Driven to Extremes

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Speaker 4 Just five minutes before, they were alive.

Speaker 4 Five minutes later, your life changes like you never thought that it could change.

Speaker 6 I saw a BMW

Speaker 4 and I thought, what happened here?

Speaker 8 And it suddenly dawned on me, it looks like my car.

Speaker 4 I called 911.

Speaker 5 There was nothing that any person on earth could have done.

Speaker 7 I've driven that street thousands of times. I have been a good driver my whole life.

Speaker 7 But I could not stop that car.

Speaker 7 You had enough time

Speaker 7 for the world

Speaker 7 to go quiet,

Speaker 7 to think,

Speaker 7 why won't you stop?

Speaker 4 A Seminole County mother plowed into a tree.

Speaker 7 I knew I had to get to the children. She lost control of the car wrong.
I could not for an instant think that they were gone.

Speaker 11 Two girls died on their way home from the very first day of school.

Speaker 4 It was just the most horrible experience I could ever imagine.

Speaker 11 The mother of one of them was behind the wheel.

Speaker 10 Those girls

Speaker 7 had everything to live for. Why couldn't I have died?

Speaker 7 My daughter is gone.

Speaker 7 Because of Mary Hill. A mother charged with crashing into a tree.

Speaker 13 I want answers.

Speaker 7 Why was she driving so fast?

Speaker 14 Hill's attorneys blamed the car.

Speaker 7 A car like that just doesn't run into a tree. I knew that something like this was going to happen.

Speaker 7 Mary Hill needs to be held accountable for her actions.

Speaker 16 She is charged with vehicular homicide.

Speaker 7 It was like a time bomb, just waiting for that time bomb to go off.

Speaker 6 Driven to extremes.

Speaker 17 When I play to her each night,

Speaker 5 I just hope that she's listening.

Speaker 10 This is Dennis Hill's nightly ritual.

Speaker 6 It just helps me to say good night every night.

Speaker 19 The song is appropriately entitled, Forgotten Dreams.

Speaker 8 I just see how hollow my life is now, and I never thought that I would experience that in my lifetime.

Speaker 23 In August 2000, Dennis Hill lost his 13-year-old daughter, Amy, in a tragic accident.

Speaker 25 How would you describe your daughter?

Speaker 10 I believe

Speaker 7 that the reason I was born was to have Amy.

Speaker 7 Amy just had this

Speaker 7 capacity for love for everyone.

Speaker 15 Before the accident,

Speaker 26 Dennis and Mary Hill appeared to be living the extremely good life outside Orlando, Florida.

Speaker 4 Dennis Hill here?

Speaker 19 They owned a successful marketing business, lived in a stately home, and their daughters, Amy

Speaker 13 and Caitlin,

Speaker 7 Caitlin is wonderful in dance.

Speaker 30 Were thriving in and out of school.

Speaker 7 Amy excelled at piano.

Speaker 7 She gave it her all. She was great.

Speaker 7 I was just so proud of her.

Speaker 22 On August 7th, 2000, Mary and Dennis Hill went to pick up their daughter Amy from her first day of eighth grade.

Speaker 26 With her were best friends Carrie Brown and Zach Rockwell. The three were inseparable.

Speaker 6 They were very jubilant. Everybody was in a very good mood.

Speaker 14 On the way home, Dennis told Mary he needed to make a stop.

Speaker 10 I had another vehicle at the gas station that I wanted to pick up.

Speaker 18 Mary got behind the wheel with the three kids in the back seat and drove off.

Speaker 7 I've driven that street thousands of times.

Speaker 14 But the next few minutes would be anything but routine.

Speaker 7 It happens so fast. You come out of the the turn and you're just starting to accelerate

Speaker 7 and I just felt like the ru-in wasn't with me, and I immediately

Speaker 7 started to stop,

Speaker 7 and it wouldn't.

Speaker 12 Although Mary says she was pumping the brakes, the car kept accelerating.

Speaker 7 I have been a good driver my whole life, but I could not stop that car.

Speaker 7 I was spinning. I saw leaves.
My last thought was, Why won't you stop?

Speaker 29 This is Mary Hill's BMW.

Speaker 36 Investigators believe it was traveling at 73 miles per hour when it slammed into a tree. Here at the point of impact, a divot two feet deep.

Speaker 36 Amy was sitting here, her best friend Carrie in the middle, Zach at the far end. Mary Hill, who wasn't wearing a seatbelt, was thrown 24 feet through this side window.

Speaker 7 I woke up. I thought I was on fire.
The heat was immense.

Speaker 38 It was just the most horrible experience I can ever imagine.

Speaker 13 One of the first to arrive on the scene, Dennis Hill frantically felt for his daughter Amy's pulse.

Speaker 6 And I thought, oh, please, I'm not doing this right.

Speaker 10 I'm doing something wrong.

Speaker 4 She is alive and I just can't tell.

Speaker 18 Dennis then checked for Carrie's pulse, but also felt nothing.

Speaker 23 Zach was breathing but unconscious.

Speaker 4 And I called 911.

Speaker 5 It was so surreal, I just could not believe this was happening.

Speaker 25 Just minutes before,

Speaker 25 there they were. We were all excited in the backseat.

Speaker 4 Just five minutes before. They were alive.
We were laughing. Life was good.

Speaker 4 Five minutes later, your life changes like you never thought that it could change.

Speaker 14 This 48 hours animation shows how police believe the accident happened.

Speaker 23 After Mary made a left-hand turn, her car began to accelerate rapidly.

Speaker 40 As it started to drift into the oncoming traffic lane, it fishtailed and began a sideways slide.

Speaker 28 Police estimated the car was traveling 73 miles an hour hour when it left the road.

Speaker 13 After it hit the tree, the car traveled 15 feet to its resting spot on the other side of the tree.

Speaker 18 News of the accident spread quickly.

Speaker 7 A Seminole County mother plowed into a tree, killing her own daughter, and she lost control of the car on Markham Woods Road.

Speaker 9 Keith Rockwell assumed his son, Zach, was taking the bus home that day day until the police showed up at his door.

Speaker 41 They said you need to get to the hospital as fast as possible.

Speaker 23 Keith found his 13-year-old son Zach alive but unconscious.

Speaker 43 They basically said he was in a coma and that the longer he was in, the worse it would be.

Speaker 10 Carrie Brown's sister Jennifer was home alone when she got the news.

Speaker 7 The life was just sucked out of me. Like I just remember the most empty feeling.
Christmas morning. That's one of my favorite pictures.

Speaker 23 Carrie's mother, Rita Brown, heard the news from a friend.

Speaker 7 And all I said was who?

Speaker 10 Who?

Speaker 10 And he said, Carrie. I collapsed.

Speaker 10 Not my baby. Not my baby.

Speaker 40 Once some of the shock started to wear off, naturally the question question started.

Speaker 7 A car like that just doesn't run into a tree for no reason at all.

Speaker 22 Was this tragic accident really accidental?

Speaker 32 And then once the light changed, she floored it.

Speaker 15 The answers were getting very complicated.

Speaker 32 The tires were screaming and she took off.

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Speaker 7 Why couldn't I have died? I lived a life.

Speaker 44 I have wonderful children.

Speaker 7 I had a good life.

Speaker 10 Those girls

Speaker 7 had everything to live for. They were such good girls.

Speaker 23 For Mary Hill, the guilt of driving the car that killed her daughter Amy and best friend Carrie Brown and left Zach Rockwell in a coma has been unbearable.

Speaker 43 You didn't know would he be out a day or a year.

Speaker 41 So you were, at that point, you were just really scared.

Speaker 19 Keith Rockwell was terrified, but considered himself strangely lucky.

Speaker 12 His child was alive.

Speaker 41 As a single dad, it's just me and him, and he's, you know, he's number one.

Speaker 19 For four days, Zach's loved ones kept a bedside vigil until one friend gave him a teddy bear.

Speaker 41 Then he just went, thank you.

Speaker 41 Just sat up just like that.

Speaker 47 Would you say to him,

Speaker 10 welcome back.

Speaker 25 You feel lucky to be alive?

Speaker 36 Yes.

Speaker 10 I really do.

Speaker 48 Although Zach had no memory of the accident, he was on the road to recovery. But some wounds would never heal.

Speaker 5 And what did you lose when you lost those two friends?

Speaker 50 I lost a lifelong friend partner, a lifelong partner.

Speaker 44 I lost a lot of things.

Speaker 7 I can't come up with a reason as to why they have to die.

Speaker 7 And I can't accept something that I don't have a reason for.

Speaker 7 It's like I am angry, and everyone is angry, I know, at me.

Speaker 7 I felt sorrow and anger. I was mad.

Speaker 10 And kick over, show me a finish.

Speaker 29 Carrie's mother, Rita Brown, is a world-renowned Olympic gymnastics coach.

Speaker 7 I didn't know who I was mad at at the time when I first found out because I was just mad that Carrie was gone and it wasn't fair. And why?

Speaker 7 Why my baby? Why is she gone?

Speaker 7 Why did this happen? I can't believe I'm reading her name. It takes my breath away.

Speaker 14 I don't know.

Speaker 35 Rita's grief turned to anger while she slid through this intersection here when she learned the details of what a witness saw just before the crash.

Speaker 46 She almost sideswiped me. I mean, she just came from no place at a very, very high rate of speed.

Speaker 28 Jimmy Arthur was attempting to change lanes when he first encountered Mary Hill's BMW.

Speaker 25 Did you have any sense that she was struggling to control this car?

Speaker 32 You know, I didn't feel like there was any mechanical problem.

Speaker 46 It just seemed like she was either upset or angry or just in a very, very big hurry.

Speaker 26 She was in such a hurry, Jimmy says, that she overshot a red light.

Speaker 32 After she shot past that, she put the car in reverse and quickly backed up, burning the tires.

Speaker 32 And then once the light changed, she floored it and the tires were screaming and she took off.

Speaker 15 What direction did she go in?

Speaker 32 She headed actually south on Markman Woods Road.

Speaker 18 Jimmy watched as Mary Hill then lost control of her car and wrapped it around the tree.

Speaker 15 His eyewitness account would become crucial to investigators as details about Mary Hill began to surface.

Speaker 50 In a speeding car, I feel unsafe. And I usually did in Mrs.
Hill's car.

Speaker 25 How would you describe Mary Hill?

Speaker 44 When I went over to her house, she always seemed like she was depressed.

Speaker 19 In fact, Mary Hill was receiving treatment for depression.

Speaker 23 In the days leading up to the accident, investigators learned Mary had been behaving strangely, including making a bizarre phone call to Rita Brown.

Speaker 7 She says, well,

Speaker 7 I'm going to go in Monday for shock treatment. And I said, shock treatment for what? She goes, well, I haven't been doing well, and they thought that they might try that.

Speaker 18 Rita wasn't the only witness to Mary Hill's unraveling.

Speaker 7 She was weaving,

Speaker 7 just she was very unsteady on her feet.

Speaker 45 Neighbor Vicki Hartzell encountered Mary one afternoon in her driveway.

Speaker 49 After you witnessed this behavior with Mary Hill, what did you end up telling your two girls?

Speaker 7 I told them they weren't allowed to ride in the car with Mary Hill anymore.

Speaker 25 Because.

Speaker 7 Because I felt that there was something wrong with her.

Speaker 22 But a blood test after the crash revealed Mary wasn't using drugs or alcohol.

Speaker 28 So was the crash caused by Mary Hill losing control of her car or her emotions?

Speaker 19 The only person who could answer that wasn't talking.

Speaker 7 I wasn't allowed to answer phones. I wasn't allowed to answer doors.
I wasn't allowed to open the gates.

Speaker 19 On the advice of her attorneys, Mary Hill did not speak to the victims' families.

Speaker 7 To tell you the truth,

Speaker 7 There aren't any words in the English language that could ever express

Speaker 7 my sorrow for what happened. To say, I'm sorry for what happened to your daughter.

Speaker 7 I can't face that woman and say that to her because it's just to me so meaningless.

Speaker 7 Everything I have known is gone from me.

Speaker 41 My work,

Speaker 7 my life, my spirit. I don't know what else

Speaker 7 could be taken. I don't know how it could be any worse.

Speaker 36 But eight months after the accident, when Mary was at rock bottom, things got a whole lot worse. Prosecutors say that Mary's reckless driving caused the deaths of Amy and Carrie.

Speaker 36 She is charged with two counts of vehicular homicide and manslaughter. And if convicted, Mary could be sent to prison for 30 years.

Speaker 7 I never expected it.

Speaker 7 Not for the most fleeting second. could think that someone would think I would do something like that intentionally.

Speaker 23 Now, the Hills are fighting back.

Speaker 4 We've endured more than our share and it's time to turn the tables now and I believe that we're going to be ready.

Speaker 21 Dennis hired high-priced defense attorney Gerald Boyle, best known for defending serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, to prove his wife did not intentionally kill their daughter and her friend.

Speaker 5 I want total vindication. Mary was an exceptional driver, and it just, I never quite understood how this could possibly happen.

Speaker 40 But defense experts think they have an answer.

Speaker 18 After examining the Hill's car, they believe a fault in the BMW's cruise control caused the car to speed up on its own.

Speaker 5 Once the investigators were able to say, you know, hey, there's a problem with the cruise control here and the throttle linkage.

Speaker 5 Well, then pieces of the puzzle start to go together.

Speaker 42 I know the first time it happened to me, I had no idea what was going on.

Speaker 19 BMW owner Larry Gustafson has never met Mary Hill.

Speaker 42 He said, ah, we got a problem. The car is driving itself.

Speaker 31 But he knows what it's like to have a car unexpectedly race off.

Speaker 42 And it went from 35 to 40 miles an hour to almost 60 miles an hour just that quick.

Speaker 14 Is it believable to you, based on your own experience, that Mary Hill could have gotten up to 70 plus miles an hour in a tenth of a mile and hit this tree?

Speaker 42 Absolutely. I went from 40 to 60 and probably a shorter distance than that.

Speaker 48 Gustafsson claims his mechanic fixed the problem on his used BMW by replacing an electrical circuit. But Rita Brown's not buying the runaway car theory.

Speaker 25 Does Mary Hill deserve to go to jail?

Speaker 7 Mary Hill needs to be held accountable for her actions.

Speaker 7 And if that includes

Speaker 7 going to jail,

Speaker 7 then so be it. But the judge and the jury will decide that.

Speaker 48 And while Mary Hill awaits her trial, stunning allegations as the Hills marriage is pushed to the breaking point.

Speaker 25 You were slapped,

Speaker 9 you were kicked,

Speaker 48 you were punched.

Speaker 49 Are all those things true?

Speaker 49 What do you miss most about your daughter? Oh,

Speaker 30 her smile.

Speaker 10 There's Carrie. There's Carrie's.

Speaker 13 Carrie Brown would have turned 17 on this sunny July day.

Speaker 7 Happy birthday, Carrie.

Speaker 10 Happy birthday, Carrie.

Speaker 7 I love you.

Speaker 23 But for her mother, Rita, and sister, Jennifer, there are no birthday hugs and kisses to share.

Speaker 7 She was my best friend. We did a lot together.

Speaker 14 Just memories of a promising young life cut short in a tragic car crash three years earlier. God, I miss her so much.

Speaker 7 I miss her so much, Mom.

Speaker 13 And Rita Brown says there's one person to blame for her loss.

Speaker 7 My daughter is gone because of Mary Hill. I wish after all this she would come back.

Speaker 7 They were very, very kind and giving girls.

Speaker 7 It's just so hard to understand

Speaker 7 why they were taken.

Speaker 23 But these two mothers are unable to share their grief. for the battle lines have been drawn.

Speaker 7 I never thought I would be charged with a crime.

Speaker 23 Mary, charged with vehicular homicide and manslaughter, has become a recluse.

Speaker 7 For over two years, I wouldn't leave this home.

Speaker 5 It just crashes on her.

Speaker 6 The pressure, the reminding, and it's tough on her.

Speaker 23 And making things tougher are rumors flying furiously through their posh community.

Speaker 21 Rumors that Mary had a history of depression, drug use, and dangerous driving.

Speaker 7 I knew that something like this was going to happen.

Speaker 19 The rumors are being fueled by sworn statements made by this woman.

Speaker 28 What kind of mother was she?

Speaker 7 She was a horrible mother.

Speaker 10 Dean David, the Hill's former nanny.

Speaker 7 Amy would sit in the kitchen and tell me everything that went on at school.

Speaker 23 Dean worked for Mary less than a year and left after a falling out overpay six months before the accident.

Speaker 25 Based on what you saw and what you knew about Mary Hill, did you worry that she was a potential danger to her children?

Speaker 7 Oh, in the car, most definitely, yes.

Speaker 7 That was my worst fear was her in the car with them. She has accused me of horrible things.

Speaker 13 Dean David's most scathing allegation that Mary abused cocaine.

Speaker 7 Two weeks into the job I found out that Mary had a cocaine addiction. Her purse had fallen off the counter and in that a compact had fallen out.
with powder on the mirror and a razor blade.

Speaker 49 Mary, were you using cocaine?

Speaker 7 No, absolutely not. I have tried it.
I will not say I have not tried it, but no. I have never had an addiction, but I don't think trying it

Speaker 7 once makes you an addict.

Speaker 39 Two and a half years have passed since the accident.

Speaker 22 The trial is delayed three times, and the pressure on the Hills marriage has reached the breaking point.

Speaker 37 New charges have been filed in court that take this case from the tragic to the bizarre. Once united in their grief, Mary now wants a divorce, claiming that Dennis is violent and sexually abusive.

Speaker 36 Dennis counterattacks with allegations that Mary has a history of drug abuse and alcoholism.

Speaker 37 The battle plans are piling up in what has become the War of the Hills.

Speaker 6 And the War of the Hills is almost as dramatic as the War of the Roses. If they would have followed Surround and filmed this thing, it would have made a heck of a movie.

Speaker 49 Do you still stand by, Mary?

Speaker 5 Absolutely.

Speaker 10 In spite of Dennis' public support, Mary has thrown him out and even got a restraining order against him.

Speaker 49 According to a paper, you were slapped,

Speaker 9 you were kicked,

Speaker 48 you were punched, pushed,

Speaker 46 restrained.

Speaker 49 Are all those things true?

Speaker 7 Yes, they are.

Speaker 7 Dennis is into

Speaker 7 physical pain for sexual gratification,

Speaker 7 both

Speaker 7 giving and receiving. It got to be far too much.

Speaker 6 How do you respond to that?

Speaker 7 Well,

Speaker 6 that's absolutely not true. In 25 years, I never hit that woman.

Speaker 25 You've never sexually abused Mary?

Speaker 17 Oh, good lord, no.

Speaker 25 Never forced her to do something she did.

Speaker 6 Never, absolutely not.

Speaker 7 Well, he admitted openly in court after I filed the injunction to keep him away from me. He was going to slash my faces to pieces and see me disappear.

Speaker 6 Got so mad, I said, you know, Mary, I'd like to get a two before and just come and smash your face in.

Speaker 25 I hope you regret saying that.

Speaker 4 Of course, I regret saying that.

Speaker 27 And there's another casualty in the War of the Hills.

Speaker 12 Their 13-year-old daughter, Caitlin.

Speaker 49 She claims that you said you wish Caitlin had died in the accident instead of Amy.

Speaker 7 That is true, Peter. But I'm not perfect.
And yes, I did. And I apologize, and I apologize to this day.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 I was so consumed with the loss of Amy.

Speaker 42 With Mary facing homicide charges and Dennis accused of domestic violence, they both lose custody of Caitlin.

Speaker 48 A judge sends her to live with her older half-sister, Jennifer.

Speaker 5 I've lost two daughters.

Speaker 8 I can't accept that.

Speaker 4 I'll never accept it.

Speaker 8 I'll fight until they put me in the ground.

Speaker 30 As Mary's trial date finally nears, she has hired a new attorney, Tim Berry.

Speaker 49 Was this a crime?

Speaker 23 Was this an accident?

Speaker 33 Absolutely not a crime, an accident. She's a wonderful lady.
She loved that child. It broke her heart.

Speaker 10 But what will a jury that has seen all the damaging headlines think of Mary Hill?

Speaker 26 Three and a half years after the accident, she's about to have her day in court.

Speaker 11 Jury is present.

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Speaker 7 I know in my heart, I would never, ever have done anything like that deliberately.

Speaker 7 Never.

Speaker 29 It's been three and a half years since the BMW Mary Hill was driving

Speaker 40 slammed into this tree.

Speaker 7 I wish I could change everything that happened that day.

Speaker 7 You both make the cutest couple.

Speaker 19 Killing her daughter Amy.

Speaker 7 I kind of know that's coming in.

Speaker 26 And her best friend, Carrie Brown.

Speaker 7 She's always there. The remembrances,

Speaker 7 her room, her things.

Speaker 14 And now, the trial that Rita Brown and her daughter Jennifer have waited so long for

Speaker 15 is about to begin.

Speaker 7 I have a lot of questions that have not been answered.

Speaker 25 If found guilty, you face the possibility of up to 30 years in prison.

Speaker 7 Yes, I'll die in prison.

Speaker 7 This is a fight for my life.

Speaker 33 I've got to save this woman.

Speaker 13 Attorney Tim Berry will lead Mary's defense team.

Speaker 18 He claims a malfunctioning cruise control made Mary's BMW speed out of control.

Speaker 25 Are you going to put Mary Hill on the stand?

Speaker 33 I haven't made that decision yet. She's a very fragile lady.

Speaker 45 Mary's fate will be determined by an all-female jury.

Speaker 11 Mary is present.

Speaker 22 They will decide if she's guilty of vehicular homicide,

Speaker 31 manslaughter,

Speaker 9 and negligence for Zach Rockwell's injuries.

Speaker 16 The evidence is going to show that she was essentially driving an interstate speed on Markham Woods Road.

Speaker 45 In his opening statement, Prosecutor Bart Schneider says, it's clear Mary's reckless driving killed Amy and Carrie.

Speaker 16 When the light changed to green, that BMW was gone.

Speaker 43 It took off fast, real fast, way too fast.

Speaker 22 Tim Berry tells the jury, the real culprit in this tragedy is the car itself.

Speaker 33 Something occurred with that car, that mechanically unreliable BMW.

Speaker 33 You will learn that Mrs. Hill did nothing,

Speaker 33 nothing,

Speaker 33 to cause that car to accelerate and to kill those children.

Speaker 33 And despite Mary Hill's well-publicized record of mental and marital problems, she was not suicidal and that she was not homicidal, that everything was okay.

Speaker 14 The prosecution uses eyewitness Jimmy Arthur to prove their theory that Mary was driving out of control.

Speaker 46 She would pass me by going 65 to 75 easily.

Speaker 16 Okay, so you could see the, what, the face of the driver? Correct. How about the kids? You remember anything about the kids?

Speaker 46 Two young ladies and a young man on the right-hand side, and I remember the young man looking up at our van.

Speaker 16 You remember the boy looking back

Speaker 6 at you?

Speaker 19 After overshooting a stoplight, Arthur says Mary reversed her BMW and almost smashed into his van.

Speaker 15 The BMW then raced off, and seconds later, it immediately hit the oak tree.

Speaker 46 It spun around the tree and I ran to the passenger rear door. I reached across and felt for the pulse in the neck of the young lady on the driver's side in the river and there was no pulse.

Speaker 46 And the young lady sitting in the middle, I could tell by the direction her head was turned that I should not touch her.

Speaker 40 So I took two fingers.

Speaker 46 and put above her heart and there was a very faint heartbeat.

Speaker 46 And the young man that was convulsing, I tried to get the seatbelt loose and just could not pull it loose at all.

Speaker 19 With emotions running high,

Speaker 7 the whole truth, nothing but the truth,

Speaker 15 Dennis Hill is called to the stand.

Speaker 23 Lead prosecutor Pat Whitaker uses Dennis to undermine Mary's claim that the BMW was defective.

Speaker 47 Did you have any mechanical problems with the car or operational problems with the car during that time?

Speaker 10 No.

Speaker 20 But the jury hears nothing from Dennis about the Hills' bitter separation and allegations of physical abuse.

Speaker 33 On that day,

Speaker 33 August 7th of 2000, was there any

Speaker 33 difficulty between you and your wife?

Speaker 10 No.

Speaker 15 In fact, Dennis says just two hours before the accident, Mary was relieved because she had just learned from her psychiatrist she wouldn't need electroshock therapy to treat her depression.

Speaker 33 What was her mood?

Speaker 17 Very good.

Speaker 22 Suffering from a stomach ailment, Mary is forced to leave the courtroom.

Speaker 29 While she recovers,

Speaker 22 jurors take a field trip.

Speaker 28 They see firsthand where Amy and Kerry died.

Speaker 36 Now, Mary's attorneys begin their defense.

Speaker 37 They're relying on a British electrical engineer to convince the jury that the accident wasn't Mary's fault, but rather a fault in the BMW.

Speaker 7 Have you reached a conclusion as to what you believe the reason for the car accident was?

Speaker 34 My conclusion is that it was a sudden acceleration event.

Speaker 23 That sudden acceleration event was caused by what defense expert Dr.

Speaker 26 Anthony Anderson claims is a rogue electrical signal.

Speaker 34 A rogue signal can come in and give a false command, which can affect these very sensitive electronic circuits

Speaker 34 within the cruise control.

Speaker 23 And that false command, Anderson says, could have switched on the BMW's cruise control, which triggered the accelerator and caused the car to speed up on its own.

Speaker 14 But the prosecution's BMW expert, Mark Yeldom, twice tested Mary's BMW and found no faults stored in the cruise control system.

Speaker 47 He says no faults. What does that tell you about the cruise control system?

Speaker 55 That it's operating as designed, that it's functional.

Speaker 45 Yeldom, who works in BMW's corporate litigation department, admits the company receives dozens of sudden acceleration complaints every year.

Speaker 33 You've got about 2 million BMWs out there,

Speaker 33 and you investigate 50 cases of this unexplained acceleration a year?

Speaker 55 Approximately, yes.

Speaker 33 So it does occur.

Speaker 55 There are claims of unintended acceleration.

Speaker 48 But of those 50 complaints each year, Yeldom says that they are hardly unexplained.

Speaker 26 Most involve driver error.

Speaker 34 Ever learn of any electrical problems that created this?

Speaker 10 No.

Speaker 30 In a final move to bolster their runaway car argument, the defense calls two drivers who claim their BMWs had also experienced sudden acceleration.

Speaker 17 And the harder I pushed on the brake, the faster it accelerated.

Speaker 33 After I completed the maneuver and let my foot off the gas, the car continued to accelerate.

Speaker 20 And on the last day of the trial, after three and a half years of silence, the defense would call Mary Hill.

Speaker 23 Mary Hill's life is, once again, in her own hands.

Speaker 33 When you took your foot off the gas, what happened?

Speaker 7 It picked up speed. It started going faster.
I released the brake and applied it again.

Speaker 7 The car started to

Speaker 7 going out of the lane. It was

Speaker 7 pistoling.

Speaker 7 Everything was very quiet.

Speaker 7 I just remember looking down at my dash, and I said, I said, why won't you stop?

Speaker 33 Did you ever intentionally

Speaker 33 accelerate and drive fast through there?

Speaker 7 No.

Speaker 23 Incredibly, it's the first time Rita Brown and prosecutors have heard from Mary about the crash.

Speaker 47 And this morning in the courtroom, you talked about the car accelerating.

Speaker 47 Is that right? Yes, sir. On its own?

Speaker 47 Is that correct?

Speaker 7 Yes, sir.

Speaker 47 During the months of that investigation that you knew was going on, did you tell any investigators that that happened?

Speaker 7 No investigator ever talked to me.

Speaker 47 No further questions.

Speaker 7 Pardon.

Speaker 39 After five days of testimony.

Speaker 38 Will you pass out the jury instructions, please?

Speaker 15 It's now up to the jury.

Speaker 45 Was it Mary

Speaker 20 or her car

Speaker 27 that was an accident waiting to happen?

Speaker 27 The jury in the Mary Hill trial went into deliberation.

Speaker 15 The jury began its deliberation around 2:30 today.

Speaker 26 It's three and a half years after Mary Hill's deadly car crash, and the jury is finally deliberating her fate.

Speaker 7 I'm not a habitual speeder,

Speaker 7 it just

Speaker 7 was a freak accident.

Speaker 13 If found guilty, Mary, who's 53, could spend the next 30 years behind bars.

Speaker 24 After just five hours, the jury's announced they have a verdict and bring the jury in.

Speaker 15 The wait is over.

Speaker 7 In the case of the state of Florida versus Mary Hill, verdict as to count one, we the jury find the defendant guilty of vehicular homicide.

Speaker 7 Verdict as to count two, we the jury find the defendant guilty of vehicular homicide.

Speaker 23 The jury has found Mary guilty on all counts. A dramatic rejection of her claim that her BMW had sped out of control on its own, killing Amy and Carrie and causing brain damage to their friend Zach.

Speaker 12 Rita? Yes, sir.

Speaker 25 What is your reaction to this verdict?

Speaker 7 I prayed and hoped that justice would come, and it came today.

Speaker 28 As she is mobbed by reporters, Mary is too distraught to talk.

Speaker 19 But these two women have plenty to say.

Speaker 36 They contacted 48 hours after the trial with explosive allegations the jury never heard.

Speaker 7 I thought it was just a matter of time before something tragic would happen. It was like a time bomb, just waiting for that time bomb to go off.

Speaker 37 And Mary was that time bomb.

Speaker 10 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 23 Heather and Julie Hill, Dennis' daughters from his first marriage, say they know what it's like to be in the back seat of a speeding car driven by Mary Hill.

Speaker 7 She got mad at my dad.

Speaker 7 She tore down the highway, going like 90 miles an hour. I was so scared in the back seat.

Speaker 7 They're angry at me over, you know, Amy's death. I'm not their mother.
I'm their stepmother. Truthfully, if I go to jail, let's face it, it will help their father considerably with the divorce.

Speaker 48 And it's jail time that Rita Brown pleads for at Mary's sentencing.

Speaker 7 Carrie will not go off to college. I will not be able to spoil her children.
And I will not be able to take care of them when she's on vacation with her husband. The husband she never met.

Speaker 13 Then, for the first time since the accident,

Speaker 33 Judge Michelle would like to briefly address the court.

Speaker 14 Mary utters the words Rita has waited so long to hear.

Speaker 7 The words I'm sorry could never convey to her

Speaker 7 how I feel.

Speaker 7 I do apologize. to the parents and to the families and to the friends and to everyone that knew Carrie and Amy and Zach.

Speaker 44 I felt like she meant it, but I mean, it's

Speaker 10 too little or too late, I guess.

Speaker 24 There's not an easy decision, and there's not a good decision that can be made in this case.

Speaker 19 The judge then surprises everyone by ordering Mary to jail until he decides on her sentence.

Speaker 23 Even her estranged husband, Dennis, finds the sight of her in handcuffs unbearable.

Speaker 4 Probably one of the worst moments I've ever gone through in my life.

Speaker 8 It hurt a lot.

Speaker 5 It really did.

Speaker 4 I just think that she will just will herself to die and she'll just die in jail.

Speaker 8 I don't know if I could really handle that.

Speaker 19 More than three months later, a visibly shaking Mary Hill, now being treated for depression and alcohol and drug addiction, is back in court to hear the judge's decision.

Speaker 10 There has been a crime.

Speaker 38 There's no way to get around saying two wonderful people are dead.

Speaker 4 And one was very seriously injured.

Speaker 38 But the court is ready to impose sentence, and the court sentences the defendant to serve 15 years in the Department of Corrections of the state of Florida with

Speaker 14 15 years behind bars.

Speaker 19 And some advice from Judge O.H.

Speaker 10 Eaton.

Speaker 38 Mary Hill, I don't know what you're going to do with your life.

Speaker 6 You're going to have to make a lot of adjustments.

Speaker 13 She once had it all.

Speaker 20 A successful business.

Speaker 14 A mansion where she raised a loving family.

Speaker 23 And a world of possibilities.

Speaker 10 But now, a prison will be the only world Mary will know until she's almost 70 years old.

Speaker 7 It's over. It's four years.
It's been very long, very tiresome, very, very

Speaker 7 draining on everybody.

Speaker 22 But will this tragedy ever truly be over for any of the survivors?

Speaker 14 Mary and Dennis are getting a divorce.

Speaker 19 15-year-old Caitlin, still in the custody of her older sister, must deal with the haunting memory of her mother in shackles.

Speaker 12 And Rita Brown can only dream of what her daughter Carrie

Speaker 14 might have become.

Speaker 6 In 2018, Mary Hill was released from prison after serving a 15-year sentence.