.
And obviously you felt compelled to go. Yes.
So

Speaker 61 that's one of the main things that we're kind of confused about.

Speaker 49 In the case file, detectives see that nine months after Leslie's murder in January 2002, a tip had come in about Eugene, who had been living with his mother after his parents' divorce.

Speaker 12 A lady that lived in the neighborhood where Eugene Gleegore lived said, I know that he used to date the victim's daughter, and he was getting in trouble in the neighborhood for noise complaints and just nuisance things where the police had come out there.

Speaker 12 And for some reason, he stuck out to her and she said, I just want to let you guys know, look at this guy. It was just a hunch.

Speaker 12 She didn't have any specific evidence to point to he's the killer, but she just got a weird feeling about him and wanted to call in and give his information.

Speaker 6 So this neighbor calls it in, speaks with police.

Speaker 21 It's documented,

Speaker 56 but nothing happened.

Speaker 13 No, no.

Speaker 28 They weren't able to locate him, and it just is one of those, you know, loose ends that was never tied up.

Speaker 35 Eugene was not tested. He wasn't asked for his DNA.
He wasn't interviewed. It just sort of went away.

Speaker 32 They didn't have probable cause that would connect him in any way to the crime. He was an old boyfriend, and there was no indication that there had been animosity between him and the mom.

Speaker 4 Another person with a hunch about Eugene at the time, Lauren's father, Sandy.

Speaker 67 He never liked him.

Speaker 71 He never liked him?

Speaker 26 Even though I was dating him, he thought there was always something off.

Speaker 44 And then after she was gone, he said, do you think Eugene could be a part of this?

Speaker 43 I said, no.

Speaker 21 Like, what are you talking about?

Speaker 49 But what remains unclear to investigators? Why would Eugene Glegor commit a crime like this?

Speaker 51 As for Glegor's run-ins with the law, they don't see anything violent enough to suggest he'd be capable of murder.

Speaker 12 Eugene did have some police interactions throughout the years.

Speaker 12 There were a couple of incident reports for thefts or burglaries where he was listed as a suspect, but he was never charged because either there wasn't enough evidence or the families decided not to go forward with anything.

Speaker 12 At some point, he had been charged with marijuana possession.

Speaker 32 And he had two other contacts with the criminal justice system, but nothing that would have indicated he would have been involved in a violent crime.

Speaker 4 So these findings

Speaker 29 didn't really paint a picture of a brutal murder.

Speaker 12 No, not at all. No.
No.

Speaker 51 But then, detectives stumble upon something worrying.

Speaker 93 Okay, it was very scary, and I ended up calling the police.

Speaker 12 Now, that kind of changes things to where,

Speaker 12 okay, he might be capable of actually killing someone.

Speaker 36 I ended up leaving that house that night.

Speaker 93 I did not stay there. Okay.

Speaker 94 Um, because I was afraid of him.

Speaker 51 In the summer of 2024, 44-year-old Eugene Glegor has no idea that his life is under the microscope of detectives Augustine and DuPois.

Speaker 49 What was Eugene Glegor doing with his life?

Speaker 12 He had kept jobs and

Speaker 12 was just kind of living under the radar life.

Speaker 11 In the years after high school, he worked in the restaurant industry in New York, at one point as a maitre D at a Michelin-starred restaurant, then moved back to DC, working in business development.

Speaker 33 He built a life for himself. Married twice, divorced twice.

Speaker 35 He would host Super Bowl parties. He joined fantasy football leagues.
Eugene's life was completely normal in all the tellings from the people who interacted with him.

Speaker 42 I met Eugene Glegor in the summer of 2018. We both were working at a real estate technology startup.
Eugene did business development and sales. He was a very bubbly, friendly, gregarious person.

Speaker 42 You know, a classic salesperson. Laughing, joking.

Speaker 42 He was a mentor and I learned a lot from him and I looked up to him and he was my go-to person to ask for advice.

Speaker 35 Everyone in his life knew he struggled with alcohol. He was also really open about his journey to become sober and attending AA meetings.

Speaker 42 He had internalized a lot of self-help best practices, so to speak.

Speaker 42 I remembered him telling me, you know, having control over your thoughts and being able to see them as they come in and not just impulsively react to them is the first step toward being able to have control over your life.

Speaker 30 But detectives Augustine and DuPois find something troubling in court records from 2021.

Speaker 12 So this is a petition for a protective order and this was from his second wife after they got divorced.

Speaker 35 She describes in here an incident where Eugene came to collect his belongings without telling her. Shia writes, Eugene is an addict and has two guns.

Speaker 35 His behavior has been erratic and scary for a couple of years off and on.

Speaker 35 I am scared to be in my home. He is unpredictable.

Speaker 35 Eugene repeatedly calls me a whore and yells into my face. He throws objects, punches walls, and I fear for my safety when he has these outbursts.

Speaker 35 I am seeking protection from this verbal abuse and escalation.

Speaker 49 The petition for the protective order was ultimately denied by the court, which said there was no reasonable grounds to believe abuse as defined by the statute occurred.

Speaker 4 Detectives would later speak to that ex-wife.

Speaker 36 He had moved out.

Speaker 93 He was supposed to let me know. and get my approval before coming over and he just came in and it was very scary and I ended up calling the police and I ended up leaving that house that night.

Speaker 93 I did not stay there again because I was afraid of him.

Speaker 98 It was probably the only time that I was like, oh my god, like this is really scary.

Speaker 51 So she was frightened. Yeah.

Speaker 58 She was afraid of something.

Speaker 11 She thought he might go after her.

Speaker 51 What stood out to you the most in this?

Speaker 12 It just showed a completely different side of him that hadn't been exposed before.

Speaker 12 Once I saw that, okay, well, there is a propensity for violence. And now that kind of changes things to where, okay, he might be capable of actually killing someone.

Speaker 52 After detectives find that petition for a protective order, signs are pointing in the direction.

Speaker 49 Eugene Glegor is their guy, but they need proof, especially since there are other males in the Glegor line.

Speaker 12 His brother did dog sit for them occasionally, so we knew his brother did have access to the house as well.

Speaker 35 When you were dog sitting for the Preers, did you

Speaker 35 have a a key to their house?

Speaker 35 You know, I don't remember if Leslie gave me a key that I would give her back or whether

Speaker 35 the key was hidden somewhere.

Speaker 35 That DNA could match to another Gligor, could have matched to Eugene's brother, it could have matched to somebody else in that family, and so they needed Eugene's DNA to confirm their suspicions.

Speaker 12 We figured, okay, well, if Eugene's DNA doesn't come back a match, then Andre's our next step.

Speaker 61 Now the challenge, collecting that DNA without Eugene suspecting.

Speaker 12 And we got information that he was actually overseas and that he would be returning to the United States on a certain date, and we have the flight information.

Speaker 54 When Eugene Gliegor arrived here at Dulles Airport in Virginia from an overseas trip in June of 2024, you may have thought he was just another anonymous traveler passing through.

Speaker 53 But it turns out investigators were watching and waiting.

Speaker 32 They knew he was flying in. They knew he was going to be at Dulles.
So he's coming off a plane and bam, there's some detectives there.

Speaker 33 They set up essentially a sting. They arranged for him to be pulled aside by customs for a special screening.
They had arranged in the interview room several bottles of water.

Speaker 33 hoping that as he sat there, he would take one of them and they would have their DNA evidence.

Speaker 35 And that is when Eugene unknowingly takes the bait, drinks a bottle of water, and then leaves it there on the table.

Speaker 35 And after he leaves the room, detectives come in, take that bottle of water, and there they have his DNA.

Speaker 2 And then you get the call.

Speaker 43 And my world was once again

Speaker 12 upside down.

Speaker 81 What's going on? What is this trap?

Speaker 30 Eugene Glegor,

Speaker 51 finally confronted by police.

Speaker 92 I'm sure you're wondering what this is all about.

Speaker 37 Really like to know.

Speaker 50 Finally, 23 years after the murder of Leslie Preer, there's a DNA match to the crime scene. DNA taken from a water bottle Eugene Glegor drank from and left here at Dulles Airport.

Speaker 12 Normally, these things take a lot more time, but the biology lab was great in getting us a quick answer.

Speaker 12 And so we obtained the sample on a Sunday and by Friday, we had a report saying that it was a match.

Speaker 48 It's a pretty joyful moment to realize you've got your guy.

Speaker 4 With Eugene's DNA confirmed, his brother Andre was officially eliminated as a suspect, as was Lauren's father, Sandy, who had died still under that cloud of suspicion.

Speaker 12 So at this point, we didn't want to alert Lauren and ask her any questions about him because we didn't want anybody to know that he was our suspect yet until we had him into custody.

Speaker 12 He was actually living in Washington, D.C. at the time.
So the officers were sitting outside of his apartment waiting to see if they saw him leave so they could arrest him outside.

Speaker 12 And he came outside to drink coffee and hang out on a stoop.

Speaker 12 Hands off! Hands off!

Speaker 94 What's wrong with you? Can't pull your back. I can't pull your back.
There's no none. This is about.

Speaker 51 So what was his reaction?

Speaker 62 He

Speaker 12 was asking what it was about.

Speaker 39 Can you tell me what this is about?

Speaker 9 Yeah, you have a warrant.

Speaker 94 For what?

Speaker 12 He acted like he had no idea. You got a warrant.

Speaker 45 My boss is going to tell you everything about it, okay? So

Speaker 39 he'll give you a copy of it.

Speaker 68 So you didn't know anything about this warrant?

Speaker 9 No. Okay.

Speaker 32 I think he was completely surprised. The police wanted to catch him off guard.

Speaker 32 I don't think he had any idea they were going to be there.

Speaker 54 When did you call Lauren?

Speaker 12 So I called her as soon as we knew he was in custody. I said, we have someone under arrest for your mom's murder.
It's Eugene Glegor.

Speaker 68 And I almost fainted.

Speaker 82 What goes through your mind?

Speaker 44 I was in shock.

Speaker 44 I'm still in shock.

Speaker 29 Total shock.

Speaker 95 Just what?

Speaker 44 And then she goes, he's actually under arrest right now.

Speaker 99 You have a shoe right there.

Speaker 99 You can take the cuss off and just chain his ankle.

Speaker 99 Hi Eugene.

Speaker 62 Hello.

Speaker 92 I am Detective Agreston. This is Detective DuCoy

Speaker 12 from Montgomery County.

Speaker 92 So when we talked to him, I'm sure you're wondering what this is all about.

Speaker 99 Really like to know.

Speaker 38 This has been really,

Speaker 37 really hard.

Speaker 12 He was inquisitive at first and answered some questions.

Speaker 92 We were working on a case that came from Chevy Chase.

Speaker 92 And do you recall back in 2001, Leslie Prier?

Speaker 99 Yes, that she was murdered.

Speaker 37 Yes.

Speaker 92 Okay. So that's the case that we are investigating.
You went to BCC with her daughter at the time?

Speaker 99 Correct.

Speaker 92 Is that correct? Okay. And what was your relationship with Lauren, the daughter?

Speaker 37 We had dated.

Speaker 92 Like, were you still in touch with Lauren when this stuff happened to her mom?

Speaker 37 No, we had broken up a couple years before.

Speaker 12 But

Speaker 12 once confronted with some evidence, he completely changed his attitude.

Speaker 92 We actually have a sample of your DNA and it was compared to the crime scene DNA and it matched.

Speaker 99 So

Speaker 92 we know that you were there at the time when Leslie died.

Speaker 99 I never gave a sample of DNA.

Speaker 92 That's correct. We obtained a sample from a discarded water bottle and it was compared.
So your DNA matches the crime scene DNA.

Speaker 2 I don't know what to say. I have not,

Speaker 99 I have no recollection.

Speaker 37 I have no memory. I have no

Speaker 28 information from him, any explanation of how or why this could have happened. Only two people know what happened that day, you know, he and Leslie, and Leslie can't speak for herself.

Speaker 13 We can tell you more about, you know, what we think happened.

Speaker 83 I don't, I mean, what do you think happened? I don't know. I can't verify.
I don't know. I don't recall.
I don't have any memory. I didn't do anything that you're talking about, so I don't know.

Speaker 83 And I don't feel like I can,

Speaker 83 I don't know how to answer and go into it. I don't want to

Speaker 101 incriminate myself with questions. You guys are professionals.

Speaker 83 I'm not. I don't know.

Speaker 65 I really do think I need an attorney.

Speaker 92 Okay, that's fine.

Speaker 92 We're not going to ask you any more questions.

Speaker 92 There's no tears coming out of your face.

Speaker 87 I'm very dry right now.

Speaker 82 You're dry?

Speaker 83 I'm very dry.

Speaker 82 I'm parched dehydrated.

Speaker 101 You can probably see my eyes are bloodshot red because I'm just tired and drained. I don't know what's going on.
You want me to drink water so I can tear?

Speaker 92 I don't want you to tear.

Speaker 82 I just don't want you to say.

Speaker 92 I'm just trying to say that this seems a little put on.

Speaker 99 Are you kidding me?

Speaker 99 Are you fing kidding me?

Speaker 12 No, he was putting on a bit of a show, being emotional and just acting like he doesn't understand how this could have happened.

Speaker 99 In your eyes, it's guilty until proven innocent. I get it.

Speaker 92 Well, I mean, your DNA was in the crime scene. That's why, like.

Speaker 99 But I don't remember. I don't know.
I don't know.

Speaker 82 I don't know.

Speaker 92 What we're trying to figure out is how your blood was at the scene that day. Could it have been, you know,

Speaker 92 an interrupted burglary?

Speaker 28 Did something happen where

Speaker 92 you didn't expect anybody to be home?

Speaker 37 I have no idea. I don't remember.

Speaker 62 I don't recall.

Speaker 12 He just kept saying, I don't remember. I don't remember.
I don't remember.

Speaker 92 You keep saying you don't remember and you don't have any recollection.

Speaker 92 But if somebody was not involved, it would be an adamant, I didn't.

Speaker 99 Oh, I didn't do it.

Speaker 99 I definitely didn't do it. Like, this is absolutely.

Speaker 92 That's why we wanted to talk to you. I don't know why your blood is there also.
I don't know.

Speaker 92 Wow. The only person that knows is Leslie, and she can't tell us.

Speaker 28 He was very much wanting to be the victim in the situation, and it was very, very clear that we weren't buying it.

Speaker 92 I'm trying to give you an opportunity to be a little bit forthcoming before we... I mean,

Speaker 55 I feel very...

Speaker 87 I feel a little bit trapped here.

Speaker 13 Well, you're under arrest, so you should be.

Speaker 82 Okay.

Speaker 4 Did you think this moment would come?

Speaker 12 Yeah I hoped it would. I didn't think

Speaker 12 it was going to be him.

Speaker 12 I thought it was a random person and when you figure out the relationship to the family it makes it even worse because he betrayed any kind of like loyalty or relationship and trust that he had with the family.

Speaker 33 I have been a television reporter for a very long time now. And this is one of the crimes, homicides, murders that I never forgot about over the years.

Speaker 33 And so to ultimately hear on that day that they had made the arrest was even for me stunning.

Speaker 4 This case remained open for 23 years.

Speaker 102 Until now. Montgomery County State's Attorney John McCarthy speaking this afternoon moments after this man, 44-year-old Eugene Glygor, now charged with first-degree murder.

Speaker 42 Like this copacetic Zen person who had been through AA and had all this advice and had taught me a lot. Murdered someone?

Speaker 31 I couldn't wrap my head around it. Like, it just, I think, brings a

Speaker 31 sense of confusion and betrayal.

Speaker 6 When you guys were together, did you ever feel unsafe at all around him?

Speaker 6 At no point.

Speaker 11 And you were together for a number of years, but you never felt as though you were in any danger. Never.

Speaker 65 Never.

Speaker 44 Not once.

Speaker 7 It was very violent.

Speaker 24 It's so not what I ever knew of Eugene.

Speaker 28 You take a breath and then you gear up for helping to prepare for trial.

Speaker 28 And that's the next step because we, you know, we have him in custody, but we have to convince 12 people on a jury that he is the murderer.

Speaker 49 Investigators know Eugene Gligor is not going down without a fight.

Speaker 12 He was adamant that he was fighting it and that he was going to, you know, be out in a few months months and everything was gonna be fine.

Speaker 48 But even before they get to trial, there's an unexpected twist.

Speaker 42 I just could not believe it. I was completely gobsmacked.

Speaker 103 The college football playoff isn't over.

Speaker 4 Not yet.

Speaker 104 That epic run, that wild dream? Not over till the clock hits zero.

Speaker 103 Till the stadium shakes, till the wild things are let loose, till the trophy is lifted and the confetti falls. This is is the national championship.

Speaker 103 When it's over, you'll feel it.

Speaker 104 This is the wild world of college football.

Speaker 103 The CFP National Championship, Monday, January 19th at 7:30 p.m.

Speaker 4 Eastern on ESPN and the ESPN app.

Speaker 23 With Eugene Glegor in custody, the state starts preparing its case.

Speaker 57 This is when they track down the people from his past who were closest to him, starting with his ex-wives.

Speaker 9 Okay.

Speaker 12 He has two ex-wives and both of them kind of reiterated that he was a completely different person when he would drink.

Speaker 35 When we met,

Speaker 98 I had no experience with addiction in my life and so I didn't recognize what it was. But within about two months, I was like, something's wrong.

Speaker 13 But he

Speaker 94 was an alcoholic and he would drink and then pass out.

Speaker 98 And it was just a mess.

Speaker 12 And it was really, very, very sad.

Speaker 12 And that they oftentimes feared for his own safety when he would drink because he would be very reckless was he like a danger to himself like saying he would harm himself or just being impulsive going out drinking and driving or what kind of stuff

Speaker 105 okay okay we definitely started taking two different directions where my grudge was making celery juice and his was

Speaker 105 hiding a bottle under you know kitchen counter while working kind of thing. But he did a really good job of, I guess, jumping on hiding it.

Speaker 12 It got to a point with both of them that they ended up getting divorced because of his substance abuse issues.

Speaker 49 Detectives then interview Eugene's brother Andre, who is shocked. I'm sure it's very hard.
And we understand that this is a difficult, you know, predicament that you're in.

Speaker 49 I don't even know what to say. It's just

Speaker 30 beyond shocking. Detectives learned that Andre feared his brother may not only steal from him, but also interfere with his life.
Was there anything else that made you fearful of him?

Speaker 30 I was concerned or scared that he was going to sort of sabotage my life.

Speaker 59 According to detectives, Andre was living in a townhouse owned by their mother.

Speaker 30 And with Eugene's recent separation in 2021, Andre feared Eugene might do something to get him kicked out.

Speaker 30 He was sort of posturing and maneuvering to come after my living situation, and he wanted me to get kicked out of where I was, you know, where I live. So that's why I felt threatened by him.

Speaker 30 And I just had a gut feeling that perhaps he could be dangerous.

Speaker 48 Andre would tell police that he was so unsettled about his brother Eugene, he actually reached out to Lauren Prier.

Speaker 48 I reached out to somebody who I thought knew him, his character, not recent character, but from the past, I wanted to sort of confirm or deny my gut.

Speaker 48 And so that's why I messaged Lauren when I didn't really get

Speaker 48 an answer. Do you remember what that piece that you wrote to her?

Speaker 48 I just basically said, you know,

Speaker 48 I feel like my brother just

Speaker 48 he

Speaker 48 dislikes me.

Speaker 48 Some days I'm scared of him.

Speaker 48 Should I trust my instinct or am I going crazy?

Speaker 28 The picture that was painted for us was that he tended to be manipulative in his relationships according to these people and he would always try to make himself the victim and at the expense of other people.

Speaker 12 In my mind, he would put one persona out there, but behind closed doors, he was a different person.

Speaker 32 The case against him, I think, was rock solid. He did this crime.
That was not going to ever be the issue. The issue was going to be, is it first degree, second degree manslaughter?

Speaker 49 Then with the trial approaching, there's a surprising announcement. Glegor agrees to plead guilty to second degree murder.

Speaker 5 Were you both surprised that he pled guilty?

Speaker 12 I was. Now he's saying that he's responsible for it and that he's pleading guilty because he is, in fact, guilty.

Speaker 97 What was your reaction to that?

Speaker 27 Thank God.

Speaker 46 You didn't want to go to trial? No.

Speaker 45 That would have been hell.

Speaker 100 Calling criminal case C-15CR24870, Staden Mario versus Eugene Teodora Legor. Sir, are you pleading guilty here today freely and voluntarily?

Speaker 37 Yes, Your Honor.

Speaker 100 And are you pleading guilty because you do believe that you were guilty of second-degree murder?

Speaker 37 Yes, Your Honor.

Speaker 6 Did he look at you? No.

Speaker 45 Nothing. He didn't look at anybody, but he knew.

Speaker 27 I know he saw us.

Speaker 97 Did he seem remorseful?

Speaker 27 No.

Speaker 27 Nothing.

Speaker 95 He sat there and just stared, basically he stared down.

Speaker 75 Based on all of this evidence, what do you think happened to Leslie that morning when she was killed?

Speaker 12 I think that Eugene was breaking into the house thinking no one was home and he encountered Leslie and knowing that she would recognize him and he would get in trouble, I think that he just panicked and only thought about himself and made a selfish decision to kill Leslie in the heat of the moment just so he could get away.

Speaker 6 Knowing your mom so well, what do you think her reaction was when she saw Eugene?

Speaker 68 I think she was probably in shock and I think she was like, you know, Lauren's not here.

Speaker 68 What's going on?

Speaker 70 And then

Speaker 44 I think he got scared because he was in the house and she saw his face and knew exactly who he was.

Speaker 67 And then he freaked out and she ran for her life.

Speaker 13 He took her into the shower thinking that the DNA was going to be gone.

Speaker 6 But it wasn't.

Speaker 46 Not at her fingernails and then there was blood in the house.

Speaker 70 It was horrifying.

Speaker 82 It's terrifying.

Speaker 2 It's haunting.

Speaker 97 Your ex-boyfriend killed your mother. Yes.

Speaker 21 Literally.

Speaker 15 And the fact that somebody I knew that I dated went to prom with, it's insane.

Speaker 2 And then he almost got away with it.

Speaker 40 He almost got away with it.

Speaker 31 I think the burning question right now that everyone wants to know is why? Like, why did it have to result in murder?

Speaker 27 Do you think you'll get answers from him in sentencing?

Speaker 26 If he wants to talk.

Speaker 26 Thanks, Your Honor. And, Your Honor, make no mistake about it.

Speaker 26 Today is a day of reckoning for this defendant, who for 23 23 years

Speaker 26 hid in plain sight.

Speaker 4 And just two weeks ago, what Eugene Glegor had to say in court.

Speaker 106 At this time, Mr. Glegor, you do have the absolute right to address the court before I sentence you in this matter.

Speaker 106 If there is anything that you would like to say to the court, now is your opportunity to do so.

Speaker 100 Your Honor, yes, I would.

Speaker 49 The day has finally come for Eugene Glegor to be sentenced after pleading guilty to murdering Leslie Prier.

Speaker 30 But for those who knew her, there are still so many unanswered questions.

Speaker 14 I want to know why you were so violent to this woman. What snapped in you?

Speaker 107 Many family members are present today here in the courtroom to honor Leslie's memory.

Speaker 107 They're also here to finally see justice done after 24 years.

Speaker 20 Before Glegor is sentenced, Lauren gets the opportunity to speak directly to him.

Speaker 107 Why would you kill my mom?

Speaker 107 She was the sweetest of all I could say that she never judged anyone.

Speaker 107 You're a boxer of wolves and suits clothing.

Speaker 106 Well, thank you very much. Mr.
Glegor, if there is anything that you would like to say to the court, now is your opportunity to do so.

Speaker 108 Your Honor, I want to express my deepest regret, shame, and remorse for the devastating tragedy that I caused.

Speaker 59 And to help back up that remorse, Glegor's defense submitted a pre-sentencing memorandum that included these photos of him smiling alongside Lauren, saying after their breakup, there was no animosity between them, and he only had positive memories of Leslie Prier.

Speaker 108 I'm sorry it's taken me this long to take full responsibility. I'm grateful the time has come.

Speaker 108 I'm relieved the secret is over.

Speaker 108 I had many blackouts leading up to the evening of May 1st and the morning of May 2nd, 2001, but none that resulted in the most regretful and devastating event of my life.

Speaker 54 Although in court, Glegor said that most of the day was a blur, a memorandum filed by prosecutors prior to the sentencing quoted a more specific account from Glegor, saying, on May 1st, 2001, Mr.

Speaker 49 Glegor remembered drinking both shots and mixed drinks.

Speaker 77 He stated that he vaguely remembered driving to work and stopping off at the Prier house around 9:30 a.m.

Speaker 61 on May 2nd, 2001.

Speaker 30 He recalled a vague memory of going into the house and he and Mrs.

Speaker 20 Prier having some sort of physical altercation.

Speaker 30 He does not recall placing her in the shower or trying to clean up the crime scene.

Speaker 108 For Lauren and Leslie's family,

Speaker 101 I'm so sorry for causing you so much misery and hardship.

Speaker 4 After Eugene Glegor's statement, the judge sentenced him to 22 years in prison with five years of supervised probation.

Speaker 73 Our Maryland Bureau Chief Brad Bell is joining us now live first tonight, and he's been covering this case since we learned that Leslie Prier's murderer was identified.

Speaker 96 Yeah, a lot of emotions at play in the courtroom. The family finally today able to stand around this picture and take a family portrait and say they are thankful for some amazing detective work.

Speaker 32 This is a history-making case. I want to thank the family.

Speaker 41 There's no closure in these cases, but the sentence given by the judge was appropriate.

Speaker 96 You heard him speak today.

Speaker 96 What do you think? Johns has no remorse?

Speaker 12 I think it's the Eugene show in his mind, and I think it's the same thing over and over. I don't believe anything he says.

Speaker 40 I can't believe it's over. It's been so long.

Speaker 101 Almost 25 years. I'm 48 years old.

Speaker 40 I thought I was going to die without knowing.

Speaker 9 But it's over.

Speaker 2 It's over.

Speaker 35 We did it.

Speaker 2 Thank God.

Speaker 9 Thank you.

Speaker 9 Thanks.

Speaker 24 We all had these questions of who did it for years. And now we finally have an answer and some kind of idea to allow us to carry on with our lives.

Speaker 85 With Glegor now behind bars, Lauren Prier finally has some answers, but they're answers that came too late for her father, Sandy.

Speaker 6 How do you process that knowing that he passed a few years ago and it was so close to seeing this day?

Speaker 67 I have pictures of him in the guest bedroom and I

Speaker 43 talked to them and I said, I wish you had been here.

Speaker 29 I said, Daddy, thank you for being such a wonderful father.

Speaker 95 And I'm so sorry that you didn't get to see justice, but you're getting justice.

Speaker 6 She seemed like a wonderful, wonderful mom.

Speaker 68 She was smart.

Speaker 44 She was beautiful.

Speaker 4 She was an incredible human being.

Speaker 26 Yeah, she was my angel.

Speaker 74 We should point out tonight that Eugene Glegor could be eligible for parole after serving just half of the 22 years. He's already filed a motion asking for the court to reconsider his sentence.

Speaker 72 David, as for Lauren Prier, she tells us there are no words to express her gratitude to those two cold case detectives who never gave up on bringing her mother's killer to justice.

Speaker 72 That's our program for tonight. Thanks so much for watching.
I'm Deborah Roberts.

Speaker 74 And I'm David Muir from All of Us Here at 2020 and ABC News.

Speaker 19 Good night.