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Toxic Season 1 Episode 3

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Transcript
00:00We decided to go to the cemetery where we came across a beautiful plot and she
00:18said this is the perfect place for him. The geese were swimming in the little
00:23stream behind there and and she put her arms around me and she said mama don't
00:29you worry I'm gonna help you on this journey. She said I'll be here don't
00:35worry. Little did she know that she was picking her own grave.
00:40Montgomery County 911 what's the address of the emergency?
00:44Hi this is James Ryan 13907 Gottlich Street. My girlfriend I think overdosed. I'm trying to resuscitate her right now.
00:52He was a very well-known and respected doctor practicing in this community.
00:57He had this charming personality. I'm supposed to trust him. He couldn't be poisoning my daughter.
01:08Can he? Can he really be doing that? Did you sense any remorse from him at all? No not one tear shed.
01:14I trusted him as a doctor and I trusted him as a person. I would not have ever forced Sarah to take
01:19such a large quantity of pills. She went from patient to employee to live in girlfriend in a
01:24matter of months. It was part of this power dynamic that he had over her. He drugged this girl when
01:30she was asleep. I wish I wish I wish I would have known what was going on. You left that day you sprung
01:37into action. I knew leaving the house that day I was going to prove that he murdered my sister.
01:43When it comes to love, betrayal is the death of a thousand dreams.
01:55And the unraveling of countless lives.
01:58You can spend years picking up the pieces, examining them, rearranging them.
02:05Digging through the past to make sense of it all.
02:07Navigating through my personal heartbreak took me back to my roots as an investigative journalist.
02:13Hi, I'm Elizabeth Chambers. Elizabeth Chambers. Elizabeth Chambers outside the Los Angeles Police
02:17Department.
02:19It ignited a curiosity inside of me about love that fractured. Oh my god.
02:23Inflicts lasting trauma. Hi, I wanted to see if I could ask you some questions. Absolutely not.
02:29And can lead to tragedy. And that's when my world ended.
02:32I feel that it's part of my calling to meet with the victims, the survivors,
02:37to listen to their stories, show how it can happen to anyone, and expose the truth.
02:45I'm Elizabeth Chambers, and this is Toxic.
02:49I've always been interested in the dynamics of power in a relationship.
03:04In most relationships, there is an imbalance of power. One person can have more power because of
03:09finances, social standing, maybe even their personality. And in most relationships, that's okay.
03:15But it's important to understand the consequences when that power is in the wrong hands.
03:23That's why I connected with Tina Harris, the mother of a remarkable woman whose life was cut
03:30very short after she found herself in a dangerously imbalanced relationship.
03:36Tina, tell us about your Sarah.
03:38Well, it's hard to know where to start. Um, she was the light of my life.
03:45Sarah was my youngest child of four beautiful children. Victoria, Christopher, Rachel, and then
03:52my Sarah Jane. Sarah was very, very intelligent. She could speak several different languages.
03:59Hi! I just wanted to tell you happy birthday.
04:02Psy language was her favorite because she felt like she could give back to people with the Psy
04:07language. And when she went to college, she loved the medical field. And so I envisioned her
04:13as someone that would make a name for herself in the world.
04:17We were very close. We were four years apart. We played together, navigated the world together.
04:26Sarah was gorgeous inside and out. She was caring, ambitious. I mean, you met Sarah
04:33one time for a brief second. You would not forget her.
04:36Sarah was a light in a world that needed light. People were drawn to that.
04:44I'm James Ryan. Our philosophy really is to treat patients the way that we want to be treated ourselves.
04:50Anybody that has teeth or even doesn't have teeth, we can see. So that's pretty much everyone.
04:58September of 2020 is when Sarah had to get her wisdom teeth pulled. And James Ryan was recommended.
05:06During the recovery period, he asked her if she knew anyone that would be interested in coming
05:15to work for him as a surgical assistant. She said, well, I guess maybe I'm interested,
05:20but I have no experience. And his response was, that is exactly what I wanted to hear. You were the
05:25one that I wanted. I looked at it as a wonderful opportunity, a stepping stone into a career in
05:34medicine that she was interested in. Only three months, four months later, he texted her on her
05:41phone and said, you should go into the office before everybody else gets there. I have a Christmas
05:46present in your locker for you. He bought her a diamond necklace. I said, is he wanting to date you?
05:53And she goes, yeah, he's been after me about it, which I was kind of surprised. She goes, I don't know
05:59what to do, Mom. I said, well, you're an adult woman. That's your call. If you want to date him,
06:03date him. If you don't, tell him to leave you alone. And she had just turned 24 when she went
06:10out with him for the first time. He was an older man. He had life experience. And he had a brilliant
06:18career. And she told me it was just amazing to watch him and what he was teaching her. So she started
06:28dating him in January of 2021. And then in March of 2021, we had the horrible, horrible tragedy.
06:38March of 2021. So this is where I might. So March of 2021, my fiancee took his life, um,
06:50in front of me. It happened in front of me. There are no words to explain, um, other than
06:56that Rachel that existed, died. My family rushed to my rescue. I was in Florida. And at this point,
07:07Sarah and James were together. So immediately James went into, don't worry about anything.
07:13He paid for the hotels. He paid for a rental car. Every evening he would go on an app and he would
07:20have food sent to the hotel room for us. And I just thought, what a nice man. He really must like my
07:26daughter. From what Tina told me, Rachel was so distraught that she couldn't even function.
07:32So James prescribed anxiety medication for her. It helped her greatly. It kind of knocked her out
07:38most of the time, which is what I needed to get her home. James stepped up. He made sure there was
07:46a wheelchair at the airport. He flew them first class so they didn't have to be around other people.
07:50And a few months after Rachel returned to Maryland, he even gave her a job at his practice to get her back
07:54on her feet. Through every step of this tragedy, James was the rock. Not only for Rachel, but for the
08:01whole family. That was really the introduction that James had to my family. And it was through
08:08this horrific tragedy that it happened. And he's willing to do this for my family, for myself.
08:15Wow, that speaks volumes.
08:20This is a little album of baby pictures. Big blue eyes. Yep. And that smile. She
08:27always has that smile. She really was such a happy, happy child. And this one here, I love
08:33that model pose. The beginning of the pageant career. Yeah. These are pictures from the pageant
08:42in July of 2021. Wow. And when she came out on stage, I just was like, oh my gosh,
08:49I can't believe that's my Sarah. Because she just looked so grown up to me.
08:54Mm-hmm. In July of 2021, Sarah was invited to compete in the Miss Marilyn pageant. James Ryan,
09:06myself, and Rachel all went to see her compete. She was healthy. She looked good. James was very
09:17loving. He seemed proud of Sarah. It was a very nice time that we had. At that time is when he
09:24asked Sarah if she would move in with him. And she did. After that, things changed drastically.
09:34She became very withdrawn. She became very isolated. It was very rare that I was speaking to her
09:41throughout the week. We would make plans to see her and then she'd cancel. She had lost appetite.
09:48She would run out of energy really quickly, which I found surprising. She just wasn't herself. It's like,
09:54just all of the lights were turned out. I mean, at this point in time, she was 24 years old.
10:00So I kind of just thought, well, you know, this is the first time she's moved out of the home. She
10:05hasn't lived with my mom. So kind of checking it up to those things. Tina and Rachel felt that Sarah
10:12was clearly going through something when all of a sudden an unthinkable tragedy struck again.
10:20I get a call that my son's in intensive care in Montana on life support.
10:27He had suffered a heart attack. Christopher was 38 and heart disease runs in his father's family.
10:37And the doctors advised that the family get to Montana as quickly as possible.
10:42So it was extremely stressful for everyone.
10:49I watched the sunrise in that hospital room the day he died.
10:53I was with him when he came into this world. And I'm so glad I was with him when he left this world.
11:01As a mother of two, I cannot think of anything worse than losing my children.
11:05Part of your being is gone. And you have to figure out, how do I live in a world without my child?
11:16So when we came back from Montana, we had started looking at different cemeteries.
11:22Sarah was very sad, but she was Sarah. And she said, I'm going to put a bench here
11:27so I can come and talk to my brother all the time. So the next day comes, I guess it was about 8.30.
11:35I woke up to Rachel screaming in the other room. And James Ryan is on the phone.
11:42She's in the living room. I'm doing health compressions and CPR. She's not breathing.
11:47And that's when my world ended. And hell began for me.
11:58So you got a FaceTime coming from James Ryan?
12:01Yeah. And what did he say to you?
12:03He said, Sarah, Sarah's gone. Sarah's dead.
12:08I didn't believe him. I was like, you're lying. So he flipped the camera around.
12:14He showed you her body.
12:15He did. Yes.
12:17That is not normal human behavior. I cannot imagine how she felt at that time. Her entire world came crashing
12:25down and went dark. And I can't imagine what he was thinking. For a person to do that, you have to be
12:32very unaware of other people's feelings and emotion. And you have to lack empathy in a very extreme way.
12:39All I remember saying is, don't let them take her. I have to get to her. Don't let them take her.
12:48And when I touched her, she was cold as ice. And I just kept asking them what happened.
12:55Do you know how long it was before James called you from the time of her death?
13:01He said he came down at 6.30 in the morning and she was slumped over on the couch.
13:11That's when he realized that she was not breathing and he moved her to the floor and tried to perform
13:18CPR. He called the paramedics about 7. I got a call at 8.30. So that would have been almost two hours after.
13:29And I immediately started thinking, okay, something's not right.
13:34And I confronted James Ryan. First, he said Sarah accidentally overdosed,
13:40that she was stealing drugs from his office, that he had no idea at all that she was a druggie.
13:47And the 911 call has him putting the blame on Sarah.
13:51Hi, this is James Ryan. My girlfriend, I think, overdosed. I'm trying to resuscitate her right now.
13:56Then he tried to convince us that she killed herself. But I know my Sarah and she would not
14:03have taken her life, especially right after her brother died. To the detectives at the scene,
14:08this appeared to be an accidental overdose. But Tina and Rachel knew something the investigators didn't.
14:17In October of 2021, I called Sarah. And when she picked up the phone, it was early in the morning.
14:27She sounded completely drugged. I said, Sarah, what's going on? Are you okay? She goes, no,
14:33I'm just tired. I was sleeping. I said, no, no, that's, you don't sound like yourself. I'm coming
14:38right over right now. Rachel and I got in the car and we went over there.
14:43She looks unwell. She looks like she hasn't showered in days. She smells.
14:52I said, oh my gosh, what's wrong? And I'm just, I'm not feeling good. And as we proceeded to walk
14:58into the house, I started seeing things that just alarmed me. Needles, IVs, tubing, all of these
15:07medical supplies. I freaked out. I was like, what in the world is going on here? She goes, no, mom,
15:12it's okay. He's just hydrating me. I said, is he allowed to do this in his home? She said, yeah,
15:19I think he is. He told me he was. I waited for James Ryan to come home and I confronted him.
15:27What are you doing to my daughter? He said, I'm just trying to help her. I'm just hydrating her.
15:31I said, well, I don't think this is legal. He said, I'm allowed to do this.
15:36James was very good at convincing people, especially if you're questioning him. No, it's,
15:43it's okay. You can trust me. You know, look at what I've done for you in the past. This was a,
15:48I shouldn't have brought these things home. I was just hydrating her. His bedside manner was great.
15:55I'm not a medical profession. I, I don't know. And I trusted him. He was a doctor.
16:00Why would he be harming my daughter? You know? So that's going through my head.
16:05He wouldn't do anything to hurt Sarah. He got me out of Florida. He helped me and my family
16:11during this horrific time. And I don't know what would have happened if he hadn't. And it was like,
16:17I was indebted to him and I didn't want to look too much because if I did, I might find something
16:24that I couldn't, that I couldn't be ignorant to. A doctor is entrusted. They take a Hippocratic
16:30oath to put health and wellbeing above all else. So if they walked into the house and there were IVs
16:37and drugs and needles all over the place and Sarah was dating a construction worker, that would be a
16:43very different story. His job is to administer medication. And that just adds another layer of
16:49confusion, another layer of imbalance and another layer of smoke and mirrors because Tina and Rachel
16:55trusted that he knew what he was doing. And then look what happened. Two months later, in December of
17:012021, Sarah calls them again, dazed, confused, completely out of it.
17:07After the first incident, he gave us a key to the house saying, oh, I'm never, I'm not going to do it
17:12again. And to prove that I'll give you a key so you can come over anytime. When I walked into the house
17:18that time, it was a much different scene than the first time. I had, I had never seen something like it
17:25before. There was blood everywhere. There was syringes. There was needles. I mean, I referred
17:32to it looking like on the outside, you see this multimillion dollar home and you go inside and it's
17:36a crack den. There was bloody footprints. There was blood soaked paper towels. There was needles.
17:43I'm finding vials of drugs. I had no idea what these drugs were, what they did, but there's no way this
17:49could be from hydration. My thought was like, I need to document this. I was walking into this very
17:59naive and you don't know what these drugs are capable of. You don't know how addictive these
18:04drugs are. This isn't a world that you live in. And so I took pictures. I went around. I was looking
18:09for my sister, but I didn't go upstairs. I just, I had to get out. And so at that point, after the second
18:16incident, I knew everything he had said was a lie and that he was not who he was claiming to be.
18:25At this point, I was so angry. I suspected that James Ryan was administering drugs to Sarah.
18:36And probably about four hours later, I get a call from Sarah and she immediately starts crying and
18:42sobbing and said, look, she's just hydrating me. I said, no, this is something more. I don't know
18:49what's going on, but this is going to stop. The next day I went to James Ryan's work and I confronted him.
18:58I told him that he was going to break it off with my daughter, that he would go home and he would tell
19:05her that this was going to end. And if he did not do that, that I would turn him into the authorities.
19:12So the plan was for her to move out after the holidays. And, um,
19:21I think for me, the most tragic part of this entire story is the timing.
19:28Sarah was scheduled to move out of James's apartment the day after Chris's heart attack.
19:35So as James once again comes to the family's aid during another horrific tragedy, Sarah stays with him.
19:43And just three weeks later, Tina and Rachel are beside her lifeless body on James Ryan's floor.
19:51When I first walked into the house and there were police everywhere and the paramedics,
19:56they went into her purse and on the top of her purse were vials and vials of drugs just tossed on
20:03the top of her purse. The IV pole had been moved to the closet and there were IV bags in the trash.
20:10I believe in my heart that he injected my daughter with those drugs and he overdosed her
20:19and he couldn't get her to come back. I firmly believe that he realized when he could not revive
20:26her that he went into the panic mode and started cleaning things up as much as he could, but left some
20:33things out to make it look like she did it to herself. So he took time to clean up before he called 9-1-1.
20:43The autopsy report showed that Sarah had the following drugs in her system, diazepam,
20:52propofol and ketamine.
20:55It's not a crime scene, right? At this point, it's an overdose.
20:57Right. Yeah. At that point, the day Sarah passed away, it was not marked as a crime scene.
21:01How did, what was your internal response?
21:03I just kept thinking this isn't right. I knew he, he was involved with my sister's death.
21:09Every fiber in your being was like, this is not an accident.
21:13No part of me wanted to open up this disturbed world. I sat with it for a week and I tried to
21:21say, no, no, no, he didn't. It's no, no. I would wake up in the middle of the night, James killed her.
21:26And so it was my job to bring his dirty secrets out of a closet. I knew leaving the house that day
21:33that I was going to prove that he murdered my sister.
21:41All of this escalated quite quickly.
21:43Yes.
21:44And do you think that was a result of his reaction to thinking she was leaving,
21:48that he upped the doses at that time?
21:50Part of me thinks that he did it on purpose. The mentality of, if I can't have you, nobody's gonna
21:57have you. And that he knew he could get away with it because there wasn't any evidence to prove what
22:03he was doing. I knew that he was going to paint Sarah in a picture that wasn't the reality of it. And
22:11so it was my job to figure out how to get the information determined to the police.
22:15I had her MacBook, which was synced to her cell phone.
22:23I knew my sister. I knew, okay, well, maybe she used this password.
22:29There was a mixture of guessing, the specific dates, birth dates, names. It took me quite a few tries.
22:41Once I got into Sarah's computer, that was the mother load.
22:45There were just, I don't even know how many text messages of James admitting to giving my sister
22:53these medical grade drugs.
22:56This is what I need. Sarah's not just gonna be considered another overdose.
23:02I spent two weeks compiling a binder of over 200 pages of incriminating evidence against James to
23:10turn into the police with the hopes of providing them with a road map as to where to start an
23:16investigation. We have to prove that he did it. We have to give the evidence that he did it.
23:20Right, like she wasn't possibly, she was murdered.
23:22Yeah, we have to figure this out. This is what's going to bury James.
23:26So the binder first came to me on March 4th, 2022. Yeah, that's...
23:40Because that day in my life and my career kind of changed, so...
23:45The binder was given to me by the original detective.
23:52So Detective Icavello was part of Montgomery County PD's department that focused on pharmaceutical
23:58drugs. So his expertise was targeting doctors who prescribed outside of their limit.
24:04Because of what I am trained in, I knew exactly what had to be done. The text gave a very clear
24:11route from start to finish. Sarah had been complaining in the text about not being able to
24:18sleep. James said, I can give you a shot and it will be gone in, I think it was six seconds.
24:23Her response was, that doesn't sound very good. He says, it's already, it's already, it's done.
24:29At that point, everything started. And the text did show that he's administering
24:34the drugs and that there was an IV.
24:36And this was in February of 2021 that he introduced her to these drugs. And it just progressively got
24:42worse until she was so deep into this addiction and so reliant on James that she could never leave.
24:54In September, in October, in November, the texts were pretty much a shopping list.
25:01Sarah was no longer working. Sarah was at home. Sarah was complaining about symptoms.
25:06She was feeling all symptoms of these drugs. She would say, we don't have any syringes.
25:12Is there any more ketamine? His response would be, I'll have to wait for everybody to leave to check.
25:17Maybe I'll pretend to leave and then come back. I can't believe what I'm looking at.
25:23These texts were something unlike I'd ever seen. These were daily. And the texts showed me that drugs
25:29were being taken from the office. He's administering the drugs at his house. And he's the one who's
25:35trained in knowing the long-term effects of all of these drugs is death. I told the Harris family,
25:43I'm going to do whatever I can. We're going to get justice for Sarah.
25:49James did not stop working. The office was open. He had a very large patient base, of which many
25:55were children. I stress to the state's attorney's office, we needed to operate quickly.
26:01My name is John McCarthy, the state's attorney for Montgomery County, Maryland. This is a kind of
26:07a unique case. You've got a medical doctor who's armed with special information based on years of
26:14medical training to know precisely what the risks are. The way in which and the place in which he
26:19administered the drugs you would have never done outside a clinical setting and not even close to
26:25being consistent with what he was taught to do. I knew that they were very close to getting ready
26:32to arrest him. I had to pretend like everything was okay. He kept texting me and telling me that Sarah
26:40was coming to him and in her spirit, her ghost was in the house. And he kept saying, you know,
26:47I know now what I need to do with my life for Sarah. I'm just going to get back to work and really just
26:52concentrate on helping people. The family didn't want it, but I allowed him to go to the viewing.
26:58I had to allow him to hug me at the funeral home. I said, we have to allow it because I don't want him
27:06to think anything is going on because I didn't want him to, you know, run away. I'm so lost in grief
27:16that it was tearing me up. But I said, I have to keep up the charade until they arrest him.
27:27James Ryan was arrested on March 22nd, 2022 and was charged with second degree depraved heart murder.
27:35The idea behind a depraved heart second degree murder charge is that the defendant didn't necessarily
27:44want to kill the person, but the actions they took were so extreme that it exhibited a wanton
27:51and reckless disregard for human life. So the depraved heart charge is really interesting.
27:58In order for the prosecution to convict him of this, they had to prove that James
28:02acted with reckless indifference towards Sarah's life by bringing her the drugs.
28:07We were obviously confident in the guilt of James Ryan, but when you have a jury trial,
28:14ultimately it's up to those 12 people to actually determine that guilt.
28:18Depraved heart theory hadn't been successfully used in any overdose case in Maryland.
28:25And so that was our biggest challenge. How did you feel on the day of the trial?
28:29Honestly, when I, when I walked into the courtroom, I was still living in this like sort of false reality.
28:38And I thought that I knew who James was, but I unfortunately didn't
28:44know the extent of, of how dark and disturbed and twisted he really was.
28:49In August of 2023, James Ryan's criminal trial begins, and I was able to get my hands on the audio
29:04recordings from the trial. He had the power in the relationship. He had the access to the drugs,
29:12ketamine, propofol, and diazepam. He introduces these drugs to her. He created a dependence. The
29:20text messages show a history of the defendants setting up those lines that it took to eventually
29:26kill Sarah Harris. Our main thing was text messages that we had between James Ryan and Sarah Harris.
29:34There was one message about him giving her ketamine while she was sleeping. He was instructing her on how
29:41much more to push basically in the IV, if she needed to, when she woke up. We saw his instructions
29:47to her on how to increase their potency. He was giving her the tricks. He told her to take the medication
29:56with grapefruit juice and to leave the pills under her tongue and to not drink water to increase the
30:02potency. And if that wasn't enough, he invited her to get Popofol versed in syringes from the trunk of his
30:10car at his office. The power dynamics for us were a really important part of this case. He had such
30:21the upper hand in terms of power dynamics. He started off as her doctor. Then he became shortly thereafter
30:30her employer. Afterwards, they became involved in a romantic relationship. He again held the power
30:38in that scenario. He was grooming her step by step, much like a child. He clearly sort of seemed to have
30:47been fixated, as it turns out, seemed to have been fixated on her for a really long time.
30:54Back in September of 2021, like two months before we saw her with the drugs, she told me that James and
31:04her were going to go to Key West for a few days. Would you and Rachel come? James will pay for
31:10everything. You don't have to worry about a thing. And I said, oh, that sounds like a lot of fun. So we
31:16all went together and James was charming and fun. But on that trip, I noticed that he drank a lot.
31:25We were sitting on a couch and it was just myself, Rachel, and James Ryan. Sarah had gone to bed.
31:32And he had been drinking and he started talking to Rachel and I. He told me, you know, I used to
31:39live down the street from you. And I said, well, that's weird. What a coincidence. Then he went on
31:47to say that he noticed Sarah in the neighborhood. And she was how old at the time? Sarah would have
31:53been 14. And he said, I used to see Sarah in the neighborhood playing at the park and saw her with
31:58her girlfriends and everything. And he thought she was very pretty. And then he proceeded to say that
32:05he went into the local toy store that she worked at and he realized she was working there. And he just
32:11thought she was so beautiful. And he would take his kids to the toy store just so he could see
32:17Sarah. When she started working as a server in one of the local restaurants, he would go back to
32:23that restaurant just so he could see her and she could wait on him. But she had no idea who he was.
32:28And he said when she walked into the office, he knew exactly who she was and that he had been
32:34attracted to her. I eventually did tell Sarah and she said, that's really creepy. But she didn't think
32:40any more of it. And I didn't think anything of it really. But now that I look back on it, that just
32:46tells me that he wanted control over her is all he wanted. And with control comes isolation. Yes.
32:53Which he accomplished. Yes, he did. He isolated her. He
32:58he did his best to remove her from her family. I believe James knew if he created dependency within
33:05my sister by pumping her full of drugs, then it almost would be impossible for my sister to leave him,
33:12which I think was his ultimate goal was to make it so that she could never leave.
33:20I learned a lot of things at the trial. He was barely going to work, but he was ordering
33:27two to three times more drugs than he would normally order in a week.
33:31This patient number had gone down, but his ordering had gone up. Yes, drastically. He tried
33:37to set up another office in DC where he could stock more drugs there and take those drugs. We also
33:44found out that right before Christmas, he OD'd her and had to resuscitate her.
33:51I did not know about any of this until the trial. I found out when her message was read that she sent to
34:00her friend. James had to give her CPR for a whole five minutes and that she's really upset about that
34:08and that she didn't want to die. He brought her back literally from the dead on a prior overdose without
34:16ever calling anybody for any help. She may have died on a particular day in January of 2022, but she
34:23was dying for months. We have all of the members of the jury present. We have received your note that
34:32the jury has reached a verdict. The jury took, though, maybe over three hours to come to a verdict.
34:42Ladies and gentlemen, have the jury come to reach a verdict? Yes. As to count one murder in second
34:48degree. To hear that guilty verdict, it doesn't bring my sister back. But what it does do is it
35:07sets my sister free from James's lies. We all just sat there and cried. And then I immediately started
35:15thinking, okay, how many years could he actually get? And the last two years comes down to this
35:21decision tomorrow. Once you get that guilty verdict, that's really the important part is how long is
35:26this person going to prison for? Thinking about James Ryan not spending the rest of his life in prison
35:32tears at my gut.
35:34Hi, good morning. How are you? I'm just going to give you a squeeze before.
35:46Been waiting for a long time for this, so we're ready.
35:51How are you guys here? There's obviously a sense of anxiety and worry, but at the end of the day,
35:56I trust that the judge sees through his narcissism and his lies. We want him to spend the rest of his
36:04life in prison. He took a life and he, in our eyes, needs to pay with his. For him to sit in the trial and
36:11show no remorse, to stare me down when I was on the stand as if he was going to frighten me, I want the
36:20opportunity to look straight at James Ryan and speak to him.
36:30I have been absolutely devastated for discovering Sarah on the morning of January 26th, 2022.
36:36I do not place blame on anyone else or try to excuse my actions in any way, and I fully accept my
36:42responsibility. He makes some statements that I take full responsibility, but then he turns around and
36:47needs to denies it to a lot of extent. Well, I did not administer the drugs to Sarah, and I'm not
36:52exactly sure when she got them, but it's necessary is for me to own my choices, accept my responsibility,
36:58work extremely hard every day to ensure that I never repeat any of the choices that have led me here.
37:06For me personally to sit in the courtroom, I needed him to hear me hear my voice.
37:13My Sarah was everything, but you took her from me. You lied to me. You used me. You conned me.
37:25This is all I have left of my baby. Her ashes in her hair. Do you see this? This is all I have.
37:34Don't look away from me.
37:36The Harris family spoke to make sure that it was clear James Ryan was the sole reason for Sarah
37:46Harris's death. There may have been a lot going on in her life, but the court's focus should have
37:53been on James Ryan and his role in her death. I was feeling more nervous the day of the sentencing
38:00than sometimes I was feeling throughout the trial. Questioning is the judge going to see through his
38:06lies because ultimately it comes down to what she feels is the appropriate amount of time for him to
38:12spend in prison for these crimes. The reason I don't think I'll ever forget these messages is because
38:22the one person in the room who knew better was the one supplying. So if you would stand up, sir.
38:32As to count one second degree murder, it is the sentence of this court that you be committed to
38:37the Maryland Division of Corrections for a period of 45 years.
38:43When the judge gave him the 45 and no parole, I think my heart leaped. I really knew then that
38:52he would suffer. I want him to never have another happy moment in his life for what he's done.
39:00This sentence is 20 years over the top of the Maryland sentencing guidelines. I think this is an
39:05enormously good sentence. I hope he's going to go to jail for the most of the rest of his life. I am
39:11enormously proud of the men and women that worked for me that helped us get to where we are. Rachel's
39:16a hero to me in this case. And the Montgomery County Police Department, one of our great detectives here.
39:27What a way to end my career. This was a wrong that I'm so happy that I was able to write.
39:35My goal is to get some kind of law put into place to enforce checks and balances into private
39:47practices that have license to buy these deadly drugs. The amount of drugs that James Ryan
39:55purchased, there should have been a red flag. I know for a fact that my daughter is not the only
40:00one that has died from something like this. It's just never been able to been proved.
40:05You made history today and it was because you guys fought so hard. Imagine if you didn't.
40:10This is the first time a case like this has gone to court in the state of Maryland. There's not been
40:16another one like it. Right. It's a win. It is. I am. It's been a pleasure getting to know you during
40:24this process. I appreciate you allowing me to introduce Sarah to everyone. I'm hoping through
40:30this and through my words that I will have a hand in stopping one person from losing their life to
40:37something like this. That's Sarah's legacy for us now is to make it so that these people in high
40:44power positions don't feel that they can play God and decide who gets to live and who gets to die.
40:49To keep this kind of grief from one mother. That is my journey now and I do it for my Sarah and I
40:57will stay on that journey until I can get it get it done for her.
41:00She said he's going to kill me before you people do anything. That is what is burned in my brain
41:20forever. I stood to lose three generations of my family that night. I thought it was lights out and
41:27then Will all of a sudden yelled don't do it daddy don't shoot mommy.