00:00:01
♪♪ -Jon Green does
what Jon Green does, right? He's a charmer.
He's a smooth talker.
00:00:14
I think he could talk
his way into anyone's life. Beneath the surface,
there's something really dark.
00:00:21
-Is this a man who just
happens to have really bad luck? Or is he a bad guy? -He's a bad guy.
00:00:28
-We had good times together. I never felt like
I'm with a bad person. -I think he's unlucky.
I think he's unlucky.
00:00:36
-We were so happy
when he met Kim Lark, his wife. They went skiing together. They loved dogs together.
00:00:44
I had not seen him so happy in all these years
that we've known him. -I think Jon Green saw Dr. Kim
and saw dollar signs.
00:00:51
-You think he targeted her? -Yeah, I do. -It all turned sour
really quick. They were not only separating,
but he took the dogs.
00:01:05
-She loves her dogs.
Those are her babies. It's like if he had taken
her children.
00:01:10
-He's stealing your dogs.
He's kidnapping your dogs? -Oh, I was scared to death
that he would get rid of them.
00:01:17
-Now it became
just one thing after another. He's on the road.
On the road and on the run.
00:01:24
-With the dogs. -He's actually arrested
in San Antonio. -He's a thief.
He's a liar. A con artist.
00:01:32
-At Eddy County
Detention Center, I met Jon, and he kept asking me
if I knew somebody
00:01:37
that could kill his wife. -So, here's my husband in jail, talking with somebody
about the various different ways
00:01:46
to kill me
and take care of the body. -Do you believe
that this was a real plan?
00:01:52
-Yes. -This isn't the first time
he's been in question of a heinous crime. If he did it once,
he can do it again.
00:02:02
-Who was this man, really? -He wasn't Jon Green.
His real name was Ted Maher. And he had been convicted
of an arson
00:02:13
resulting in the death
of a billionaire. -So much of it
still remains a mystery.
00:02:21
I mean,
this guy's story is just crazy. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Carlsbad, New Mexico,
00:03:16
a small city dwarfed
by a vast, dirt-red desert, was home to Jon Green in 2017. That was the year
a routine medical exam
00:03:30
would become a turning point
for him and his new doctor, Kim Lark. The very first day
when he walks in,
00:03:37
how would you have
described him? -Smiling. Happy.
Wanted to talk. Just kind of made you feel
comfortable.
00:03:44
-Months later,
they began texting, then dating. -He liked everything
that I liked.
00:03:51
We started skiing together. We started riding bikes
together. -Early in their relationship,
Kim says,
00:03:59
Green told her
about his troubled past -- that he had been falsely accused
of arson more than 20 years ago,
00:04:08
causing the deaths
of two people, including a billionaire banker
in Monte Carlo.
00:04:17
-I believed him at first. I kind of believed his side
of the story. -She says she wanted
to believe the best
00:04:26
about the new man in her life. -He said all the right things. He did all the things that
I needed my best friend to be.
00:04:34
-By the time they married
on Valentine's Day 2020, they'd already settled
into a comfortable life.
00:04:42
Kim had a lucrative
medical practice, an $800,000 retirement account
tucked away,
00:04:49
and a home on four acres
outside of town. At that time, did you realize
what he was capable of?
00:04:56
-No, I had no idea. -I think he's motivated
by money, motivated by power. -Molly Forster,
a documentary filmmaker
00:05:07
and CBS news consultant, has spent years reporting
Green's story for a new series streaming
on the EPIS online platform.
00:05:16
-He likes skiing. It's just like he was
a chameleon. -She says the man who calls
himself Jon Green
00:05:24
has led a life of deception. -He's been able to fool
a lot of people and caused a lot of trauma.
00:05:33
-Trauma that would eventually
crumble their marriage in just a few years, says Kim.
00:05:39
-Just because he's
so willing to lie, cheat, steal. -In April 2022, Kim noticed
her checkbook was missing.
00:05:49
-That's when the bank
called me and said, "Hey, did you write this check?" -She learned that her husband,
00:05:57
seen here on bank
security footage, was trying to cash
thousands of dollars in checks
00:06:04
by forging her name at banks all over town. Kim filed for divorce and changed the locks
on her house.
00:06:16
About a month later,
he stole something else from her that mattered a lot more
than money.
00:06:23
He's kidnapping your dogs? -My dogs and my vehicle.
Yeah. -Storm, Zero, and Felony
are not only precious pets,
00:06:33
they're extremely valuable, highly trained search-and-rescue
dogs, says Kim. And she is their trainer.
00:06:41
-We have a really special bond. My dogs are with me 24/7. -For years,
Kim and her canine companions
00:06:50
have assisted FEMA
during national disasters and law enforcement
at crime scenes.
00:06:57
-He could have taken anything
except my dogs. -And Zero was pregnant
at the time.
00:07:03
-I really was scared to death. -Kim believed
her estranged husband might have taken the dogs
to Texas,
00:07:12
and she found someone there
who could help. Abel Peña had 26 years
with the FBI before he retired
and founded a nonprofit
00:07:23
called Project Absentis to help find missing people. What is the difference between
looking for missing people
00:07:32
and missing dogs? -Dogs don't maintain
a pawprint online. It's more challenging
to try and find dogs.
00:07:41
-It was more than a month
before he got a good tip, and it wasn't about the dogs,
00:07:46
but about Green himself. On June 13th, 2022, Peña
called law enforcement for help staking out
a parking lot in San Antonio.
00:08:00
Shortly after Green arrived
in a BMW, authorities arrested and charged
him with forgery and larceny.
00:08:08
He had changed his appearance,
shaving his head. -I ran over to the vehicle, looked in the back windows
to see if the dogs were there.
00:08:16
The dogs were not there. -But Peña had another lead and headed to a nearby house
00:08:23
belonging to the aunt
of one of Green's friends. -I knock on the door, and I'm
greeted by an older woman.
00:08:30
She was like, "I know
why you're here. Come on in." -He found Kim's dogs
in a back bedroom,
00:08:37
and by then,
Zero had multiplied. There were now eight puppies
in a box. And how did you feel?
00:08:45
-I was ecstatic. -Abel Peña took all 11 dogs
to his house and waited for Kim to arrive.
00:08:55
-Look at what we have here.
-Oh, my goodness! Come on. My girls were so happy
to see me.
00:09:02
I was so relieved. -And it was a fantastic ending. -Good boy. -Kim was so thankful she named
one of the puppies Abel,
00:09:13
after the man
who had found them. -Bye.
-Bye. Thank you. -See you later. -Did you think at that point
you had it all behind you?
00:09:24
-Yes. -The forgery and larceny charges
landed Jon Green here, locked up in the Eddy County
Detention Center in Carlsbad,
00:09:36
where he met this man, Greg Markham,
detained on drug charges. Was he angry with Kim?
00:09:44
-Oh, he was furious with her. -Markham says they bonded
over a chess board. -I played chess with him
every day.
00:09:52
Got to know the guy. He kept asking me
if I knew somebody that could kill his wife.
00:09:57
-Greg Markham says
he saw an opportunity to make Jon Green his pawn. -And I was like,
"You know what, man?
00:10:05
I can't find anybody.
I'll do it. How do you want it done?" -So, you promised
to kill his wife?
00:10:11
-I said, "Oh, yeah, man,
I'll do it. I'll do it for you." -Were you going to? -No! No!
00:10:17
-Markham says he's a con man,
not a hit man, and was never serious
about killing Kim Lark.
00:10:25
-I've been living on my own.
It's me and my dog. -He desperately needed
bail money, he says,
00:10:30
to save his dog, Atlas,
from being euthanized. -I got to convince this guy
to bond me out
00:10:36
so I can go take care of my dog,
make sure he's okay. -He says Green paid
for the bail.
00:10:41
-Once he was convinced
that I was going to do it, he wouldn't stop talking
about it.
00:10:45
He says,
"Let's talk about it again. What are you gonna do?" -Markham says
Green had a specific way
00:10:51
he wanted his wife to die. He concocted a lethal plot
to poison Kim, forcing her to drink
water laced with fentanyl
00:11:00
to look like an overdose. -Yeah, I was supposed
to mix up fentanyl pills and make sure she drank
the whole water bottle.
00:11:08
-If she refused, says Markham, Green's grisly plan was
to aim a gun, not at Kim,
00:11:15
but at her beloved dogs. -And she'll do
whatever you want done. -Jon Green fiercely
denies all of it
00:11:23
and was determined to fight
the charges against him, as he had before
in another courtroom
00:11:31
on another continent. 26 years earlier, a roaring inferno engulfed
a Monte Carlo penthouse,
00:11:40
killing the billionaire
and his private nurse. At the fiery center
of that mystery
00:11:47
was the very same man
with a very different name. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Sun-drenched, laid-back
Carlsbad, New Mexico,
00:12:14
isn't the only place
where this man made headlines. -One of the world's
richest bankers died today.
00:12:22
-And it isn't the first time
he was accused of a major crime. -An American male nurse...
00:12:27
-And Kim Lark is not
the only woman who loved him. ♪♪ ♪♪ -I've saved every rose
he gave me.
00:12:43
-Every rose he's given you
since you've known him? -Yeah. [ Chuckles ] -It was 2002 when I first met
Heidi Wustrau.
00:12:51
She was married to the man who
would one day become Jon Green. His name then -- Ted Maher.
00:12:59
That name would become
known around the world. The couple lived in New York
and had two children together,
00:13:06
meeting in nursing school. -What kind of nurse is he? -He's a neonatal
intensive care nurse.
00:13:13
Some pictures with kids, just some of the infants
that he took care of. -Ted told her
about his time serving
00:13:21
as a Special Forces Green Beret. He seemed defined
by intensity and compassion. -He always put others first.
00:13:30
He was just so loving,
so caring, you know? And I wanted someone like that. -His compassion was on display
in the summer of 1999
00:13:39
in the neonatal unit
where Ted worked, when two grateful
new parents connected him
00:13:45
to the job of a lifetime. -To take care of a rich banker
who we never heard of, to be his private nurse.
00:13:53
He had Parkinson's disease. -Edmond Safra
was that rich banker. And he wasn't just regular rich.
00:14:01
He was one of the richest men
on earth. The bank?
Safra owned it, living with his elegant wife,
Lily,
00:14:11
in this penthouse
above this bank branch... ...here in the Monte Carlo
district of glittering,
diamond-sized Monaco...
00:14:24
...tucked along
the exclusive French Riviera. -Obviously, we've never seen
the world, you know, like that.
00:14:31
-So, when Safra made the offer, Ted couldn't refuse, says Heidi, despite having to leave
his family.
00:14:38
-We thought,
this is just temporary and we have the rest
of our lives to get together afterwards.
00:14:44
-It was that October when Maher's fascinating new job
brought him to Monaco. -It was just a different world,
he kept saying.
00:14:55
He liked it.
He liked Mr. Safra very much. They got along well. -Maher sometimes worked
the night shift,
00:15:01
at times with nurse
Vivian Torrente. Along with his
private-duty nurses, Safra also kept a personal
security force for protection.
00:15:14
-We didn't know
who this man was. It was all new to us. -December 3rd, 1999. -I was getting the kids off to
school in the morning as usual,
00:15:27
and I got a phone call, and it was Ted's sister, who sounded upset and crying. She asked me
to turn on the news.
00:15:37
-Two masked men
armed with knives invaded the Riviera penthouse
of Edmond Safra.
00:15:44
-It was a startling report
about intruders and a fire
in the Safra penthouse. Just five weeks after
her husband left for Monaco,
00:15:54
the billionaire
who brought him there and nurse Vivian Torrente,
were dead. Autopsies would determine
they had both died
00:16:03
from smoke poisoning,
and Ted was wounded and bloody. Ted would tell authorities
a story
00:16:12
that would be discussed
and debated for years. He said that intruders broke
into the penthouse,
00:16:19
attacked and stabbed him, that he scrambled to get help while his boss took shelter
in a bathroom.
00:16:26
Ted says he lit a small fire
with a candle and paper towels in a trash basket, thinking the fire department
would respond quickly.
00:16:35
-He knew the smoke detectors
were direct access to the fire department,
so he wanted to set that off.
00:16:42
-Back in New York,
Heidi was worried, and she contacted
Safra's office. She wasn't surprised
at what she heard.
00:16:50
-They said that Ted was
indeed a hero that night. I said, "That's Ted." -And within hours,
Heidi headed to Monaco.
00:16:59
-I was to go straight
to the hospital to see Ted. -Did you?
-No. -Instead, soon after arriving,
00:17:08
Heidi says she was intercepted
by police. She had been told
that Ted acted like a hero.
00:17:15
That was about to change. As police questioned her, Heidi says it became clear they thought her husband
might be a killer.
00:17:24
She alleges they took
her passport and used it as a weapon
against Ted. -When my passport was taken,
they brought it to Ted
00:17:34
to get him to confess for this, and he was told then that I
was strip-searched and tortured,
00:17:40
and I would not be allowed
to leave the state of Monaco back to our family. -She said that threat caused
Ted to falsely confess.
00:17:49
He would now say
there were no intruders, that he had taken a knife and that he had
stabbed himself
00:17:57
to make it look like he had
tried to save his powerful boss from attackers. -They're saying he gave himself
a lidocaine injection
00:18:07
prior to stabbing himself. -And lidocaine, what, deadens --
-Would numb it. -And Heidi says the confession
he signed was written in French,
00:18:16
which Ted did not understand. -I feel they want a nice, clean
ending to this, quick.
00:18:22
It would be good
for the state of Monaco to have their citizens
feel safe. -Ted was locked up,
00:18:31
charged with arson --
an intentional act -- leading to the deaths
of Safra and Torrente.
00:18:39
He faced life in prison
if convicted at trial. -This is someone I know, and I know he didn't do this.
00:18:49
♪♪ -Tonight's "48 Hours"
will continue. -A family patriarch
disappears. The blame game goes round
and round.
00:19:07
-It's a homicide.
-Absolutely. -Follow and listen to "Blood is
Thicker: The Farris Wheel"
00:19:12
on the free Audacy app or wherever you get
your podcasts. ♪♪ -With the strike of a match,
00:19:29
Ted Maher's dream job
went up in smoke. Two people were dead,
and Ted was now being blamed.
00:19:38
-I've known him now 13 years.
He would never hurt anyone. -Monaco's chief prosecutor
says an American male nurse
00:19:45
confessed to starting the fire that killed Safra
and another nurse. -The death of Edmond Safra
00:19:51
exploded into
a sensational story that would fascinate authors
Jennifer Thomas and her husband Bill Hayes.
00:20:01
-If you saw this
on the screen, you'd be going, "This doesn't --
none of this makes sense.
00:20:05
This doesn't happen." -There were allegations,
none of them substantiated, that might have supported Ted's
original claim about intruders
--
00:20:15
talk that Safra had enemies, that he had been the victim
of a Russian mob hit. -Safra had an awful lot
of connections to Russia.
00:20:25
-And rumors were inflamed
by a suspicious discovery. Heidi told us
that the night of the fire,
00:20:32
Safra's private force
of security guards were oddly not on site. -Was that usual?
-It was unheard of.
00:20:41
-There were also whispers about Safra's stylish wife,
Lily. -The rumors about her
and her previous husbands.
00:20:49
-Lily had been married
four times, with one other husband
also deceased, prompting more conjecture.
00:20:57
-She is rumored
to be a black widow who has inherited a lot of money
from her husbands.
00:21:04
-But police believe Ted was
responsible for two deaths. ♪♪ It would take three long years
to bring Ted to trial.
00:21:20
[ Telephone rings ] -Hello? -Hi. Okay. -And in that time, Heidi was only occasionally
able to speak to Ted
00:21:32
from his prison
on the Mediterranean Sea. -I try to be strong because I know he needs
my strength. too.
00:21:50
I love you. I just wish this wasn't my life. ♪♪ -We're going to the prison,
the Maison d'Arrêt.
00:22:14
-New York lawyer
Michael Griffith joined Ted's defense team. Griffith had made
a name for himself
00:22:20
defending Americans abroad. Ted Maher became a client --
and a tough one. Let me go through
some of the odd things
00:22:29
about this
case. Is there any evidence -- other than what Ted said
initially -- any evidence of two intruders?
00:22:37
-There was no evidence
that I know of of any intruders. -Instead, Griffith would argue
00:22:42
that Ted did
what authorities said -- he stabbed himself
and set the fire, but that he never intended
for anyone to die.
00:22:52
He was just trying to make
himself look like a hero. -Ted is the fireman
who started the fire.
00:23:00
Fireman who start fires do it not to hurt people,
but to save people. -Are you saying
that you believe Ted
00:23:07
actually did start the fire? Cut himself to make himself
look like a hero? -I believe that's
what Ted did.
00:23:14
-Did he actually tell you
he did this himself? -Well, yeah, he told me
that he did this to himself.
00:23:19
And that's the basis
of our defense. -Griffith contends that no one
would have died that night
00:23:28
if police and firefighters had
gotten to the victims faster. It took them
about two and a half hours
00:23:36
to reach Safra and Torrente, but authorities say they
got to the scene in minutes,
00:23:43
but had to be careful
and slow their response because Ted told them there were
violent intruders inside.
00:23:50
-He's totally liable
of the circumstances that he created. -In 2002, attorney Marc Bonnant
spoke to "48 Hours."
00:24:00
He represented Safra's widow,
Lily. He says the rumors about her
are false. -Not only it's not true,
obviously.
00:24:08
It is scandalous. Lily is devastated
by what happened. ♪♪ -November 2002. Heidi traveled to Monaco
as the trial began.
00:24:25
Ted was facing possible life
in prison. -Do you think your husband
will get a fair trial in Monaco?
00:24:32
-Not at all.
-Why not? -They have the reputation
of Monaco on the line, and they would never risk that.
00:24:40
-She wasn't happy
when Ted testified that there had been no intruders and that he had, in fact,
stabbed himself.
00:24:48
And she was furious that Griffith allowed Ted
to take the blame for something
she believes he didn't do.
00:24:57
Heidi believes
with all her heart that Ted didn't do this, that he's being forced
to say he did it.
00:25:03
I mean, what's the truth here? -Well, all I know
is that Ted is my client. I know what Ted has told me.
00:25:08
-He was told this is
the best way to go. -Heidi,
I don't know what to tell you. All I know is I'm doing my job,
00:25:14
based upon what my client's
told me. And I guess
you're going to have to -- -And this is our life.
This is --
00:25:19
-This is your life.
-This is Ted's life. -Right. -Ted Maher was convicted
of arson,
00:25:26
leading to the death
of two people. -We have a reaction
to the verdict. -Yeah, we were disappointed.
00:25:32
-He was sentenced to 10 years. -Heidi? -To Heidi, it was the end
of life as she had known it.
00:25:42
-Yeah, she's -- she's upset. ♪♪ -And then in January, just seven weeks
after the trial,
00:25:53
Ted called Heidi... from outside the prison. -Ted said, "It's me. I'm out." -He had cut the metal bars,
00:26:06
scaled down the prison walls,
and escaped. -I said, "You're joking." And he says, "No, I'm out."
00:26:16
He asked for money,
and I said no, and he got angry at me. -Ted's freedom was short-lived.
00:26:25
The next day,
he was back in custody. Heidi was furious
that he would risk so much,
00:26:32
including having
his sentence extended. She says her faith in Ted
had run out. -I don't need him
and I don't want him.
00:26:43
I did the best I could
to bring him home, but now it seems like he's doing
his own job of screwing up.
00:26:51
-Heidi filed for divorce. As for Ted,
he was released in 2007. When he landed at JFK,
00:27:04
the woman
who had believed in him was nowhere to be found, but Ted would eventually find
others in his corner --
00:27:13
those authors,
Jennifer Thomas and Bill Hayes. Together with Ted, they would
write "Framed in Monte Carlo."
00:27:23
Ted was back to insisting that
while caring for Edmond Safra, he was attacked
by violent intruders.
00:27:31
-What they had accused him
of doing didn't make any sense why anybody would do that
in the first place.
00:27:36
And so, everything he said
made perfect sense when he told us the story. -What Thomas and Hayes
found intriguing
00:27:45
was a report
in a French newspaper. According to Le Figaro, at an unrelated hearing,
00:27:53
a judge who served
on Ted Maher's case had claimed Ted's sentence
had been predetermined
00:27:59
before the trial even began. And in your mind, the real story
is this guy was set up.
00:28:06
-100%. -Back in the States,
Ted was alone. Steady work, tough to find. Especially if your name
was Ted Maher.
00:28:23
And that new name? -Jon Green. ♪♪ -Tonight's "48 Hours"
will continue. -"48 Hours" is back.
-I'm with "48 Hours."
00:28:41
-And so is the official
after-show podcast, "Post Mortem"... -Great to be with you again.
00:28:46
-...where we bring you
a closer look at each case. -This was one of
the most emotional interviews.
00:28:50
-Follow and listen
wherever you get your podcasts. ♪♪ -In his first 10 years
back in the United States,
00:29:07
Jon Green tried to shed
his alter ego, Ted Maher of Monaco. He found a new job
driving trucks
00:29:15
and began a new romance
with Dr. Kim Lark, who he went on to marry in 2020. But the marriage crumbled,
and in 2023,
00:29:26
Green found himself facing
a new charge -- solicitation to commit
first-degree murder.
00:29:35
-Dr. Lark is a big name
in this town. She's well known
by a lot of people. -Green was still behind bars
for forging those checks
00:29:43
and stealing the dogs when Detective Garrett Silva of the Eddy County
Sheriff's Office
00:29:49
began investigating
the alleged plot that Green made
with his jail-mate, Greg Markham, to murder Kim.
00:29:56
-Greg Markham was hired
by Jon Green to kill his wife. -It was a charge
that Green vigorously denied
00:30:05
when investigators interviewed
him in September of 2023. But authorities
weren't persuaded.
00:30:34
Jon Green's trial began
on March 3rd, 2025. Prosecutor Martin Wolfson
called his star witness,
00:30:41
Greg Markham, to the stand. Kim Lark took us
through the house where it was supposed to happen.
00:30:56
What's he supposed to do? -Turn off the power
to the house. -I've been an electrician
for 19 years.
00:31:03
I knew how to do that. -And where was he going to be? -He was supposed
to be hiding in the carport.
00:31:09
-Now, this used to be
a carport here. -Well, he said,
"She's kind of pretty frail.
00:31:13
You're a big guy." -Markham says the plan was
for him to overpower Kim and grab the gun she kept in
the center console of her car.
00:31:23
-Apparently, he was going
to bring me into the house. He told him
how to control my dogs.
00:31:30
-Show it to me.
Show me exactly. -Yeah, so you're raising
your hands up as high as you can get,
00:31:35
and you yell, "Down!"
as loud as you can, and slam your hands down, and then dogs stop,
00:31:40
and they won't move
until given another command. -According to Markham,
Green also told him
00:31:46
where he could find
Kim Lark's safe. -And you would only know that if somebody told you that,
right?
00:31:52
There's no way you would.
-Yeah. -But defense attorney
Blake Dugger told the jury
00:31:57
Greg Markham is no angel and that they shouldn't
believe a word he says. -Greg Markham is an individual
with a checkered past
00:32:12
who really tried
to take advantage and did take advantage
of Jon Green. -But the state
presented evidence
00:32:19
they say proves Greg Markham
was telling the truth -- a diagram Markham made
with similarities
00:32:26
to the interior of Kim's house. He testified Jon Green
had detailed it to him as part of the murder plot.
00:32:39
And prosecutors had evidence that Green was in a hurry
to get money to pay Markham for the hit --
00:32:45
jail calls between Green
and author Jennifer Thomas, who was managing his finances
while he was behind bars.
00:32:54
Green called
her multiple times, asking her to wire $2,500
to an intermediary. First, he said he wanted
the money to buy a trailer,
00:33:05
but his story kept changing. Thomas eventually did
what Green asked, but she was stunned
00:33:18
when she learned
the prosecutors believed the money was really partial
payment in a murder-for-hire.
00:33:25
You had gotten the money
for him. -I was freaked out. -She said she and Hayes
were relieved
00:33:31
when the D.A. decided they had not knowingly
done anything wrong. Blake Dugger insisted
his client didn't, either,
00:33:40
arguing even Greg Markham's
diagram wasn't damning because it could
have been cooked up
00:33:47
after a casual conversation
with Green. Jon Green didn't testify, and Dugger didn't call
any witnesses,
00:34:02
believing that prosecutors
had failed to prove their case. After just two days,
it was in the jury's hands.
00:34:11
-I was feeling good.
I was feeling good. ♪♪ ♪♪ -The jury deliberated
for only about an hour.
00:34:38
They convicted him
of solicitation to commit first-degree murder. -His lying has
finally caught up with him.
00:34:48
-Judge David Finger
sentenced Jon Green, aka Ted Maher, to nine years in prison.
00:34:55
With time served, he'll be out in less than three. For nearly 25 years, we've
had questions for Ted Maher.
00:35:05
New Mexico authorities barred
our cameras from the prison. But in March of 2026,
Ted's attorney, Blake Dugger,
00:35:13
arranged a video visit with him, and Ted allowed us
to interview him. Did you try to hire someone
to kill your wife?
00:35:28
Once again,
Ted says he was framed. He would never instruct
someone to hold a gun
00:35:34
to a dog's head, he says. And he claimed that he only gave
Greg Markham the $2,500
00:35:41
to help rescue Markham's dog, not to murder Kim. But how, then, did Markham
seem to know so much
00:35:55
about the layout
of Kim Lark's house? -But this was
the basic layout. -Markham made us
a diagram, too...
00:36:04
-I knew where the keys were. -...and we compared it
to the house itself. It wasn't exactly a match,
00:36:11
but there were disturbing
similarities. It shows
where the power source is. -Right.
-And where the safe was.
00:36:18
Is that right?
-Yes. -He did a drawing
of her house. How would he have those details
if you didn't give it to him?
00:36:32
-Then you had, like,
a dining room. -Ted echoed what
his lawyer argued in the trial.
00:36:37
Whatever Markham knew about
the home's layout came from
innocent conversations. In fact, he told us
he was a doting husband,
00:36:58
devoted to making life easier
for Kim. You said you loved Kim Lark. He admitted he forged
her signature on a check,
00:37:09
but said
as the marriage crumbled, he had no income
and needed money. And he said he had a right
to the dogs,
00:37:18
since his divorce settlement
with Kim hadn't been finalized yet. Just like he once claimed
in Monaco,
00:37:30
he told us he's an innocent
and fundamentally good man, taken advantage of by others.
00:37:40
As you sit here today, do you feel responsible
for Edmond Safra's death? But the couple who once believed
00:37:50
Ted Maher's proclamations
of innocence... ...now wonder
what really happened on the December night
in Monte Carlo
00:38:02
that ended with the deaths
of a billionaire and his nurse. -There is a chance
in my mind now
00:38:10
that he did orchestrate that. -Bill Hayes still believes
Ted told the truth about intruders attacking him
that night,
00:38:18
but Hayes and Thomas agree that when it comes to Ted's
plot to kill Kim Lark -- the plot they say
he sucked them into --
00:38:27
he is guilty as charged. -I feel betrayed. -I would want to know why --
why you lied.
00:38:37
-And while we may never know
the whole truth for sure, we found evidence
that Ted had hedged
00:38:43
one of his most basic claims, which he repeatedly made
over the years. Were you, in fact,
Special Forces
00:38:52
and a Green Beret? You're saying you went
through the training? Come on, Ted,
don't double talk here.
00:39:04
So, you never served
as a Green Beret? -If Ted Maher didn't give
us a straight answer,
00:39:15
the Army certainly did, telling us,
"There is no evidence that Theodore Maher served
in the special forces."
00:39:25
-He's a thief.
He's a liar, a con artist. -And Kim Lark says she's worried she hasn't seen
the last of him.
00:39:34
-When he gets out,
I'll be in trouble. -Does Kim Lark have a reason
to be scared of you?
00:39:42
-There's no telling
what he may do. -Detective Garrett Silva, who helped piece the murder
solicitation case together,
00:39:50
was promoted to sergeant
with a K9 unit. He told us that if he were
in Kim's position,
00:39:57
he would keep a dog by his side
for protection. And that's exactly
what Kim Lark is doing.
00:40:04
-I don't trust anybody.
I'm always on alert. -She told us Ted has demanded
money as part of their divorce,
00:40:12
and she's infuriated. Kim admits
that anger can be lonely. -Come on, Fel-bel. -But anyone
who knows Kim knows...
00:40:22
-We're just going for a ride. -...she's never really alone. Kim, do they follow you
everywhere?
00:40:30
-Yes.
-Oh my God, that makes me laugh. -Dogs just want to be
with you all the time.
00:40:38
-And you can trust them.
-Yes. -Yes.
-Okay. ♪♪ ♪♪