UsernameFatigue

It appears from what I have read, that an investigative producer for Dateline has been following this story since 2008. His name is Dan Slepian, and he is the one filming the interviews with family, and all of the footage of Tom including when he clears his stuff out of Sharon's house, and when Tom is arrested at his mother's house. So I guess that is why it is not the typical Dateline format with one of the hosts. I definitely prefer the host format, but am still finding the episodes fascinating. I think that for the most part the true crime shows these days are pretty respectful of the families when they interview them, And the families seem grateful to have their loved one not be forgotten, and the killer be exposed for the heinous person he/she is. I do though think that not that long ago, some journalists/interviewers were not as sensitive. An old interview we saw recently of Connie Chung asking a boy how he felt about his father possibly getting the death penalty was jaw dropping. I do think all of Dateline interviewers are good, as is Paula Zahn who has been doing her show for ages.

Wow. Just when I think I have seen everything with regards to true crime stories.....I haven't. My first thought in part one was "Why would a hair dresser be attracted to a man with a rat's nest for a hair style"? Then I was wondering about all the footage they were showing from 2008. Did Dateline do a story then, and now is just reshowing it without the interviewer parts? It was interesting to see the cops in 2008, and now. On a purely shallow note, the LV cop was/is gorgeous. He rivals Matt Murphy, and that is a high bar. Part Two? Wow again. It is a bit misleading when they kept referring to four dead wives, when one died a year after she divorced Tom, of cancer. But definitely one wife was murdered, and two died under suspicious circumstances. When Tom was found not guilty of murdering his second wife, but then convicted for trying to have his former friend and witness killed, I turned to my hubby and said that the jury must have felt bad for not convicting him of murder. But then Tom managed to sue the police department and prosecution office, and won. WTH? Another head shaker was why there was no autopsy when his (I think, I have lost count) fifth wife died in hospital after heart surgery. WTF again. My father died in hospital after heart surgery, and you had better believe that there was an autopsy. We were not given a choice, and I am shocked that Tom was. The best part of the whole three hours was Tom being tasered and dragged out into the cold and snow, wearing only his boxers and socks. I enjoyed it so much I rewound it twice. The only satisfying part of the whole three hours so far. I watch Paula Zahn, but don't remember this case. I have no problem with watching another two hours though - I can't imagine covering this story in a standard one hour or even two hour episode.

While it is too bad that the ex was considered the murderer by Susan's friends and family, it is hardly unusual. We have seen cases where families have been sure that the ex is the murderer, and even after the real killer has been found, they still believe that the ex did it. What I didn't understand is how her family won a civil case against the ex? It was known that he sold her car within a day or so of her murder, and was 1,000 miles away from the murder scene. What evidence did they have to convict him? I know it is easier to win a civil case than a criminal one, but still....... The shocker in this case for me was finding out at the end that the killer was one of Susan's best friend's first cousin. Yikes.

I forgot about her claim to have ended a relationship because she wasn't ready for a serious commitment. Which is a pretty odd claim, since she married a ball room dancer named Edson Jeune in 2012. So was Benita just flirting with the truth since she actually did enter into a serious commitment by marrying him, but then changed her mind? One would think an investigative journalist would know that that fact would be pretty easy to find. I hope this show does some damage to her credibility, because I think she is as much of a con artist (though not a deadly one) as Paolo is.

Benita has been peddling her story for awhile now. It was on Investigation Discovery Channel three years ago (as I am just discovering - no pun intended), she has been on Dr. Oz, and the story was on an ABC show called The Con in 2020. She also has continued to work on projects since finding out that she will not be moving to Barcelona. BusyOctober, I was just typing out pretty much the same things that you have said regarding Bonita's wedding dress. WTF X 100. And PsychoKlown, I don't feel played at all. I can't remember the last time I was so amused by a 20/20 show (not by Paolo's victims of course, but Benita). She is as much of a narcissist as he is, she just didn't kill anyone. BTW, apparently Benita was married a second time (I think she only talked about the ex who died). She married a ball room dancer in 2012, and met Paolo in Feb of 2013. So what happened to hubby number two? Seems like they could do another show just on Benita herself, as I think she and Paolo are two peas in a pod.

After reading the above post, I decided to google Bonita as well. For those of us who are true crime fanatics, I was both stunned and amused to read that Bonita worked at Dateline for 16 years, including working on true crime stories. You just can't make this stuff up -lol. I wonder why Dateline isn't covering this story? Benita was definitely more interested in the life style that Paolo offered her, than listening to what one would think would be many voices in her head telling her to investigate him. Sheesh. The guest list/entertainment for the wedding was hilarious. Hubby and I wondered why, once again, she would believe this? Had she ever even spent any time with his friends, let alone (and obviously not) the famous ones? And believing that the pope was going to push his agenda of modernizing the church by marrying two divorced people, one who wasn't even Catholic? I would think even most non Catholics (like myself) would know how ludicrous that was. I find that most 2 hour shows could be one hour, but this episode was way too short. I still want to know who the woman was at his house, and the kids? Was that another woman he was scamming? His actual wife? I would imagine there are other women he has conned over time, but he certainly hit gold with Benita.

I really, really, really disliked Benita. As she talked about how wonderful Paolo was to her when he ex husband was dying/died, I kept thinking WTF? Why aren't you with your daughter comforting her as she loses her father? Again, WTF? Then she proceeds to take several vacations with Paolo, leaving her daughter with relatives. Her daughter who has just lost her father. Sorry Benita, Paolo may have duped your daughter, but you willingly abandoned her for your new rich boyfriend. Some award winning investigative journalist. When they showed the picture of the ring Paolo gave her that he supposedly paid $100,000 for, I turned to hubby and said "Not likely". I don't know of any woman who would have looked at that ring and believed it was worth $10,000, let alone $100,000. The diamonds were tiny. And as someone upthread had said, had she bothered to get it appraised that would have been one of many many red flags. Honestly, hubby and I were laughing at her continued stupidity, which has been pointed out by several already in this thread. I almost had tears in my eyes from laughing when she discovered on her wedding day that Paolo was not in Russia, but in Italy at his home. My husband did a great imitation of Benita saying "I can't believe you lied to me about where you would be today!" Imagine, Paolo lying!! Too funny. Equally funny was that she had no idea that the piano Paolo was playing was a player piano. It was pretty obvious by the picture they showed of the front of it. And her daughter was playing the violin right beside him at times? I can't imagine she didn't notice that the piano was playing itself. I don't think Paolo was even trying to pretend that he was playing (as seen when he was flicking dust off the keys as it played) Bonita was just too dumb to notice. What isn't funny is how he has gotten away with the surgery that killed 7 out of 8 patients he operated on. How in hell was he allowed to get that far, and on so many people? But again, Bonita didn't really have that much to do with exposing him, as when she was supposed to be getting married, within a couple of weeks the institute received a 500 page report of concerns about Paolo. They just chose to ignore it. The guy who wrote to Vanity Fair article did much more digging into Paolo's claims that Bonita ever did. I know love is blind, but it was dumb in this case as well. I have no sympathy for Benita. Other than she looks 20 years older than she did 7 years ago, but that appears to be self inflicted.

Alexis Rose, because I would choose any one of the Rose family to spend time with, above pretty much any other fictional family/person.

I am still wondering what Wade sees in Shannon. Her, and their, OTT reaction to Jared assuming they were married was ridiculous. As was Shannon's reaction to Wade calling her Jill. Personally, if I were Shannon I would have taken it as a compliment. They have not been together long, and Wade was in a situation where he was with his 4 best friends and someone who he was very comfortable with, much like he would have been with Jill when she was alive. Now if that were to happen several months down the road it might be more jarring, but for a new relationship I hardly think it is the big deal that Shannon made it out to be. Shannon and Wade, as they are being written, are not a good fit. Many years ago my now husband and I were in a restaurant waiting to be seated. At that time we were not even dating, just friends as we had been for many years. One of the other people waiting pointed to us and said "Look, newlyweds". I have no idea why that person said that, as we were not even sitting close together, and were just talking waiting for our table. We laughed and said that no, we were just friends. We did not freak out, we thought it was kind of funny. At that point it would be several years before we actually started dating, and several more before we would marry. I often wondered if that person had some kind of psychic ability to see something that we did not, as at the time it happened dating my now husband was not something that had crossed my mind. We lived several hours away from each other and had different goals, different lives. Anyhoo as I said, we were not even dating and didn't take offence, so why Shannon and Wade freaked out is beyond me. The writers seem to have taken the annoying parts of the characters, and written them as caricatures this season. Especially Forrest and Delia. This isn't unusual (I found that in Modern Family, and Life in Pieces to name just a couple) but it usually doesn't happen this soon in a series.

And what was even better than seeing "Rose" again, was that the professor was wearing clothing with flowers on it in the first class, which Rose always wore. Perfect!

Dateline first showed this episode back in March 2020. I didn't re watch the episode, but did look back at the posts regarding it here, which start on page 138. I reread many of the posts, including my own to refresh my memory. I thought he was guilty then, and don't think re watching the episode would change my mind.

I think they said that the methadone was Anna Nicole's, so her son was taking his own medications along with one that was not prescribed to him. I was googling a bit about the court case of Anna Nicole, and then her estate, fighting for years to get some of Marshall's estate. I thought Anna Nicole's estate had received some money, and didn't realize that that decision had been overturned and the case continued for years. I also didn't know that Marshall's son Pierce, who was spearheading the fight against Anna, died several months before AN. Did they mention that in the documentary? He died of an infection that was resistant to antibiotics. His widow then carried on the fight. Also a second son that Marshall cut out of the will also sued along with AN. Can't remember if that was covered as well, I may just have missed that detail. It was interesting to hear Larry say that Stern had stayed in their lives all these years. I wonder if it was because, as the executor of AN's estate, he was hoping to eventually get a windfall? He seems like he would be that type, but Larry seems to appreciate him so hopefully he is there for the right reasons.

I have seen this case before, and figured it was on Dateline and they were just repackaging it as a new episode, as they have done before. But maybe it was on 20/20 or 48 Hours? In any case yes, it was obvious early on that it was the ex wife. I skimmed though the episode, and the only thing that took be a bit by surprise was his mother having a celebration at his grave site, including the small fireworks tribute, because he loved the sound of fireworks. The pop-pop-pop of the fireworks startled me, because that is the last sound her son heard when he was shot to death, as heard on his 911 call.

I hope the prosecution had a better reason to think the guy wasn't sleep walking than that. Sounds like the prosecutor in that case thought that sleep walkers walked like zombies with their arms out in front of them. Sleep walkers often carry out normal tasks, and I can't imagine anything more normal than petting your dog/cat. In fact to me that might point to the fact that he was sleep walking, as you would think that if he wasn't and had just killed his wife, he might be a bit too pre occupied and stressed to worry about petting his dog.

I loved Lori the bartender! The phrase "yes ma'am customer" is priceless. Dennis did say that Lori paid the $36 tab and kept the rest as a tip. And so she should. Wow, those other ladies Lois befriended may have dodged bullets. They didn't resemble her (not that Pam did either) but who knows if Lois was looking for another target and would for example dye her hair a darker colour, etc. to change her look. Thank goodness for the manager of the restaurant recognizing her.

The sleepwalking case reminded me of a case in the Toronto area in the late 80s. A man drove 20 kms from his house to his in laws, killed his mother in law and attempted to kill his father in law. He had no memory of driving to his in laws, and said he had no reason to harm them. He woke up, and drove himself to the police station to turn himself in. He had a history of sleepwalking, and was acquitted of the murder/attempted murder. At the time of his trial in 1989 apparently there were about 35 cases world wide of homicides committed during sleep walking. I am on the fence with this case. I have had a couple of episodes of sleep walking (that I know of) and both times mine were related to carrying out tasks that were a part of a dream. I have no idea how long I was sleep walking for, and only knew that I had because of things that were different/moved when I woke up. I am not sure based on other murders of people supposedly sleepwalking if it is unreasonable to think that he carried out two attacks on his wife, and hid clothes/knife in his car? Definitely a strange case, and one that I do not have a strong feeling about one way or the other.

I think he was/is so head over heals in love with Brauny that he was/is willing to do anything to make her happy. And as we know, abused spouses often think that if they just do whatever the abusing spouse wants, all will be well. He even said on the show a couple of times that her unhappiness was his fault, and he just needed to change to be what she wanted, and then she would be happy. Unfortunately he did not realize that he did not have the right genitalia (to put it bluntly) to make her happy. I also think that Sean really loves his kids (as opposed to narcissist Brauny who only loves herself) and wanted/wants to stay together for them. I don't see that happening though in the long run.

Brauny didn't even want to work inside the home. Which is why she had/has nannies. And I believe housekeepers? Remember, Brauny didn't even know how to do laundry until she was forced to during the Covid lockdown. This is after seven children. Can you imagine how much laundry 9 people, including 7 kids generates? But nope, Brauny was clueless as to how to turn on a washing machine. If Sean is a manipulator, he is really, really bad at it.

Brauny told us from pretty much her first TH in her first season that she told Sean when they met that she had no interest in working. She wanted to be a SAHM and be taken care of. Brauny also told us this season that the reason she had 7 children is so that she would stop drinking for periods of time while she was pregnant/breast feeding. In addition 3 of her pregnancies and 4 of her children were the result of IVF. It isn't like Brauny was super fertile and that resulted in 7 kids. She had to go to some trouble in order to get pregnant the last three times. Sean did not keep Brauny home pregnant so that she could not be independent. Brauny had no interest in being independent. Other than from her children, which is why she had/has multiple nannies. Furthermore, women are quite capable of having children and a career. Even having multiple children and a career. Andrea Canning from Dateline comes to mind. She has given birth to 6 children, all the while having a very successful career. Having children does not prevent one from having a career. Not wanting a career prevents someone from having a career. Certainly someone with Brauny's means. Brauny is Brauny's version of a SAHM - one with multiple nannies so she can actually not be home, but spend her time shopping, getting facials, going for lunch with girlfriends, etc. Why do you think she screeched at the reunion that she didn't want a divorce when Elizabeth said that she had a good divorce lawyer? As Gina said, she will never divorce Sean. He has given her exactly what she wants. Including letting her friend Shari "move" into their house for a time. (Which of course was another lie by Brauny as Shari had her own house). Brauny did say at the end of the regular season that she was starting school to become a counselor. That was at the end of August. No mention of it whatsoever at the reunion, so I would imagine Brauny found out that schooling actually involved some work that could not be foisted off on nannies. She instead she is spending her time vacationing and having fun with her new girlfriend(s). All while Sean continues to foot the bills. Yes, there is a manipulator in their relationship, but it isn't Sean.

I gave a side eye to Elizabeth's 18 wheeler comment, too. I am pretty sure you need a special license to drive one, and did even back when Elizabeth's mom left the cult. Sometimes it seems like Elizabeth adds details to the story - whether out of nervousness or just not thinking before she talks - that makes one question the truthfulness of what she is saying. Maybe it was just a big truck and she blurted out 18 wheeler? I am still undecided on whether I like Elizabeth or not, or believe some/all of what she says, or not. I am glad that Jolie likes Rick, but I do wonder where Michael stands in her life? He often seemed to be the stable parent in Jolie's life, and it is odd that his name is never mentioned any longer. I do remember reading awhile back that Kelly was mad with Michael at times when he would not change custody days with her so she could be with Rick (when he was still living in NYC). I hope Jolie is still seeing Michael, and he is just not mentioned because he does not want to be.

That is why I couldn't figure out the smirk. Doesn't Andy live in NYC?

Also, Andy is the one who spent so little time on the subject of one of his howives offering her drug dealer's number to the child of another of his howives. He is the one who chose to move on rather quickly. I would imagine that Bravo was not anxious to spend too much time on the subject. So once again Brauny pretty much skated on her reprehensible behavior. Maybe Andy and Brauny share a drug dealer? I don't for a minute think that Andy almost fell when he went to get up at the end of the reunion, because he had been sitting for so long. When he smiled/smirked at Kelly when she was talking about the looting and burning of buildings in NYC, he looked stoned. I am always amazed that Andy and Anderson Cooper are such good friends. AC always strikes me as a decent person with morals. Andy, not so much.

Not only did she protect the father of her baby, but she went on to have three more children with a guy that she knew was a murderer. What a POS. She also let Tracey's daughter believe for 30 years that her father killed her mother. Carl was a lousy husband, but maybe had Dawn told the truth years ago, Carolyn could have had a relationship with her father, of some sort. At least the prosecutor admitted how scary it was that they had come so close to putting the wrong man on trial for Tracey's murder. Yes, he was an abusive husband, but I am still shocked that they thought they had enough to convict Carl, when they really had nothing tying him to the murder. If it was not for the fact that the prosecutor noticed the report where Dawn had said years ago that Carl had choked Tracey, Dawn would never have come forward and told the truth.

It was ridiculous to think that there would be numerous discussions, including with the girls, leading up to Shannon spending the night, but she would not pack night clothes to wear. A nightgown and robe for the morning, or even sweats if she did not want to make the girls uncomfortable with a robe, etc. And why would Shannon and Wade not think that one of the girls might be in the kitchen, and let Wade go down to make the coffee? Dumb.

You are far too kind, CHITCHAT. I have yet to find something about Brauny that isn't terrible. She duped Sean into marrying her and siring seven children, all the while not filling him in on the fact that she is not the least bit attracted to him. She kept this little gem from him for 25 years. Brauny claimed that she had 7 children so that for at least periods of time she would stop drinking. Nice way to let your kids know that is the reason they exist. Brauny bragged that she has had numerous nannies to look after her children. Even after she became sober and claimed to now be able to look after her kids, she left the majority of the childcare to nannies. She brushed off spousal abuse, and has her husband convinced that it is his fault. : She berated her anxiety ridden daughter for not listening to Brauny's problems, and basically told Rowan to just get over her anxiety. She offered drugs/drug dealer number to a 14 year old. Who knows what she has done in front of her children, if she will do that to a cast member's daughter. That is just off the top of my head. Brauny has no business telling any other housewife what to do with their lives. She is by far the worst howife I have ever watched, and that's a pretty high bar to clear. Brauny has done it with space to spare.