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[Music] While on a business trip in 1986, Edpo spent the morning jogging near his hotel
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in downtown St. Louis. [Music] When he returned to his hotel room, he discovered his wife dead in the bathtub.
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The medical examiner ruled the death was by drowning. presumably accidental. But
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homicide investigators weren't so sure. [Music] [Music] Ed Post met Julie Thigpan when they were
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both students at the University of Southern Mississippi in the 1960s. They married in 1967, had two daughters
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and moved to New Orleans. Ed went to work in the real estate business. His outgoing personality and
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sophisticated manner made him a successful salesman right from the start. >> I thought Ed was a good fellow. What
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you'd expect a real estate salesman to be. Kind of relentlessly cheerful. >> After a few years, Ed Post became part
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owner of the Wagner Truax real estate firm. Julie Post also joined the company and was very successful, selling over a
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million dollars of real estate every year from 1982 on. In June of 1986, the Posts attended a
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real estate convention in St. Louis, Missouri at the Omni Hotel at Union Station.
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On the morning of June 3rd, Ed Post decided to go jogging before the meeting started. He said he drew his wife a bath
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and woke her before leaving around 700 a.m. [Music] >> Julie. doing. It's time to wake up.
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>> On his way out, he thanked the hotel's concierge for a suggestion she made to
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the posts the day before. >> Really wonderful. >> I'm so glad. It's a wonderful place. If
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there's anything else I can do for you, just let me know. >> Hello, Siri. Having a nice day?
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>> Yes, I am. Thank you. Have a nice run. >> Sure. Ed Post jogged past Bush Stadium
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around the city's famous arch and returned to the hotel at 7:40. >> How was your run, sir? Was
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>> great. That's terrific. Had a great workout this morning. Have a nice day,
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sir. [Music] >> When he entered his hotel room, he said he discovered his wife lying face down
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and unconscious in the bathtub. After pulling her body from the water, he called for an ambulance at 7:43.
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>> Bathroom. Could you send an ambulance, please? >> It looked as if Julie Post lost her
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footing and grabbed the towel ring which pulled out of the wall. At the hospital, Julie Post was
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pronounced dead. She was 39 years old. The autopsy revealed that death was due to drowning. Ed Post immediately phoned
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his brother, who was a lawyer. Together, they photographed the broken towel ring
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and wall mount for a lawsuit against the hotel. >> His brother told a policeman here in St.
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Louis, I'm going to sue him for $450 million. You watch. Ed Post was convinced that had it not
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been for the faulty towel ring, his wife Julie might still be alive. After Julie Post was pronounced dead, an
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autopsy was performed in St. Louis before the body was transported to New Orleans for burial. The autopsy found no
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sign of alcohol or drugs in her system. There were no skull fractures or bleeding in the brain that would have
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been present if the victim had been struck in the head before drowning. In short, the pathologist could find no
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evidence of foul play. >> I was certainly not convinced that it was an accident.
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On the other hand, I couldn't prove that it was anything else. >> On the death certificate, the manner of
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death was undetermined. When the St. Lewis Post Dispatch reported the news of Julie Post's death.
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There were some interesting reactions. D. Joyce Hayes was a prosecutor in the district attorney's office. Her husband
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Gary was a detective in the St. Louis Police Department. D had just read an article about a woman who was who had
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drowned in a bathtub at the Omni Hotel. And uh she said, "Gary, make sure you
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read this. It doesn't sound right to me." We both read the article and looked
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at each other and said, "Nah, no way." >> The hotel management found it hard to
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believe that a 120 lb woman like Julie Post could have pulled the towel ring from the wall since the ring had been
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designed to withstand more than twice that weight. We went to the two adjoining rooms and I probably weighed
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close to 220 lbs at the time with all my weight hung on to both towel rings in both rooms and neither one of
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them gave nothing. >> Edpost told police that he and his wife had a very good relationship, but a
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background check of the post's finances revealed an interesting coincidence. We
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went to the insurance company and lo and behold um I don't know 27 29 days uh prior to
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Julie post death Ed had it increased her insurance like $45 $500,000. Now, this is a woman who's making uh in the low to
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mid $20,000 a year range in salary, and he's got this $600 $700,000 life insurance policy on his wife. Uh
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that's when I begin to believe maybe we have something here. >> Police also discovered that Ed Post was
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enamored with a married woman who worked in his office. Her name was Kim Otan. On
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the day of Julie Post's funeral, Ed made an unusual request to Kim Otan. >> Kim Otan had a twin sister. And at the
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time of the funeral of Julie, Ed Post said to Kim Otan, "Maybe when this is
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over, you can set me up with your sister." And that seemed u a most inappropriate thing to be saying and
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particularly saying at the time that he's alleged to have said it. Police were also suspicious about the way Ed
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Post told the story of finding his wife's body. The story never varied, almost as if it had been rehearsed. St.
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Louis police tape recorded those conversations. And uh then when she came over the edge
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of the tub uh being as wet as she was uh in the water there was then at that point once
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I got her partially out of the tub I was not prepared for what happened next which was she literally slid out at that
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point. >> Do you think that she she did hit her head on on on the front portion? I think
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that's because >> it's the fact that Ed Post in his golden tongue glib manner
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uh came off as a as a non-aring person that had this alibi who had everything down pat. I
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mean, he didn't change his story one iota from the first time he told it to the second time he told it.
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And some of the hotel employees noticed that Ed Post was acting suspiciously on the morning of the accident. Before
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leaving the hotel for his morning run, Edpost made sure that the concierge knew who he was, thanking her for a favor she
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did for him the day before. >> I believe you're the one that told us about the botanical gardens. My wife
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finally had a chance to visit there yesterday. It was spectacular. Really wonderful.
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>> I'm so glad. And the hotel doorman said that Post introduced himself by name
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before going out for his run. >> Hello, sir. You enjoying your stay? >> Yes, I am. Thank you. My name is Ed
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Post. I'm going on a run this morning. I'll be gone about 30 minutes. Uh, watch
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out for him, please. >> I sure will. Have a nice run. >> Sure. >> You made it a point to say good morning
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to the dorman at the hotel. Say who he was and what room he was in and that he was going to go out and jog. I mean,
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like, it was from the book of Who Cares? The Dorman didn't care. Why would you do
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that? >> But all of these incidents simply raised suspicions. Homicide investigators had
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no hard evidence that Edpost played any role in his wife's death. Investigators decided to conduct more
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sophisticated tests on the broken towel ring to see if a woman Julie Post's size
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could have pulled it from the wall during a fall. Prosecutors in St. Louis were starting
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to wonder whether the death of Julie Post in the hotel bathtub was truly an accident. The autopsy did not find any
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evidence of foul play. So prosecutors decided to exume Julie Post's remains for a second autopsy. She had been
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buried in a cemetery outside of New Orleans. The water table is so high in New Orleans that most people are buried
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in above ground vaults, but Julie Post had been buried in the ground and her body was placed in a wooden casket.
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Investigators feared that water damage to the body would be significant. When they opened the grave, it was almost
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completely filled with water. Fortunately, the foot of the casket was the part that sunk. Her head was the
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only part of her body that was not submerged in water >> and her head was in perfect shape. The
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casket had collapsed and pushed down and had pressed flattened her nose from the
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pressure, but that was the only disfiguration from the collapsing of the casket. Most of the casket collapse had
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been at the foot end. The pathologist who performed the second autopsy found numerous bruises that were not noted
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during the first autopsy. That's not unusual because some bruising continues
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to develop even after death. Ed Post's attorney said that the additional bruises prove nothing, that they could
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have been caused by the removing of her organs and bones for donation shortly after her death. But the pathologist
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found two new bruises in a critical area. The only additional finding at the autopsy
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was an area of bruising that was very low far down in the back of the head in the upper neck region. Uh where in a
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normal autopsy I usually don't take the scalp down quite that far. >> I'm looking at these bruises and as far
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as I'm concerned, it's from a thumb and a hand. If you're holding somebody
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underwater, you got to hold them by the base of the neck if you're if you're
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going to drown them. Next, prosecutors turned their attention to the metal towel ring found inside the tub next to
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Julie Post's body. The towel ring was attached to metal studs inside the wall
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with 1 and 1/2 in screws. The ring and wall mount had been designed and manufactured to withstand hundreds of
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pounds of force. Prosecutors hired Bolter Kelsey, an accident reconstructionist, to attempt
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to recreate the accident. Kelsey conducted his experiments at the Hotel Omni in a room with an identical
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towel ring attached to the wall in the same way as the towel ring in Ed and Julie Post's room. And for the test,
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Kelsey used a woman who was the same height and weight as Julie Post. Kelsey asked the model to simulate a fall by
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grabbing onto the towel ring with all of her weight. Nothing happened. Then she was asked to wrench the ring
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back and forth. >> Again, nothing happened. >> What we found was that uh doing some
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calculations based on what information we had on the ultimate strength of the ring that we could not remove it or a
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person couldn't remove it at that size unless she fell about 64 ft and grab the
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towel ring as she went by. And of course, the hotel room has an 8ft ceiling, so there's no way that that
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could happen. Finally, as a last resort, Kelsey asked the model to use both hands
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to remove the towel ring in any way she could. After considerable effort, the ring came off.
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>> Concept that Julie Post somehow grabbed this towel ring during a fall and pulled
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it off the wall was impossible. It could not physically have happened that way. Next, prosecutors sent an identical
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towel ring and wall mount to Dr. William Wines, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of
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Nebraska in Lincoln. Dr. Wines was asked to determine how much force was required
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to remove the towel ring from the wall attachment. Those tests revealed that it took between 480 and 500 lb of force to
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remove it from the wall. It was also obvious very early on the testing that those types of modes of uh
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force application straight pulls pulls down clearly didn't match the evidence
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that the the deformed toler failed to ring didn't look anything like the tower
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ring in question here >> the base plate had damage underneath the stem and on the left side the towel ring
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itself also had been damaged Dr. Wines performed 23 different tests to reproduce the damage found on the
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base plate and towel ring. All without success. But on test number 24, Dr. Wines
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produced something very close. That test indicated that the towel ring was removed from outside the bathtub. Our
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conclusion was that it was taken off the wall by by someone with considerable strength and it was uh you know the type
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of action where one would grab it and pull outside the tub and it was uh uh and if you look at the location of it,
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it would be consistent for instance with someone like putting their foot on the edge of the tub and grabbing the tow
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ring and then pulling it off out toward the outside of the tub. Prosecutors now had scientific proof that Julie Post
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death was no accident. In 1986, New Orleans was going through its worst economic downturn since the Great
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Depression. Many local businesses were affected and real estate was just one more casualty. Ed Post was 10% owner of
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the Wagner Truax real estate business and was responsible for 10% of the losses which in 1985 and 86 were
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substantial. And the Post's marriage was going through a downturn of its own.
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Friends said that Ed and Julie fought frequently fights which were sometimes physical and Kim Otan who worked with
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the posts said that Ed Post had made advances towards her in the months before Julie's death.
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>> I think that Ed fell in love with Kim Otan. Just him being a free man wouldn't
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get Kim. He had to be a free man with lots of money to compete with her husband.
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And he hatched this plan. Prosecutors believe that plan was in motion one month before Julie's death when Ed Post
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increased his wife's life insurance. On June 3rd, 1986, before going out for his morning run,
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prosecutors believe that Post drowned his wife in the hotel bathtub. Afterwards, he pulled the towel ring
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from the wall, not only to corroborate his cover story that Julie fell while holding on to the towel ring, but also
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for the money, the potential settlement from the hotel in a civil lawsuit. After the murder, Post made sure to
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speak with both the hotel concierge and doormand to cement his alibi. Yes, sir. Thank you. My name is Ed Post. I'm going
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to be going on a run this morning. Thank you. >> The whole business with the towering,
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which is really what killed him, not literally, but figuratively. You know, he had to go pull that off the
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wall. He had to go pull that off the wall so that he could set up a lawsuit against
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the Omni Hotel and get more money. The greedy sob. >> 3 years after Julie Post's death, Ed
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Post went on trial for firstdegree murder. Ed Post pleaded not guilty and took the stand in his own defense.
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>> Ed's demeanor on the stand, I think, could best be described as follows. He
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was very well-dressed. He was very articulate. Spoke uh at a very uh sophisticated level. Uh including his
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use of the language. Um spoke I think uh far differently than the jurors were accustomed to speaking or hearing. Uh he
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did not speak with a southern accent at all although he was from New Orleans. Um, and he came across as as Ed often
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came across as condescending. And I think that um, those things did not play well.
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>> And the scientific experts provided powerful testimony that Julie Post was
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not capable of removing the towel ring during a fall. It took the jury less than a day to reach its verdict. Ed Post
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was found guilty of firstdegree murder and was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. Ed Post
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and his attorneys appealed the conviction. And in a plea bargain, Post agreed to plead guilty to seconddegree
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murder and confessed to the murder of his wife in exchange for a 30-year prison sentence that included the
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possibility of parole. If he doesn't take the tower ring off, he gets away with it. It's just an accidental
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drowning. I mean, look at how it happened. Almost everybody classified it as undetermined
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or accidental. But for that, Ed Post would be on his merry way. He probably sued the army,
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got a couple million dollars, and had 700,000 in life insurance. We wouldn't even know who he was.
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In my opinion, the most important thing uh in the trial was the science. It was the tile ring.
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When you when you can show that it was red back and forth, back and forth until it until it broke or until it came
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loose. Um that convicted him. If he would have left that out of there, he might be a free man today.
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[Music] Why? [Music] Heat. [Music]