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0:55

badly hurt the other day. So

0:57

much harder. Oh my God, that's not

0:59

me, that's not me, that's not me.

1:02

He says you've got to help me find the murderer. And

1:05

I'm thinking to myself, I'm looking at the murderer right now.

1:09

There was a dark side. He was a

1:11

very jealous and controlling individual. I

1:14

couldn't see that guy hurting a fly. There's no

1:16

way possible. She

1:18

took on our victim's name. She kind

1:20

of took over our victim's persona. Plan

1:23

A was stuff the body in the trunk

1:25

and then leave. Now

1:28

plan B went into effect. We

1:31

saw those videotapes. That was like an aha

1:33

moment. That's when a bright light

1:35

goes on. We're both shaking our

1:37

heads going, there's something wrong here. The

1:40

witness told one story. The evidence

1:42

told another. A search for

1:44

the truth and a killer.

1:47

I'm Lester Holt. This is

1:49

Dateline. Here's

1:55

Josh Mankowski.

2:00

with The Breaker. A

2:07

Wednesday morning, bright and sunny in

2:09

Palmdale, California, about 60 miles

2:12

north of Los Angeles. The

2:14

perfect day for two girlfriends to hang

2:16

out. Except this

2:18

ordinary afternoon was hiding something.

2:22

It really just blew my mind.

2:24

I couldn't believe it. A

2:28

plot so sinister, so

2:30

stunning, it took even seasoned

2:32

detectives by surprise. The lights

2:35

start to go on that we're heading in the wrong

2:37

direction. The

2:41

sun was setting as a woman rushed into

2:43

the Palmdale Sheriff's station. She

2:46

was frantic, her clothes covered

2:48

in blood. The

2:50

woman said the horror began when

2:52

she'd walked barefoot into her friend's garage.

2:56

It was dark inside and she slipped

2:58

on something wet. She

3:06

fell, and as she sat there,

3:09

a terrible scene began to come into

3:11

focus. There

3:13

was blood everywhere. I'm

3:16

looking at the blood, and then when I looked I

3:18

saw her legs. She told

3:20

deputies she recognized her friend's

3:22

pedicure and took

3:24

a closer look. And then I walked

3:26

around the corner and she had a bow over her head, and

3:29

I'm sitting there like, oh my gosh. Her

3:31

friend was lying face up on the garage

3:33

floor next to her car. And

3:36

I ran over there and I picked her up. The

3:39

woman making the report was Lorraine Austin. Police

3:42

snapped these photos of her that night. While

3:45

the blood was still on her, the

3:47

victim, she told deputies, was her friend

3:49

of ten years, Linnell Barsock. One

3:54

hour later, the call went out to homicide

3:56

detectives. I

3:58

had actually taken my tie off. had dinner and

4:00

the call came in, put my tie back on,

4:02

off I went. Detectives

4:05

Joe Espino and Bob Kenny of

4:07

the LA County Sheriff's Homicide Bureau

4:10

were on call that June night. And

4:13

the person on the other end of the phone told

4:15

me to wake up, get dressed, and get pretty because

4:17

I was heading out to the beautiful city of Palmdale.

4:21

They made their way from LA to

4:23

Palmdale and to LaNel's house, now

4:26

an active crime scene. What

4:30

can you tell early on just by your

4:32

first walkthrough? The house was a

4:34

very nice house, very large, I believe it was

4:36

3,400 square feet. It was a

4:38

nice area of Palmdale. Investigators

4:41

discovered LaNel and her live-in

4:43

boyfriend Louis Bonaire had

4:45

just bought the house less than a year

4:47

before. And they were still

4:49

in the process of filling on the house. A lot

4:51

of the rooms were empty, they were still putting up

4:54

window shades and things like that. As

4:57

they worked their way through the home, nothing

4:59

appeared to be out of place. Well,

5:03

almost nothing. So

5:05

you go from the living room into the family room, and

5:07

the family room looks like a normal

5:09

family room. The only thing that's odd about it is

5:11

there's a void on the floor. It looked like there

5:14

had been an area rug there but was gone. It

5:18

wasn't until they came to the laundry

5:20

room that odd turned to

5:22

alarming. There was

5:24

several bloody towels on the floor

5:27

and several clean towels on top of a washer

5:29

and dryer but they were all in disarray as

5:31

if they'd been like tossed around. And there's blood

5:33

on the floor and that looks odd.

5:37

Detectives made their way from the laundry

5:39

room to the garage. On

5:42

the floor more bloody towels. The

5:45

plastic sheeting Lorraine said she slipped on

5:48

and trash bags filled with what appeared to

5:50

be bloodied bedding. The victim's car had been

5:52

parked in the garage back in and the

5:55

trunk was open. We walked around the car

5:57

and we find the body with the head

5:59

towards the rear wheels and the feet are

6:02

towards the front of the car. 29-year-old

6:05

Lanell was pronounced dead at the scene.

6:08

The cause? A gunshot wound

6:10

to the head. She had

6:12

a black plastic bag over her head. Yes.

6:15

What does that say? It says a

6:18

couple of things. Whoever put this bag on her did

6:20

it for two reasons, I think. Number one was the

6:22

containing amount of blood. And

6:25

reason number two? Usually

6:28

when somebody puts a plastic bag or

6:30

any type of covering over a victim's

6:32

face, it means they don't want to

6:34

see that person or they

6:37

don't want that person who is

6:39

deceased watching them. So we

6:42

made the assumption that

6:44

whoever had done this killing knew

6:47

the victim. They

6:49

soon learned they might be right about that.

6:54

The sergeant who'd taken down Lorraine's statement

6:56

arrived at the crime scene to brief

6:58

detectives. Lorraine

7:00

recounted how almost immediately after

7:03

discovering Lanell's body, she'd

7:06

heard a noise. And

7:11

in the same moment realized

7:14

she wasn't alone in the house. It

7:16

was a man. Lorraine said she

7:19

instantly recognized

7:24

him. As

7:29

in Louis Bonheur, Lanell's boyfriend of

7:32

four years, detectives would

7:34

learn Louis was one half of

7:36

a relationship that was already

7:38

on life support. She

7:40

said, Louis tried to run me off the road, mother.

7:43

She was screaming, screaming. You

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16:00

the two on the phone and

16:02

became furious. Ike

16:04

said he could hear Lewis screaming on the other

16:06

end of the line. He's the one

16:08

who put in a long distance call to 911. Ike

16:13

became very concerned about Lynnell's safety.

16:15

So he called the local sheriff's

16:18

department to have

16:20

them respond. And they

16:23

resolved it without an arrest being made. That

16:26

did not settle it, Lorraine said. She

16:29

told detectives the couple continued to argue

16:31

right up until the week Lynnell died.

16:34

Karen Lewis got into a fight Monday. He

16:37

was in her face to like something. Three

16:39

days ago. Yeah, that if she was cheating,

16:41

she said she could get a scratch on

16:43

them. And she

16:45

told detectives the day before Lynnell died,

16:48

Lewis learned about a secret phone

16:50

she was carrying. There

16:53

was a cell phone that Ike had given Lynnell so

16:55

that they could communicate secretly. That alone takes you

16:57

past the friend zone. Yes. Lorraine

17:00

said a big argument ended with

17:03

Lynnell promising to no longer like

17:05

Ike. You got a pretty

17:07

classic love triangle going on here. Am I wrong

17:09

to think that at some point you would have

17:12

looked at where Ike was and what he was

17:14

doing at the time of the murder? Oh, we

17:16

had to figure out where Ike was.

17:18

And he had an alibi. Yes, he

17:20

had a very good alibi. Which was what?

17:23

He was interviewing for a job

17:25

at University of California at Davis.

17:28

So he was there near Sacramento and

17:31

you talked to the person he was interviewing with.

17:33

Correct. That

17:35

cleared Ike as a suspect. So

17:39

detectives turned back to Lewis. Ike,

17:42

they thought, provided him with

17:45

all the motive in the world. What

17:48

he believed was happening with Ike was

17:50

happening. They were both competing for the same

17:53

woman. Correct. Detectives

17:55

wanted very much to know where Lewis

17:57

was and what he was doing. walked

20:00

to a nearby park and stayed there for

20:02

a few hours before

20:04

returning to the house around 6.30 p.m. and

20:08

finding LaMel dead. At

20:12

which point she sees Louis, who is at the top

20:14

of the stairs. Lorraine

20:16

said she ran out to her car in a

20:18

panic and couldn't find her cell phone to call

20:20

911. So

20:23

she drove straight to the sheriff's station.

20:26

She also said Louis wasn't

20:28

done. Well,

20:30

en route, she sees that now he's chasing

20:32

her in his truck. And she

20:35

says, no question, this is Louis. Absolutely, no

20:37

question at all. The 100%, it's Louis. Lorraine

20:41

told detectives Louis stopped following her

20:43

as she got closer to the

20:45

station. Now,

20:48

he was nowhere to be found. So

20:51

the search for Louis Bonheur was on.

21:00

So, detectives

21:09

were looking hard for Louis Bonheur.

21:12

He turned up at LaMel's mom's home

21:15

in LA, sleeping. Louis

21:18

comes out. Very agreeable, not

21:20

a problem at all, walks outside. While I'm still talking

21:22

to him on the phone, he's very

21:25

cooperative. While a squad car

21:27

drove Louis to the sheriff's station, Detective

21:30

Kenny gave LaMel's mom the terrible

21:32

news that her daughter had been

21:34

murdered. How'd she take it?

21:38

She didn't take it very well on the phone. She got

21:40

very emotional. The

21:42

questioning of Louis Bonheur began.

21:46

What's your girlfriend's name? Hey, Nervous. What happened

21:48

to her? How did you look

21:50

at her? You don't know? I need the house,

21:52

Eddie. We'll go fix some backup. Louis

21:55

admitted he returned and that he

21:57

did follow LaMel and Lorraine to the...

22:00

beauty store. But then he

22:02

said he met up with Lorraine's boyfriend

22:04

90 minutes away in LA and

22:07

spent the afternoon at auto supply stores

22:10

before driving to Lanell's mother's house,

22:13

where he slept to avoid a long

22:15

commute in the morning. Lanell's

22:18

mom mentioned her son had seen Lewis

22:20

that night on the computer, making

22:23

bank transactions and looking up

22:25

flights to Miami. So

22:28

we thought right away, here's Lewis. If

22:30

he catches a flight to Miami and he

22:32

catches a subsequent flight from Miami to Haiti

22:34

or a boat, he's gone. Now

22:37

facing detectives in that little interview

22:39

room, Lewis was about to

22:41

dig a deeper hole for

22:44

himself. Tell

22:46

me about your relationship with your

22:48

girlfriend. You guys happy? Yeah. Your

22:51

relationship is good. I'm okay with her. She's okay

22:53

with you. She's okay

22:55

with me. She's been telling

22:57

me, she's loving me all

23:00

the time. And

23:06

in fact, you know everything

23:08

already. You already know Law enforcement has been

23:10

called to that house before. Right. He

23:13

said that there was no issues. He

23:15

loved Lanell. Lanell loved him. She wasn't

23:17

seeing anybody. Everything was perfect, hunky dory.

23:20

But I noticed that Lewis has a scratch on the side of his

23:22

face. Okay. Got

23:24

a question for you. You got a scratch

23:26

on your face. Where did you get that? This

23:28

one? Yeah, the one where I crushed your cheek. Who scratched

23:30

you? Oh, that was Lanell. Ask me.

23:33

And then he says, well, okay, Lanell did

23:35

scratch me. We did get an argument. But

23:37

even then he downplays, he waters it down.

23:40

He says it was over. Lanell

23:42

got jealous because she saw me on Facebook and thought

23:44

I was communicating with some girl. However,

23:47

detectives heard the scratch was the

23:49

result of an argument because Lewis

23:51

was the jealous one. Now

23:54

they asked him about Ike. Who

23:57

is this guy named Ike? Who is he? Okay,

24:00

Ike? Ike, Ike

24:03

is your friend. Lewis

24:06

said he was unaware of any

24:08

romantic involvement between his girlfriend and

24:10

Ike. So detectives confronted

24:12

him with a piece of evidence they'd found

24:15

on their initial walkthrough of the house, something

24:18

that smelled a lot like a smoking

24:20

gun. It was

24:22

a breakup letter, a dress to Lewis,

24:24

signed, Lanell. A

24:27

letter that to Lewis must

24:29

have been as informative as

24:31

it was insulting. It

24:34

read in part, "'Dear Lewis,

24:36

I am leaving you for Ike. He makes more money.

24:39

So you can do whatever you want to do with the

24:41

house. I am moving out of state with Ike. We're

24:44

getting married, so just leave me alone. I

24:47

have been sleeping with him for four months now. Good

24:49

luck in life. Goodbye,

24:52

Lanell.'" Short and

24:55

sweet. And one

24:57

more thing. Lewis said he'd never seen

25:00

it before. Almost

25:09

half an hour into the interview, they laid

25:12

it out for him. Lewis

25:27

did sound genuinely inconsolable. At

25:30

the same time, evidence against him was

25:32

stacking up. And he

25:35

was subsequently booked for the

25:37

murder of Lanell Barsock. Oh,

25:39

my God! Lewis said, "'I

25:41

am a man, and I

25:44

am a man, and I am a man, and I am a man, and I am

25:46

a man.'" Lewis

25:49

said, "'I am a man, and

25:51

I am a man, and I am a man,' and

25:54

he is a man, and I am a man, and I am a man, and

25:57

I am a man, and I am a man.'" evidence,

26:00

there wasn't any. Lewis

26:02

didn't even own a gun. Detectives

26:05

went back to the crime scene. Inside

26:08

the garage they found a pair of

26:10

bloodied black latex gloves and

26:12

a plastic container with a bloody

26:15

fingerprint. And inside

26:17

Linnell's car. There

26:20

was a pillow in the victim's trunk that

26:23

had a bullet hole and it had

26:25

stippling around the actual bullet hole which

26:27

is unburned gunpowder. Meaning somebody like held

26:29

the pillow over the gun and and

26:31

used that like a silencer like in

26:33

the movies? Exactly. They

26:36

also found this. There's

26:38

a very large area rug that stuffed into the

26:40

back seat of the car. The

26:43

rug had a bloody footprint on it and

26:46

though the bulk of the evidence was concentrated

26:48

in the garage detectives

26:50

theorized the murder had taken place elsewhere

26:52

in the home. Remember

26:55

that void in the family room? We're

26:59

looking at the grudge and then we're looking at

27:01

the void going that looks like that fits over

27:03

there and come to find out it

27:05

fit exactly. They

27:08

performed a luminal test searching for

27:10

blood. What it

27:12

looked like a spotless floor suddenly lit

27:14

up showing a clear

27:16

trail of blood that started in

27:18

the family room. You

27:20

could see where she'd been dragged from

27:23

that spot across the kitchen floor across

27:25

the hallway across the laundry room into

27:27

the garage. Also

27:30

in the family room a single

27:32

empty shell casing. Investigators

27:34

said everything to get tested

27:37

certain it would all lead back

27:39

to Lewis. At

27:41

least they were certain of that before

27:44

they saw this grainy security footage that

27:47

was about to change everything. And

27:50

that's when kind of a bright light goes on.

27:52

The lights start to go on that we're heading

27:54

in the wrong direction. You

28:03

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28:06

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28:08

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28:11

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28:13

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28:15

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28:18

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28:20

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28:22

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28:24

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28:26

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28:29

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28:31

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28:33

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28:35

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28:37

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28:41

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28:46

slash podcast free Louis

29:00

Bonheur was living in County Lockup

29:02

in LA. Accused

29:04

of murdering his girlfriend. His

29:07

best friend Philippe was on a business trip

29:09

when he heard the news. No,

29:12

this isn't true. Not Louis.

29:14

It's not possible. Not

29:16

knowing any of the facts. Yeah, not knowing any of the

29:18

facts. You immediately did not believe it. No, I couldn't see

29:21

that guy hurting a fly. He

29:24

didn't believe it. Others

29:26

did. I thought

29:28

he was likely the person who killed

29:31

her because he had shown that he

29:33

was jealous and probably didn't

29:36

want the relationship to end. Detectives

29:38

were building their case, which meant

29:40

looking at the alibi Louis had

29:42

offered. He said that around

29:44

the time detectives determined LaMel was killed,

29:47

he was more than an hour away in

29:49

LA buying auto parts.

29:53

So detectives went to the auto parts

29:55

store to see their security video and

29:58

they There was Lewis

30:01

Bunner. At

30:04

2.50 p.m., he was at a Craig and

30:06

Auto Parts store. Then

30:09

later at an AutoZone. And

30:12

then back at Craig and. We

30:15

saw those video tapes. That's when that was like a

30:17

ha moment. When I said, well, maybe he's telling the

30:19

truth. The videos made it

30:21

clear. Lewis had not lied about being

30:24

in LA that afternoon, but could

30:26

he have been in communication with an

30:28

accomplice? Detectives really

30:30

wanted to check Lewis's phone. A

30:33

process that requires a warrant and can

30:36

take some time. And

30:38

so Lewis sat in jail for

30:40

days, which became weeks.

30:44

Finally, the cell phone records came through. They

30:46

showed. Lanell called Lewis at 2.30

30:49

p.m. that day. It

30:52

was the last time anyone heard from

30:54

her. By the time her mom called

30:56

her at 4 p.m., Lanell

30:59

was no longer answering her phone. There's

31:02

no way that he was there in Palmdale. At

31:04

the time that Lorraine is telling us that he was at the

31:07

top of the staircase and chased her down. And

31:09

there's no way that he could have committed the

31:11

murder because it's up to 2.30, which

31:13

is the last time we know our victim was alive. He

31:15

was in LA. Which

31:17

meant Lewis Bunner was

31:20

not their murderer. Time

31:23

to let him out. We believe he did

31:25

not do this murder and we need him

31:27

out of jail. More than

31:29

a month after his arrest, Lewis

31:31

was set free. Despite

31:33

that 911 call to his house and

31:36

the stories Lanell told loved ones about

31:38

his bouts of jealousy, Lewis

31:41

said he was not the angry man

31:43

detectives thought he was. Who

31:46

did you think was responsible? I mean, if it

31:48

wasn't you, then who was it? I asked myself

31:50

the same question when I'm in jail. Who's did

31:52

it? I would like to know who. I

31:55

asked myself the same question all the time.

31:57

You couldn't figure it out. I can. I

32:00

didn't see no one in the picture. Now

32:03

detectives went back to square one, starting

32:05

with their first witness, Lynelle's

32:08

friend, Lorraine. She

32:10

says she leaves our victim's house at 1.25 in

32:12

the afternoon, and

32:15

she goes to a park that's 1.3 miles

32:17

away. Lorraine

32:19

said she'd gone to the park

32:21

because Lewis and Lynelle were fighting.

32:24

And this is the middle of June. So it's how

32:27

hot? I would say it's in the 90s or 100. Lorraine

32:31

said she returned to Lynelle's house

32:33

around 6.45 PM. That

32:36

meant she would have been sitting in that

32:38

park, in that desert heat, for

32:41

close to five hours. And

32:44

we asked her, what are you doing at the park? And

32:46

she said that she sat there watching the children play. Another

32:51

strange thing detectives noticed. The

32:54

morning after the murder, Lorraine bumped

32:56

into Lynelle's mom, Bobby, in the hallway

32:59

of the Sheriff's office. Lorraine

33:02

went over and hugged Bobby Barsock. And

33:05

then we had Lorraine escorted

33:08

down the hallway, and Bobby Barsock

33:10

asked us, who is that woman? And you said,

33:12

that's your daughter's best friend. That's your daughter's best

33:14

friend. They've known each other since high school. And

33:16

she said, I've never seen her. There

33:20

was more. The night

33:22

a bloody Lorraine rushed into the Sheriff's

33:24

office, deputies found

33:27

two bullets in her purse. So

33:29

Detective Espino checked the state registry to

33:33

see if Lorraine owned a gun. And

33:35

he found nothing. Now,

33:37

with Louis cleared, they brought Lorraine

33:39

in again and began

33:42

to question the story she'd told. Did

33:45

you kill your friend? I did not kill my

33:47

friend. I had no reason to kill my son. I

33:50

love my friend. About

33:53

a week after that interview, Detective

33:55

Espino once again ran Lorraine's name

33:57

through the same state database. What

42:00

are you going to tell your daughter about Lanell? That

42:02

I named her after an amazing

42:04

woman, a woman who

42:06

believed in helping people, a

42:10

woman who was hardworking,

42:14

and a woman who believed

42:16

in human beings being better

42:19

visions of themselves. And

42:21

I hope my daughter can be that person as

42:24

well. That's

42:29

all for this edition of Dateline.

42:31

And check out our Talking Dateline

42:33

podcast. Josh Mankiewicz and Keith Morrison

42:35

will go behind the scenes of

42:37

tonight's episode, available Wednesday in the

42:39

Dateline feed, wherever you get your

42:41

podcasts. We're off on Fridays for

42:43

a couple of weeks, so NBC

42:45

can bring you coverage of the

42:47

Olympic trials. But we'll see you

42:50

back here on July 5th. I'm

42:53

Lester Holt, for all of us

42:55

at NBC News. Good night. Angie's

43:02

list is now Angie, and we've heard a

43:04

lot of theories about why. I thought it

43:06

was an eco-move. For your words, less paper.

43:09

Oh, it was so you could say

43:11

it faster. No, it's to be more

43:13

iconic. Must be a tech thing. But

43:15

those aren't quite right. It's because now

43:18

you can compare upfront prices, book a

43:20

service instantly, and even get your project

43:22

handled from start to finish. Sounds easy.

43:24

It is, and it makes us so

43:26

much more than just a list. Get

43:28

started at angie.com. That's A-N-G-I. Or download

43:31

the app today. today.