- 18 hours ago
Susan Mauldin disappeared from her Florida home in the middle of a renovation. A trail of bank records and surveillance footage led detectives to dark family secrets— and a killer's twisted plan.
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LearningTranscript
00:00it has now been 27 days nearly four weeks since anyone has seen this woman right here
00:15this is susan malden everybody loves susan she lived by herself she was a widow
00:20there was no sign of forced entry she opened the door to someone she knew and was expecting
00:27check in hospitals talk to more friends we expanded our search around the neighborhood
00:32when we opened the storage unit we had the dog go in they're certified to detect human remains
00:37cadaver dog hit on the storage ship oh my god no why would a cadaver dog hit i felt absolutely
00:46um betrayed she asked him what he wanted for dinner uh and he hung the phone up and she never
00:52heard from him again it's a huge facility huge uh hills uh trash then on that ninth day someone
01:00starts yelling you guys get up here we found something well i knew immediately it was susan
01:04i had no doubt in my mind ladies and gentlemen there's only one person who's guilty in this space
01:10i am guilty
01:22it looks like any neighborhood in america
01:25extremely peaceful very quiet this is not the neighborhood that you would expect any crime
01:35and this was the home of one of the area's beloved residents 65 year old susan balden
01:41everybody loves susan she lived by herself she was a widow she was originally from the uk
01:46when she came over here with her husband my name's howard fryer i was a detective um the lead
01:54detective at the time this investigation was going on it was a missing person uh when it was first
02:00reported by her friend i knew sue probably about 10 years we have a big english group here in town
02:10and i met her in the english group it was a kind of club founded after world war ii for british women
02:19who moved to the u.s after marrying american servicemen we like to eat and talk and you know catch up on
02:28what's going on over in england and all the latest gossip
02:32one of my other english friends she called and she says they don't know where sue is
02:41she had missed lunch with her friends and they asked police to go to her home to conduct a welfare
02:47check her car was still in the garage my first indication maybe said she had maybe gone on a trip
02:52somewhere didn't need her car so she got to the airport when authorities ran susan's passport number
02:57through tsa there was no record of her flying anywhere we're kind of a close-knit group you know
03:04if we were going to england everybody would have known
03:08second hospitals talked to more friends we expanded our search around the neighborhood
03:14within days police then pulled the surveillance video from school buses that traveled on susan street
03:20and they could see a white pickup truck backed right up to the garage of susan balden's home
03:26belonging to a local contractor named cory benderum she had originally hired uh mr benderum to
03:32remodel her bathroom it was about twelve thousand dollars he came in and demoed the whole bathroom
03:38removed everything out of there and then essentially never did any additional work after that all that
03:44was left was the toilet bare walls no sheetrock no flooring it was no sinks and so it was just
03:51vacant like that for a year she was so upset because she could not have anybody in because
03:58she didn't have a bathroom for them to use on october 23rd in the morning she gave him the ultimatum
04:04that he needed to bring her back her money that day or she was going to hire an attorney and then
04:10she went missing on october 24th officers went to benderum's nearby home because he seemed to have
04:18been the last person to see susan i mean i have to answer your questions yeah i mean i know it's about
04:24what's it about it's about food benderum confirmed that he had been at her house that morning
04:31and that he refunded her the money she paid for the job she would get frustrated that i couldn't come
04:36along right now and she was ready and and so it just got to the point where it was just better for
04:41both of us if i just refunded her the money i went about my way she could find us my house you know
04:46and that that was the conversation he provided a carbon copy of the check to patrol deputies and it
04:52was a check for a little over twelve hundred dollars yeah yeah it's only twelve hundred
04:58she's only giving you twelve yeah and that's what i gave her back her friends knew the amount that was
05:04actually missing and it was over twelve thousand dollars and they had told police that so what was
05:09her state of mind when you left her trying to give me a inside too because you're obviously the last
05:15one we talked to you oh i am yes all right you know at this point nobody else that nobody else that said
05:20they talked so you're the last that's why i'm going to make sure we check on the box
05:25i mean she she's a very lovely lady i mean you know when he came inside i was anxious to know
05:33uh what what was going on uh my name is cassidy i am formerly cassidy benderam ex-wife of cory
05:41benderam i knew that miss malden had been missing and he could not stop saying how nice she was and
05:49that she was missing and that he hoped that they would find her then a search of susan's home turned
05:55up new clues they got the crime scene technicians involved we began seeing blood spots on the lampshade
06:02there were some blood spots on the floor looked like her laptop was missing we found um a file
06:09cabinet with uh bedroom remodeling had a red folder in it that was missing all the contents of the
06:14folders there was no sign of forced entry so it would lend to the belief that she opened the door to
06:22someone she knew and was expecting someone who was supposed to be giving her money back to her that
06:27morning so now detectives pulled neighborhood ring camera surveillance video and got a warrant to
06:34track bendram's movement on his phone's gps feature for that crucial morning according to his original
06:42timeline he met with susan that morning gave her a check and then left and that was it he had left
06:47out a very uh significant detail after leaving susan's home that morning he left and went to the
06:54rosemary hill landfill he was there for several minutes he left that completely out that he went
06:59to rosemary hill landfill after her the gps information showed that benderam then stopped
07:04at a storage unit he leased we have him on video entering uh into a storage unit but there was no actual
07:12video like of what he was put into the unit so they got a warrant to search the storage unit too
07:19and bring in cadaver dogs they're certified to detect uh human remains and decomposition um the dog
07:27alerted on uh bendram's storage unit especially on the tool bags and bins that bendram said he had
07:33picked up at susan's house we were definitely thinking that foul play was involved in this particular
07:39scenario what i'd like to do is let you know that basically you're on a long pier right now and
07:47you're coming to a short end so i'd like to talk to you about that before we get to the end of the
07:52pier if you'd like to do that uh i haven't done anything wrong i'm not saying you did but well you're
07:58saying chicken boxes but i don't necessarily believe that i think you're i think you guys have
08:02pegged me and think you've got tunnel vision i don't have anything to hide at the time i felt that
08:08the police had singled him out because he had had a past record from when he was 16 years old
08:14bendram was tried as an adult and convicted of aggravated battery in a shooting involving three
08:20people it made sense to me that you would look at somebody who had a prior felony and that you would
08:27look at them closely i never considered him to be somebody who could hurt a woman
08:36you know you lied to me right when we talked on tube thing about what you said all you owed her
08:42was 1294.54 you owed her 12 000 right why would you lie about that because 1200 is a big difference
08:51than 12 000 right pardon me that's my wife hey they're still here catherine yeah they are looking
09:02at me like i'm the reason why uh sue is missing i felt like they were early in the investigation
09:08and that um these were misunderstandings that were going to fix themselves in time this isn't fair
09:15i didn't do what you think i did and this is absolutely not fair so can you tell me what
09:22happened to her i don't know i don't have any clue we shook hands i left that's it that's the last i know
09:28i don't have an explanation i don't have anything i had nothing to do i know you don't know where she
09:33is now but you know what happened to her no i don't no i don't i shook her hand on the front
09:40unfortunately that was that he was reassuring saying that he hopes that she's found she was a
09:48lovely lady and um of course you know nothing that the police told me was true so cassidy bendram had
09:57no problem going down to police headquarters where she would soon learn there was a lot about her
10:02husband she did not know
10:04it began to come into focus more that unfortunately we thought miss malden had met a tragic end
10:17and the focus in the search for susan malden was now on the rosemary hill trash site
10:23and cory bendram had gone shortly after leaving susan's home there's three bins out there that
10:29aren't really monitored and you can dump something in pretty easy we're talking about cory bendram
10:35right and you know him because you work with them right well i met him through another friend but
10:40yeah i was working okay detectives brought in bendram's co-worker lee stansbury to see if she
10:45had noticed anything unusual about him so we went to dump and we were unloading stuff and i was just
10:52joking this was before any of this right i said oh it'd be a perfect place to dump a lotte and he goes
10:58yeah it's a perfect place to dump the lobby and then we kind of joked and laughed you know it wasn't
11:03serious but detectives were taking it very seriously especially after locating surveillance video of
11:11bendram at a home depot seen buying heavy-duty contractor bags and 50-pound bags of concrete
11:18hours before he went to the dump where he knew his truck would be weighed so he added the concrete to
11:25the truck to throw off the weight scale he knew if he just went and just dumped her without anything
11:29else that it would narrow down to it just being about the weight of a human body that morning when
11:34he went to the home depot he knew then what his plan was as they pieced it together bidram had started
11:41the day at home depot then went to susan's home then to the rosemary hill transfer station finally to
11:49the storage facility
11:50but detectives soon learned that in the days since susan had disappeared the trash dumped at the rosemary
11:58hill transfer station had already been trucked out to a larger landfill operation across the state line
12:05in georgia we knew the statistics and the chances of finding a body in a landfill there had not to my
12:12knowledge been a successful landfill search at that point where the trash had actually been
12:17processed into the landfill but even without a body the case was still being handled by detective
12:23fryer as a homicide and cory bendram was his prime suspect he's absolutely suspect number one in our
12:31mind he was definitely at this point the guy since his early run-ins with the law at his teens
12:40bendram had seemed to be a model citizen the devoted father of two daughters he was
12:47working hard to rehabilitate himself he recognized that he had made some mistakes cory loved me very
12:55much and he doted on me and we were very happy he was actually a fantastic dad very very active
13:03loved his girls cory bendram for all intent purposes he was living the american dream however when you
13:11started scratching the surface and seeing that he was struggling financially and that he wasn't able to even
13:16really pay uh the debts that he owed uh he he was draining a lot of money detectives learned from
13:23bendram's co-worker lee stansbury that he was heavily using cocaine and pills which he was keeping secret
13:31from his wife they're going through a lot of marital problems right now so he doesn't want her knowing he
13:35needs to blow again because she would leave him so he's doing pills and yeah yeah he'll do the blow during
13:40the other day and it takes the pills at night to go to sleep so i kind of thought that's what it was
13:44making me crazy two weeks into the investigation corey bendram's wife cassidy voluntarily came to
13:51the sheriff's office confident her husband had done nothing wrong i mean as you already know we're
13:57investigating sue susan uh maudlin who's missing i've heard him talk about her before
14:04some stories that she's told her about england and yeah so as of today she's still not you know turned
14:11up anywhere so she was cooperative with us we explained to her the majority not everything but
14:17the majority of of the picture we had been able to paint the reason we served the search warrant on
14:21the storage shed is because cadaver dog hit on the storage shed oh my god i watched a lot of true crime
14:30i always have and i knew what that meant well why would a cadaver dog i don't know i don't know
14:44but i think that your husband does know more about her disappearance than what he's telling us
14:50she was coming to the realization that he may have been involved in this so the day he said he went to
14:56sue's house did he tell you why he went there yeah he had to give her a check for how much um he told
15:03me the check was for eight hundred dollars here's what i can tell you what we've discovered in the
15:08investigation is that i guess she contracted him to do a bathroom okay and that was uh eight months ago
15:16so eight months ago that course bathroom gets demolished the agreed upon price was nineteen thousand
15:22dollars um she paid him twelve thousand dollars and thanked the other seven until the job was done
15:29have you noticed like it gave him twelve thousand dollars twelve thousand
15:39we know that to be a fact and i said absolutely not we have not had an influx of twelve thousand dollars
15:45in our in our household money so that was a shock to me as well twelve thousand dollars in a short
15:52amount of time i've never even seen twelve thousand dollars so according to her closest friends the ones
15:59that actually called us is um she was threatening him with filing a fraudulent complaint with the
16:08sheriff's office that he was defrauding her because she paid out all this money and she'd gotten to work
16:13and so he was supposed to come on thursday to give her this money back so that she wouldn't contact
16:21anybody and again is that backing somebody in a corner i don't know what they told me was essentially
16:28that he was taking money for jobs not completing them that he was blowing through money on drugs and i
16:37understand from what i've heard in talking to people he may have a drug problem i don't know corey hasn't
16:43touched anything in god 10 years longer than that
16:53okay maybe not maybe not he's doing drugs recently like that's what we're hearing lately we don't have
17:01proof of proof of that i felt absolutely um betrayed about um 10 years ago he developed a drug problem
17:12and i gave him an ultimatum saying that he had to go into rehab um or he was going to lose his family
17:19i never had any idea that drugs were a part of his life again um until i started talking with the police
17:28what kind of drugs cocaine cocaine cocaine and uh pain pills
17:35so i don't know if that's where maybe the money could have went
17:44it's it's and i realize this is your husband but it's important we know everything
17:49because this woman is missing i've got to find this woman i know
17:52a few nights later binderham failed to come home he simply called his wife one day and she asked
18:00him what he wanted for dinner uh and he hung the phone up and she never heard from him again
18:11clade county sheriff's office detectives have identified a person of interest in the investigation
18:16into a fleming island woman's disappearance detective howard fryer decided to go public
18:21about cory bendram once he learned bendram had fled the area and there's definitely mysterious
18:26circumstances associated with it and his whereabouts are unknown at this time anyone with information
18:31which may lead to the whereabouts of susan malden and cory bendram are urged to contact detective
18:35fryer with the clay county sheriff's office homicide unit his wife cassidy at first didn't believe it
18:41until police told her the details of what he had done all on the night before his daughter's birthday
18:47party and so he stole money from the gentleman that he was working with
18:53and i believe he forged a check for five thousand dollars and fled
19:02and that for me was the real turning point to align the fact that he would have fled and done this
19:11to his family on his daughter's birthday especially when they have a relationship where they're so
19:16close but i then realized that there's a lot that i don't understand the u.s marshals were brought
19:24in to help with a nationwide search for bendram through tracking devices with the u.s marshals they
19:30were able to determine that he had gone as far as colorado he just simply took off driving across
19:36the country he knew he was a suspect and i think he felt like the police were closing in and getting
19:42closer to making the arrest he actually contacted me for the first time on thanksgiving all he would
19:48tell me was that he wasn't in the state and that he missed us and he didn't know how long that he was
19:58going to be gone but that i needed to trust him and not listen to what the police were saying
20:02cassidy told detectives every time he called i decided the marriage was over when he left you
20:10want to be able to trust your spouse um and certainly the implication that he had been using drugs
20:17would have ended our marriage anyway but um when he fled and left me and the children to deal with
20:26the fallout of the release of of him being a person of interest that was it
20:35breaking news tonight a person of interest in the disappearance of a fleming island woman is now in
20:40custody after two weeks on the run bendram turned himself in to face the forged check charges i believe
20:47that because her body had still not been located during that time frame he was gone and there was no
20:53arrest warrant out for his arrest for the murder of susan malden i personally believe he felt
20:59comfortable coming home at that point maybe he thought he had gotten away with it so the search
21:05for susan malden's body at the georgia landfill took on added urgency it's a huge facility
21:13and basically they compact it down and create uh huge uh hills of trash waste what just so happens by
21:22the grace of god or luck whatever it was uh when she was dumped it was the last bit of trash that was
21:29going to be dumped in that specific area and folks in georgia the area was cordoned off and detectives
21:36went to the fbi for help huge ordeal a huge ordeal i mean you're you're talking they have to spend
21:42thousands and thousands of dollars in equipment and man manpower the search began in early january it was
21:49freezing cold uh in folks in georgia it was like 30 degrees the trash the landfill none of it bothered
21:57me my sole focus was finding susan but after more than a week as agents and detectives focused on the
22:04one cordoned off area no susan it was at least 30 feet high and we had to start at the top
22:11then on that ninth day it was around 3 30 uh someone starts yelling you guys get up here we found
22:20something and we all just ran up there in tears because there she was there was her skull
22:28well i knew immediately it was susan i had no doubt in my mind and they were able to
22:32positively identify it as susan malden we found her body uh in the same contractor bags style contractor
22:39about to see the purchase this morning we are confirming that the remains of 65 year old clay
22:45county resident susan malden were recovered from the chester island landfill in folkston georgia
22:51ultimately through an autopsy they were able to determine that her hyoid bones had been crushed
22:58consistent with strangulation right here at the the neck it's very routine that in strangulation cases
23:04those bones are fractured i want a seat in that great chair for me
23:09you need water anybody uh water every time okay been around how you doing i'm all right
23:16i'm gonna ask you the same but i'm sure it's not like pleasant
23:21i wanted to come and touch base with you told you i'd give you an update when we got one sure um so we got one
23:28and uh cut right to the chase and we talked about before you indicated that i had tunnel vision i didn't
23:37have tunnel vision we know what you did we located susan we're bringing our home and you're going to be
23:44charged with murder and tempered evidence to begin with okay i know that's a lot to hit you at one
23:54second but obviously you've known this whole time you've just kind of been waiting on it i'm sure
23:58not at all no no i did reach out to cassidy give her heads up because i know obviously your daughters
24:07you know i don't want them to get bombarded with stuff that they don't need to
24:11okay i did that for cassidy not for you sure all right
24:18and you you i'm sure you're familiar with this process how it goes from here
24:22yeah i'm gonna tell you i'm not gonna say anything
24:25you don't get upset again no no hey hey we won we got our body you're being charged i'm not upset
24:31it's very unfortunate that i didn't have anything to do with it so well we can prove otherwise
24:40but the evidence against bendram was almost all circumstantial the prosecutors knew this was no
24:47slam dunk case jurors they want a smoking gun they want they want to see the crime uh they they want
24:55to see it on video and and in this case we obviously couldn't do that for them
25:01you're charged with uh one count of murder and tampering with evidence as soon as he was arrested
25:13corey bendram's wife cassidy had begged him not to fight the murder charges in court you need to plead
25:20you need to work with the state look i didn't want my girls to see him the way he was going to be
25:27portrayed and correctly so by the state he did make an offer he initially offered 25 years and then
25:33he offered 30. ultimately that was rejected i didn't think it was enough for miss malden instead
25:39the prosecution went scorched earth seeking the death penalty we filed our notice and tried this
25:46case as a capital case and felt that because of the aggravation in the case death was the appropriate
25:53sanctioned while i was interested in him serving time and finding justice for miss malden it was not
26:01in my best interest or my children's best interest to have him on death row even though um i have to tell
26:07you i could have thrown the switch i was pretty angry the death penalty trial of a contractor
26:15accused of killing a fleming island woman got underway today it took five years for bendram's case to
26:21come to come to trial he had changed a lot i guess he had gained weight and he didn't look the same
26:28person at all i definitely felt like that i needed to be there because i needed to represent sue because
26:37she didn't have anybody else to represent her uh miss perry to the state and make your jury prosecutor ashley
26:45terry took the jury through the timeline of susan malden's twelve thousand dollar remodeling job gone
26:51very bad she gave cory bendram the ultimate my money back or there will be possible
27:00and then he went to her house and he held up and then he tossed her out like the garbage she thought
27:07she was at the end of everything those actions by this defendant will be clear to you and the other
27:25thing that will be clear is that he is guilty as charged thank you
27:32and the defense had one key fact that became the centerpiece of their case the dna found under
27:50susan malden's two fingernails when they compared it cory bendram was excluded meaning that there is no
27:57way possible that the male dna on that nail was from cory bendram they have never identified whose dna
28:03that is we've always believed that that was the dna of whoever strangled susan malden
28:09and we at the end of this case the fashions term murdered are not guilty for all accounts
28:24because there is reasonable doubt in this case
28:27based on that
28:28right thank you
28:36would you please say your name for the jury
28:38cassidy lee
28:40and do you know a man named cory bendram i do uh that's my ex-husband
28:46now after the defendant eventually turned himself in and was arrested for this case did you
28:51finally get a divorce yes it was difficult testifying i hadn't seen him in years
28:59or had any type of communication with him uh he didn't make eye contact with me i didn't think that
29:04he would cassidy described to the jury her ultimatum after she first learned he was using drugs years
29:12earlier that was a mandate that i gave him was that um if we wanted to try and stay together and at that
29:21point it was a try um if we were going to try and work on our relationship that he had to go to rehab
29:27an inpatient rehab was he also aware that if you ever found out about drugs again that you would be
29:35yes and it's hard sometimes as a wife you don't want to emasculate your husband by constantly being
29:43over him all the time but i did i relaxed were you aware that miss malden was upset with him and was
29:48demanding her money back no were you aware that miss malden told him that if he didn't give the
29:54money back that she was going to the police of an attorney no had you been made aware that um the
30:01defendant had taken a twelve thousand dollar job and couldn't reimburse it and miss malden was going
30:06to the police would that have been an issue for you yes you think that would have possibly led to you
30:13leaving the hall yes but that meant he would have lost everything yes no further questions i think
30:22that he simply lost control and um when he realized that she was going to let me know um and let others
30:33in the community know that he had essentially stolen money from her i think he probably felt he had no
30:40other choice and of course he did bendram had refused to talk with detectives the prosecutors
30:46learned he did talk with one of his fellow jail inmates and now that inmate tom smith would be a key
30:53witness for the prosecution what does a killer look like he was a completely normal middle-aged guy with a
31:07family and a business he didn't quote unquote look like what you would imagine um a murderer would look
31:15like but his former jailmate painted a much different picture of corey bendram would you introduce yourself
31:21to our jury please sir um thomas smith yes tell us tell the jury first how you met that um i was housed with
31:32him in uh d1 in a cell block we always have to be particularly cautious when incarcerated inmates bring
31:44evidence to the state but in this case this inmate when asked why he had come forward actually said it
31:52was because he had a a mother that was around susan malden's age and bendram bragging about it
32:01was chilling to even him what word came out of his mouth said what he did um he just said he shut her
32:09up what was great about the informant was the fact that he tells us in corey's own words
32:17what happened that morning did he tell you whether he went over there thinking clearly or was he under the
32:23influence of any kind of substance so what i assumed the way he was talking he was you know under the
32:31influence of what um crack or uh coke or something like that all right was there any violence between
32:39you tell us what he did or what he told you yeah said that things started she started getting loud and
32:46he was trying to shut her up so he hit her or something and then he started screaming and choked
32:52her choked her out or something now what if anything did he tell you about hearing anything hurt on her
32:58broken bones anything like that what did he tell you about that said he felt like something snapped
33:05did he say whether he heard something snap when he hit her or when he had his hands around when he had
33:13his hands around now sir tell us uh after uh he talked about what he did to her what did he do with
33:20her in particular after this operation said he wrapped her up in something and took her to a dumpster or
33:28something like that i i assume he had a dumpster out in the front yard or something that's the way we
33:34would have done it sir you keep saying you assume yeah there was a dumpster in the front yard i'm just
33:38going to ask you real clearly you're not doing fine i just want to ask you directly as i can what did he
33:44tell you with the words out of his mouth about what he did says though he was doing just what you
33:49tell him said he wrapped her up and took her to the dump to dumpster whatever sir were you surprised
33:57by what he was telling you very now mr uh smith will ask you a couple of questions have i myself
34:06miss hazel miss terry any member of the state attorney's office promised you anything at all about
34:11your case in exchange for what you're doing here i mean i thought it was trash to be honest uh it
34:23it lacked any detail of anything all right cross you're hoping that testifying for the state
34:31will help you out in your other two felony cases aren't you no i'm not oh you're not no i'm not
34:37they can say whatever they want on the witness stand but i'm telling you the only reason anyone
34:43ever comes forward is because they want to benefit did you actually tell the detectives that he said
34:49that he rolled up an old carpet i believe so and he said they put her in the dumpster is that why
34:59that's what i understood all right thank you uh mr smith you can step down susan malton's body was in
35:06fact found wrapped in black contractor bags not an old carpet there was no rug missing okay from the
35:13house that is simply a fact that is false the jury should have disregarded everything he said and the
35:20defense also scored points with expert testimony about the dna found under susan's fingernails
35:27corey binderem was excluded as a contributor to the mixed dna profile obtained from this item
35:32all right mr binderem uh the court has now received all the evidence in this case certainly
35:41from the state do you understand that it's the state's burden to prove the charges against you
35:46beyond a reasonable doubt yes have you made a decision of whether you will testify or not
35:52we were prepared for him to testify he's been kind of arrogant throughout this whole thing maybe he will
35:57and what is that decision now we've been following this case since the beginnings they say binderem was
36:09the last person to see her yeah these documents are pretty detailed the extensive media coverage of
36:14the trial made life difficult for corey binderem's wife and daughters they struggled during the trial i
36:21asked them not to watch it and they didn't watch it they were experiencing bullying and um you know it
36:29was a difficult time they didn't want to think that their father could be capable of something like this
36:37now the question was whether binderem would take the stand and give his version of what happened so i
36:43did believe that he may try to get on the stand so that the jury could see who he was what is that decision
36:51i'm not there's a price that i have to pay anytime i put a client on the stand and that is we were
37:01up against three very talented prosecutors with decades of experience they get to go after him
37:12now please pay attention to the lawyers as they give their closings it's hazel for the state
37:18ladies and gentlemen extremely susan the malls and it is premeditated work 40 minutes is plenty of time
37:26to knock an elderly one to the ground strangle her which takes a matter of minutes put her in a bag and
37:35put her in the trunk of the cloth i believed our evidence was compelling the timeline was tight and that
37:41we had proven what we needed to beyond a reasonable doubt there's a saying to the living we all respect
37:49and to the dead we owe the truth
37:53not things that we do today will ever bring season all of them back but it will forever define what
37:59happened on october 24th of 2019. in europe ladies and gentlemen there's only one person who's guilty in
38:08this space and it's cory benderam and say you ask that you find him guilty as possible thank you so much
38:15very much here mr karate you're closing sir thank you my honor please yes sir
38:20i thought the defense did a very good job of
38:41challenging the evidence and they challenged that the dna was not mr benderam's and that
38:47you know the real killer's dna was what was on the fingernail
38:50that nail had the flesh the skin of whoever killed
39:01the nail and both nails had no dna
39:10because he did not attack her he did not kill her
39:14we ask that you find mr benderam not guilty on all charges
39:17the jury was back after four hours four hours were long but they're always long it feels like an
39:36eternity
39:44i haven't done anything wrong we shook hands i left that's it you know you lied to me right
39:49this is unfair i didn't do what you think i did
39:57there's always a sense of relief when you know that the jury got it right
40:06i stand before you asking for justice for simpson mullin complete justice we are asking you to
40:14recommend to the score on revert form that this defendant get the death penalty thank you so much for
40:21your time all right mr hernandez you're closing sir
40:25we had a lot of good deeds that cory benderam had done for others during his life we knew that his
40:39two daughters were going to be providing a statement asking the jury to spare his life
40:46the daughter's statement was read by a victim advocate lee wilson
40:49dad tried his best to lead by example and steer us towards success and happiness which is one reason
40:56this tragic crime has been so hard for us to understand we cannot imagine that hurting anyone
41:03he has never been violent he has been a protective and loving father to us throughout our lives the only
41:10time he showed emotion through the entire trial was when the letter from his daughters was read and he
41:16cried we love our father very much and ask you to show mercy when considering his sentence if there is
41:23a chance for us to be together again one day free from all this completely free please do everything in
41:31your power to ensure we are able to do so we love our dad always sincerely bailey and megan benderam
41:39i think that uh the letter in conjunction with the pictures of them and obviously corey's active
41:45involvement in their lives i think that was important under florida law eight of the 12 jurors
41:52had to vote for the death penalty they were out for a very long time deliberating that verdict
41:57ladies and gentlemen i understand the jury has reached its verdict and so we know that they were
42:03thinking hard about what to do we the jury are the defendant corey lewis benderman should be sentenced
42:12as follows life in prison without the possibility of parole five death seven
42:23so it was uh seven to five and seven for death five for life and therefore by florida law corey
42:31benderam was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole there was definitely a
42:36sense of relief from him when the life recommendation was read i don't know that he cried again but you
42:42could definitely see that he was relieved i was really grateful that they didn't recommend death and
42:47that the judge honored that recommendation but he definitely needs to be in prison for the rest of his
42:52life what he did to her was just horrendous and i don't understand how any human being could do that
42:58to another human being but over money over twelve thousand dollars twelve thousand dollars changed
43:03everyone's life in this
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