00:00:04
NANCY GRACE: Huntington,
Long Island, 1987. Newlyweds Lisa and
Matthew Solomon so excited to spend their
very first Christmas together.
00:00:14
Christmas was
always a big event. Lisa loved Christmas. They were still young,
so every little event
00:00:22
was a big deal. NANCY GRACE: But a
mysterious disappearance ruins Christmas for the family.
00:00:27
He said, "oh, my God,
something horrible happened." I need all the
people I can get.
00:00:32
I need everybody out there. NANCY GRACE: A heartbroken
husband organizes a search in the bitter cold.
00:00:38
We don't know where she is,
but I want her to come home. This is becoming
very possible.
00:00:42
This guy abducted Lisa. This was a perfect
opportunity to snatch and grab. NANCY GRACE: In the
days after Christmas,
00:00:49
a family desperate for answers. We went to the local
gun store and he bought a Mossberg pistol grip shotgun.
00:00:56
All I can say is that for
whoever is involved right now and whoever has
her for their sake.
00:01:03
The police should
find him before we do. [theme music] [intriguing music] Hello, I'm Nancy Grace.
00:01:38
This is "The
Christmas Killings." New York City, a magical place
during the Christmas season.
00:01:46
They light a giant tree
in Rockefeller Center. Holiday decorations
are everywhere.
00:01:55
On nearby Long Island, there's
a more quaint Christmas scene. There, you find a scattering
of coastal villages
00:02:03
that light up
during the holidays. December, 25, 1987
should be especially exciting for 22-year-old
Lisa Solomon of Huntington.
00:02:16
Lisa and her brand
new husband, Matthew, are set to celebrate
their very first Christmas
00:02:22
as a married couple. Christmas was
always a big event. We set up a Christmas
tree and all that stuff.
00:02:32
It was just a big, happy family. Lisa loved Christmas. And of course, when
she went missing,
00:02:43
it just blew the
whole family apart. NANCY GRACE: At 7:00
AM, Christmas morning,
00:02:50
Suffolk County Police
received a distressing call from Matthew Solomon saying
his wife Lisa is gone,
00:02:59
she's missing. A police officer goes
straight to the Solomon home and takes Matthew's statement.
00:03:06
And Matthew said
on Christmas Eve that they had planned a
dinner to have at home
00:03:10
a lobster champagne dinner. DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK: Lisa
was so excited to come home
00:03:14
and have this special dinner. They were still young, so every
little event was a big deal.
00:03:21
NORMAN REIN: They had been
married two months earlier, and it was more than
just celebrating
00:03:26
their first Christmas
together, but they were also celebrating
their one-year anniversary
00:03:30
of their engagement. And the table was decorated in
such a way that it was festive.
00:03:37
They had three
bottles of champagne and they consumed a
good part of that. So it gives Lisa the feeling
that everything's wonderful.
00:03:47
They're celebrating. And look at this guy,
he loves me so much. The evening just doesn't
continue you on the way
00:03:54
that it started. Christmas Eve is obviously
a very special time of year. Matthew at some point,
apparently after drinking,
00:04:02
had fallen asleep, which
upset her very much. NORMAN REIN: And they
got into an argument
00:04:07
and Lisa was very upset and
said, "I got to cool off." She went outside not
wearing any outerwear,
00:04:13
didn't have her asthma
medication, nor her purse, nor keys. DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK: So
she went out ill-prepared.
00:04:21
And again, you have to
remember, it was Christmas Eve. And we're looking
at Long Island.
00:04:28
It's cold. So maybe she didn't
think she'd be gone long. And maybe she ran into
somebody that might have
00:04:40
had ill-intentions towards her. And we just don't know. NORMAN REIN:
Matthew's expectation
00:04:48
was that she was going to
walk up and down the block and then come back in a few
minutes and she never came back.
00:04:54
NANCY GRACE: Matthew
Solomon spends the entire night driving around
looking for his new bride, Lisa.
00:05:02
As the sun comes up
Christmas morning, he is frantic and calls police. NORMAN REIN: There was a
rule that police would not
00:05:09
get involved for
the first 24 hours, because most of the
times the person would come back or
communicate that they were OK.
00:05:16
However, in this case,
the husband, Matthew, was not going to wait 24 hours. NANCY GRACE: Husband Matthew
Solomon reaches out to Lisa's
00:05:26
close-knit family for help. So on Christmas morning, I
got a phone call from my brother
00:05:31
Eric that Lisa had gone missing
and that this is serious and that I needed to
come down to Huntington
00:05:37
to help look around for her and
find out what happened to Lisa. When I got to the
house, the living room
00:05:44
was filled with people. My father was there. My brothers were there. My Auntie Diane was there.
00:05:51
Lisa's mother and
Matthew was explaining that Lisa had gone out for
a walk and never returned.
00:06:01
Lisa's mother was crying. She was just panicking
to find Lisa. I mean, as any mother would.
00:06:08
And, uh, and we told her
we're going to find Lisa. NANCY GRACE: In Lisa and
Matthew Solomon's community,
00:06:22
there is a sudden outpouring
of charity and goodwill. Neighbors, friends,
even strangers
00:06:29
they don't know leave their
Christmas celebrations at home to join the search for Lisa.
00:06:36
NORMAN REIN: They made posters
and broke out a number of maps, and assigned people to
search in certain areas
00:06:43
and try to keep track
of who was going where. They used the CB radios to
communicate with one another.
00:06:49
STEVE KLERK: Matthew, put it
out to the media that you know, "we needed help to find Lisa."
00:06:54
I need all the
people I can get. I need everybody out there. NORMAN REIN: The fact that
Lisa was missing on Christmas
00:07:00
was a huge element
in attracting people. She can't get to us
and we can't find her.
00:07:05
And we don't know where she is. But I want her to come home. I know she's alive.
00:07:09
I just know. There was a lot of people. Hundreds of people at one point
were involved in the search.
00:07:14
Every friend this
girl has in the world is out looking
for her right now. This is Lisa.
00:07:19
This is someone that we love. NANCY GRACE:
Christmas night, Lisa now officially missing
24 hours, so police
00:07:29
launch an investigation. The chief detective came
to our office and said, "it's time that the
homicide squad is involved
00:07:37
in this investigation." And then I became
the lead detective. NANCY GRACE: Investigators
examined the initial police
00:07:43
report from husband Matthew. Next, they head to the home of
Lisa's mother, Diane Weaver.
00:07:49
NORMAN REIN: Diane Weaver
was very distraught. I knew that it would be
troubling to say that I was
00:07:55
from the homicide squad, because
it comes with the inference that we're looking
for a dead person.
00:08:01
And so I explained
that we're here because we have more
experience, a greater skill set, and greater resources
to get into this investigation.
00:08:09
Diane said that she
and her daughter Lisa, were going to go
to midnight mass, and that Lisa was going to pick
her up at about 11:00 at night.
00:08:18
DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK: Matthew
and Lisa shared different faiths and didn't celebrate
in the same way.
00:08:23
Her mother was waiting
for her, dressed up to go to mass to celebrate
the Christmas holiday.
00:08:30
And at some point in the
evening, falling asleep. [phone ringing] She woke up Christmas
Day to a phone call
00:08:37
from Matthew saying
that Lisa was missing. Lisa Solomon never
comes to pick up her mom.
00:08:45
It's the holidays where people
are drinking, where people might be depressed because they don't
have somebody to celebrate with.
00:08:54
And so, Lisa might have run
across somebody like that. That person might not
have been a good person.
00:09:01
And so this was a
perfect opportunity to snatch and grab and fulfill
whatever it was that that person
00:09:11
needed at the moment. NORMAN REIN: You think about
what possibilities it might be.
00:09:15
She could have gone into
a nearby convenience store and been swept away by someone,
and foul play was involved.
00:09:22
A lot of possibilities
could happen. Realistic or not, Diane
Weaver was very hopeful
00:09:28
that her daughter
would be found safe. She knew that the prospects
of surviving that cold weather
00:09:34
were not good. But Diane said that Lisa was
going to come home to me. She had such a very, very close
relationship with the daughter,
00:09:42
and she described her
daughter in very loving terms as vivacious, independent,
a strong, capable person.
00:09:48
NANCY GRACE: Lisa Solomon
a treasured member of a large, loving family. We grew up together.
00:09:56
We were a very tight family. We'd all get together
and have dinners just about every weekend.
00:10:00
[soft music] We spent vacations
together, Summers together, every holiday together.
00:10:10
My sons were her big
brothers, there was no question. And I was like a dad
more than anything else.
00:10:17
When she was in high school,
she was a cheerleader. And she was very popular
with the other students.
00:10:22
DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK:
She was very attractive. She was described as the
fun girl, the smart girl.
00:10:29
Everybody wanted
to be around her. She did not lack for
any male attention. NANCY GRACE: In 1983,
18-year-old Lisa
00:10:38
catches the eye of
Matthew Solomon, who goes on to win her heart. [soft music] HOWARD KLERK: She was
walking past the gas station
00:10:50
and he came running out and
introduced himself to her, and that's how she met him.
00:10:54
And there were a few years
together before they finally got engaged. The day they got married, her
dad was dying at the time,
00:11:02
he had cancer. He couldn't make it out anymore. So I had to take his place. And I walked her down the aisle.
00:11:10
You know, of course,
we had to tell Matthew we're entrusting her to you. I remember we did
say that to him,
00:11:16
and kind of in a
kidding nice way. It's his wedding, of course. HOWARD KLERK: My God,
she's just so happy.
00:11:23
It's unbelievable. It was probably the happiest
that I've ever seen her. NANCY GRACE: After
their wedding,
00:11:30
the newlyweds move into an
apartment there in Huntington. Lisa, working as a loan
processor at a bank,
00:11:35
while Matthew has a
job as a sheet metal worker in downtown Manhattan. Two months later,
Christmas Eve, Lisa Solomon
00:11:45
vanishes, seemingly
into thin air. [intriguing music] NORMAN REIN: Matthew agreed
to meet us at the precinct.
00:11:54
He was very cooperative
and we spent some time interviewing him. He provided us with pretty
much the same account
00:12:00
that we had heard. We asked about the relationship,
and he had nothing but accolades
00:12:05
about his wife and their
relationship and how loving they were. And he's just totally
devastated and can't
00:12:11
believe this is happening. Matthew brought to our
attention that there was a man named Rob who sought
a loan from Lisa at the bank.
00:12:20
He tried to date
her, he asked her out and Lisa told him on a few
occasions, I'm engaged.
00:12:27
Who was Rob? Matthew didn't know. NANCY GRACE: Investigators go
to Lisa's workplace, the Anchor
00:12:32
Bank in Huntington Station. We spoke to her supervisor
and her colleagues. Lisa's last day of work was
on Christmas Eve, Friday,
00:12:43
and the bank closed at 2:00. There was a small
celebration at the bank and Lisa was talking
about she and Matthew are
00:12:50
going to have a special dinner. She was very much in
love with her husband and loved her new life
as a married woman.
00:12:57
We asked about Rob. NANCY GRACE: Police
learned a man named Rob is a client of Lisa,
who seems obsessed with her.
00:13:07
She processes a
loan for him to buy a flashy new car, a Corvette. STEVE KLERK: And
he was very wealthy
00:13:15
and he didn't really even
need the loan for the car. He just wanted to go
through the loan process
00:13:19
to interact with Lisa. HOWARD KLERK: She was
a very pretty girl. And I guess he figured
she wasn't married.
00:13:29
So I guess he thought, well,
maybe there's a chance I could get her as a girlfriend.
00:13:33
But of course, that didn't work. NANCY GRACE: No one
remembers Rob's last name, so investigators must
painstakingly search
00:13:43
through file folders
full of paperwork to find Rob's application. We wanted them to go
through their records.
00:13:52
They were not computerized, so
we couldn't do a digital search. Remember, it's 1987.
00:13:58
Records are not digitized
like they are today. Police must search through
dozens and dozens of files.
00:14:05
Then they get a
random phone tip. It's a call that startles
them because of one detail, a chilling detail.
00:14:17
NORMAN REIN: A psychic
called in a lead saying that they envisioned that
Lisa was in the streets
00:14:25
and a Corvette came by. [tense music] NORMAN REIN: And offered
her a ride, and she took it.
00:14:36
STEVE KLERK: So now Rob
started becoming very real. Like, if this is true,
then it's very possible
00:14:41
that Rob abducted Lisa. [tense music continues] NANCY GRACE:
Christmas Eve, 1987.
00:14:54
Huntington, Long Island. Newlyweds Matthew and Lisa
Solomon have an argument. Wife Lisa goes out for a walk.
00:15:02
She hasn't been seen since. Police launch an investigation. Has Lisa Solomon been
picked up by a stranger?
00:15:12
Has someone been stalking her? So far, detectives
have just a few clues. There is, however, one standout.
00:15:21
A psychic gives police a
tip about a mysterious man in a Corvette. Police wonder, could it be
that client of Lisa Solomon's,
00:15:33
the client named Rob? Then police learned
something else that occurred Christmas morning.
00:15:40
[intriguing music] DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK:
Christmas morning, Rob calls the mother's house.
00:15:50
Doesn't even ask for
Lisa, asks for the mother, and the sister says
she's not available.
00:15:57
And then gives this strange,
ambiguous statement. "Well, tell her I
said Merry Christmas."
00:16:06
And that's the end of the call. So you can perceive that
in a lot of different ways.
00:16:12
But the one thing I can
say is it's not normal. NORMAN REIN: Diane
Weaver told us
00:16:18
she never met Rob and
thought it very, very strange that he would call. Why would he be calling her?
00:16:24
Is there a motive behind that? Was this something very sick and
sinister behind this phone call?
00:16:33
NANCY GRACE: Lisa
Solomon's family continues a desperate search. STEVE KLERK: We stayed at
that house with Matthew
00:16:40
for the entire time, slept
on the floor, the couches. Every morning, got
up and searched.
00:16:46
Every evening we searched. We searched the whole time. Well, everybody was coming in.
00:16:50
Police were coming in. Reporters were coming in. At this point, Lisa
Solomon appears to have
00:16:55
vanished without a trace. She left behind her pocketbook,
her keys, her money, even her asthma
medication, which
00:17:01
Lisa needs to take twice a day. We were going
around the clock. I mean, we were working hard.
00:17:06
NORMAN REIN: Matthew
never expressed any doubt that she would be found alive. And be back in his arms again.
00:17:14
REPORTER: Do you think
your wife's still alive? I have to think she is. Because when you give
up hope, that's when
00:17:20
you, you stop doing anything. And I'll never stop doing it. So, yeah, she's alive.
00:17:25
She's alive somewhere. And I'm going to find her. DR. KIMBERLIE MASSNICK: The
community that Lisa and Matthew
00:17:33
lived in was small, and people
really did know one another and care about one another.
00:17:42
It's the holidays and Matthew
is out there and he's begging, he's grieving. And so I think it was a lot of
people coming together genuinely
00:17:55
wanting to ease Matthew's pain. [soft music] Please don't hurt her. Please don't do anything rash.
00:18:05
Please keep her warm and
make sure she gets fed. And to whoever did it, no
harm is going to come to them.
00:18:11
Just bring her home. These searches started
to expand out into town, into some pretty bad
areas down in Huntington.
00:18:31
There were cracked ends, banded
buildings and warehouses and construction sites and fields.
00:18:38
Matthew thought that if
somebody were to abduct Lisa, these would be the type of
places they would take her to.
00:18:47
He said we needed
to protect ourselves in these places we were going. So we went to the
local gun store
00:18:52
and he bought a Mossberg pistol
grip shotgun, which he carried in the trunk of the car.
00:18:59
The searches got more
intense and they got real. All I can say is that
whoever is involved right now
00:19:07
and whoever has
her, for their sake, the police should
find him before we do. NANCY GRACE: Police spend days
looking through bank records.
00:19:16
They finally locate
Rob's loan application. We're provided
with his home address
00:19:23
and his place of
employment, which was a car dealership nearby. And we reached out to him, made
arrangements to speak to him.
00:19:29
We talked to him and asked
him, among other things, why he didn't reach
out to the police
00:19:34
and he said he heard
about the case, but it was a Lisa
Solomon who was missing and he didn't know
who Lisa Solomon was.
00:19:40
He knew her as Lisa
Weaver, so he didn't pay much attention to it. He confirmed that
on Christmas Day,
00:19:47
he called the Weaver
residence to wish Diane Weaver a Merry
Christmas, not knowing
00:19:52
that her daughter was missing. And then we asked him about what
he did that evening, where he
00:19:56
was, and he said he was with
his family up in Connecticut and he wasn't here at all.
00:20:01
We checked out his story and
other information he gave us, and we washed him out as
being a suspect in this case.
00:20:09
NANCY GRACE: Christmas Day is
now several days behind them, and police hit a wall
with only one solid lead.
00:20:19
Lisa Solomon's
family's struggling with the idea they will have to
ring in a new year without her.
00:20:27
STEVE KLERK: There
was a Christmas tree with unopened gifts. It was hard. I had anger and sadness
at the same time.
00:20:39
When you go into six
days of searching, each day's just
there's a loss of hope. She's not coming back.
00:20:48
And we have to find her. NANCY GRACE: On the
night of December 30, Steven Clark is part of
another search party.
00:20:57
They're looking through
two large fields of debris on either side of
an industrial road.
00:21:05
STEVE KLERK: It was
approaching 11:00 and I had a handheld CB
and an 11:00 we were all supposed to check in.
00:21:12
So I called my father and
said, dad, this is where we are and we're searching
this field, but I'm
00:21:17
going to stay longer because
there's a field directly across the street, and we're
going to go there, too.
00:21:22
So we can rule these areas out. HOWARD KLERK: It was cold. It was about 20 below
zero that night.
00:21:29
It was really, really cold. And I said, we're just going
to have to knock it off.
00:21:33
He said, well, I got
a couple of one or two places I just want
to look at yet. STEVE KLERK: Where
I was standing,
00:21:41
there was garbage
bags all around me. There was a bunch of them. They were all black bags
with leaves in them,
00:21:46
and I was kind of kicking them
and moving them around as I was talking to my father on the CB.
00:21:54
One of the bags
was hard and heavy. As soon as I got off the CB, I
started ripping open the bag.
00:22:01
And all of a sudden I
discovered an elbow, an arm. [intriguing music] I've never been in
such a shock in my life.
00:22:22
NANCY GRACE: Newlywed
Lisa Solomon goes missing Christmas Eve, 1987. Scores of neighbors in
Huntington, Long Island
00:22:30
joined the search with
her family and friends, and they all pray for
a Christmas miracle
00:22:37
that Lisa will be found alive. Six days after Lisa and her
new husband toast Christmas
00:22:44
Eve with champagne, her
cousin, Steven Clark, discovers human
remains in a trash bag
00:22:52
left in the middle of a field. I was standing
still and the world was turning around me like the
air was sucked right out of me.
00:23:07
I started to tear
the bags open further till I saw my cousin's face. [somber music]
00:23:15
I saw Lisa in the bag. It was kind of a surreal moment,
standing alone in the field,
00:23:24
with my cousin laying
there, naked in the bag, just thrown away like garbage. [somber music continues]
00:23:40
STEVE KLERK: So I got on the
CB and I called my father. HOWARD KLERK: He
said, "I found Lisa."
00:23:48
I said, "is she alive?" He says, "no, she's dead." [sirens wailing] They were detectives,
I guess, close by.
00:23:57
They had to be because
it was within a minute, somebody pulled up. The Detective, he started
putting up crime tape.
00:24:03
And right at that
moment, Matthew pulled up with his father, Jack, and he
jumped out of the car and said,
00:24:08
"Steve, where's Lisa? Lisa, where's Lisa? Is she over here?
I need to find Lisa.
00:24:12
I want to find Lisa." And with that, he
started running across the field in a diagonal
straight for Lisa's body.
00:24:18
He was going to contaminate the
crime scene, so I ran after him. I grabbed him by the
back of the jacket.
00:24:23
His feet went out
from under him, and I brought him to the
ground and tackled him.
00:24:27
And I had my arm around him. And Matthew started
hyperventilating and crying that Lisa was dead.
00:24:36
REPORTER: The search
for Lisa Solomon ended just before midnight. Searchers found her body
in a field about a mile
00:24:42
from her home in
Huntington Station. Family members say they were
not prepared for the bad news.
00:24:54
Lisa's husband, Matthew,
collapsed and had to be taken to a hospital. NORMAN REIN: The joy of
Christmas and the prospect
00:25:03
and hopefulness of
a new coming year was sadly taken away from her
family and friends in a moment.
00:25:13
Now the scene, I went over
and I saw the part of the body in the bag, frozen in
the fetal position.
00:25:23
It was almost a sterile scene. Garbage bags, a body
in the garbage bags. And that was it.
00:25:32
After the forensic unit
had finished their work at the scene, the
body was removed
00:25:36
to the morgue for an autopsy. This missing person case now
turned into a homicide case.
00:25:45
REPORTER: Her husband and
an estimated 200 friends had been combing the
woods and fields nearby.
00:25:50
Posters have gone up
all over the area. But now, Lisa Solomon
is missing no longer.
00:25:55
We just want to say Thanks
to everyone who came out and that's all we
can really say.
00:26:00
And the police have
taken the matters in and with the
help of the family, know they're going
to catch this guy.
00:26:06
And when they catch them,
I hope he rots in hell. HOWARD KLERK: The
police, in the meantime,
00:26:14
said to Steve, come on,
you're going to come with us. You know you're going
to have to talk to us.
00:26:20
So they hauled him off
to the police station. STEVE KLERK: I had to
go to their precinct
00:26:27
where they took a statement. I was there for a
couple of hours. I took my boots and my gloves,
and I was still in total shock.
00:26:38
NORMAN REIN: The post-mortem
examination had to be delayed until the body was thawed out.
00:26:41
And so it took perhaps
to the next day until they actually
examined her body. The medical examiner determined
that the cause of death
00:26:52
was strangulation, and he
found that the hyoid bone in the throat was fractured.
00:26:58
And that usually happens when
someone puts a stranglehold on another person. The M.E. said she
could have died
00:27:05
within two or three minutes. She suffered an unbelievable,
slow, torturous death,
00:27:13
in my opinion. HOWARD KLERK: Lisa was abducted. Lisa was strangled. Lisa was thrown
into a garbage bag
00:27:24
and dumped in a field
along with bags of leaves. Nobody deserves to be thrown
away like a sack of garbage.
00:27:34
The garbage bags. The ties on the garbage bag
are forensically checked. There were red fibers
on the garbage bags,
00:27:44
and there was also hairs. We were very interested
in those red fibers. And where did they come from.
00:27:52
This is now a homicide case. And Suffolk County
detectives began interviewing family and friends.
00:28:00
It's S.O.P. Standard
Operating Procedure. Spouses are the
first people police consider as possible suspects,
but Lisa and Matthew are
00:28:11
basically still on a honeymoon. They're newlyweds. Husband Matthew seems genuinely
grief stricken during the search
00:28:20
for his missing wife. NORMAN REIN: Diane. Weaver loved Matthew, thought
that he very much loved
00:28:25
her daughter, and was
very protective of her, and she was crediting
Matthew with the efforts
00:28:31
that he was making,
appealing to the public and leading the searches and
being the husband that she
00:28:36
would hope he would be for her. She was saying, well, I
lost my daughter, I lost Lisa,
00:28:45
but at least I have her
husband, I have Matthew, but I didn't like him. At one time, my son
Eric was talking to Lisa
00:28:55
and he put his arm around her. Matthew came along and
threw his arm off Lisa and really threatened him.
00:29:03
I mean, they were like
brother and sister. And even at their wedding,
she was sitting on my lap
00:29:12
at one point and we were talking
and carrying on and laughing, and he was off to the
side and glaring at us.
00:29:20
I took her off to the side and
I tried to talk her out of it. He just didn't see it that way.
00:29:29
NANCY GRACE: Stephen Clark
agrees with his father. He repeats concerns about
husband Matthew when
00:29:34
he's interviewed by detectives. STEVE KLERK: They had some ups
and downs in their relationship.
00:29:40
He was very controlling. He was very possessive. When they went out to eat
or went to places together,
00:29:46
Matthew would escort her to the
bathroom, stand outside the door and wait. In other words, he
didn't even let Lisa
00:29:52
go to the bathroom on her own. They went on to tell us
that there were times when
00:29:57
Lisa was still living at home. Before she went to work, he
would stop by in the morning
00:30:01
and check to see what
she was wearing that day, and that he would
object if he thought
00:30:06
it was something that would
be attractive to other people. NANCY GRACE: Stephen Clark
has reservations about husband
00:30:14
Matthew, but he doesn't think
Matthew is capable of murdering his new bride. But then he remembers one moment
in time that changes his mind.
00:30:27
It's when Lisa's body is
discovered in that trash bag. [intriguing music] [sirens wailing]
00:30:38
First detective
that pulled up. He started putting
up crime tape. But we're on the wrong
side of the road.
00:30:43
So I was telling him,
listen, Lisa is over here on the other side of the road. And that's when
Matthew pulled up.
00:30:50
And he started running that
way towards Lisa's body. We were standing on the
opposite side of the road.
00:30:57
How would he to run there? Why would you pick
that spot, of all spots in this entire two fields
on both sides of the road?
00:31:03
Lisa could have been anywhere,
but he knew where to run. It was like a bolt of
lightning went through me.
00:31:10
Matthew killed Lisa. New Year's Eve
1987, New Yorkers celebrating in Times Square in
nearby Huntington, Long Island.
00:31:24
Lisa Solomon's family are making
plans for her wake and funeral. There's a massive turnout
of family and friends
00:31:34
for Lisa's wake. Suffolk County PD is also there. NORMAN REIN: An element
of most every homicide
00:31:44
investigation is to attend
the wake of the victim. It's an opportunity
to talk to people
00:31:52
that may something that if
they're willing to talk to us. [melancholic music] We went to the funeral.
00:32:03
And Matthew was there. Lisa's casket was open. He came in, looked at her and
ran out, ran across the street,
00:32:19
bought a case of
beer, went downstairs and started drinking beer. And a couple of his
friends came in,
00:32:27
they were having a party
downstairs in the funeral home. In the meantime, we were up
in the room with Lisa's body.
00:32:38
[soft dramatic music] Everybody behaves differently
than he did as well. He did not put himself up
front and greet people.
00:32:53
He rather stood behind what was
going on and drinking and trying to wish that night away.
00:33:00
That was my opinion. He didn't even go in
the room where Lisa was. Didn't even go up to the casket.
00:33:05
Didn't show any remorse. He bought beer, and him and his
buddies sat in the parking lot
00:33:11
and drank beer. NANCY GRACE: From that very
first moment when husband Matthew Solomon runs to his
wife Lisa's body in that trash
00:33:21
bag out in the field,
Lisa's cousin, Steven Clark, is suspicious. And now he doubts
everything Matthew
00:33:29
Solomon has ever said or done. We gave him enough of
the benefit of the doubt. Six days with nothing, you know.
00:33:37
But the story wasn't
really panning out. Like, why would Lisa leave
and walk out the door
00:33:42
and go for a walk with
nothing on Christmas Eve? Lisa wouldn't do these things. Well, if Lisa was to leave the
house, she would have a coat on.
00:33:52
She would have her bag,
her medication, everything. Lisa was not willy-nilly. She was very meticulous
about everything.
00:33:59
NANCY GRACE: Stephen Clark
immediately tells his concerns to Detective Norman Rein.
00:34:04
Stephen was convinced
that Matthew murdered Lisa. We didn't accept it and
we didn't discredit it,
00:34:12
but we went deep into
the investigation and to see if there was anything
more we should know about.
00:34:17
The relationship between him and
Lisa, we talked to Gerald Clark a number of times, the
youngest son of Howard Clark,
00:34:25
cousin of Lisa, and he was
the one that was staying in the apartment with Matthew.
00:34:31
They were together
24 hours a day, and then at one point, Gerry,
he goes in the bathroom,
00:34:36
and Matthew was just coming
out of the shower at the time, and he noticed a
huge bite on his arm.
00:34:47
So he had wore
long sleeve shirts. But later on when-- You know, we slept
in the living room,
00:34:54
so we got to see him
in his t-shirt later, and he had a bruise on
his arm and had a scratch
00:34:57
on the side of his face. Police began to focus on
husband Matthew's bruises. Could they show Matthew and
Lisa had a physical altercation
00:35:09
leading to her murder? NORMAN REIN: And it was
very troubling to us. Matthew said that we
had a disagreement,
00:35:16
she walked out of the house. Now we're hearing that
something physical took place.
00:35:21
NANCY GRACE: Investigators
keep looking for hard evidence. We are hoping that anyone who
has seen anything that would
00:35:30
indicate any activities
of the deceased would contact the Suffolk
County Homicide Squad.
00:35:37
NORMAN REIN: Every investigation
includes a neighborhood search. Who saw anything.
00:35:43
Who heard anything. We had to go back several
times to the homes of people who were out of
town during the holidays.
00:35:50
It's amazing the clues
a neighbor might notice. Clues that can crack
a case wide open.
00:35:58
Matthew and Lisa Solomon's
downstairs neighbors are home on Christmas Eve. They tell police what
they heard from upstairs.
00:36:07
NORMAN REIN: Matthew and Lisa
were living in an apartment that was occupied on the
first floor, and so we
00:36:13
talked to the
husband and the wife and asked them, were their
attention drawn to anything
00:36:19
different on that evening? They both said that
later in the evening they heard noise upstairs.
00:36:25
Sounded like an argument, mostly
Matthew talking very loud, maybe even shouting.
00:36:30
And then they heard someone
was running across the floor. They didn't say that they heard
Lisa's footsteps going down
00:36:38
and the front door opening. They heard a thud. And then there was silence. NANCY GRACE: Do the
downstairs neighbors
00:36:48
hear the very moment
Lisa is killed when her body falls to the floor? We knew Matthew was lying,
and we knew he was involved.
00:36:59
It was just a matter of
how much was he involved and what exactly happened. NANCY GRACE: Now, Lisa's cousin,
Gerald remembers something
00:37:06
that could be critical. NORMAN REIN: He remembered
that at some point, Matthew put the shotgun
in the trunk of the car,
00:37:14
and when Gerald saw the
trunk of the car, he thought, this is a man who works
with tools and other things,
00:37:21
and it's clean. It's sterile. It's just got this
red carpet in there. NANCY GRACE: Red fibers
in the trunk of husband
00:37:28
Matthew Solomon's car. And red fibers in the
bag with Lisa's body. Are they both from the rug
in Matthew Solomon's car?
00:37:38
NORMAN REIN: We
knew that we wanted not only to search
his apartment, but to search his
vehicle as well.
00:37:45
Certainly we could have
gotten a search warrant, but it's just because
I'm going to Texas
00:37:49
with my brother who
lived there and just spend a little time away. I'll leave you fellas the key.
00:37:55
You don't have to break in. And he readily gave
us that consent. Matthew left. We searched the apartment.
00:38:00
We found nothing that
was of evidential value to the investigation. We went out to his car
and we opened the trunk.
00:38:11
And there was a red carpet. So when the lab tested
the fibers that were found on the bags that the
body was put into
00:38:22
and the fibers that came
from the trunk of his car, it was an absolute match. [intriguing music]
00:38:34
NANCY GRACE: For
newlywed Lisa Solomon, Christmas Eve 1987 begins
with a champagne toast
00:38:41
and a lobster dinner
with her brand new husband, Matthew Solomon. It ends tragically
when she Lisa, ends up
00:38:50
violently strangled, dumped in a
field in a trash bag, abandoned. The evidence points to Lisa's
husband of less than two
00:39:01
months, Matthew Solomon. Police wonder how
could a Christmas Eve celebration end in murder?
00:39:12
Things like this should never
happen at any time of the year, but certainly all the more
egregious on Christmas Eve.
00:39:21
NANCY GRACE: Police
obtained an arrest warrant for Matthew Solomon, and
detectives have a plan
00:39:26
to take him into custody. Matthew was back in New York,
and we had learned that he was
00:39:31
going to go to work the
next day at around 4:30, 05:00 in the morning. Our squad, in many
different vehicles,
00:39:39
gathered around the route
that Matthew would take. A couple of minutes
later, Matthew's car came.
00:39:43
We surround him with
a traffic light. We get him out of
the car, we put him in the back of my squad car.
00:39:48
HOWARD KLERK: He got into
the car, the police car, and one of the first
words out of his mouth
00:39:53
was, how are you doing with Rob? I mean, he just never took
responsibility for what he did.
00:40:00
It was unbelievable. REPORTER: Suffolk
detectives arrested Matthew Solomon at 06:20 this
morning as he left for work.
00:40:07
Police say Solomon gave
up without a fight. NANCY GRACE: While
in custody, he breaks and tells detectives
a different version of what
00:40:16
happens on Christmas Eve. NORMAN REIN: Matthew
said he had fallen asleep and she was annoyed with him
and that she got argumentative.
00:40:25
He said we both
had been drinking and it just got out of hand. She was going to
run out of the house
00:40:30
and I grabbed her and she
was screaming and yelling. It's possible because we only
have Matthew's word on what
00:40:39
happened that evening, that
Matthew was the one that was upset and jealous that Lisa
had made plans with her mother.
00:40:48
Lisa had said that she
was going to midnight mass with her mother and he said no.
00:40:54
And Lisa said, I'm going to
take my mother to midnight mass. It's already been arranged.
00:40:59
And she went for the
door and he grabbed her, and then it became a scuffle. I just wanted her to stop,
but I was begging her to stop.
00:41:10
Stop what? Stop fighting and
stop yelling and crying. He says I just put my arm
around her to calm her down
00:41:16
and that she would relax. And then we could
talk about this. And he says she was dead.
00:41:23
How long did you did you
grab her around the neck? It happened for a
couple of minutes.
00:41:28
NORMAN REIN: He wanted
to call his father. I had him call his father. We recorded it.
00:42:02
NORMAN REIN: He said,
"I undressed her, put her in the bags,
put her in the car,
00:42:06
and I drove to the empty
field and I dumped her." TIMOTHY MAZZEI: He
tried to convince
00:42:12
us that he didn't mean it. It wasn't his fault.
It was an accident. Except the problem is, if
it really was an accident,
00:42:19
he would have called the police
right away and said, oh, my god, something horrible happened.
00:42:25
I held her too tight. I didn't mean to do it, but
please come and help me. But that didn't happen.
00:42:31
So he was choking her with a
bar armed chokehold, hard enough to break the bones
in her neck and then
00:42:39
throw her out on the side
of the road like garbage. And then take the
family out on the search
00:42:45
for a week in the cold. REPORTER: Matthew led an
estimated 200 volunteers on a search for Lisa, telling
anyone who would listen
00:42:53
that the family needed
help finding her, and that Matthew was
sure she was still alive.
00:42:57
He knew damn
well she was dead. He killed her. Or he's one hell of an actor. So there's Matthew
at the funeral.
00:43:09
So we had to go to the
funeral with the killer and watch him carry on the
charade the whole entire time.
00:43:18
Every step of the way,
was the worst part. But I think this was
really the worst part.
00:43:23
[somber music] TIMOTHY MAZZEI: Well,
I was confident, but I was concerned
going into the trial
00:43:31
because if you believed
his video confession, he may be guilty of criminally
negligent homicide or maybe
00:43:37
guilty of nothing,
but he certainly wasn't guilty of murder. He said that they
got into an argument
00:43:42
and that she started
crying uncontrollably. And he grabbed her and he held
her to try to calm her down.
00:43:52
And while squeezing her,
she stopped breathing. We proved through the medical
examiner that before she died,
00:44:03
she would have passed
out and therefore any uncontrollable crying or
struggling would have stopped.
00:44:11
But he continued to strangle
her until she was dead. He wanted her dead, at
least at that very moment.
00:44:18
NANCY GRACE: February,
1989, one year after newlywed Lisa
Solomon's murder, the jury returned a verdict.
00:44:26
JUDGE: With respect to
count two of the indictment the charge of murder in
the second degree, that is,
00:44:30
depraved indifference murder. How do you find the
defendant, Matthew Solomon? MEMBER OF THE JURY: Guilty.
00:44:36
TIMOTHY MAZZEI: He was convicted
of murder in the second degree, what we call
depraved indifference
00:44:41
murder, which was more of
a reckless, negligent way. I didn't mean to
kill her, but I was
00:44:47
aware of what I was doing
could cause her death, and I continued to do it. The maximum penalty that
he could have gotten
00:44:56
would have been 25 to life. And the judge decided
on 18 years to life. NANCY GRACE: Matthew
Solomon's family
00:45:06
is also pulled apart by the
trial and the sentencing. Go ahead. You want pictures?
00:45:12
Here, take them. REPORTER: Matthew
Solomon's father, Jack, ran out of the courtroom.
00:45:16
Frustration and anger that had
built up for the past 11 months now rushed out of him.
00:45:20
You got your
pound of flesh now. All right? I think what you
got in that courtroom
00:45:24
today is nothing
compared to what he'd get with me in five minutes. I mean, he's
what kind of person
00:45:32
marries somebody two months
later on Christmas Eve murders her. That's not a human being.
00:45:40
That's an animal. NORMAN REIN: Weddings,
funerals, family holidays bring out the best and
the worst in people.
00:45:51
My experience as a
homicide detective was that just about every
Christmas that I worked,
00:45:57
we dealt with someone's death. HOWARD KLERK: Something that
I'll never, ever forget.
00:46:03
I walked her down the aisle
and I lifted her veil. I kissed her, and I
turned her over to the guy
00:46:12
who murdered her. NANCY GRACE: Lisa
Solomon's family tries to keep husband Matthew in
prison for the rest of his life.
00:46:21
He is eventually
released in 2019, after serving just 31 years. He deserves to spend the
rest of his life in prison.
00:46:33
But he didn't, he got out. There's no justice. Soft on crime is
hard on victims.
00:46:42
Every Christmas, you think
about where you were on that day when you went to that apartment
and began that search.
00:46:51
[somber music] I never thought that I
could ever enjoy a Christmas until my kids were born.
00:47:15
Seeing them on Christmas is
what brought Christmas back. [somber music continues]
00:47:28
Even at Christmas,
when most of us are counting our blessings, a
beautiful, joyous and Holy time
00:47:38
can turn deadly. So it was for two newlyweds
whose passion and anger could no longer be contained.
00:47:49
I'm Nancy Grace. Thank you for joining us here
on "The Christmas Killings." [intriguing music]