Fatal Attraction

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Speaker 3 From the Creator of Homeland, Claire Danes and Matthew Rees star in the new Netflix series The Beast in Me as ruthless rivals whose shared darkness will set them on a collision course with fatal consequences.

Speaker 3 The Beast in Me is a riveting psychological cat and mouse story about guilt and justice and doubt, now playing only on Netflix.

Speaker 6 I didn't see it coming. It was shocking.

Speaker 7 I had a bad feeling.

Speaker 6 She did say he has a gun, and I'm afraid he might use it.

Speaker 8 A story of sand, sunsets, and fatal attraction.

Speaker 9 She had so much to give.

Speaker 10 She would make everybody feel special.

Speaker 8 Successful at everything, except love.

Speaker 8 Then she found him.

Speaker 11 She said she felt so good in his arms.

Speaker 8 He was handsome, sophisticated, and crazy about her. There was talk of marriage.
Then suddenly, there was talk of trouble.

Speaker 12 She was frightened enough not to go home.

Speaker 10 She had fear that something would happen to her.

Speaker 1 It did. My sister, she's not answering her phone.

Speaker 8 How did love go so wrong? In a surprising twist, it would take not one, but two trials to discover the truth.

Speaker 10 All of a sudden, he wasn't convicted of killing my sister anymore.

Speaker 12 Nantucket, Massachusetts, a gorgeous smudge of an island off the coast of Cape Cod.

Speaker 12 It's simple and elegant in a way that says serious money.

Speaker 12 The beaches are pristine, the food phenomenal, and the shopping, pack your credit cards.

Speaker 12 As a setting for romance with its surf, sunsets, and sea breezes, Nantucket is 50 shades of fabulous.

Speaker 12 But then the fog rolls in, dense, mysterious, and everything changes. Suddenly, it seems anything is possible in this moody place.
Maybe even sinister things.

Speaker 1 911, the slide is recorded. State your emergency.
Hi, we got an emergency. My sister, she's not answering her phone.

Speaker 12 It was Monday, October 25th, 2004. A gray day.

Speaker 12 Officer Daniel Furtado of the Nantucket Police Department was on patrol when the car radio crackled at about 1.15 in the afternoon.

Speaker 1 A call had come in. She was supposed to leave and pick up my son at daycare now.
She won't answer her cell phone. Okay, I'm going to send someone over right now.

Speaker 12 It was a routine matter, or so it seemed. Fratado was dispatched to check it out.
He met his partner at Pawthorne Lane. There were two houses on the property.

Speaker 12 Both were owned by longtime island resident Barbara Kodillak.

Speaker 14 I said, excuse me. Are you Miss Elizabeth Lachtefeld? And she said, no, she's over there, pointed towards the cottage.

Speaker 12 The officers walked to the cottage and knocked. No answer.
It was the first hint of trouble.

Speaker 14 I moved around to the bay window and I looked in, at which time I saw someone laying on the ground.

Speaker 12 Furtado was looking at a crime scene.

Speaker 14 I turned towards Sergeant Coakley and I told him that we had somebody down inside.

Speaker 12 Furtado's partner kicked in the door. The body was on the living room floor.
A woman stabbed to death. Furtado had never seen anything like it and was hit by a wave of fierce emotions.

Speaker 14 From shock to awe to frighten, that's pretty much how it went. And then the police training kicked in.

Speaker 12 Adrenaline surging, the cops pulled their weapons.

Speaker 14 Our immediate thought was to draw our weapon for our safety. So with weapons drawn, we proceeded to clear the house.

Speaker 12 It was all clear.

Speaker 2 But horrifying.

Speaker 12 There were signs of a struggle, blood in a bedroom, and in the living room by the body. Officer Furtado radioed in.

Speaker 14 I made the comments. Just get here.

Speaker 12 It was Furtado's first homicide. But if he was a stranger to homicide, so was Nantucket.
There hadn't been a murder on the island for two decades.

Speaker 14 It doesn't happen here. It can't happen here.
And that was kind of the way it was up until that day.

Speaker 12 Her name was Elizabeth Lochtefeld, but everyone called her Beth, and she was an unlikely victim.

Speaker 12 She was 44 years old, a successful businesswoman from New York who'd sold her company for a tidy profit and moved to this Nantucket cottage just months before.

Speaker 10 Beth had this incredible gift of making people feel comfortable around her.

Speaker 12 Beth's brother, Tom Lochtefeld. I would be with her.

Speaker 10 We would go into the store to run an errand, and she'd be chatting up the clerk at the counter, getting into a conversation. I'd be like, come on, Beth, let's go.

Speaker 10 What are you doing?

Speaker 12 Smart, vibrant, adventurous, Beth was certainly all that and more. But what Tom remembers most is her way with people.

Speaker 12 It sounds like your sister made the other person feel better, bigger, you know, more loved.

Speaker 10 It's a gift. She would make everybody feel special.

Speaker 12 The third of five children, Beth was raised in Peakskill, New York, about 50 miles north of New York City.

Speaker 10 My mom stayed home, cared for us. My dad was home at 5.30 for dinner at 6 o'clock.

Speaker 12 But when school was out, the family headed to Nantucket, where Beth's father, John Lochtefeld, was a well-known local artist. And for years, if it was summer, Beth was on the island.

Speaker 6 She was game for everything.

Speaker 12 Leslie Costello met Beth more than three decades ago. They were freshmen together at the University of Notre Dame.

Speaker 6 The last time that she was in California, we were going to go out surfing. And I said, Beth, I think you probably, she'd never surfed before, and she was, she'd boogie boarded plenty.

Speaker 6 I said, you know, you might have more fun boogie boarding. She goes, oh no.

Speaker 11 She wanted to go for it.

Speaker 1 I want to go for it.

Speaker 6 I want to learn to surf. So off she was, you know, always willing and wanting to embrace a new experience with joy.

Speaker 12 After college, Beth settled in New York and started her own company. In this video, she talked about those early days.
Hard work,

Speaker 16 you work your fingers to the bone, your nose to the grindstone, it's about blood, sweat, and tears.

Speaker 12 She chose a tough gig, gig, helping architects navigate New York's Byzantine building regulations. That seems like the kind of business for a tough, savvy, hard-edged type woman.

Speaker 12 It doesn't sound like the woman you're describing, really.

Speaker 6 Oh, you know what? She was enormously successful because she was hardworking and she was honest. You know, she shined and people...
just could trust her.

Speaker 12 But it sounds like there was just one part of her life that was missing. Just love, finding someone to spend her life with.
Did she talk about that?

Speaker 6 She did want a family.

Speaker 12 In early September 2004, that dream suddenly seemed to be within reach.

Speaker 11 She was thinking this could be the guy, absolutely.

Speaker 12 It was Labor Day weekend, a sunny day on Nantucket. Bernadette called her friend Beth.

Speaker 11 I said, hi, hi. And I said, you know what? I think I'm looking at your future husband right now.

Speaker 11 And she said, really? And I said, yeah.

Speaker 6 And she said, I'll be right over.

Speaker 12 Bernadette Feeney had only known Beth for a few months.

Speaker 4 Not long, but long enough.

Speaker 11 She told me she'd been successful in every part of her life, except for love.

Speaker 12 So when Bernadette's old friend Tom Toulin came to stay at her Nantucket home, she introduced him to Beth.

Speaker 11 It was the connection. It was electric.
The minute she walked in, it was like, whoa.

Speaker 12 Beth had finally met Mr. Wright.

Speaker 12 But people aren't always what they seem to be or pretend to be.

Speaker 8 There was a lot to like about Beth's new beau, but there was also something a little troubling, especially after he met Beth's friends.

Speaker 11 She said something like, They thought you were really sophisticated and you know charming. And he said under his breath, Boy, I really should have been an actor.

Speaker 8 When Dateline continues

Speaker 12 In September 2004, Beth Lochtefeld was a woman in love. Her brother Tom remembers exuberant phone calls about the new man in her life.

Speaker 10 Of course, she was over the top. I met this guy, friend of a friend.
And of course, I had learned after

Speaker 10 many of those phone calls to try not to get too excited for her.

Speaker 12 At 37, Tom Toulin was a walking, talking swoon machine, tall, broad-shouldered, preppy. And Beth had a lot in common with him.

Speaker 10 He liked literature, he liked music, he was good-looking, he came from a Catholic family whose parents were still married. 30 years later, that was a big attraction for Beth.

Speaker 12 She saw someone who she thought was like-minded, I guess.

Speaker 10 In many ways, yes.

Speaker 12 Tom Toulin's childhood friend, Bernadette Feeney, had introduced the couple. Bernadette had known Tom since he was a toddler.
They'd grown up in the same apartment building in Brooklyn, New York.

Speaker 11 He was four years younger and the same age as my brother. So he always felt like a little brother to me.
And we were, I can't even tell you how close we were.

Speaker 12 Tom went to private school, then Columbia University. After college, he sold cars for a while, then landed a job as a broker at Smith Barney.

Speaker 12 Other jobs in finance followed, including a stint as a bank executive on Wall Street. He seemed to have it all with charm to spare.

Speaker 11 She'd call me on the corner of some corner of Manhattan saying, oh my gosh, I'm just waiting for him here. I just have to thank you.
This is unbelievable. We're having so much fun.

Speaker 12 Tom was smitten too from day one.

Speaker 11 He just said, my gosh, she's a great gal. I mean, she's an amazing gal.

Speaker 12 Even though Tom lived in New York and Beth in Nantucket, they started seeing each other regularly. Beth at 44 was eager for marriage and a family.

Speaker 12 Very soon, there was talk of rings, although Beth's brother says it was mainly Tom doing the talking.

Speaker 10 As a matter of fact, it's my understanding that that first day he said, I'm going to marry you. And she was like, yeah, right.

Speaker 12 Beth may have hesitated as she learned more about her new man. He told her he'd had drinking problems.
But for Bernadette Feeney playing Cupid, Tom's drinking hardly seemed like a deal-breaker.

Speaker 11 I knew that he had a drinking problem. Regardless, I know a million people with drinking problems.

Speaker 12 Other friends had misgivings. Louis Guarnaccia taught Beth Japanese martial arts on Nantucket, and she confided in him.

Speaker 15 She says, well, I met somebody. I says, oh, that's great.
And she says, but he smokes and drinks. I'm going, wow, Beth, that doesn't sound like a good mix for you.

Speaker 15 And she says, well, he's a little crazy. And then she had to subdue it.
She says, well, I'm a little crazy, too.

Speaker 12 If she was making excuses for him, she had her reasons.

Speaker 11 She said she felt so good in his arms. He was was so protective.

Speaker 11 She told me this is the first time in 15 years I'm with a man that wants to be with me.

Speaker 12 And besides, Beth was a fixer.

Speaker 10 When she would date guys, a lot of times she would say to herself, well, he'd be really great except for this, but I think we can work on that.

Speaker 12 No surprise then that Beth decided to work on Tom's drinking problem with him.

Speaker 11 I believe, yes, she was trying to help him dry out. And he told her he wanted to stop and he wanted to dry out.

Speaker 12 Two weeks after they met, Beth and Tom flew to California together. Tom, who was now working as an investment consultant, had meetings there and Beth decided to tag along.

Speaker 12 It was their first extended trip together. And for Beth, it was an eye-opener.
Now she saw things she could not dismiss.

Speaker 11 He's a mess, she said. He couldn't get on the plane.

Speaker 11 They missed the plane. I said, what was he doing? What do you mean? She said, I just stood back and watched him.

Speaker 11 And he was just walking in circles in the hotel room, smoking cigarettes, not packed, just a mess.

Speaker 12 Beth wanted to introduce Tom to her friends on the West Coast. Top of the list was Leslie Costello, Beth's college friend.

Speaker 12 Leslie lives in San Diego, and she was eager to meet Beth's new beau, but she was less than impressed.

Speaker 6 He was distant and very formal, and I didn't understand him.

Speaker 12 The trip ended badly.

Speaker 11 They were in a taxi and he had a temper tantrum.

Speaker 11 And I guess she said, let us off here or whatever. She said, he turned and he like really yelled at her.
And she said it was like a little bit scary.

Speaker 12 And he was drinking.

Speaker 6 She said he had had eight beers by the time you even got to the airport and got on the plane.

Speaker 12 Bernadette says that on the way home, Tom asked Beth what her friends thought of him. He said something chilling during the exchange that followed.

Speaker 12 Something that troubled her so much, she told Bernadette about it right away.

Speaker 11 He said, what do they say about me?

Speaker 11 And she said something like, they thought you were really sophisticated and, you know, charming and this and that. And he said under his breath, boy, I really should have been an actor.

Speaker 11 And she said, that just went right into her gut.

Speaker 12 It was at that point, perhaps, that she began asking, who was the real Tom Toulin?

Speaker 12 She told family and friends that she was going to give the relationship the four seasons test to see how things stood in a year.

Speaker 12 But it was becoming clear that Tom Toulin was not inclined to let one season pass, let alone four.

Speaker 8 Coming up, a troubled relationship becomes a terrifying one.

Speaker 6 Why she didn't leave that next day, I'm not exactly sure.

Speaker 8 When dateline continues.

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Speaker 12 In October 2004, Beth Lochtefeld went to New York to be with her boyfriend, Tom Toulin. By then, the two had been dating for six weeks, but the relationship was fraying.

Speaker 12 Beth was beginning to see a troubling side of this new guy, and she had started to give him ultimatums.

Speaker 6 He'd start drinking, and then he'd get really ugly. She would just say that, you're a good guy, but when you're drinking, you're an idiot, and you need to decide between alcohol and me.

Speaker 6 And he would, you know, apologize and say, you know, I choose you and I want you. I, you know, I don't want the alcohol.

Speaker 12 That week, Beth invited her brother to meet her boyfriend. Perhaps she wanted his take on Tom.
First impression you see him walk in.

Speaker 10 Well, he had

Speaker 10 longish blonde hair sort of combed back and a double-breasted blue blazer on. He looked like something off of, you know, the love boat Captain Stubie, you know?

Speaker 10 But very pompous, very,

Speaker 10 I don't know.

Speaker 12 know he seemed fake to me that night over dinner Beth's brother kept asking Tom Toulin what he did for a living

Speaker 10 and he couldn't really tell me to my satisfaction what he did oh I'm an investor this that well what do you invest in and then he couldn't really give me an answer Beth's brother says Toulin was drinking during dinner but not to excess Afterwards, Toulin and Beth headed back to his apartment.

Speaker 12 And on the way home, Beth told friends something shocking happened. She'd seen him drunk, she'd seen him angry, but she'd never seen her new boyfriend like this.

Speaker 6 He'd put her into a headlock and was walking down the street saying, I want to beat your head in.

Speaker 6 She shared with me, you know, I went back to his apartment to just get my palm pilot and my cell phone and get out of there. And I

Speaker 6 wonder if I shouldn't have just left that stuff behind and left at that moment.

Speaker 12 Little did Beth know that Toulin had apparently been aggressive with at least one other woman after he'd had a few drinks.

Speaker 6 I thought, wow, flowers, how nice. You know, I thought, this is a really, he's such a gentleman.

Speaker 12 Becky Hammonds, who was working as a bartender at a New York sports bar, dated Toulin once.

Speaker 6 We had plans to go to dinner at the New York Athletic Club, and I thought, well, that's nice. That's a nice date.

Speaker 12 But it didn't turn out that way. Dinner was pleasant.
Then came drinks.

Speaker 6 That's when he accused me of being lascivious with the bartender because I was just having a conversation with the bartender.

Speaker 12 They got into a cab to go home and Becky says Toulin tried to grope her. When they reached her street, she didn't wait around.

Speaker 6 I jumped out and I ran. I literally ran across the street.

Speaker 12 And now four years later, Beth Lochtefeld was in a frightening situation with the same man. But that night, instead of grabbing her stuff from Toulin's apartment once she got there, Beth stayed.

Speaker 12 And Leslie says Beth later told her that things went from bad to terrible.

Speaker 6 And then he got very violent with her that night and he

Speaker 6 sexually assaulted her. And I think that Beth was probably sort of in a state of

Speaker 6 and it's it's a confusing thing when it's somebody that you're supposedly close to violates you. My guess is that she was just probably in a state of shock.

Speaker 6 And why she didn't leave that next day, I'm not exactly sure.

Speaker 12 By Friday, October 22nd, two days after the dinner with her brother, Beth had decided to leave New York. Friends and family say it was clear that she intended to call it quits with Toulin.

Speaker 12 She'd even left a message at her brother's Connecticut home saying she was coming to spend the night. But by now, something else was becoming clear.
Tom Toulin was not going to let Beth go.

Speaker 6 He wouldn't leave her. And he followed her.
And she said, we ended up in the Metropolitan.

Speaker 6 And she said, I was standing there in front of this painting, and it was an incredibly dark painting, thinking, this painting reminds me of Tom Toulin.

Speaker 12 As bizarre as it sounds, that was the moment, Beth later told Leslie, that Tom Toulin picked to propose to her.

Speaker 12 He chose the most public place possible, a gallery in this world-famous museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He'd proposed to Beth before, but never like this.

Speaker 6 He pulls this ring out, gets on his knees, and you know, proposes to her again. And she said, I was not,

Speaker 6 she didn't feel safe safe enough to say no. She knew she was in a dangerous situation so she said to him, I need more time.

Speaker 10 She was like so upset because he said, you know, it's now or never.

Speaker 12 And her response to him was, then it has to be never.

Speaker 10 And these were words right out of Beth's mouth.

Speaker 12 Beth rushed out of the museum. Toulin pursued her.

Speaker 6 He was screaming, I'm going to go get drunk with my friends. She was just going to go back, get her stuff, and get out.

Speaker 6 And he, at the last minute, hopped in the cab with her, and they ended up back at his apartment.

Speaker 12 At some point that night, Beth called her brother. In retrospect, he says, she sounded terrified.

Speaker 10 Her words were very measured.

Speaker 10 She was talking very slowly and enunciating very clearly, unlike her.

Speaker 10 And she kept saying,

Speaker 10 I'm here with Tom in the city and we're trying to work things out.

Speaker 10 And

Speaker 10 I didn't even think to ask her, are you okay?

Speaker 10 Or cough twice if you're in trouble or something like that.

Speaker 12 He had no idea his sister was in danger.

Speaker 10 I was sort of tired. I didn't want to deal with the breaking up, making up kind of thing.

Speaker 12 Later, from family and friends, he would learn the horrifying details of Beth's ordeal that night.

Speaker 10 It's my understanding that he was holding her at gunpoint.

Speaker 12 Beth's brother says he has no proof of that or other details of exactly what went on that night, but he's pieced together a story from various accounts.

Speaker 10 He held her captive. She tried to get away.
He was either drunk or tired, and he ended up, she was laying down on the bed.

Speaker 10 He ended up laying on her legs and then going to sleep or passing out himself. To prevent her from leaving.
Yeah, at which point she slipped out and slipped away.

Speaker 12 And I understand that she didn't even want to use the elevator because she was afraid the ding might wake him up, so she ended up taking the stairs. It was around around 4 a.m.

Speaker 12 when Beth managed to escape from the apartment. Where was she going to go? I know she just wanted to go.

Speaker 10 She was going straight to LaGuardia. Okay.
Get the next flight to Nantucket and get away and get back to her home.

Speaker 12 It was now Saturday, October 23rd. At 8 a.m., Beth called her brother.
It would be the last time the two spoke.

Speaker 10 She mentioned that she had broken up with him and that he had called her about 50 times since on her cell phone, and the guy wouldn't stop calling her.

Speaker 12 And did that raise any alarm nails with you?

Speaker 1 No, it didn't.

Speaker 12 Just a guy who's heartbroken.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 10 So I was thinking, well, she's going to go up to Nantucket. It's all going to be over and everything's going to be fine.

Speaker 12 Except that was not going to happen. Tragedy was two short days away.

Speaker 8 Coming up, a surprise visitor and a panicked phone call.

Speaker 7 He just said to me, Barbara, lock your door, don't go out. I'm calling the police.

Speaker 8 When dateline continues.

Speaker 12 After a terrifying night when she was held captive in Tom Toulin's New York apartment, Beth Lachtefeld had managed to escape and get home to Nantucket, her island refuge.

Speaker 12 She called her friend Leslie the morning she got back.

Speaker 6 But she did say he has a gun, and I'm afraid he might use it. I'm not going to stay here tonight.
I'm going to go spend the night at my brother's house.

Speaker 12 That same day, Saturday, October 23rd, Beth stopped by the Nantucket Police Department to ask about filing a restraining order.

Speaker 12 For her to get to the point of even stopping at the police department, that probably tells you all you need to know about what was going on inside of her.

Speaker 10 Yeah, yeah, I would think so. I mean, I think she had very well-founded fears,

Speaker 10 especially after the incident in New York where he held her captive.

Speaker 12 But Beth did not file the paperwork. She spent that night and the next at her brother Peter's home.
She was frightened enough not to go home.

Speaker 10 I would have to say she had fear that

Speaker 10 something would happen to her.

Speaker 12 On Monday, October 25th, Beth returned to her cottage in the morning, collected Tom Toulin's clothes, parceled them up, and mailed them back to him.

Speaker 12 She returned to the cottage and chatted with her landlady, Barbara Kodalak. It was just after 10.30.

Speaker 7 She came in the yard and we were talking in the driveway. She's going to do some work on her computer and we were going to meet again around one o'clock.

Speaker 12 Beth went inside the cottage to work.

Speaker 7 And that's really, that's the last I saw of Beth.

Speaker 12 Barbara continued to garden. A short time later, she was filling a wheelbarrow when suddenly she heard a voice behind her.

Speaker 7 And the voice said, is there anyone here in this house? And I just turned around and looked up and I looked right at him.

Speaker 12 The man, oddly dressed for Nantucket in a hat and long overcoat, was inquiring about Beth Lochtefeld's cottage.

Speaker 4 And I said, I don't know.

Speaker 12 Something about him bothered her.

Speaker 7 Because I knew Beth had been seeing someone and I think she more or less told me that, I think it's over. And I said, oh, I guess this is the boyfriend who's come back.

Speaker 12 He moved toward the cottage door. Barbara went to her house to have lunch, but she was uneasy.

Speaker 7 And as I said, it was an intuition.

Speaker 12 Barbara says she called Beth's brother Peter, but couldn't reach him. She says she called Beth's parents and couldn't reach them either.

Speaker 12 She knew Beth was planning to pick up her nephew before 1 p.m., but Beth's car did not move. And then she noticed the shades in Beth's bedroom windows had been drawn.

Speaker 7 I had a bad feeling. I had a bad feeling.

Speaker 12 She called Peter Lochtefeld again, and this time she reached him.

Speaker 7 I told him that there was someone in the yard, and I think it's

Speaker 7 Beth's boyfriend, and he just said to me, Barbara, lock your door, don't go out. I'm calling the police.

Speaker 1 911, he's come to Nantucket. He's at her house now.
She won't answer her cell phone.

Speaker 12 It was then that Sergeant Daniel Furtado of the Nantucket Police arrived at the cottage and with his partner, made the discovery. Beth Lochtefeld's body on the living room floor.

Speaker 12 It was just weeks after she thought she'd found the love of her life and dreamed of a new beginning.

Speaker 12 For the Lachtefeld family, life would never be the same.

Speaker 12 What did you lose on that day?

Speaker 10 I would have to say I lost probably my best friend and confidant, aside from my wife.

Speaker 10 She was my closest sibling. We always got along really well.

Speaker 12 Leslie Costello got a call that same day. When you heard the news, how was it told to you?

Speaker 6 He killed her.

Speaker 6 And I remember just being in shock. I didn't see it coming.
I didn't know it was coming. I was in shock.
It was shocking.

Speaker 12 You knew exactly who he was.

Speaker 1 Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I did.

Speaker 12 Tom Toulin was arrested within hours of the murder, picked up in Rhode Island, driving a rented car, with bottles of beer and vodka in the car with him, his bloody clothes in a bag on the back seat.

Speaker 12 The Rhode Island State Police videotaped his arrest and recorded his voice voice in the cruiser. Can I be told why this...
why I'm in this situation, sir.

Speaker 12 Toulin was held without bail and arraigned a month later. Bernadette Feeny was in the courtroom.
She could barely contain herself.

Speaker 11 It was the reality hitting me.

Speaker 11 Sitting there that this

Speaker 11 happened. This really happened.

Speaker 11 And he walked in and it was like they were bringing in, you know, King Kong like a monster, you know. And I felt, it's just, you know,

Speaker 11 like it was my fault, you know, and she's gone.

Speaker 12 Toulin was charged with first-degree murder and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon. He pleaded not guilty.

Speaker 12 Ahead lay a trial and explosive revelations about a man finally stripped bare of all pretense.

Speaker 8 Coming up, what seemed like an open-and-shut case was anything but

Speaker 21 have all of these swirling together inside this man's head.

Speaker 8 When Dateline continues

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Speaker 5 Stop myself? Tune in next time to see if I do it again.

Speaker 1 Spoiler, I will.

Speaker 1 Wow, that had everything.

Speaker 1 Reese's, suspense, Reese's.

Speaker 12 In June 2007, while tourists wandered through old Nantucket town looking for souvenirs, Tom Toulin went on trial for the murder of Beth Lachtefeld in a courthouse in the center of town.

Speaker 12 He'd pleaded not guilty.

Speaker 20 All right.

Speaker 12 The defendant was as smartly turned out as ever, looking like the successful executive he'd long wanted to be, the sort of guy who'd fit right in on this Tony Island.

Speaker 12 But the defense would argue that Toulin's polished exterior was nothing more than a facade for a profoundly troubled man.

Speaker 12 They wouldn't say that he did not kill Beth Lachtefeld, but they would argue that he shouldn't go to prison for it. He was, they said, not guilty by reason of insanity.

Speaker 23 More curious.

Speaker 12 Toulin's attorney, Kevin Reddington, began by hinting at the turmoil that lurked within Tom Toulin.

Speaker 20 Sick Tom Toolin? Looks good. He's got a suit on and a tie.

Speaker 20 He has slick back.

Speaker 20 Certainly, someone may say doesn't look crazy to me.

Speaker 12 But the Master of the Universe Act was just that, Reddington declared, an act.

Speaker 12 Because Tom Toulin was a mess, plagued not just by alcohol abuse, but drug addiction too.

Speaker 8 His drink of choice would be absolute vodka right out of the bottle.

Speaker 9 Drink a fifth a day.

Speaker 23 He was on the prescriptions legally. He was taking them illegally.

Speaker 12 When Beth broke up with him, Reddington told the court, Toulin snapped. The drinking and drugging and even deeper troubles, all of them combined to push him over the edge.

Speaker 21 The evidence evidence will show that Thomas Toulin was suffering from a mental disease, a defect at the time of this incident.

Speaker 15 That he was well within our legal definition of insane.

Speaker 12 And who better to tell the jury about the defendant's demons than the defendant's mother?

Speaker 25 My name is Dolores Toulon.

Speaker 12 She recited the sorry facts of her son's life.

Speaker 1 At some point, was it apparent to you that he had an alcohol problem?

Speaker 18 Yes, I would say

Speaker 25 when he was 16, 17.

Speaker 12 His battle with drugs.

Speaker 20 Did you know if he had occasion to make purchases from places other than drugstores?

Speaker 1 He

Speaker 25 got some prescriptions from the internet.

Speaker 12 She told the court that she and her husband tried to straighten him out, sending him to rehab several times, beginning in 1999.

Speaker 20 And how long was he in Hazelton for?

Speaker 1 A month.

Speaker 12 Now to describe Toulon's state in the days before the murder.

Speaker 24 Did you at some point receive a phone call from your son?

Speaker 18 Yes.

Speaker 12 She described a conversation with her son two days before the murder. He was inconsolable over the breakup with Beth.

Speaker 25 And he said, she's gone.

Speaker 18 She's gone. She's taken all her stuff.
She just, she said, I was asleep and she just left.

Speaker 12 The next day, Sunday, the Toulins went to Manhattan to see their son. He was in terrible shape.

Speaker 18 His whole body exuded

Speaker 1 the smell of alcohol.

Speaker 12 The defense believed that established Toulin's state in the days before the murder. Now for the day itself.

Speaker 12 When Toulin was picked up in Rhode Island hours after the murder, he had been drinking. Sobriety tests later put him at twice the legal limit.

Speaker 26 And multiply that by six.

Speaker 12 A forensic toxicologist doing some complicated calculations estimated that at the time of the murder, Toulin's blood alcohol level was 0.30.

Speaker 23 The 0.30, where does that fit in?

Speaker 26 That fits in the next level above confusion to the stupor phase.

Speaker 12 So the defense argued Toulin was profoundly impaired at the time of the murder, and that was just from the drinking. Add in the drugs.
How much did... drugs play in Tom Toulin's life?

Speaker 21 He would take whatever drugs that he could get his hands on. Such as methamphetamines, benzodiazepine, Paxil, Zoloft.

Speaker 12 There was more. The defense revealed that Toulon had spent years fighting depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder, that in the late 80s he'd attempted suicide.

Speaker 12 And finally, the defense was ready for its knockout punch.

Speaker 12 A neuropsychologist.

Speaker 17 My opinion is that he has

Speaker 17 profound

Speaker 27 frontal executive dysfunction.

Speaker 12 Davidoff testified that years of substance abuse had brought about that mental defect.

Speaker 12 Because of it, Toulin could not control his impulses, and so the defense argued he could not be held criminally responsible for the murder.

Speaker 21 It's like the perfect storm. You have the frontal lobe defect, person's unable to control their emotions and the executive function, coupled with the lowering of the inhibitions through the alcohol.

Speaker 21 You have all of these swirling together inside this man's head.

Speaker 12 The prosecutor's job was to blow that argument away, to argue that Tom Toulin knew exactly what he was doing when he murdered Beth Lachtefeld, that he was so enraged by the breakup that he planned and carried out a cold, calculated killing.

Speaker 28 The Commonwealth will present to you, ladies and gentlemen, a timeline.

Speaker 12 As evidence of premeditation, prosecutor Brian Glennie told the court that on the night before the murder, security guards at New York's LaGuardia airport stopped Toulin from boarding a plane to Nantucket because he was carrying a 10-inch knife.

Speaker 12 When asked about the knife, Toulin offered a series of stories.

Speaker 14 He said that he forgot it was in there. He had it to cut a birthday cake.

Speaker 26 He was having lunch with his sister in Nantucket and that she wanted him to bring a knife.

Speaker 12 The prosecutor presented evidence to show that the next morning, Toulin boarded another plane bound for Nantucket, this time without a knife. But when he landed, he went shopping for knives.

Speaker 12 Toulin may have been drinking that day, the prosecutors argued, but he was used to consuming quantities of alcohol and drugs without showing it.

Speaker 12 And the prosecutor called witnesses who would testify that Toulin didn't seem drunk.

Speaker 12 That's what the clerk who sold him the knives testified.

Speaker 26 I would say he was sober.

Speaker 12 And the rental car agent at the Nantucket airport.

Speaker 29 Did he seem intoxicated to you at that time?

Speaker 11 No.

Speaker 29 Would you have rented a car to him if he appeared intoxicated to you?

Speaker 7 Not likely.

Speaker 12 The prosecutor played a surveillance tape from the airport at Hyannis, Massachusetts. Toulin flew into the airport after the murder, arriving at about 1.15.

Speaker 12 Jurors could see him renting a car, walking out to get it, and driving away in a gray Chevrolet Impala.

Speaker 27 You're able to see how he's walking and he's not falling, he's not stumbling. The persons that are interacting with him are interacting him in in no way.

Speaker 12 And there was audio of Toulin in the back of the state trooper's cruiser after he was arrested in Rhode Island.

Speaker 1 Can you tell me what's going on in the business?

Speaker 12 The prosecutor argued Toulin was coherent. He was capable of thinking clearly and of distinguishing right from wrong despite the alcohol.

Speaker 29 Dr. Martin Kelly, please.

Speaker 12 And the prosecution also had a forensic psychiatrist whom they thought would deliver their own knockout punch.

Speaker 27 Were you able to form an opinion concerning the criminal responsibility of Thomas Toulin III on or about October 25th of 2004 in respect to the killing of Beth Lachtefeld?

Speaker 9 On that date, he did not have a mental disease or defect.

Speaker 12 And so the prosecutor told the jury, Tom Toulin was criminally responsible when he stabbed Beth Lachtefeld to death. The testimony took nine days in all.

Speaker 12 As the summer arrived on Nantucket, the surf and sea beguiling visitors, the stores beckoning shoppers, inside the Nantucket Superior Court, the jury in Toulon's murder trial got the case.

Speaker 13 Coming up, the end of the trial.

Speaker 25 Defendant guilty or not guilty.

Speaker 8 But not the end of the story. When dateline continues.

Speaker 12 The jury in the Tom Toulin trial took five hours to reach a verdict. Do you get butterflies every time?

Speaker 3 Yes, you do.

Speaker 12 As family members and jurors returned to their seats, the courtroom suddenly seemed too small for a big drama.

Speaker 21 You can hear a pin drop in the courtroom. You know, the emotion is palpable.
I think obviously it's high stakes.

Speaker 25 Man, a four-person has the jury agreed upon a verdict.

Speaker 12 High stakes with subtle hints.

Speaker 21 As you can tell, you know, if the court officers surround the defendant, you know, you figure things aren't going that well.

Speaker 25 Let's say you mount a fourth person, is the defendant guilty or not guilty?

Speaker 6 Guilty.

Speaker 12 Guilty of first-degree murder, guilty of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, a stoic Tom Toulin, a distraught mother, and no rejoicing from the victim's family.

Speaker 17 We are relieved.

Speaker 10 that this troubled and vengeful and dangerous man can never harm another innocent person.

Speaker 12 Tom Toulin was sentenced to life in prison, and that's where things stood for four years.

Speaker 12 But in August of 2011, everything changed. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court overturned Tom Toulin's conviction.

Speaker 12 The court said there were flaws in the jury selection process and ordered a new trial. The trial got underway in June 2013, this time at a courthouse on the mainland in Barnstable, Massachusetts.

Speaker 12 For the Lachtefeld family, going through it a second time was deeply disappointing and worrying.

Speaker 10 All of a sudden, he wasn't convicted of killing my sister anymore, and he was, as far as I was concerned.

Speaker 12 But for Tom Tulin, it was an incredible second chance. This time, the defendant looked thinner than he had during the first trial.
And this time, a new defense attorney argued the case.

Speaker 23 This is not a we've done.

Speaker 23 This is not a where,

Speaker 23 when,

Speaker 23 how

Speaker 11 case.

Speaker 10 This is a why case.

Speaker 12 Robert Shekhatoff opened with an admission that the first defense team never made explicitly that Toulon did kill Beth Lachtefeld. What the jury had to decide was why.

Speaker 27 This is a difficult issue to look into somebody's mind and figure out what was going on in that mind.

Speaker 24 Was he a common criminal or was he not? That's the issue.

Speaker 12 It was the insanity defense all over again, dressed up a little differently, presented in court by an attorney who was keenly aware he had an uphill battle on his hands.

Speaker 9 The real question is: is anyone willing to let somebody who's done something this horrific,

Speaker 9 quote-unquote, off the hook because of the problem with their drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and underlying mental issues?

Speaker 12 The prosecutor, Brian Glennie, had the gloves off once again.

Speaker 28 52 days, ladies and gentlemen, 52 days from the time Elizabeth Beth Lachtefeld met Thomas Toulin

Speaker 28 until he stabbed her 23 times until she died.

Speaker 12 Glennie told this new set of jurors just what he said during the first trial, that Tom Toulin knew exactly what he was doing the day he killed Beth Lachtefeld.

Speaker 27 It was a choice that he made knowing it was wrong, and he understood that at the time, and he still chose to do it. That's what criminal responsibility is.

Speaker 12 This time the trial was considerably shorter and this time when the jurors went out to deliberate they were back the same day. The defendant Thomas E.

Speaker 15 Toolin is charged with murder. Is he not guilty or is he guilty?

Speaker 7 The jury has found him guilty.

Speaker 17 Guilty of what, please?

Speaker 12 First degree murder. Guilty again on all counts and stoicism from the defendant sentenced again to life.
He is appealing his conviction. Beth's sister Kathy read a statement in court.

Speaker 16 This verdict cannot bring Beth back,

Speaker 16 but it does bring a measure of justice.

Speaker 12 For Tom Lochtefeld, it was satisfying, even though for him, the first conviction was the one that mattered.

Speaker 10 On that day, we all took a walk up to Beth's gravesite after the conviction, and I just remember feeling that it was a beautiful June day, and it felt like, wow, this is finally, I'm finally not upset to be here anymore.

Speaker 10 And it was good again.

Speaker 12 For those who were close to Beth Lachtefeld, there is a real sense of closure this time.

Speaker 12 The trial behind him, Beth's father, the artist John Lochtefeld, finished the book he and Beth had worked on together. It was published after she died.

Speaker 12 He illustrated her words and dedicated the book to Beth and her dreams.

Speaker 12 The dreams she lived and those that died too soon with her.

Speaker 8 That's all for now. I'm Lester Holt.
Thanks for joining us.

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