- 16 hours ago
Trust turned to treachery in these horrific cases... Join us as we examine the most disturbing betrayals where criminals took the lives of their own friends. Our countdown includes cases where jealousy, greed, and even fantasy drove people to murder those closest to them. These shocking true crime stories will make you question who you can really trust!
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00:00Does that appear to be Mr. Hernandez holding an iPad?
00:03It appears to be Mr. Hernandez and he's holding something in his hand that's got a white glow to it.
00:08Welcome to WatchMojo.
00:10And today, we're looking at criminals who turned on the people closest to them.
00:15You gotta hide us.
00:18I mean, they know how Bobby died in every event.
00:20I mean, we're all in this together, right?
00:23Christine Marie Paolilla.
00:25She floated a lot, but within her own group, she was really kind of top dog.
00:31The same could not be said for Christine Paolilla, a shy outsider who had always struggled to fit in.
00:38Before the Clear Lake murders, Christine Paolilla was already struggling and her life worsened
00:44after she began dating Christopher Snyder.
00:46He battled severe substance use disorder and Paolilla slipped into the same pattern.
00:51This dangerous lifestyle ultimately set the stage for the murder of her own friends.
00:56In July 2003, Paolilla went to her friend Tiffany Rowell's home, planning to steal drugs.
01:03This was not a group of kids that would be considered thugs or gangsters by any means.
01:09It was an earthquake to our family.
01:12It was devastating.
01:14Things went sideways when an argument broke out between Snyder and Tiffany's boyfriend,
01:18Marcus Presella.
01:20All four people inside the home were killed, including Roel and Rachel Poloroutis.
01:26Tragically, these were the same friends who had once taken Paolilla under their wing.
01:31The case went cold for years, until an anonymous tip led to Paolilla's arrest and conviction in 2008.
01:38There's been times where you get almost satanic talking about people, like, I wonder what it'd be like to kill someone, right?
01:52Megan Furimuska.
01:54I wouldn't miss her dearly.
01:59She's forever strong in the midst of all of the people, people's lives she touched.
02:06Some cases just leave you asking, why?
02:09Why would someone kill a friend they'd known for years?
02:13In Megan Furimuska's case, it wasn't random violence, but a deeply disturbing personal motive.
02:18Furimuska reportedly pretended to be pregnant at the same time as her longtime friend, Heidi Broussard.
02:24Then, in December 2019, she allegedly strangled Broussard with a dog leash and left her body in the trunk of her car.
02:31A search warrant was not approved until around 8.30 later that evening.
02:36Because of the time difference, the admissibility of the evidence recovered is being challenged.
02:40Investigators said she did so to steal Broussard's baby and pass the child off as her own.
02:46The baby was later found in Furimuska's ex-boyfriend's home, who believed it was his child.
02:51In 2023, Furimuska pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 55 years in prison.
02:57With friends like this, who needs enemies?
02:59Is Ms. Broussard a friend of yours?
03:03Yes.
03:04Okay, well, we're interviewing friends and family in an effort to help locate her.
03:09Is now a good time to answer some questions?
03:11Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weyer.
03:14After nearly 24 hours on the run, Slenderman stabbing assailant Morgan Geyser's escape coming to an end Sunday night.
03:21An employee called police concerned about two people sleeping in the cold at this truck stop off 148th Street.
03:27Slenderman is a fictional character often lurking in creepy stories and pictures of children playing.
03:33But for Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weyer, that fantasy became terrifyingly real.
03:38In 2014, these miners lured their friend Peyton Lutner into the woods of Waukesha, believing it'd please Slenderman.
03:47While Weyer encouraged the attack, Geyser stabbed her friend Lutner 19 times.
03:53What were you nervous about most?
03:55Seeing a dead person, because the last time I saw a dead person, it was at a funeral and it was my uncle.
04:01Shockingly, she managed to survive by crawling to the road where a cyclist found and helped her.
04:06Though the violence was fueled by fantasy, the legal consequences were real.
04:11Geyser was later diagnosed with a serious mental health problem and committed to a facility.
04:15As for Weyer, she was sentenced to a lengthy term in a psychiatric institution before being released under strict supervision.
04:24By the time we found them, they had walked about five hours and made it to the north end of our city.
04:30Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weyer are brought back to the Waukesha police station for questioning.
04:35Sheila Eddy and Rachel Schoef.
04:37You could tell she was mad at someone.
04:39In the weeks before she vanished, Skyler had posted angry messages.
04:43There's just something about you I can't f***ing stand.
04:46We often hear of killers targeting strangers, which is terrifying enough.
04:51But murdering a friend simply because you no longer like her is a whole other level of horror.
04:56That's what happened to Skyler Niece.
04:59In July 2012, she was reported missing, but it turns out she had already been murdered by her friends, Sheila Eddy and Rachel Schoef.
05:06On the night she disappeared, Niece snuck out to meet them, unaware of their deadly plan.
05:12This is the last sighting of 16-year-old Skyler Niece.
05:15Surveillance video outside of her home in West Virginia.
05:18An eerie vision as she sneaks out of her bedroom, enters an unknown car, and vanishes.
05:24They lured her to a familiar spot, tricked her into retrieving something from the car, then stabbed her repeatedly until she died.
05:31The truth remained hidden for six months until Schoef broke down and confessed.
05:35She was sentenced to 30 years in prison, while Eddie received a life sentence.
05:41Rachel Schoef told investigators they were going to bury Skyler, but when they couldn't, they left her body here on the side of the road and covered it in branches.
05:50Daniel Wozniak.
05:51Prosecutor Matt Murphy proved that Daniel Wozniak shot her, went to his ATM to withdraw money, and then took the stage for a performance.
06:00Despite being unemployed and drowning in debt, Daniel Wozniak was determined to have a lavish wedding and a honeymoon.
06:07His solution? To murder not one, but two people.
06:11This evil mastermind targeted his friend and neighbor, Samuel Herr, a military veteran whose combat pay he knew about.
06:18And Dan was kind of like an older brother mentor to him.
06:20He's a cool kind of cat that I would like to groove with.
06:23That cool cat? That's Dan Wozniak, Sam's friend, the broke neighbor.
06:26After killing Herr to steal the money, he lured Julie Kibuishi to Herr's apartment to make it look like Herr had murdered Herr and fled.
06:35His plan initially worked, even sparking a manhunt for Herr, who was already dead.
06:40But things unraveled when he had a boy withdraw from Herr's account, a move that traced back to him.
06:47After repeatedly lying about his involvement, Wozniak finally confessed and faced justice for his horrific crimes.
06:54Okay. When did you fear you had to kill Julie? What was the rationale behind that? I was going crazy.
07:04Liam McItasney.
07:05That's what makes this really, really a heinous event, that these were two people, meaning Sarah and Liam, that knew each other since, I believe, grammar school.
07:15Like Wozniak, Liam McItasney was driven by greed to take the life of his own friend.
07:21According to prosecutors, he spent about six months plotting the murder and robbery.
07:27Not only was he accused of strangling his childhood friend, Sarah Stern, in her home, but also of dumping her body from a bridge.
07:34This was to make it look like Stern had taken her life just to conceal his crime.
07:38And you see Liam in court today?
07:40Yes.
07:40Can you point him out for me?
07:41Yep.
07:43It's right there, the defendant's table.
07:45Instead of getting away with it, he was caught after an accomplice pleaded guilty and testified against him.
07:50McItasney was later convicted on multiple accounts, including first-degree murder and robbery, and sentenced to life without parole.
07:58Stern's body was never found, making his betrayal all the more chilling, given their long history together.
08:05Liam McItasney stops talking with police, and so investigators turned to his friend and his roommate, Preston Taylor, to try and get some answers.
08:14Karen Severson and Laura Doyle.
08:17Eva started to walk back up the trail towards the cars.
08:19I followed, and Laura and Missy didn't.
08:23This case will give you serious trust issues.
08:26We're talking about the murder of Michelle Avila by her former best friends and rivals, Laura Doyle and Karen Severson.
08:33According to Avila's mother, she had no reason to suspect either girl, especially since Severson appeared truly sympathetic, and even moved in with her to console her.
08:44But behind that caring facade, jealousy festered.
08:48Missy was popular with the boys, and they were not, and that was the whole motive for murdering her.
08:53They didn't want her around anymore.
08:55Doyle and Severson had lured Avila to the creek where they got into a heated argument and drowned her, using a log to hold her down.
09:03Thanks to a teenage witness, the truth came out, leading to the girls' arrest in 1988.
09:09They served almost 44 combined years in prison before they were released.
09:13My hands didn't hold her underwater, but when I turned my back, my heart killed her.
09:19Martin Puccio.
09:21Lisa was convinced that Bobby Kent was no real friend of Marty's, and that he would be much better off without him.
09:28She also saw him as a rival to her relationship with Marty.
09:32Bobby Kent's murder echoes that Brutus Caesar-style betrayal, and that's what makes it so unsettling.
09:39He was murdered by his own best friend, Martin Puccio, along with several others.
09:44The motive?
09:45A mixture of resentment, manipulation, and misplaced loyalty.
09:50Kent was widely described as abusive, domineering, and controlling.
09:55This attitude extended not just to his girlfriend Alice Willis, but also to Puccio.
10:00Lisa Connelly was appalled at the way Bobby treated her boyfriend, Marty, and would often complain about it.
10:07But for reasons only dimly understood, even now, there was a violent undercurrent in relations between the two.
10:15Over time, Puccio's girlfriend, Lisa Connelly, convinced Puccio and others they had to eliminate Kent.
10:21What began as venting soon turned into a calculated murder plot, despite a first failed attempt.
10:28On July 14th, 1993, they lured Kent to a remote area, where they stabbed and beat him before dumping his body.
10:36Their crime didn't go unpunished, as some of them later confessed.
10:40Sheriff's over.
10:41What's going on?
10:42Is the name Bobby Kim, ring a bell?
10:44Aaron Hernandez.
10:45At the time, a lot of people thought he was talking about marijuana.
10:49That he used a lot of marijuana, that he had gotten older, he'd gotten more mature.
10:54It doesn't seem like he was talking about marijuana.
10:56It sure looked like Aaron Hernandez had it all.
10:59But behind the fame and fortune was a troubled young man.
11:02His childhood was far from rosy, and as he grew older, his life became more chaotic.
11:08Even after joining the NFL, that didn't stop.
11:11There were reports of substance use, involvement in shootings, and other legal issues.
11:16The turning point came with the murder of his friend, Odin Lloyd.
11:19In 2013, Lloyd's body was found at an industrial park a mile from Hernandez's home, riddled with gunshot wounds.
11:42The investigation quickly pointed to the NFL star and with overwhelming evidence.
11:46He was eventually arrested and convicted of first-degree murder in 2015.
11:52Why he threw everything away by murdering his own friend remains unclear.
11:57Police are also investigating Hernandez's alleged involvement in a 2012 drive-by shooting in Boston that left two people dead.
12:16Make sure you go into your settings and switch on notifications.
12:22Robert Durst.
12:23A lot of people write him off as an eccentric kind of guy.
12:26And, you know, it's just Bob being Bob.
12:29It would be cute if Bob being Bob didn't result in three people being dead.
12:35In 1982, Robert Durst's wife, Kathleen McCormick, disappeared, and his friend Susan Berman provided an alibi that helped deflect suspicion.
12:46The case went cold for years, only to be reopened in 2000.
12:50Just weeks after the case gained renewed attention, Berman was found shot, execution-style, in her Los Angeles home.
12:58After that, Durst went on the run, disguising himself as a woman who can't speak to avoid being questioned.
13:05Prosecutors argued that Durst had killed Berman to stop her from revealing she had covered up for McCormick's disappearance.
13:14More than 20 years later, in 2021, Durst was eventually convicted for Berman's murder.
13:20The case is truly scary, knowing the two had been so close that Durst had even walked Berman down the aisle at her wedding.
13:29We know about the cadaver letter that the killer supposedly sent because the police received it.
13:36It was postmarked before the body was found.
13:38Let's look at that.
13:39Does that match his handwriting?
13:41Are there any other treacherous criminals who should have made this list?
13:46Let us know in the comments section below.
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