Open Water

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Speaker 11 He says, Mickey's missing.

Speaker 11 I said, what do you mean she's missing?

Speaker 12 It's devastating.

Speaker 13 Her last moments in life still haunt me.

Speaker 14 I just thought,

Speaker 15 what a horrible way to die.

Speaker 13 I had no clue how in the heck she would end up overboard.

Speaker 17 We found a lot of things suspicious.

Speaker 18 There's no video of it happening. There's no eyewitness testimony.
There's no fingerprints.

Speaker 19 She was dead before she landed in the water.

Speaker 13 I was approached by the FBI to record my conversations.

Speaker 6 My name is Dave Danny.

Speaker 18 You're interrogating somebody who's a murder suspect.

Speaker 13 Nothing I would have ever imagined could have prepared me for this.

Speaker 18 This is just phenomenally devious, what you're describing.

Speaker 22 Yes.

Speaker 11 It's time the truth came out now.

Speaker 23 The call came in the middle of the night.

Speaker 4 It was their friend in a panic.

Speaker 24 Lonnie was in Napoli, and Mickey had gone missing off the boat, and that's where it started.

Speaker 25 And what'd you think?

Speaker 24 That was a take to the count of three, kind of, you know, repeat all of that, let me hear it one more time, type of thing.

Speaker 26 No matter how many times she heard it, it just didn't make sense.

Speaker 24 You think of all of these things, everything starts rushing through your head.

Speaker 29 Except this was clearly true.

Speaker 11 I just saw a disaster happening in a foreign country.

Speaker 24 You say, this can't be. This can't be.

Speaker 11 Knew it in my heart. There's got to be another explanation.

Speaker 31 There was an explanation, all right.

Speaker 33 It just wasn't the one anyone was expecting.

Speaker 24 My instinct said this is going to go sideways fast. I just didn't know which way or how, and how we were going to get there.

Speaker 34 Naples is a marvelous city. It's beautiful, it's chaotic.

Speaker 35 Marco Grasso is an investigative reporter for the Italian newspaper Il Secolo Decimonamo.

Speaker 34 It's full of life, it's full of colors, and it's a beautiful place to visit as a tourist.

Speaker 38 One of those tourists was Lanny Cakatas, an American who arrived in Naples in May 2006 on board a cruise ship, the Island Escape.

Speaker 34 The Island Escape started from Palma de Mallorca in Spain,

Speaker 34 then stopped in Messina in Sicily.

Speaker 28 Lanni had booked the cruise as a way to rekindle the flame with his longtime love, Mickey Kanasaki.

Speaker 43 The couple had been married for years and then divorced.

Speaker 45 This was a new beginning, a chance to rediscover some amore.

Speaker 31 They spent the day exploring Messina on the island of Sicily.

Speaker 47 They took a bus to see the sights.

Speaker 27 Here's Mickey by Orion's Fountain.

Speaker 22 After the excursion, they returned to the island escape, and the cruise ship began its journey to the next stop, Naples.

Speaker 6 Less than 24 hours later, and still in open water,

Speaker 6 the trip took an awful turn.

Speaker 47 Lonnie's friend Bill Price was sound asleep back in Florida when the phone rang.

Speaker 11 3.10 in the morning. I was in the bed with my dog.
I picked up the phone and it was him.

Speaker 52 Lonnie. Lonnie.

Speaker 44 How's he sound?

Speaker 11 Concerned. He said,

Speaker 11 I have a problem. I said, where are you? He says, I'm in Italy.
And I said, okay. And he says, Mickey's missing.

Speaker 11 I said, what do you mean she's missing? He said, we can't find her.

Speaker 18 When did he tell you he had last seen Mickey?

Speaker 11 He said that he had gone to bed that night. They had some drinks in a club.
He couldn't sleep, so he took some ambient.

Speaker 11 And he woke up the next morning and she wasn't there.

Speaker 18 And that's when Lonnie sounded the alarm.

Speaker 35 Yes, apparently

Speaker 11 he reported her,

Speaker 11 couldn't find her.

Speaker 11 He asked for them to look.

Speaker 46 The crew of the Island Escape started searching the ship, and the captain made an announcement to passengers to be on the lookout for Mickey.

Speaker 48 Then he checked Lonnie and Mickey's cabin and found nothing amiss.

Speaker 34 He recalled a bottle of wine in the trash and this chair on the balcony in upright position.

Speaker 23 According to the captain, the Mediterranean had been calm.

Speaker 34 There was good weather and it was a very quiet night. The sea was

Speaker 34 very quiet.

Speaker 31 The crew showed Mickey's photo to the other passengers.

Speaker 34 Then, as scheduled, the Island Escape docked in Naples.

Speaker 31 Bill spoke with Lonnie again.

Speaker 11 I kept saying, she's got to be around there somewhere. Something's happened.
Bathroom somewhere. You can't just disappear.
He said, they've sent people over and over and they can't find her.

Speaker 35 Almost 12 hours later, the Island Escape prepared to leave port and continue on with the cruise.

Speaker 2 There was still no sign sign of Mickey. Lonnie quickly packed up his things and Mickey's and got off the island escape.

Speaker 35 Reality was setting in.

Speaker 57 The woman he loved may have gone overboard.

Speaker 34 Italian Coast Guard started searching for Mickey.

Speaker 37 Lonnie checked into the Hotel Mercure.

Speaker 35 From his room, he spoke again with Bill.

Speaker 11 He said, everything in here is in Italian. He said, I don't speak the language.
He said, I'm scared.

Speaker 35 Lonnie also spoke with his friend Susan McQueen, who says she could hear fear in Lonnie's voice.

Speaker 24 He was claiming that he was being treated unjustly, that no one spoke English, and that everyone was just being mean to him, treating him as if he had done something wrong, and that he was out of his element and he didn't know what to do.

Speaker 30 That's when Lonnie Kakatas made a decision that would come back to haunt him.

Speaker 24 He was a disheveled mess and he was acting fearful.

Speaker 60 Mickey is missing, and Lonnie is desperate.

Speaker 24 It just seemed like he should just go.

Speaker 53 To protect himself. Yes.

Speaker 11 He says, Can you get me out of here?

Speaker 6 When the cruise ship Island Escape docked in Naples, Italy during the early morning hours of May 26, 2006,

Speaker 52 American tourist Mickey Kanasaki was no longer among its passengers.

Speaker 61 Soon, her brother Toshi got a call from the State Department.

Speaker 62 You're the brother of Mickey Kanasaki.

Speaker 63 Yeah, yes.

Speaker 62 Well, she's missing off of this cruise.

Speaker 63 Missing?

Speaker 63 What do you mean, missing? Well, go find find her.

Speaker 43 Mickey's ex-husband slash boyfriend, Lonnie Kakatis, was in a Naples hotel.

Speaker 28 He was waiting to hear from the Italian Coast Guard, which was searching the Mediterranean for Mickey.

Speaker 59 According to his friend Susan McQueen, Lonnie sounded frantic.

Speaker 24 He was a disheveled mess, and he was acting fearful. He was acting very fearful and very irrational.

Speaker 6 The Lonnie Susan knew was never irrational.

Speaker 24 He was a pretty spectacular fireball of an attorney.

Speaker 6 Lonnie graduated from law school with honors in 1992.

Speaker 46 By the time Susan met him, he was an attorney at a top law firm in Los Angeles.

Speaker 35 Susan was a private investigator.

Speaker 24 He put in 25 out of 24 hours a day. I mean, he was a very truly dedicated, fast-thinking attorney.
He had the respect of us.

Speaker 67 Us meant Susan and Bill Price, a retired Washington, Washington, D.C.

Speaker 9 cop turned investigator, now partners with Susan in business and life.

Speaker 68 They both came to respect Lonnie.

Speaker 11 The guy is phenomenal.

Speaker 18 Not just hardworking, but smart.

Speaker 11 Extremely.

Speaker 49 And out of that, a friendship grew.

Speaker 69 Yes.

Speaker 11 He was like a brother that I never had.

Speaker 11 I could count on him.

Speaker 33 Especially when Bill needed major heart surgery.

Speaker 15 and felt he wasn't receiving the care he needed from hospital staff.

Speaker 11 So I made a call to him.

Speaker 11 He was there.

Speaker 11 And that hospital changed their whole tune. I mean, he legally was ready to take all of them on.

Speaker 18 That's a good friend.

Speaker 11 It was a very good friend.

Speaker 6 Bill recovered.

Speaker 2 He and Susan spent time with Lonnie, along with a secretary at Lonnie's law firm named Mickey Kanasaki.

Speaker 24 He saw Mickey getting off the elevator one day and said she was beautiful and she had this beautiful black shiny hair and he knew right away when he saw her he was going to ask her out and so forth.

Speaker 29 He really pursued her, didn't he?

Speaker 24 Yes, he did.

Speaker 71 Mickey was

Speaker 71 smart, beautiful, had a great sense of humor.

Speaker 35 Sue White was also a secretary who worked side by side with Mickey for several years.

Speaker 73 She worked for a high-powered partner in the firm.

Speaker 71 She had to know what she was doing.

Speaker 12 She just didn't ruffle feathers.

Speaker 6 Wanda Carter also worked with Mickey at the law firm.

Speaker 14 When there was a deadline and sometimes I was pressed for time, she would offer. She'd just come up and say, what can I do to help you? She would step up.
Right, she would step up.

Speaker 31 Then Mickey started working with Lonnie Kagantas.

Speaker 72 She started working overtime. And apparently, that's when she started doing work for Lonnie.
In the evenings, nobody's around or a few people are around.

Speaker 53 And that's when something blossomed.

Speaker 29 Yes.

Speaker 6 They kept definitely quiet.

Speaker 76 They definitely did.

Speaker 13 He was charming. She definitely thought that.

Speaker 64 Mickey's niece, Julie Saranita, was in college then.

Speaker 18 What did you like about him?

Speaker 13 I think she liked that he had similar interests, that he was a hard worker, and she appreciated that.

Speaker 77 Mickey and Lonnie bought this home in Orange County, California.

Speaker 55 They married in 1995.

Speaker 15 That bliss

Speaker 55 did not last.

Speaker 13 That allure that he initially had, that initial attraction, disappeared with time.

Speaker 6 It didn't take long for it to crumble.

Speaker 14 Like a Django game, where the pieces started to come out and it all toppled over.

Speaker 38 What was she telling you?

Speaker 78 A lot of it had to do with control, control of money.

Speaker 14 Guys like to be in control.

Speaker 38 I've noticed that.

Speaker 14 It's kind of a shame. Yeah.

Speaker 14 So the wall came tumbling down.

Speaker 53 Like many relationships, this one was complicated.

Speaker 20 After six years of marriage, the couple divorced, and Lonnie got an apartment in downtown LA near his office.

Speaker 77 He still spent time at the home he and Mickey owned together in Orange County.

Speaker 39 And somehow that seemed to work better.

Speaker 47 They were still close.

Speaker 23 And maybe they'd work things out after all.

Speaker 28 In early 2006, Lonnie booked them both on a romantic cruise.

Speaker 24 It was my understanding he was trying to repair their marriage, repair their relationship, and go on a cruise together.

Speaker 18 Maybe they've turned a corner.

Speaker 24 Sounded like a really big step for him.

Speaker 36 In fact, Lonnie had booked two cabins on board the Island Escape.

Speaker 11 He says, we're going to take a cruise, Mickey and I. And we want you and Susan to join us.

Speaker 43 Then Susan's mother needed an operation, and she and Bill had to cancel at the last minute.

Speaker 2 And now, just two two days into that cruise, Mickey was missing.

Speaker 6 If she had in fact fallen overboard, what were the odds of finding her?

Speaker 28 According to Italian journalist Marco Grasso,

Speaker 6 not good.

Speaker 34 Usually bodies are never found when they disappear in open waters.

Speaker 82 Lonnie spoke with both Bill and Susan several times while he was in Naples.

Speaker 70 They worried what might happen to Lonnie in a foreign country with an unfamiliar legal system.

Speaker 24 We've seen or heard of people in other countries being arrested and unjustly or maybe unfairly accused of something at a time and being restrained.

Speaker 24 And it just said, seemed like you need to just come back.

Speaker 51 Before this spirals out of control in some legal way that you can't get your hands around.

Speaker 24 I don't even think I was thinking that far ahead. You're just saying, get yourself out where you can communicate and get questions answered.
It just seemed like he should just go.

Speaker 53 To protect himself. Yes.

Speaker 11 He says,

Speaker 11 can you get me out of here? I said, yeah, I can do that.

Speaker 68 There's an Italian saying that goes, see Naples and die.

Speaker 4 The idea is that everyone should visit this memorable place while they're alive, and that once you see it, you may not want to leave.

Speaker 7 Well, Mickey Kanasaki didn't make it to Naples.

Speaker 46 And now Lonnie Kakatis definitely wanted to leave.

Speaker 26 Lonnie took a cab to the Naples airport.

Speaker 22 Bill had booked him a flight to Tampa, Florida, where Bill lived.

Speaker 67 All this while Mickey was still missing.

Speaker 27 That would not last.

Speaker 72 It's like, how does this happen?

Speaker 32 A sudden discovery at sea.

Speaker 13 I was in shock and disbelief. Nothing I would have ever imagined could have prepared me for this.

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Speaker 2 Along the Italian peninsula lie the vast waters of the Mediterranean.

Speaker 68 It's here the Astrea calls home.

Speaker 33 The Astrella travels the Italian coast, doing scientific research.

Speaker 20 At about 4 p.m.

Speaker 27 on May 27, 2006, Captain Massimo Colorito made a different kind of discovery.

Speaker 89 I saw something in the distance that was directly right straight by the bow, straight ahead. I got closer to it.
I realized it was a body in the water.

Speaker 77 He immediately got on his radio.

Speaker 2 Earlier that morning, he'd seen an alert.

Speaker 53 The Coast Guard was searching for an American passenger missing from a cruise ship the day before.

Speaker 86 The advisory they sent out was about a person lost at the sea who was wearing a black shirt and green pants. So I let them know right away that we have found the person they were looking for.

Speaker 35 There seemed no doubt this was Mickey Kanasaki.

Speaker 86 We were not a part of a search party.

Speaker 29 Finding her was truly random.

Speaker 81 As they approached Mickey's body, the captain said his crew was careful not to touch her.

Speaker 86 We used the strap and passed it around her chest. Then we lifted the body with the crane in the best way to not touch the body.

Speaker 32 They brought Mickey's body onto the Estrella and covered her with a sheet.

Speaker 64 Then they met up with the Coast Guard and Mickey's body was moved to their boat.

Speaker 86 Finding a body in the sea isn't something that happens every day.

Speaker 86 And then on top of that, to bring it on board.

Speaker 2 journalist marco groso heard about the grim discovery

Speaker 34 i was very surprised and that was the moment in which we started uh following uh uncovering this case with a body and the body was taken to vibo valencia

Speaker 28 Vibo Valencia is a small town near the coast in southern Italy.

Speaker 22 That's where Italian authorities opened their investigation.

Speaker 91 And the State Department called Mickey's niece, Julie Sarinita.

Speaker 13 Was in shock and disbelief. I just talked to her a few days before.
I was at first asking, are you sure you have the right person? I had no clue how in the heck she would end up overboard.

Speaker 68 The news hit Mickey's friends hard.

Speaker 71 I was

Speaker 17 very sad.

Speaker 73 I couldn't believe it.

Speaker 72 I couldn't believe it at all. It's like, how does does this happen?

Speaker 12 I couldn't believe my ears.

Speaker 14 Devastating.

Speaker 45 Lonnie broke the news to his friend Bill Price.

Speaker 11 He said he was glad they found the body and that he can't imagine what happened.

Speaker 27 Lonnie was calling long distance.

Speaker 51 Although Bill had booked the flight from Italy to Tampa, Lonnie didn't go there.

Speaker 48 He changed his ticket.

Speaker 42 and flew to California.

Speaker 11 He said, I just wanted to go home. I said, okay.

Speaker 11 I said, if you're okay, you know, that's fine with me.

Speaker 33 At the same time, in Vivo Valencia, an Italian prosecutor named Alfredo Ladonio was assigned to Mickey's case.

Speaker 64 He knew what his investigation needed to address.

Speaker 90 The circumstances of the dead, the cause of the dead,

Speaker 90 the date, and the location.

Speaker 45 He soon discovered there were no obvious answers to those questions.

Speaker 30 A search of the island escape hadn't turned up any clues.

Speaker 90 She could have fallen in the water

Speaker 90 from

Speaker 90 the ship, so anything could have happened.

Speaker 2 Mickey's death could have been an accident, or suicide, or murder.

Speaker 32 Everyone had questions for Lonnie, especially Julie.

Speaker 13 Nothing I would have ever imagined could have prepared me for this.

Speaker 27 Another woman woman enters the picture.

Speaker 18 His wife's missing off a cruise ship. He flies to the home of the other woman.
I mean, it's like putting a target on you and saying, please investigate me.

Speaker 75 Absolutely.

Speaker 32 When an American citizen dies dies mysteriously overseas, the case falls under the jurisdiction of the FBI.

Speaker 20 An agent arrived at Lonnie's home in Orange County, California, within hours of the discovery of Mickey's body.

Speaker 47 Lonnie called his friend Bill Price to tell him the Bureau was on the case.

Speaker 11 He said, Well, what do I do now? I said, What do you mean? What do you do? I said, The FBI is there.

Speaker 6 I said, Talk to them.

Speaker 11 I said, They're on it.

Speaker 49 I said, This is good.

Speaker 21 I'm all happy about this.

Speaker 31 Here's something Bill wasn't happy about.

Speaker 67 Learning right then that when Lonnie flew from Italy to Southern California, it wasn't to sleep in his own bed.

Speaker 35 It was to visit a woman Lonnie had been dating until he decided to patch things up with Mickey.

Speaker 18 His wife's missing off a cruise ship. He flies home.

Speaker 18 Not to visit his friend, but to the home of the other woman. I mean if you're Lonnie, it's like putting a target on you and saying, please investigate me.

Speaker 11 Absolutely. The first thing out of my mouth was, do you know how this looks? He said, I need to console him.
I said,

Speaker 11 it's like I'm talking to a moron.

Speaker 45 As sharp an attorney as he was, Lonnie seemed tone deaf to how his actions would play.

Speaker 19 The initial impression was,

Speaker 19 the guy's not quite right.

Speaker 35 The FBI's Rick Simpson said Lonnie seemed almost too eager to show agents.

Speaker 20 He had no marks on his body.

Speaker 19 He volunteered to disrobe for them to try and convince the agents that, you know, he wasn't involved in any physical struggle.

Speaker 18 He's answering questions that he hasn't been asked.

Speaker 19 Exactly.

Speaker 8 Yes.

Speaker 42 Lonnie repeated the story he told his pal Bill.

Speaker 6 They were in the room.

Speaker 55 They had wine.

Speaker 2 Mickey, he said, left to get some herbal tea.

Speaker 35 Lonnie took Ambien and fell asleep.

Speaker 19 He woke up at 4.30 in the morning, and her light was on, but she wasn't there. And he was alarmed, so he went looking for her.

Speaker 18 What's Lonnie's demeanor during this interview? I mean, is this a guy frantic at losing the love of his life?

Speaker 95 No.

Speaker 19 No,

Speaker 17 they didn't have that impression.

Speaker 18 Did the FBI find it suspicious that Lonnie left Italy? before Mickey's body was found?

Speaker 49 Yes.

Speaker 17 We found a lot of things suspicious.

Speaker 75 He was in a hurry to get out of there, obviously.

Speaker 4 Mickey's niece, Julie Saranita, spoke with the FBI too.

Speaker 70 She talked about her aunt's relationship with Lonnie in the months before the cruise.

Speaker 13 He said he was going to change, he was going to work less, and things were going to be better. She was just so happy.

Speaker 33 Happy and excited about her luxury Italian cruise.

Speaker 13 She had said that

Speaker 13 he's planning everything and this was such a surprise and they're reconciling. She couldn't wait to go.

Speaker 64 Now, just days after that conversation, her Aunt Mickey was dead.

Speaker 46 And Julie believed Lonnie knew more than he was saying.

Speaker 40 She soon found out the feds believed the same thing.

Speaker 13 I was approached by the FBI.

Speaker 13 Would I be willing to record my conversations with him and to get details?

Speaker 66 They gave her a crash course in recording protocol.

Speaker 6 My name is Lucy and the date is here.

Speaker 81 And told told her to let Lonnie do the talking.

Speaker 81 Maybe she was doctor

Speaker 81 and slightly intoxicated.

Speaker 81 You know?

Speaker 12 How many drinks do you think she had that night on the ship?

Speaker 12 Well, we just drank the wine. And she had, you know, probably a couple of good-sized glasses.

Speaker 18 Lonnie's theory of what had happened was what?

Speaker 13 He thought that either she committed suicide and jumped, or there was foul play, and perhaps maybe one of the crew cabins or all the different people from all the different countries, someone had murdered her.

Speaker 13 I mean, there's only three possibilities. She was murdered,

Speaker 18 she jumped, or it's an accident. Right now, I have no information to tell me what.
All I know is that they found the body, and there's going to be an autopsy.

Speaker 13 He was fixated on the condition of the body. He said multiple times, I need to see the body.
I need the condition of the body. I don't know what's going on with the body.

Speaker 48 Julie would continue to learn more from the FBI, and she continued speaking with Lonnie.

Speaker 13 I called him frequently.

Speaker 18 And he didn't seem suspicious about that.

Speaker 13 No, not at all. I mean, I checked on his well-being.
He was more interested also talking to me. I think he just found it a welcome reprive.
Someone was talking to him from the family.

Speaker 23 Julie did think Lonnie was acting strangely, even though there was no evidence he'd done anything to Mickey, or for that matter, any evidence that Mickey's death was anything but accidental.

Speaker 38 however

Speaker 39 that was about to change

Speaker 38 I just thought

Speaker 38 what a horrible way to die stunning new details from the autopsy someone on board was a killer there's got to be an explanation here this isn't Lonnie right this wouldn't be his nature if not Lonnie then who

Speaker 25 Miki Kanasaki never lived to see her 53rd birthday.

Speaker 44 She was found floating in the waters of the Mediterranean.

Speaker 6 Wanda Carter was haunted, thinking about her friend's final moments.

Speaker 14 I thought, oh my God, I hope she wasn't alive when she was in that water, trying to save herself. And I just thought,

Speaker 38 what a horrible way to die.

Speaker 35 Mickey's body was brought to this hospital in Vibo Valencia, Italy.

Speaker 28 Dr. Pietro Antonio Ricci performed the autopsy.

Speaker 88 I've received the case and I conducted the autopsy on June 16th.

Speaker 45 What he found told a sinister story.

Speaker 64 Dr.

Speaker 68 Ricci saw Mickey's body was badly bruised, especially at the base of her neck, a sign of strangulation.

Speaker 20 He also noted bruising on her inner thighs, possibly evidence of sexual assault.

Speaker 31 Perhaps most significant was what the autopsy did not show.

Speaker 88 We did not find water in her lungs, nor did we find water in her stomach.

Speaker 45 Meaning, Mickey Kanasaki was already dead when she hit the water.

Speaker 20 That told Italian prosecutor Alfredo Laudonia, this was a deliberate act of murder.

Speaker 90 This was fundamental.

Speaker 90 The death

Speaker 90 come not from accidental circumstances, but was provoked.

Speaker 31 Lonnie Cagadas, the tenacious attorney, seemed to understand that if Mickey's death was a homicide, he would be a suspect.

Speaker 39 And so he turned to two trusted friends, investigators Susan McQueen and Bill Price.

Speaker 64 Bill, the former cop, gave Lonnie some blunt advice about dealing with the FBI.

Speaker 11 I said, you need to find out what happened. If you didn't do anything, you need to find out what happened and give it to them.

Speaker 53 Susan was confident she and Bill could help Lonnie do just that.

Speaker 24 There's got to be an explanation here.

Speaker 6 This isn't Lonnie. Right.

Speaker 24 This wouldn't be his nature. We've got to find out what happened.
We need to do this research.

Speaker 24 And the first goal was to get back on that boat and try and interview people and ascertain what happened into the moments leading up to her death.

Speaker 33 So a couple of months after Mickey's death, they traveled to Italy and booked a cabin aboard the island escape.

Speaker 11 We wanted to take measurements of different places on the ship where they had low railings, where they had higher railings.

Speaker 11 We wanted to meet with the captain so we'd get permission to go into into the exact room that he went into.

Speaker 18 The room Mickey and Lonnie were staying in.

Speaker 11 Yes.

Speaker 15 They met with the captain and didn't learn much from him, except this.

Speaker 40 There were almost 1,500 passengers and crew on board the island escape at the time Mickey went overboard, meaning, potentially, hundreds of possible suspects from a wide range of countries.

Speaker 83 Those people, those potential suspects or persons of interest, they're going to be hard to track down.

Speaker 11 We wanted a manifest. Cruise Line was fighting to give it to us.

Speaker 18 And then you're going to run it against lists of sex offenders and anybody with a criminal record.

Speaker 94 Correct.

Speaker 21 Yes.

Speaker 37 Except they couldn't get the manifest.

Speaker 4 So that was a dead end.

Speaker 6 They had more luck with the autopsy report.

Speaker 15 Lonnie hadn't been able to get a copy.

Speaker 27 But Susan's talents as an investigator and her Italian language skills paid off.

Speaker 51 You're good at this, aren't you?

Speaker 24 I was able to get the copy.

Speaker 60 Susan thought the autopsy report wasn't definitive, and what was there pointed away from Lonnie.

Speaker 24 It indicated that she had been raped, strangled, and obviously thrown overboard.

Speaker 18 That sounds to me more like an assailant that didn't know her than some fight with Lonnie.

Speaker 24 Possibly.

Speaker 18 Susan and Bill found out there were no security cameras anywhere on the ship.

Speaker 2 And according to the crew, no one on board at the time reported hearing anything suspicious.

Speaker 18 Nobody saw or heard Lonnie and Mickey fighting. No.
Nobody saw Mickey in any kind of struggle with anybody.

Speaker 24 Not that I could find.

Speaker 18 And no one saw anybody menacing either one of them.

Speaker 24 Not that I could find.

Speaker 18 And where was she on the ship when she went into the water? No real way to know.

Speaker 24 No way to know.

Speaker 6 Lots of open questions.

Speaker 2 Susan and Bill felt the Italians had stopped investigating once Lonnie left and never really looked at other suspects.

Speaker 41 The FBI, on the other hand, was just getting started.

Speaker 19 He had built a good story to bolster his defense from the beginning.

Speaker 4 The FBI digs deep.

Speaker 38 What would they find?

Speaker 11 He just said, see, I told you, I told you I didn't do anything.

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Speaker 10 Hi there, it's Andy Richter and I'm here to tell you about my podcast, The Three Questions with Andy Richter.

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Speaker 98 Where do you come from? Where are you going? And what have you learned?

Speaker 97 New episodes are out every Tuesday with guests like Julie Bow and Ted Danson, Tig Nataro, Will Arnett, Phoebe Bridgers, and more.

Speaker 10 You can also tune in for my weekly Andy Richter call-in show episodes, where me and a special guest invite callers to weigh in on topics like dating disasters, bad teachers, and lots more.

Speaker 99 Listen to the three questions with Andy Richter wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 100 Luck is just when preparation meets opportunity.

Speaker 78 HBO Max presents a new comedy series. I love LA.

Speaker 24 Hey, did you guys see Shaloo's hunting campaign?

Speaker 80 I made her successful.

Speaker 6 I can do it for other clients.

Speaker 80 Your show Bucker.

Speaker 78 Starring Rachel Sennett.

Speaker 85 Those kind of people that want success and money and all these things.

Speaker 101 I am addicted to deals. It's going to be epic.

Speaker 78 The HBO original series, I Love LA, Sundays at 10.30 p.m. on HBO Max.

Speaker 47 Toshi Kanasaki's early childhood was spent in Japan, the only boy with three sisters.

Speaker 81 Mickey was the youngest.

Speaker 2 Their father left his job at a Japanese coal mine to work on a farm in California's Central Valley.

Speaker 64 Eventually, he brought you all over here.

Speaker 62 1960, brought the wife and the four kids.

Speaker 47 They traveled by ship to their new home.

Speaker 62 Nikki was maybe five or six and I was eight.

Speaker 62 I think when you're that young, we're here in this strange country, but it's kind of slightly exciting because we're so young, we don't comprehend what really happened.

Speaker 45 Decades later, Toshi and his wife Carolyn were trying to understand how Mickey had lost her life in another country, so far from home.

Speaker 103 We were devastated. How could this be? One minute she's excited going on this cruise and

Speaker 103 the next she's not alive anymore. How can this be? We're just completely shocked.

Speaker 70 The FBI was investigating Mickey's death and learning more about her relationship with Lonnie, including the crisis their marriage faced in 1999.

Speaker 66 A client of the firm said Lonnie had done something terrible.

Speaker 87 Mickey's niece, Julie Saranita, heard about it.

Speaker 13 An accusation came up that he had sex with the client's daughter, and the client obviously was upset. And what made it worse was she was a minor.

Speaker 13 And he denied it and swore up and down that nothing happened.

Speaker 38 Lonnie was arrested.

Speaker 64 He insisted he was innocent and Mickey stood by him.

Speaker 13 She wanted to believe him. Of course, she loved him.

Speaker 6 The law firm fired Lonnie and he was concerned about possible legal problems.

Speaker 13 His idea was to divorce to protect his assets in the event that he got sued. So everything went in her name temporarily.

Speaker 18 And so the idea was they'd be legally divorced, but not actually divorced, and maybe they'd get together again?

Speaker 13 They stayed as man and wife, but on paper, they were legally divorced.

Speaker 37 To fight the sex charges, Lonnie turned to his friends, Susan McQueen and Bill Price, for help.

Speaker 24 We were tracking where he'd been at what time by key cards and license plates and so forth. And apparently we had him at work when he was supposed to be where they claimed he was.

Speaker 45 Lonnie was never prosecuted and the charges were later dropped.

Speaker 18 Is your work related to why he was never prosecuted for that?

Speaker 11 I like to think so.

Speaker 45 Even so, things were tense between Lonnie and Mickey.

Speaker 20 Bill says Lonnie would sometimes call him in mid-argument.

Speaker 11 He'd say, listen, she's out of control. And then he'd say, don't you dare hit me and stuff like that.

Speaker 11 And you would hear a crash. You'd hear things breaking in the background.

Speaker 11 And when he told me that she's drinking and she went through a bottle of wine and she's nasty, I'm thinking, why are you putting up with this?

Speaker 82 Mickey's friend Sue never heard about any of that.

Speaker 68 In fact, Sue had no idea Mickey was even divorced.

Speaker 4 So she was really sort of hiding a lot of things that went on in her life from...

Speaker 72 Hiding big things.

Speaker 47 One more thing FBI special agent Rick Simpson learned.

Speaker 57 At the time of Mickey's death, the couple's assets were worth almost $2 million,

Speaker 28 including that beautiful home in Orange County.

Speaker 6 When Mickey died, all of it went to Lonnie.

Speaker 18 That sounds like a motive.

Speaker 19 It does.

Speaker 41 Except, no one had seen or heard Lonnie fighting with Mickey on the cruise ship.

Speaker 57 There was no evidence he'd been the one to harm her in any way, let alone kill her and throw her overboard.

Speaker 15 And Lonnie's account never changed.

Speaker 40 He took to Ambient, went to sleep, and she left to go get herbal tea.

Speaker 83 He had built a good story, if you will, to bolster his defense from the beginning.

Speaker 55 Of course, it was possible Lonnie was simply telling the truth.

Speaker 33 While the FBI suspected he was responsible for Mickey's death, the Bureau didn't have much evidence to back up that suspicion.

Speaker 4 In December 2006, the U.S.

Speaker 45 attorney brought the case to a federal grand jury.

Speaker 2 Except, the grand jury's role was only to investigate.

Speaker 22 not to issue an indictment.

Speaker 18 If you had proof that Lonnie had killed his ex-wife, you would have taken that to a grand jury and gotten an indictment. And

Speaker 18 I have to believe that you didn't do that because you thought there wasn't anything really that proved that beyond your suspicions.

Speaker 19 We in the FBI are investigators, and our role is to find facts. Whether a case is presented to a grand jury, that's a prosecutorial decision.

Speaker 18 And the Justice Department apparently decided there wasn't enough to go forward at that point.

Speaker 19 At some point, they made that determination.

Speaker 42 So the grand jury met and no charges were filed against Lonnie.

Speaker 11 He just said, see, I told you.

Speaker 11 He said, I told you I didn't do anything.

Speaker 91 To Lonnie, it must have felt like vindication.

Speaker 35 To his friend Bill Price, it was starting to feel like something else.

Speaker 66 A plan to help prove Lonnie's innocence.

Speaker 11 I said, let's show the FBI that you have nothing to hide.

Speaker 57 And a secret about the other woman in Lonnie's life.

Speaker 36 Explain to me how Lonnie kept this hidden from everybody.

Speaker 24 Crafty, I mean, he's a smart man.

Speaker 44 Susan McQueen and Bill Price are proof.

Speaker 45 You can spend years as a dogged and determined investigator, only to have that tough exterior melt away as easily as your prized mastiffs can drool.

Speaker 11 Dogs bring you love.

Speaker 11 You can leave for five minutes, come back, and their tails are wagging, they act like they hadn't seen you in years.

Speaker 27 Bill organizes and runs dog shows for the American Kennel Club.

Speaker 31 Susan is a professional handler.

Speaker 47 Training a champion requires some significant instinct, doesn't it?

Speaker 24 Yes, it does.

Speaker 35 And from the beginning, Susan's investigative instincts had told her her friend Lonnie Kakadis was no killer.

Speaker 2 Bill thought the same.

Speaker 11 But I'm thinking, I know this guy for these years. I know how he responds to dogs and animals.

Speaker 6 He's no murderer.

Speaker 23 And to prove it, Bill came up with a plan.

Speaker 11 I said, I'll get him to take a polygraph. I said, let's show the FBI that you have nothing to hide and you're going to take this test.

Speaker 52 Lonnie agreed.

Speaker 9 He was now living in Florida.

Speaker 6 So Bill set up the test with a friend named Mike Brentnell, who was also an expert polygraph examiner.

Speaker 50 Lonnie answered 11 questions, including,

Speaker 54 Did you kill Mickey?

Speaker 35 Did you cause the death of Mickey Kanasaki?

Speaker 68 Were you present when Mickey was killed?

Speaker 67 The examiner asked those questions three times.

Speaker 42 The results were not what Bill Price had hoped for.

Speaker 11 They came out. Lonnie said, I have to use the bathroom.
And as he walked away, Mike said, you in on this?

Speaker 11 I said,

Speaker 11 You want to repeat that again? Am I in on it?

Speaker 93 In on what?

Speaker 11 He says, you know he's guilty. And I say, is this a joke?

Speaker 11 He said, no. And I said, he's guilty.
I said, Mike, this isn't funny. He said, I'm not trying to be funny.
So I took a deep breath. And that's when it flashes before you the little things that

Speaker 11 you want to overlook.

Speaker 45 Little things like the height of the railing on the island escape and the realization of how difficult it would be for the 5'3 Mickey to go off that balcony by accident.

Speaker 25 Now, Bill's investigator's brain was telling him, along with the polygraph, that Lonnie knew more than he was saying.

Speaker 32 As much as he wanted to believe Lonnie was innocent, the evidence was pointing elsewhere.

Speaker 18 Now you're thinking, am I being played for a fool here?

Speaker 69 Yes.

Speaker 11 I wasn't willing to accept it, but I'm thinking about it, yes.

Speaker 40 What to do about that nagging feeling?

Speaker 2 Well, during the time he'd been helping Lonnie, Bill had also been talking with FBI Special Agent Rick Simpson.

Speaker 19 Well, I think he was working hard to kind of navigate his own internal contradictions, right? He was trying to navigate his own moral compass in that situation.

Speaker 73 It's a difficult situation.

Speaker 18 It sounds like you had some sympathy for what Bill was going through.

Speaker 8 Yes,

Speaker 102 I do.

Speaker 49 You were convinced Bill was a straight shooter.

Speaker 18 He wasn't slanting things towards Lonnie's interest when he would talk with you.

Speaker 19 I didn't have any doubt that Bill was being honest with us.

Speaker 28 He couldn't say the same about Lonnie Kakatis.

Speaker 35 Special Agent Simpson had been keeping a close eye on Lonnie's finances.

Speaker 6 When Mickey died, Lonnie inherited all her money and moved it to an overseas bank.

Speaker 19 I think he moved it offshore because he knew he had murdered Mickey and that's where the money came from and he knew what that meant.

Speaker 102 That's my conclusion.

Speaker 52 Offshore, that money was untouchable.

Speaker 45 Then when Lonnie tried to repatriate more than a million dollars to a bank in Florida, Agent Simpson pounced.

Speaker 47 The Fed seized the money and began a civil case against Lonnie, who hired attorney David Michael.

Speaker 54 Why was Lonnie moving his money around the world?

Speaker 16 My understanding is that he was trying to do some overseas financial investment where some country was paying high interest rates for U.S. currency.

Speaker 55 In other words, Lonnie wasn't trying to hide that money.

Speaker 65 He was merely investing it.

Speaker 36 Lonnie's attorney argued in the civil asset case that the federal government couldn't prove Lonnie was guilty of killing Mickey to get his hands on her money.

Speaker 20 So they had no right to seize it.

Speaker 52 And

Speaker 6 he won.

Speaker 16 That's when the federal government went to the district attorney.

Speaker 28 The government had lost, but it wasn't over.

Speaker 35 The U.S.

Speaker 23 attorney handling that civil case sent several boxes of evidence here to the Orange County, California District Attorney's Office.

Speaker 12 And he said, I just think there's more to this case. Can you take a look at it for criminal liability?

Speaker 64 Susan Price, no relation to Bill, is an assistant DA.

Speaker 4 She and Deputy DA Seton Hunt learned that in Florida, Lonnie had married again.

Speaker 35 Then something else in the case file really caught their attention.

Speaker 6 It was another woman. Another ex-wife.

Speaker 55 Who's Amy Nguyen?

Speaker 102 Amy Nguyen is a teacher. She's originally from Vietnam.

Speaker 26 Amy is the woman Lonnie went to see in California after he came back from Italy.

Speaker 40 Here she is in a photo from the school where she's a fifth grade teacher.

Speaker 55 Amy and Lonnie had met online.

Speaker 12 Amy loved Lonnie. I don't think she expected as much from him as I think he probably thought Mickey expected of him.

Speaker 15 Investigators discovered Amy wasn't just Lonnie's girlfriend.

Speaker 9 She'd been his wife.

Speaker 69 They married in July 2005, but it only lasted a few months before Lonnie divorced Amy and returned to Mickey.

Speaker 20 Just a few months after that, Lonnie booked the cruise.

Speaker 49 And then, after Mickey went overboard, Lonnie's first stop in the U.S.

Speaker 2 was at Amy's house to continue a relationship Lonnie had largely kept secret.

Speaker 18 Explain to me how Lonnie kept this this entire relationship, this marriage with Amy Nguyen sort of hidden from everybody, including you, I guess.

Speaker 24 I don't have an answer for you. Crafty, I mean, he's a smart man.

Speaker 41 Bill said he, too, was completely in the dark.

Speaker 11 Lonnie had bought a huge house and a very nice Lexus for Amy Wynn.

Speaker 18 Unbeknownst to Mickey.

Speaker 11 Unbeknownst to me, too. This is my friend.

Speaker 45 Well, if Lonnie Lonnie planned a future with Amy, it didn't pan out.

Speaker 28 In early 2007, when he sold his home and left California for Florida, he left Amy, too.

Speaker 77 However, the FBI knew all about Amy.

Speaker 33 In fact, she had testified before that federal grand jury.

Speaker 51 What essentially was her story?

Speaker 24 That she knew nothing, that to her knowledge, he had no intent.

Speaker 18 Basically, in front of the grand jury, her testimony was, I don't know anything about any plan to do away with Mickey, and he didn't say anything about it.

Speaker 18 And as far as I I know, there's nothing to any of it.

Speaker 24 Correct.

Speaker 31 After his assets were seized by the FBI in late 2008, Lonnie wanted to know if Amy was still sticking with that story.

Speaker 77 Apparently, he thought Amy might be upset with him after things between them hadn't worked out.

Speaker 28 So in January 2009, Lonnie asked Susan and Bill to visit Amy.

Speaker 64 Despite Bill's misgivings about Lonnie, they agreed.

Speaker 15 And that conversation changed everything.

Speaker 24 This just went into a completely different direction than I had any expectation of hearing.

Speaker 2 A bombshell of a story captured on tape.

Speaker 58 You know that you're being recorded.

Speaker 24 Yes. Her fear told me she was telling the truth with us.
You can't create that kind of fear.

Speaker 84 With Vimmostash, a tag on one hand, and ordering a ride in the other means you're stacking cash back. With Venmo Stash, get up to 5% cash back when you pick a bundle of your favorite brands.

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Speaker 93 Hi there, it's Andy Richter, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast, The Three Questions with Andy Richter.

Speaker 93 Each week, I invite friends, comedians, actors, and musicians to discuss these three questions.

Speaker 98 Where do you come from? Where are you going? And what have you learned?

Speaker 10 New episodes are out every Tuesday with guests like julie bow and ted danson tig nataro will arnett phoebe bridgers and more you can also tune in for my weekly andy richter call-in show episodes where me and a special guest invite callers to weigh in on topics like dating disasters bad teachers and lots more listen to the three questions with andy richter wherever you get your podcasts

Speaker 100 Luck is just when preparation meets opportunity.

Speaker 78 HBO Max presents a new comedy series. I love LA.

Speaker 24 Did you guys see Shaloo's helping campaign?

Speaker 80 I made her successful. I can do it for other clients.

Speaker 78 Yes, Shafer, starring Rachel Sennett.

Speaker 85 Those kind of people that want the success and money and all these things.

Speaker 58 I am addicted to deals.

Speaker 101 It's going to be epic.

Speaker 78 The HBO original series, I Love LA, Sundays at 10:30 p.m. on HBO Max.

Speaker 61 It had been years since Mickey Konasaki plunged from the deck of a cruise ship, dead before she hit the waters of the Mediterranean.

Speaker 6 Private investigators Susan McQueen and Bill Price sailed those same waters, retraced those steps on the island escape,

Speaker 91 all to prove their friend Lonnie Gakadis did not kill Mickey.

Speaker 24 It just didn't seem possible. It just didn't seem possible.

Speaker 31 Bill agreed at first, and then over time, he came to believe it did seem possible.

Speaker 11 My gut was telling me he was guilty as hell by this time.

Speaker 11 I had to fight with that part, wrestle with it. And

Speaker 11 slowly, I was moving away from the friendship because I wasn't comfortable with it.

Speaker 46 Even so, at Lonnie's request, they agreed to meet with his ex-wife, Amy Nguyen, a woman Lonnie had married and then divorced, all of it unbeknownst to both of them.

Speaker 24 I think she was genuinely hurt. She really thought that she had a relationship that she was moving forward with there.

Speaker 66 She loved Lonnie.

Speaker 24 I believe she did.

Speaker 49 You think Lonnie loved her?

Speaker 25 I believe he did.

Speaker 22 Lonnie asked his friends and investigators to confirm what Amy had already told the FBI.

Speaker 54 that she knew nothing about Mickey's death.

Speaker 45 The meeting happened in January 2009, three years after that fatal cruise.

Speaker 44 Bill stayed in the car.

Speaker 54 Susan's instincts told her she might do better with Amy one-on-one.

Speaker 24 I meet with her and I talk to her about what kind of contact has she had, who's been calling her from the federal government, what are their questions, how is she feeling, how does she feel about Lonnie?

Speaker 24 We go through all of these things and then she starts to become very emotional and this just went into a completely different direction than I had any expectation of hearing.

Speaker 2 Amy Nguyen began to tell a story that was the complete opposite of what she'd said under oath to a federal grand jury.

Speaker 55 Now she told Susan that Lonnie had planned to kill Mickey on the cruise and booked the island escape specifically to get away with it.

Speaker 35 There was more, Amy said.

Speaker 55 Lonnie didn't do it alone.

Speaker 26 He told Amy his well-connected friend helped him arrange Mickey's murder.

Speaker 27 That friend's name?

Speaker 50 Bill Price.

Speaker 64 In that conversation, Amy describes Bill as being sort of at the center of this.

Speaker 18 Yeah, this guy who sort of has this army of assassins that he can send out after whomever.

Speaker 6 Exactly.

Speaker 20 Which, as you can imagine, was news to Bill's partner, Susan.

Speaker 64 Not that she believed it.

Speaker 4 Just the opposite.

Speaker 27 But she also realized if Amy believed it, that had to be because of Lonnie.

Speaker 24 So at some point in this interview, I waved to Bill to come out of the car.

Speaker 18 Does Amy know that Bill's outside at that exact time?

Speaker 24 She had no idea he was with me.

Speaker 6 Bill walked over and they turned on a recorder. You know that you're being recorded.

Speaker 6 Yes, okay. Can you please say the things that Lonnie told you about Bill?

Speaker 24 Which one do you want to worry about?

Speaker 24 How about with his connections regarding the cruise ship?

Speaker 6 Let me tell you that

Speaker 58 we all have a connection, a big connection,

Speaker 34 that

Speaker 103 he has to have his people

Speaker 63 come over.

Speaker 92 Do what

Speaker 24 makes you throw Leggy out of the boat, out of the boat.

Speaker 24 Okay.

Speaker 45 Bill had questions too. They say

Speaker 45 Interesting.

Speaker 45 I don't know why the JJ fell this before the incident or after the incident.

Speaker 81 How do you determine whether Amy

Speaker 18 is telling the truth to you and therefore lying at the grand jury, or whether she was telling the truth to the grand jury and she's lying to you because she's angry at Lonnie because after all was said and done, he didn't come back to her.

Speaker 24 Her fear told me she was telling the truth with us. You can't create that kind of fear.

Speaker 18 She was afraid of Lonnie.

Speaker 24 She was afraid of Lonnie. She was afraid of Bill.

Speaker 2 It was a double whammy.

Speaker 68 Amy said that Lonnie had planned the murder.

Speaker 64 That was bad enough.

Speaker 77 Then she said Lonnie implicated Bill.

Speaker 2 before the cruise.

Speaker 28 Remember, Lonnie had invited Bill and Susan to come along.

Speaker 44 They had to cancel at the last minute.

Speaker 40 Now it began to look as if Lonnie's invitation was part of the plan too.

Speaker 40 Maybe he'd ask Bill to go with him, so Bill could take the fall for Mickey's murder.

Speaker 18 That's your friend doing that.

Speaker 19 My friend, yes.

Speaker 18 The guy that was nearly a brother to you. Yes.
The guy you had been an investigator for, the guy you'd been to dinner with, the guy you'd defended, the guy you were trying to exonerate.

Speaker 8 Yes.

Speaker 18 I think you're lucky Lonnie wasn't in front of you at that moment.

Speaker 11 I think that's an accurate statement.

Speaker 8 Yes.

Speaker 24 The anger and fury that I felt at that moment was incomprehensible.

Speaker 28 Lonnie was counting on the two of them to prove he wasn't involved in Mickey's murder.

Speaker 64 Now they had evidence on tape that he was.

Speaker 64 Let me make sure that I should not have

Speaker 64 told you that.

Speaker 11 When I flew back into Tampa, I immediately called him him at his house and said, I want to see you and I want to see you in person.

Speaker 11 He stood in my dining room area and I said, did you tell her that I had anything to do with Mickey's death?

Speaker 11 And or that I had connections to do this? Did you make her believe that I had anything to do with her death?

Speaker 11 Yeah, I did.

Speaker 11 I said, why?

Speaker 11 He said, I wanted her to think I had power and I was a big guy. I said, and you should know that I have a tape recording and it's going to the FBI.

Speaker 4 What did Lonnie say when you said that?

Speaker 16 Please don't.

Speaker 11 I was just trying to impress her.

Speaker 90 I said, okay.

Speaker 11 And I said, get out of my house and don't ever come near me. Don't come around me.

Speaker 11 I said, I don't want to hear from you again.

Speaker 11 And then when he left, I called Agent Simpson. and said, I have a recording for you.

Speaker 19 He called and said that he and Susan had gone to see Amy, and that was, I think, a real turning point for Bill.

Speaker 18 He wanted Lonnie to be innocent.

Speaker 19 Sure, but I think over time, he came to the conclusion that he wasn't. But I think it took some time for him to come to that conclusion.

Speaker 32 That recording of Amy's news story eventually made its way to Orange County Assistant DA Susan Price.

Speaker 18 If Bill and Susan hadn't recorded her saying that, she might to this day be defending Lonnie.

Speaker 12 That's absolutely true.

Speaker 35 Now it was up to prosecutors, and that would take a few years because Amy Nguyen was the key.

Speaker 6 And it turned out that was a problem.

Speaker 12 She just said, I don't want to talk to you. I have no interest in talking to you.

Speaker 6 A problem indeed.

Speaker 35 How are they going to solve that?

Speaker 105 I'm tired of it, Amy. I'm tired of him.

Speaker 105 I need your help.

Speaker 11 I said, it's time for you to step up to the plate.

Speaker 22 As Toshi and Carolyn Kanasaki patiently waited for answers, They would sometimes visit Mickey's gravesite

Speaker 27 and see the name Lonnie Kakatis on the headstone next to hers.

Speaker 70 That was difficult.

Speaker 103 The first seven years, we thought that.

Speaker 103 We knew they were investigating him,

Speaker 63 but...

Speaker 18 Didn't seem to be going anywhere.

Speaker 8 No. Not really.

Speaker 63 No.

Speaker 62 We just lived our life, but me is always in the back of my mind.

Speaker 62 It's not going away.

Speaker 103 Because Mickey's gone.

Speaker 64 It turned out Assistant DA Susan Price was investigating Lonnie, especially after she listened to that recording where Lonnie's ex-wife Amy Nguyen told Lonnie's own investigators that she knew about his plan to murder Mickey on the cruise ship.

Speaker 28 The prosecutor knew she needed to meet Amy.

Speaker 12 We actually did go to Northern California and arrived at her doorstep.

Speaker 8 Unannounced. Unannounced.

Speaker 18 And when you said to her, as I'm pretty sure you did in that interview, somebody's been murdered here and we think you have important information, she said, I don't or I'm not talking.

Speaker 12 Well, we didn't even get that far. She just said, I don't want to talk to you.
I have no interest in talking to you. So we came back home.

Speaker 42 They weren't giving up.

Speaker 4 The DA asked Sergeant Don Vogt from the Orange County Sheriff's Department to assist with the case.

Speaker 74 A top priority.

Speaker 55 Try to talk with Amy.

Speaker 92 Then I went up to talk to her and she did not want to cooperate with law enforcement.

Speaker 23 They compelled her with a subpoena and when Amy finally came down to Orange County, prosecutors invited someone else to the meeting, Bill Price.

Speaker 105 Bill Price, Amy Nguyen, I don't know if you guys know each other.

Speaker 105 So go ahead and have a seat.

Speaker 11 My objective under their direction

Speaker 11 was to get her to talk.

Speaker 26 In that meeting, Amy was emotional and at times said she didn't know who Bill was, even though that was clearly not true. I don't know you.
You have to. What do you mean you don't

Speaker 26 know me?

Speaker 28 Bill told her law enforcement already knew all about their previous conversation.

Speaker 105 They had the tape recording of you and I talking.

Speaker 105 I don't know you. Do you understand that they have that tape recording? That I turned it in because I'm protecting myself and my family.
Do you understand that?

Speaker 105 you. You can't say you don't know me.
You'd be lying. If he's telling you to do this, Amy, this is not good.
Amy, why are you protecting him? I get not protected. I don't know you.

Speaker 50 She was still scared, maybe of Bill.

Speaker 46 Remember, Lonnie had made him sound like a gangster.

Speaker 68 And as he pressed Amy, Bill seemed to lean into that role.

Speaker 105 I am not here to kill you. I am here to...

Speaker 105 I am here to protect my name and to protect you and bring you underneath my coats. I'm here to tell them that if they mess with you, they mess with me.

Speaker 105 I'm here to bring in the best attorneys if I have to. What I'm not here to do is protect his lies and him from hurting me and everybody else around us.
I'm tired of it, Amy. I'm tired of him.

Speaker 105 I need your help. I need you to be with me.

Speaker 11 I said, it's time the truth come out now.

Speaker 11 I said, and he's made fools out of all of us. I said, now it's time for you to step up to the plate.

Speaker 65 The DA gave Amy immunity for her testimony, and she agreed to cooperate.

Speaker 67 She told sheriff's investigators her own version of what happened on that cruise, how Lonnie had booked it planning to kill Mickey.

Speaker 57 And then Amy said, Lonnie threatened her, forcing her to lie to the federal grand jury.

Speaker 40 Bill started this trying to help out Lonnie and ended it helping you guys.

Speaker 11 Absolutely.

Speaker 92 He did.

Speaker 45 Four days after that interview, Sergeant Vogue traveled to Safety Harbor, Florida, where Lonnie lived.

Speaker 92 Lonnie wasn't in the house. We found him about one hour away at a strip mall operating his new business, which was these bouncy houses for children.

Speaker 92 We told him he was under arrest for the murder of Mickey Kanasaki. Of course, randized him, and at that point, he declined to give us a statement.

Speaker 8 He didn't say anything.

Speaker 92 He didn't say anything.

Speaker 31 It was Lonnie's right to remain silent as he was under arrest for for murder.

Speaker 28 He was booked into the Pasco County Jail.

Speaker 20 How'd that feel?

Speaker 17 Actually, it felt pretty good.

Speaker 11 It felt pretty good.

Speaker 25 For Mickey's family, it was welcome news.

Speaker 49 What'd you think?

Speaker 63 I go, what a relief after seven years,

Speaker 62 because I knew he had something to do with Mickey's murder.

Speaker 6 One thing had not changed.

Speaker 2 There was still no physical evidence tying Lonnie to Mickey's death.

Speaker 22 Would this case be enough for a jury?

Speaker 16 There's no blood in the room. There's no evidence of a struggle.
There's nothing. Where's the evidence? Where is it?

Speaker 79 Could Mickey herself help prove this case?

Speaker 13 He never anticipated that her body would ever be recovered.

Speaker 84 With Vimmost, a tackle in one hand, and ordering a ride in the other, means you're stacking cash back. With Venmostash, get up to 5% cash back when you pick a bundle of your favorite brands.

Speaker 84 Earn more cash when you do more with stash. Venmo Stash Terms Inclusive Clock max $100 cash back per month.
C terms at venmo.me slash stash terms.

Speaker 10 Hi there, it's Andy Richter, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast, The Three Questions with Andy Richter.

Speaker 93 Each week, I invite friends, comedians, actors, and musicians to discuss these three questions.

Speaker 98 Where do you come from? Where are you going? And what have you learned?

Speaker 97 New episodes are out every Tuesday with guests like Julie Bowen, Ted Danson, Tig Nataro, Will Arnett, Phoebe Bridgers, and more.

Speaker 10 You can also tune in for my weekly Andy Richter call-in show episodes, where me and a special guest invite callers to weigh in on topics like dating disasters, bad teachers, and lots more.

Speaker 99 Listen to the three questions with Andy Richter wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 100 Luck is just when preparation meets opportunity.

Speaker 78 HBO Max presents a new comedy series. I love LA.

Speaker 24 Did you guys see the Louis Hubbing campaign?

Speaker 80 I made her successful.

Speaker 6 I can do it for other clients.

Speaker 80 Your chef Bucker.

Speaker 78 Starring Rachel Sennett.

Speaker 85 Those kind of people that want success and money and all these things.

Speaker 101 I am addicted to deals. It's going to be epic.

Speaker 78 The HBO original series, I Love LA, Sundays at 10.30 p.m. on HBO Max.

Speaker 40 Attorney David Michael had already defended Lonnie Kakantis in civil court, protecting his assets from seizure by the feds.

Speaker 35 Now there was much more than money at stake.

Speaker 16 I was stunned that he had been arrested, actually. I was absolutely stunned.

Speaker 26 This time the charge was murder.

Speaker 15 Lonnie faced life in prison.

Speaker 16 I've been doing criminal defense for 45 years where I've done some heavy stuff. And I will tell you that my belief 100% is that Lonnie Kakantas is innocent of killing Nikki Kanasaki.

Speaker 15 Lonnie pleaded not guilty.

Speaker 64 Attorney Michael knew the case relied on Amy Nguyen, whose story he says was one big lie, influenced by none other than Bill Price.

Speaker 16 He scared the hell out of Amy Nguyen. I have money.
I can protect you. I can save you.
Come on, he's a rat. He's a scumbag.
He said horrible things about you.

Speaker 42 Horrible stuff.

Speaker 16 I've never heard of it before. And that's when Amy Nguyen, I guess you could say, turned.

Speaker 75 Why is it so hard to believe that

Speaker 18 she was frightened of Lonnie, that she lied for him, and that she eventually stopped lying for him and told the truth?

Speaker 16 There's no basis at all for what she's saying to be true. It's just fantasy stuff.
And the fact that when they investigated the island escape, there's no blood in the room. There's no blood anywhere.

Speaker 16 There's no evidence of a struggle. There's nothing.
Where's the evidence? Where is it? You know, yeah, she got killed, but that doesn't mean that Lonnie Kakantis did it.

Speaker 64 As Sergeant Don Vogt worked with the Orange County DAs to gather evidence against Lonnie, one thing became clear.

Speaker 36 The Island Escape was not the luxury cruise ship Mickey had looked forward to.

Speaker 49 I kind of get the feeling that if you grew up watching The Love Boat, you probably would not recognize the Island Escape.

Speaker 92 You definitely would not.

Speaker 6 The Island Escape was a former ferry boat, once used to transport cars, then later tourists who were looking to save a buck.

Speaker 12 This was not the type of ship that an American attorney would view as a vacation type of a vessel. It's designed to be cheap and cheerful.

Speaker 102 It has one peculiar feature though that was appealing to Lonnie Kakantes. It's a straight drop into the sea from the balconies that were welded onto the side of this converted ferry.

Speaker 64 On most modern cruise ships, if you fall off the Aloha deck, you've got a good chance of landing on the Lido deck.

Speaker 36 Not so on the Island Escape.

Speaker 64 Those balconies guaranteed that in a fall, the only thing you'd hit was the Mediterranean, almost seven stories straight down.

Speaker 92 That's a long fall. And as you're standing there looking over the balcony, it's a long fall into the ocean, definitely.

Speaker 64 A jury would decide if this unusual defendant was guilty of Mickey's murder.

Speaker 59 An attorney himself, Lonnie filed motion after motion and delayed the trial for years.

Speaker 102 Lonnie is a bright man. Lonnie worked very hard as an attorney.
Throughout these proceedings, he wrote a lot of the briefs that were presented to the court.

Speaker 8 And how did he do?

Speaker 35 He's a good attorney.

Speaker 102 However, he was blinded by his own narcissism. And he's not as smart as he thinks he is.

Speaker 27 David Michael did not represent Lonnie for the criminal trial.

Speaker 56 Instead, Lonnie had a public defender.

Speaker 36 Opening statements began in February 2020.

Speaker 12 The defendant believed that the last chapter of Mickey's life

Speaker 12 was overseas. But it is not.

Speaker 24 The last chapter is here.

Speaker 48 Their first witness, the captain of the island escaped.

Speaker 4 He testified about going to Mickey and Lonnie's cabin just hours after her disappearance and speaking with Lonnie.

Speaker 106 He was not upset at all. It was very cold.
His conversation

Speaker 106 when I asked him various questions, he wasn't talking quickly or nervously. It was very measured.

Speaker 12 The people called Julie Saranita.

Speaker 87 The jury also heard the recorded calls between Mickey's niece Julie and Lonnie.

Speaker 36 He'd been eager to talk until Julie asked him this question.

Speaker 107 Is there any way that you had anything to do with Mickey's death?

Speaker 77 What do you think?

Speaker 107 I just had to ask.

Speaker 92 I think you know the answer to that already.

Speaker 13 He got really angry at me, and the first thing he said, he's like, What do you think?

Speaker 107 The only reason why I asked was because the FBI told me she had died before she hit the water.

Speaker 92 I don't know. She might have been robbed, if that's true.

Speaker 27 Well, I don't know. That's all they told me.

Speaker 58 That's all I know.

Speaker 61 I didn't know what happened to her.

Speaker 30 I didn't have anything to do with it.

Speaker 92 Okay, and I don't appreciate the implications.

Speaker 37 Julie had done what she could to help investigators.

Speaker 35 Now she realized Mickey herself was key to proving the case.

Speaker 13 He never anticipated that her body would ever be recovered.

Speaker 36 Remember how Lonnie had mentioned Mickey's drinking, suggesting she'd gotten drunk, maybe fallen overboard by accident, and drowned?

Speaker 9 Her body told a different story.

Speaker 35 According to the toxicology report, Mickey was not under the influence of alcohol when she died, and the autopsy found no water in her lungs.

Speaker 12 To point to the torso.

Speaker 2 However, there were bruises, some around her neck.

Speaker 68 Italian pathologist Dr.

Speaker 38 Ricci testified through an interpreter that it was clear evidence Mickey had been strangled.

Speaker 78 Mechanical asphyxia.

Speaker 78 Through strangulation or by means of strangulation.

Speaker 54 Under cross-examination, Dr.

Speaker 64 Ricci testified that despite those bruises on Mickey's thighs, he did not believe Mickey had been raped.

Speaker 68 He did see trauma to the back of Mickey's head, possibly caused by a blood object.

Speaker 12 Could it have been a wine bottle that didn't break?

Speaker 78 It could be any object that had a convex surface.

Speaker 78 It could be even a bottle, yes.

Speaker 74 The question was why Lonnie would want her dead.

Speaker 36 According to prosecutors, the motive was money.

Speaker 44 Lonnie had been the beneficiary of Mickey's will, meaning all that money he'd parked with her during his legal troubles belonged to Lonnie after she died.

Speaker 30 When Bill Price took the witness stand, it was to testify against his former close friend.

Speaker 11 He looked down, looked around.

Speaker 11 He couldn't look me in the eye, but I looked at him. I'm not ashamed of anything I said or did.

Speaker 6 Remember, Bill had confronted Lonnie about what Amy told him, which was that Bill helped to arrange the murder.

Speaker 79 Lonnie's response?

Speaker 11 He told me, don't worry about it, that she'd already testified in a grand jury, and therefore the FBI wouldn't believe her.

Speaker 12 And so he told you that she wouldn't be believed anyway, is that right?

Speaker 11 That's correct.

Speaker 45 So here was the moment Amy Nguyen was called to testify.

Speaker 12 Think, Your Honor, the people call Amy Nguyen.

Speaker 26 In court, the judge would not allow us to take pictures of her face.

Speaker 33 Amy testified that Lonnie told her he booked the cruise for himself and Mickey and his supposedly well-connected friend, Bill Price.

Speaker 12 And did he tell you what his plan was? He said that Bill's people will throw Mickey in the water and Bill and his girlfriend will be his witness.

Speaker 6 In other words, his alibi.

Speaker 6 But when Bill canceled at the last minute, Amy says Lonnie told her this.

Speaker 12 He will have to take matters onto his own hands.

Speaker 26 Remember, if Amy was telling the truth on the stand, it meant she had previously lied to a federal grand jury.

Speaker 12 We had assessed the reality that she had given a prior statement under oath, but we also took everything we know to be true about our jobs and human beings and evaluated her in person to see whether we believed her.

Speaker 12 So a little bit of a gut check there for me at least.

Speaker 8 And you believed her.

Speaker 18 Absolutely. And you thought a jury would.

Speaker 12 Absolutely.

Speaker 6 Before the jury had a chance to deliberate, this courtroom and the world would have to face a new reality.

Speaker 6 A global pandemic.

Speaker 12 We're seeing that there's a travel ban in Italy. And I'm thinking, what is happening?

Speaker 64 The trial comes to a sudden stop.

Speaker 35 But the case?

Speaker 6 Not over yet.

Speaker 22 An undercover plan is about to be revealed.

Speaker 108 I actually posed as a hitman.

Speaker 60 And it's a stunner.

Speaker 27 By March of 2020, The trial of Lonnie Kakatis for the murder of Mickey Kanasaki was well underway.

Speaker 6 In fact, the courtroom was probably one one of the last places left with order.

Speaker 56 Outside, it was chaos.

Speaker 10 The impact of coronavirus around the world is becoming more dire.

Speaker 101 It's a global battle against a virus spreading fast.

Speaker 11 In Italy tonight, infections are spiking.

Speaker 12 All of these witnesses had come from Italy, and literally within 48 hours of the last one going back to Italy, there's news about coronavirus hitting Italy.

Speaker 12 And within a day, we're seeing that there's a travel ban in Italy. And I'm thinking, what is happening?

Speaker 41 Next, the Orange County court calendar was wiped clean.

Speaker 40 Were you worried when the trial had to pause because of the pandemic?

Speaker 9 Yes, I was.

Speaker 26 That delay lasted more than two months.

Speaker 65 Then on May 26, 2020, with COVID-19 cases still spreading in Orange County, The judge called a hearing to determine whether Lonnie's case could move forward.

Speaker 28 Toshi went to court with a heavy heart.

Speaker 68 It was the 14th anniversary of Mickey's death.

Speaker 37 The hearing was live-streamed to the public, and no surprise, the defense argued for a mistrial.

Speaker 70 Among the reasons, after the long delay, jurors couldn't possibly remember everything, putting Lonnie at a disadvantage.

Speaker 79 To which the judge said,

Speaker 109 We have to continue. It's so important to have the rule of law, even during a pandemic.

Speaker 43 The judge denied the motion for a mistrial and two days later,

Speaker 66 all 16 jurors returned.

Speaker 28 Following social distancing guidelines, jurors would spread throughout the courtroom and everyone would wear masks except the witnesses.

Speaker 110 Good morning.

Speaker 42 And the first witness to take the stand was Lonnie Kakadas.

Speaker 109 I don't know if my ex-wife was killed. I don't know what happened to my ex-wife, Mickey.

Speaker 9 Lonnie had an explanation for everything.

Speaker 110 Why did you book a cabin with a balcony?

Speaker 109 Well, I didn't want to cheap out. I mean, I was trying to impress Mickey with the fact that I was trying to change.
You know, one more vacation to spend more money.

Speaker 52 All of it was to salvage a relationship that, according to Lonnie, Mickey's hot temper had destroyed.

Speaker 109 Well, she broke telephones. She threw things.
One particular incident in 2001, she broke a fax machine, threw it from the second level down to the living room floor.

Speaker 52 That time, the cops were called.

Speaker 59 Lonnie said he talked them down from arresting Mickey.

Speaker 46 So, when Lonnie learned that Mickey's niece Julie was trying to get him arrested for Mickey's murder by secretly taping their conversations, Lonnie said he was really hurt.

Speaker 109 And then, for her to accuse me

Speaker 109 of something I didn't do

Speaker 109 after I thought we were trying to help each other upset me greatly.

Speaker 68 Lonnie said Julie wasn't the only one who took advantage of his kindness.

Speaker 28 There was also Bill Price, the friend who turned on him.

Speaker 6 And of course, Amy Nguyen. Lonnie called her a gold digger, said she was lying.

Speaker 37 and said Bill Price put her up to it.

Speaker 109 I don't trust Amy Nguyen, didn't trust Amy Wynn, and don't trust Amy Wynn when it comes to an intimate relationship. I did not expect her to start making up lies about me again.

Speaker 81 Lonnie said Amy wasn't the only person telling lies about him.

Speaker 6 There was also someone he met behind bars, someone who was prepared to tell the jury quite a story.

Speaker 64 Back in April of 2014, a year after Lonnie was arrested for Mickey's murder, the Orange County DA's office got a call.

Speaker 30 An inmate inmate named Tony, a frequent flyer in the criminal justice system, was requesting an emergency landing.

Speaker 35 Sergeant Don Vogt set up a meeting.

Speaker 92 So Tony had told us that he was approached by Lonnie Cocontas, who asked Tony and another inmate if they were willing to have Lonnie's third wife recant her statement and then have her killed.

Speaker 44 This is Amy we're talking about.

Speaker 49 Correct. What happens next?

Speaker 92 We created a hitman named Greg, who's going to be a hitman for Lonnie Cocontis to take care of Lannie's third wife.

Speaker 64 Greg was played by an undercover investigator named Bill.

Speaker 35 We've disguised him so he can get more work in the future.

Speaker 18 How often when you're asked to pose as a hitman is the person that you're going to supposedly be working for already behind bars?

Speaker 108 In the six cases that I actually posed as a hitman, four of the six were already behind bars.

Speaker 18 How many of those six cases were men wanting you to kill their wives?

Speaker 108 Six out of six.

Speaker 87 This has to give you a dim view of men, or at least of husbands.

Speaker 108 Well, at least one's in custody.

Speaker 55 Tony, the informant, then introduced Greg, the hitman, to Lonnie, the inmate.

Speaker 18 I think people, maybe from watching TV shows or movies, have this idea that this all happens in one phone call.

Speaker 108 No, he was definitely feeling me out during the first few conversations. But after he got some bad news at court, he opened up much more with me on the phone.

Speaker 44 What kind of money are we talking about here?

Speaker 108 Lonnie was offering $100,000 for me to kill Amy.

Speaker 32 Greg said the ever-so-careful Lonnie spoke in code.

Speaker 108 He told me it was time to take the property off the market. Another call.
I said, well, I just want to make sure we're good foreclosing on property D16, which is his code.

Speaker 108 He goes, and he agreed, it is time.

Speaker 81 When you hear that, you know

Speaker 18 we can go into court with that.

Speaker 86 Yes.

Speaker 108 He knows I'm not a realtor.

Speaker 68 Then a surprising thing happened.

Speaker 6 Someone wanted to call the cops, and it was Lonnie.

Speaker 110 How many times have you lied to this jury since yesterday morning?

Speaker 58 None.

Speaker 12 He had an answer for everything.

Speaker 15 Lonnie Kakatis, innocent man?

Speaker 36 Or guilty as charged?

Speaker 94 They have 14 years to come up with a story.

Speaker 94 14 years.

Speaker 35 12 jurors were about to decide his fate.

Speaker 64 Everyone who knew him said Lonnie Kakatis was a resourceful, hard-working attorney.

Speaker 52 According to prosecutors, in the years leading up to his trial, Lonnie had done more than file motions.

Speaker 68 They said he also tried to hire a hitman to take out the key witness against him, his ex-wife, Amy Nguyen.

Speaker 67 Lonnie thought the hitman's name was Greg.

Speaker 2 He was wrong.

Speaker 27 It was Bill, and Bill wasn't a hitman.

Speaker 6 He was an undercover cop who followed up on their conversations.

Speaker 57 with a letter to Lonnie.

Speaker 108 I asked him to specify some of the terms that we were using during this investigation to get clarification from him.

Speaker 18 That sounds like it's going to make somebody suspicious.

Speaker 108 And it did.

Speaker 68 Lonnie may have realized he'd been the target of a sting operation.

Speaker 65 And true to form, he went on the offensive,

Speaker 4 asking his attorney's office to call the police.

Speaker 16 Lonnie never said that he wanted Amy to win killed. It's only that investigator that can try this.

Speaker 45 He cut off communication after that.

Speaker 108 He called me one more time and he said that Tony had misled me about the entire process. He was doing damage control at that point, but unfortunately for Lonnie, the damage was already done.

Speaker 67 Prosecutors charged Lonnie with solicitation to commit murder.

Speaker 68 He denied it and said he'd been set up by a jailhouse informant who was looking to cut a deal.

Speaker 45 Assistant DA Susan Price had waited years for the chance to cross-examine Lonnie.

Speaker 110 How How many times have you lied to this jury since yesterday morning?

Speaker 111 None.

Speaker 112 You've been truthful? Yes.

Speaker 8 Tell me about cross-examining Lonnie.

Speaker 43 You're smiling.

Speaker 12 Well, I've never cross-examined a defendant quite like Lonnie Kakantis. He had an answer for everything,

Speaker 12 a very lengthy answer for everything. a very self-serving answer for everything.

Speaker 8 The world's out to get me.

Speaker 12 He was the victim of everybody.

Speaker 12 You have testified about how you've been victimized by different people. Would you agree with that?

Speaker 109 Well, I have been victimized. I'm pretty naive.

Speaker 6 That was how he played it anyway.

Speaker 33 And under cross-examination, Lonnie did not crack.

Speaker 112 You testified yesterday that Mickey, when she drank, she became unpredictable.

Speaker 109 She was unpredictable when she drank.

Speaker 112 Was she unpredictable on the night you saw her alive last?

Speaker 109 She was okay that evening.

Speaker 112 Was she violent towards you on the night you last saw her alive?

Speaker 38 No.

Speaker 55 Lonnie insisted there was no argument and no violence.

Speaker 109 I don't know what caused her death, so I don't know if her drinking was a factor or not.

Speaker 112 Because you believe she could have strangled herself?

Speaker 109 I don't believe she was strangled. And of course she could not have strangled herself.

Speaker 18 When you finish cross-examining Lonnie, you think we've got it?

Speaker 12 No, I never think we've got it. I did think, to me, he doesn't seem credible,

Speaker 12 but I didn't know if any of the jurors felt sorry for him.

Speaker 22 Five months after trial started, the case was handed to a jury.

Speaker 54 Would they see an innocent man taken advantage of time and again?

Speaker 2 Or a heartless murderer?

Speaker 61 Mickey's brother Toshi wondered.

Speaker 94 You have 14 years to come up with a story.

Speaker 94 14 years.

Speaker 62 Over and over to make everything fit.

Speaker 52 After just an hour of deliberation, it all came undone.

Speaker 25 The verdict? Guilty of first-degree murder for financial gain.

Speaker 18 How did Lonnie take it?

Speaker 9 Shook his head.

Speaker 62 He stood there and shook his head. Because I watched him.
I'm watching him. He's shaking his head.

Speaker 8 He wouldn't look back at you.

Speaker 46 Mickey's niece, Julie, had been waiting, too.

Speaker 13 And as soon as I heard the verdict, it was just this big sense of relief, like my aunt finally got justice.

Speaker 56 Lonnie Kakadis was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Speaker 4 He is appealing his conviction. Because of the life sentence, the DA's office dropped the murder for hire charge.

Speaker 35 For Bill Price, who thought of Lonnie as a brother and then ended up turning him in,

Speaker 23 it had been a very long road.

Speaker 79 How's your conscience?

Speaker 11 Relieved? Whether Mickey was a good person or a bad person, nobody deserves to die

Speaker 11 that way. Nobody does.

Speaker 11 And I suppose the guilt that I would have had then

Speaker 11 would be:

Speaker 11 I believed him.

Speaker 102 That hurts.

Speaker 18 You're a pro and he fooled you.

Speaker 41 Yeah.

Speaker 40 For Miki Kanasaki, the ocean always carried hope.

Speaker 27 A coal miner's daughter from Japan, she'd once traveled across the sea for a better life.

Speaker 66 And the island escape was supposed to carry her and Lonnie to calmer shores.

Speaker 21 He didn't know how good he had it.

Speaker 103 Yeah, he does not know.

Speaker 6 He did not know.

Speaker 103 Yeah, to the end, she was always there for him.

Speaker 103 And look what happened. Look what he did to her.

Speaker 103 She didn't deserve that. She had a lot to live for.

Speaker 38 She was

Speaker 14 a beautiful person. And I'm talking about her soul.
She just had such a beautiful soul.

Speaker 39 A soul lost at sea.

Speaker 52 who found her way home.

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