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Dateline NBC - Season 2025 Episode 32 -
The Ruse
The Ruse
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00:00into the house there was an obvious smell of bleach we discovered a lot of
00:05blood evidence maybe there was some foul play involved here we believed that
00:12something violent happened in the house and that mr. Perez was the one that did
00:15it to his father were you convinced that your friend had killed his dad yes an
00:20officer indicated we have overwhelming evidence how would blood get in those
00:24spots I don't know you think he's lying to you correct you told him his dad was
00:29dead correct you told him you had the body yes correct Thomas that's not gonna
00:34help anything it was a really difficult thing to watch we see you ripping at
00:38your clothes ripping at your hair they think I murdered my father this can't be
00:45real this can't be right this was the moment that you thought maybe he was
00:48going to crack we just looked at each other shocked couldn't believe it still
00:53can't a father missing a son under suspicion and an ending that will make
00:59your jaw drop I'm Lester Holt and this is Dateline
01:10tonight the ruse
01:17hello this is here so pain with Fontana police yeah it began in August 2018
01:23Fontana California sometimes he takes a dog for a walk but the man on the phone
01:30Tom Perez jr. was describing how his father Tom Perez Sr. went out for a walk and
01:37didn't come back what happened was he went to the mailbox last night normal no big deal he
01:45went there with the dog and the dog came back and he wasn't around Tom jr. and his dad
01:52and his dad lived together here on this quiet street both were in real estate though Tom Sr.
01:58was retired Carl Perez up has known both men for more than 20 years how would you describe the
02:04younger Tom he's he's unique he's extremely intelligent very self-disciplined Papa Tom he's very quiet
02:13he's very opposite from his son I've known him for a long time we would go to their house and you know
02:20have a little party watch sports and now Tom was asking police if anyone had reported seeing his dad
02:27dad he told the officer he had wandered off before you didn't hear any weird noises or anything like
02:33that no no type of yelling no type of struggle after speaking with Tom community service officer
02:43Joanna Pina paid him a visit she took immediate note of his appearance his pants are unbuckled yeah and he's
02:54just kind of like not concerned just standing here like all right Tom told Pina he'd been awake all
03:00night packing to move I noticed there was a bunch of boxes a lot of it was the house was in disarray
03:06I'm like what are you doing and then as you get deeper inside does this thing become more curious to
03:11you yes and you left his wallet in his phone here and his keys yeah because he just went to the
03:19mailbox the mailbox wasn't far just a two-minute walk around the corner you go check to see if he
03:26actually picked up the mail yeah go for it we enter the mail and this is the mailbox right here
03:37the mail's here the mail that from the day before was still there why he didn't get the mail I don't
03:45know was he volunteering information what you're having to drag it out of him I was asking him and
03:50he wasn't very clear on his answers he was very big he might have just walked to the metro and head
03:57to LA Pina isn't a detective but her gut told her this case needed one recording started more officers
04:05and detectives arrived can I kind of tell you where we're at obviously we want to find your dad so
04:11what I would like to do is I like for you to go back to the station with me so I can use all my
04:15resources and all that good stuff yeah Tom left with police as sergeant Brian McClain took charge of
04:23a now growing investigation I noticed almost immediately when I started to go upstairs there
04:29was an obvious smell of bleach what was really telling to me was the shower curtain was missing we
04:36discovered a lot of blood evidence blood evidence that you could see with the naked eye and blood evidence
04:44that you could see using a mixture of spray that can show trace evidence of blood that had been cleaned
04:50up are you talking about smears or drops all of the above they brought in a cadaver dog was the dog
05:00successful in sniffing out human remains it did have a positive alert to the order of human remains within
05:07the room and in the kitchen investigators found a receipt from Lowe's timestamp the night Tom senior
05:16vanished police check surveillance footage and there was Tom junior buying large trash bags it feels like
05:27what you're describing is arrows all pointing roughly in the same direction definitely yes what was that
05:32direction that the father may have been killed and his son may have been responsible for it that was
05:39only the beginning the real surprises would come out later Wow I couldn't believe it we haven't talked
05:46about the cruelest thing they did yet which was I don't think we did anything wrong
05:51yeah let's go let's go after reporting his father missing Tom Perez willingly went to the police station
06:11station where he was interviewed for hours overnight the whole time insisting he had no idea where his dad
06:18was the next morning two new detectives David Janice and Kyle Guthrie took over we were investigating a
06:27possible homicide up in Thomas's room we got him out of the interview room went and got him some coffee
06:33now detectives asked Tom to take them through every moment from when his dad supposedly went to the
06:40mailbox to when he called police Tom led them to a donation site where he said he'd gotten rid of
06:51some things that night while packing what's all yours this we came here and we found three bags with
07:03the father's clothing that he had deposited so thinking something nefarious may have happened
07:08between the time that he said his dad went missing and the time that he called us he also led them to a
07:16golf course where his dad sometimes played and immediately when we got out of the car he started
07:22looking in the bushes kind of oddly and then he started to walk over to the to the water hazard and
07:30then while standing next to the water hazard he asked me don't bodies float
07:34don't bodies float no this is where you think he's at which seemed to be extremely suspicious
07:42back in the car Tom began to get emotional you're the only one that can help daddy
07:50if he is in trouble that's all I want to do we have a lot of circumstantial evidence because of what we
07:59had in front of us we weren't weighing too much on his statement that he didn't do anything they took
08:05Tom back to the station to ask him more questions what was your first awareness that both father and son
08:12might be in trouble I got a call he identified himself as an officer from Fontana Police Department
08:18he says I have Tom here and we're looking for his father he said we'd like you to come to the police
08:24station because we believe he may have committed a homicide I explained to Carl that you know we're
08:32trying to get mr. Perez to tell us what happened at the house we believe that there was some type of
08:36struggle an officer indicated to me we have overwhelming evidence that there was a murder
08:43committed and he committed this murder were you convinced that your friend had killed his dad yes
08:49Carl rushed to the station the freaking evidence okay I'm talking to them they said they they have
08:59enough evidence on murder yeah and where are you too well I don't care it's bull it's bull it's all
09:07circumstantial so you got a body let's say you did because nah what else makes sense man I mean based based on
09:18the evidence then and then we're really really blowing away they say it's his blood huh he just ignored it says yeah you
09:27know what it's it's the wrong this that he was a little incoherent because he was extremely tired
09:33the detectives tried something else we brought the dog in so that he would maybe feel a little bit
09:40more comfortable and relaxed comfort for Tom and detective said more evidence against him one of
09:48the crime scene investigators did find human blood in the paws of the dog I know where she got it from
09:56inside your house where all the other blood is that we found detective Janice told Tom a story about
10:02another dog one who had been so disturbed by witnessing a murder it had to be euthanized and
10:09the dog was so distraught and depressed like that dog is that they ended up having to put it down
10:15because of what it witnessed they told Tom they were sure Margo had seen a murder too you killed him
10:22and Margo was there Margo saw it you're watching this interplay yes yes and I said wow I don't know
10:30what tactic that is how would blood get in those spots I don't know but soon the detectives had
10:36something to tell Tom a bombshell that turned the case upside down this was the moment that you
10:45thought maybe he was about that Tom Perez jr had been talking to police for more than 24 hours straight
11:10when the detectives dropped a bomb news that finally shifted the interrogation it's not
11:17circumstantial anymore no they told Tom they had found his father's body what happened I don't know
11:27tell us or what is he we're not getting into that well he's gone he's in heaven Tom didn't cry
11:37he didn't collapse to the detectives that said everything you know what's messed up Tony we just
11:45told you we found your dead dad and you don't give a not a tear not a I'm sorry what yeah exactly you
11:56don't even care you don't even care we find your dad and he's dead they left Tom alone in the room
12:04he curled up on the floor clutched his dog Margo and cried
12:09you all right Thomas jump back up man how can you sit there and say you don't know what happened
12:21and your dog is sitting here looking at you knowing that you killed your dad look at your dog
12:31that's when Tom started to unravel would it be easier to write it and say it out loud
12:39Thomas that's not gonna help anything
12:53we see him literally pulling his hair out pulling his buttons off did moments like that give you pause
13:15not completely I've had other homicide suspects admit to murder in the past and there is a lot
13:21of a release of emotion this was the moment that you thought maybe he was going to we thought that
13:25after nearly two more hours of denials Tom's story slowly began to change
13:35he stood up and he came toward me and then he said I'm tired of you
13:43Tom agreed that maybe he did fly into a rage is it plausible that you stabbed him
13:50the scissors so how many times you think when you were in that rage you stabbed him with the scissors
14:01if that were the case with scissors or some other night I wouldn't stop he went through motive he talked
14:10about um a fight they had in a kitchen him stabbing his dad did he fall down
14:15I don't know yes you do
14:20because oh he went upstairs to shower and he did fall down
14:30he mentioned uh his dad going up to the bathroom and potentially bleeding out in the bathtub
14:35was he like just covered in blood you couldn't see anything yeah because the shower's on and it's
14:41just all splashing and it's just blood everywhere I pulled him out of the tub I remember yeah how did
14:48you get him out there would have been slit him on the carpet and what is covering him the carpet
14:55shower curtain maybe that's what that was shower curtain it was a very detailed confession that he
15:05gave us minutes later Tom sat alone in the interrogation room he removed his shoelaces tied them
15:14together and tried to hang himself from the table okay buddy Ryan McClain was monitoring it all outside of
15:24the room maybe he was now feeling the pressure of having to face something that he may have done to
15:30his dad case closed not even close you may not believe who I'm about to interview next so Tom who's
15:40the tuberculosis sitting next to you
15:56this is Tom Perez Jr he agreed to sit down for an interview to tell his side of the story
16:03he says what police called a detailed confession was really just a guided fantasy directed by them
16:14i didn't say yeah i killed him i didn't say that did you stab him i didn't think that i did
16:24they said if you were to kill him how would you do it but if you did
16:31where would you stab him so then he said did you wrap him in the shower curtain are you sure you
16:36didn't wrap them up in the shower curtain i mean i just kept going with their lead
16:43that's what they call a confession tom told us he was exhausted and hungry so i'm in the 30-something
16:52hours straight with no sleep tom says there were innocent explanations for everything police found
16:59suspicious explanations he'd offered to detectives where did the blood come from not certain but i
17:06do know dad falls he says his dad had a history of falling and he offered another explanation
17:14i had been telling them they said there's no blood and then if there were blood it had to be probably
17:21from he checks his uh diabetic prick he likes to prick the thing and he walks around so if there's any
17:28blood it could be from that i tried to give answers along the way and they rejected them they rejected
17:34them yes there was some concern about your demeanor your behavior my demeanor being how the way it was
17:41expressed to us from police is that you did not appear to have a great deal of concern
17:48for your father's whereabouts uh that would probably be correct because he's done this thing before
17:54even though tom called police he says he never expected them to jump to the conclusion his dad was
18:01dead he told us the pressure in that interview room was intense bordering on psychological torture
18:08i'm starting to go in a downward spiral because now we have my father's dead
18:16my dog's going to die they think i murdered my father
18:24and do you want to end it i want it to stop painful
18:29and why should we believe tom's story now well he didn't come to our interview alone
18:36so tom who's is sitting next to you my father tom senior tom senior yeah i've heard a lot about you
18:45i'm sure you have that's right tom senior was not dead there was no murder there was no crime
18:55you won't even care we find your dad and he's dead you won't even care police had lied about finding
19:01his dad's body it's a legal interrogation tactic that the fontana investigators call a ruse prior to
19:10all this did you have any idea that police can legally lie to a suspect no i had no idea
19:19what was it like to hear police tell you that your father is dead
19:23the heart sunk shock
19:30so what really happened i've got to ask you where were you when i started off
19:37my little journey to the mailbox i said well it's very nice evening and i find myself close to the
19:44railroad tracks and i said oh it'd be kind of nice it's still early enough to take a little train ride
19:52so that i did that exact theory was among the first his son had suggested
19:58he might have just walked to the metro and head to la and that's what he did that's exactly what he did
20:04destination unknown have you seen any of the interrogation tape
20:08i said what what are they doing when you finally found out that papa tom as you know him wow was
20:25alive and well i i couldn't believe it what else makes sense man i mean based based on the evidence
20:32i said what did i just do his father's alive i trusted the officers i don't understand how they
20:40can deceive people like this have you ever seen a case like this one no no civil rights attorney jerry
20:50steering represents tom he spent four decades suing police for misconduct
20:57he says lying to suspects isn't the exception it's common what's uncommon is that
21:07that doesn't happen until they know there's been a crime committed what makes it different is that
21:13there was no crime in this case this one you could argue they had suspicion that a crime had been
21:18committed yeah and they had a suspicion that this was the guy that did it
21:21okay so shouldn't they as police have the right to follow up on that pursue absolutely ask him any
21:27question you want but how about when you mentally torture him so badly that they attempt suicide in
21:33the police station how about that you think that's bad enough we haven't talked about the cruelest thing
21:37they did yet which was after they found out that his father was okay they put him in the mental hospital
21:45after attempting suicide tom was involuntarily committed and put on a 72-hour hold all that
21:53time police chose not to tell him his father was alive saying they were still investigating
22:00so for three additional days he believed that his dad was dead and that he's going to prison for life
22:07and they can euthanize his dog for three additional days i thought that those cops had no souls
22:12i thought that they were cruel and vicious and creepy what do the fontana police have to say about
22:22that do either of you think you've done anything wrong
22:38that you've done anything wrong with the police station in the police station and the police station
22:41detectives david janice and kyle guthrie believed they'd solved a murder
22:47only to learn there wasn't even a crime
22:52tell me when you found out that mr perez was alive
22:55we were shocked i was shocked based on all of the evidence that we had we believed that something
23:02violent happened in the house and that mr perez was the one that did it to his father
23:06up until his father was found i can honestly say that we thought his dad was dead because based on
23:11that evidence knowing what you know now would you have done anything differently i don't think we
23:16would have done anything differently maybe at the very tail end if if we were going to use a ruse again
23:22in the future we would probably discuss it more in depth you keep using the term ruse but i want to
23:27i want to ask you about lying though do you still think it's a useful tool in extracting a confession
23:33yeah well he's gone he's in heaven do either of you think you've done anything wrong
23:40i don't think we did anything wrong but to bring an individual to the point where they're trying
23:45suicide to the point where they think their dog is is going to be perhaps euthanized um to the point
23:51they're being told their their father his dad has been murdered can you understand why people would
23:56use the word cruel to describe how you handle this i could understand that i could understand that
24:02but i do think that those are three things that are very um very small part of this in a large
24:08investigation good job in my view police should never ever be allowed to lie in the interrogation room
24:21stephen kleinman is a former military intelligence officer who has conducted interrogations around
24:27the world he says lying to suspects can result in false confessions while being honest with suspects
24:34builds trust and trust leads to truth everything i tell you is going to be true now am i going to
24:41tell you everything i know no i can't just like i'm not going to share everything you tell me with
24:45everybody but that that creates a certain level of trust and this is a judgment based on empirical
24:52research by behavioral scientists we asked him to watch tom perez's interrogation in all tom had been
24:59with police for more than 24 hours in that room for 17. all three of us know that daddy's not coming back
25:08the statement of fact that daddy's not coming back i mean that that didn't even border on the
25:13ridiculous that exceeds it by a margin that's that is it should be an embarrassment kleinman says he's
25:20not surprised tom broke down given the length of the interrogation and the lie false confessions
25:28occur at a frequency that would alarm anybody tom felt so manipulated so pressured so confused
25:37that he said things that he knew wasn't true many people say they would never confess to something
25:43they didn't do it happens that type of interrogation and that pressure and that breakdown was that
25:51intense i don't think anybody's exempt from falsely confessing this year virginia became the 11th state
26:01to bar police from lying during interrogations but only to juveniles just a handful of states have
26:08pending legislation to extend that to adults law enforcement has incredible challenges and michael dorsey
26:17is the current chief of police in fontana i think it is super important to understand that everything
26:23that the officers did is legal i mean there are some leading experts who believe that police should never
26:28use lying or ruses as a technique i understand where they're coming from we do not always lied of people
26:36but it is a legally acceptable practice on occasion when needed and sometimes it is needed
26:46some of the scenes that we see play out i mean did they make you wince they did i'll be honest
26:55it's uncomfortable to watch mr perez as he has uh an emotional response to the interrogation tries to
27:04kill himself he does you know if you're sitting here with tom perez jr right now what would you say to him
27:10i would tell mr perez that i apologize i apologize for what you went through what i want you to know
27:19mr perez is that we are a better policing organization because of this incident tom perez sued the city of
27:27fontana last year the case settled for 900 000 the city admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement
27:37would it surprise you to know that the police chief of fontana in an interview with us apologized to you
27:46yes yeah that would surprise me um because he they've held the position the whole time they did nothing
27:54wrong how does this affect you even today today i'm more cautious if dad's going to go out to check
28:03the mail i'm timing him now that's all for this edition of dateline and don't forget to check out our
28:12talking dateline podcast in which i'll go behind the scenes of tonight's episode available wednesday in
28:19the dateline feed wherever you get your podcasts we'll see you again next friday at 9 8 central i'm lester
28:27hulk for all of us at nbc news good night
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