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NARRATOR: In the
middle of the night, a man watched in
horror as his neighbor committed a horrible crime.
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The perpetrator said he had no
recollection of the incident. It would be up to
a jury to decide
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between the forensic evidence
or the mysteries of the mind. [theme music] On a brisk January night
in Phoenix, Arizona,
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a man heard some noises coming
from his neighbor's backyard. JUAN MARTINEZ: He actually
heard some moaning
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sounds coming from
over the fence. He thought that perhaps the
Falater's were making love,
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because that's what the
sounds sounded like to him. NARRATOR: He saw Yarmilla
Falater on the ground,
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and her husband Scott
was in the house upstairs changing his clothes. Scott came back downstairs,
silenced the dog,
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walked outside to Yarmilla,
then threw her into the swimming pool and held her
head underwater.
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The neighbor immediately
called police. NARRATOR: The police found
Yarmilla floating in the pool.
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She had been
stabbed and drowned. Scott was inside the
house, dazed and confused.
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-His reaction was kind
of a surprise, what the officers were
doing at this location.
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DR. CARTWRIGHT: The first
question he remembers is, how many people
are in the house?
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To which he answered,
four, immediately, not knowing his wife was dead. Himself, his wife,
and his two kids.
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NARRATOR: The
Falater's two children were asleep upstairs
in their bedrooms. They heard nothing
during the attack.
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At police headquarters,
investigators were convinced that
Scott would confess, but they were met with
a complete surprise.
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-[inaudible].
You OK? Cold? -Obviously you think I did it. I don't-- I don't know
what makes you think that.
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-Well, because
you had a neighbor staring at you
watching you do it. That's why.
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-Jeez! NARRATOR: Scott
Falater said he had no recollection of
killing his wife. -Neighbors saw me
pushing her in the pool?
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You've got to be kidding. -That's what I got.
-I'm sorry. I don't remember doing it.
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NARRATOR: Friends and
family told police that the Falater's never fought. JERRY KAMMER: There had
never been any eruption
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of overt conflict between
the mother and father, and that whenever there
were disagreements,
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they were settled amicably. NARRATOR: At Yarmilla's
autopsy, the medical examiner
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found 44 stab wounds, as
well as water in her lungs. JUAN MARTINEZ: We
had the wife, who
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had been stabbed multiple
times, being thrown in the pool and held down. But we also had a
husband, a very devout,
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religious individual,
telling us that it was not him who had done this. So the decision had to be made--
were we going to believe him,
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or were we going to go
ahead and charge him? NARRATOR: In the back of Scott's
car, in a plastic container,
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police found a knife
covered with blood. They also found Scott's
bloody clothing in the car.
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When questioned,
Scott's sister believed she knew why Scott was
unaware of what happened.
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It was because of
something that happened between them many years earlier. Scott and Yarmilla
Falater had been
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married for almost 20 years. Scott was a computer engineer. Yarmilla was a preschool
teacher's aide.
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JERRY KAMMER: They were
high school sweethearts. Yarmilla was the only woman
that Scott ever dated,
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and I believe it may
have been the same in terms of Yarmilla's dating. NARRATOR: When
questioned by police,
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Scott didn't deny
he killed his wife. But he insisted he had no
recollection of the incident.
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And Scott's sister offered
a possible explanation. She told police Scott had
a history of sleepwalking.
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JERRY KAMMER: She had been
attacked by Scott when he was sleepwalking years ago when they
were growing up in Illinois.
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She had attempted
to interrupt Scott as he was walking in the
house-- sleepwalking--
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and that startled
by her interruption, he threw her across the room. NARRATOR: Sleep expert
Dr. Rosalind Cartwright
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says that there's no doubt
that sleepwalking occurs, although it's rare. DR. CARTWRIGHT: Some
sleepwalkers, for example,
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have jumped out of a
window or thrust their arm through a plate glass door,
carved up the nice new living
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room furniture with a butcher
knife, kicked in a garage door. These are all patients of mine.
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And some attack a person. The closest person to them
is likely to be attacked. NARRATOR: So the question
remained, was Scott Falater
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sleepwalking when he
murdered his wife? To find out, Scott
was monitored for four
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nights in a sleep laboratory. -So that they could determine
the types of brain waves
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that were characteristic
of his sleeping patterns. NARRATOR: Researchers
connected electrodes
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from the polysomnograph
to Falater's skull to analyze his brain
activity during sleep.
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The result showed something
called hypersynchronous delta waves, a symptom
sometimes associated
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with individuals who sleepwalk. DR. CARTWRIGHT: Some
sleepwalkers will have it. It's a sign of
neurological immaturity.
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NARRATOR: Scott
Falater told police he was trying to fix a
broken pump in his swimming
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pool on the night
of his wife's death. DR. CARTWRIGHT: He didn't finish
it before his wife called him
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in to dinner and the family
assembled, had dinner, told her about the problems at work and
said he didn't know what do do.
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NARRATOR: The problem
at work Scott referred to was the possible cancellation
of the computer chip project
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Scott headed, which
meant his staff would all lose their jobs. After dinner, Scott said
he worked at his computer,
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then went to bed. He said Yarmilla was downstairs
watching TV on the sofa. Dr. Cartwright
believes Scott went
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to sleep with the unfinished
pool repair still on his mind, and while still asleep,
got up to finish the job.
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He put on his clothes,
grabbed a flashlight, and took a knife out to the
pool pump to cut a plastic ring.
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When Yarmilla went outside
to see what Scott was doing, she startled him, prompting the
violent attack that followed.
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-They start out to
do something related to that stressful
event, and if stopped,
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they have a kind of fight
or flight reaction of I've got to do this. NARRATOR: Research shows
that sleepwalkers are not
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capable of facial
recognition, which is why they sometimes
attack people they know.
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It's embarrassing. You don't even know where you're
walking or what you're doing.
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NARRATOR: Doug Coldren has
had numerous sleepwalking incidents-- some
that have included
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violence towards his wife. DOUG COLDREN: I was on
top of her, choking her. I wasn't aware of I
was even doing that.
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I could tell that there's
something that's drastically wrong once I woke up,
but I was in a deep sleep
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while I was doing it. I wasn't really aware
that I even did it. NARRATOR: People
who sleep normally
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move from one stage of
sleep to the next seamlessly without waking. But for reasons
not entirely clear,
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sleepwalkers cannot successfully
transition from deep sleep into the dreaming
stage of sleep.
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DR. CARTWRIGHT: They get
into a disassociated state. It's not a normal wakefulness.
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It's not a complete sleep. It's partially one and
partially the other. Part of the brain is functioning
as if awake, part of the brain
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is not. NARRATOR: If Scott Falater was
sleepwalking when he committed the crime, then legally,
he wouldn't be responsible.
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That's what happened
in Toronto, Canada, when 23-year-old Ken
Parks was acquitted
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of killing his mother-in-law
and attacking his father-in-law. JUAN MARTINEZ: Even though he
drove approximately 15 miles
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over to his mother-in-law's
house and had walked down some
stairs, opened the door,
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and then ultimately had stabbed
both of the individuals there. DR. PRESSMAN: Well, I do
agree that sleepwalkers
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are capable of becoming violent. Probably over 100
published cases by people who were
apparently sleepwalking.
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NARRATOR: But prosecutors
weren't so convinced that Scott Falater was innocent. As investigators searched
for a possible motive
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in Yarmilla Falater's
murder, they learned that the
couple's marriage was not as happy as friends
and family thought.
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Scott Falater was an active
member of the Mormon Church, and investigators found
evidence that Yarmilla resented
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the amount of time Scott
spent on church activities. JERRY KAMMER: Yarmilla
was considering a divorce.
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That she, apparently, was
feeling worn out by the demands of the church, while Scott was
fully committed to the church.
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NARRATOR: Investigators also
found evidence that Scott wanted more children
and Yarmilla didn't.
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JERRY KAMMER: Mormon families
typically have a lot of kids. She apparently
put her foot down.
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Did not want to have more
children beyond the two teenagers that they already had.
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NARRATOR: There were also
unsubstantiated allegations that one of the two may
have been having an affair.
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Prosecutors hired their
own sleep expert, Dr. Mark Pressman, to analyze Scott
Falater's behavior on the night
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of the murder to see if
there was any evidence that Scott had
been sleepwalking.
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First, Pressman disputed
the significance of Falater's
original sleep tests. DR. PRESSMAN: I didn't
find that the sleep
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studies were very
impressive at all. Those kinds of waves can
be found very commonly
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in patients with sleep
apnea, for instance. And there's only about
40 million sleep apnics
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in the United
States, which means this is not specific
to sleepwalking. NARRATOR: On the
night of the murder,
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Falater said he went to sleep
with his contact lenses in, then apparently got
up, got dressed,
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and took a flashlight outside. Dr. Pressman said,
true sleepwalkers can't distinguish
day from night.
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DR. PRESSMAN: That suggests that
he knew it was chilly outside and it was dark outside.
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And those are both
pieces of information that no sleepwalker
I've ever heard of would actually know
or be aware of.
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NARRATOR: The neighbor said
he saw Scott inside his house after the stabbing removing
his bloody clothes.
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Scott put those clothes
and the murder weapon into a plastic container
in the trunk of his car.
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And he also bandaged
a cut on his hand. DR. PRESSMAN: Again, shows
that he was consciously
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aware of the fact
he was injured. He knew what he had to do
in response to the injury,
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and he successfully
completed it. NARRATOR: The neighbor also saw
Scott trying to calm his dog.
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JERRY KAMMER: Scott claimed
not to have heard any screaming from his wife,
and yet apparently
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was aware of the
agitation of a pet. -An individual who
is sleepwalking does not know that
a dog is there.
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For him to have quieted the
dog meant that he was awake. NARRATOR: But the
defense experts
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believed there was
another explanation for the incident
with the family dog. DR. CARTWRIGHT:
I'm not at all sure
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that Scott quieted
the dogs in terms of responding to them barking. They were jumping up on him is
the way it was described to me.
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So I don't think that
the auditory system was functioning. NARRATOR: And Dr.
Cartwright says,
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Scott may not have gone
directly to Yarmilla's body out near the pool
before the drowning,
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but may have stumbled over
her while sleepwalking. She points to the
neighbor's first statement
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to police as proof. DR. CARTWRIGHT: His first report
on seeing Scott stand over the body was that he looked,
glazed, staring at this object
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that was in his way, and that
he rolled it into the pool as if he was just removing
something that was in his way.
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NARRATOR: In
addition, studies have shown that stress and
sleep deprivation are both major contributors
to sleepwalking.
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-It was somebody
who'd had a history of sleepwalking in his past. He had no memory of it.
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He had no motivation for it. He was bewildered
and remorseful. NARRATOR: Sleep
experts were at odds
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on how to interpret
Scott's behavior. The jury would have
to weigh the evidence and decide whom to believe.
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JERRY KAMMER: I think that of this case was that it
was attempting to probe the secrets of the
mind, you know?
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The last frontier of medical
science, perhaps, is the brain. It was also seeking to probe
the secrets of a family.
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NARRATOR: In 1999, Scott
Falater went on trial for the murder of
his wife Yarmilla.
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He pleaded not guilty. -He was sleepwalking at the
time the event occurred. He had no consciousness in his
mind operating at that time.
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In fact, his brain
was, in a fact, asleep. NARRATOR: Sleepwalking has been
used as a defense in about two
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dozen murder trials worldwide. -She went down, and he
continued to stab her. NARRATOR: But prosecutors
presented a very powerful case
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to the jury-- one that focused
on logic as well as science. Prosecutors believe fal
Falater made the decision
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to kill his wife and
to make it appear to be the work of an
unknown assailant. When the children
went to bed, Yarmilla
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was on the sofa
watching television. Prosecutors think Falater
lured Yarmilla out to the pool,
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then stabbed her. He went back
upstairs to clean up, and he also bandaged his hand.
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He hid the murder weapon
and his bloody clothes in the trunk of his car. When he returned to the
pool, Scott quieted the dog
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and noticed Yarmilla
was still breathing, so he dragged her over to
the pool and drowned her.
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Prosecutors think
his original plan was to go back to bed,
and the next morning,
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let the children find their
mother's body outside. JUAN MARTINEZ: One can only
imagine that he pretends
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to awake, finds that his wife
is gone, wakes up the children, is aghast that she is
gone, goes downstairs,
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and the three of them
find her floating in the pool, slain by
an unknown intruder.
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That was his plan all along. NARRATOR: But
those plans changed when his neighbor
saw the whole thing.
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-That was the only thing that
Scott Falater did not predict. NARRATOR: Prosecutors
think Scott may have known
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about the Toronto case, the man
who was acquitted of killing his mother-in-law using
a sleepwalking defense.
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Dr. Pressman testified
for the prosecution and listed 65 behaviors Scott
exhibited during the commission
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of the crime that were
inconsistent with sleepwalking. He said, touching
the cold water alone
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would have been
enough to wake him from a sleepwalking episode. DR. PRESSMAN: I think all the
evidence says he was awake,
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and all the evidence says
his behaviors were far too complicated to be sleepwalking.
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NARRATOR: In testifying
for the defense, Dr. Roger Broughton said,
Scott's actions that night were
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not logical for
someone who was awake. -It's my opinion that
he was sleepwalking.
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He would not leave all
the evidence there. He would not leave bloody
clothes in the back of a car
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that he was going to drive. He would not leave a
pool full of blood. To me, none of this makes sense.
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NARRATOR: Scott
Falater took the stand and testified in
his own defense. -I assume that I
must have gone crazy
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or that something in
my head had broken. NARRATOR: The jury
didn't buy it. -We, the jury, duly empowered
and sworn in the above entitled
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action, upon our oaths
do find the defendant guilty of murder in
the first degree.
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NARRATOR: Scott Falater was
sentenced to life in prison. -The number of stab wounds,
the fact that she was drugged
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to the pool and
held under-- I can't believe that he
was sleepwalking. JUROR: Hiding the clothes
and lifting up the hatchback
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and scrunching down and
getting underneath there and changing clothes
several times
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and going up down the
stairs, I mean, come on. That's a lot of activity. -They said it
defied common sense.
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It defied their understanding
of human behavior. And even though they were
willing to listen carefully
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to the defense experts, they
said that strain of credibility just snapped under the
pressure of the testimony
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from the next door neighbor. -I never would have thought
in my wildest dreams someone
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would think that I premeditated
and planned to murder my wife. I just can't see
how they could have
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come to that determination. So I was not expecting a
first degree guilty verdict.
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-How important was the science? Unfortunately, I think
it was not important, as far as the jury
was concerned.
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It did not get through
to them at all. -That couldn't be
further from the truth.
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They understood it, and
they understood it well. They just chose to
disbelieve that he
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was sleepwalking
when he killed her. The science of
sleepwalking is a science. But just like every
other science,
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it is prone to being misused. In this case, that's
what was happening. Scott Falater
wanted to misuse it.
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[theme music]