Let the Devil In Season 1 Episode 1

Reality Insight Hub

2 days ago

Transcript

00:00The New Barbie Pool Party

00:30I am from Jefferson Township, New Jersey.

00:40It's my hometown where I've made the best friends that I've ever had in my life.

00:50In 1988, this terrible thing happened a mile from where I grew up to a kid that I played basketball with.

00:55There was this explosion of violence that nobody saw coming.

01:03That just hasn't ever made sense to me.

01:05A mother and son from New Jersey are dead tonight.

01:09This was brutal.

01:10This was much more than typical murder.

01:13Tommy was my age.

01:16Same socioeconomic background.

01:18We all grew up with the same rules.

01:19Great kid, wrestler, baseball player, good student.

01:23And his mom.

01:24Super, super leading.

01:28Such a small town was such a tragic event.

01:32It was just all everybody wanted to talk about.

01:36We pray for Tom.

01:37We pray for Betty Ann.

01:39We pray for the family that was left.

01:42We pray for ourselves.

01:43The rumor mill's running wild because people want answers.

01:49Morris County believes they're broadening their investigation to determine if it was linked to a local satanic cult.

01:54We had a lot of things that pointed toward the devil made him do it.

02:00Is that possible?

02:02Everybody was buying in that this was a satanic murder.

02:05To the greatest demons of hell, I'd like to make a solemn exchange with you.

02:11When you make a pact with a deity,

02:14there has to be a sacrifice.

02:19This meeting in Morris County was set up to make people aware that Satanism exists.

02:24People in the community, we're looking for something to blame.

02:27I just cannot believe what's going on.

02:30You can call it the boogeyman, you can call it the devil.

02:32The devil doing it, it's not really a satisfying explanation.

02:36What was going on with this family?

02:37What's being hidden here?

02:41Parents were terrified that their kids could be next or that they could be next.

02:45It's one of those moments that you question your faith.

02:49How can this happen?

02:52The whole room got cold.

02:54The question was, was I talking to Satan or Tom?

03:00It's horrifying, it's scary, it's fascinating, it's mysterious, it's insane.

03:09You know, Satan comes in many disguises.

03:13And he knows everybody's weaknesses.

03:15And he knows how to manipulate them.

03:18What he did, I don't know.

03:20But I know he played a part in it.

03:25It wasn't God.

03:26It wasn't God.

03:56The suburbs in the 1980s was the ideal place and time to be a kid.

04:07No phones, no social media, just bikes, friends, and freedom.

04:13The world felt safe and magical, a perfect little bubble.

04:17But beneath that innocence, there was this thing, this malevolence creeping in the shadows.

04:26No one knew where or when it would strike.

04:29But when it did, it was shocking.

04:32And it shattered everything we thought was real.

04:35I'm Eli Roth.

04:37And I've spent decades writing and directing horror movies.

04:40They entertain, but they also tap into real fears we all have about the darkness around us.

04:47I've been inspired by true stories.

04:53They conjured images in my mind that were even scarier than any ghost story I could make up.

04:57And it's these kinds of stories that haunt a whole community for decades, just like what happened in Jefferson, New Jersey, one cold, snowy night in 1988.

05:09I was a police officer for Jefferson Township in the 80s, 20-something years old.

05:25Now I was really just becoming an adult, really.

05:31I came from a family of police officers.

05:34My dad was a police officer in Jefferson Township also.

05:37And spent most of my childhood around police and police families.

05:44I always looked up to my father and, you know, respected him and wanted to follow in the path that he took.

05:50I knew the police life and I understood it and just always found it interesting, you know, dangerous, risky.

06:02And I kind of enjoyed that, you know, the adrenaline and something I really like to do.

06:20Usually on a Saturday night, you'll get a call about a party or a bar fight or something.

06:31Officer McConley.

06:33The dispatch said, oh, we got a call, but a guy couldn't find his wife.

06:38And it was kind of a weird call.

06:40You know, to me it sounds like, all right, does she have a boyfriend?

06:42Or like, you know, like, what do you mean you can't find your wife?

06:45Copy that.

06:45I was young, so I was aggressive.

06:54You know, I got there quick.

06:57It was cold and it was snowing.

07:00And I remember a lot of snow on the ground.

07:04When I pulled up, there was a yard that went up kind of like a hill to the front door.

07:08There was a group of people down by the road.

07:12And one of the kids I played football with, Stuart Kennedy, was in the yard with some people.

07:18He was my age.

07:20You know, we graduated together and everything.

07:22And he was distraught.

07:24And I got out of the car and I said, what's up, Stuart?

07:28And he said, oh, you might need the first aid kit.

07:31She's bleeding.

07:32We proceeded into the house.

07:40It was a small house, very small.

07:43So we went in the front door and it was like a living room area.

07:48We proceeded straight.

07:50And then when we took the corner, there was the steps going down to the basement.

07:54I never expected to come across what I found.

08:13Hello?

08:16Is anybody here?

08:19This is police.

08:24Ma'am?

08:44Ma'am?

08:54Blood is like oil.

08:58If you take a quart of oil and you drop it, it'll keep spreading.

09:07Remember, I leaned over her because I didn't know if I was going to need to do CPR.

09:10That's when I saw that, like, I remember quickly, like an eyeball hanging out of the head and all.

09:18It was, it was pretty, um, don't know how to explain it.

09:23It's not, um, it's not something, you know, you'd expect to see, like, you know, it's like something out of a horror movie.

09:37Then I saw weights on the floor and the weights were off to one end.

09:40So I assumed that her head was bashed in, which caused her eyeball to explode out of the socket.

09:48And at that point, I knew that she was gone.

09:53When I went into, like, my job mode, I didn't know if somebody had broke into the house and killed her.

10:08Was it a burglary that went bad?

10:09Was it?

10:11I had no idea what it was.

10:13I'm just, is there a killer in this house?

10:19Hello?

10:19The basement was small.

10:27But then it was kind of like a utility room.

10:32I thought for sure, because the blood was still coming out, like, slowly,

10:36that whoever did it was, was maybe in the other room.

10:44You know, your blood's pumping.

10:49For a second, I didn't know it was Stuart.

11:06So, that was close.

11:08Hey.

11:10He was shooken up.

11:11Yeah.

11:12Once we realized there was nobody there, anyone upstairs.

11:20A lot of people in town had police electrons, so they could hear everything that you talked about on the radios.

11:25So we were instructed that if it's something major, call headquarters from the phone.

11:29And then Bruce showed up.

11:33When Bart got on the radio, you could tell it was obviously something serious.

11:36His voice was excited.

11:37He was calling for the detectives, calling for the medical examiner, calling for additional help and resources.

11:44In 1988, I was 31 years old.

11:48That time I was a patrolman in Jefferson Township.

11:51Married.

11:51No children at the time.

11:54And just enjoying life.

11:56Well, it was a nice town.

11:57I mean, I'm obviously familiar with everybody.

12:00Grew up here.

12:01And that's the way the town was back then.

12:03Everybody knew each other.

12:05It was just a normal, you know, good place to live.

12:12There's been other homicides within the town, but not frequently.

12:16Maybe, you know, once a year or once every two years.

12:21So this was shocking.

12:26When I arrived at the scene, it was 11 o'clock at night.

12:30About a dozen people out in the front yard.

12:33As soon as I got out, all kinds of people are telling me what's going on and, you know, trying to sort out who was who and who actually even lived in the house.

12:46When I first entered, I noticed the smell of burnt paper.

13:06There's books scattered about the floor that had been on fire.

13:10I remember just a lot of confusion, you know, trying to figure out what was going on.

13:18So I'm up by the kitchen now.

13:20And this guy comes storming in the house.

13:25Excuse me, sir.

13:26This is a close drive.

13:28This is who did it.

13:30This is my son.

13:31I live here.

13:31And says, my son did it.

13:34Like, aggressively.

13:35He grabs a photo.

13:44It looked like a school photo of a young boy.

13:47And that kind of threw me back.

13:49I said, well, who's that?

13:50And he said, that's my son, Tommy.

13:51He killed my wife.

13:53She's downstairs.

13:55He was excited and upset, understandably.

13:59I was trying to calm him down.

14:02He was adamant that it was, you know, Tommy was the one that did it.

14:05But I just couldn't comprehend that a young boy would be able to do that to his mother.

14:10You know, an eighth grader.

14:11I mean, he looked like he was a child.

14:14She looked at the picture.

14:15It was a child.

14:17I remember he seemed credible when I first spoke to him.

14:23He was very adamant.

14:24My son did this.

14:25Get him.

14:26Look, he tried to burn the house down.

14:27But that's what really threw me off.

14:32The father made him a suspect.

14:35Which I found unusual because I don't think a father would want to blame his kid until he knew.

14:43Wouldn't you be worried that maybe they abducted your son, too?

14:46Killed the wife and took the son?

14:48The father would protect his child.

14:52None of it made sense to me.

14:53There are several police reports available from that night.

15:01And one is a write-up from Officer Bart McConley.

15:04In his report, he recounts a statement from the father of the house, Tom Sullivan Sr., about his whereabouts that night.

15:12He advised me that he was sick and went to bed early.

15:18As he was sleeping, he heard the smoke detector go off.

15:23He got up to see what was wrong and found what he thought was newspapers burning on his living room couch.

15:30After distinguishing the fire, he went to the door and saw his automobile rolling down the driveway and into the snowbank across the street.

15:40He claims he then went over to neighbors and had his neighbor call the police.

15:45I said, let's go over there.

16:15I went into the house with him, and there were books on the floor that were on fire.

16:25We started stamping it all out.

16:28And the books that were on fire were satanic books that were set up in a circle in the living room.

16:35It was unnerving, that's for sure.

16:37The younger son comes out of his bedroom.

16:48I mean, that kid was young.

16:52So I said, well, let's check downstairs.

16:56Ready, Ann?

16:57Get halfway downstairs.

17:07Tom looks to his left, sees his wife.

17:11Baby!

17:12And just flipped out.

17:14Ran up, picked the kid up, and ran across the street to my friend's house.

17:19And I just followed.

17:22He turned to me and said,

17:23Tom, he did it.

17:27I was scared shitless.

17:29Scared shitless.

17:322014-19, if you're correct, 13-8-0-5-7.

17:36Received a phone call.

17:39We lived probably a mile, mile and a half from the scene.

17:43In 1988, I was a detective and a juvenile officer for the Township of Jefferson Police Department.

17:53So any kids that got in trouble usually ended up sitting in front of my desk or me paying a visit.

17:57I had never heard of Tommy or his brother, Brian.

18:00So they had no history with me as a juvenile officer or the department.

18:05They started looking at what was going on with this family.

18:08How did this come about?

18:09The family, Betty Ann and Tom Sr., to the best of my knowledge, had never had any contact with the police department.

18:20It wasn't a place, as soon as they gave out the address, you know who it was, that type of thing.

18:23We certainly had plenty of those over the years.

18:25I had never had any dealings with this family at all, prior to this and after this.

18:32They weren't on the radar for anything.

18:35Betty Ann was a devout Catholic.

18:37From what we understood, she went to Mass every day.

18:40She made sure that Tommy got to Mass, usually at least once a week on Sunday, and maybe even more.

18:46We have no real idea of why this happened.

18:51We need to facilitate the gathering of whatever forensic evidence might be available at the scene.

18:58There was still some smoke evident in the house at the time.

19:02I'm just looking at remnants of a newspaper fire, where somebody bought some newspaper up and lit it.

19:07And then there were the hooks that were in the circle.

19:10After I got down to the basement, the first thing I saw was Mrs. Sullivan.

19:18And it was obviously the, you know, she was deceased at that point.

19:21It wasn't even a matter of, you know, any ambulance transport in her, because she may make it.

19:27What we initially took away from it was the level of violence.

19:33People can get upset, have a fight, maybe lose their temper,

19:37hit someone, have a weapon, and use it, you know, in the heat of passion, or...

19:44But this was brutal.

19:47She was stabbed multiple times about the upper torso in the face.

19:51And just the saturation of the blood down in the basement was...

19:55It kind of sticks in my mind.

19:57She had to have put up a fight.

19:58She did have, you know, wounds to her arms, mostly to her upper torso,

20:03which I'm guessing after she had collapsed, that they continued stabbing her.

20:09These were serious wounds.

20:11The number 47 sticks on my mind.

20:15The ones to the face, it appeared that there was almost an attempt to peel the skin off the face.

20:23I was the traffic officer for a while in handling many accident investigations.

20:32And quite honestly, I could say I've never even had a motor vehicle accident that was...

20:36The victims were as, you know, disfigured as what Mrs. Sullivan was.

20:43It was definitely a homicide.

20:45At that point, I'm trying to piece everything together.

20:48Mr. Sullivan was inside, along with Mr. Eastman, one of the neighbors.

20:52So I'm trying to figure out the time frame of everything that had happened at this point.

20:57We had everybody accounted for in the family.

21:00Tom Sr., who was the father.

21:02Betty Ann, who was the mother, and she was the victim.

21:04And then Brian Sullivan was also at the house.

21:08We hadn't seen or there was no account of Tommy Jr.

21:12The question became, where is Tommy?

21:14I was the next-door neighbor of Tom.

21:24I could walk and knock on Tommy's door, and it would take me 30 seconds.

21:30Tommy was my age.

21:31We grew up together.

21:33We were in the same class and wrestled on the same team.

21:37Jefferson, it was just like a regular, I guess, middle-class type town.

21:41There was a bunch of kids, all the same age, on that street.

21:45Wait up!

21:46So we would all hang out.

21:49There was this old, burnt-out tree that had, like, 20 Playboys underneath.

21:55We would always ride our bikes there and look at the Playboys.

21:59If the weather wasn't nice, you'd try to play video games inside.

22:02I'm excited.

22:03I don't know.

22:03I remember we had a ColecoVision.

22:06The Sullivans had an Atari.

22:08His mother would bring us out for snacks, make, you know, bring juice or whatnot.

22:11She was always really nice to us.

22:17Being in the house was just, like, kind of normal.

22:21We would see the mom and the boys at church pretty regularly.

22:24And they were, you know, for the most part, just super quiet.

22:30They were just like every other family on the block.

22:33There wasn't really anything out of the ordinary.

22:37Being on your own is a responsibility that begins as soon as you leave school.

22:4280s kids had so much freedom.

22:45Summer breaks and weekends were spent playing all day.

22:48Either riding bites until the streetlights flipped on, or retina burned from an arcade screen.

22:54At some point, someone's mom would scream, it's dinner time, and we'd all go home and

22:58dine on Blue Box mac and cheese and burgers.

23:02But underneath that independence was something new.

23:05Everyone looks forward to growing up.

23:08And it's a good feeling to be given more responsibility.

23:11For many families, this was the first time that both mom and dad had full-time jobs.

23:16So when you got out of school, you'd come home to an empty house.

23:20They called us Lashkey Kids.

23:22And of course, it was fun, but it made us vulnerable.

23:25And it made people nervous.

23:27It's 10 p.m.

23:28It's 10 p.m.

23:30It's 10 p.m.

23:32Do you know where your children are?

23:34That wasn't just a PSA.

23:36It was more of a warning.

23:38Because when no one's paying attention, anything can happen.

23:42I'll never forget that night.

23:55There's police in the backyard.

23:57There was yellow caution tape.

24:00I remember seeing the dogs going around and sniffing things in the woods and whatnot.

24:04You could see a ton of footprints all over the place.

24:06So people have been trampling all around the snow in between his house and our house.

24:10And in both backyards and the front lawn and whatnot.

24:14Growing up in the town we grew up in, I mean, you never really saw any cops.

24:19You're like, oh my God, is everybody okay?

24:22What the hell happened next door?

24:24The first thing that clicked in my head was just find Tommy and find out what was going on.

24:37Did a search of the house to make sure Tommy wasn't there.

24:42I remember walking into his bedroom.

24:51It was fairly dark.

24:52Bed is there, still made, so we know he didn't go to bed that night.

24:59I have to look under the beds to see if he's under there.

25:04With all these cuts and everything on this woman,

25:08I'm thinking I'm going to get stabbed in the face.

25:09I didn't know, you know, like...

25:11There was some things referring to some heavy metal.

25:25I did notice some drawings that he had made.

25:39Ram's skull.

25:41Some pentagrams that he had drawn.

25:43Just on scrap paper notebooks on the covers of the books.

25:46The one that I remember in particular was one of Satan's face.

25:54You could tell that he was not of the normal mind of what was going on at that point.

26:00Heavy metal.

26:01Is it harmless for your children?

26:02Or an invitation to drugs, violence, even suicide?

26:05Every decade has its own unique teenage rebellion.

26:09Pop culture to help them rage against the status quo.

26:12The 80s were no different.

26:14Alienated boys taking comfort in the aggressive sounds of Ozzy Osbourne, Anthrax, Metallica,

26:20laughing at the tongue-in-cheek slasher films like Friday the 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street.

26:25It's the one and only Freddy Krueger.

26:30When it comes to fashion, if you couldn't find a pentagram shirt or a band you liked at the local mall,

26:35you just got out a black marker and did it yourself.

26:37In fact, I remember being around Tommy's age and I silkscreened an Iron Maiden Eddie

26:42on the back of my Texas Chainsaw Massacre shirt.

26:44It was an innocent expression.

26:46A way to feel tough and in control.

26:48Unless it wasn't.

26:50Unless it was something darker.

26:52But how would anyone know?

26:55The main thing at that point was secure the scene.

27:03Hey! Hey, come on, guys!

27:06In the house, we probably had about maybe six people that didn't belong there that went in.

27:10Outside, we probably had about another seven or so that didn't belong on the property.

27:15They all knew the Sullivans and they were trying to help.

27:18It was kind of overwhelming trying to control the scene when you have a dozen people wandering around.

27:22And at that point, we realized the scene was completely contaminated.

27:28I got everybody out of there and secured the area.

27:30And that's when we started doing our searching of the outside area.

27:37The Sullivans' car was out of the driveway and kind of perpendicular to the roadway, almost.

27:45And a 45-degree angle stuck in a snowbank.

27:47And at that point, the problem was we didn't have really many witnesses, you know, other than the father.

27:53I was 19 years old, going to college.

28:05Coming back that first winter break, that was my first time being back home.

28:09I remember just feeling on top of the world.

28:15Chris Eastman, he was a friend of mine.

28:17We used to always have parties at his house.

28:20So there was one that night, you know, I knew all my friends were going to be there, or a lot of my friends anyway.

28:25And, yeah, so it was just an exciting time to get back and just to connect it with everybody.

28:32Parked probably about maybe six or seven houses away.

28:35I remember just getting out of the car, and I was just in a good mental spot.

28:40I remember singing a song.

28:42You know, I know it's a little corny, but I was just in that good mood.

28:45I was humming, singing, and as I was doing that, I noticed up the block,

28:50somebody come running outside with something shiny in their hand.

28:55I thought it was a flashlight at first, but then I realized the way it was moving in the light,

29:00that it was something else, and I had no idea, but I knew it was metallic.

29:02I kind of stopped, because I just thought it was weird that they were moving so fast.

29:08Couldn't tell how old the person was.

29:10I probably couldn't tell you if it was a guy or a girl, that's how far away it was, and it was dark out.

29:16Hopped in the car, started, and pulled out right away.

29:18It was like there was no warm-up or anything like that.

29:21So I was like, wow, this is really weird.

29:23Backed out very aggressively into a snow mound.

29:26We had a lot of snow at that time.

29:27And the car got stuck in the mound.

29:31Couldn't get out.

29:32Opened the car door.

29:34They didn't go in the back and try to dig it out.

29:37You know, they didn't even go and look at it, why it was stuck.

29:40Left the door open and ran.

29:43Back up their driveway to the right, and they went in between the houses that was directly to the right of them.

29:51And disappeared.

29:52I went joyriding with my friends in Jefferson before we were, you know, of age.

30:01So I thought that might have been the situation where somebody just was trying to joyride and made a mistake

30:07and just kind of just took off because they were scared.

30:11I headed back to Chris's party.

30:13So I went inside and I told Chris, I said, hey, your neighbor just backed out and left the car running

30:22with the door open, kind of in the middle of the street.

30:25You know, I guess me just passing that piece of information to him satisfied me.

30:30You know, I was like, oh, I kind of did my job.

30:32I let him know that there was something outside that was a little unusual,

30:35and he's not worried about it, so I'm not going to worry about it.

30:40Started having a couple beers.

30:43You know, it was just, it was, it was a good time.

30:47I was down there for maybe about 20 minutes.

30:52And the Jefferson police came.

30:56Most people there at Chris's house were 21 years old, you know, so I was one of the minors.

31:02So I was really worried about being in trouble for underage drinking.

31:06But they hit us right away with, did anybody see anything next door?

31:12It's okay.

31:14And I just kind of raised my hand and opened my mouth.

31:17I saw something.

31:18Do you mind coming with me, please?

31:21Yeah.

31:22They took me down to the police station because they said they wanted to, you know, do some questioning.

31:26You knew something happened, and that's when I really started to get scared.

31:32I am a lifelong resident of Jefferson Township, born and raised in the Lake Shawnee section of the community.

31:54I love growing up there, raised my own family there, and the house that I actually grew up in.

31:59So I can't get any more hometown than that.

32:03For the last six years now, I've been the mayor in Jefferson Township.

32:07But in 1988, I was on the Jefferson Township Police Department at that point about two years.

32:12That night, I was working the midnight shift.

32:17At that point, they were going to do a search of the area, looking for Tommy Sullivan.

32:23For a lot of reasons, you know, you want to try to find him.

32:26What happened?

32:27Was anybody else there?

32:28I mean, at that point, you don't know.

32:30He was the missing piece of, you know, anybody in the home at the time.

32:33So naturally, he's the first suspect.

32:36On foot, he couldn't have gotten too, too far.

32:39But it was imperative to try to find him.

32:43At that time, we were about 30 officers, which is relatively small in New Jersey.

32:48We had a large area to cover, 42 square miles.

32:51Not a big population.

32:52I think at that time, we were probably running about 18,000 people.

32:57But a wide area, a large area.

33:03My understanding is that my parents talked to the police and said that Tommy was not in there.

33:08And they were literally just looking, like, police came in, looked around in all the houses to see if Tommy was there.

33:13And then they went to the next house to see if he was there.

33:15And it was just, like, kind of a manhunt for Tommy.

33:18As all the investigators started arriving, I started to become more involved with the outside search.

33:22It started out when we had to organize in teams.

33:28We didn't want to damage the scenes any more than what it was, so we held off on doing a foot search of the general area.

33:33Initially, it took a while to get the canine unit there.

33:40You want to get the canine there as quick as possible so that the scent is still fresh.

33:45You know, another animal comes through or anything can distract the dog off that particular scent.

33:50They started at the car where it was stuck in a snowbank and went across the street, through the neighbor's yard, and down and across through the woods.

34:01White Rock is kind of a planned community.

34:04You know, houses on one side, houses on the other, and woods behind.

34:08We're walking through the woods just looking for anything.

34:11Looking for tracks, looking for, you know, canine will lead you in different directions and stuff like that.

34:16I was with the handler from the sheriff's department, tracking the dog from White Rock Boulevard.

34:22We ended up all the way out to Schoolhouse Road, which is a road that runs parallel with White Rock Boulevard.

34:30Turned out what we were tracking was one of the neighbors that thought they were being helpful, trying to find Tommy.

34:40When the canine search didn't come up with anything, then we started branching out more and doing a search of the neighborhood.

34:46A lot of things going on in my mind about which way to proceed next.

34:52Wintertime, nighttime, so he's not going to be hanging around outside.

34:55So, you know, first thing you're worried about is he trying to break into somebody's home.

34:59He'd be known in the area because the neighbors all knew each other.

35:02So they would know if he tried to their house, they'd be calling us right away.

35:06At some point, it was decided we needed to take Brian and his father to the police station.

35:11A gentleman and his son were in a room.

35:34They were, you know, very upset.

35:35I was scared.

35:42I didn't know what was going on, and I could tell the father was really emotional.

35:49The father was pacing back and forth, saying, I don't know if I'm going to hug him or if I'm going to kill him.

35:57When they find him, I don't know if I'm going to hug him or if I'm going to kill him.

36:02And that's when I realized something, you know, really bad happened.

36:10Tom?

36:12They took the father out, and they left me in the room with the young boy.

36:16And I could hear a lot of commotion through the door, and I realized that somebody died.

36:29The boy was sitting there crying.

36:31You know, I went over, and, you know, he didn't know me.

36:48I didn't know him, but, you know, he was crying.

36:50And then, you know, I started crying, not sure why.

36:56Don't know why.

36:57Maybe I was feeling compassion for the boy.

37:01Maybe I was scared that somebody died, and I'm in the police station, and I'm being questioned.

37:08It was just a really emotional experience for me.

37:11But I remember I was just trying to comfort the boy, and I don't know how long it was, but they pulled me in for some questioning.

37:22I just remember I needed to focus and give them every bit of information as best I could, but it was certainly a tough time, for sure.

37:33There was a lot of concern about Brian that night.

37:38Tell me everything you remember tonight.

37:41And then he started talking about it.

37:45And what he related to me was his interaction with Tommy.

37:55Brian Sullivan, age 10, states that he and his brother Tom had watched TV in the downstairs family room from approximately 8 p.m. to 10 p.m.

38:05During this time, his mother remained upstairs with his father, who wasn't feeling well.

38:11At approximately 10 p.m., he went to his room to go to bed.

38:38He said his prayers.

38:47A short time later, he got up to go to the bathroom.

38:52He got up and came basically face to face with Tommy.

38:56He saw his brother Tom, who appeared all hyped up, shaking and nervous.

39:04I noticed that Tommy was getting cleaned up.

39:10It looked like he had blood on his hands, bloody towel, that type of thing.

39:15And I asked him what had happened, and Tommy just kind of said, don't worry about it.

39:20I just got myself.

39:21It's all taken care of.

39:22Tom then told Brian to go back to bed and don't wake up daddy.

39:26Brian then states he became scared and went back to his bedroom to find his stuffed animals.

39:34It wasn't long after that that the smoke alarm in the house went off, and that's what kind of sparked the series of events that led to the discovery of Betty Ann in the basement.

39:47I would say it was maybe 45 minutes to an hour before I was sent back on patrol.

40:05So I'm driving, and I remember a lot of things were going through my mind, thinking about what my father told me.

40:18Just didn't feel right to me.

40:21For a father to draw a conclusion that quickly, to go from knowing nothing to saying, get my son, when you don't even know where your son is.

40:30He was very adamant my son did this.

40:32Look, he tried to burn the house down, but, but, but.

40:35But how do you know that?

40:37You were sleeping.

40:39He said that the smoke detector woke him up, and already in my mind I'm thinking, that brutal murder didn't wake you up in that little tiny house.

40:48I found it a little odd.

40:51You never search your house.

40:53Why are you going to look at a high school party?

40:55Why wouldn't you look in your house first?

40:57And why did you have teenagers call headquarters?

41:00How did you go from going down the street to the party to coming back and knowing that your son did this?

41:07At minimum, I felt like he knew a lot more than he was telling me.

41:10My shift ended.

41:18I didn't go home.

41:20I went to my parents' house, and I remember I was still in uniform.

41:23And my dad came out and said, what's going on?

41:26I was really just becoming an adult, really, like 20-something years old.

41:33Didn't experience much in life.

41:36And I just kind of told him what happened.

41:38You know, that I found this woman that was, like, brutally murdered.

41:46And I was trying to process it.

41:49I mean, it was terrible.

41:53And it bothered me.

41:56My dad, he was like, you know, it's terrible, but imagine what kids in being um saw.

42:02You know, like, they went through a lot worse.

42:04Back then, you didn't, you didn't really discuss your emotions or anything.

42:11You always taught us to be men.

42:14And so, I just buried it.

42:17Compartmental after them.

42:21You know, you can't be a crybaby.

42:34Not only did we search the woods behind the homes across the street, but, you know, we had a condo development that were just being built at that time.