“Friendly” Wife Has No Idea Police Are About To Arrest Her For Murder

The woman on the phone is 43 -year -old Rebecca Fenton.Her husband is on the floor of their foyer, shot twice.

I can't live without this.Okay, I understand, ma 'am.What is your husband's name?

And the version of events she is about to give to detectives over the next six hours will not match a single thing investigators find at that scene.

Do you have a life insurance policy?

I think Larry does, yes.For how much?

I don't know.Who's the beneficiary?

I think I am because I'm his wife.

So the person that ransacked the place probably killed him first, do you think?

It is a routine Sunday afternoon in Clearwater, Florida, February 3rd, 2008, when the Clearwater Police Department receives a call logged simply as a possible domestic emergency.Officers respond expecting a medical situation.What they walk into is a crime scene that has been designed to look like something it's not.

Okay, what is the address there, ma 'am?Okay.I want you to stay on the line for the police department.I'll need to speak to them first.Stay on the phone.It looks like a burglary.

Oh my God.Go ahead.Call her.What's going on?It looks like shot or stabbed or something.

You have just heard Rebecca Fenton's voice on the 911 call.Officers arrived to find Lawrence Fenton face down on the foyer floor between the living room and the front door, shot twice.Once in the back, once in the neck, his body pointed toward the exit.He had been running away from whoever fired the gun and whatever he was running from, it was already inside the house with him.A neighbor standing across the street in the open air heard five separate shots.The police department's own evidence would later determine that five shots were fired inside that house.

Rebecca Fenton, in a detached gym directly behind the house with music blaring, heard exactly one.

I was working out at the gym.I heard a noise.What kind of noise did you hear?It was like, and I was like, what is that?So I came in front of the gym.

The description of that sound is not consistent across her accounts.She adjusts it each time she gives it.What does not adjust is the number.What investigators are quietly building from is not what she says she heard, it is the gap between 1 and 5.The house appears ransacked across two floors, but the items left behind tell a different story than the ones taken.Paintings valued between $17 ,000 and $25 ,000 were still on the walls.

a set of antique furniture untouched, a sewing box containing expensive jewelry hidden inside a compartment that opens like a puzzle, only accessible if you had been told it was there.The only things gone were Larry's watch, his wallet, and his white Jeep Cherokee.That Jeep was found less than one block away, parked, engine off, every item still inside it.There is one thing about the crime scene that investigators keep returning to.A real burglar, after shooting a homeowner, flees.They do not stay to open drawers on two floors.

They do not carefully stage a scene and then leave the stolen car around the corner with everything inside it.The only explanation for parking that Jeep 50 yards away and walking back is that the person driving it had a specific destination to return to and very little time to do it before the police arrived.What exactly that destination was and what they did once they got back there would not become clear to investigators for years.What they had in those first hours was only a question they could not answer.None of that is what she tells the two detectives sitting across from her that night.And the places where her story is most carefully constructed are exactly where investigators find the most useful gaps.

Okay, Detective Spalding, like I said earlier, this is my partner Detective Rowland.I just want to get some general information from you.Do you have any answers?

Have you found anything else?

Not yet, no.I don't have any information.The other officers are out on the scene doing what they have to do.The lady said that it was going to take some time.Yes, it will.Forensics comes out there.

They do the processing.

It really doesn't matter.

He's gone.So, but the more evidence obviously we can get, you know, processing the scene, the better it will be and the quicker it will be to capture who's done this.

Good.

Okay?Okay.Do we have an idea, anything, neighbors, anybody?There are officers out there talking to the neighbors, they're doing canvassing, but they haven't gotten back to me yet.So, there's more going on at the scene.Sorry.

No, that's okay.

What the detective is watching in real time is the absence of something specific.When a spouse receives confirmation that their partner is dead, the processing of that information takes over the room.It is involuntary.It is not managed.The woman sitting across from him is managed.The questions come in the right order.

The emotional beats arrive where they are expected and end before they become inconvenient.Spalding will later describe it as the behavior of someone running a calculation rather than absorbing a loss.Larry Fenton was 57 years old, a sales representative for a Swedish medical equipment firm.Super Bowl Sunday was supposed to be a quiet day off before an upcoming business trip.

When this incident happened, we have an in -law apartment in the back that we turned into a gym.I was in the gym, in our gym, when this happened.Okay.

Tell me about today, when you guys first got up.Anything unusual or strange happen in the morning?First of all, what time did you guys get up?

I had to get up a little bit earlier than usual because I was taking a girl that I, again, you know, I have to tell you,I'm in the program.I hate to break my anonymity, but it has a lot to do with my life.And one of the girls that I sponsor is in the PAR program.I had to pick her up to take her to a morning meeting that started at 9 .45.And that meeting probably 200 people saw us there.

Larry had told me before his trip that he didn't want to do anything.He was going to go to the gym, come home, do a little bit of work on his laptop, and then he was going to watch golf, something about Tiger Woods playing in Dubai, and then, of course, try to take a nap.Poor guy went to bed early, and he wanted to stay awake for the Super Bowl.

Okay.That's where he was left when this happened.Okay.

The alibi is fully formed before the detective asks a single confrontational question.Rebecca has the morning accounted for.The 9 .45 a .m.meeting.200 witnesses in that room.

Breakfast after.Dropping off her sponsee Alex at exactly 1 .37 p .m.by the clock in her car.She came home.She talked to Larry.

She went to the gym.She heard a noise.She came in.What she is not accounted for and what she will not be asked to account for until later is what happened in the gap between arriving home and going to the gym or why a man who was killed in the foyer was last seen by her on the living room couch.

I was sitting on the ball when I heard a noise.Okay.But it didn't sound like a pop, it sounded like somebody dropped something.Okay.And I also had music on real loud.So I continued to keep working out and all of a sudden I was like, I wasn't concerned, I just was, let me just go see him again.

Right.Now, the music, is it like stereo?Stereo.Okay, you don't have headphones in your ears or anything like that?I have an iPod, but I only...But you weren't using it today?

Okay.

Do you remember what station you were listening to?

I had a CD.Okay.

You heard something that sounded like you said it dropped.Something dropped.Something fell off the roof.Was it...One noise?Was it several noises?

No, it was one.

It was like something fell off the roof.Okay.And I kept on doing my sit -ups.And then I realized, I was like, yeah, let me go check on him.But it wasn't because of the noise.I just periodically, we just check on each other.

Okay.From the gym, what route did you take to get there?Well, I didn't ask for.

My husband was laying in the foyer.Okay.There was blood everywhere.He was laying.

Is the back door open or shut?Do you mean open, not locked.Open, standing open?No, it was shut, but it was not locked.Was the front door locked?

The front door was not locked, unless he got it to lock it, which I doubt, because I walked out the front door to go out to my car and grab some where and when and some pamphlets on some sponsorship for AA.Earlier and Larry wouldn't get up and lock the front door.He'll do all that at night.

Do you guys normally leave your doors open?Unlocked?

Not the front door, no.The front door is set up so that when youI feel like I can't think.I feel like my mind's not inside of my head.That's okay.I haven't repped.

Right.

It's a huge shock.

Our front door is set up so that you lock it only from the inside.Okay.

Is it an envelope from the inside or is the lock in the door or both?

I'm not sure what you're asking me. I know that from the inside, it's twist.There's a twist lock.There's not a key.If I shut the door, there's not a key for me to lock it.So it has to be locked from the inside.I'm the one that will go out the front door.

Larry Wilt, they're in the way to get the mail.But he always locks it behind him.When I come back in, I always lock it behind me.If I go for a walk on the trail, I'll go out the front door, he'll leave the door open so that I can get back in it.But we almost always go through, we have a six -foot fence around our property.We always go through the side, through the lanai, and through the back door.

We will lock the back door if neither one of us is home.If I'm gone doing service work, and he has to go up to low, then he'll lock the door.If he's not home, then I'll lock the door.

Okay, so basically you keep the back door unlocked when you guys are homing around, but you keep the front door locked?Most of the time.Okay.

What investigators cannot reconcile with any version of the burglary theory is what they find at the scene.She tells them she checked his pulse twice.but the forensic processing of that foyer shows the area around Larry's body completely undisturbed.No compression marks at the neck, no displacement consistent with a hand reaching down to check anything at the wrist.The fluid pooling beneath him had already begun to separate andsettle by the time officers arrived.

If she touched him in two different locations, that evidence would be there.It is not.

I said, I'm loaded, I have the police following me, so if you're in my house, you better come out now.

Okay, then when did you call 911?

I thought the house had been ransacked.I ran back down.I checked my husband again for a pulse.

Did he have a pulse the first time?

I couldn't tell.

What about the second time?

I didn't feel one, but I didn't know if I was feeling in the right place.

Okay.

I got out of the house.I went to my car, which was in the driveway.I opened up the door and I called you guys.Okay.And then I got out of my car and I was hysterical and I just started pacing the driveway.I was like, somebody's got to get here now.

If he's still alive, maybe you can help him.I'm trying to remember what else I said.

What did they tell you on the phone?

Try to calm down.What is your name?Help is on the way.Um, was he shot or was he stabbed?I told him that I didn't know, I couldn't tell.I just kept, I don't know if I was screaming, I just kept saying.

You just, let me, when you checked him, you just checked his pulse.

His eyes were open.I checked here.

Was he face up or face down?He was face down.Face down?Blood.

all around him.

How was his head?Was his head down or to the side?

His head was to the side and his eyes were open and that's what made me think that maybe he was alive and if I could get an ambulance out there fast enough even we could save his life.

Okay, so you checked his pulse?

I checked his neck.When I came back down the stairs, I checked his arm.And then I thought it was a good idea if I got out of the house to just call the police.

Okay, you didn't try CPR, didn't try to revive him?

No, I didn't think it was a good idea to touch anything.

What did you think happened?

I wanted to know if my husband was still alive.

Let me just make sure I understand you right.You came in the back door, your husband's laying there.You went to him first.Yes.Okay.Screamed.

Okay.Where's the nearest phone to your husband at that time?

The nearest phone to my husband would have been in the living room, but our living room phones, the buttons haven't been working recently.

Okay.

So my cell phone is sitting in my car.I would have had to have gone upstairs and either used his business line or use the landline that's upstairs.When I went upstairs, it wasn't to use the phone.It was to see what the hell had happened and if anybody else was still in my house.When I saw my husband's office and I saw my room had been ransacked, I ran back downstairs.I checked Larry again.

OK.Was anything ransacked on the first floor?

Yes, the living room.The living room was ransacked.The drawers had been pulled out.All of my self -help books had been pulled out.This just happened.I'm having a hard time remembering.

I'll do this again.best I can.And I think it was a good idea to move him.I just remember telling the lady, hurry, if we get an ambulance to him, maybe he's not dead.

Let me just ask you, why didn't you think it was a good idea to move him?

I couldn't tell them the fact of what had happened.I couldn't.

What did you think happened?

Very wrong.He couldn't be dead.If I could get an ambulance there fast enough, maybe they could help.I didn't think it was a good idea to touch them.I can remember being leery just to get a pulse.I guess I just watched too much TV, and it's like, don't touch.

Don't disturb.What kind of TV would tell you that?

I don't know.CSI, I guess.Don't touch anything.The minute you find out something's wrong, get outside.Call the police.

The explanation she offers is that she watches too much television.What investigators noted was that the only phone she used was the one that was with her the entire time, and that using it from the car, rather from inside the house, put a specific amount of distance between her and the scene before any recording of her location began.

We did on a gun.We bought one very, very recently.You just have one gun in the house?

Yes.

Is it a handgun?Is it a shotgun?A rifle?It's a handgun.

I don't know a lot about it, but we bought it recently and it's registered, so I can't tell you the exact date.Is it registered to you or your husband?Don't quote me, I think Larry told me that it was legal for both of us to use, but only if we used it in the house.Like I couldn't put it in my car or tote it around in my purse.The reason that we bought it was because, and again I'm guessing three or four months ago, and I have a couple of friends that can confirm the date.Some wack job ended up seeing me at the grocery store and started following me, giving me a hard time, showed up at a meeting on time.

I filed a report with an officer or sergeant, I don't remember, but his name was Was he a Clearwater officer?Yes, I talked to him right on the streets of Clearwater, right very close to the courthouse and I told him I was being harassed and he said that counted as a report and to just watch my back and I carry mace, I showed him my mace.

Did he give you a report number?

No, I'm trying to remember if he gave me a card though.

Did he take a report?

No, we stood talking on the streets because I asked him, I parked my car by the courthouse to go talk to the police about this guy that was continuously bothering me, and he stopped by as I parked my car, and I was like, can you tell me how to get to the police station?Well, then you pull up again and then pull up again, and he said,got in the car and was like, can I help you?And I was like, yeah, I need to talk to somebody about somebody who's harassing me. I don't know what his name is. I don't know what to do, but I want to file a restraining order.I've never filed a restraining order before.And he told me, until we know who the guy is, you know.

Tell me a little bit about this guy.You said the first time you noticed him was in the grocery store?Which grocery store?Okay, and this was about three or four months ago, do you believe this is when it happened?

He wore Oakley sunglasses.He was bigger than I was and he never quit smiling.And the only thing that came out of his mouth is, I just want to talk to you, you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen.And it started with, I was taking groceries from the cart and putting them into my car.I turn around and there he is handing me my groceries.And it doesn't seem like it now, but I have a very dominant personality, and I'm not hysterical by nature.

I told him to step back or I'd call the police.And that I didn't need his help, and him being so close was making me uncomfortable.He followed me out of the parking lot.

He followed you in his vehicle?

In his vehicle.

Okay, do you remember what he was driving?

He was driving a gray Taurus.But the next time I saw him...

Okay, is this a white male or a black male?This is a white male.Okay.About how old do you think he is?

I'm going to guess and say between 30 and 40, but it's very hard to make guesses.He never quit smiling and he never took those Oakleys off and that's all he said.

Do you remember anything about his teeth?Did he have any chipped teeth, crooked teeth?

I don't remember that.I just remember that he just had a goofy smile.

What about hair color?Dark?

Dark, yes.Chestnut brown.Okay, what about the length?Just, I don't want to say ordinary.

Just a regular cut, like an inch?If you look at him, you'd think he was a normal guy.Okay.Except that he had this goofy smile.What about facial hair?Any goatee?

No.Mastic clean shaven?No.Glade shaven.

Oakley sunglasses.

Did you notice any tattoos on him anywhere?

No.

Was he wearing What kind of clothes was he wearing?

The first time that I saw him, he was wearing a dark, like a cobalt, not a cobalt, more of a cornflower blue, Ralph Lauren sort of shirt.I can't guarantee it was a Ralph Lauren, but that type of a shirt.

Like a polo shirt?Yeah, like a polo.

And jeans and tennis shoes.

So that's when he heard his wet guy had something to do with it?We haven't had any problems with him.I haven't seen him.I don't know.Basically, we're just gathering information and trying to find out, you know?And this is all information that I need to get from you.

All right, so that was three or four months ago.He followed you in his car.You thought it was a gray Taurus.Did he follow you all the way out of the parking lot?I didn't realize it was following me until I got on Gulf to Bay.

There is no police report.Investigators check.Officer Fowler has no record of the conversation Rebecca describes on the sidewalk near the Clearwater Courthouse.The verbal report she says was logged into his radio does not appear in any system.The stalker cannot be identified.What the story does accomplish, whether it was designed to or not, is this.

It explains the gun's purposein the house without making either of them sound like the kind of people who simply decided to get armed.It introduces an external threat with a face.

Did you remember at all handling this gun at all?

No.

Okay, so you've never put your hands on a gun?Oh, I did when he showed it to me, yes.Okay.

Yeah.So, but it was safe.I remember, I remember like picking it up like this and I was like, you know, I don't know, Mary, we haven't seen this guy.And he's like, it's there if we need it.99 .9 % chance you're not going to need it.We've never had a problem.

My husband's traveled so frequently, over 144 lives a year.We've never needed any protection.Nobody's ever given me a hard time.We live in what I consider a safe neighborhood and our house runs right along the trail, very close to Myrtle, which can be considered a bad area for drugs.We've never had any problems.Never.

So you picked up the gun before, but just by like the...

He brought it home and he showed it to me and I was just kind of like...I was like, you know, we haven't seen this guy in a while.And he was like, I'm going to take you down to the gun range.I'm going to show you how to shoot it so you're perfectly comfortable with it.We don't see the nut ball again, then fine.When I'm out of town, if you ever need it, he said, but I will tell you this, it's only legal to use in the house.

You can't go toting it around.He joked with me, he said, you can't get PMS and think that you want it.And I was like, I understand.And he was like, this is where it's going to be kept.Where did you guys keep it in the house?We kept it in our armoire, in our bedroom, in the third drawer on the left side.

Okay.Was it in a gun case?It was in a, like a canvas.Did it, did it come with the gun?In other words, or was it just a canvas case that you guys?No, I think that it came with the gun.

Okay.Do you keep it loaded or not loaded?

I don't know.I don't know if it was or if it wasn't.I didn't pay attention.

Okay.Do you remember where he kept the bullets?

I know the bullets weren't kept in the drawer because I did the laundry and I put his laundry away.There was no, there was no bullets.Maybe out in the laundry room you would find it or look in our garage.Maybe he kept ammunition there.

So if you guys had an emergency, say the guy came into your house, Would you know where to get the gun, how to load the gun, protect yourself with it?

I'd do the best I could.I mean, I'd have to unzip that case.Larry told me if anybody ever came, I would be upstairs.Chances are.And he said, you know, hopefully you won't be down in the great room.You'll be upstairs.

He said, if you can just undo the safety and just shoot.And I go, I don't want to hurt anybody.

I stopped you right there for a minute.Why would you be upstairs?If somebody came?

Because I spend a lot of time upstairs.Most of my life is upstairs.Our television's up there.I have my own bedroom, dressing room in the house.When Larry's gone, I spend most of my time upstairs.And he said, you know, if you're upstairs, all you have to do is undo the safety, you know, and if you can just fire it, it'll scare the dickens out of them and they'll get out of the house.

You say you have your own bedroom?

I have my own room.It's a dressing room.

He has a separate room.Do you guys have separate bedrooms?

No, no, no.We live together.We're very intimate.We have our own room.I'm a princess, so I had to have my own dressing room.And then he had an office.

We had three bedrooms.

Following morning, ballistics matched that weapon to the rounds that killed Larry.It had been wiped clean of prints, and what was in the bag alongside it confirmed something specific about the person who put it there.They knew where the gun was kept, they knew which keys opened the house, and they had access to the car from the moment the shooting ended to the moment the first officer pulled up.Investigators were already working that problem when she was still in the interview room.They had not yet told her about the bag.They would not.

Not that night.Partway through the interview, the detective asks about the marriage.What Rebecca Fenton gives him is one of the most elaborate descriptions of a love story this interrogation room has heard.

We are madly in love with each other.We're still on our honeymoon.And if you can question some other people, they'll tell you that.

No problems at all.

Um, no marriage is perfect.I wasn't, um...

Nothing major?Any financial problems?No.

Not at all.We're doing, we're doing very well financially.But again, we don't go around telling people that.People knew, and like I said, there was a little crow that would whisper.But we would just ignore them, and then there were other people that knew me before I married Larry, and they knew that that's not...We didn't brag about it.

You know, but you can walk in looking nice or dressed decently, you know, or carrying a decent handbag and people can assume.You know, people can see the outside of our house and assume.

Did you guys have a security system in the house?

No, an officer wouldn't do that.

Any pets?

Dogs, cats, anything like that?No, no kids.We didn't want any of that.We decided on Persian rugs instead.

Do either of you have kids from any Persian family?relationships?

No, thank you God.Nothing against you if you have kids.Larry never wanted children, even before he ever met me.And at the age of 17, I turned to my mother and said, you're not getting grandkids from me.It was a decision, as a matter of fact, when we dated, it was a big compatibility issue that once he said he didn't want kids, I was like, I'm listening.So no, we didn't want kids.

Do you have an ex -husband, any ex -boyfriends around here, anything?

Ex -boyfriends, no.

Anybody that's jealous about you and him?

I'm going to be honest with you, before I met Larry six years ago, I was involved with a woman for a couple of years.We split up, we had been split up for six months, and then I met Larry at the gym.She wasn't crazy, you know, three years later when she found out that I was getting married, but not enough to hurt her or any of that.As a matter of fact, Within the last year, we've become friends.And in the last year, I was invited to watch her graduate from Harley -Davidson School.I'm very close to her mother as well.

Her name's Mariak.She's a nice girl.

Does she own any firearms?

I don't think so.

Can I ask her a question?

Do you remember her birthday?Yeah, I never forgot it.It was July 24th.My younger sisters were the 22nd.I'm giving you some personal information, but it's just to try to help.Do you know what year she was born?

Let me think how old Linda is.She's just a couple years older than I am.No, I'm going to say I'm 40.I'm going to say she's 42, maybe 43.Okay.It wouldn't be hard to find out.

I'm friends with her and her mother.

Where does, what's her mom's name?

Her mother's name is, and again at home I have her number.

Okay.

I meet with her about once a month.She's an elderly woman in her 70s.She's married and I take her to Walgreens and to this place and that place and then we go to lunch and we enjoy each other's company.So I still get along with her.

Okay.

She may not have been crazy about me getting married.I'm sure there were a few guys who weren't happy about it either, but nobody would do something like this.

Never been married?

Me?

No.

Where does Sally live?She lives in an old friend of mine.She has a rental apartment.

Are you still friends with her?Do you see her?

No, I haven't seen her since the graduation.I'm trying to remember when the graduation was.It was in October.And it was in Orlando.Of 07?This last year, yeah.

Okay.And I was real proud of her.She's the only girl that graduated from Harley School.I haven't seen her since then, but I always ask her mom about her and her mom's like, you know, what does I know?Yeah, so.

Okay, what about any other boyfriends then?

I don't have, I haven't had a boyfriend since.

How long did you, um, date?

And before that, another girl.

Were you guys in a relationship?

I don't want any of this stuff used again.me.

What do you mean used against you?

I don't know, I guess all of a sudden it's like here I am, I'm an alcoholic, now I'm a lesbian, now I'm a...I'm just getting a lot of real personal information.

Let me just make sure we clarify this.You haven't had any lesbian relationships while you've been married to him, have you?

None.None at all?None at all.There's been absolutely no fidelity on my part, and I am 100 % positive, none on Larry's.So, I loved that man madly and he told me on a daily basis that I was his world.Everything Larry did was for me.

We loved each other.It was something, we had something very, very special.And if you'll talk to some people, that can be confirmed.

And you guys met, you met at a gym?About how long were you together before you got married?

Larry, um, years ago.We dated about a year and a half, then we announced our engagement and then we started selling our property and I was planning our wedding.I was still drinking, very heavy, and he came home.And said, I know you're planning a big wedding, but we could save a lot of money on capital gains taxes if we were to get married by the end of December.And I told him, absolutely not, my mother will kill me and there's got to be a minister where I'm out of the family.And he was like, we can have two.

So we got married at the Clearwater Beach Hotel before it was torn down, which was very special to both of us.I was still drinking.I drank at one wedding and was sober at the other one.

And when did you quit drinking again?2005?

June 17, 2005.I'll never forget it.As a matter of fact, my husband somewhere in that house has my three -year medallion that he was going to present me with.We were just talking about that the other day.

What a person says while overwhelmed is one thing.What a person says while performing overwhelmed is something else.That sentence isn't resignation.It's a door closing before anyone has asked whether she did it.and the love story has a structural problem of its own.Every detail confirms a partnership with conflict.

No enemies, no debt, no infidelity, no tension.The man she's describing had no reason to run toward his own front door, no reason to be afraid of anything inside his own house on a quiet Sunday afternoon.And yet the crime scene shows him face down in the foyer, body pointed toward the exit running from something.For all its warmth, her account never explains what that something was.There is a detail inside that interview that does not surface in the crime scene evidence or in the ballistics report, but that investigators pull from the tape and file quietly.At one point, Rebecca mentions she received a call from a sponsee while she was in the gym.

She took it on her cell phone.

Did you get any phone calls during that time period you were home or make any phone calls?

Did I make any phone calls?No, I did get a phone call from a girl that I sponsor and I told, as a matter of fact, I was in the gym when I got the call.

Is there a phone in the gym or she called your cell phone?She called my cell phone.Okay.

And I said to Gail, I said, is this important?Do you think you're going to drink?Are you having any problems?What are your thoughts and feelings?She goes, no, I'm just checking in with you.Okay.

And I said,listen, I'm working out right now.

Is this the same girl you were with earlier?

No, this is a different one.Okay.I know this AA thing is confusing.I just, I work with a lot of different girls.Um, anyways.I told Gail, I said, well, if you can wait, I said, I'm in the middle of a workout.

And I said, if you give me about 20 minutes, I said, when I get inside, I'll get online and we'll talk.And she's like, yeah, it's nothing important.Okay.

So this is a quick conversation while you were in the gym.

Yeah.It was like, you know, you're going to drink.If you're not going to drink and you know, you're not flipping off the walls and flipping in or whatever, and everything's okay.I do care, but let me finish my workout and I'll give you a call.Right.Okay.

How do you know her?

We're both in AA.

Okay.Yeah.She told us you're her.

The sponsee she claimed to have spoken with had actually stepped away from Rebecca two weeks prior.The reason was personal, not for a police interview.

Do you have a life insurance policy?

I think Larry does, yes.

For how much?I don't know.Who's the beneficiary?

I think I am because I'm his wife.You're not sure?It's on that chip.He told me if anything ever happened to take that chip and give it either to Terry or if Terry had died by then give it to David Boyd.David could pop it in, he'd know exactly what to do.

The insurance company confirmed a policy worth approximately $1 ,000 ,000 with Rebecca as the sole beneficiary.They also confirmed they would not be paying it.Too many open questions about the circumstances of death.What the insurance company did not know, and what investigators had already confirmed from the marriage documents, is that the prenuptial agreement in place made that policy the only financial outcome available to Rebecca from this marriage.Divorce triggered a complete forfeiture of Larry's assets.Death triggered the policy.

Those were the two options.One of them just happened.

We're just going to ask, we're going to put you in your room, but we're going to ask that you don't wash your hands.Right.Because you understand we have to rule you out because you were there, right?

The woman explained to me, because I signed something and it said something about accused.And then it was, she had to come in the bathroom with me so I didn't wash my hands.So all of a sudden I just, I turned, am I a suspect?And she very calmly explain that this is a procedure and this is how it goes and this is why it goes like this.

See we want to do this because we don't want somebody to say three months from now after we did nothing with you that you did it.You see what we're saying?

I don't understand what you're saying, no.

That's the purpose of us doing this, to eliminate you since you're at the house.

Okay.

So, somewhere down the line, somebody says three months, somebody down the line accuses you for whatever reason, we can say, well, we did this, this, and this.

Great.

Okay.You haven't shot a gun recently, have you?

No.

Okay.

No, I don't.

All right.

The gunshot residue test comes back negative.She had not recently fired a gun or the residue was gone.Detectives let her go.They cannot hold her.Not yet.She leaves the station furious she cannot return home.

The police hold firm.and for the next five years, so does the case.The case broke open from a direction no one predicted.A man named Alfred Nolan, facing a parole violation, offered investigators a piece of information in exchange for consideration.He had briefly lived with Rebecca after Larry's death.During a fight with them about money, she pressed a kitchen knife to his throat.

She told him she would do to him exactly what she had done to Larry.Investigators executed an arrest warrant at the home park in Clearwater.The moment Rebecca understood what was happening, she asked for a lawyer.She was already in handcuffs.By trial, prosecutors had assembled the full sequence of what they believed happened inside that house.She finished her workout.

She went upstairs, opened the armoire, took the gun from the third drawer.She came back down.The moment Larry saw it, he ran toward the door.She fired.She then moved through both floors, pulling out drawers, took his keys from the antique desk in the dining room, loaded the stolen items into the Jeep, drove it around the corner, and walked back.She washed her hands.

She put the gun and the casings and his keys into a bag and pushed it under the passenger seat.She planned to move it later.She ran out of time and called 911 from the driveway instead.Between the gun, the casing count, the cell phone contradiction, the prenuptial agreement, the insurance policy, and Alfred Nolan's statement, the jury needed less than a day.Rebecca Fenton was convicted of first -degree murder, life in prison, no possibility of parole.She maintains her innocence and has never stopped.

explain it, but we just had a funny feeling we were going to have some problems with them.Not an altercation, but fixing an engine and starting it up in the middle of the night.And I grew up hillbilly, so I just want to say that.And it's basically what moved in behind us.So we just thought we were going to end up with some problems there.I really don't want to say that that's a wild guess, because I just don't think it I don't think that, I don't have a wild guess.

Larry Fenton had just received the best performance review of a 30 -year career.He was supposed to leave for San Antonio the next morning.He had plans to retire at 68, travel, live quietly.He went to bed early the night before, Saturday night, because he wanted to be rested for the week ahead.He got up on Super Bowl Sunday, went tanning, stopped at the grocery store, came home.He told his wife it was a do -nothing day.

He sat on the couch.He watched golf.He never left that couch again.But what stays with you most about this case?Is it the staged scene that fell apart the moment the Jeep turned up 50 yards away with everything still inside?Or the six hours she sat in that room, crying, performing grief, describing a love so deep she could not live without him, and then telling two detectives it really didn't matter who did it because he was gone?

Let us know in the comments.