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a young mother arrives home one morning to a scene of carnage even some of the most seasoned
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detectives were just shocked when they saw brutal i mean really brutal manling sang had stumbled upon her whole
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family slain but to cops her response didn't add up crying one minute but then acting like
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everything was a joke the next how much of manling's story is true she said that
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when she left the house at around 4 am she left the door unlocked who was responsible for murder in an la suburb a
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jealous ex an unknown intruder or a killer much closer to home [Music] [Music] [Music]
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according to statistics in western societies so-called family annihilators are most likely to be white males in
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their 30s family annihilators are are driven to kill their family in an act known as familicide
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95 of family annihilators are male and in half of cases after they've murdered
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their family they then go on to take their own life men when they commit this act it's
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typically for egotistical reasons men who kill their families might have failed financially
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they might think their wife has betrayed the family and so must be punished everything from a man being so
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crazily obsessed and jealous that his girlfriend or wife is out at night and when she comes home he's beat the
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baby to death it's a pretty bizarre phenomena they start to blame the child for the behavior of
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the other person in their relationship i've never personally worked a case where
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someone just killed their child without having some sort of rage with the other party
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pretty sick people some of whom decide their family isn't the status symbol that they hope they
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would be such are the typical cases of familicide but every now and then a case of
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familicide comes along which breaks all of the conventions and that's what happened in roland
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heights los angeles county on august the 7th 2007 with mandling known as ling sang
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at the heart of tragic events she didn't have rage against her children she might have seen them as an
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impediment to her future goals or future plans during the hot dry summer of 1999 in the
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eastern suburbs of los angeles california two shy teenagers crossed paths for the first time
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neil had been talked into going a friend talked him into going to a performance of the rocky
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horror picture show and that's where he meets manling neil williams a student who worked
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part-time at a fast food restaurant had been raised in a close loving single-parent family in the photogenic
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town of whittier neil williams was just kind of one of those nice guys that you don't necessarily remember from
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school he grew up with his mother jan and his sister mala in the los angeles county
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he was described as somewhat of a geek he and his mom jan were very much alike she says
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she says that they were both geeky they both liked star wars a lot uh computer gaming
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quoting monty python and he liked to collect things particularly had kind of an obsession with collecting unusual
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swords uh samurai type swords manling sang had a less harmonious relationship with her parents
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men ling sang of taiwanese descent she was born also in the l.a county area and grew up there
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she had a more difficult ride she had a learning disability and so that made it kind of rough in school and you can
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imagine that she wouldn't have enjoyed her school years this much [Music] i think when children have a difficult
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time growing up maybe a difficult time being accepted possibly even being bullied made to feel unloved
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it's really hard to get your footing in life forensic psychologist dr judy ho
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believes what manding experienced during her formative years could well have shaped her personality
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and not for the better it's really hard to feel good about yourself to believe that you deserve
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good things and to have good decision-making i think when those types of adverse factors happen in your
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childhood sometimes it makes it more difficult for you to not not be narcissistic when you're an adult to
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think about other people and the good of others this was not a side of herself that she
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showed to the young man she met at the movies in 1999 and mandling a meal both on the fringes
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of their peer groups for different reasons hit it off neo was probably just your your textbook
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geek i'm thinking that saying williams was not so much a geek as she was awkward
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uh as as a result of her upbringing i think neil and manly gravitated toward one another because they needed one
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another their kindred spirits in many ways they were both a little bit of an outcast and they got to geek out
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together over things that they mutually enjoyed and bonded over and he's really
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never met anyone like her before and he just thinks she's just amazing she's
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beautiful and she's smart and she's funny and manly and neil become an item
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and they start dating the young couple was smitten but their days of being carefree and unencumbered
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were few a missed period unexplained nausea a trip to the drugstore and confirmation of the news that brought
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their youthful happy-go-lucky relationship to something of an abrupt end before long
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uh menling is pregnant so in 2000 she gives birth to a baby boy and the couple do sort of a rush marriage
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it didn't seem like it was planned and they kind of got thrown into marriage as
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a result they go to the county courthouse and they get married and then they plan and have later
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a more formal wedding in a taiwanese church the big formal wedding with all the friends and family
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they were just 21 years old it was a rocky start to married life let's not forget they married at a young
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age there was no support from her family for that marriage in fact they were scandalized by it
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but neil and manling were in love and with the optimism of youth they were certain they could make a go of things
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in some ways i think they were each other saving grace i think they saw each other at that time during their young
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age as a way towards a better life and it explains why they would rush towards marriage at such an early age perhaps
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even before they really understood what marriage would be about i think their relationship escalated so quickly and
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advanced so quickly because they were all that the other person had at the time the newlyweds heard something to prove
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they wanted to show their families that they could cope that the marriage hadn't
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been a mistake a couple years later the couple has a second child a little boy again
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to everybody else this looks like kind of the picture-perfect marriage the couple seems to be happy the children
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are happy the young family moved to a condo in the 18200 block of camino bello roland
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heights an area known to the local taiwanese immigrant community as little taipei
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manling and neil rented the apartment from mandling's parents who run a business in the area
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she's working as a waitress she's doing pretty well with her tips her husband is
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working at a amusement park at disney amusement park and it's great for him because he's that fun-loving geek he's
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still kind of a just a big kid they put on a good show for family and friends but playing at being grown-ups
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was not easy i think it's so difficult to have children when you're still young and
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you're still a child yourself in many ways and you're still developing and all
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of a sudden now having all these responsibilities where you have to take care of others
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and you can't think about your own interests and needs and goals and you have to already put the needs of your
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children ahead of yours and i think that was probably a struggle for both of them
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very quickly manling realized she wanted more from life menling is not happy with
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where they're living she wants a house instead of this little apartment she wants to be able to spend more money
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and they don't have that much pretty early on in the marriage ben ling and neil are having financial
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difficulties they're struggling to to make ends meet he's not bringing in as
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much money and meddling pressures him so in 2006 he quits his job at the amusement park and at her urging he
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takes a course and tries to learn to sell life insurance but he's not really much of a salesman
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so it's not going so well and that job doesn't last neil really struggled with
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holding down jobs manly ended up having to work full-time manning increased her hours at the
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restaurant where she waited tables while neil gave up working together to become a full-time stay-at-home dad
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for him it was the ideal scenario he loves being with the kids he loves being a dad it's perfect for him and
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then in his spare time he can play video games manling though was left feeling like she got the raw deal
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neil basically regressed into a child when he became the stay-at-home father and manling continued to work full-time
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he basically just stayed home never cleaned the house didn't really cook menling is
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really desperately unhappy she's working as a waitress and she's really had it
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with her husband neil because she will come home from work and while neil was a good dad he was a pretty terrible
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housekeeper and the place is always a mess six years into her marriage mrs williams
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had begun to wonder if she was cut out to be a wife or a mother she's kind of had it with being a mom
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she hadn't really bonded with her children and they were part of the cause for her unhappiness
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was there any way out of what she thought was a miserable life one that she had made for herself
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who knew but the seeds of a horrific story had just been sown by the spring of 2007 neil and manling
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williams marriage was on the rocks so the couple is now six years seven years into their
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marriage and they're fighting all the time i'm in loud fights as their relationship deteriorated it was
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reported that they'd have these huge arguments and screaming matches back and forth sometimes the
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neighbors can hear them screaming it's pretty clear that things aren't going
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well it was around this time that maddling sang williams first raised the idea of a
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divorce neil i think it's time to really get serious i want a divorce neil says no
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there's no way my parents got divorced i don't want that i don't want that for us
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i don't want that for our kids so he's resisting she's unhappy so the couple stayed together but in
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manling's mind the marriage was all but over i think when manley started to think
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about this relationship as being over wanting to divorce wanting to leave neil i think the more she talked about it the
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more resolute she became in this decision i think the more she talked about it she decided that this had to
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happen one way or another i don't think that she was thinking maybe there's a
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way to work around this it wasn't just her marriage she was disillusioned with manling's young sons
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were beginning to feel like a millstone around her neck she's kind of had it with being a mom
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kids are getting a little older they're not as cute and cuddly as they were when
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they were babies it definitely seemed like manly had a hard time bonding with her children and it may be that there
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was a part of her that resented having them in the first place maybe she could have bonded with them better but she
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just didn't want to and she didn't want to become more invested in them because
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if she did then she would have to even spend more time in her life dedicating herself to her children's needs and so i
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think it was a conscious effort to not get closer to her family you know it sounds like manling had this feeling
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that she things were just beyond her control that she really didn't have a say in in much of what had happened to
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her life she told her friends that she felt like she was rushed into this marriage
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because she got pregnant and suddenly now she has two young children and she's
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a housewife and working as a waitress and and she never wanted that life manling
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may have struggled with motherhood and neil may not have been the provider his wife wanted him to be but there was
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somebody else in their life who was happy to pick up the slack neil's mother jan
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she and her son were so close and once he was married manling was like a daughter to her and she was very
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supportive of the two of them she helped them out financially when they needed she was very close to the
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children she was just the most wonderful grandmother loves spending time with her
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two little grandsons years later jan williams would recount a memory that continued to haunt her
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she remembers this one night where she was caring for her two little grandsons and little ian asked her to sing one of
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his favorite songs puff the magic dragon so she starts singing it and in the middle of it devin stops her and he says
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no stop i'm scared and she says why why are you scared and he said because the
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song says the dragon lives forever but not so little boys and she laughs and she says
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honey that just means that little boys grow up to be grown-ups and they don't
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need their toys anymore though just seven years old the little boy's question to his grandmother jan
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would turn out to be eerily prophetic she says that song now comes back to haunt her
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she says i told him he'd be safe in his bed and he wasn't that was in the spring of 2007. by the
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early summer manning had begun to rebel against the situation that she found herself in acting in many ways as though
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the last six or seven years had simply never happened she was spending a lot of her off time partying
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with her friends going out drinking instead of being a mother june of 2007 manling gets on myspace which was the
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hot place to be before facebook arrived manling discovers an old flame and she's intrigued so menling and her
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old flame and her friends from high school all get together they're out having a
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wonderful time having drinks talking remembering the good old days manling feels free like she hasn't in years a
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few days later she asked her mother-in-law jan to take care of the two little boys because she had to go to
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santa barbara for work imagine asking your mother-in-law to watch your kids so that you can go
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out and cheat on her son with some other guy but that's just what meddling has
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done so she gets to santa barbara and she gives her old boyfriend a call and she says hey i'm in town
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why don't we get together so they actually met up and during that weekend they had sexual
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relations manling sang williams a wife and mother had crossed the line she sees this life unfolding before her
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she can just imagine being with him and not having to deal with with being a housewife and and kids and all of that
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that goes with it and the messy house and she's so enthralled with this guy and he says you know menling um
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you're married i don't i don't feel right about this if you want to have a relationship you have
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to get out of the one you're in the affair came to nothing but manling still only in her 20s had got a taste
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for what life could be like if she was once again free and single i don't think that manly was actually
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looking to be with the man she had a brief fling with it was very brief and i think that was just her acting out
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because she was unhappy in her life i think that it gave her a taste of what freedom could feel like
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that summer los angeles county was hit by drought during the long hot nights manling sang
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williams struggled to sleep manling is just seriously unhappy and she's having trouble sleeping and
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she tells her sister that she's having this recurring nightmare she dreams that she comes home to find
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her whole family dead and that she commits suicide manling confided in her sister that in
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other dreams neil had murdered their little boys before taking his own life it begins to look like either she really
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is coming apart and she's building this in her own imagination or she's actually
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plotting what's about to happen the fact that madeline was basically fantasizing
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in her dreams about neil being dead i think there was a blurring of reality versus
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fantasy i think in her mind she probably thought this would be the cleanest way to go
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had manling begun to plan her escape from the family the family she had come to resent
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she really looked at her husband as a reason for all of her suffering because she needed to pin it on somebody and i
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think she decided to pin everything on her husband making it his fault that she got pregnant too early and making it his
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fault that now they have two children and she has to be a full-time working mom while still having household and
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child care responsibilities she also started saying that neil had changed and that she was afraid that he may have
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hurt her or hurt the boys to former homicide detective rod emery manling's claims about her husband
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didn't drink true neil was not a violent person nor did he ever display any personality of such in
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hindsight these stories were manufactured to kind of lay the groundwork for what was about to happen
00:19:01
as the long hot la summer of 2007 wore on manling's dissatisfaction with her
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marriage grew how would this unhappy union end let's not kid ourselves she intended for
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him to die whether he did it by his own hand or hers august 8 2007. as the sun rose on a still dry day in
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los angeles county the piece of the early morning was shattered by a woman's
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screams it was manling sang williams in the doorway of her roland heights condo surveying a horrifying scene
00:19:41
oh my god what's happened here oh my god and her neighbors all come to her aid and they're all surrounding her
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and she says my husband my husband oh my god he's dead he's dead the neighbors described
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her as being barefoot wearing boxer shorts smelling like alcohol so she's screaming you know oh my god who's done
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this my husband somebody help me her hands and feet spattered with blood manling begged her neighbors for help
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she told them that she just returned from a late night drive to cool off her hair
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she likes to do that from time to time when she can't sleep and she was watching the sun rise so when the
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neighbor went in the house they saw neil who was obviously dead blood all throughout the house
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there was clearly no saving 27 year old neil williams the shop neighbor dialed 9-1-1
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officers were there in minutes so the police arrive they go inside they find neil at the top of the stairs
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covered in blood it's blood everywhere he has clearly been stabbed and next to
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him in this pool of blood is this big samurai sword and it's bathed in blood
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the officers could tell that even with the blood and all the destruction that the house was not well kept there was
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garbage overflowing from the garbage cans there was things in disarray and the house just wasn't very much cared
00:21:09
for what are the two little boys neil william's sons where were they in all of this carnage
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as they continued to look around they went to the boys bedrooms looks like the children are still sleeping
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so you know they're relieved and then they realize wait a minute and they try to wrestle the children and
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they realize the children are not sleeping both were dead in their beds the young one ian on his bottom bunk
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and then above on the top bunk the older brother devin they're both dead in their
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beds it was a devastating discovery manling's husband and her two little boys lay dead
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in the family home yet the hysterical young mother seemed oblivious to the finality of her loss
00:21:56
she's screaming does anybody know is my husband is my husband still alive is he
00:22:00
still alive and she's saying my baby's my baby somebody please help my babies
00:22:05
manling was taken to a sheriff's outpost six miles away in walnut williams hearing for the first time of
00:22:13
the tragedy that had befallen her son and grandsons assumed manning's questioning was a formality
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within hours the grieving grandmother would be hit by the shocking truth police take meddling down to the station
00:22:29
um for questioning and they asked her you know where was she she said she she was out she told
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them that she had just gotten home from shopping she had early morning grocery shop
00:22:41
this was not the same story that she had told neighbors the one about the early morning drive because she couldn't sleep
00:22:47
a game of detective cat and mouse was about to begin stories are not adding up and she's
00:22:54
really sort of grasping for stories here but cops are starting to suspect that that something is really wrong here she
00:23:01
changed her story slightly and she told police that she couldn't sleep that night so she got up went to the ridge to
00:23:07
smoke a cigarette and came back home to find the family dead she said that when she left the house at
00:23:14
around 4am she left the door unlocked then she asked if her husband was okay and if her children were okay
00:23:20
so when she heard that they were dead she had a huge reaction she screamed and cried and wailed she gets sick
00:23:28
and she could stick into a trash can this could have been just an overwhelming stress
00:23:32
response detectives were baffled i think this point the police weren't sure what her reaction was was it
00:23:40
genuine or was she acting or did she really know more than she was saying so police are saying you know
00:23:46
who would do this why would anyone want to kill your husband can you think of anything and she says well
00:23:52
you know my husband was actually having an affair for over a year he just confessed to me
00:23:58
recently that he was having this affair and you know i don't i don't know you know
00:24:04
could this maybe be a jealous person as his girlfriend that might have done this
00:24:10
or maybe she had somebody do it could it be jealousy detectives interviewed manling for hours
00:24:17
over the course of that day and she consistently denied knowing anything about the murders of her sons and
00:24:22
husband investigators found her version of events hard to believe and her behavior even stranger
00:24:30
one of the things that the investigators mentioned during her interview was that
00:24:34
her moods changed quite a bit you know one minute she was arrogant one minute she was sad one minute she was happy and
00:24:41
the the variations in the mood were just too odd i think manley probably did feel
00:24:46
a couple of different conflicting feelings as she was processing this in the aftermath but the fact that she was
00:24:53
so dysregulated crying one minute but then acting like everything was a joke the next probably
00:25:00
shows the truth of her emotional instability if i were interviewing her then it would be
00:25:09
a challenge to find out why the mood swings what did detectives make of the grieving
00:25:15
mother's bizarre behavior in their place rod demery would have seen it as a vital
00:25:20
clue was it because she actually was in shock about what happened or was it because she was pretending that she
00:25:28
didn't know what happened or trying to make up a story or a personality so it
00:25:31
would have been very interesting to find out exactly at what point and what question was
00:25:36
asked that her mood changed while manling answered hour after hour of questions and neil's family waited
00:25:43
for news detectives were searching the williams condominium in rowland house there they made a discovery that turned
00:25:51
manning's story upside down detectives have been investigating um all kinds of of leads
00:25:59
and one thing they're looking at is electronic devices and computers as they
00:26:03
always do um and when they look at the computer in the home they find a suicide note supposedly written by neil
00:26:14
saying that he has just killed the children and he's going to kill himself could this explain what had really
00:26:23
happened at that cluttered apartment on camino bello to answer that detectives turned to the
00:26:28
crime scene examiners who were building a picture of how the father and his little boys had died
00:26:34
three-year-old ian and seven-year-old devin showed no signs of traumatic injury it appeared they may have been
00:26:41
suffocated to death neil williams was a different story even some of the most seasoned cops when
00:26:48
they found neal's body they were just horrified he's lying in this pool of
00:26:54
blood and he has just countless stab and slash wounds in all over 90 of them the autopsy would reveal several stab
00:27:07
marks a large x mark on the stomach his hands from defensive wounds were mingled
00:27:11
basically he's been butchered the suicide note supposedly written by neil suggested he was going to take his
00:27:19
own life but could he really have stabbed himself 92 times how could we expect anybody to commit
00:27:26
suicide with a samurai sword it's odd because that doesn't add up with what's
00:27:31
actually happened he couldn't have killed himself with that sword still manling stuck to her guns perhaps
00:27:40
neil's jealous mistress had killed her family perhaps neil himself had done it
00:27:45
then comes the smoking gun in this case it's a cigarette pack as officers continued their meticulous
00:27:52
investigation into the couple's lives they seized the game-changing piece of
00:27:56
evidence inside manling's car police find a cigarette pack with blood on it and they trace that blood
00:28:07
and they find that it goes back to kneel so police confront manling we found the cigarette box
00:28:16
in your car why it's important that they found a cigarette box in the cart with
00:28:21
blood on it is it shoots her story out manling had told cops that she'd been
00:28:27
for a drive into smoke before coming home to the scene of carnage she claimed that she left the house came
00:28:34
home and found them dead if she had done that there would be no blood on a cigarette box in her car so
00:28:42
obviously when she got into the car she had blood on her and got it on the cigarette box and now
00:28:48
she knows it's over and she breaks down and she confesses everything what exactly had happened that night
00:28:57
in the home of mr and mrs williams and you imagine he has been asleep and he's waking up and he's being stabbed to
00:29:04
death late on the 8th of august 2007 in an interview room at the walnut headquarters of the los angeles county
00:29:17
sheriff's department 27 year old manling sang williams walked detectives through
00:29:21
the grisly events of the night before so august 7th menling feeds her children pizza for dinner so
00:29:30
hawaiian pizza with pineapple and ham their favorite and she puts them to bed and
00:29:36
she tucks the youngest one into his bed with his favorite little blanket the little teddy bears all over it
00:29:48
and she tucks her older son into the top bunk and he's lying there with his little blanket his favorite with
00:29:54
spongebob squarepants and then she lets them fall asleep once they were sleeping she crept back
00:30:04
into their room she goes over to the youngest one ian she takes the pillow and she puts it over his head and she
00:30:14
holds it there and he's squirming and she holds it there until she doesn't
00:30:19
feel him breathing anymore she's pushing the life out of her son it must have been a very tough way to go
00:30:28
for her children to be struggling for what probably would have been minutes she gets on the ladder and she climbs up
00:30:34
to her older son devin's bed she does the same thing she takes his pillow she puts it over his face and she holds
00:30:43
it there and he's squirming a little harder he's a little older and she holds it and
00:30:48
she forces it and she is squeezing the life out of her little boy her husband kneel out of the house
00:30:55
manling was focused on what she needed to get her life back i think at that point manly was
00:31:01
completely single-minded she hadn't really bonded with her children and they
00:31:05
were part of the cause for her unhappiness and so perhaps she even delighted in taking her children's lives
00:31:11
and in fact she did so in such an intimate and painful way she then arranged their bodies she
00:31:19
kind of put them in a natural sleeping position with their favorite blankets and toys and they both look like they're
00:31:24
just sleeping and she leaves the bedroom with her two now dead children and she goes to her
00:31:32
computer and she turns it on she logs on to myspace [Music] after looking at the profile of the man
00:31:40
she'd so recently cheated with at around 9 30 pm manling sent text messages to
00:31:45
friends showered got changed and went out she went to tgif fridays and had drinks
00:31:52
with friends you're the mother of these two young children you have just with your bare hands you have smothered
00:32:00
both of your children to death and then you go out and have drinks that shows me that there's a profound
00:32:08
lack of empathy callousness involved what's mending intended to happen next is a matter of speculation
00:32:16
it appeared that she was hoping that neil would come home find the kids dead and commit suicide it's very possible
00:32:23
that neil would have said something to her to that effect god if anything ever happened to you or the kids i would kill
00:32:29
myself and it's you know she might have taken that at face value and thought
00:32:32
that he was absolutely serious when manning returned to the condo little after midnight neil had done
00:32:39
nothing of the sort he was sitting at the computer oblivious to the bodies of his sons lying in the bunk bed just
00:32:44
meters away she gets home and she opens the door and the place is just a mess it is trash
00:32:51
there's trash everywhere and neil has left his his dinner what's left of it
00:32:56
sitting out on the counter everything is just the trash is overflowing she's furious she is so angry
00:33:05
the couple argued according to manling it was about sex a neighbor heard raised voices then neal went to bed and fell
00:33:12
asleep leaving manling enraged that her plan for him to take his own life hadn't
00:33:17
come together lisa's how the story goes when he didn't do that that's when she took actions
00:33:23
into her own hands she goes to his collection and she pulls out the samurai sword and she gets to
00:33:32
her husband and she starts stabbing him and she stabs and slashes over and over neal woke up and began to
00:33:43
try to defend himself and run off but as he ran she kept slicing she chases him from the bedroom he's he's literally
00:33:52
dying he's been stabbed she just doesn't stop she just keeps slashing and
00:33:56
stabbing over 90 times she is so enraged she doesn't stop until she knows he's dead
00:34:04
in his last words were was something like like like help me help me an autopsy would later find that neil
00:34:13
had 92 separate wounds including 22 on his hands where he had tried desperately to defend himself the tips of two of his
00:34:21
fingers had been severed his lungs were punctured as was his small intestine his skull was fractured and in a blow
00:34:29
that even without the others would have caused certain death he had been stabbed
00:34:33
through the heart manling's annihilation of neil indeed of her entire family was complete
00:34:41
it's just an unbelievable thing to imagine what he must have looked like at the end of his
00:34:46
death when she had hacked at him so many times there was obviously so much built
00:34:52
up anger and resentment but also i believe a semblance of evil for somebody to do it that many times when you know
00:34:58
you probably already killed the person by the fourth or the fifth slash of the sword
00:35:03
she had got what she wanted she was once again free and unencumbered but had she
00:35:08
planned her next steps i believe manling did completely think through her murders of her family members i just
00:35:18
don't think that she thought through what would happen after she murdered them i think she
00:35:22
thought through to the point of when i remove these obstacles to my happiness that my life will be different but she
00:35:28
didn't really have a plan afterwards for what that would actually look like once
00:35:32
her entire family was dead first there were practical considerations she changes her clothes and she grabs
00:35:39
the bloody clothes and she takes them with her she gets in her car and she drives and
00:35:44
on the way she stops and she dumps this pile of bloody clothing into a trash can
00:35:52
and then she continues on and goes to her favorite place this ridge near their home and she lights up a cigarette and
00:35:58
she smokes and she waits for the sun to rise [Music] on august 9 2007 having taken manling's
00:36:07
shocking confession detectives charged her for her crimes she's charged with three counts of first
00:36:14
degree murder multiple murder and lying and weight if found guilty she could be sentenced to death
00:36:24
the callousness of premeditation and the planning of it and the fact that you had
00:36:28
to be pretty certain that you wanted to kill these people to go through so much forethought whereas
00:36:34
in a heated situation where you just flow to changes the scenario for the punishment
00:36:43
news that manly had been charged came as a shock to the couple's families but it
00:36:47
would be three long years before they would find out if the case against her could be proven
00:36:53
in the fall of 2010 the trial began and the prosecution's point of view was that madeline just
00:36:59
wanted her life back she wanted to be free and single and not have the responsibilities or the restrictions of
00:37:05
a marriage and children she just wanted to get back to where she was calling the man that she had slept with
00:37:10
in the summer of 2007 to the stand prosecutors used the affair to make sense of the killings
00:37:17
the prosecution argues that you know her motive was that she wanted to get back with this old boyfriend that
00:37:23
was it during closing arguments the prosecution showed or attempted to show that
00:37:29
this was pre-meditated for months before and some of the stories that meddling had told family and friends about neil
00:37:37
that weren't true were kind of set the groundwork for a story that she wanted
00:37:42
to finally reveal after she committed this murder the defense had a different story they
00:37:47
believed that she was abused by her husband she had a difficult childhood a difficult
00:37:56
past abusive past no this was not planned this was you know uncontrolled rage she just sort of snapped madeline's
00:38:04
father actually testified and said that he believed that he might have done something for her to
00:38:11
behave that way and he apologized to neil's family which version of manling's crime would
00:38:16
be the most believable to the jury the trial concluded in november 2010 the jury deliberates for eight hours in
00:38:25
november of 2010 meddling was found guilty of all charges including the special circumstances of land and weight
00:38:32
a few days later a jury convened once again to decide manling's fate then comes the punishment phase
00:38:40
life in prison or the death sentence the jury deliberates and deliberates and they can't come to an agreement
00:38:48
it's a hung jury the verdict was split eight for the death penalty and four against
00:38:54
it was a blow for jan williams neil's mother who simply wanted the process to
00:38:58
be over so she could begin to properly grieve and process the loss of her son grandchildren
00:39:04
both manling's family and neil's family agreed or asked the judge to give her
00:39:11
life in prison rather than the death penalty because of the appeals processes and the
00:39:18
cumbersome processes of a death row or death sentence they just wanted it to end
00:39:25
their pleas fell on deaf ears in august of 2011 a second jury convenes for the punishment
00:39:33
of manlington williams in this case in the end the jury is unanimous they recommend the death
00:39:41
penalty and in january 2012 the judge makes it official manling sang williams is sentenced to
00:39:49
die in summing up the case the judge made his contempt of manling's actions clear
00:39:56
he said she had savagely killed her husband and just heartlessly murdered her children
00:40:06
for selfish narcissistic reasons because she wanted to start a new life with a new man and
00:40:13
leave her old life behind he said she killed her own two children when there were people who would have been
00:40:21
happy to take these children in and those are long and brutal deaths several minutes and during each time she could
00:40:28
have reflected and decided not to but she continued on he said you know she planned this this
00:40:36
was clearly premeditated she laid out this plan over two months she had plenty of time to reconsider and
00:40:43
back out the fact that she wore gloves when she killed her husband or latex gloves when she killed her husband
00:40:50
showed that this was not in the heat of passion the judge said you know this was a heartless killer
00:40:57
selfish narcissistic heartless killer who could take her own children's lives
00:41:03
he said you know i it's not for me to forgive and the people who the only people who would be in a
00:41:10
position to forgive aren't here anymore the case against manling sang williams
00:41:16
was overwhelming despite the death penalty she remains alive [Music] meddling is currently on death row
00:41:23
marlene sam williams is currently being held at the california central women's
00:41:28
facility in chauchila california of the 700 death row inmates in california prisons
00:41:36
less than two dozen are women and the death penalty was only restored in california in 1976 and since then 13
00:41:45
inmates have been executed not one of them has been a woman manling would be the first
00:42:35
[Applause] [Music] um [Music] you