"Murder 360" Killer in the Forest

1 00:00:02,680 --> 00:00:05,400 All she's doing is, on New Year's Day, 2 00:00:05,520 --> 00:00:08,360 <i>taking a hike with her dog.</i> 3 00:00:08,480 --> 00:00:09,680 <i>The blood was wet.</i> 4 00:00:09,800 --> 00:00:10,720 It was fresh. 5 00:00:10,840 --> 00:00:13,000 That was disturbing. 6 00:00:13,120 --> 00:00:15,800 It was a calm place, she thought. 7 00:00:15,920 --> 00:00:19,240 <i>And then she was kidnapped.</i> 8 00:00:19,360 --> 00:00:21,920 <i>The way in which this person gets money</i> 9 00:00:22,040 --> 00:00:24,520 is by abducting these victims. 10 00:00:24,640 --> 00:00:27,240 He fits the definition of a serial killer, by far. 11 00:00:29,000 --> 00:00:35,074 Support us and become VIP member to remove all ads from www.OpenSubtitles.org 12 00:00:41,840 --> 00:00:43,280 I mean, he's just pure evil. 13 00:00:45,840 --> 00:00:48,920 It was too much to even comprehend. 14 00:01:00,960 --> 00:01:03,640 <i>And she kept repeating, he's going to kill me.</i> 15 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:04,520 And he shoots my daughter. 16 00:01:07,600 --> 00:01:09,320 <i>That's about the only time in my career</i> 17 00:01:09,440 --> 00:01:10,400 that I just wanted to shoot him. 18 00:01:19,720 --> 00:01:20,840 <i>You can run.</i> 19 00:01:20,960 --> 00:01:22,760 You can't hide. 20 00:01:41,400 --> 00:01:44,840 <i>North Georgia is a really unique area.</i> 21 00:01:44,960 --> 00:01:46,520 <i>It's a very mountainous area.</i> 22 00:01:46,640 --> 00:01:50,320 <i>National Forest land is abundant.</i> 23 00:01:50,440 --> 00:01:54,240 <i>Blood Mountain is actually the highest</i> 24 00:01:54,360 --> 00:01:59,320 peak in Georgia that the Appalachian Trail crosses. 25 00:01:59,440 --> 00:02:01,040 <i>It's beautiful.</i> 26 00:02:01,160 --> 00:02:03,240 <i>There's waterfalls and great mountain views.</i> 27 00:02:03,360 --> 00:02:05,000 And so we have lots of tourism and lots 28 00:02:05,120 --> 00:02:08,320 of hikers and campers in these areas. 29 00:02:08,440 --> 00:02:11,920 <i>The forests, as they are, are remote locations</i> 30 00:02:12,040 --> 00:02:13,480 throughout the United States. 31 00:02:13,600 --> 00:02:15,840 But they bring leisure to most people, 32 00:02:15,960 --> 00:02:18,160 but sadly can be an opportunity for those 33 00:02:18,280 --> 00:02:20,360 looking for horrific activities, 34 00:02:20,480 --> 00:02:22,000 criminal activities to take place. 35 00:02:29,160 --> 00:02:31,880 <i>My name is Clay Bridges.</i> 36 00:02:32,000 --> 00:02:35,320 I was working for the region 8 GBI office. 37 00:02:35,440 --> 00:02:37,760 And we would be called in any time 38 00:02:37,880 --> 00:02:41,320 there was a missing person, homicide, 39 00:02:41,440 --> 00:02:43,280 suicide, those type thing. 40 00:02:43,400 --> 00:02:46,520 <i>I was driving home and received a telephone</i> 41 00:02:46,640 --> 00:02:50,920 call from the chief deputy of Union County Sheriff's Office. 42 00:02:51,040 --> 00:02:53,680 He contacted me and said that they had a missing 43 00:02:53,800 --> 00:02:56,440 person on Blood Mountain. 44 00:02:56,560 --> 00:03:01,160 So my first action was to learn as much as I could 45 00:03:01,280 --> 00:03:05,480 about her, as to what could have happened to her. 46 00:03:05,600 --> 00:03:08,400 <i>Meredith Emerson was 24 years old.</i> 47 00:03:08,520 --> 00:03:12,520 <i>She lived at the time in a northern suburb of Atlanta.</i> 48 00:03:12,640 --> 00:03:16,160 <i>And she was an avid hiker.</i> 49 00:03:16,280 --> 00:03:20,120 By the next day, when Meredith Emerson did not show up 50 00:03:20,240 --> 00:03:25,960 for work, and the fact that the weather conditions on Blood 51 00:03:26,080 --> 00:03:31,520 <i>Mountain had deteriorated greatly, we all were concerned</i> 52 00:03:31,640 --> 00:03:35,200 that even if it was an injured hiker or just a lost hiker, 53 00:03:35,320 --> 00:03:37,480 or got off the trail and was lost, 54 00:03:37,600 --> 00:03:41,000 <i>could anybody survive that kind of environment?</i> 55 00:03:45,760 --> 00:03:50,120 <i>We set up a command post at the Vogel State Park,</i> 56 00:03:50,240 --> 00:03:52,440 which is right there at the base of the mountain, 57 00:03:52,560 --> 00:03:54,680 just running down any kind of leads. 58 00:03:54,800 --> 00:03:58,960 <i>So a lot of what we were doing was making phone calls,</i> 59 00:03:59,080 --> 00:04:02,040 just trying to-- you know, anybody in the area, 60 00:04:02,160 --> 00:04:06,560 trying to identify anyone who may have seen anything. 61 00:04:06,680 --> 00:04:10,640 <i>The tips we began to receive were sightings of Meredith</i> 62 00:04:10,760 --> 00:04:13,120 <i>and her dog, Ella, that she took with her</i> 63 00:04:13,240 --> 00:04:14,960 <i>that morning to go hiking.</i> 64 00:04:15,080 --> 00:04:17,720 I went to the parking lot of the 65 00:04:17,840 --> 00:04:19,520 <i>Herbert Reese Memorial Trailhead</i> 66 00:04:19,640 --> 00:04:20,960 <i>there at Blood Mountain.</i> 67 00:04:21,080 --> 00:04:23,120 <i>I call that the approach trail.</i> 68 00:04:23,240 --> 00:04:26,800 <i>When we discovered her water bottles</i> 69 00:04:26,920 --> 00:04:29,240 <i>and some of her effects at the trail,</i> 70 00:04:29,360 --> 00:04:31,440 <i>we felt like something bad had happened.</i> 71 00:04:31,560 --> 00:04:33,800 There was also a police baton found in the area. 72 00:04:33,920 --> 00:04:36,160 That was concerning for us. 73 00:04:36,280 --> 00:04:39,280 <i>And, you know, I wonder if someone</i> 74 00:04:39,400 --> 00:04:41,600 <i>had tried to strike her with that.</i> 75 00:04:41,720 --> 00:04:44,040 The ground was so disturbed in that area 76 00:04:44,160 --> 00:04:48,800 where the-- you could tell it was a very violent fight that 77 00:04:48,920 --> 00:04:50,440 <i>had taken place right there.</i> 78 00:04:50,560 --> 00:04:54,120 That was the trigger that prompted them to contact 79 00:04:54,240 --> 00:04:56,960 my office, just in case this was going to be 80 00:04:57,080 --> 00:04:58,640 more than an overdue hiker. 81 00:04:58,760 --> 00:05:01,240 All she's doing is, on New Year's Day, 82 00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:03,400 taking a hike with her dog. 83 00:05:08,600 --> 00:05:13,200 <i>I was there on January 2nd when all this came to light</i> 84 00:05:13,320 --> 00:05:17,280 and searches began to happen there on Blood Mountain. 85 00:05:17,400 --> 00:05:20,240 <i>We needed to close the trail and the parking lot</i> 86 00:05:20,360 --> 00:05:22,320 <i>and move down to the state park, where</i> 87 00:05:22,440 --> 00:05:25,040 <i>we set up our search effort.</i> 88 00:05:25,160 --> 00:05:28,680 <i>You can walk for literally days</i> 89 00:05:28,800 --> 00:05:30,520 <i>and not come across a road.</i> 90 00:05:30,640 --> 00:05:33,400 <i>It's just vast amounts of--</i> 91 00:05:33,520 --> 00:05:36,600 <i>vast amounts of woods, nothingness.</i> 92 00:05:36,720 --> 00:05:40,240 If someone disposes of a body in a national forest, 93 00:05:40,360 --> 00:05:42,120 you'll never find them. 94 00:05:52,680 --> 00:05:54,240 <i>We have lots of tourism and lots</i> 95 00:05:54,360 --> 00:05:57,200 <i>of hikers and campers in these areas.</i> 96 00:05:57,320 --> 00:06:01,080 <i>So a lot of what we were doing was making phone calls,</i> 97 00:06:01,200 --> 00:06:04,280 just trying to-- you know, anybody in the area, 98 00:06:04,400 --> 00:06:06,840 trying to identify anyone who may have seen anything. 99 00:06:09,480 --> 00:06:12,080 We pushed out information asking 100 00:06:12,200 --> 00:06:15,160 the public to call our tip line if they had 101 00:06:15,280 --> 00:06:17,680 seen Meredith on the trail. 102 00:06:17,800 --> 00:06:21,400 We began to get reports of a strange-looking man 103 00:06:21,520 --> 00:06:23,720 with Meredith on the trail. 104 00:06:23,840 --> 00:06:27,280 <i>They all described him almost identical-- you know,</i> 105 00:06:27,400 --> 00:06:31,320 older gentleman, very fit, wearing high-end hiking gear, 106 00:06:31,440 --> 00:06:32,720 but he has duct tape on his shoes. 107 00:06:32,840 --> 00:06:36,240 He's got a dog with him. 108 00:06:36,360 --> 00:06:39,320 And they saw him around a white van. 109 00:06:39,440 --> 00:06:41,040 <i>The very first thing I did, I checked her phone</i> 110 00:06:41,160 --> 00:06:44,880 records and her bank records. 111 00:06:45,000 --> 00:06:51,400 We determined that Meredith's debit card 112 00:06:51,520 --> 00:06:54,520 had been attempted to be used at various ATMs 113 00:06:54,640 --> 00:06:56,880 <i>off the mountain.</i> 114 00:06:57,000 --> 00:07:01,160 <i>There was one attempt 45 miles away the first night.</i> 115 00:07:01,280 --> 00:07:04,880 There was another attempt 80 miles away from the abduction 116 00:07:05,000 --> 00:07:06,320 site the next day. 117 00:07:08,760 --> 00:07:10,560 At that point, we were actually contacted 118 00:07:10,680 --> 00:07:13,440 by law enforcement in North Carolina 119 00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:17,480 and said, hey, we had a couple just 120 00:07:17,600 --> 00:07:19,040 like that, that were hiking, that 121 00:07:19,160 --> 00:07:21,680 went missing without a trace. 122 00:07:34,400 --> 00:07:38,000 <i>John and Irene Bryant were in their late 70s, early 80s.</i> 123 00:07:38,120 --> 00:07:40,240 <i>They were experienced hikers.</i> 124 00:07:40,360 --> 00:07:46,800 And they took out one afternoon to just do 125 00:07:46,920 --> 00:07:49,720 a day hike in the Pisgah National Forest, 126 00:07:49,840 --> 00:07:53,040 <i>which is probably a couple hours from our office</i> 127 00:07:53,160 --> 00:07:54,840 <i>here in Georgia.</i> 128 00:07:54,960 --> 00:07:58,400 <i>And the Pisgah National Forest is extremely remote,</i> 129 00:07:58,520 --> 00:08:04,800 <i>consists of several thousand acres of forest land.</i> 130 00:08:04,920 --> 00:08:09,360 <i>John and Irene Bryant were very friendly people,</i> 131 00:08:09,480 --> 00:08:11,920 well-liked in the community. 132 00:08:12,040 --> 00:08:16,480 And they had told someone that they were going hiking 133 00:08:16,600 --> 00:08:19,520 in the National Forest area. 134 00:08:19,640 --> 00:08:21,680 <i>They disappeared.</i> 135 00:08:21,800 --> 00:08:25,200 <i>And so, when the authorities began</i> 136 00:08:25,320 --> 00:08:29,680 to search for John and Irene, they found the body of Irene, 137 00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:31,560 <i>but not--</i> 138 00:08:31,680 --> 00:08:34,040 <i>no signs of John.</i> 139 00:08:34,160 --> 00:08:37,600 They stated that she had been killed with blunt-force trauma. 140 00:08:37,720 --> 00:08:40,920 <i>And it was a cylindrical object with what looked like</i> 141 00:08:41,040 --> 00:08:43,040 <i>maybe a ball at the end of it.</i> 142 00:08:43,160 --> 00:08:46,640 I immediately thought, there's a police-style baton 143 00:08:46,760 --> 00:08:47,880 up here on this trail. 144 00:08:50,040 --> 00:08:54,440 We believe John tried to call 911. 145 00:08:54,560 --> 00:08:56,960 And the call was almost immediately 146 00:08:57,080 --> 00:08:59,200 dropped because the signal was too low. 147 00:08:59,320 --> 00:09:05,200 <i>Later on in the same day, John's debit card</i> 148 00:09:05,320 --> 00:09:08,760 was used at an ATM in an area called Ducktown, 149 00:09:08,880 --> 00:09:13,480 Tennessee, which is about two hours from the Pisgah 150 00:09:13,600 --> 00:09:15,040 <i>National Forest.</i> 151 00:09:15,160 --> 00:09:16,920 And that's when North Carolina officials 152 00:09:17,040 --> 00:09:21,280 also told us about the Florida case concerning Sherry Dunlap. 153 00:09:26,880 --> 00:09:29,400 <i>My name is Gloria Tucker.</i> 154 00:09:29,520 --> 00:09:34,080 My cousin, Cheryl Dunlap, which I referred to her 155 00:09:34,200 --> 00:09:36,880 as Sherry all the time, she was a beautiful person 156 00:09:37,000 --> 00:09:38,960 <i>inside and out.</i> 157 00:09:39,080 --> 00:09:41,240 <i>She had two grown children.</i> 158 00:09:41,360 --> 00:09:42,960 She was divorced. 159 00:09:43,080 --> 00:09:44,800 She was somebody who kept herself busy, primarily 160 00:09:44,920 --> 00:09:46,880 serving other people. 161 00:09:47,000 --> 00:09:49,800 <i>She was a devout Christian, very involved in her church.</i> 162 00:09:49,920 --> 00:09:51,560 Sherry loved her children. 163 00:09:51,680 --> 00:09:53,320 She had two boys. 164 00:09:53,440 --> 00:09:58,600 She took home the burden of really caring for the boys 165 00:09:58,720 --> 00:10:02,880 totally all by herself. 166 00:10:03,000 --> 00:10:06,800 She was just a very home-oriented 167 00:10:06,920 --> 00:10:10,320 <i>person who wanted to help other people have a good life.</i> 168 00:10:13,440 --> 00:10:16,480 She went for a day hike in the Apalachicola 169 00:10:16,600 --> 00:10:19,400 National Forest in an area called Leon Sinks. 170 00:10:21,360 --> 00:10:23,760 <i>It's very much like any other national forest.</i> 171 00:10:23,880 --> 00:10:26,960 <i>There's hiking trails, you know, just a very nice area</i> 172 00:10:27,080 --> 00:10:28,720 <i>to spend time.</i> 173 00:10:28,840 --> 00:10:31,200 And then she was kidnapped. 174 00:10:35,320 --> 00:10:39,080 <i>The search for Cheryl was on down there,</i> 175 00:10:39,200 --> 00:10:40,400 <i>very similar to the search for John</i> 176 00:10:40,520 --> 00:10:42,120 <i>and Irene Bryant in North Carolina.</i> 177 00:10:42,240 --> 00:10:45,160 They had volunteers who came into the forest 178 00:10:45,280 --> 00:10:47,120 to look for Cheryl. 179 00:10:47,240 --> 00:10:53,040 And not too far into the search, 180 00:10:53,160 --> 00:10:58,280 Cheryl's car was found just outside the forest. 181 00:10:58,400 --> 00:11:02,520 <i>And the driver's side rear tire had been punctured.</i> 182 00:11:13,400 --> 00:11:15,520 He had his face taped up. 183 00:11:15,640 --> 00:11:19,760 <i>He didn't want anyone to recognize who he was.</i> 184 00:11:19,880 --> 00:11:23,640 The county, at that time, was just in an uproar. 185 00:11:33,240 --> 00:11:36,080 <i>Some hunters in the forest</i> 186 00:11:36,200 --> 00:11:39,600 saw some buzzards circling in the area and went over 187 00:11:39,720 --> 00:11:43,360 and found the remains of Cheryl. 188 00:11:43,480 --> 00:11:47,440 Her head had been removed, as well as her hands. 189 00:11:47,560 --> 00:11:51,480 But they were able to identify her through some DNA. 190 00:11:51,600 --> 00:11:56,720 It was unnerving, you know, the manner in which 191 00:11:56,840 --> 00:12:00,240 Cheryl Dunlap had been found. 192 00:12:00,360 --> 00:12:02,280 <i>I didn't want to know anything about it.</i> 193 00:12:02,400 --> 00:12:06,320 <i>But several people told my sister and myself about it.</i> 194 00:12:06,440 --> 00:12:09,200 So, you know, it was-- 195 00:12:09,320 --> 00:12:11,360 it wasn't a good thing. 196 00:12:11,480 --> 00:12:15,160 <i>It's just an overwhelming feeling when you have to deal</i> 197 00:12:15,280 --> 00:12:18,400 with that much tragedy. 198 00:12:18,520 --> 00:12:20,760 Just a terrible thing. 199 00:12:25,880 --> 00:12:29,720 When we learned of those cases, 200 00:12:29,840 --> 00:12:32,800 then we began to talk to both jurisdictions 201 00:12:32,920 --> 00:12:34,120 about the similarities. 202 00:12:35,840 --> 00:12:41,320 <i>The photographs of the person walking up to the ATMs</i> 203 00:12:41,440 --> 00:12:43,000 <i>was very, very similar.</i> 204 00:12:43,120 --> 00:12:45,640 The way in which this person gets money 205 00:12:45,760 --> 00:12:47,880 is by abducting these victims. 206 00:12:50,520 --> 00:12:55,080 And then, when we got our photographs from our ATMs, 207 00:12:55,200 --> 00:12:57,960 there was no doubt that it was the same person. 208 00:13:10,600 --> 00:13:14,360 We got a telephone call to the tip line 209 00:13:14,480 --> 00:13:20,120 from a lady about 60 miles south of Blood Mountain who 210 00:13:20,240 --> 00:13:25,160 said, I think I just saw Meredith Emerson's 211 00:13:25,280 --> 00:13:29,640 <i>dog walk into a grocery store.</i> 212 00:13:29,760 --> 00:13:33,080 <i>And the video surveillance at the grocery store</i> 213 00:13:33,200 --> 00:13:37,600 shows it walking around, almost-- 214 00:13:37,720 --> 00:13:40,120 it almost looked like it was asking for help. 215 00:13:40,240 --> 00:13:45,440 <i>We were able to pick up the dog very quickly</i> 216 00:13:45,560 --> 00:13:49,520 and identify the dog as Ella through an ID chip 217 00:13:49,640 --> 00:13:51,160 <i>that she had in her.</i> 218 00:13:51,280 --> 00:13:55,360 <i>So we knew that Ella was in an area 70 miles</i> 219 00:13:55,480 --> 00:13:56,800 <i>south of the abduction site.</i> 220 00:13:56,920 --> 00:13:59,400 And the agents I sent down there found 221 00:13:59,520 --> 00:14:02,640 a dumpster in the parking lot. 222 00:14:02,760 --> 00:14:05,760 <i>And they decided to look in the dumpster.</i> 223 00:14:05,880 --> 00:14:09,520 <i>And that's where we found the things that</i> 224 00:14:09,640 --> 00:14:11,600 <i>I had hoped that we wouldn't.</i> 225 00:14:11,720 --> 00:14:13,480 We found bloody clothing. 226 00:14:16,520 --> 00:14:20,680 We found Meredith's driver's license and wallet. 227 00:14:20,800 --> 00:14:22,840 We found other clothing, 228 00:14:22,960 --> 00:14:24,400 men's clothing with blood on them. 229 00:14:29,320 --> 00:14:32,080 And this is not just blood stains. 230 00:14:32,200 --> 00:14:35,600 This was blood that you could-- 231 00:14:35,720 --> 00:14:38,440 so much, you could wring it out. 232 00:14:38,560 --> 00:14:40,040 <i>The blood was wet.</i> 233 00:14:40,160 --> 00:14:41,760 <i>It was fresh.</i> 234 00:14:41,880 --> 00:14:43,960 <i>That was disturbing, because up</i> 235 00:14:44,080 --> 00:14:45,560 to this point, we were all holding out 236 00:14:45,680 --> 00:14:47,160 the hope that Meredith's alive. 237 00:14:47,280 --> 00:14:49,720 We're going to, you know, capture the bad guy 238 00:14:49,840 --> 00:14:51,080 and recover her. 239 00:14:51,200 --> 00:14:52,080 And it's going to have a happy ending. 240 00:14:56,320 --> 00:14:58,160 <i>My name is John Tabor.</i> 241 00:14:58,280 --> 00:15:00,840 <i>I own a telemarketing operation.</i> 242 00:15:00,960 --> 00:15:05,960 I was working out and caught the top of the news 243 00:15:06,080 --> 00:15:07,680 where they-- 244 00:15:07,800 --> 00:15:11,000 they broke to cover this case of the missing 245 00:15:11,120 --> 00:15:12,400 girl up in North Georgia. 246 00:15:12,520 --> 00:15:14,120 They said that there was evidence 247 00:15:14,240 --> 00:15:15,600 <i>of a struggle in the parking lot</i> 248 00:15:15,720 --> 00:15:18,240 <i>where they found Meredith's vehicle.</i> 249 00:15:18,360 --> 00:15:21,040 But what really got my attention was, 250 00:15:21,160 --> 00:15:24,720 they said they found an expandable police baton. 251 00:15:24,840 --> 00:15:27,560 <i>That's what really made me stop in my tracks.</i> 252 00:15:27,680 --> 00:15:31,040 I knew someone who used to work for me 253 00:15:31,160 --> 00:15:32,640 who carried a police baton. 254 00:15:32,760 --> 00:15:35,920 And now I'm just staring at the television. 255 00:15:36,040 --> 00:15:39,880 <i>I just remember just going numb.</i> 256 00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:42,640 <i>John Tabor contacts us and says,</i> 257 00:15:42,760 --> 00:15:43,880 <i>I know who you're talking about.</i> 258 00:15:44,000 --> 00:15:45,640 His name is Gary Michael Hilton. 259 00:15:56,040 --> 00:16:00,360 I first met Gary Hilton when he replied to a help 260 00:16:00,480 --> 00:16:02,800 wanted ad for telemarketers. 261 00:16:02,920 --> 00:16:05,360 <i>He was very fond of the outdoors.</i> 262 00:16:05,480 --> 00:16:08,280 <i>And he was a smart individual.</i> 263 00:16:08,400 --> 00:16:12,600 He could do rather complex mathematics 264 00:16:12,720 --> 00:16:14,840 in his head and spit numbers out that most 265 00:16:14,960 --> 00:16:16,160 people couldn't do. 266 00:16:16,280 --> 00:16:18,120 <i>He did his job.</i> 267 00:16:18,240 --> 00:16:21,080 <i>And my impression was just that he never got along</i> 268 00:16:21,200 --> 00:16:24,160 <i>that well with other people and just, therefore,</i> 269 00:16:24,280 --> 00:16:28,040 <i>seemed to prefer the company of his dog</i> 270 00:16:28,160 --> 00:16:31,240 <i>rather than other humans.</i> 271 00:16:31,360 --> 00:16:34,800 He worked in that office 272 00:16:34,920 --> 00:16:38,200 uneventfully for a decade. 273 00:16:42,400 --> 00:16:48,400 <i>I got frustrated at some point, where it just</i> 274 00:16:48,520 --> 00:16:54,480 became obvious that he had lost interest in actually working. 275 00:16:54,600 --> 00:17:00,040 And then, suddenly, within a matter of a few weeks, 276 00:17:00,160 --> 00:17:05,440 he became extremely distant and belligerent. 277 00:17:05,560 --> 00:17:09,320 <i>I realized at that point that this is a real problem.</i> 278 00:17:09,440 --> 00:17:14,200 The situation just spiraled downward rapidly. 279 00:17:14,320 --> 00:17:16,040 <i>I decided to stop by the office</i> 280 00:17:16,160 --> 00:17:17,520 <i>one evening unannounced.</i> 281 00:17:17,640 --> 00:17:18,800 <i>The first thing I noticed, there were</i> 282 00:17:18,920 --> 00:17:21,120 <i>no lights on in the office.</i> 283 00:17:21,240 --> 00:17:24,800 <i>And the back door was wide open, which was also unusual.</i> 284 00:17:24,920 --> 00:17:27,360 <i>I just had this feeling of doom.</i> 285 00:17:27,480 --> 00:17:28,440 <i>Nothing seemed right.</i> 286 00:17:28,560 --> 00:17:30,120 Everything seemed out of order. 287 00:17:30,240 --> 00:17:35,120 And then suddenly, he pops out of a doorway. 288 00:17:35,240 --> 00:17:36,840 So I immediately noticed that he was much 289 00:17:36,960 --> 00:17:39,320 more disheveled than normal. 290 00:17:39,440 --> 00:17:41,440 And I noticed that several of his teeth were missing. 291 00:17:44,520 --> 00:17:47,920 <i>And I was pretty shocked by that.</i> 292 00:17:48,040 --> 00:17:52,320 And I just said, oh, well, you know, what happened to you? 293 00:17:52,440 --> 00:17:55,680 He said, I pulled them out with this pair of pliers. 294 00:17:55,800 --> 00:17:58,960 <i>He said he did it so it would frighten people</i> 295 00:17:59,080 --> 00:18:00,800 <i>when they looked at him.</i> 296 00:18:00,920 --> 00:18:03,240 I knew at that point, I needed to get the hell out of there 297 00:18:03,360 --> 00:18:05,120 as soon as I could. 298 00:18:05,240 --> 00:18:10,720 I felt like something bad could happen at any moment. 299 00:18:13,760 --> 00:18:18,120 <i>It really hit home when</i> 300 00:18:18,240 --> 00:18:23,840 he demanded a certain amount of money, $3,000. 301 00:18:23,960 --> 00:18:26,720 <i>And he said, you know, John,</i> 302 00:18:26,840 --> 00:18:28,680 <i>you've got a great life, beautiful wife,</i> 303 00:18:28,800 --> 00:18:32,360 this beautiful young son. 304 00:18:32,480 --> 00:18:35,800 It would be such a shame for you to lose all that. 305 00:18:35,920 --> 00:18:40,040 <i>It's a hell of a thing to be confronted with.</i> 306 00:18:40,160 --> 00:18:43,600 <i>I agreed to write this check for him.</i> 307 00:18:43,720 --> 00:18:46,040 I told him I would put it by the front door of my house, 308 00:18:46,160 --> 00:18:47,560 and he would come get it, so I did. 309 00:18:47,680 --> 00:18:49,040 I wrote the check 310 00:18:49,160 --> 00:18:50,800 <i>put it by the front door of my house.</i> 311 00:18:50,920 --> 00:18:53,080 <i>And Hilton came out of the woods,</i> 312 00:18:53,200 --> 00:18:56,360 <i>out of nowhere, at exactly the same time</i> 313 00:18:56,480 --> 00:18:57,960 <i>as I was walking down the driveway.</i> 314 00:18:58,080 --> 00:19:00,440 So we literally are now facing each other. 315 00:19:00,560 --> 00:19:03,760 <i>And all I can remember thinking at that point was,</i> 316 00:19:03,880 --> 00:19:06,440 wow, I wish I had on a bulletproof vest and a firearm 317 00:19:06,560 --> 00:19:07,720 right now. 318 00:19:07,840 --> 00:19:10,680 <i>I felt incredibly vulnerable.</i> 319 00:19:10,800 --> 00:19:14,720 I knew at that moment, I needed to get inside that front door 320 00:19:14,840 --> 00:19:16,360 of my house as quickly as possible, 321 00:19:16,480 --> 00:19:19,560 because I had a Glock 9-millimeter positioned 322 00:19:19,680 --> 00:19:21,480 close to the front door. 323 00:19:21,600 --> 00:19:24,880 <i>I dropped my belongings on the floor, got my firearm,</i> 324 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:28,120 chambered the round, and came right back out the front door 325 00:19:28,240 --> 00:19:32,600 <i>with the gun pointing in the direction he was in.</i> 326 00:19:32,720 --> 00:19:35,120 He was now maybe a hundred feet away, 327 00:19:35,240 --> 00:19:40,400 and he was fleeing back off into the woods. 328 00:19:40,520 --> 00:19:43,680 I believed that one of us was going to end up dead. 329 00:20:03,080 --> 00:20:06,160 <i>We found out of his bizarre encounters</i> 330 00:20:06,280 --> 00:20:08,320 <i>with law enforcement in the past.</i> 331 00:20:08,440 --> 00:20:10,960 For instance, he would be confronted in the forest 332 00:20:11,080 --> 00:20:13,600 for camping in an unauthorized area. 333 00:20:13,720 --> 00:20:15,640 That was captured on video. 334 00:20:15,760 --> 00:20:19,400 And he was acting extremely bizarre. 335 00:20:19,520 --> 00:20:21,360 <i>When we look at people who have gotten in trouble</i> 336 00:20:21,480 --> 00:20:24,240 with the law, they don't necessarily 337 00:20:24,360 --> 00:20:27,600 fit our idea as a society of acceptable behavior. 338 00:20:29,760 --> 00:20:32,600 That's where most serial killers kill, in an area 339 00:20:32,720 --> 00:20:34,000 where they are the most comfortable, 340 00:20:34,120 --> 00:20:35,160 and they feel the most in control. 341 00:20:39,760 --> 00:20:41,000 He has the upper hand. 342 00:20:41,120 --> 00:20:43,920 He knows this area backwards and forwards. 343 00:20:49,080 --> 00:20:52,120 So it was easy for him to scout, 344 00:20:52,240 --> 00:20:54,760 to have this fantasy of whatever he's doing. 345 00:20:57,440 --> 00:21:00,760 He knows exactly what to do to get these people to do 346 00:21:00,880 --> 00:21:02,120 what he wants them to do. 347 00:21:18,400 --> 00:21:21,120 <i>Authorities hold out little hope of finding 24-year-old</i> 348 00:21:21,240 --> 00:21:22,920 <i>Meredith Emerson alive.</i> 349 00:21:23,040 --> 00:21:26,160 <i>At that time, the newscast was,</i> 350 00:21:26,280 --> 00:21:30,760 <i>missing young girl up here in North Georgia mountains.</i> 351 00:21:30,880 --> 00:21:33,600 I remember running upstairs after watching that broadcast 352 00:21:33,720 --> 00:21:37,840 and telling my wife, you know, hey, 353 00:21:37,960 --> 00:21:39,440 you're not going to believe this. 354 00:21:39,560 --> 00:21:41,360 But did I just hear an expandable police baton? 355 00:21:41,480 --> 00:21:43,040 Because that's something that I knew 356 00:21:43,160 --> 00:21:46,240 Hilton had with him all the time. 357 00:21:46,360 --> 00:21:49,720 <i>He used those to protect his dog from other dogs</i> 358 00:21:49,840 --> 00:21:51,000 <i>approaching his dog.</i> 359 00:21:51,120 --> 00:21:53,200 And again, I had never met anyone 360 00:21:53,320 --> 00:21:56,520 in my life that carried around a police baton 361 00:21:56,640 --> 00:21:58,520 unless they were a police officer. 362 00:21:58,640 --> 00:22:03,360 And I said, I think I need to call the police. 363 00:22:03,480 --> 00:22:04,960 I basically just said-- 364 00:22:05,080 --> 00:22:09,080 told them who I was and that I knew someone 365 00:22:09,200 --> 00:22:11,880 who carried a police baton. 366 00:22:12,000 --> 00:22:18,400 He fit the description, had a dog that fit that description. 367 00:22:18,520 --> 00:22:20,160 I told them his name. 368 00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:24,000 I told them the vehicle that he was driving. 369 00:22:24,120 --> 00:22:27,720 John Tabor says, I can give you the tag number to the van 370 00:22:27,840 --> 00:22:32,200 because I bought it for him. 371 00:22:32,320 --> 00:22:35,080 So we pull a driver's license photo of him 372 00:22:35,200 --> 00:22:38,400 <i>and put it out onto the news media.</i> 373 00:22:38,520 --> 00:22:41,800 <i>Maybe six hours after I made that phone call, and--</i> 374 00:22:41,920 --> 00:22:46,160 this is the part that still stuns me today-- 375 00:22:46,280 --> 00:22:47,280 my phone rang. 376 00:22:48,760 --> 00:22:52,160 And it was him. 377 00:22:54,240 --> 00:22:57,320 <i>After seven months of absolutely no communication,</i> 378 00:22:57,440 --> 00:23:00,520 <i>and there he was, on the phone with me, out of nowhere,</i> 379 00:23:00,640 --> 00:23:04,000 <i>like a ghost.</i> 380 00:23:04,120 --> 00:23:08,320 I'm just, you know, sitting in my car 381 00:23:08,440 --> 00:23:10,160 in a state of disbelief. 382 00:23:12,600 --> 00:23:14,440 <i>And I played along.</i> 383 00:23:14,560 --> 00:23:18,800 <i>And he said he needed some money to get started,</i> 384 00:23:18,920 --> 00:23:20,560 you know, to get back to work and whatnot. 385 00:23:20,680 --> 00:23:21,760 And I said, hey, that's no problem. 386 00:23:21,880 --> 00:23:23,360 How much do you need? 387 00:23:23,480 --> 00:23:25,000 We discussed an amount. 388 00:23:25,120 --> 00:23:26,120 And I said, yeah, I'll be more than 389 00:23:26,240 --> 00:23:27,760 happy to give you the check. 390 00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:28,720 I tried to meet him right then and there. 391 00:23:28,840 --> 00:23:30,080 I said, well, where are you? 392 00:23:30,200 --> 00:23:34,120 I'll bring you a check right now. 393 00:23:34,240 --> 00:23:35,640 <i>He just said that that's not possible.</i> 394 00:23:35,760 --> 00:23:37,360 <i>I can't meet you.</i> 395 00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:39,440 He could not meet me then under any circumstances. 396 00:23:39,560 --> 00:23:41,480 But within the next couple of days, 397 00:23:41,600 --> 00:23:44,480 he would come get the check. 398 00:23:44,600 --> 00:23:46,800 <i>Once we learned that there was a possibility that Hilton</i> 399 00:23:46,920 --> 00:23:48,640 would go to pick up the check, 400 00:23:48,760 --> 00:23:52,440 we got with the local jurisdiction in Atlanta. 401 00:23:52,560 --> 00:23:57,480 And they deployed their SWAT team around the business. 402 00:23:57,600 --> 00:24:00,360 <i>And they were prepared to grab him if he showed up.</i> 403 00:24:00,480 --> 00:24:04,240 <i>They stayed all night, into the next day, and into Friday,</i> 404 00:24:04,360 --> 00:24:06,200 and he didn't show up. 405 00:24:11,520 --> 00:24:17,320 It wasn't that long until a citizen called 911 in that 406 00:24:17,440 --> 00:24:19,520 jurisdiction in Atlanta and said, 407 00:24:19,640 --> 00:24:21,280 I think I'm looking at the guy that y'all 408 00:24:21,400 --> 00:24:24,000 have been looking for all week with the missing hiker. 409 00:24:24,120 --> 00:24:25,360 <i>DeKalb 911.</i> 410 00:24:25,480 --> 00:24:27,080 <i>What's the exact location?</i> 411 00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:13,040 Basically stayed on the phone, 412 00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:16,520 watching him, while the officers were responding 413 00:25:16,640 --> 00:25:17,840 to take him into custody. 414 00:25:19,880 --> 00:25:22,120 <i>He was not talking.</i> 415 00:25:22,240 --> 00:25:27,840 But we knew that there were answers to some 416 00:25:27,960 --> 00:25:30,000 of our questions in the van. 417 00:25:30,120 --> 00:25:33,160 <i>Three bloody fleece tops and a bloodstained piece of a car</i> 418 00:25:33,280 --> 00:25:35,360 <i>seat belt were found in a trash bin</i> 419 00:25:35,480 --> 00:25:36,880 <i>beside a convenience store where</i> 420 00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:38,600 <i>Hilton had used a pay phone.</i> 421 00:25:38,720 --> 00:25:40,680 <i>Hilton had attempted to vacuum and wash</i> 422 00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:42,400 <i>portions of his van.</i> 423 00:25:42,520 --> 00:25:45,960 Basically, everything that had blood on it, or he thought 424 00:25:46,080 --> 00:25:48,720 had blood on it, or anything that could tie him to Meredith, 425 00:25:48,840 --> 00:25:52,520 he was trying to rid his van of it, basically. 426 00:25:52,640 --> 00:25:55,840 We had DeKalb County transport him to our headquarters. 427 00:25:59,600 --> 00:26:03,320 <i>When I arrived at the scene, Gary's vehicle was there.</i> 428 00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:06,200 There were witnesses that had seen Gary taking items out 429 00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:08,280 of his vehicle and throwing them in the dumpster 430 00:26:08,400 --> 00:26:10,040 at the convenience store. 431 00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:12,160 So I had a long night ahead of me. 432 00:26:12,280 --> 00:26:13,840 <i>I had to go through the dumpster,</i> 433 00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:15,680 <i>process every item in the dumpster</i> 434 00:26:15,800 --> 00:26:17,640 <i>behind a convenience store.</i> 435 00:26:17,760 --> 00:26:20,400 <i>I then had Gary's van, which we made the decision</i> 436 00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:23,160 to tow the van and process it in a controlled environment 437 00:26:23,280 --> 00:26:25,080 back in our lab. 438 00:26:25,200 --> 00:26:28,720 When I first met him, he was on the floor in a conference 439 00:26:28,840 --> 00:26:32,400 room in GBI headquarters. 440 00:26:32,520 --> 00:26:36,520 <i>Gary was lying on the floor in a fetal position</i> 441 00:26:36,640 --> 00:26:40,640 <i>and kept saying that he had multiple sclerosis,</i> 442 00:26:40,760 --> 00:26:44,240 and he needed an immediate shot of folic acid, 443 00:26:44,360 --> 00:26:47,840 and just kind of talking crazy. 444 00:26:47,960 --> 00:26:52,160 <i>He had a fingernail gouge into his nose,</i> 445 00:26:52,280 --> 00:26:57,320 <i>a pretty substantial cut on his nose from a fingernail.</i> 446 00:26:57,440 --> 00:27:00,640 It looked to be a defensive wound someone 447 00:27:00,760 --> 00:27:02,680 else had inflicted on him. 448 00:27:02,800 --> 00:27:05,480 And his hand was obviously broken. 449 00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:10,000 <i>And I said, hey, I just want to talk</i> 450 00:27:10,120 --> 00:27:11,840 <i>to you a little bit about where Meredith Emerson is.</i> 451 00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:34,720 He said, I believe verbatim, he said, 452 00:27:34,840 --> 00:27:36,000 I'm answering no questions. 453 00:27:36,120 --> 00:27:37,920 I'm waiving no rights. 454 00:27:38,040 --> 00:27:40,560 I want an attorney present with me before any questioning. 455 00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:46,400 <i>In Georgia, police are questioning</i> 456 00:27:46,520 --> 00:27:49,640 <i>the man last seen with missing hiker Meredith Emerson.</i> 457 00:27:49,760 --> 00:27:51,560 <i>Emerson disappeared on New Year's Day</i> 458 00:27:51,680 --> 00:27:54,840 <i>after going to a state park for a hike with her dog.</i> 459 00:27:54,960 --> 00:28:00,000 Once we had his van, we had tons of evidence. 460 00:28:00,120 --> 00:28:03,080 <i>The first obvious blood pattern that was located</i> 461 00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:05,840 <i>was on the back of the driver's seat.</i> 462 00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:08,040 So we cut it out. 463 00:28:08,160 --> 00:28:12,440 We had blood in the van that matched Meredith Emerson. 464 00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:15,040 <i>Cheryl Dunlap's car had a flat tire.</i> 465 00:28:15,160 --> 00:28:18,080 <i>And there was a bayonet that we recovered,</i> 466 00:28:18,200 --> 00:28:20,480 <i>like a military-style bayonet knife.</i> 467 00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:23,400 <i>And Florida forensics were able to match that</i> 468 00:28:23,520 --> 00:28:26,200 <i>to the puncture in the tire.</i> 469 00:28:26,320 --> 00:28:30,120 In a couple of the videos, 470 00:28:30,240 --> 00:28:34,000 where Gary is trying to get money out of the ATM, 471 00:28:34,120 --> 00:28:36,240 <i>he's wearing a yellow jacket with a piece</i> 472 00:28:36,360 --> 00:28:38,520 <i>of reflective material on it.</i> 473 00:28:38,640 --> 00:28:41,560 <i>That jacket was in the van.</i> 474 00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:45,080 In Georgia, there is a criminal statute 475 00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:48,440 called kidnapping with bodily injury, 476 00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:50,440 which carries a life sentence. 477 00:28:50,560 --> 00:28:53,920 So we knew that we had him for that. 478 00:28:54,040 --> 00:28:55,240 <i>We got a call from the prosecutor</i> 479 00:28:55,360 --> 00:28:57,960 and said, OK, he's willing to meet and tell 480 00:28:58,080 --> 00:28:59,320 you where Meredith is. 481 00:29:05,880 --> 00:29:08,200 <i>He is such a narcissist</i> 482 00:29:08,320 --> 00:29:13,040 that he believes that he is the best at what he does. 483 00:29:13,160 --> 00:29:18,280 <i>And I believe that for him to be caught</i> 484 00:29:18,400 --> 00:29:21,720 <i>was almost humiliating to him, because he was</i> 485 00:29:21,840 --> 00:29:23,160 <i>smarter than anybody,</i> 486 00:29:23,280 --> 00:29:26,080 smarter than any of us in the room with him. 487 00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:42,480 <i>Everything I've studied throughout my career</i> 488 00:29:42,600 --> 00:29:46,440 tells me that he's probably a sexual sadist psychopath. 489 00:29:47,920 --> 00:29:50,640 <i>One thing that he wanted very much</i> 490 00:29:50,760 --> 00:29:52,200 <i>was to have the death penalty taken off the table</i> 491 00:29:52,320 --> 00:29:54,080 <i>before he would talk.</i> 492 00:29:54,200 --> 00:29:57,080 At that point, we knew we had John Bryant 493 00:29:57,200 --> 00:30:02,120 <i>DNA in that van.</i> 494 00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:06,560 <i>Some boots had Cheryl Dunlap's blood on it.</i> 495 00:30:06,680 --> 00:30:08,800 So we knew we had a couple of more bites at the apple 496 00:30:08,920 --> 00:30:10,840 of giving him the death penalty, 497 00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:14,120 <i>and agreed to go ahead and take</i> 498 00:30:14,240 --> 00:30:15,640 <i>the death penalty off the table for Meredith</i> 499 00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:18,600 and recover her body. 500 00:30:18,720 --> 00:30:20,160 <i>Went up to the jail.</i> 501 00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:22,640 <i>And Clay and I went into a room.</i> 502 00:30:22,760 --> 00:30:24,280 <i>And they brought him in.</i> 503 00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:26,840 <i>And I said, I understand that you want to tell</i> 504 00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:28,520 <i>us where Meredith is now.</i> 505 00:30:28,640 --> 00:30:30,560 <i>And so he began to tell us the story.</i> 506 00:30:38,200 --> 00:30:42,840 Meredith decided to go for a hike and a jog on New Year's. 507 00:30:42,960 --> 00:30:46,040 <i>Gary sat up in the woods and surveyed the parking lot</i> 508 00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:47,960 <i>and made the decision on who he was going to abduct</i> 509 00:30:48,080 --> 00:30:50,080 <i>and carried out his plan.</i> 510 00:30:50,200 --> 00:30:53,680 Hilton basically saw her on the trail. 511 00:30:56,240 --> 00:30:57,120 <i>She had a dog.</i> 512 00:30:57,240 --> 00:30:58,800 <i>He had a dog.</i> 513 00:30:58,920 --> 00:30:59,560 <i>He knew that he could strike up a conversation</i> 514 00:30:59,680 --> 00:31:02,080 <i>about the dogs.</i> 515 00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:04,200 <i>Eventually, she said, OK, I'll talk to you later.</i> 516 00:31:04,320 --> 00:31:06,080 <i>And she pretty much ran up the trail.</i> 517 00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:08,280 <i>And she probably sensed that there</i> 518 00:31:08,400 --> 00:31:10,960 <i>was something-- something wasn't good about it,</i> 519 00:31:11,080 --> 00:31:13,600 <i>and left him behind.</i> 520 00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:19,160 So he concealed himself along the trail. 521 00:31:19,280 --> 00:31:21,480 Some people had actually seen him hiding, 522 00:31:21,600 --> 00:31:23,080 crouching behind the rocks. 523 00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:25,920 Gary Hilton waited on Meredith as she was 524 00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:27,880 coming back down the trail. 525 00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:30,360 And he attacked her. 526 00:31:47,080 --> 00:31:49,040 Meredith was trained in martial arts. 527 00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:50,640 And Gary Hilton would later tell 528 00:31:50,760 --> 00:31:52,960 us that she almost took him. 529 00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:55,680 In other words, she almost beat him up. 530 00:31:55,800 --> 00:31:58,720 He finally got control of her by convincing her he had a gun. 531 00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:08,520 And so he makes his way back down to the parking lot 532 00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:12,400 and forces Meredith into the van, along with Ella, 533 00:32:12,520 --> 00:32:14,120 and they leave. 534 00:32:31,280 --> 00:32:36,480 The bank should have known that her PIN and her card 535 00:32:36,600 --> 00:32:38,200 was used. 536 00:32:38,320 --> 00:32:44,320 For whatever reason, since no money was taken out, 537 00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:49,880 they didn't classify that as being used, or something. 538 00:32:50,000 --> 00:32:54,120 <i>But I feel confident that in Meredith's mind,</i> 539 00:32:54,240 --> 00:32:57,160 <i>she was doing that</i> 540 00:32:57,280 --> 00:33:01,760 in hopes that we would be able to track her 541 00:33:01,880 --> 00:33:03,440 and be able to find her sooner. 542 00:33:16,800 --> 00:33:18,000 She was thinking, well, if I can just 543 00:33:18,120 --> 00:33:21,080 keep him at bay just a little bit longer, 544 00:33:21,200 --> 00:33:22,080 they're going to find me. 545 00:33:22,200 --> 00:33:23,000 They're going to find me. 546 00:33:59,400 --> 00:34:01,120 <i>I listened to all that and him</i> 547 00:34:01,240 --> 00:34:02,960 <i>describe how he took her life.</i> 548 00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:08,200 And once he was taken away, it all flooded in on me, 549 00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:09,760 and I just began to cry. 550 00:34:09,880 --> 00:34:12,520 It was nothing I've ever experienced 551 00:34:12,640 --> 00:34:16,760 <i>before, nothing like anything I've ever been around.</i> 552 00:34:26,840 --> 00:34:31,640 It was too much to even comprehend, 553 00:34:31,760 --> 00:34:36,840 how he could be that cruel, 554 00:34:36,960 --> 00:34:43,080 that evil, and commit the horrific acts that he did. 555 00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:44,840 <i>It's sickening.</i> 556 00:34:44,960 --> 00:34:47,880 <i>It makes me sick today, just thinking about it.</i> 557 00:34:48,000 --> 00:34:51,320 <i>I'm sick to my stomach.</i> 558 00:34:58,040 --> 00:34:59,680 I wish I had killed him. 559 00:35:02,360 --> 00:35:07,440 After the fact, finding out 560 00:35:07,560 --> 00:35:12,480 everything that she did and how close we came to catching him 561 00:35:12,600 --> 00:35:15,600 on numerous occasions, and she was still alive, 562 00:35:15,720 --> 00:35:20,640 to this day, it breaks my heart. 563 00:35:35,240 --> 00:35:37,240 He agreed to tell us where the body was. 564 00:35:37,360 --> 00:35:40,200 <i>And he started showing us on a map.</i> 565 00:35:40,320 --> 00:35:43,400 <i>And he said, the head will be missing.</i> 566 00:35:43,520 --> 00:35:47,200 <i>So we took Hilton to that area.</i> 567 00:35:47,320 --> 00:35:49,320 <i>We take him with us down there because I</i> 568 00:35:49,440 --> 00:35:55,440 was not sure at all that we could find both scenes. 569 00:35:55,560 --> 00:36:00,800 And so we were able to find Meredith's body. 570 00:36:02,600 --> 00:36:05,520 Well, the body was covered with leaves 571 00:36:05,640 --> 00:36:07,320 and limbs and debris. 572 00:36:07,440 --> 00:36:09,600 Literally, you could be standing a couple of feet away 573 00:36:09,720 --> 00:36:11,320 and not know there was a body there. 574 00:36:11,440 --> 00:36:14,520 So he had done a very good job of concealing the body. 575 00:36:16,520 --> 00:36:20,120 He had taken her head off and moved it 576 00:36:20,240 --> 00:36:25,320 to another location about a mile away from her body. 577 00:36:25,440 --> 00:36:31,240 And we walked him down a little road inside the forest. 578 00:36:31,360 --> 00:36:36,560 And he told me to walk up over a small bank 579 00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:40,120 <i>to a dead tree that would be lying on the ground.</i> 580 00:36:40,240 --> 00:36:42,040 <i>On one end of the tree would be some</i> 581 00:36:42,160 --> 00:36:43,960 <i>of Meredith's clothing.</i> 582 00:36:44,080 --> 00:36:48,200 <i>And toward the other end would be her head.</i> 583 00:36:50,640 --> 00:36:53,640 And we secured both scenes and went to work 584 00:36:53,760 --> 00:36:55,400 that night in the forest. 585 00:36:58,000 --> 00:36:59,880 <i>Gary Hilton was very arrogant.</i> 586 00:37:00,000 --> 00:37:03,360 He was very nonchalant about what he had done 587 00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:06,440 <i>and why he had done it.</i> 588 00:37:06,560 --> 00:37:11,760 I asked him why he had removed her head. 589 00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:16,600 And he said, for forensic purposes. 590 00:37:16,720 --> 00:37:19,520 <i>Gary Hilton didn't do that for forensic purposes.</i> 591 00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:22,360 <i>He did it because he liked it.</i> 592 00:37:22,480 --> 00:37:24,520 As soon as I was able to find 593 00:37:24,640 --> 00:37:30,080 Meredith's head 594 00:37:30,200 --> 00:37:32,880 I guess that's about the only time in my career 595 00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:34,200 that I just wanted to shoot him. 596 00:37:36,440 --> 00:37:40,520 <i>He has absolutely no redeeming features at all.</i> 597 00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:43,000 So we got him out of there very quickly 598 00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:44,640 and took him back up to the jail. 599 00:38:01,480 --> 00:38:07,200 It was the most horrific thing I think I had ever heard. 600 00:38:07,320 --> 00:38:09,160 <i>You really start getting a sense</i> 601 00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:15,440 of this dehumanization and complete lack of any ability 602 00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:16,960 to care about anybody else. 603 00:38:28,120 --> 00:38:32,040 He seemed to have no trouble whatsoever murdering Meredith. 604 00:38:32,160 --> 00:38:36,080 But he cannot murder Ella. 605 00:38:36,200 --> 00:38:38,600 <i>And I think that's very, very significant.</i> 606 00:38:38,720 --> 00:38:41,880 <i>It just speaks to the lack of attachment</i> 607 00:38:42,000 --> 00:38:44,440 that Gary Hilton seems to have with anybody. 608 00:38:47,760 --> 00:38:51,960 John Bryant was taken, held captive 609 00:38:52,080 --> 00:38:53,920 <i>in the back of Hilton's van.</i> 610 00:38:54,040 --> 00:38:56,720 He chained him around the neck and padlocked the chain. 611 00:38:56,840 --> 00:38:59,400 <i>And takes him to another park.</i> 612 00:38:59,520 --> 00:39:05,960 And then he kills him, uses his bank card, and gets $300. 613 00:39:06,080 --> 00:39:09,160 And that is what he gets in exchange for, you know, 614 00:39:09,280 --> 00:39:12,000 just a beautiful couple's life. 615 00:39:12,120 --> 00:39:15,560 <i>And it was later on that John's body</i> 616 00:39:15,680 --> 00:39:20,240 was found in the Nantahala National Forest. 617 00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:23,240 And he was identified by his pacemaker, I believe. 618 00:39:23,360 --> 00:39:25,000 He had a pacemaker inserted. 619 00:39:25,120 --> 00:39:29,640 And it was still within his remains. 620 00:39:29,760 --> 00:39:32,360 <i>I do think, once he crossed the line,</i> 621 00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:38,440 once he murders Irene and John, I think there is no going back. 622 00:39:38,560 --> 00:39:40,000 And I think he would have continued 623 00:39:40,120 --> 00:39:43,440 to kill until he was caught. 624 00:40:00,240 --> 00:40:03,800 It tells us a lot about Gary Hilton in terms of how he views 625 00:40:03,920 --> 00:40:07,080 his victims, essentially as objects 626 00:40:07,200 --> 00:40:10,720 that he's got to now figure out how to disguise and get rid of. 627 00:40:26,880 --> 00:40:28,800 We know he allegedly had a psychotic break. 628 00:40:28,920 --> 00:40:31,800 And there have been several people who've said that perhaps 629 00:40:31,920 --> 00:40:33,560 he had some severe mental illness, 630 00:40:33,680 --> 00:40:35,400 like schizoaffective disorder and those kinds of things. 631 00:40:58,960 --> 00:41:00,760 He goes in all these rants. 632 00:41:00,880 --> 00:41:02,440 <i>He talks about all these things that</i> 633 00:41:02,560 --> 00:41:05,680 <i>don't seem to have anything to do with the reason</i> 634 00:41:05,800 --> 00:41:07,760 <i>he's being interrogated about.</i> 635 00:41:07,880 --> 00:41:12,000 <i>He absolutely does seem to be, you know,</i> 636 00:41:12,120 --> 00:41:16,080 <i>disturbed in some respects.</i> 637 00:41:16,200 --> 00:41:17,960 There is no doubt in my mind that he 638 00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:21,160 killed many other people. 639 00:41:21,280 --> 00:41:23,200 You don't wake up at 61 and start 640 00:41:23,320 --> 00:41:26,640 doing these kinds of crimes the way he does them. 641 00:41:26,760 --> 00:41:28,960 Dismembering bodies is not something 642 00:41:29,080 --> 00:41:31,760 you just decide to do. 643 00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:34,560 <i>There's no way to know that unless he tells you that,</i> 644 00:41:34,680 --> 00:41:36,000 unless you can prove to him that you 645 00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:37,760 can prove that he did do it. 646 00:41:41,800 --> 00:41:45,520 I think that Gary Michael Hilton 647 00:41:45,640 --> 00:41:50,640 is a coward. 648 00:41:50,760 --> 00:41:56,320 <i>What he did to Meredith and what he did to Sherry,</i> 649 00:41:56,440 --> 00:41:59,280 <i>just absolutely, totally wicked.</i> 650 00:42:17,280 --> 00:42:20,080 <i>Gary Hilton's absolutely evil.</i> 651 00:42:20,200 --> 00:42:22,440 <i>You look in his eyes, and you can tell that.</i> 652 00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:27,240 He brags about being the smartest guy in the room. 653 00:42:27,360 --> 00:42:31,960 <i>Yeah, even though he has a fairly high IQ,</i> 654 00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:34,520 <i>he made some serious mistakes in these cases</i> 655 00:42:34,640 --> 00:42:38,920 <i>that helped us prosecute him.</i> 656 00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:43,920 But he's a typical serial killer, very narcissistic, 657 00:42:44,040 --> 00:42:47,680 holds himself in very high regard, 658 00:42:47,800 --> 00:42:51,360 has to be the center of attention when you talk to him. 659 00:42:51,480 --> 00:42:54,400 He fits the definition of a serial killer, by far. 660 00:42:58,200 --> 00:43:02,280 I honestly believe that there's countless victims that 661 00:43:02,400 --> 00:43:05,280 fell victim to Gary Hilton. 662 00:43:05,400 --> 00:43:09,480 But he will never say anything about it 663 00:43:09,600 --> 00:43:15,240 unless his execution date is set and the time draws near. 664 00:43:15,360 --> 00:43:19,760 He may bring something up just to remain alive. 665 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:24,520 So I'm holding out hope that when that day comes, 666 00:43:24,640 --> 00:43:27,200 and hopefully in the near future, that he will 667 00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:29,160 start to open up a little bit. 668 00:43:29,280 --> 00:43:34,400 But unless you can show Gary Hilton that he is caught, 669 00:43:34,520 --> 00:43:39,400 he will admit to nothing. 670 00:43:39,520 --> 00:43:41,600 <i>He's just pure evil.</i> 671 00:43:41,720 --> 00:43:43,640 <i>You can see it in his eyes.</i> 672 00:43:43,760 --> 00:43:46,120 I've never met anybody that you could 673 00:43:46,240 --> 00:43:49,800 literally look in their eyes and see evil, but him. 674 00:43:49,920 --> 00:43:50,800 <i>And he is.</i> 675 00:43:50,920 --> 00:43:54,360 <i>He's truly evil.</i> 676 00:44:18,720 --> 00:44:21,440 He called himself a sick ripper. 677 00:44:21,560 --> 00:44:23,960 <i>He was an affable southern gentleman,</i> 678 00:44:24,080 --> 00:44:26,480 had a good sense of humor, and was very easygoing 679 00:44:26,600 --> 00:44:27,480 and laid back. 680 00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:36,200 <i>He shows that picture and tells a jailhouse inmate,</i> 681 00:44:36,320 --> 00:44:38,080 I'm the one that murdered this young woman. 682 00:44:45,200 --> 00:44:47,600 She was stepping into a death chamber. 682 00:44:48,305 --> 00:45:48,326 Do you want subtitles for any video? -=[ ai.OpenSubtitles.com ]=-