Kathryn Briggs

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It was a love affair that started online. He was overseas at war in Iraq.
This is an extremely beautiful woman flirting with him online.

When he finally met her, he was just so enamored with her.

But their budding romance is torn apart by a vicious crime. Whoever did this was very brutal.
in their attacks.

The search for a motive would unravel a dark web of deceit and betrayal. They had some kind of personal vendetta.
He admitted to her that he had had two or three affairs.

And when the deadly mastermind is finally unmasked, it will leave even the most veteran law enforcement officers speechless. You don't do that unless you're cold-hearted and you're evil.

Killeen, Texas, October 14th, 2008.

At 11:30 a.m., police receive an urgent call from U.S. Army officials at Fort Hood.

They're concerned about one of their decorated soldiers, 24-year-old Staff Sergeant Ryan Sullivan. It was a welfare concern.

He always shows up for PT and he always shows up for formation in the morning. He hadn't been heard from that morning, which was unusual.

We were advised that that's just not characteristic for him not to show up to work. He's always on time.
If he was going to be out of work, he would call.

Killeen police officers meet Ryan's supervisor at Ryan's off-base apartment.

Responding officers show up to the scene and they knock on the door and don't get a response. They try to access the door and it's locked.

They got a hold of the property manager and they were able to get into the house.

When they opened the door, you can smell coming out of the apartment.

You just know its decomposition.

Once you smell it, one time, you'll just know what it is for the rest of your life.

There's blood on the wall behind the couch

and you can see some on the coffee table and you can see a pair of feet sticking out between the love seat and the couch.

They had a pretty strong suspicion that that was going to be Ryan Sullivan.

Ryan Sullivan was born in 1984 in Grand Rapids, Michigan to a large and loving family. From everything that I knew about Ryan, he really held his family close to chest.

His sisters, his brother, his mom's dad. He had very high regard for them.
Ryan's father and grandfather were both in the military. And from a young age, Ryan knew he wanted to serve his country.

He had a big heart. He really wanted to take care of people.
He would constantly put himself before others.

After high school, Ryan enlisted in the Army as an infantryman with the 1st Infantry Division.

He doesn't just join the Army, he He joins the Army and becomes like the top hand-to-hand combat fighter in his unit. Sergeant Sullivan was just a rock star.

He knew his tactics, his techniques, his procedures. He was a superstar.

A valuable leader, Ryan was deployed to Iraq and served on the front line in 2002. Ryan was squad leader that other squad leaders wanted to be, and he was able to lead soldiers in combat.

He was the kind of guy you wanted to go into combat with. He was the kind of guy that would have your back.

Because of his wherewithal, his tenacity, his abilities to lead, all this potential that he had, he was able to get to a higher rank of sergeant.

When he wasn't in combat, Ryan would sometimes go online to meet new people.

Anytime soldiers are able to talk to someone who shows that compassion and they care and they tell them things like, oh, you know, I can't wait for you to get back. I hope you make it home.

They need that encouragement over there in Iraq.

One of the people Ryan met online was a young woman from Ohio who said she was a model. She said her name was Marissa and she sent him dozens of photos she said were from her recent modeling shoots.

This is an extremely beautiful woman flirting with him online and this relationship develops. develops.
At the start of the relationship, he was you know at war in Iraq.

So a lot of their relationship was through email and phone calls and stuff like that. He's falling in love and this beautiful woman is falling in love with him.

After nearly a year of online dating, Ryan returned to the United States and finally visited Marissa at her home in Cincinnati.

But Marissa hardly resembled her online online photos.

We're not talking about a 5'10 model. We're talking about a 5'2 ⁇ , heavy-set woman.
She didn't sit up straight in her chair. She didn't cross her legs like a model.
She didn't walk like a model.

There was nothing about her that pointed to her being a model at all.

Marissa assured Ryan she was the same woman from the photographs.

She had said she had broke her back or injured herself in some way to where she had shrunk three inches and gained 50 pounds from what she used to be.

She says that they had to remove a portion of her spine that made her shrink from 5'7 to 5'3.

She claimed that the accident ruined her modeling career, made her feel insecure, and like he wasn't going to pay attention to her or even like her if she wasn't beautiful.

That's why she shared the older pictures with Ryan. That was her reason for doing it.

Ryan was shocked by Marissa's appearance, to say the least, but after the conversations they had had in Iraq, he told Marissa, don't worry about it. You know, it's no big deal.

We've been talking for this long already. And so he kind of just accepted her.

Relieved that Ryan accepted her for who she was, Marissa made another admission.

She ends up telling Ryan that Marissa is not her real name, that it's her professional name that she used for her modeling career.

And her real name was Katie Briggs.

As Ryan spent time with Katie, he got to learn more about her. Katie was born in a Cincinnati suburb in 1982, and she told Ryan after her career as a model was over, she decided to work for the IRS.

She was a data transcriber. Her job was just to transcribe text forms into the system, and she was really good at her job.

She was more like a social butterfly. She was always around talking to everybody.
She was always happy, always loud. Ryan kept seeing her because he really liked who she was.

It didn't matter to him that she wasn't this beautiful model anymore. He liked Katie.

But just as their relationship was taking off, Ryan received upsetting news. We were preparing for our next deployment.
This time we were going to Iraq yet again.

Ryan was heartbroken at the thought of leaving Katie so soon.

So to take advantage of the time they had before his next deployment, Ryan invited Katie to move with him to Texas.

She jumped at the opportunity. And she landed a new job in Austin, not far from their apartment in Killeen.

So Katie decided to go over 1,000 miles, leave her job in Cincinnati, and go to Austin to take another job with the IRS. And Austin's only about an hour away from Fort Hood.

In October 2006, Ryan began his second deployment to Iraq, while Katie waited for his 15-month rotation to end in their new apartment in Killeen.

Finally, in January of 2008, Ryan came home. Ryan was looking forward to starting a life with her, to being with her.
He saw no end in sight. She was it for him.

But their love story was about to come to a tragic end.

Only nine months after Ryan returned home, Killeen police find a dead male in Ryan and Katie's apartment. He had over 35 stab wounds and cuts on him.

He was basically eviscerated. Whoever did this was very brutal in their attack.
We were able to identify, positively identify this as Ryan Sol.

Homicide detectives are stunned and left questioning how a combat soldier could survive several tours in an active war zone, only to end up slain in his own home.

And who would want to do something like this to a respected military man?

Coming up, police attempt to track down Ryan's live-in girlfriend, Katie Briggs. The police become a little more concerned, even like, could she be a victim? Could she be a suspect?

And investigators get a tip about Sergeant Sullivan's personal life that points to a possible person of interest.

He showed back up to her the same day that Ryan's body was discovered. We immediately started looking at that as being more than a coincidence.

Police in Killeen, Texas have just discovered Staff Sergeant Ryan Sullivan stabbed to death in his apartment. The coroner estimates Ryan's been dead between 24 and 36 hours.

And missing from the scene is Ryan's live-in girlfriend, Katie Briggs.

At that point, when we find out that she's on the lease, we try to get a hold of her. They called the number that was on the paperwork and speak with Katie.
She was in Austin at the time at work.

She had been contacted and requested to come to the police department. We did not tell her what happened.
We just asked her to come to the police department so that we could speak to her.

While Katie makes the 60-mile drive from Austin to Killeen, officers canvass the neighborhood.

One neighbor mentions seeing an unfamiliar vehicle parked outside Ryan and Katie's apartment a few days before the murder.

There had been a black motorcycle parked in front of Ryan's apartment on multiple occasions, but nobody knew who the driver was. And it was a black sports bike.

Could whoever owned the motorcycle have something to do with Ryan's murder? And if so, could Ryan's girlfriend Katie offer any insight?

She came to the police department and I made contact with her about 4 o'clock that day. She seemed very quiet.
Do you have any idea why we would have asked you to come in? I have no idea.

Do you have an apartment here in Killeen? Yes. Okay, who lives there?

I do and my boyfriend.

Katie tells police that she hasn't been back to her apartment in Killeen for three days. Instead, she's been staying staying at a second apartment she leases in Austin.

Asked why she hasn't been at the home she shares with Ryan, Katie reveals that the couple had been having problems recently.

We've been dating for four years, and it just seems like these last five months have been the worst. Four years, you know, you gotta decide: do you want to date or

do you just want to break up? And he just asked for time and space to figure it out before you deploy.

Make the break.

We both needed it. Katie explains to Detective Uvay that they are still in a relationship, but they're separated at this time.

When asked why they were separated, Katie explains that Ryan's demeanor had taken a dark and troubling turn ever since he'd returned from his latest combat tour.

She said it was like she was walking on eggshells. Ryan had been depressed and drinking a lot.
Sullivan had possible anger issues and he needed to work those out.

And so she stated that she lived in Austin until that time that he could decide whether or not he wanted to continue the relationship. When was the last time you talked to him?

Friday night, Saturday morning. What time? Somewhere between 11

and 1.

He was out with friends drinking. Okay.

The reason why I'm asking all these questions, okay and the reason why we were gonna need to get consent to get into your house they found in the apartment oh now deceased she finally tells Katie that we have a body in the apartment and Katie breaks down crying

and I'm sorry I know this is hard on you and and I hate to have to be the one to break this to you this is why we've asked you to come down here. We didn't want to tell you over the phone.

I felt bad for her. She cared for him and she loved him.
And then the hard part is telling a family member or spouse that, you know, that their loved one is deceased.

Detectives confirm Katie's alibi that she was in Austin at the time of the murder, which leaves police confident that they can rule her out as a suspect.

I didn't think Katie would have the physical stature to be able to take Sullivan out based on what I had received from the other individuals in his unit.

Also, Katie was in Austin during the timeframe.

Following their interview with Katie Briggs, detectives returned to the crime scene to search for clues.

There are no signs of forced entry. The doorknob is locked, but the deadbolt is locked as well.
It couldn't have been locked from the outside unless she had a key.

We're realizing this is probably going to be someone that knew Ryan and that it was a personal attack.

Detectives surmise that Ryan may have been sleeping on the couch when he was attacked.

There was a blanket also on the couch. And when you further examined it, there was a lot of blood in the couch and on the couch.
So it looks like the initial assault probably took place there.

The TV was on, and I believe a video game was up on the screen. So it tells me that maybe he passed out while he was in the living room playing video games.

Curiously, it doesn't appear Ryan had been the only one sleeping there that night.

There was a decorative blanket on the ground and a pillow on the ground on the opposite side of the couch.

That kind of interests me because it tells me that at one point somebody might have been sleeping underneath there.

After we process the crime scene, I speak to his supervisors and I ask them, is there anybody they can think of that would want to harm Sullivan?

Ryan's military superiors can only think of one name,

Staff Sergeant John Valdez. Valdez was the medical platoon sergeant with Headquarters Company.
Ryan and John had served a tour together and became close.

They served together. Men and women who served together in times of that type of situation come back as friends in a way that

many other people could never be. They've experienced tremendous difficulty and survived.
And so when they come back, I think there's a bond.

And like Ryan Sullivan, John Valdez was also a valuable asset to his team. As a testament to John, at the age of 24, he was already a staff sergeant.

That's a very hard rank to receive in the military. And he did it in a very quick amount of time.

When you talk to the people in unit, there was this discussion about there was some bad blood recently between the two of them.

The military supervisors add that despite his stellar reputation, John Valdez had also been acting strangely out of character the previous week.

He had gone AWOL in this timeframe, which was a major red flag. Valdez showed back up to work on the morning of October 14th, which is the same day that Ryan's body was discovered.

We immediately started looking at that as being more than a coincidence.

Coming up, police questioned Sergeant John Valdez about the murder of Ryan Sullivan. You are good friends with Sullivan, Craig, Roger.
And detectives get their first clue about a possible motive.

This guy was running around and having relationships with different women every weekend.

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St. Dennis Medical, Monday on NBC.

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Detectives in Killeen, Texas are investigating the stabbing death of 24-year-old Army Sergeant Ryan Sullivan.

Based on interviews with his military superiors, detectives have identified a possible suspect.

Ryan's former best friend, Staff Sergeant John Valdez.

I asked him to have John Valdez meet me in the morning at the police department. When was the last time you spoke with with him? Last time I spoke with him was last Monday.

I start asking him questions in reference to Sullivan. He's very nonchalant.

He is answering my questions. At this point, I bring up to Valdez that I had received information that you were able.

What happened there?

I was out partying the whole time down in Austin. Okay.

Now Friday and Saturday, where were you? Saturday I was still in Austin. I was with Mesh that night.

John claims he'd spent the weekend partying in Austin with another soldier, Private First Class Kyle Meish.

John claims both he and Kyle ended up crashing with Ryan's estranged girlfriend, Katie Briggs, at her apartment in Austin.

He advises that during the interview that he is friends with Katie, but as far as anything further, they're just friends. John explains he's actually engaged.

I end up getting that fight with my fiancé.

Okay.

What's her name? Her name's Ariana.

John says that he'd met his fiancée, Ariana, a few months earlier, and that they'd been introduced by Katie Briggs.

He had gotten really drunk, and Kate had informed him that he hooked up with a female named Ariana.

She says they really hit it off and that he bought her some sort of cheap ring, like a joke engagement ring type thing.

He says after that, he wakes up and that's when Kate tells him, hey, you hooked up with Ariana, what did you think? And he didn't remember it.

John tells investigators that Katie had given him Ariana's phone number. When he called her, the two hit it off and made the decision to pursue the relationship.

After that, the only conversations he ever had with her was over the phone.

Detective Drozd redirects the conversation back to the investigation. I asked John Valdez if he knows of anyone that had an issue with Sullivan.

Nothing I know other than, you know, his top boys say he might have a death club or something like that. There's outbursts at the club.

John Valdez advises me that Ryan Sullivan had gotten into a few altercations at the Starlight Club there in Kaleen, Texas.

Valdez made the comment that Ryan was meeting up with women at the club and Ryan was having affairs with them, knowing that most of them were married.

If Ryan had been having an affair with a married woman, is it possible he was killed by a jealous husband? It's a theory detectives will have to follow up on later.

First, they want to know more about the rumored bad blood between John and Ryan.

He never does admit that he had an issue. In fact, he tells me that he'd never fought with Sullivan and that they were good friends.
You don't know what happened to Ryan.

And you didn't have anything to do with what happened to Ryan, right?

Before ending the interview, detectives ask John about the black motorcycle spotted by witnesses outside Ryan's residence. What type of vehicle do you drive? I drive a JX2600 motorcycle.
Motorcycle?

Okay. What color is it? It's black.
We've got a witness

that places a black motorcycle at his residence this weekend.

So who would that have been?

John says that that wasn't his black motorcycle there, that he was in Austin at the time. so it couldn't have been him.
It had to be someone else.

The next day, detectives follow up on John Valdez's tip about Ryan's supposed affairs with married women.

They interview his fellow soldiers at Fort Hood, who confirm that Ryan liked to frequent local bars. But the soldiers describe Ryan's nights as being anything but rowdy.

They always end up back at his house playing Xbox or something of that nature. We said, well, what about these fights Ryan's had at the club? Nobody else knew about them.

The only person that said that was Valdez.

The soldiers also confirm that despite John's denials, he and Ryan did, in fact, have a falling out.

And the issue had been John's close relationship with Ryan's girlfriend, Katie Briggs.

Katie was crying on John's shoulder about how Ryan had been treating her, what he he had done, and things like that. But none of them thought that there was anything physical going on.

They thought that it was all protective on Valdez's portion, on his part.

The soldiers also reveal that Ryan had actually broken up with Katie Briggs months earlier because of her close relationship with John.

It's interesting because Katie during her interview is telling us, We didn't break up, we're separated because she wanted Sullivan to think about their relationship and whether or not they should continue it.

She'd never had advised that they had broken up. So at this point, the information I've received is making Valdez more of a possible suspect in this case.

And why is Katie telling us that she's still in a relationship with Sullivan?

Determined to uncover the truth about Katie's relationship with Sergeant Sullivan and her supposed connection with John Valdez, detectives ask her to come back for a second interview.

Describe your relationship to me about Valdez. Ryan introduced me to him in January when they got back.
Okay. I'd say he's like an annoying cousin.

Police asked Katie why she lied about the breakup between her and Ryan, and she tells police that she was embarrassed. about it, that she was ashamed.
And so that's why she didn't mention it.

We've been having some problems. What kind of problems? What do you mean? We were waiting on

DNA results. I mean, there was a girl who said that she was pregnant.

This child could have been his.

Katie says that Ryan had admitted to her that he had had two or three affairs while he was seeing her. The last one he had was with a female by the name of Jordan.
She was possibly pregnant.

And Ryan told her that he didn't believe the child was his, and that he was going to ask for, I guess, DNA paternity test.

Adding another layer to his complicated story, Katie reveals that Jordan is the sister of Ariana Benitez, who is John Valdez's fiancé.

I had heard about Ariana from Valdez earlier, the fact that, you know, he's engaged to her, that's his fiancé, but yet he's never physically met her other than what Katie told him.

One of the things we were trying to do within my office was to try to find out who this person was by the name of Ariana Benitez.

Because that name had been coming up that connected Kate Briggs, Brian Sullivan, John Valdez.

Do you have the phone number to Ariana? Yeah.

But when detectives call the number Katie provides for Ariana, they don't get an answer. Nor can they find any trace of Ariana at the apartment building where John Valdez had claimed she lived.

We couldn't figure out who she was.

And in my business, we're usually pretty good about figuring out who you are.

Detectives have hit a dead end. And without more evidence, the investigation into who killed Ryan Sullivan is at a standstill.

Coming up, police confront an informant who may hold the key to solving the case. I'm doing something that I shouldn't be doing right now, and I don't want to put myself in jeopardy.

He was shaking like a leaf. You could tell that something was getting to him.
I finished him. Be a man.
Be a man for Ryan. Step up.
Say something.

Police investigating the stabbing murder of Sergeant Ryan Sullivan have identified two possible persons of interest.

His girlfriend, Katie Briggs, and his former best friend, Staff Sergeant John Valdez.

In their first interview with police, Katie and John made it seem like everything was perfect with Ryan. They made it seem like everything was hunky-dory and everybody was getting along perfectly.

But police later found out that that was not the case. I think it's safe to say that Ryan was not comfortable with Katie and John's relationship.
He was not okay with it

but so far police have been unable to tie either katie briggs or john valdez to the crime and the investigation has come to a grinding halt

until police catch a major break when they receive a call from someone who claims to have important information on the case I'm doing something that I shouldn't be doing right now, and I don't want to put myself in jeopardy.

The caller is identified as specialist Jeremy Jacobs, a fellow soldier in the same unit as John Valdez. Jeremy Jacobs lived with Sergeant Valdez.

At this time, Valdez had been having some money problems, so Jeremy Jacobs offered to let him move in and live with him and split the rent.

So Valdez was living with Jeremy Jacobs at the time this happened. Like John Valdez, Jeremy Jacobs is an Army medic and was a good friend of Ryan Sullivan.

He agrees to come to the police station to talk to investigators. Like super nervous about Darren Loss.

He was shaking like a leaf. You could tell that something was getting to him.
I finally stumbled and says, Jeremy, listen, you and Ryan had a bond. You were warriors together in a combat zone.

Be a man.

Be a man for Ryan. Step up.
Say something.

Jeremy finally reveals that in early September, John Valdez had approached him with a shocking story. He said that there was a hit out on Sullivan and that he was going to get it.

That's what Valdez said? Yeah. And he told you he was going to carry the contract out is what he was saying.
He said, there's a hit and I'm going to get it. It's for $100,000 and I'm going to get it.

Valdez told two different stories. One was about Congressman had put a $100,000 hit on Ryan and another one was that some high-ranking Pentagon official had placed a $150,000 hit.

John was going to kill Ryan for the money. Jeremy says John asked him and another soldier, Kyle Mesh, for help.

He asked me and Meish if he did it, if we would help him with it. What do you mean by that? He said, I'll give you guys each some money, and when it goes down, just help me make it go away.

Kyle Mesh was the person John Valdez was partying with in Austin the weekend of the murders.

Jeremy claims neither he nor Kyle took John up on his offer, and he assumed John wouldn't follow through with his plans.

But on the weekend of the murder, Jeremy had been startled awake by a frantic knocking on his door. Kyle Maysh showed up that morning and got him out of bed.
Said it just happened. It just happened.

I don't know what to do. It just happened.
So our soul is dead.

Kyle Mech had told him that Sullivan had went out with Mesh earlier that night to the starlight, and they left and went back to Sullivan's house.

He says Meish tells him that he lays down on the couch, and eventually Sullivan lays down on the other couch. They fall asleep,

and he says he's woken up to a loud noise, and he looks over, and he sees a masked figure.

Kyle told Jeremy he saw Ryan's dead body on the floor.

Then the masked figure turned and revealed himself. And the guy took off his mask, and it's Valdez.

He said Valdez was standing over me. He had a ski mask pulled up over his face and was yelling at me to get the f ⁇ up and get the f ⁇ out of the house.

Following Jeremy's statement, police arrest John Valdez. When Valdez got arrested on the murder warrant, he had a key in his possession that was for a room at the Economy Inn.

So Detective Droz and I went to the room. We look in the hotel room and we find a motorcycle jacket.

Inside the motorcycle jacket, I find an envelope from Bank of America and it's got roughly $4,400 in it.

Detectives are now questioning whether the money is part of John's payment for killing Ryan Sullivan. And if so, who had actually hired John?

While detectives try to answer those questions, they bring Kyle Mash in for questioning. When he arrives, they ask him to take a polygraph exam.

That's when the soldier breaks down and reveals his involvement in Ryan Sullivan's killing. Valdez had approached Meish about murder for hire.

I'm going to promise Kyle Maish $5,000 to help me kill this guy. I just wanted money.

You know what I'm saying?

Valdez had texted him to take Ryan to the club, get Ryan as drunk as possible, and to bring him back to the apartment. And when he got back in the apartment, let him know.

And that was all in the plan to kill Ryan. Kyle texts him.
All right, he's asleep. He's down.

Valdez was hidden in the apartment, and he came out and attacked Ryan Sullivan and viciously, you know, stabbed 34 times.

Based on his admission, police arrest Kyle Mash.

But there are several mysteries that remain unsolved.

So at this point, police have no evidence as to who would hire John Valdez to kill Ryan. And was it a congressman or a Pentagon official? Like, these are the things he was saying to Jeremy and Kyle.

Hoping to find the answer, police monitor John Valdez's communication while he's in jail.

So the idea was whoever hired him, they might just call him in jail.

John never receives a phone call from a congressman or Pentagon official,

but he does receive several phone calls from his fiancé, Ariana Benitez.

So we're monitoring jail calls, and when you listen to the phone calls where Valdez calls her,

the voice is

sounds like a baby almost, like a teenager trying to talk baby talk. It was very peculiar.

Coming up, police finally track down the elusive Ariana Benitez

and uncover a web of lies orchestrated by a devious mastermind. She thrives on deception and she thrives on manipulation.

Army soldiers John Valdez and Kyle Meish have been arrested for the contract killing of Sergeant Ryan Sullivan.

And police are hopeful John's jailhouse communication will lead to the person who hired him.

We really started monitoring everything at the jail. So these jail calls, we listen to them when Valdez calls Ariana.
She never does come to the jail. Okay, we know she never visited the jail.

But one person who does visit John in jail surprises authorities. Ryan Sullivan's ex-girlfriend, Katie Briggs.

Police pull Katie's financial records and make an interesting discovery.

Despite the fact that she and Ryan had broken up, she was still listed as a beneficiary on his life insurance policy.

In the military, there's an automatic $400,000 life insurance policy, and Ryan had divided that up.

Katie would have received $100,000 from his life insurance policy, and I believe the rest went to his family.

We found out, we didn't realize it at the time that it had been paid so quickly, but the military had paid her on Ryan's life insurance policy, and she had $100,000 already, you know, a few days after the murder.

Police also noticed a $4,400 cash withdrawal from Katie's account right before the murder,

which just happened to be the exact amount of cash that was in John's possession at the time of his arrest.

They found the cash in the hotel room when they searched his subsequent about his arrest.

This discovery leads police to one conclusion. There was no congressman or Pentagon official wanting Ryan dead.
It was someone much more devious.

This was a murder for hire scheme that appears to have been masterminded by this woman, Catherine Briggs.

Katie was the driving force behind all of this.

She was the real criminal here.

On May 14th, 2009, police arrest Katie at her home.

While deputies transport her to jail, an evidence team searches her car.

We notice there are two phones sitting on the center console.

Working on a hunch, detectives try the number Katie gave them for John Valdez's fiancé, Ariana Benitez.

The maroon phone on the center console rings.

When that phone rang, it was all of that, you know, about Ariana really not existing and she's totally created was absolutely 100% confirmed. Kate's Ariana.

She's just disguising her voice when she's talking to him as Ariana. The thing with Ariana and Valdez's relationship is that he doesn't remember it.

He gets told by Katie that he hooked up with this girl named Ariana, who Katie knows down in Austin. Valdez never in his life meets Ariana, but they start having phone conversations.

Ariana Benitez was someone created by Kate Briggs to manipulate John Valdez. That's how twisted and what a pathological liar and how good she was at it.

Police also suspect that Ariana hadn't been the only person Katie Briggs invented. Now we're getting back to the pregnant Jordan that Katie refers to at the beginning.

Ariana has a sister by the name of Jordan. We were never able to locate or identify Jordan, and nobody else, none of Ryan's friends, had ever heard of Jordan.

So we're pretty confident that Katie made Jordan up.

Prosecutors consider Katie Briggs, John Valdez, and Kyle Maish equally culpable for Ryan Sullivan's murder.

And on March 28th, 2011, the capital murder trial for all three defendants begins.

The prosecution lays out their theory that Katie Briggs had catfished Ryan from the very beginning. She's a manipulator.
Everything that Katie did, from I'm a model.

I had a medical condition that caused me to put on weight. I had a spine problem.
I had to cut out four inches. So I'm no longer 5'7 ⁇ , I'm 5'3 ⁇ .
Every time she opened her mouth, she lied.

When their relationship got rocky, Ryan decided to break things off. But Katie still wanted his $100,000 life insurance.

Ryan was getting ready to change his beneficiaries, so the window was narrowing rather quickly. If Katie wanted him dead for money, she had to do it before he changed the beneficiary.

That's when Katie decided to make John Valdez her patsy. Almost immediately after Ryan dumped her, Katie began manipulating John with lies about Ryan.
Katie was crying on John's shoulder.

She would claim that there was times when Ryan was physically abusive to her and that he was cheating on her and wasn't treating her right.

There's no indication that Ryan ever did anything that Katie's accusing him of. But I think John, Valdez, fell into it.
I think he believed it.

Katie even pretended to be John's fiancé, Ariana, and fed him the same sob story. So now we have Katie saying all these bad things about what Ryan's doing.

His fiancé is announced saying that Ryan had threatened me.

So now Valdez is looking at two women that he feels strong emotions for, the one he's never met in his entire life, and Katie, who he has, I think, a big brother approach to protecting her.

This guy, John Valdez, killed his friend, probably

because he thought in some way he was a threat to his girlfriend who didn't even exist.

To sweeten the deal, Katie promised John a cut of Ryan's life insurance payout.

Katie at one point had told Valdez that she'd get $100,000, and she told Valdez, if you kill him, I'll give you half.

Once John Valdez was on board to murder Ryan Sullivan, he lured in their mutual friend. Kyle Meish intentionally jumped on board with this little trio to kill Ryan Sullivan for money.

And nobody got anything. I don't believe Meish ever got paid.
And Valdez, he only got a little bit of that money.

John Valdez and Kyle Meish may not have gotten their full shares shares of the money, but all three defendants received the same verdict from the jury.

The jury came back with guilty verdicts on every one. They received life sentences without the possibility of parole, all three of them.

It was such a relief to the family to see that justice was done. Despite the convictions, those who served with Ryan still have a hard time coping with his murder.

This was not something that I was fully prepared for. It's one thing to lose a soldier in battle.

It's a completely different thing to lose a soldier in the comforts of his own home, especially a battle-tested and decorated veteran such as Ryan Sullivan.

This poor guy goes to Iraq twice, twice for a country. Nothing happens when he comes here and gets killed.
I never thought anybody

sitting next to me would do something like that.

It blows my mind to think that she could have hired someone, his best friends, let alone,

to kill an American hero.

For more information on Snapped, go to oxygen.com.

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