Samantha Wohlford

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When an aspiring YouTube star marries a brooding gamer, they prove that opposites do attract.

I am the biggest dreamer ever.

I'm very free-spirited.

He was the calm, tame stuff that she needed, and she was just the right amount of fun and crazy that he needed.

They were like soulmates.

after becoming parents to two sets of twins this young texas couple seemed like a reality show in the making until their home turned into a real life nightmare

she was crying and through the crying trying to say that somebody had kidnapped her husband

I can hear her and at that point I start hearing panic.

As the investigation begins, a dangerous conspiracy fueled by an unquenchable thirst is discovered.

So much of her behavior was attention seeking.

She said, I can make anybody believe anything I'm an actress.

When the truth is revealed, this once idyllic family will land in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons.

They had hit him in the head multiple times with the pistol.

They had hit him across the face with it.

They had punched him.

She said, I am really freaking out.

I've never been so scared in my life.

February 20th, 2015.

It's just after 2 a.m.

in Titus County, Texas, as Rosie Wolford is wrapping up a fun night on the town with her daughter Natasha.

We were having a karaoke night.

We had walked out of the club and we were standing outside talking to the owner when my phone started ringing.

Rosie answers the call from her oldest daughter, 26-year-old Samantha Wolford.

It was muffled and not clear.

I finally get to the point where I can hear her and At that point, I start hearing

panic.

My mom just looked horrified, and I'm like, what's the matter?

She's like, your sister.

She said, all I know is something about

they took him.

And I was like, what's the matter?

She's like, I can't understand her.

Through her daughter's muffled cries, Rosie begins to understand that Samantha is talking about her husband, 29-year-old Ernie Ibera.

She said there were intruders,

and apparently they have kidnapped him.

I finally managed to hear her say,

I'm tied up.

And now I'm really freaking out.

I've never been so scared in my life.

She's like, get in the car right now.

So I'm like, okay.

And I jumped in the car and she said, get me to Mount Pleasant.

So I'm literally driving 90 miles an hour in a 40 trying to get her there.

Rosie and Natasha rush to Samantha's house about an hour away.

As they drive, Rosie calls her sister, Ginger.

My sister was clear-headed enough to think, hey, we should probably call 911.

So she immediately had called 911.

The mom calls Ginger, the aunt, who lived probably 10 minutes down the road, and told her what Samantha was saying.

And then Ginger and Ginger's husband went over to the house.

Ginger and her husband arrive at Samantha's home home before law enforcement.

I tell her to haul her so they can hear her.

And so they know that she's upstairs.

And so they go upstairs.

And when they get upstairs, she's got her hands tied behind her back and her ankles are tied and she's gagged.

She was crying and through the crying, trying to say that somebody had broken into her house, that they had kidnapped her husband.

We have no idea what has happened.

Where is my son-in-law?

What is going on?

Where is Ernie?

Born on Christmas Day, 1985 in Mount Pleasant, Texas, Ernie Ibera was a bright and quiet child.

He was kind of a bookworm.

At one point,

my mom had to

ground him from his books because he would stay up all night reading books and go to sleep during class.

As Ernie got older, his affinity for books gave way to another passion.

He loved to mess around with computers, period.

He could tear one apart, put it right back together.

He was very, very good at it.

He did go to college and got some certificates on technology and computers.

Ernie spent most of his time gaming and working toward his dream.

Then, in 2008, he met a woman at a local tattoo shop who would change his life, Samantha Wolford.

Sam was a real bubbly person.

Everybody liked her.

She just has that way about her.

Samantha was born in 1989.

From a young age, she had a strong instinct to nurture.

Samantha was my oldest.

Then I have Natasha, and then I have Daryl.

Sam always had that mothering instinct.

She was mama to the babies below her.

She knew all along she wanted to be a mom.

At the young age of 19, Samantha's dream became a dramatic reality when she and her high school sweetheart found out they were expecting.

She had told me she was pregnant.

She said it's twins.

I was like, oh my gosh.

It was just as mind-boggling.

While the pregnancy was a dream come true, Samantha's relationship with the twins' father was not.

She was with him for a while, probably two years, but he was not

husband material.

So she finally ended it.

For the next few months, Samantha struggled to make ends meet.

She was a photographer for newborns and um she also was doing like side jobs like selling mary kay she did little ventures here and there to try to make money

then in january 2008 her life turned around when she met 22 year old ernie ibera

he was in this very dark stage gothic i i would call it

he had long hair wore a long black trench coat and

black boots, black pants.

She liked the persona he put off.

She liked like mysteries.

I guess he was a mystery that she was wanting to unravel.

For the first couple of years, Ernie and Samantha kept their relationship casual until 2011 when things got serious fast.

She found out she was pregnant.

She's like, oh my goodness, another set of twins.

When they were born, of course, he was the proud father,

as any father would be.

With two sets of twins, Ernie and Samantha were immersed in family life and grew closer through the chaos.

He was the calm, tame stuff that she needed, and she was just the right amount of fun and crazy that he needed.

I mean, they were like soulmates.

In late 2013, 24-year-old Samantha gave birth to her fifth child, and Ernie worked hard to support his growing family.

He ended up getting a job at D-Bat,

which they make baseball bats, and he ran the machine that did all the lasering on the bats.

He was working two jobs.

He was working as a computer programmer at a local bat manufacturing company here.

And he was also working part-time at a Little Caesars.

Samantha also looked for a way to bring in additional income for her growing brood.

She was really big into YouTube and she made this series of YouTube videos.

Basically her videos were just going on and on about her pregnancy.

She did hope that she could make some kind of extra money at it.

September 21st, my babies turn one years old.

My youngest twins, I feel I'm getting so old.

Oh my God.

There's one where she's just talking about tips on how to get your kid ready for for school really fast like she was trying to help other moms with every video she posted Samantha's confidence and aspirations grew she was wanting to be famous she wanted to be seen she wanted to be known I love you guys

bye

By March 2014, it seemed there was only one thing missing.

A ring on Samantha's finger.

She's like, it's time, you know, I'm sitting here, we're living together,

I'm ready to become the wife.

I babysat their kids and they went out, went to Hope, Arkansas, and got married.

Now, just shy of their second anniversary, in the early morning hours of February 20th, 2015, Samantha is found bound and gagged inside her home, crying out that her husband Ernie has been kidnapped.

She was devastated and she was crying uncontrollably and she was scared.

She said they gotta find him.

As we go into the house, Samantha and her aunt are coming down a staircase and that's where me and the officers have our first encounter with her.

The kids were asleep.

They were upstairs.

So I told Samantha, just leave them where they're at right now so I could get more information from her about what happened without having to worry about the children.

Investigators know they have to act fast to find Ernie.

At that point in time Ernie is possibly still alive and we can get to him.

We've got to get this solved and get it solved fast because you know we knew something wouldn't riot.

Coming up, investigators look into a potential family vendetta.

The subjects made a statement that they were there to get payback.

She painted the picture that this was in retribution for something that Ernie's father might have done.

And Samantha recounts the chilling details of the attack.

So, when they drag you out of bed, what happens to the corner?

Instantly, we go one face down and press the blade that you have inside throat.

On February 20th, 2015, investigators with the Titus County, Texas Sheriff's Department have just arrived at the home of Ernie Ibera and his wife, Samantha.

Samantha described who had broken into her house, that they had kidnapped her husband.

She said she was taken upstairs and tied up with her hands behind her back and her ankles tied.

She is just pale as a ghost and she is just distraught and she looks like this scared little girl not knowing what's going on.

As deputies work to calm Samantha, they can hear the couple's children growing restless in an upstairs bedroom.

By the time they got through

photographing the home and everything, they did get the kids for me and everything and bring them out.

So we loaded them into our vehicle.

While Samantha helps settle her children, investigators look for any clues that might lead them to Ernie.

There was nothing missing.

The extent of valuables would be flat screen televisions, and there's nothing there to give us an indication that somebody broke in that home for the purpose of taking property out of it.

There was some kind of struggle.

because there is damage upstairs to a wall that looks like somebody got pushed into the sheetrock and the sheetrock's damaged.

There is some blood on the wall, which probably happened during a scuffle.

Right by the door was a lock of hair.

The front door is lying in the living room as you come off the front porch, and it's just shattered in about four or five pieces.

There's blood all over the place.

So, you know, something's happened here, and we're trying to piece this together.

While a team of officers continues to process the crime scene, investigators escort Samantha back to the station for additional questioning.

Walk me through what was your routine yesterday.

I came home, we watched the DV,

we ate, no big deal, no fighting, everything was normal.

He was actually in a really great mood.

After their evening together, Samantha says the couple went to bed, but they weren't asleep long.

So when you were laying there in bed, like you and Ernie, they're on the bed in the far bedroom back there.

What's your first

memory of what's going on?

I remember at some point, it was a little after one,

somebody jerking the blankets down, which startled me.

So when they drag you out of bed, what happens at that point?

Once they drag me out of bed, jerk me

bed and sleep me out, one face down,

and press the blade that he had against my throat.

They got him down the stairs and left me upstairs with a guy holding a blade on me and I could hear him hitting him in the living room and yelling but I couldn't tell what was being said.

And then they told them to break me down.

They had me on my knees forcing him to look at me.

It was like they were using me like some kind of taunting factor

and they were punching him in the face with a gun.

She said something to the effect that Ernie was actually holding his own pretty good until one of the intruders hit him in the head with a pistol and at that point she said the fat was pretty much all out of him.

Samantha says before the men dragged Ernie from the home they paused to send a chilling message.

One was holding him and the other one was hitting him.

The guy pulled his hair up, sawed it off and dropped it beside him.

They told her, you can keep that because that's all you're going to have to remember your husband.

Samantha says one of the attackers then took her back upstairs where he tied her up.

So

how did you call for help if you tied up?

I used my nose.

So they didn't take your phone in.

They left your phone there.

They asked me if I had a phone and I told them no.

How'd you get to it?

How'd you get to it?

I wiggled on my side.

Detectives ask Samantha if she can recall any identifying details about the attackers.

They were all wearing masks, their whole face.

Baggy black shirts, baggy black pants, shoes like something like this, but black, and gloves.

She described somebody with a Hispanic voice, somebody with a voice that sounded like he might be African-American.

She told the investigators that it was these three guys.

She had no idea who they were, that they took off with Ernie in this vehicle.

She didn't know, she didn't give any description of the vehicle whatsoever.

Investigators asked Samantha if there was anything about the attack that hinted at a motive.

I think it's something to do with his dad.

What do you think would be going on for the day?

I hate, and I'm usually right, and I hate that, but

his dad has a problem

with getting involved in things that he don't need to be getting involved with.

She said the guys made a

statement that they were going to Ernie's father's house.

She painted the picture that this was in retribution for something that Ernie's father might have done.

According to Samantha, Ernie's dad has a reputation for running with a rough crowd, and the men hinted that he might be in over his head.

The subjects made a statement that Ernie's father had narced on somebody, which is given narcotics information, and

I guess got somebody else arrested for it, and they were there to get payback for what Ernie's father had done.

With Ernie's life at stake, detectives waste no time acting on the lead.

We know where Ernie's father's house is, so I tell my deputy that's with me, hey, go ahead and start heading towards Ernie's father's house.

They had to get to that location to one, make sure that he was okay, two, maybe locate these attackers and possibly, first and foremost, find Ernie.

As deputies race to Ernie's father's house, Samantha tells detectives Ernie may still have his cell phone on him.

The phone was really key.

They asked for a phone number for him and see if they could get a location on it.

I can then provide that phone number to my dispatcher who can contact the cell phone provider provider and do what's called a phone ping, which will give us the location of the phone.

Moments later, investigators get word that Ernie's phone has been located in a town just 20 minutes away.

Around 3.20 a.m.

that morning, the location came back to a residence in Pittsburgh.

The location of the ping is nowhere near Ernie's father's house.

I started having officers respond that direction.

It came through Chris Durant's radio and he, at that point, he was with Samantha and Durant asks her, you know anybody in Pittsburgh?

And she says no.

The deputies went to the location and were unable to locate anything where it last pinged.

Deputies check back in with dispatch only to learn troubling news about Ernie's phone.

All of a sudden the phone gets turned off.

I just thought that was very strange.

Once the phone's turned off, you can't get an updated location.

It's frustrating, but we just keep trying.

We were not going to stop till we hopefully find Ernie alive.

Coming up, investigators uncover a new wrinkle in the case.

She was saying, you know, that it was cartel involvement.

And a shocking confession changes everything.

He told her, so if you want to do it, just leave your door unlocked.

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After a failed attempt to track down 29-year-old Ernie Ibera's cell phone, detectives refocused their efforts back onto his wife Samantha's claim that the abductors might have taken Ernie to his father's house.

The detectives went to the house, but they didn't find Ernie Sr.

No one was there at his house.

They didn't see anything that made them feel like there had been any kind of signs of a struggle.

So that's when I had the guys come back to my location.

Back at the station, investigators pull Ernie's father's records.

Ernie Ibera Sr.

and his uncle had reputations in the community.

They had been arrested numerous times, but we hadn't dealt with him in quite a long time.

He'd gotten older and kind of seemed to have amended his ways.

My gut feeling was this is not.

This is not what we're dealing with.

That was their biggest lead because she was saying it was cartel involvement.

It was obvious to law enforcement that he had no kind of involvement with drugs whatsoever.

So that didn't make any sense.

As investigators continue to dig, they uncovered nothing on Ernie's father and he is ruled out.

Ernie, however, is another story.

It seems less than a year earlier in the summer of 2014, Zamantha called the police to report that Ernie attacked her.

Ernie was brought in for questioning and he was ultimately arrested on on that charge.

I think the allegation is that he hit her with a box.

As part of that arrest, an emergency magistrate's protective order was issued against him.

The discovery of a protective order has investigators wondering why Ernie was even at the couple's home the night of the attack.

To find out, investigators turn their attention back to Samantha.

She knew that we knew there's a history of domestic issues between them, but they were back together.

When asked about money situation, finances, she said that's not an issue for us.

She really painted a pretty rosy picture, a picture of bliss.

Detectives ask Samantha to once again walk them through her day leading up to the attack.

She goes into the story about, well, I was at the hospital with my friend.

She's having a baby.

And then she came home and then she was home when Ernie came home and they had a nice evening evening and went to bed.

Then in the middle of the interview, Samantha's demeanor dramatically changes.

She just has an epiphany.

Oh my goodness.

There's this guy I met yesterday.

His name's Johnny Rebb.

That's all I know him by.

He could have done it.

According to Samantha, Johnny Rebb was also there visiting her friend at the hospital.

Samantha says Johnny didn't have a car, so she agreed to loan him her Chevy Equinox.

This mutual friend of theirs was supposed to get out of the hospital that next morning, and he was going to use Samantha's car to give her a ride home.

Samantha admits that while at the hospital, she said something about her husband that Johnny took offense to.

She said, well, I told these guys that my husband, you know, abused me.

He said he would take exception to someone hitting a woman or something like that, and that he kind of offered to somehow intervene in her situation.

She says, oh my goodness, he has my car too.

What if he's the one that did this?

She looks at her phone and says, oh my gosh, I just got a message.

They're at the hospital now because they're supposed to be picking up this mutual friend.

We found his Facebook page.

We were able to figure out, okay, his real name is Jonathan Sanford.

Turned to find out he had recently gotten out of prison.

The detectives that we had, they got on it really quick.

We were walking in and these two guys were walking out.

I'd never seen them, but one of the guys just matched the description.

So I turned around and I yelled, Sanford.

And when I did, they split, tried to run.

So we chased them and

jumped on them and put them in the car.

Investigators quickly identify the two men as 25-year-old Jonathan Sanford and 26-year-old Jose Ponce.

Detectives bring both men back to the station for questioning.

Jonathan Sanford's personality was very cooperative and forthright once he was caught.

He just kind of seemed to have the attitude of, they got me, I might as well help.

According to Jonathan, it all began the day before when he'd met Samantha at the hospital with his friends Jose Ponce and Octavius Rhimes.

Jonathan claims that after Samantha opened up about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband, he felt the urge to act.

Jonathan Sanford just said that a man shouldn't treat a woman that way, a man shouldn't raise a hand against a woman.

Jonathan says Jose and Octavius felt the same way and offered to help Samantha get rid of Ernie by landing him in jail.

The plan they come up with that afternoon is that they are going to get some methamphetamine from somebody that Octavius knows and plant it in Ernie's truck and then make an anonymous phone call to law enforcement.

Jonathan claims Samantha agreed to the plan.

Samantha went with them to the next town to the west of any size, Mount Vernon.

They purchased this methamphetamine and

loaded up and headed back to Pittsburgh.

After taking Samantha home, the three men continued to talk about the plan over dinner.

At some point, Jonathan Sanford said, what if we got rid of him permanently and didn't involve the cops?

It changed from, you know, planting drugs on him to, let's just kidnap him and kill him.

According to Jonathan, they kept Samantha mostly in the dark about this new and fatal detail of their plan.

Sanford indicated she was aware that there's a change of plans from this initial drug setup.

Now, the plan was they were just going to beat him up.

She was part of it, but they weren't supposed to kill him.

Jonathan Sanford asked her, what about the kids?

And she said, don't worry about the kids.

I can give them something to make them go to sleep.

They'll never hear a thing.

Finally, Jonathan told Samantha that if she wanted Ernie out of her life, all she had to do was one thing.

Jonathan told her, so if you want to do it, just leave your door unlocked.

And she left the door unlocked.

In the early morning hours of February 20th, Jonathan says the three men viciously pulled Ernie from his bed, beat him, and drove him in Samantha's car to a remote area in neighboring Camp County.

The initial plan was for Jonathan Sanford to pull the trigger and shoot Ernie once they got him out there.

Then Sanford changed his mind and said that he had decided to slit Ernie's throat.

But before they got to that point, Ernie trips and stumbles over some briars.

When Jonathan reaches down to pull him back up, Ponce just reaches out behind him and pulls the trigger and shoots him in the back of the head.

As they wrap up their interview with Jonathan, detectives learn Jose Ponce is telling a very different story.

Everybody does want to figure Chew to be the one who pulled the trigger.

That's what I'm saying, though, and I didn't.

Who pulled the trigger there?

Jonathan.

And you saw him do it?

Yes.

Coming up, two suspects face off.

Jose Pons and Jonathan Sanford wanted to blame the other one.

And the details of an explosive relationship are revealed.

She would fight with him because if he wasn't working, he was on that game.

Once it started, she would go out of her way to push his buttons.

He would go out of his way to push her buttons.

Less than 12 hours after Ernie Ibera was kidnapped from his home, Texas investigators have two suspects in custody: a 25-year-old ex-con named Jonathan Sanford and his 26-year-old friend, Jose Pons.

There's no indicators that Jonathan fired a shot.

Jonathan, in his interview, said he really wanted to do it himself, but said, ultimately, Jose Pons did it.

Jose, however, is eager to point the finger back at Jonathan.

Jonathan told him, let it, don't move, just let it.

At first, when he first threw him down, he was like this.

Uh-huh.

He was trying to talk.

All of a sudden, he was like this.

And then...

Jose Pons and Jonathan Sanford wanted to blame the other one for actually firing the shot that killed Ernie.

While investigators can't prove one man's statement over the other, they have a hunch as to which story is likely true.

We all feel like Sanford's version was accurate, especially given his willingness to testify that, you know, he was going to slip the guy's throat.

He just didn't get to fast enough.

Jonathan agrees to direct investigators to a remote area known as Sand Crossing in neighboring Camp County, Texas.

Sanford get out.

He walks them far enough that they can see Ernie's body out in the woods.

He was laying on his stomach.

His hands might have still been behind his back.

He was in his underwear and there was some kind of like

sheetrock tape that they had used to wrap around his mouth.

As CSI examined the body, Ernie's injuries tell the story of his attack.

They had hit him in the head multiple times with the pistol.

They had hit him across the face with it.

They had punched him.

But the death came from being shot in the back of the head.

It was just

a really gloomy, dreary place to die.

News of Ernie's death quickly reaches his loved ones.

I kept asking my dad what was wrong.

He just looked at me and he said, Somebody killed your brother.

And

my jaw hit the floor.

It just, it was like a dream.

Officers put out an APB for the other alleged co-conspirator named by Jonathan and Jose,

28-year-old Octavius Rhimes.

Meanwhile, detectives continue to determine Samantha's actual role in the crime.

One of our considerations would be, did she really want to go as far as to contribute to his murder?

When investigators talk to friends and family of the couple, they learn the marriage was rife with tension, centering over Samantha's online obsessions.

I guess her dream was to be a YouTube star.

He didn't care to be on her channel.

He was a very private person.

She would do all kinds of stuff on there.

Venting about his family, venting about their relationships.

As much as she wanted to be internet famous, you know, she never really told a lot of people in our family that she did it because she knew that my brother didn't like that kind of thing.

He is definitely out there working two jobs and she's just kind of hanging out, complaining about her problems on YouTube.

That was really frustrating to deal with.

I just wanted to post this video for all those women who think that having a child as a teen would be something smart to do.

For starters, you do not have a life anymore after you have a baby.

She felt like this was going somewhere.

She kind of stopped paying less attention to her kids and she acted like her so-called job was just more important than that.

For their part, Samantha's family says she had her own set of grievances when it came to Ernie's gaming.

That's where a lot of their fights came from because the minute he walked in the door, he was playing a game.

She would fight with him because he was literally day in and day out.

The minute he woke up to the minute he goes to bed, if he wasn't working, he was on that game.

Samantha's family says her frustration came to a head when Ernie's avatar became involved with another woman.

Their characters or their avatars got married.

She got a little upset about that and threw a big enough fit that he said, you know, well, I'll marry you in real life.

Family says the wedding didn't solve their problems.

She would go out of her way to push his buttons.

He would go out of his way to push her buttons.

Ernie's family claims Samantha's favorite way to push Ernie's buttons involved making allegations of abuse.

Samantha had tendency towards attention-seeking behaviors.

She typically used her description of Ernie being abusive towards her or not treating her right to get that attention.

According to Ernie's family, the incident involving the restraining order was questionable at best.

The worst that he had ever done to her was he told me that he had chunked a cardboard box at her, and he said that box would not have caused no bruise.

The details details of a troubled marriage still don't prove whether Samantha knew Ernie's kidnapping was actually a death sentence.

But that all changes when investigators obtain Samantha's phone records.

Samantha sends a text message to the people that have Ernie and advise them, hey, the cops are tracking the phone.

Ditch it and move.

It was obvious of her choice to participate.

She's trying to help them get away with killing her husband.

On February 23rd, three days after Ernie's kidnapping, detectives asked Samantha to come back to the Titus County Sheriff's Office.

I think she thought she was coming to get Ernie's phone, and she showed up and she was not going to be leaving that day.

Samantha was charged with aggravated kidnapping and murder, and she was indicted on each of those charges separately.

Coming up, prosecutors face an uphill climb.

That was just kind of the million-dollar question: what was the motive?

And Samantha pulls a last line of defense in court.

She had taken an ambient before she went to bed and didn't really remember any of the event.

Just three days after her husband was kidnapped and murdered, investigators in Titus County, Texas have arrested 25-year-old Samantha Wolford.

That was a huge relief off my shoulders, knowing that

she was a part of it because I felt in my heart she was.

On February 26th, an officer in nearby Pittsburgh tracks down the last suspect in this crime, Octavius Rimes.

He was located in the Brookshers parking lot in Pittsburgh and was arrested there.

Once in custody, Octavius tells detectives that he didn't know the kidnapping would result in murder.

You said that once that you thought you were going over there to hang out with him.

I mean, it was two o'clock in the morning.

Well, I didn't know what was going on.

I didn't even know they said I didn't have it.

And they happened so fast that I was, I was in shock.

Octavius and Samantha stick to their innocence, choosing to let a jury decide their fates.

In April 2016, their alleged co-conspirators, Jose Ponce and Jonathan Sanford, both accept plea deals.

Jose Ponce and Jonathan Sanford both pled guilty to two

50 years for the murder, 50 years for the kidnapping, I believe, and those run concurrent.

Samantha and Octavius must each face two different trials for their roles in Ernie's death.

Octavius and her both had two trials.

You had to have a trial in Mount Pleasant.

for the aggravated kidnapping part, and then you had to have a trial in Camp County for the murder portion.

In July of 2016, Octavius is found guilty of kidnapping.

In December, he has his chance to fight the murder charge in a Camp County courtroom.

His testimony did not match the statements he had given to law enforcement.

He tried to remove himself even more.

And I would say the jury found his testimony unbelievable and they convicted him.

In March 2017, Samantha is convicted of aggravated kidnapping and sentenced to 50 years.

The position she tried to take there was that she had taken an ambient before she went to bed and didn't really remember any of the events and didn't remember sending any text messages.

That's just unbelievable.

Seven months later, Samantha's murder trial gets underway inside a a Camp County, Texas courtroom.

When Jonathan Sanford takes the stand on behalf of the prosecution, he claims that on the night of the murder, Samantha was on board with the entire plan.

Sanford stated that, she told me, I'm an actress and I can handle the law.

Y'all don't worry about that.

Y'all just go get rid of it and I'll handle the police.

Prosecutors allege that the text Samantha sent warning her co-conspirators to turn off Ernie's phone amounted to a death sentence for her husband.

She could have sent a text, don't do it.

Don't do it.

But instead, she did things purposely to hide what they were doing.

She wanted it done.

After establishing Samantha's role in Ernie's murder, prosecutors face a more difficult task, laying out her motive.

That was just kind of the million-dollar question.

What was the motive?

Ernie is dead because Samantha, in seeking attention, using this rhetoric of Ernie being abusive to her and not treating her right,

she just finally told somebody who would do something about it.

I love you guys.

I think she thought this murder was gonna really put the spotlight on her and, you know, make her a YouTube star ultimately.

As for her defense, Samantha's attorneys claim she knew nothing about the kidnapping or murder.

The only defense I saw that her attorney tried to put on was that we're just trying to sling mud.

You know, we're just putting her in this and there's no proof.

Her attorneys during the course of her trial tried to say, well, it was the ambience she was taking.

There's the reason why she had no idea what was going on.

It was just lie after lie after lie.

On Thursday, September 14th, 2017, the jury finds Samantha guilty of murder.

Between the two convictions, she faces 99 years in prison.

The sentences are stacked on each other.

She'll have to make parole on the kidnapping charge before she even starts serving the sentence on the murder charge.

She's likely to die in prison.

If she did do this, then she's where she belongs.

But a mother can tell, and she couldn't go through with a murder.

There is no way.

I'll never believe that.

It hurts that this happened.

It not just hurts that we lost her, we lost him too.

And those kids lost so much more than I did, so much more than they did.

Those kids lost everything.

Most people will never understand the pain of losing a family member like that

in such a horrific way.

He should be here.

No amount of time is ever going to take his place.

Octavius Rums was sentenced to 23 years for kidnapping and 75 years for murder.

Ernie and Samantha's five kids are under the care of her mother.

How hard is it to kill a planet?

Maybe all it takes is a little drilling, some mining, and a whole lot of carbon pumped into the atmosphere.

When you see what's left, it starts to look like a crime scene.

Are we really safe?

Is our water safe?

You destroyed our town.

And crimes like that, they don't just happen.

We call things accidents.

There is no accident.

This was 100%

preventable.

They're the result of choices by people.

Ruthless oil tycoons, corrupt politicians, even organized crime.

These are the stories we need to be telling about our changing planet.

Stories of scams, murders, and cover-ups that are about us and the things we're doing to either protect the Earth or destroy it.

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