00:00:00
[Music] They were found uh Sunday afternoon, July 7th. My dad and his fiance Karen were shot
00:00:17
and killed in their beds. I was 17 and my brother was 15. And there was just shock.
00:00:28
The killer made it downstairs, shot Karen Harkness multiple times, shot Mike Cisco multiple times. Whoever it was
00:00:36
that did this hated these people. The only person that hated them was my mom. Dana, what should people understand
00:00:46
about the fact that you, Dana Chandler's daughter, thinks Dana Chandler killed your father? I do have a mind of my own
00:00:54
and I'm not biased in this situation. I don't want it to be her. I want the truth to come out. I wanted to
00:01:04
help the police. So, I started to record my conversations with her. I think that the
00:01:12
only way I can really move on with a relationship with you is if we can get it. You know, if you can just tell me
00:01:20
yourself that you did it. Well, number one, I didn't do it. And number one, I don't And number two, I
00:01:25
don't know what happened to Haley. Did you know anything about the death of Michael and Karen? I have no idea what
00:01:31
happened. I hit a point where I didn't know if justice would ever be served. Both hands out of the car.
00:01:41
I needed justice for my dad and for Karen. We, the jury, find the defendant guilty of the crime of murder in the
00:01:49
first degree. I feel better in the sense that my dad's killer is paying for their
00:01:57
actions. I don't feel better that my mom is capable of killing my dad. And then the
00:02:06
Kansas Supreme Court comes and says, "This is prosecutorial misconduct. We're going to go ahead and overturn her
00:02:12
conviction. You have a new trial. My liberty, my freedom is hanging in the balance. If she could bring out
00:02:22
something to prove she didn't do it, that's for her and her own freedom. But she can't and she hasn't. I did not kill
00:02:30
Mike Cisco. She would not hesitate to get revenge on me. I did not kill Karen Hartness. I know the truth. I am an
00:02:39
innocent woman. The truth is that she murdered them. She scares me. Your mom scares you?
00:02:49
Yeah. [Music] [Music] I wanted to understand what happened and why and they actually know the truth of
00:03:43
what happened. For two decades, Haley Seal has been waiting for justice in the murders of
00:03:52
her father, Mike Cisco, and his girlfriend, Karen Harkness. This hasn't been resolved.
00:04:01
In 2002, multiple bullets struck 53-year-old Karen and 47year-old Mike as they lay in bed in Karen's Kansas home.
00:04:11
Authorities believed it was a crime of passion as the rest of the house seemed undisturbed with money and jewelry left
00:04:19
behind. And Haley believed it was her mother, Dana Chandler, who was responsible. The truth is that she was
00:04:29
in Karen's house on July 7th in the middle of the night with a gun and she shot them both multiple
00:04:37
times and she murdered them. I hate that that's the truth, but it is the truth. I've never seen a case
00:04:45
like this. Even Daryl Burton is co-founder of Miracle of Innocence, an organization that paid for Dana
00:04:52
Chandler's lawyers and supports individuals it believes are wrongfully convicted. No DNA, no fingerprints, no
00:05:01
confession, no weapon. This just doesn't add up. In the summer of 2022, Dana Chandler was on trial for the
00:05:10
second time for the murders of Mike Cisco and Karen Harkness. As in her first trial, the defense focused on all
00:05:18
that was lacking in the case against Chandler. There is no evidence that she was in the Harkness residence. No
00:05:24
evidence she was in Topeka. There's no evidence she was in the state of Kansas. Defense attorney Tom Bath insisted Dana
00:05:31
Chandler was in Colorado at the time of the murders, more than 500 miles away, and faulted investigators for zeroing in
00:05:40
on her. Everything they looked at, everything they examined excluded Dana. The lack of
00:05:47
physical evidence was acknowledged by Shaunie County Deputy District Attorney Charles Kit. Science is not going to
00:05:54
solve this case. This case is not based on DNA. This Instead, the state focused on
00:06:01
evidence such as Dana's hatred of her ex-husband and his girlfriend. This case is based on jealousy, rage,
00:06:10
and obsession. Prosecutors presented evidence they say showed that obsession, including records
00:06:17
of more than 600 phone calls Dana made to Karen and Mike in the 6 months before the murders. And they introduced
00:06:26
witnesses who said Mike and Karen told them some of those calls were menacing. Karen's coworker Kim Warer and she said
00:06:35
she had been up all night receiving phone calls from Dana. She told you she was afraid? Very afraid.
00:06:43
Erin Sutton also testified that her mother, Karen Harkness, was scared of Dana. She spoke about messages she said
00:06:51
she heard that Dana left on her mother's phone. She would call my mom horrible names.
00:06:58
And like what kind of names would she call her? he would call her a [ __ ] In addition to testimony about calls
00:07:05
Dana Chandler made, there was also attention paid to when there was no call activity on her phone, specifically
00:07:12
during 27 hours the weekend of the murders. Authorities believe Dana Chandler's phone was turned off, so it could not be
00:07:22
traced as she traveled to Kansas, but the defense suggested it could have just been Spotty's cell phone service in
00:07:31
Colorado. Prosecutors told the jury about a purchase Dana made the day before the murders, but failed to
00:07:38
mention to investigators. Kit asked Richard Volley, the lead detective on the case, about the
00:07:45
purchase. Can you tell us what that is? This is an AutoZone receipt. It shows the p first
00:07:53
two purchases were $5 or 5 gallon gas cans. Authorities wondered why Dana didn't tell them about the gas cans and
00:08:03
why she would need gas cans unless she was planning a trip perhaps to Kansas and did not want to stop for gas along
00:08:11
the way. And there was the issue of Dana Chandler's alibi. According to Detective
00:08:18
Volo, a changing, unconfirmable one. One witness testified that Dana said she was
00:08:24
in the mountains in Colorado at the time of the murders. But Detective Volo testified Chandler told him she was at
00:08:32
home in her Denver apartment. Uh, she said she'd stayed at her house, had no guests or phone calls, and that she
00:08:40
turned in about 9:00. A friend of Dana's testified about something authorities thought might have been a dry run for
00:08:47
the murders. She said about a month before the killings, Dana called and told her about a trip she made to Mike's
00:08:55
home. She told me that she knew nobody was in the house and that she went into Mike's home through the window. After
00:09:04
that, she did go to um his girlfriend's house and sat outside her house waiting for them to come home, but they didn't
00:09:13
show up. Did she tell you what she did when she uh got into Mike's house? She wanted to see what it looked like on the
00:09:22
inside. But Dana's attorney questioned the reliability of her testimony, pointing
00:09:28
out she may have gotten some dates wrong regarding calls with Dana. It must not have been a Monday. Okay.
00:09:36
About 20 years ago, you said it was a Monday, right? Sure. Testimony about Chandler's behavior also came from Kathy
00:09:43
Boots, Mike's sister. She described an incident several years before the murders that she said she witnessed
00:09:51
while staying at Mike's house. We went to bed that night and I woke up in the early morning hours to a noise out in
00:09:59
the backyard and we had left the back porch lights on and I looked out through the blinds and Dana was jumping on the
00:10:09
trampoline out back. And Mike's brother-in-law, Mark Boots, recounted a disturbing conversation he
00:10:18
said he had with Mike 9 days before the murders. Mike told me that the patterns of
00:10:24
harassment had increased and that he feared for he and Karen's lives. Mike and Dana's daughter, Haley, was
00:10:33
going to be in the uncomfortable position of testifying against her mother. And who is Dana Chandler to you?
00:10:48
She's my mom. I was absolutely still nervous and and scared being up there. It causes
00:11:18
conflict. As Haley Seal reflected back on testifying against her mother, Dana Chandler, she recalled the stress she
00:11:26
was under. As a prosecution witness, Haley was asked to describe some of her mother's behavior. Behavior Haley said
00:11:34
she found obsessive. Was there a time where you were asked to spy on your dad? Yeah. Haley recounted an incident after
00:11:44
her parents split up when she said Dana drove her and her brother to Mike's home
00:11:49
and they all sat in the car to watch the house. She said, "Come on, we need to watch your dad. You can be my little
00:11:57
helpers." She had me go with her to the house after so long. And um and she wanted to look in the windows.
00:12:06
Did she look in the windows? Yeah, we both looked in the windows and she said, "Did you see that? did you see that? And
00:12:12
I said, "No, I didn't see anything." It was episodes like that which led Haley early on to think her mother could
00:12:20
be responsible for the murders. I always suspected she had something to do with it because of the history of her
00:12:30
harassment, stalking, hatred, talking bad about them to us all the time. Haley testified about some of the ways her
00:12:38
mother expressed that dislike of her father, like the demeaning ways Dana referred to him in emails and online
00:12:46
chats. Yeah. Including ones where Dana referred to Mike as if sent when Haley was 14 years old. Um, and did she call
00:12:55
him manipulative and deceiving? Yes. Uh, and then calls him a rapist. Yeah. And just a couple of lines down, I hate
00:13:04
his guts. Yeah. Are those things that you want to tie to? Yes. Nobody can say that you were in Colorado
00:13:13
that weekend. Also played in court were those conversations Haley secretly recorded with her mom as she tried to
00:13:20
learn more about Dana's possible involvement in the murders. In all the conversations you had with her over the
00:13:28
days, weeks, months, even years after this happened, she never told you something that made you think, "Well, at
00:13:38
least my mom didn't do it." No. Every time I talked to her, I felt more and more confident that she definitely had
00:13:44
something to do with it. And perhaps most telling to Haley was a conversation played in court where Dana said she had
00:13:52
thought about killing Mike. ever think about killing him? No, but I did. In one of those discussions, Haley
00:14:00
asked her mother about why she bought those two gas cans, which authorities thought could have been used to help
00:14:07
drive round trip from Denver to Topeka without stopping in Kansas for fuel. Dana, who'd been a problem drinker,
00:14:16
explained she bought them for someone else, a woman she met at AA. She asked me for money and we don't give people
00:14:23
money in aa. I think I'll go buy you some gas. The prosecutor asked Haley if she was able to learn anything more
00:14:30
about that woman from Dana. She wouldn't tell you who that person was. No, she didn't. But Dana's defense team argued
00:14:38
those recorded conversations proved nothing about the murders. And regarding the two gas cans, it
00:14:46
maintained that the 10 extra gallons the cans could hold would not have been enough for Dana to drive round trip from
00:14:53
Denver to Topeka without still needing to stop for fuel. The defense accused authorities of
00:15:02
tunnel vision, including not looking more thoroughly at other suspects. and her lawyer said Dana Chandler never
00:15:10
owned a 9mm gun, the type of weapon used in the murders, which was never found. What was found were unusual
00:15:21
bullets made in Israel. Israel Military Industries, that's the manufacturer. Dana's attorney questioned a firearm
00:15:29
examiner who had worked with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation about those bullets. Is
00:15:36
that a bullet you would ammunition you typically see? Actually, we had not seen that before and so it was a little bit
00:15:43
unusual to us. The prosecution though explained there were places one could buy those bullets. Could that ammo have
00:15:50
been brought into Kansas and sold at a gun show? Yes, sir. Could have been exchanged by individuals. Yes, sir.
00:15:56
There were other parts of the investigation that the defense argued supported its case. There was forensic
00:16:03
work it said eliminated Dana Chandler. Unidentified fingerprints found at the house did not match Chandler. None of
00:16:10
Dana's DNA was found at the murder scene, nor were any fibers found from her clothing or any of her hair. I did
00:16:18
not find any hairs that were consistent with the known samples coming from Miss Chandler. In 20 years, the state had no
00:16:25
evidence, no evidence whatsoever that placed Dana Chandler in Karen Harkness's home, in the city of Topeka, from the
00:16:34
state of Kansas. After 3 weeks of testimony, that lack of physical evidence would be the defense's theme in
00:16:42
its closing argument. Each and every time they tested something, it excluded Dana. From the beginning, I told you
00:16:50
this case is about obsession, jealousy, rage. The state focused on Dana's behavior, her calls, emails, and
00:17:02
her own family's testimony against her. The defendant clearly hated Karen and Mike. Words from her own mouth and her
00:17:11
own fingers typing those messages. A lot of evidence about Dana's bad behavior. That's true. That's not evidence. They
00:17:18
have not proven this case beyond a reasonable doubt. On August 25th, 2022, the case went to the jury and Haley was
00:17:27
waiting for a verdict. I've really tried to trust the process as I knew I didn't
00:17:32
have any control over it. So, it was going to be what it was going to be. But the wait to find out what the verdict
00:17:38
would be was a long [Laughter] When you retire to the jury room, you will first select one of your members as
00:17:59
presiding juror. The person selected will preside over your The case in the second trial of Dana Chandler for the
00:18:06
murders of Mike Cisco and Karen Harkness went to the jury on August 25th, 2022. That day came and went, as did
00:18:18
several more. Members of the jury, would you like to recess for the day? Yes, we would like.
00:18:24
After about 4 days, I started to get nervous and think, "Wow, this actually could not come back in a guilty
00:18:33
verdict." And I started to think about that possibility. And so I [Music] prayed and I just trusted that if she
00:18:44
did get away with this that life would have to go on. Right. Members of the gallery, I would ask that
00:18:54
you just please refrain from any outbursts at After 6 days of deliberating, Dana Chandler would learn
00:19:00
her fate. I understand that the jury is unable to reach a unanimous verdict at this time. Is that correct? That is
00:19:09
correct. The jury informed the judge they were deadlocked. You're hung at this time. Is that correct? There were
00:19:16
seven votes to convict and five to acquit. We did what we could with what we had.
00:19:24
Ben Alfred and Carrie Kimes were two members of the jury who voted to find Chandler not guilty. I never saw actual
00:19:34
evidence that Dana Chandler was ever in the Harkness home. I can't send somebody
00:19:41
to spend the rest of their life in prison if you can't even prove she left Colorado that weekend. The science is
00:19:46
not going to solve this case. Everything that was tested for DNA proved inconclusive. And that's pretty
00:19:54
remarkable. But for juror Randy Edwards, the state's depiction of Dana Chandler's
00:20:00
behavior was persuasive evidence. She was beyond upset. She was obsessed. He also found those conversations Haley
00:20:09
recorded with her mother to be convincing and voted to convict. Ever think about killing him? No, but I did.
00:20:17
When I was able to comprehend that Dana said that she had thought of killing Mike, that was probably the the piece
00:20:24
that pushed me beyond any question of reasonable doubt anymore. There was a split verdict, but the majority of the
00:20:30
jury was in favor of a conviction and that was meaningful. DA Mike Kge decided to retry Dana Chandler. The next issue
00:20:41
that we have before the court is a motion to modify bond. Her lawyers convinced the court to reduce her bond,
00:20:48
which allowed her to be released with supervision as she awaited the next trial. The court is going to direct that
00:20:56
she have GPS monitoring. Welcome home. Welcome home, Dana. After spending more than a decade
00:21:07
incarcerated, Dana Chandler celebrated her freedom with Daryl Burton and Miracle of Innocence. Anybody who's
00:21:15
getting out of prison after you've been in prison for any length of time, it is it's a joyous occasion. You're happy
00:21:20
that someone's been released and you, you know, also feel like, well, maybe it's a good chance that, you know, we
00:21:25
can, you know, mount a defense and know and get her totally acquitted. As a condition of her release, Dana was not
00:21:32
allowed to contact her children. Still, Haley worried about her safety. She is married to Chris Seal, her high school
00:21:41
boyfriend, and is a mother of three. I'm scared to death that she's going to hurt me or she's going to affect my
00:21:52
kids in some way. Haley's fear only grew when Dana made this post to her Facebook
00:21:58
page. Chandler complained about her treatment at trial, calling it a kangaroo court. And in the background,
00:22:06
she showed images of Haley's children. Haley says Dana somehow learned which church she attended and downloaded a
00:22:14
live stream of a service to create the photos. It was chilling and it was disturbing. I feel like it was a direct
00:22:22
message to me. And what was the message? Intimidation. I don't care about your boundaries. Her belief that her mother
00:22:39
committed the murders remains unwavering and she says disturbing. She's my mom, but if you're
00:22:48
my mom, why would you do that to my dad? For your kid's sake, maybe maybe that would be a reason not to do it.
00:22:56
Being a mother now I have a new perspective it becomes even more unreal now. Also unreal to Haley thoughts of a third
00:23:08
trial. What are your expectations for yet again another trial? Uh this time I'm not as confident.
00:23:20
For trial number three, jurors would be from Padawatami County, Kansas. The defense requested a change of venue and
00:23:27
the judge agreed, citing excessive media coverage. It would take place in West Morland, a smaller, more rural area 60
00:23:38
mi away from the last setting in Topeka. July 7th, 2002 was going to be a good day. Mike Cisco, Karen Harkness had been
00:23:51
in a relationship for a few years. The trial got underway with opening statements on February 7th, 2025.
00:24:00
One name just kept coming up. Dana Chandler. Charles Kit was back retrying the case, joined by prosecutor
00:24:08
Dan Dunar. Judge Cheryl Rios again presided. And in a lastminute change on the morning of opening statements, Dana
00:24:19
Chandler dismissed her defense attorneys. My name is Dana Chandler. And Dana Chandler decided the best person to
00:24:28
represent her was herself. I am innocent. I did not kill Mike and Karen. I think this case is a character
00:24:57
assassination. In February 2025, Dana Chandler was on trial for the third time for the murders of Mike Cisco and Karen
00:25:06
Harkness. But this time she was representing herself. She was exercising her constitutional
00:25:14
right. It was an unknown. It was certainly unexpected. One thing that was the same as in the
00:25:25
previous trials, Haley Seal testified. Good afternoon. Hi. Can you please tell the jury your name? Um, Haley Seal.
00:25:35
Haley was asked again by the prosecution about her mother's inappropriate behavior. What sort of things would she
00:25:42
say about Karen? She called her a home wrecker. Um, a [ __ ] Very bad names. Prosecutors
00:25:55
were also interested in an incident when Dana Chandler drove Haley and her brother to drop them off at Karen's
00:26:02
house. We waited there for a really long time in the car. Then my dad and Karen got there and my mom got out and yelled
00:26:13
at them and just was very angry with my dad. Haley, I don't have any further questions. Thank you. When it was time
00:26:22
to be cross-examined, Haley knew it would now be her mother doing the questioning. Well, let me see.
00:26:31
I really went up there with like my game face on, you know? I I knew it was war.
00:26:36
I knew it wasn't going to be a nice, a cordial, a thoughtful, you're the victim. This was your dad and I'm so
00:26:43
sorry place that she'd be coming from. Dana Chandler challenged Haley about her description of that drop off at Karen's.
00:26:51
Chandler said it was Haley's father, Mike, who was behaving badly, not her. When your dad Karen drove up, your dad
00:26:59
stormed over to the car. Oh, no. No, he did not. And he started banging on the window. What? No. No, he did not. I was
00:27:07
inside that car and my dad absolutely did not bang on the windows. And I didn't get out of I never got out of the
00:27:13
car. You were the first one out of the car. I was just in disbelief because I knew she just made that up because it
00:27:20
never happened. And he never did that. But I didn't get concerned. I just said, "No, you know, I'm glad you asked so I
00:27:30
could straighten this out." That never happened. And then it comes down to who's believable, and I wasn't worried
00:27:38
about that. As another way to seemingly explain some of her past behaviors, Chandler brought
00:27:45
up that she used to have a drinking problem. And I did tell you that I was I realized that I had a problem with
00:27:51
alcohol. You did tell me you had a problem with alcohol. Something Dana said she stopped by
00:27:57
1999, 3 years before the murders. I told you I was going to three AA meetings a day trying to get well. True. I knew you
00:28:07
were trying to get well. Yes. The state questioned though if becoming sober changed Chandler's behavior. When she
00:28:15
came back clean and sober, did that change how she treated you? No. Did it Did it change how she talked
00:28:25
about your dad? No. Did it change how she talked about Karen? No. Do you swear that the testimony you're
00:28:36
out in this case happened or the truth? The whole truth and nothing but the truth. Second thing, Dana Chandler not
00:28:43
only thought she was the best person to represent herself, but when it was time to put on her defense, she decided she
00:28:51
would be her own main witness. But I feel like that I need to kind of tell my story to kind of put things in
00:28:59
perspective. She testified over seven days. You have not seen evidence that I was in Topeka,
00:29:07
Kansas on July 7th of 2002. speaking for about 20 hours. I kind of like to review a little where I left
00:29:16
off. There was times when she would take so long to try to get her point across.
00:29:22
Dana Chandler's supporter Daryl Burton was concerned when she put herself on the stand and sometime it seemed as
00:29:29
though she was just rambling, you know, and that was just unfortunate. She may have knew, she probably knew where she
00:29:35
was trying to go, but she'd get lost. But I continued drinking. She again addressed issues such as her drinking
00:29:41
and inappropriate conversations with Haley. I was writing emails drinking the black out. I'd get up the next morning
00:29:49
and not even remember those emails. I had a serious problem and horrible things I said about Karen spreading her
00:29:56
legs. I mean, seriously, Haley was 14 years old. I am just so ashamed and embarrassed about that. And I hated that
00:30:05
Haley that I put Haley through that. And Chandler in her own testimony addressed
00:30:11
again that incident when she waited outside Karen's house to drop off Haley and Dustin with the couple. She said it
00:30:20
was done out of necessity. I yelled through the window I could not afford to feed Haley and Dustin and that I needed
00:30:27
to leave them with him. Chandler contrasted those times to when she stopped drinking, showing videos of
00:30:35
her spending time outdoors with Haley and Dustin. This video was taken about 9 months into
00:30:45
my recovery. Dana also disputed making frequent harassing calls to Karen and Mike, saying when she called, there was
00:30:53
a reason. I was calling to speak with my children, Haley and Dustin. As to her having disagreements with Karen
00:31:01
Harkness, she testified there were none. I never ever had any confrontations with
00:31:08
Karen Harkness at all. Chandler also pointed out what she said was sloppiness in the police investigation. When
00:31:16
Chandler questioned lead detective Richard Voloy, she asked about whether police were too focused on her and
00:31:22
should have been looking more thoroughly at other possible suspects. Did you or did you not receive any leads for other
00:31:32
suspects besides me? Uh, early on in the investigation, there were several other people that were
00:31:38
looked at as possible leads. So, it's a matter of checking people off to dismissing people that couldn't have
00:31:45
done it. Uh, when we can't dismiss them, we keep focusing on them like we did with you. Chandler though said there was
00:31:53
an area where she felt law enforcement thoroughly investigated whether she bought a 9mm gun like the one used in
00:32:00
the murders and they came up empty-handed. I've never owned, purchased, or possessed a 9 mm firearm.
00:32:11
And throughout her defense, Dana Chandler was adamant that at the time of the murders, she was in Colorado and no
00:32:19
one could place her in Karen's house or even in Kansas. [Music] It seemed like a simple question Dana
00:32:44
Chandler was asking Detective Volley. Did you ever develop any information that I was into Kansas on July 6th or
00:32:53
7th of 2002? But in answering that question, Voy said there was a woman named Patty Williams who may have
00:33:01
spotted Chandler in the state of Kansas around the time of the murders. What do you know about Patty Williams? She was a
00:33:07
clerk at a convenience store in Waini, Kansas. The gas station convenience store in Wini, where Williams worked,
00:33:14
was nearly halfway between Denver and Topeka. It had been visited by an investigator searching for locations
00:33:22
where someone may have spotted Chandler around the time of the murders. There, the investigator showed Williams this
00:33:30
photo of Dana. She was seven out of 10 that it was you. According to Volo, the clerk was 70% sure she had seen Dana
00:33:40
Chandler and described some distinguishing features. She has said that she had gray near the
00:33:48
hairline for Chandler though told the jury she did not have gray hair back then. By the time of the trials,
00:33:55
Williams had died and could not be questioned again. Chandler also expressed concern that the investigator
00:34:02
only showed a single photo of her initially instead of an array of photos, including different people. Something
00:34:10
Voloy did do when he went to the gas station about 2 weeks later. We later later went out with a what we call a
00:34:18
six-pack photo. It's six photographs of people that look very similar and amongst those photos was Miss Chandler.
00:34:27
Volo said Patty Williams immediately picked out Chandler and again was 70% sure she saw her there, but Voloy
00:34:36
acknowledged using an array initially would have been better. There was still for law
00:34:43
enforcement the issue regarding Dana Chandler's alibi. Remember, Voloy said Dana told him she was home in her Denver
00:34:52
apartment the night of the murders, but she told others, including an acquaintance, Jeff Bailey, she slept in
00:34:59
her car in the Colorado mountains that night. I was confused. Dana Chandler told the jury she had been confused when
00:35:08
she spoke with Volo, but prosecutor Kit was not accepting that explanation. So, what you told Detective Oley is not
00:35:16
consistent with what you told Jeff Bailey, is it? Uh, as far as my trip to Miss Chandler, it's not consistent.
00:35:24
Okay. Yeah, I would agree with that. Um, I would That's true. Have you seen that document before? Once again, those
00:35:33
secret recordings Haley made with her mother were played in court. Ever think about killing it? No, but I did. This
00:35:42
time, Kit questioned Dana herself about its authenticity. Was that your voice saying, "Did you ever think about
00:35:49
killing him?" I did. It sounds like it is. When it was time for the final witness, Dana Chandler decided it should
00:35:58
be Dana Chandler. She knew the jury heard witnesses testify about her parenting and past behavior. Chandler
00:36:06
explained if she was a less than attentive mother, it was because of her drinking and a lack of money, not a lack
00:36:14
of love. I absolutely did want to have a relationship with my children. You know,
00:36:20
I think the financial the substance abuse combination um it just wasn't feasible.
00:36:28
That's all I have. Thank you, Mr. uh during this time that you couldn't afford to feed your children,
00:36:37
you were buying booze, correct? I was. You buying enough alcohol to get black out drunk? I was. Okay. Thank you for
00:36:44
the question. And with that, after 18 days of testimony, prosecutor Charles Kit and
00:36:53
Dana Chandler presented their closing arguments. Why are Mike and Karen dead? And the
00:37:01
evidence shows one simple answer. control. I think Kit nailed it when he said it was about control. The state
00:37:11
described Chandler losing control of Mike as he planned his future with Karen and the rage that followed. And that's
00:37:19
what led to the defendant traveling to Topeka, Kansas on July 6th and murdering them on July 7th. Kit spoke about
00:37:27
Chandler's depiction of events not lining up with the testimony of others. It's the defendant versus everyone. You
00:37:36
can believe the defendant's testimony or you can believe everybody else that you heard from in this case.
00:37:44
In Dana Chandler's closing, she used a scam to make her point that prosecutors, whom she called her accusers, did not
00:37:52
have enough evidence to tip it in their favor. the um the accusers must uh tip the
00:38:02
scale here. I'm innocent. I have my infirmities and I have my shortcomings, but I do stand here before you all today
00:38:14
and proclaim that I am an innocent woman. She acknowledged the life she led was not perfect, but said that doesn't
00:38:24
make her a murderer. The state has woefully failed to meet its burden to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that I
00:38:33
killed Mike Cisco or Karen Harkness. About 4 hours later, the jury delivered its verdict.
00:38:44
We the jury find Dana Chandler guilty of murder in the first degree is charged in
00:38:48
count one verdict for guilty of the murders of Mike Cisco and Karen Harkness. After hearing the verdict, Dana Chandler
00:38:59
turned away. And while it was the verdict Haley hoped for, the end result is nothing she ever wanted. It is so
00:39:08
much worse that my mom is the one behind these murders because we lost my dad and Karen, but
00:39:16
then through all this now, we've lost our mom. I really wish it was someone else.
00:39:22
I don't believe that they have proved this case beyond a reasonable doubt. Chandler supporter Daryl Burton remains
00:39:29
undeterred. He still believes she is innocent. The evidence just doesn't, you know, prove that she's guilty of
00:39:36
anything. Dana Chandler is filing motions for an appeal. 48 Hours reached out to Chandler again for this episode,
00:39:45
but did not receive a response. I am very confident in this verdict. District Attorney Mike Kge is certain the jury
00:39:53
convicted the right person. I have every confidence in my prosecutors and how they handled this case. The focus of
00:40:04
this case has gone almost completely to Dana Chandler and that the victims has really
00:40:14
been lost which is really sad. More than 20 years have passed since Mike Cisco and Karen Harkness were
00:40:23
murdered and Haley wants to make sure the lives lost are not forgotten. I was trying to tell my daughter about
00:40:34
who my dad is and I said he was a really fun, supportive, encouraging guy who believed
00:40:44
in me and my brother and Karen was so kind, so accepting. I miss him a lot. [Music]
00:41:04
I can only describe it as evil. Something horrible from 48 hours. This is trained to kill the dog trainer, the
00:41:11
ays, and the bodyguard. He couldn't control his obsession. Who was the hunter and who was the hunted? Follow
00:41:18
and listen on the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. [Music]