00:00:00
When my mom came in, she said, Nikki's not here. Where is she? Because this isn't funny.
00:00:18
In the bottom of my heart, I knew something was really, really wrong. He looked underneath the sagebrush and saw what he thought appeared to be blood.
00:00:26
A high school beauty found dead in the desert, bound and buried. What does that say to you?
00:00:33
A great deal of rage by someone. He looked like your average high school student. Tall, clean cut, polite.
00:00:42
A teenager with two sides. He would yell at her. He would be pushing her around.
00:00:48
A puzzle seemingly solved, then blown apart. We recorded that conversation and it was dynamite.
00:00:57
McKayla was on the ground and she wasn't really moving. To unravel the mystery, investigators would follow a trail through high school hallways teeming with secrets and schemes.
00:01:10
Behavior grew more and more and more. Bad idea that became a horrible idea. Bad idea that went very, very bad.
00:01:22
He waves at you for miles, the big neon cowboy. Wendover Will is what they call him, and his job for more than 60 years
00:01:38
has been to tempt travelers off Interstate 80 here at the Utah-Nevada border. Pull them off the road to this tiny, bright gash of high-desert casino commerce.
00:01:48
And most leave again a little lighter in the wallet, knowing precious little about the stories West Wendover loves to tell.
00:01:55
About the racers who come here to break speed records of the nearby Bonneville flats.
00:02:00
About the local air base from which the Enola Gay took off for Hiroshima. But there's also the story they whispered to each other
00:02:13
up and down the little strip. The one that shocked them all. That puzzles them still.
00:02:19
about the terrible night when three families lost their teenage children, about the dark mystery spawned under the pointing grin of Wendover Will.
00:02:34
It was a Thursday afternoon, a windy late winter day in the high desert. Here at the local high school, star runner Michaela Costanzo cleaned up after track practice.
00:02:46
Mickey, as everybody called her, intended to walk home. It wasn't far about a mile.
00:02:51
Her usual ride, her sister Christina, was out of town. Before we had left, me and or my husband would always pick Michaela up from school.
00:03:02
And so we were like, are you sure you're going to have a way home? This is something you do every day.
00:03:06
This is something I do every day. It was the first time I left her. Mickey was 16, a junior, clockwork reliable.
00:03:15
said her mother, Celia. Michaela is not your typical teenager. That girl would check in with me all the time.
00:03:25
So we have a routine. I'm changing. I'm going to be heading out. I'm heading out the back. You know, I'm heading home.
00:03:33
I'm home. Always kept in touch. Always. Always. To a fault. As the sun began to set,
00:03:43
Celia was still working at one of the local casinos, expecting Mickey's usual check-in call.
00:03:49
She did not call me to tell me track practice was over and she was getting ready.
00:03:55
She didn't call me to tell me she was walking home. And so I started calling her phone.
00:04:04
And it rang and rang and rang the first time. And then I called it right back because that was unusual.
00:04:10
and it was like you hit the ignore button. This is so not her. So now Celia called Christina 400 miles away in Las Vegas
00:04:19
to see if she had heard from Mickey. And I said, Mom, she's probably at practice.
00:04:25
And she says, no, practice, they ended, and she's not home. And I said, calm down, you're probably just missing her.
00:04:33
Christina tried calling Mickey too. No answer. And I'm thinking, maybe for the first time in her life, she's being a normal teenager.
00:04:42
Mickey was the youngest of Celia's three girls. She was a star, student, and athlete, mature beyond her years.
00:04:50
She liked to write poetry, short stories, and she was pretty and very popular. She was the one out of all three of us girls that I say was just going down the path you would want any child to go down.
00:05:02
She was doing it the right way, stereotypically. I mean, bright, talented, good-looking.
00:05:09
The trifecta. Yes, she had it all. One of those special kids, said Celia. Born happy.
00:05:20
She was always positive. She just had a different approach to life. She found the good in everything and everybody.
00:05:27
A depressive personality she was not. No. Oh, no. Not at all. Oh, and one more thing.
00:05:36
Mickey and DJ, her middle sister, were inseparable. I'd consider us twins. Everything we did, we had to be together.
00:05:45
If we weren't at the same place, we always had to know where the other was at all times.
00:05:53
But now nobody seemed to know where Mickey was It was getting dark in the desert dark and cold Celia bolted out of work early and rushed home hoping to spot Mickey on the way or find her at the apartment But only
00:06:09
DJ was there. And my mom came in. She said, Mickey's not here. Where is she? Because this isn't funny.
00:06:16
So I immediately went out and searched for her. Called her friends, called my friends.
00:06:20
If you're here for Mickey, you need to tell me. words spread fast across west wendover by the time i had already called the police
00:06:29
there was already over 80 people starting to look the police asked me did you check with this one
00:06:35
and all of her friends did you go any place that she would go i'm like yes and they're all panicked
00:06:40
and they're all out looking and and everything so they immediately knew something was wrong
00:06:48
The tiny West Wendover Police Department jumped on the case right away. Veteran Detective Donald Burnham was in charge.
00:06:58
There's no point in waiting. The longer you wait, the bigger problem you have, and the harder it's going to be to find him.
00:07:06
Hours now since Mickey was due home. Scared, upset, panic, worry, because it was dark now and it was cold and she had no jacket.
00:07:17
and in the bottom of my heart I knew something was really, really wrong. And you're trying to tell yourself, no, no, no, no, no, it can't be.
00:07:29
Yeah. Then the police had an idea. Maybe Mickey's cell phone, the one she always used to keep in touch,
00:07:39
would give them a clue. So they checked her most recent calls, and there it was,
00:07:43
one particular number that kept popping up just before Mickey disappeared. Ten digits.
00:07:51
Would they leave detectives to Mickey Costanzo? Or something else altogether? Day two. The desert sun rose pale and cold in West Wendover, Nevada.
00:08:19
Sixteen-year-old Mickey Costanzo had been missing for twelve hours. It was horrible. I didn't sleep. I had to stay home in case Michaela came home.
00:08:30
And watched the door. And watched the door, and they kept saying, you have to be home, and I'm like, this doesn't help.
00:08:38
Mickey's sister DJ was angry or terrified or both. I called her phone real mad. I said, this isn't funny. You need to tell me where you are. What's going on? And I just kept calling her phone, crying, begging her, please answer. Please be okay.
00:09:00
Eldest sister Christina, in Las Vegas attending NASCAR races with her husband, had been telling people, don't worry, she's just being rebellious. Not anymore.
00:09:09
and I looked at my husband and I said, you need to take me home right now. He says, well, what changed your mind?
00:09:16
And I said, because nothing happens in Wendover and something did. By now in Wendover, it was a local media event.
00:09:25
I just hope that we find this little girl safe. I never thought anything like this would ever happen in Wendover.
00:09:31
It's just not hard to run away from home, I don't think. Everybody's thought, but that's just like, you know, hoping.
00:09:37
Police were hoping too for a break. They had no solid clues, no eyewitnesses, nothing that pointed to Mickey's whereabouts.
00:09:44
I didn't believe she was dead. I was hoping maybe she was just somewhere and we weren't able to find her at the time.
00:09:50
That she had just gone off to be with a friend and been irresponsible for once. We didn't know whether she'd met with foul play or if she had been restrained and held somewhere against her will.
00:09:59
It was obvious we had more than just a runaway juvenile, but we just didn't know how far that it had gone.
00:10:05
Police started talking to everybody who knew Mickey. Like her boyfriend, Javier, called him down to the station for questioning.
00:10:12
How's she been acting lately? I don't know. She's been acting pretty fine. Like, if something was wrong, she'd have been.
00:10:19
She's not one of those girls that hides her feelings, like, puts her emotions in her.
00:10:24
Could they believe the boyfriend? When they pulled Mickey's cell phone records, something odd stood out at the very time she disappeared.
00:10:33
There was a lot of text and phone calls transpiring just immediately after school and up till just after five.
00:10:41
And then they stopped. Abruptly stopped right at the time that she had left the school.
00:10:47
Those calls and texts pinging off the local cell phone tower were all from one number.
00:10:54
Definitely having communication back and forth. There was something going on. Something. The last calls were made to Cody Patton.
00:11:01
Cody Patton? Who was he? Certainly not her boyfriend. But as any kid who'd been around Wendover knew perfectly well, Cody was a friend.
00:11:09
In fact, one of Mickey's oldest friends. They grew up together. They were friends.
00:11:14
Did they ever date Michaela and Cody? Michaela was not allowed to date until she was 16.
00:11:20
But I'm sure it was probably like puppy love, what I call puppy love. Cody was an 18-year-old senior at Mickey's high school.
00:11:27
Big handsome kid, football player. He once lived in the same apartment complex as the Costanzo family.
00:11:34
Now he was engaged to another girl and lived with his fiancée's parents. Police brought Cody in for a talk as well.
00:11:40
The last time you seen her was? About 5'0". And that was where? At first school.
00:11:47
She was with somebody? Just some. I thought it was her boyfriend. Her boyfriend being Javier.
00:11:53
Yeah. But Cody wasn sure it was Javier but then he seemed and probably was exhausted He been out the night before searching for Mickey Do you have any questions for me
00:12:05
Yeah, find it, please. Search teams combed the desert outside of town. Police, volunteers, Mickey's sister DJ.
00:12:16
And out searching, I remember dropping her to the ground. And I said, I really don't think she's alive.
00:12:22
they're like you need to think positive but where was she she wasn't at school she wasn't with a friend
00:12:31
she apparently wasn't in town and it's a very big desert around Wendover so much space to get lost or to hold a person against her will
00:12:42
or god knows to hide a body Celia's last hope through her sleepless night had been seeing Mickey show up at school in the morning,
00:12:53
wondering what the fuss was about. When she didn't go to school on Friday morning,
00:12:59
I knew I wouldn't see my daughter alive. And I felt like a failure as a parent. Not just for Michaela, but for DJ, too.
00:13:12
Because I couldn't make her better. I went to my mom's house. and I told her that I was going to go find my sister.
00:13:23
Even though she's not okay, I will bring her home. And for whatever reason in my mind,
00:13:30
at that point I knew that I was going to find her and I wasn't going to find her the way we wanted to,
00:13:36
but that I was going to bring her home. All night, Christina roamed the rugged landscape, alone.
00:13:43
I stopped and looked at any little mound of dirt that looked weird, and I went to the
00:13:55
gravel pits. So close. Had Mickey called out, her sister would have heard her. But of course, that wasn't possible.
00:14:13
Day 3. 36 hours since Mickey Costanzo left school and vanished. Search teams prowled the desert beyond sight of Wendover's neon casinos.
00:14:34
Faint hope. Out here, the great empty basin sprawls 180,000 square miles. And then, Saturday morning, one of the searchers noted something that looked sort of odd out here in the middle of nowhere.
00:14:49
Fresh tire tracks veering off the dusty desert road. He followed them. He stated he'd seen some sagebrush that appeared to have been disturbed and were covering some ground.
00:15:00
So he looked underneath the sagebrush and saw what he thought appeared to be blood and decided that he needed to call the authorities.
00:15:07
This is the area they call the gravel pits. Police took a camera to record what they might find there.
00:15:14
We removed the sagebrush and gently dug into the area and found what we thought was part of a human body.
00:15:23
Did you just uncover the body then? No, no. We backed out of the area and contacted Washoe Crime Unit to come in and exhume that area for evidence.
00:15:33
Crime scene investigators from? Reno. But Rena was 400 miles away, nine hours by car.
00:15:39
Still nothing more to do until they arrived. So they sealed off the area and waited,
00:15:45
just as Mickey's sister Christina, still searching, drove by. I just felt like your heart sank.
00:15:54
I saw the unmarked police car driving on the gravel pit road that I was on the night before.
00:16:00
And I just sank. only one thing that could mean so she rushed home picked up her mother went to see the police chief
00:16:09
and he said we have found a body so we called off the search and i guess out of hope i says well
00:16:19
can you see her and he says no i says well then you don't know it's her and he says you're right christina but she's the only one missing so we're pretty sure it's her
00:16:32
But they couldn't know for sure, said the chief, till the forensics team arrived next morning.
00:16:38
And I said, you're going to leave her out here again all night? And he said, yes, we have to.
00:16:44
And I remember saying, then I'm not leaving. And he told us we had to. And he said, I'll have somebody out here at all the time.
00:16:54
And I said, it shouldn't be strangers. She shouldn't be left with strangers. For them to look at me and tell me,
00:17:09
we'll all be here, she won't be alone. Made me feel pretty good. As good as you can feel.
00:17:23
Then police made it public. Shallow grave was discovered, the contents of which are unknown.
00:17:29
Because the discovery was outside city limits, the case came under the jurisdiction of the
00:17:35
Sheriff's Department, 110 miles away, in Elko, Nevada. Detective Kevin McKinney raced down I-80.
00:17:43
He met the forensics team next morning. They started sifting and it didn't take very long once it started.
00:17:50
It was Mickey in a shallow grave beneath a clump of sagebrush five miles from home It was very emotional The age of the victim and the uh brutality i guess disturbing would be the word mickey had been beaten cut stabbed repeatedly
00:18:11
several jagged slashes across her face neck head the blood loss had saturated the ground
00:18:21
underneath her. It looked kind of personal. It was very aggressive. It was not a precision type of
00:18:28
injury. And then those policemen had to go to Mickey's family and tell them what they found.
00:18:35
My heart sank to the pit of my stomach and I screamed. I just dropped. I just kept screaming.
00:18:41
The one thing I will never, ever forget in my entire life is watching my daughter DJ scream.
00:18:54
The scream I haven't heard from her even as a baby. And fall to the ground in shock and disbelief.
00:19:03
She physically did what I felt like I wanted to do, but I couldn't do it because I'm the mom.
00:19:10
I had to keep myself together. I had to be the strong one. And so she had a news conference and said what at this point everybody in town was thinking.
00:19:22
Please, ladies and gentlemen, this is not over yet until the person or persons responsible are brought to justice.
00:19:32
But why, Mickey of all people, not an enemy in the world, at least as far as anybody knew.
00:19:39
And yet, here at the crime scene, one clue, one weird, awful clue. There was a zip tie that was bound around her wrist.
00:19:50
What did that say to you? It indicated to me that she was restrained and more than likely taken from that skull against her will.
00:19:57
Somebody kidnapped Mickey Costanzo and then murdered her with almost unimaginable brutality.
00:20:04
But who and why? And then another clue. One of the officers going through surveillance video from the school found the grainy image
00:20:14
of Mickey just outside the girls' locker room. And she wasn't alone. Now the TV trucks roared in from Salt Lake and all around Northern Nevada,
00:20:41
poking about in little West Wendover, demanding an answer. Exactly what happened to that perfect daughter?
00:20:47
That pretty and popular 16-year-old, Mickey Costanzo. Justice demanded an answer.
00:20:55
The police chief supplied a non-answer for the evening news. We don't have a suspect and we don't have a person of interest,
00:21:01
but we are getting leads all the time. But we can tell you now there were a couple of things about the murder
00:21:07
the chief did not disclose when he spoke to the media. It's true there were no hairs or fibers or fingerprints pointing to any particular suspect,
00:21:16
but there was a person of interest. We started doing a little digging. we went back to the school. We obtained some video surveillance. Remember what Mickey's friend
00:21:26
Cody Patton said, that he saw her leaving the school that day with someone he assumed was her
00:21:30
boyfriend, Javier. Now the video showed Cody was right. Mickey had indeed been with someone.
00:21:38
Just prior to her leaving from the back of the school, we saw Cody Patton leave the same doorway.
00:21:43
Cody Patton. That's the someone she was with. Cody, the childhood friend who had been calling and texting with Mickey just before she disappeared.
00:21:54
Cody Patton was probably the last person to have seen her due to the fact she had left through the southwest doors and he was in that area.
00:22:02
Now why didn't Cody tell them that? The detectives went to Mickey's mother Celia to find out a little more about Cody.
00:22:09
Cody is a very interesting young man. Cody could be the sweetest person in the world and then turn right around and just not be okay.
00:22:23
Cody has a tough temper. Cody has a hot temper. Cody had been struggling at school and at home with his parents, so much so that Cody left and moved in with his fiancée, Tony Fratto, and her parents, Cassie and Claude.
00:22:38
Mormon family. Very devout. I wanted to extend a hand to him to help him get through school.
00:22:47
We became his second family, and more importantly, we were really invested in his success.
00:22:57
But you really cared for him, right? Oh, yes. Of course. Yes. He was like a son to me.
00:23:04
But when the police asked to talk to Cody yet again, It wasn't Claude Fratto, but his actual father, Kip Patton, who brought him to the station.
00:23:13
He looked like your average high school student to me. Tall, lean, clean cut, polite.
00:23:19
He was very self-confident. Did you sleep okay last night? Not now. Why not? I slept horrible since making me miss him.
00:23:28
How come? I told my friends. Cody rehashed the story he told the cops a few days earlier.
00:23:35
how he'd been calling and texting Mickey, asking for help to move some car parts.
00:23:41
And then he saw her walking toward the front door of the school. I said, okay, you all right?
00:23:46
She goes, yeah, I'm fine. I said, okay, well, no worries, have a good one. She said, all right, bye.
00:23:52
That was it. He had seen her at the front of the school with her boyfriend and Everyone else had last seen her exiting out the back of the school.
00:24:04
Not to mention the security camera that showed Mickey walking toward the rear exit.
00:24:09
No one else around but Cody himself. Okay, so what are you getting at? What I'm getting at is you're not being totally truthful with us.
00:24:17
Yes, I am. No, you're not. But there was no getting around it. Video doesn't lie.
00:24:23
The video from the school indicates to us that you were waiting for her. I wasn't.
00:24:34
Because that was the time she disappeared. And that was the time she died. And you were involved.
00:24:41
I wasn't involved in her death. I think you were. I know you were now. I did not kill Akhil Xtetel.
00:24:48
I don't think you planned on it. I don't think you intended to. I didn't. I didn't do anything.
00:24:55
And then Cody asked if he could spend a minute alone with his dad. So the detectives left the room, and Cody's father, Kip, went in, closed the door.
00:25:06
What happened in there? Couldn't tell exactly through the door. But it didn't sound happy.
00:25:14
Not at all. Three days after Mickey Costanzo's brutalized body was unearthed in the Nevada desert,
00:25:34
a family tragedy of a different kind was playing out at the Wendover Police Department.
00:25:39
Mickey's childhood friend Cody Patton had asked for a few minutes alone with his father Kip behind a closed door.
00:25:47
I didn't hear what was said, but at one point I heard some wailing. from the father. I could hear him yell. It sounded to me like he was crying.
00:25:59
And then a few minutes later, the detectives walked back into the interview room.
00:26:04
His father told him he needs to tell us what happened. Be a man. No telling what a lawyer
00:26:09
might have told young Cody Patton, but this was a father who had just heard the worst news of his
00:26:15
life from the lips of his own son. And so here is what he said to Cody. You guys started fixing this now. As much as you can. What you did is heinous, Cody.
00:26:31
I don't want to abandon you at all. Okay? We're going to do it right. We came as well.
00:26:41
And this is what Cody told them. That he picked up Mickey at the school. And when they started driving, that Mickey insisted Cody break up with his fiancée, Tony Frato, and date her instead.
00:26:55
That when he refused... She started yelling at me and said, it's because I'm not leaving Tony.
00:27:02
She started like pounding on my chest and stuff. By this time, said Cody, they were out of the car, out in the desert.
00:27:12
She hit him, he said. Then he pushed her. She fell down and hit her head. She just laid there and was looking at the sky.
00:27:22
And like her eyes started to turn black. And I didn't know what to do. I just sat there and she started to like shake and seize.
00:27:35
Cody insisted. He tried to check her pulse and got nothing. Then he says she started flopping, so he grabbed a shovel from the car.
00:27:45
I kind of just tried to hit her on her head right here somewhere, trying to just knock her out.
00:27:51
And it hit, like, right here, and it, like, it tore up pretty bad. It tore up pretty bad.
00:28:00
He was very tearful. We had to stop several times to allow him to gain his composure back.
00:28:08
A couple times he told us he was getting physically ill while he was describing details to us.
00:28:16
Cody continued, saying he panicked then. And to stifle the sound, he cut her throat.
00:28:23
And then she stopped. I didn't know what to do. I was going to call my dad. I didn't do it. He would freak out.
00:28:32
So I put her in the little grave thing I dug by the big bush. I covered her up and I took the clothes over in the gravel pit area and burned them.
00:28:44
He stated he was alone with Michaela. He never implicated anybody else even being present or aware of it.
00:28:49
He did it alone. Did he tell anybody why? No, he did not. They arrested Cody then, cuffed him, charged him with murder
00:28:59
He'd intended to join the Marines after high school Now he could face the death penalty
00:29:04
Patton has been enrolled as a student in the West Windover Junior Senior High School
00:29:11
And has been attending until the time of his arrest It was after he confessed, after they'd put him in jail
00:29:20
That Cody finally hired an attorney John Olson His specialty is keeping accused killers off death row.
00:29:29
But Cody, unlike some of Olsen's other clients, didn't seem at all like a crazed killer.
00:29:36
You obviously got to know him reasonably well. What sort of family did Cody have?
00:29:41
Nice family. They're working people. They seem to be fairly close. They did a lot of things together.
00:29:48
Of course, that's Cody's attorney talking. But even Mickey family the very people you expect would demand the death penalty in fact felt quite a different emotion I was completely shocked It not the person that I knew And my husband was there and I said
00:30:11
Cody didn't do this. He would never hurt her. And he says, babe, he did. And I said,
00:30:18
then somebody made him do it. And I said that every single day since then. Somebody made him do it.
00:30:28
It was, everybody said, a measure of Mickey Costanzo's sunny personality, her sweet goodness,
00:30:51
that they had to rent Wendover's 1,000-seat concert hall to make room for her funeral.
00:30:57
She was, people said, everybody's daughter. This entire town suffered as if this town was her parent.
00:31:07
It really means a lot that all of you came here. Because we can all see how many people loved her like we did.
00:31:17
And one by one they wept as they said goodbye and remembered Michaela so cruelly murdered
00:31:25
as the ideal young woman, the pride of West Wendover High. She was many things to many people.
00:31:33
A friend, a fellow student, a teammate, and an inspiration. In fact, perhaps the only friend who didn't attend the public funeral
00:31:43
didn't witness its outpouring of emotion and grief was one of her oldest playmates, Cody Patton.
00:31:50
Cody, of course, was in a jail cell, awaiting trial for murdering her. Naturally, a lot of people in town had come to see that boy as evil incarnate,
00:31:59
the villain who'd snuffed out the life of their princess. And yet, even to Mickey's family, it was more puzzling than that.
00:32:07
It was simply inexplicable. He would never hurt her. I don't understand why he ended up confessing to it.
00:32:17
I'm still like, there's something more to this story. more partly because Cody's story what happened just didn't make any sense
00:32:27
especially that bit about how Mickey demanded Cody dump his fiancee Tony and date her instead
00:32:33
impossible said Celia Mickey had her own steady boyfriend and out of respect for Tony had been
00:32:40
going out of her way to avoid getting anywhere near Cody Michaela never liked confrontation
00:32:47
She did not like drama. She hated drama. If it was going to cause an issue, she would stay away.
00:32:56
Anyway, everybody knew about Cody and Tony's engagement, saw them flash their engagement rings.
00:33:03
He the six-foot-six soon-to-be Marine? She the wee slip of a thing who made it her business to tame his temper and set him on the road to righteousness.
00:33:12
She even persuaded him to convert to the Mormon church. She was determined to be Cody's savior, as you will.
00:33:22
The person that helped him to graduate. She was going to make him happy. The person that helped him be happy.
00:33:28
The person that helped him get into the Marines. Is that what it was? She encouraged that.
00:33:36
She encouraged him to do his schoolwork. She encouraged him to keep on track to graduate.
00:33:41
She encouraged him to try and be a better person. Now the man Tony so badly wanted to save was facing the death penalty.
00:33:52
But she stuck by him, sent him love letters, promised to be faithful and true, and often drove the four hours it took to visit him in jail.
00:34:01
They talked on the phone sometimes, too. And, this being jail, those calls were recorded.
00:34:16
Tony's parents visited Cody sometimes to provide support, but also to ask a particular question.
00:34:31
I said, I don't understand this. Why did you do this? Why did this happen? And he just said, I don't know. I can't tell you anything. I don't know.
00:34:42
but by now Cody's lawyer had told him stop talking tough case real tough case because the chances
00:34:51
of his getting the death penalty were quite high I think they were very high it was the identity
00:34:56
of the victim it was the brutality of the killing it was the poignancy of some of the
00:35:03
photographs in the case that would just break your heart not to mention Cody's confession
00:35:11
which made mounting a defense all but impossible. I think he really regretted doing that
00:35:17
because the confession early on was the strongest piece of evidence against Cody.
00:35:22
What Cody had in mind when he told him that he was involved in the killing or that he did the killing, God knows.
00:35:30
But the more he studied Cody's confession, the more Olsen came to believe, just like Mickey's family did,
00:35:37
that something about it didn't add up. So Olson hired a seasoned investigator, a former Secret Service agent named Bill Savage,
00:35:48
asked him to find out what he could about Cody, the murder, and that boy's confession.
00:35:55
Some of the details that Mr Patton reported didn quite pass the sniff test to me Mickey wounds for example so severe so brutal they certainly didn seem to be the result of an accident as Cody had claimed or from a shovel of all things
00:36:16
Horrible slicing disfigurement to Mickey's face. What did that say to you? A great deal of rage by someone.
00:36:26
Why would Cody have done that to a childhood friend? Had to be more to the story.
00:36:32
Attorney Olson wondered if Cody's fiancé, Tony Frato, might provide some insight.
00:36:37
Tony had already talked to the police during their routine interviews with people who knew Mickey.
00:36:41
I guess just kind of curious, like, where's Mickey? What's going on, you know? Where could she have gone?
00:36:50
So Olsen spoke to Tony himself. Did she have any idea why he... Absolutely not. No idea.
00:36:58
Was she as devastated as other people seem to have been? I would describe her aspect as deadpan.
00:37:08
I would describe her as emotionless. How did that strike you? Odd. Very odd. Vicky's sister DJ also remembered how, after the murder,
00:37:21
Tony just seemed to shut down. She refused to look at me. Refused. I understand that you're not going to be very social
00:37:29
because it's your, you know, significant other doing this, but she wouldn't talk to certain people anymore
00:37:37
that she normally would. Who knew what wheels were turning in that young woman's brain?
00:37:43
And then, early one spring morning in April, a few weeks after Mickey's murder, Tony Frato climbed into a car with Cody's father, Kit Patton.
00:37:51
She didn't tell her parents they were out of town. Tony was wearing just her pajamas, brought nothing with her,
00:37:59
as if she assumed she'd never be coming back. It was one of Mickey Costanzo's favorite places,
00:38:22
the high school track where she won so many races. Now on a bright spring day in May 2011,
00:38:29
two months after her murder, a somber celebration was underway here. It would have been Mickey's 17th birthday.
00:38:36
I bought a cake, balloons, took her down to the high school, invited her friends,
00:38:45
and that was the hardest day next to finding out she was murdered. Apparently murdered by a childhood friend, Cody Patton.
00:39:01
He'd confessed was sitting in jail, the death penalty a distinct possibility. Or so everyone thought.
00:39:07
But as they celebrated Mickey's life, there was something about her death they didn't know.
00:39:15
Several days earlier, Cody's legal team had a surprise visitor, Cody's fiancé, Tony Fratto.
00:39:24
She arrived wearing her pajamas and with Cody's father at her side said she was ready to tell the lawyers a story.
00:39:34
So are you willing to pursue it? I think so, yeah. And we talked and we recorded the conversation with her permission.
00:39:41
And it was dynamite. You're about to hear a whole new version of Mickey's murder that would turn the case upside down.
00:39:56
And here from the lips of this quiet little teen came a horrifying story. Cody wasn't the only killer.
00:40:07
It began for her, she said, with a text from Cody saying, I have her, meaning Mickey was with him in an SUV he had borrowed.
00:40:15
He wanted Tony to join them. Cody picked her up, she said, and the three drove around, ending up at the gravel pits.
00:40:27
Then Mickey and Cody got out of the car, and she started yelling at him and then pushing him.
00:40:33
She said Cody started digging what appeared to be a grave. and when he'd finished with Mickey lying semi-conscious on the ground,
00:41:04
they both started kicking her, punching her, hit her with a shovel. She wasn't moving and so we had moved her to the grave
00:41:14
and then we were kind of standing there deciding what do we do. We didn't know what really we had just done.
00:41:23
I remember holding down her legs and we had split her throat. Who cut her throat?
00:41:35
It was both of us. It was both of us. To Cody's defense attorney, five little words that changed everything.
00:41:45
Tony Frato freely admitting that she had also murdered Mickey. All of a sudden it changed from one crazed killer to two people who committed a homicide It gave us something to point the case towards other than Cody acts Two killers sharing the guilt
00:42:07
Maybe with some good lawyering his client could escape the death penalty after all.
00:42:12
Why Tony said those things was almost beside the point for Olson anyway. But not for Tony's parents, not when they found out.
00:42:21
No one that knows Tony would have ever seen this coming. It just isn't possible.
00:42:33
Their daughter hadn't even been a suspect, not even a person of interest. Now she confessed herself into a murder that could send her to death row.
00:42:44
My immediate thought was that she's been coerced into saying this. Somebody's made her do it.
00:42:50
Yes. Yeah. What person popped into your head? Cody's dad. Cody's father, Kip Patton,
00:42:58
the man who delivered Tony to her meeting with Cody's lawyers. Patton declined a request to appear on our program,
00:43:03
but he insisted. Tony told him what happened, and it was her idea to come forward and meet with Cody's attorneys.
00:43:10
He just drove her there because Tony's parents were out of town. Do you think sometimes that she thought,
00:43:18
I can't do this with my parents present. I have to wait till they're gone before I can actually go and confess to this terrible thing.
00:43:27
I don't know. Possibly so, but we've always been very, very open. Or possibly a misguided attempt to save Cody.
00:43:35
But she'd only succeeded in incriminating herself. She doesn't believe that she's confessing to the law enforcement.
00:43:43
she's talking to Cody's attorneys asking them if it's going to help. But Tony didn't have an attorney-client relationship
00:43:52
with Cody's lawyer. No privilege, no protection. So they turned her statement over to law enforcement.
00:44:00
And when Detective Donald Burnham reviewed the tape and transcript of Tony's confession...
00:44:04
I determined that we had probable cause to arrest her just based on her own admission.
00:44:10
Tony Fratto, just 18, was booked, held without bail, facing perhaps a capital murder charge, same as Cody.
00:44:19
I, in my heart of hearts, knew Tony had something to do with it, because they were a couple.
00:44:25
It was very hard for me to know she was at school, wearing his engagement ring, acting like nothing had happened, and she knew nothing about it when I knew she knew.
00:44:36
I said, I'm so glad that she is now sitting and facing what he is. now it makes sense.
00:44:45
But little Toni Fratto hardly seemed like a killer. She was a beauty queen at 13.
00:44:51
West Wendover Junior Miss, in fact. Devoutly religious, too. And extremely close to her parents.
00:44:58
She always went to church with us. You know, a lot of kids, you have to force them to get out of bed and go.
00:45:04
It was never that way with Toni. She had goals in her life. She knew exactly where she wanted to go.
00:45:09
So a truly responsible child. Yes. Yes, absolutely. Outside of her family, Tony had very few friends.
00:45:17
Except Cody, of course. From the moment they started dating in the ninth grade, they were virtually inseparable.
00:45:23
She loved him. She thought she loved him. He was very, very possessive. Did not like her time taken up by anyone else but him.
00:45:34
Now the fratters remember a possessive controlling Cody so big and strong and when they thought about it that way they wonder what was the real story behind their daughter's confession.
00:46:04
Elko, Nevada Gold Rush Town Saloons, casinos Even brothels Four of them right in the middle of town
00:46:13
Good business citizens too, according to police Nearby, there's also an historic courthouse
00:46:19
The stage for preliminary hearings for the teenagers Accused of that brutal murder
00:46:24
That so far not a single person could explain Least of all, Mickey Costanzo's mother, Celia
00:46:32
Before the hearing, she studied every grisly photo and braced herself for what was coming.
00:46:38
I had to know exactly what happened to my daughter. Everything. No matter how bad.
00:46:42
Everything. Every autopsy photo that was taken of my daughter, I saw. I saw it all because I did not want to go into a courtroom and see my daughter like that for the very first time.
00:46:59
There were separate hearings for Tony and Cody. Two occasions for Celia to hold up under questioning.
00:47:06
He's right over there and he's in her red jumps. Two occasions to hear emotional and incriminating confessions.
00:47:15
I tried to like check her pulse and stuff and I couldn't get anything and she just flopped.
00:47:21
Cody, no surprise, was bound over for trial at which everyone knew he could face the death penalty.
00:47:27
And Tony, pale and gaunt in her dark blue jumpsuit, Tony listened to excerpts of her own quite stunning confession.
00:47:35
After that, she wasn't really grieving or anything. So we kind of just stood there.
00:47:45
We were crying because we didn't know what we had just done. It was brutal. It was painful.
00:47:51
It was long. It was torturous. and those two could not ever get away with it. They could not...
00:48:00
not walk away free. But people couldn't help but notice that the two kids told very different stories.
00:48:10
Remember, Cody said he was alone. Well, Tony insisted she was with him and they murdered Mickey together.
00:48:19
Tony's parents simply couldn't believe, despite her confession, that their sweet dominion of daughter
00:48:24
was capable of so monstrous an act. Can you imagine her doing those things? Striking her with a shovel, perhaps helping with a knife.
00:48:33
I don't believe that she had anything to do with the knife. There were no fingerprints, no DNA, anything to indicate that she had touched anything.
00:48:42
The striking her with a shovel was an order from Cody. An order from Cody. That was the answer to the question, said the Fratos, and behind it a terrible secret.
00:48:55
Over the years, said the Frados, Cody had given Tony lots of orders. He was extremely possessive, physically intimidating,
00:49:03
more than a foot taller than little Tony, was often angry and abusive. He would yell at her. He would be pushing her around.
00:49:12
He would be restraining her, throwing her down. In fact, just two months before Mickey's murder,
00:49:19
the school surveillance camera caught an agitated Cody appearing to get rough with Tony right here at her locker.
00:49:25
There was an instance that occurred in the hallway of Wendover High School that depicts Cody grabbing Tony around the neck
00:49:34
and realizing he's 6'6", she's 5'1". But Tony declined to file charges. Her explanation was that if something like this happens,
00:49:46
he will not be accepted into the Marines and I don't want to stand in the way of that.
00:49:53
You have to realize what her goals were and her expectations and her final result of all of this
00:49:59
was to get him into the Marines. And perhaps get him out of her life? Now, after the murder and Tony's confession,
00:50:09
the Frados look back on their daughter's relationship with Cody with new eyes. Tony, they decided, was an abused woman.
00:50:17
She was living in fear of what she thought the repercussions would be if she brought it out.
00:50:26
So, fearing Cody might kill her too, Tony's parents insisted their daughter had no choice but to cooperate with Cody the murderer.
00:50:33
So her participation, as people say, in what happened that night was strictly out of fear, controlling, manipulation and orders by the one that she had already been suffering abuse from for two years, three years.
00:50:53
But she participated in the attack. She participated, participated under extreme orders.
00:51:03
She was afraid that she would be the one lying next to Michaela if she did not follow his orders that evening.
00:51:12
To which Cody's attorney, John Olson, responded. Baloney. Why do you say that? Baloney.
00:51:18
There's nothing in their relationship ever that would indicate that she was ever abused by Cody.
00:51:25
Even so, Tony Fratto was bound over for trial, just like Cody, and was now sitting in a jail cell facing the daunting prospect of losing her life, not to Cody Patton, but to lethal injection.
00:51:38
Unless, what if Tony told a whole news story about her role in Mickey Costanzo's murder?
00:51:46
A story that just might eventually set her free. Christmas time in West Wendover, Nevada.
00:52:06
Mickey Costanzo had been dead for nine months. Christmas Day, it was not fun for me.
00:52:14
She was missing. It's not the same. And I don't ever think that's going to go away.
00:52:22
I used to enjoy going and buying everybody Christmas presents and wrapping them up, and it wasn't the same.
00:52:33
And then having to remember not to buy her something. Cody Patton and his fiancée, Tony Fratto, spent the holidays in jail awaiting trial.
00:52:49
On New Year's Eve, Cody turned 20. Then early in 2012, a legal deal emerged. Cody would plead guilty to first-degree murder, get life in prison,
00:53:00
but with the possibility of parole, no death penalty. And in exchange, he'd have to testify against Tony.
00:53:07
Cody took the deal and then just as suddenly changed his mind. Instead, Cody decided to take his chances in court.
00:53:16
But just one day later, the DA offered Tony a deal, not the same deal. better. If Tony agreed to testify against Cody, she'd be allowed to plead a second-degree murder.
00:53:30
With a chance of parole after just 18 years, by then Tony would be just 36. And Tony,
00:53:37
offered a chance to save her own skin by throwing Cody under the bus, said, yes. She signed the plea papers right away. She said, you know what, enough is enough.
00:53:49
the truth needs to be told and I'm going to tell it. So on a chilly January day Toni Fratto was led from her jail cell to an office at the sheriff department to tell her story and put her hand on the Bible
00:54:06
and promise to tell the truth. I'm a person to tell the truth, and deep down, I wanted people to know the truth
00:54:17
because I knew Cody wasn't going to come forward and tell the complete truth. And for the next three and a half hours,
00:54:25
Tony told a whole new story about how Cody was upset with Mickey, how he hated the sound of her voice, how things were building up.
00:54:34
Then the one detail of her story that did not change, the afternoon of March 3rd, that text from Cody.
00:54:40
One of over 100 the two exchanged that day. Police weren't able to recover any of them,
00:54:45
but this one, said Tony, was burned in her memory. What was the content of it? All it said was, I have her.
00:54:55
But from here, the story changed, and blame shifted toward Cody. As they drove off into the desert, said Tony, she looked back and saw Mickey stuffed in the back section of the SUV.
00:55:07
Mickey looked scared, said Tony, with her hands up toward her face. Cody looked determined, angry, she said, but wouldn't talk to her.
00:55:16
Then as they approached the gravel pit, said Tony, Cody, right beside her in the driver's seat, sent her a text.
00:55:22
and it said we have to kill her just kind of looked at him and kind of looked why
00:55:30
cody pulled over said tony and ordered her to stand guard as he dug a hole then he took mickey
00:55:38
from the car pushed her to the ground demanded that tony hit her all i remember is him pulling
00:55:45
her hair back and I went up and hit and meet her in the face. But in this new and entirely different version of her story, Tony claimed she was an unwilling
00:55:56
participant and insisted she backed off while Cody started punching and kicking Mickey.
00:56:02
And then he issued an order. I remember looking up at Cody and him telling me, hit her with the shovel, hit her with
00:56:12
the shovel. and so I hit her in the back of the shoulder with the shovel. She said, Cody took the shovel back and whacked Mickey in the head.
00:56:22
And then in that hole he dug, Cody got on top of her. And then I remember going up and holding her legs down so she'd stop kicking.
00:56:34
And then all of a sudden her legs went completely still and she wasn't moving. and that freaked me out.
00:56:42
So I backed off and jumped up and walked off a little bit. Remember, in her first confession,
00:56:49
Tony claimed she helped cut Mickey's throat. Not anymore. Her new story, Cody used the knife alone.
00:56:57
Well, she, horrified, then backed off, but kept watching and listening. She had looked up at Cody and asked,
00:57:07
am I still here, am I still alive? And then Cody ordered her to get in the car, she said.
00:57:14
And sitting by herself, Tony said she heard the last sounds of Mickey Costanzo's life.
00:57:20
And then she said it was over. Cody buried Mickey by himself. Once in the car, according to Tony, they drove back into town, went to McDonald's for a cold drink.
00:57:31
And then later, they cruised across the state line into Utah, pulled off into the desert, and burned Mickey's clothes and belongings.
00:57:38
You can't tell me to this day why this happened. No. He never told you that. No.
00:57:47
And with that, Tony had her deal. The sworn statement she provided would now comprise much of the DA's case against her fiancé, Cody Patton.
00:57:58
In this new version of her story, Cody was the killer, orchestrated the whole thing,
00:58:03
and she, terrified of Cody's murderous rage, was forced to go along for the awful ride.
00:58:08
Not at all like her original confession. But was there more to Tony's story? Well, maybe.
00:58:17
Because just before she was arrested, Tony left something behind. Something in her very own words
00:58:24
that just might reveal the real motive for Mickey Costanzo's murder. There's a fine old technique in law enforcement.
00:58:46
Got two defendants? Get one to take a deal and testify against the other. Looked like that was about to work
00:58:52
in the case of the West Wendover murder of Mickey Costanzo. Tony Frato appeared all set to tell the world
00:59:00
that her fiancé, Cody Patton, after abusing her for years, forced her to witness and even, in a minor way,
00:59:07
assist in the killing. Apparently, like everybody else, she didn't know why Cody did it.
00:59:13
Only that she, Tony, feared he'd kill her too if she didn't go along. But of course, why was the question on the lips
00:59:21
of just about every living, breathing soul within sight of Wendover Will here. The idea that Cody would brutally murder
00:59:28
his own good childhood friend just didn't make any sense. Any more than did the idea that Tony
00:59:34
would go to such trouble to visit Cody in jail. and whisper sweet nothings to him on the phone and send him love notes
00:59:41
if in fact she was deathly afraid of him, as she claimed. Now, people around here had pretty much given up on the idea of getting any kind of an answer.
00:59:49
When suddenly, out of the blue, a little gift appeared. Tony it turned out had been keeping a diary Before she confessed Tony gave it to Cody parents
01:00:05
who turned everything over to defense investigator Bill Savage. In my opinion, there was some valuable information in there
01:00:12
with regard to Tony's personality, her feelings. In this little book, Tony poured out her fears, her hopes, her deep insecurities,
01:00:22
and what Cody's attorney thought was just perhaps a motive for murder. This, for example, she worried that Cody will leave me for someone else.
01:00:33
Cheat on me, that Cody and I won't last forever. We won't get married. In here, she wrote of her own terror,
01:00:41
that her relationship with Cody wouldn't work out. And if so, that there was no point in living.
01:00:47
I'm very angry today. So angry that I'm trying to overdose. After I got off the phone with Cody, I went and took four aspirins.
01:00:55
In my opinion, a very troubled young lady. A troubled young lady who in many ways did not feel worthy, I gather.
01:01:02
That's correct. And who loved this guy, but at the same time was terrified of losing him.
01:01:08
Yes. Afraid of losing him to the girl he had grown up with, the attractive and popular Mickey Costanzo.
01:01:17
We might as well break up so he can get back together with her. He will be happier and can see her a lot, a lot more than he will ever see me.
01:01:27
They are perfect for each other. Tony was jealous of Mickey. And if she were out of the picture, then Cody and Tony would be together.
01:01:37
She was everything Tony, wasn't it? Yes, absolutely. They would be so happy together if I didn't steal him away.
01:01:46
I know in my heart he really doesn't love me. The diaries disclosed a real animosity that Tony had for Michaela.
01:01:54
Right. No one's ever shown me any reason that Cody had to hurt Michaela. None. But Tony?
01:02:02
Tony had reasons. Was it possible she was the one who wanted Mickey dead? That her big strong boyfriend was just doing what she wanted?
01:02:12
Mickey's sisters remembered. Tony used to get so upset if Michaela was seen talking to Cody.
01:02:22
And she would just yell and holler and say horrible things to Michaela. You know, don't talk to him and call her every name imaginable.
01:02:35
An intensely jealous young woman, said DJ. He couldn't be around girls, especially my sister, but he couldn't go do certain things.
01:02:43
She couldn't go do certain things, and if one did it that the other didn't like, it was World War III.
01:02:49
And Cody was, said Christina, on a very tight leash. I must have been doing laundry or something, and here Tony came walking, and he was like, gotta go.
01:03:00
And I was like, you can't even talk to me? He was like, no, I gotta go. I can't be seen. She'll get mad.
01:03:06
Who was the driving force in that relationship? She was. But having heard Tony's sworn statement, Cody's lawyer knew that his client's story about Mickey dying after some sort of accident now sounded like the cover-up for a cold-blooded murder.
01:03:22
And therefore, that Tony's testimony could send Cody, who was still facing trial, to death row.
01:03:28
Part of Tony Fratto's statement in which she said that at some point in time in this killing, Michaela sat up in the grave and said to Cody, am I still here? Can I go home?
01:03:43
Devastating. Yeah. Which is why just weeks before the trial, Cody decided to plead guilty to first degree murder.
01:03:49
That was the safest way to go. that was the way that would present at least a possibility
01:03:56
that Cody would see daylight again and it would take the death penalty off the table.
01:04:03
At Cody's sentencing in front of a packed courtroom, he made his case for eventual parole,
01:04:08
pleading with the judge for mercy and begging Mickey's family for forgiveness. He says, I'm sorry for the unimaginable pain.
01:04:16
This has caused you. And then for the first time, Cody spoke publicly about his fiancée, an apparent partner in the murder,
01:04:23
the woman he'd protected in his confession, never revealing she was with him at the crime scene.
01:04:28
Listen to what he said now. To the court, I just want to stay there. My potent family, Tony Fryer, was not all to blame.
01:04:42
Did you hear that? Tony was not all to blame. Was Cody implying that she played a role in at least some or even most of those horrific stab wounds to Mickey's pretty face?
01:04:55
There's no reason. There's no why. There's no justification for it. I just... Mickey, sorry it's not enough, but I...
01:05:16
I apologize for everything. Moments later, his sentence. A chance at parole after maybe 25 years.
01:05:29
I sent you to a term of life in the Nevada Department of Corrections. There shall be no possibility of parole.
01:05:39
It was justice, said Mickey's family. But an odd feeling lingered. You have to sit there and go oh my God this person that I knew so well will never ever have a chance of anything You conflicted I see the good in him I see what he did
01:06:06
I want him to be punished for what he did, but I see that good side of him. Both Cody and the prison where he'll spend his life turned down our request for an interview.
01:06:19
But Tony Fratto? Different story. Toni had a lot to say about that dark night in the Nevada desert
01:06:27
and just what really happened to her romantic rival, Mickey Costanzo. The End from an adjoining room, separated by a thick plate glass window.
01:07:07
She could hear us. We could not hear her. So, two lines of communication. Ours with Tony, hers silently with her mother.
01:07:18
We began by talking about Cody, the fiancé she seemed so afraid of losing to Mickey Costanzo.
01:07:26
There are people who say that you were very jealous and that you manipulated him into committing murder.
01:07:35
I was not jealous of Michaela. Yes, that one thing that I had wrote in my diary,
01:07:42
but that was way long, early in our relationship. It never was brought up again.
01:07:51
Nothing ever recent. Did you ever say to him, get rid of her? No, I didn't. Get rid of her or you lose me.
01:07:58
No. Didn't say it's her or me. No. Didn't give them that choice. Absolutely not.
01:08:06
And then we talked about the night of March 3rd, 2011, when she and Cody took Mickey to the desert and ended her life.
01:08:18
When you put yourself back there in your memory, what does that feel like inside?
01:08:24
My heart just sinks. And, you know, to be honest, it's like it takes my breath away.
01:08:31
Like it's hard to breathe and everything. It's not something, you know, you want to sit there and think about.
01:08:39
There are differing stories. So that's why I have to ask these questions. Right.
01:08:43
And you hit her with a shovel? Yes. Why? Because I was told to. I did not want to do anything to her and everything.
01:08:57
He kept telling me over and over again, just do it. It's okay, just do it. And I just remember him putting her down and him standing over her.
01:09:08
She was struggling trying to get free. Right. Then you backed off. Yes. I don't know what he was doing up towards the top of her body.
01:09:20
I could not see because he was standing in the way. And she insisted in contradiction to that first confession of hers
01:09:29
that she did not help Cody with that slashing and stabbing. And that you didn't hold the knife, that you didn't cut her.
01:09:38
Correct. So it reduced your culpability. You can say yes. I'm not trying to diminish my actions or anything of what I did,
01:09:51
but I won't take responsibility for something I did not do. Frequently, as Tony distanced herself from the crime,
01:09:59
she looked through the glass to her mother, especially when the question turned to why.
01:10:05
I was too much in fear. I was scared, terrified. Only reason she was there, she insisted.
01:10:18
She was an abused woman, and she was afraid he'd kill her too. When you're going through a type of abusive relationship,
01:10:29
you don't always fight back with your abuser. To be honest, after finding everything out that I know now,
01:10:41
I believe I was next. was because I was a witness and I was there with Michaela.
01:10:52
So why is Mickey Costanzo dead? You'd have to ask Cody, said Tony Frato. I don't know his motive. I don't know.
01:11:04
If I knew, I'd be more than willing to, you know, come out and say why so it would make sense.
01:11:12
Is he really just a lunatic or what? I mean... I don't know. I don't have an answer for that.
01:11:19
And when he says he doesn't know why, do you believe him? No. He's got to know why.
01:11:28
There's a reason why he did this. Was this version of her story finally the truth?
01:11:37
Perhaps. And in any event, Mickey's family would have to be satisfied with what small consolations Tony Fratto offered.
01:11:46
I know sorry is not enough. If I could go back, I would. And protect her and make sure that this wouldn't happen and everything.
01:11:57
That, you know, she would still be here today. Do you see her face now? In your mind's eye?
01:12:05
Pits and pieces, yeah. Probably be seeing her for a long time. The rest of my life.
01:12:16
And with that, our interview ended. Tony Frato never wavering from her story. The one she told when she cut that deal with the district attorney.
01:12:25
The deal that could set her free by the year 2030. But of course, Tony couldn't know, leaving here, nor could we, that one more little surprise was waiting.
01:12:37
Cody had said something very interesting just before Tony took her deal. Something buried deep in the court file, but now about to be revealed.
01:12:58
They're in separate prisons now. Cody Patton at one end of the state, Tony Fratto the other.
01:13:09
Different stories about the murder, different sentences too. Tony Fratto is 26 now.
01:13:15
She'll have a chance to win parole when she's in her late 30s. But Cody Patton will most likely die in prison.
01:13:24
So in a way, this is an academic question, But there's one more version of the story of the murder of Mickey Costanzo, which we found buried in the court file.
01:13:34
And it just might provide an answer. Remember that plea deal Cody first accepted and then decided to pass on?
01:13:42
Here's the story behind that very dramatic moment. Cody had just started making a sworn statement to the D.A.
01:13:49
It was going to be finally a full and frank account of what really happened and why.
01:13:54
Here's how it began, he said. There was an incident the afternoon of the murder just down there at the school.
01:14:01
Tony confronted Mickey in a school hallway. Tony saw Mickey in the hallway, said Cody, and called her a slut.
01:14:10
Said, look at there, there's that slut. The girls argued, said Cody. He intervened, told Tony, knock it off.
01:14:18
Placible? Maybe. See, before anybody heard about Cody's statement, Mickey's sister DJ told us this.
01:14:27
Tony really hated her. She'd walk by and Tony would say something so rude under her breath.
01:14:33
We're talking about a couple of years though. Yeah. The hatred of Tony grew more and more and more.
01:14:38
I don even know why to tell you but it just escalated As Cody told the DA it escalated to a fever that day And so he suggested why don you guys just talk it out
01:14:52
And Tony agreed, said, she just wanted to duke it out with Michaela. So I relayed the message to Mickey.
01:14:58
I said, well, she wants to fight it out. And Mickey came to the resolution. She's like, OK.
01:15:04
So, said Cody, Mickey did get into a car with him voluntarily. they drove around for a while said Cody
01:15:12
then they picked up Tony they all headed to the gravel pits and what did Cody tell the DA
01:15:19
about what happened there well it turned out nothing because just then Cody's attorney
01:15:26
John Olson arrived at the hearing the two met conferred briefly and Cody stopped talking
01:15:31
he had changed his mind rejected the plea deal never told his story again and his statement was filed away
01:15:38
But Olsen, who has never disputed that Cody was involved Does have his own opinion
01:15:44
About what probably happened at the gravel pits My guess would be that there was an opportunity
01:15:50
For Tony to confront Michaela And they went out to the desert to have the confrontation
01:15:55
Away from prying eyes I think something bad happened A bad idea that became a screw-up
01:16:00
A bad idea that became a horrible idea A bad idea that went very, very bad Wasn't an idea hatched on the spur of the moment?
01:16:12
Oh no. At least not according to DJ, who said she witnessed the hostility escalate for months.
01:16:19
She heard Tony badmouth Mickey time and again. And she saw Cody play one nasty prank after another,
01:16:26
including one that seemed like more than just a prank. He had a little box cutter blade,
01:16:32
and he swiped it across her arm. And at first she said, I didn't even know. And then I look down and I'm bleeding and I look at him and he's laughing.
01:16:42
Was that kind of the straw that broke the camel's back with her? That was. She said, he's not worth it.
01:16:49
And that I really don't want a person like that in my life at all. And from then on, Mickey avoided Cody, never spoke to him, cut him out of her life.
01:17:01
He grew really angry at her after that. would do things to try to make her mad, just so she'd talk to him.
01:17:08
It was a real shock to him to all of a sudden have her there, to thick and thin, and then never have her.
01:17:15
An angry and abandoned Cody? A jealous Tony? Maybe that's why Mickey had been so worried, said DJ,
01:17:22
about what those two might be up to She says he keeps trying to get me to go with them Just constantly that what he wanted was try to get her To get her to go out
01:17:33
With him and Tony. And she was fully aware that she was public enemy number one as far as Tony was concerned.
01:17:39
She just said, I don't get it. It's not right. Something's just wrong. The Costanzo family says Mickey would never have gone
01:17:50
with Cody and Tony voluntarily. And there is evidence of that. The zip tie found around Mickey's arm.
01:17:58
Something else. Mickey's family is convinced that Cody and Tony knew that the few days around the time of the murder
01:18:05
were the only days they'd find Mickey alone after school. The timing was too perfect.
01:18:12
It was the one time, the one time that DJ was at college. Christina and Donald were at NASCAR.
01:18:20
I was at work. is the one time in all of this time that Michaela would have actually had to walk home.
01:18:30
Which, when we heard that, made us wonder. In our interview, did Toni slip and reveal a hidden truth?
01:18:36
Remember, she claimed she was an abused woman, an unwilling accomplice, there only out of fear.
01:18:42
But listen to this. Does it indicate the very planning revealed in Cody's statement to the DA,
01:18:47
planning that included picking a place for the showdown? Well, when we finally got out to the designated area and everything...
01:18:57
What do you mean the designated area? Where everything went down. That area was designated?
01:19:04
Well, just the area where we ended up. No plan to go there, insisted Tony. So, designated area? Maybe, maybe not.
01:19:15
But also, a festering jealousy, scores of text messages, a zip tie, and one more explosive ingredient, an affair.
01:19:26
Police revealed that Cody had been seeing an older woman, the very woman from whom he borrowed the SUV used the night of the murder.
01:19:35
Tony knows that now, of course, that the other woman wasn't Mickey. But did she know it then, the night they killed her?
01:19:44
A woman knows. Whether you're that age or my age, you know something's maybe not right.
01:19:53
Who that person might be, I don't think she would have ever in a million years thought it was an adult.
01:19:58
So the next person she, in her mind, would think would be my daughter, even though it's completely wrong.
01:20:06
Does that sound like Tony was an abused woman obeying an angry boyfriend Or a scorned woman determined to rid herself of a perceived rival
01:20:17
An unanswered question, which is probably the best we'll get, said attorney Olson.
01:20:24
Outside of the participants who are alive, nobody knows. Nobody knows, and nobody's going to know.
01:20:31
They're never going to reveal it? No. But then, would any answer ever be good enough?
01:20:38
I want the truth. Will I ever get it? No. They'll never tell me. And there is nothing they can say or do that will make it better.
01:20:47
They cannot fix this. Three families broken in West Wendover. Cody Patton will never come home.
01:20:57
Tony Fratto might someday, but too late for them. I don't think I will still be alive when she gets out.
01:21:07
I don't think that there will be a time that we'll be together like that again. West Wendover High School has retired Mickey Costanzo's basketball jersey.
01:21:25
It hangs now in a place of honor. But outside, the students got together to paint and sign a huge rock, a memorial in her favorite color.
01:21:37
Up in the high desert mountains outside Wendover is a ranch with a small family cemetery.
01:21:44
It's a peaceful, sacred place where Michaela Costanzo, where Mickey, now rests. The ranch is home. She's exactly where she would want to have been. She's laying right next to my father. And she is in the most beautiful spot in the world to me.
01:22:09
and she's like sitting on top of the world. We all knew that my mom, myself, we'd all eventually be there,
01:22:24
just not in the order that it seems to have happened. And here, on the little strip on I-80,
01:22:36
Wendover Will still waves his grinning welcome but he points to a place a little older now
01:22:42
it's sadder as if the neon lights strung up among the desert casinos had picked up a layer of grief