Mountain of Lies

Summary

Podcast Summary: 20/20 – Mountain of Lies Host: ABC News
Release Date: March 1, 2025

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Introduction and Background

In the gripping episode titled Mountain of Lies, ABC News’ 20/20 delves deep into the tragic and mysterious deaths of two women—Tony Henthorne and Harold Henthorn’s first wife, Lynn—revealing a sinister pattern behind seemingly accidental deaths. The podcast intertwines investigative reporting with personal narratives, uncovering layers of deception, control, and calculated motives.

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The Tragic Incident in Rocky Mountain National Park

The episode opens with the harrowing account of Tony Henthorne’s fatal fall from a mountaintop in Rocky Mountain National Park.

• David Muir introduces the incident:
  “[00:21] Park rangers recovering the body of a woman who fell to her death while hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park.”

• Detective questions Harold Henthorn:
  “[00:26] Detective: Did you realize at that point that your mother was dead?”

• The initial reports describe Tony’s fall as an accident, yet inconsistencies begin to surface.

Notable Quote:
Haley Bertolet (Tony’s daughter) reflects on the aftermath:
“They told me, you need some assistance doing some CPR. [00:40] We anybody normal is okay after the passing of their mom. And I certainly wasn't.”

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Investigation of Tony's Death

As investigators delve into Tony's death, discrepancies in Harold’s account raise suspicions.

• David Muir recounts Harold’s distressing call:
  “[02:26] David Muir: I filed it as undetermined. Homicide cannot be entirely excluded.”

• Detective highlights the significance of Tony’s camera:
  “[09:00] Detective: There were small things that didn't totally add up... and there's a shoe that was there, an untied boot.”

Notable Quote:
Detective:
“There was a shoe that was there, an untied boot. Usually in the course of a fall, shoes tend not to untie themselves.” [09:17]

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Discovery of Harold's Past and First Wife

The investigation takes a deeper turn when similarities between Tony’s death and the mysterious demise of Harold’s first wife, Lynn, emerge.

• Detective connects the two cases:
  “[24:13] Deborah Roberts: Most people didn't know that Harold was married before, but I thought, oh my gosh, you know, this is two wives for Harold that have died.”

• Haley Bertolet provides emotional insights:
  “[22:42] Haley Bertolet: We thought there was plenty of money.”

Notable Quote:
Deborah Roberts:
“We couldn't find any concrete evidence of his work. There was no online presence... he didn't have a job, that he had been lying, and that he would probably lose custody of Haley.” [23:34]

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The Pattern and Motive

Investigators uncover a disturbing pattern of Harold benefiting financially from his wives’ deaths through life insurance policies and other means.

• David Muir explains the financial manipulations:
  “[46:40] Deborah Roberts: When we looked at Lynn's death, we found there was $600,000 that he received. But then we saw over time that Harold had taken out several policies also on Tony.”

• Mark discusses the motive:
  “[67:00] Deborah Roberts: These checks that Tony would get for oil and gas, Harold would deposit them.”

Notable Quote:
Deborah Roberts:
“Our theory is that Tony was starting to pull away from her, and if Tony were to ever leave him, it would all come out financially... That was the motivating factor to kill the money.” [67:29]

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The Trial and Conviction

After mounting evidence, Harold is brought to trial where the prosecution presents a compelling case based on circumstantial evidence and the established pattern of behavior.

• Mark describes the trial strategy:
  “[71:33] Park Ranger: To tie Lynn's death to Tony's death, we needed to show that they were similar in a variety of ways.”

• Deborah Roberts emphasizes key evidence:
  “[73:03] Deborah Roberts: We showed the autopsy photos of Tony because he never mentions she's got a massive head wound and that she's bleeding out profusely.”

Notable Quote:
Park Ranger:
“The planning and premeditation points towards intent, which points towards first degree homicide.” [70:49]

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Aftermath and Haley’s Story

The conviction of Harold Henthorn brings some closure, but the emotional toll on his daughter, Haley Bertolet, is profound. She shares her journey of healing and forgiveness.

• Haley Bertolet speaks candidly:
  “[77:55] Haley Bertolet: Maybe. But ultimately no. Because I know that I'm saved by Jesus Christ and that my personality comes from my mom.”

• David Muir highlights Haley’s resilience:
  “[78:18] David Muir: She is a mirror image of her mama.”

Notable Quote:
Haley Bertolet:
“I do dye my hair blonde. But I think that me and her and pictures that I see of me now, you know, I feel like I look so much like her... So she can lead the life that Tony wants her to have.” [77:44]

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Conclusion

Mountain of Lies culminates in Harold Henthorn’s life sentence without parole, ensuring he can no longer exert control or harm others. The episode underscores the importance of vigilance and the relentless pursuit of truth in the face of deception.

• Deborah Roberts reflects on justice:
  “[76:54] Deborah Roberts: I believe that putting Harold in a position where he cannot control anything is great punishment for Harold. He robbed Haley of a mother.”

• Haley Bertolet offers a message of hope:
  “[79:03] Haley Bertolet: Because if she doesn't forgive him, he still controls her in her heart... I want to use my story to good.”

Notable Quote:
Detective:
“It was a big nothing [1995 case closed quickly]. Harold, he's smiling at his friends and he enough of a narcissist that it's all about him.” [73:21]

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Key Takeaways

• Pattern of Control and Financial Gain: Harold Henthorn meticulously orchestrated the deaths of his wives to benefit financially through life insurance and other means.

• Circumstantial Evidence: The case against Harold relied heavily on circumstantial evidence, including inconsistencies in his testimonies, financial irregularities, and the pattern of his behavior.

• Impact on the Victims' Daughter: Haley Bertolet’s story highlights the long-term emotional and psychological effects of living under a controlling and abusive parent.

• Justice Served: Despite the challenges of proving a case with predominantly circumstantial evidence, Harold was convicted, providing closure for the victims' families.

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Final Thoughts

Mountain of Lies is a testament to the complexities of uncovering hidden truths and the resilience of those seeking justice. Through meticulous investigation and unwavering determination, the episode sheds light on the dark undercurrents of manipulation and control that led to tragic outcomes.

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Listening Recommendation:
For those fascinated by true crime mysteries, psychological manipulation, and the pursuit of justice, Mountain of Lies offers a comprehensive and emotionally charged narrative that is both enlightening and thought-provoking.

Transcript

[David Muir]

Tonight, a mother's tragic fall from a mountaintop. But is that the only accident in the family?

[Deborah Roberts]

For the first time, her daughter is speaking out about a childhood filled with mystery. Only on 2020.

[Mark]

I told Harold I'm sorry, but she's gone.

[David Muir]

Park rangers recovering the body of a woman who fell to her death while hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park.

[Detective]

Did you realize at that point that your mother was dead?

[Haley Bertolet]

We anybody normal is okay after the passing of their mom. And I certainly wasn't.

[Deborah Roberts]

Tony's camera was destroyed, but the SD card was still intact. These are the last moments of Toni Henthorne's life.

[Detective]

How important were these pictures in piecing together your investigation?

[Deborah Roberts]

There's a photo of Tony and Harold sitting where I'm standing.

[David Muir]

She kind of tumbled down the rock face.

[Detective]

When you saw the autopsy report, what did you think?

[Deborah Roberts]

I was taken aback by the size of her head wound. That's when I felt like something's not right here.

[David Muir]

I filed it as undetermined. Homicide cannot be entirely excluded.

[Haley Bertolet]

Oh my gosh.

[Deborah Roberts]

Hello again.

[David Muir]

Hello, Missiley.

[Detective]

You've never told your story before.

[Haley Bertolet]

I haven't.

[Detective]

Let's start at the very beginning.

[David Muir]

We love you.

[Haley Bertolet]

We love you. I remember my mom. She was amazing. She was so intelligent and so wise and eloquent.

[Detective]

Do you remember your parents anniversary that day that they went on that surprise trip?

[Haley Bertolet]

I definitely knew that something was wrong. Everyone was acting so weird to me and I didn't know what was happening.

[Detective]

Were you scared?

[Haley Bertolet]

Absolutely.

[Harold Henthorn]

Hello, my name is Harold. He's in the Rocky Mountain National Park.

[David Muir]

Okay.

[Deborah Roberts]

My wife has fallen for a rock.

[David Muir]

On the north summit of deer melting.

[Haley Bertolet]

When she's in really critical condition.

[David Muir]

Every year on their anniversary, Harold would plan a trip with Tony. Typically a phone would ring. Hey Lee, this is Harold. Tony and I are going to go on this little honeymoon trip. Could you take care of Haley for the weekend? Sure.

[Mark]

They were about to have their 12th anniversary. He was going to surprise her. She was just going to be overwhelmed. She was going to love it.

[Detective]

The Henthorns live just outside of Denver. Tony is an ophthalmologist and Harold is a fundraiser. After dropping their seven year old daughter Haylei at a neighbor's house, they leave for a weekend at Rocky Mountain National Park. I ended up texting Dr. Henthorn just to say congratulations. Have a great weekend. Be safe. Have a great time. See you Monday. And I never heard back from her.

[Harold Henthorn]

I need an out prime Mountain rescue team immediately.

[Mark]

I already have rangers getting ready to come up there.

[Park Ranger]

We got the call about 6 o'clock.

[Mark]

Of an accident on Deer Ridge Mountain. My primary concern was finding where the patient was quickly.

[Park Ranger]

I'd only been hiking 30 minutes when.

[Mark]

I heard radio traffic.

[Deborah Roberts]

They tell me, you need some assistance doing some cpr.

[Mark]

What have you been doing so far?

[Harold Henthorn]

Good compressions.

[Mark]

Hanthorn was performing cpr. It made me realize that this was probably not gonna have a good ending. As I got closer, I started blowing my whistle. And Henthorn also had a whistle and he respond. As I approached, she was laying on her back and her head was wrapped.

[Park Ranger]

It was obvious she had a head wound.

[Mark]

Her eyes were partially open. And I evaluated her for a pulse and respirations. I told Harold, I'm sorry, but she's gone.

[Detective]

How did you find out something happened to your sister?

[David Muir]

There was a series of text messages saying Toni had been involved in an accident. And then things were critical. The first call we got from Barry, he said that Tony had an accident and she was in serious condition and it didn't look good. Of course, we prayed that God would intervene and save Tony. And then he called back and said that she was gone. Three horrible words.

[Detective]

What was Toni like growing up?

[David Muir]

She was very athletic and she really excelled. And she was very, very smart, at the top of her class. Toni always wanted to be a medical doctor. She felt like ophthalmology would basically allow her to do what she loved and give her some downtime and some family time.

[Harold Henthorn]

She was married pretty young, someone she'd met in medical school. He was a dentist.

[David Muir]

But ultimately it ended up in a divorce. And to have a failed marriage and have that disappointment, I don't think she ever really accepted that. I think that she went through a period where she had to recollect herself. She did pour herself into her medical practice.

[Detective]

She also began spending a lot of time at her church. She especially loved singing in the choir.

[Harold Henthorn]

The clock, unfortunately, was ticking for her. The divorce had set her back, and she wasn't meeting the kind of people she apparently wanted to meet in Mississippi.

[Mark]

I was pretty shocked one day when Tony and I were having a conversation and she just outright said, I met a guy online, this guy named Harold.

[Deborah Roberts]

When he was wooing her online, some of the things that they talked about was that they both wanted children. It's a Christian dating site, so they were both Christian.

[Detective]

Harold raises money specifically for nonprofits.

[Harold Henthorn]

And if you've just met him, you already know that he has made himself a fortune doing this.

[Detective]

I'm curious what you guys thought of Harold when you first met him.

[David Muir]

When you first meet Harold, you are very impressed. He does come across as polite. He's cordial. He's very engaging.

[Grace Rachel]

He always had a plan. Very much a person in control.

[Mark]

They got engaged in February and got married in September. They didn't see each other but six or seven times during that whole period.

[David Muir]

And there's the ground. Here we go. One, two. Right here.

[Deborah Roberts]

Bingo.

[Park Ranger]

All right.

[David Muir]

All right, Catfish.

[Grace Rachel]

The wedding day for Tony and Harold was just beautiful.

[Detective]

Tony was just stunning.

[David Muir]

Mr. And Mrs. Harold came for him.

[Harold Henthorn]

So Harold and Tony, two years after they get married, are leaving Mississippi.

[Grace Rachel]

It's so pretty, isn't it?

[Harold Henthorn]

Apparently, he always wanted to go to Colorado. He always wanted to bring Tony there.

[Detective]

And so she sells her practice in Mississippi, and they move to a suburb just outside Denver called Highlands Ranch.

[Mark]

They wanted children right away. Both of them did. She was in her mid-40s when she got pregnant with Haley. So she got her dream.

[Haley Bertolet]

That's right.

[Deborah Roberts]

We will.

[Mark]

We promise.

[Harold Henthorn]

From the outside looking in, Tony and Harold's marriage looked ideal. It certainly looks like the perfect life.

[David Muir]

We love you.

[Haley Bertolet]

We love you.

[David Muir]

Park rangers recovering the body of a woman who fell to her death while hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park. Authorities say that victim was from Littleton. She was in her 50s. She'd been hiking in the area with a family member. Now we have a fatality investigation we have to conduct, and the first thing we want to do is document the scene.

[Detective]

There's a tree that on one side, the branches had been kind of knocked.

[Deborah Roberts]

Off or broken off.

[Mark]

I called the impact tree.

[Detective]

You can see that was a place.

[Deborah Roberts]

Where I imagine Toni probably impacted as she fell to the ground.

[Detective]

There were small things that didn't totally add up. There's an obscure area, not a place where I would expect your average hiker to just happen across because it was just so steep. I noticed there's a shoe that was there, an untied boot. Usually in the course of a fall, shoes tend not to untie themselves.

[Deborah Roberts]

And there was a really key piece of evidence. Tony's camera was destroyed, but the SD card was still intact. We were able to look at the photos, and these pictures are very important to us because these are the last moments of Tony Henthorne's life.

[Detective]

What was supposed to be a romantic anniversary hike has turned deadly. Toni Henthorne's husband Harold, says she accidentally slipped and fell to her death off a 160 foot cliff in Rocky Mountain National Park. That puts this case in the jurisdiction of the Federal Park Service. And they launch an investigation into exactly what happened up on that mountain.

[Deborah Roberts]

Ranger Faradian made arrangements to go to Harold Henthorne's house and interview him. Because there's still a lot of questions we need to ask.

[Mark]

One of the things I had brought with me was a memory card from Tony's camera. And I showed him some of the pictures off the camera, and he acted upset. He said, that's my wife, Mark. That's my wife. As he looked at pictures of Tony.

[Detective]

You guys were able to get pictures from Tony's camera and Harold's cell phone. How important were these pictures in piecing together your investigation?

[Deborah Roberts]

The pictures were extremely important to the investigation in terms of building a footprint of what they did that day. So this is them in front of the Stanley, which is a big hotel in Estes park, the night before. The next morning, they had breakfast, and then they went and picked up some sandwiches. But you can see Toni's in the car. She's got her lipstick on. She's looking happy. This photo is them at what we've dubbed the lunch spot. We know that they had lunch there. It's a very key spot to the investigation. What Harold had told Mark was they hiked up till the trail plateaued. They wanted to get off the trail for some privacy. When we recreated their steps. There's no trail where Tony and Harold had lunch. It's not cleared in any way, and it's pretty difficult hiking. We were actually able to determine that this is indeed where they did have lunch. It's a very distinct rock feature with a very distinct dead tree in the photos. And there's a photo of Tony and Harold sitting right where I'm standing. The lunch spot is a very beautiful spot, and there's really no reason to go any further. However they go further, we know that this is the spot that they stopped because there are several photos of Harold Henthorn standing right on that ledge with this death grip on this tree because it's a sheer drop on the other side of him. Fifteen minutes later, there's another picture of him. Identical, but he's wearing a blue denim shirt.

[Detective]

This strikes investigators as odd. Why would Harold stand at the edge of such a dangerous cliff and then do it again 15 minutes later?

[Deborah Roberts]

This photo, you're actually looking up from where her body was recovered. This is 160ft. This is where Tony fell.

[David Muir]

She had what we call multiple blunt force injuries. She kind of tumbled down the rock. She had abrasions of her forehead, and she had a large laceration or tearing injury to the top of her head to the scalp.

[Detective]

When you saw the autopsy report, what did you think?

[Deborah Roberts]

I was taken aback by the size of her head wound. She probably would have bled out very quickly.

[Mark]

Okay, what's your main injury?

[Deborah Roberts]

Concussion. Never once did Harold mention in any of the 911 calls that she was bleeding.

[Detective]

And a curious discovery. As rangers go through Harold Henthorn's vehicle, they find a map with markings on it.

[Deborah Roberts]

What's interesting on this map is there's an X and it says hike.

[Detective]

Yeah, you can see it. It's in that gray right there.

[Deborah Roberts]

That's almost exactly where her body was found, where that X was. There's a lot of things here that don't add up when you look at.

[Detective]

These pictures, particularly because they're 15 minutes apart. What stands out to you about that?

[Deborah Roberts]

Our theory was that he was trying to lure her to stand where he is, that he's saying, look, honey, this is safe. You can stand here. One of the things that was very suspicious was Harold's story that they stopped at this cliff ledge and that he received a text message from his nanny saying that his daughter had just won a soccer game. And that out of the corner of his eyes, he looked up and Tony was gone. Very specific moment in time. And we realized that, well, that text message came in at the same time that he called 911.

[Haley Bertolet]

Hi, my momma te address. Emergency.

[Harold Henthorn]

Hello, My name is Harold Hithworth.

[Deborah Roberts]

He told Mark it took him about 45 minutes to get down to the bottom of the cliff where Tony's body was. And then he called 911. We know when he called 911 and when that text message came in, and those don't match up to his story. He then subsequently starts making more phone calls. He calls very bitterly. Tony Henthorn's brother, he is a surgeon.

[Detective]

He's sending you the doctor vital signs.

[David Muir]

Initially, he told me that her heart rate was good and her respiration rate was somewhat low and that she was not conscious.

[Deborah Roberts]

Harold never says she's got a massive head wound. Never says that she's bleeding out. None of that. Just that she fell and is unconscious.

[Mark]

Do you know how she performs in New York?

[Deborah Roberts]

I do.

[David Muir]

I do. Harold said he did CPR from the whole time that the 911 call came in to when the park service got there.

[Deborah Roberts]

In the autopsy photos, her lipstick was intact. I've personally done cpr, and it's extremely messy, and you don't end up with intact lipstick like Tony did. So Harold's texting with Barry While he's allegedly helping his wife, while he's telling people that Tony has fallen from a cliff, he ended up receiving and sending over 90 texts that night.

[David Muir]

I guess it was about 10:00 at night, we got a text from Harold. Tony's been hurt. She's critical. Please pray. There was one more text that followed, and it said, my bride is gone. Just was inconceivable. We just couldn't. We just couldn't believe it.

[Detective]

At what point did you find out that your sister had passed?

[David Muir]

It was probably about 10:30 central time that night.

[Detective]

Who told you? Was it Harold or the rangers?

[David Muir]

Actually, Harold, he had texted.

[Haley Bertolet]

He texted a lot of people the same text.

[Deborah Roberts]

My pride is gone.

[Detective]

Almost immediately, family and friends begin to notice Harold behaving in a way they think is strange.

[Deborah Roberts]

And I thought, wow, he just seemed kind of together for having gone through.

[Detective]

What he went through.

[Deborah Roberts]

No tears, no sign that he had been crying, no, you know, struggling with his voice to get the words out. This is not a normal grieving husband. That's when I felt like something's not right here.

[David Muir]

Harold called me and asked me to officiate the memorial service. He had this service entirely planned. He'd already put together a video montage of Tony.

[Harold Henthorn]

Somehow in the 36 hours since he was in this cold, dark place next to his dead wife, he's put this together.

[David Muir]

It felt like to me that he had been planning this for a while.

[Harold Henthorn]

In the hours and days after Tony's death, everyone's watching Harold, and he is, for the most part, showing no signs of what you would expect. How can I not put your antenna up?

[David Muir]

We arrive in Denver, and the whole time, he never saw him cry. He never said, you know, I loved your sister, you know, never heard any of that kind of thing out of him.

[Harold Henthorn]

Tony's funeral is the ultimate chance for Harold to kind of control the narrative. And what Harold chooses to do that moment is pretty telling. Everybody notices the berdelays, especially where everyone's sitting in the funeral. They're brought in, they're seated away from the rest of the family. Harold is one of the last people escorted in.

[David Muir]

We had to literally line up in order in order to walk back in for Tony's funeral.

[Deborah Roberts]

It's like we were sequestered, you know, and we could only come out when we were told to come out.

[David Muir]

You know, I'm all the way positioned at the back because everything was planned out just like Harold always does. He had already had a slideshow ready and prepared.

[Harold Henthorn]

Everyone experiences some Feeling of deep discomfort that this isn't right. And that extends to the slideshow, too, because one of the first people Harold contacted the day after Tony died is the photographer to create the slideshow for her funeral. And she's expecting some loose collection of photos over the years, and that's not what she gets. What she gets are 70 carefully selected photos. Somehow, in the 36 hours since he was in this cold, dark place next to his dead wife, he's put this together.

[David Muir]

And I'm thinking to myself, now, if Paula died, I'd be over here in a little puddle of mush. He has all this ready to go, and he's proud of it. The odd thing is that Tony was the one that died. But Harold's got most of the photos in there of him.

[Detective]

What do you mean?

[David Muir]

There would be pictures of him and Haley, or him, Tony and Haley, but not all of them were even about Tony.

[Deborah Roberts]

Tony's life started when she got married to Harold. And I thought, how insulting and hurtful to Tony's family. We talked to other people who were at the service, and he didn't say any nice things about Tony, that he was more angry that there was an investigation. And in fact, at one point, he said to somebody, toni had to go and get herself killed on federal lands.

[Detective]

Soon after the funeral, Harold hires an attorney who puts a stop to any more interviews. So investigators turn to friends and family to get more information. And some aren't buying Harold's story about this being an accident.

[Deborah Roberts]

I talked to the Bertolet several times. They maintained contact with Harold to keep an eye on Haley. He wanted to make sure Hayley was okay. But they also were giving me updates on Harold, and they felt that that was a way that they could help in the investigation.

[David Muir]

We were taking notes.

[Detective]

How can you keep being around him and not just explode?

[David Muir]

I thought that I was helping by doing that. We were making, on our part to get justice. He had established a wall there. And so for us to continue to see Haley, we had to see him. And so it was like a price of admission. The real jewel was Hailey.

[Deborah Roberts]

We talked to the nannies. One of the nannies told us that Harold and Tony didn't sleep together, that they had separate areas where they slept. He had an office in his basement. But occasionally he would also go on business trips. And he would go on these trips, but he wouldn't have luggage. And then he would just kind of show up the next day. And the nanny was wondering if Harold was having an affair. He seemed to have a Secret life. So, all right, let's find out what we can about his business.

[Harold Henthorn]

Now, the address for the business was in his basement. But if you talk to him, he would say, I've got 10 to 12 managers reporting to me daily. I've got 90 employees working all over the country.

[Haley Bertolet]

We thought there was plenty of money.

[Detective]

He always portrayed himself as a wealthy person. And we were getting word that they were needing money. It wasn't just Harold who seemed to be doing well financially. Toni's family had money of their own. Money she had access to. I do remember that Mr. And Ms. Berdelet were confused why the money seemed to be missing.

[David Muir]

My parents are buying the house, they're buying the car. They're paying for the tuition. That doesn't make sense.

[Detective]

And as investigators start to dig deeper, they make a series of head scratching discoveries.

[Deborah Roberts]

We couldn't find any concrete evidence of his work. There was no online presence. And almost everybody has an online presence of some sort if they have a business. Especially if you're a fundraiser. On his business cards, Harold had CFR certified fundraiser and there is actually an agency that issues that certification. So I contacted that agency and they indicated, no, we have no idea who he is and no, he's not a certified fundraiser. Oh my gosh, he doesn't even have a business.

[Detective]

But that's nothing compared to what they're about to learn. Anonymous tips start pouring in, raising questions about Harold's past.

[Deborah Roberts]

Most people didn't know that Harold was married before, but I thought, oh my gosh, you know, this is two wives for Harold that have died. Now the similarities are too eerie to ignore. Oh, sheet.

[Mark]

Honey, chill.

[Grace Rachel]

It's just laundry.

[Deborah Roberts]

Not that I'm talking about these arm.

[Detective]

And hammer power sheets.

[Haley Bertolet]

All the power of arm and hammer.

[Deborah Roberts]

Laundry detergent in a convenient impossible sheet. Oh, sheet.

[Harold Henthorn]

That's what I'm saying.

[Deborah Roberts]

And arm and hammer power sheets deliver.

[Grace Rachel]

An effective clean at a great price.

[Deborah Roberts]

Think of all the laundry we'll do.

[David Muir]

And all the money we'll save.

[Detective]

Oh, sheet.

[Deborah Roberts]

Arm and hammer.

[Mark]

More power to you.

[David Muir]

Now streaming on Hulu. It's a serial killer case.

[Detective]

He's the downmen you've never heard of.

[Deborah Roberts]

I definitely felt the presence of evil.

[David Muir]

But did he act alone? Now, finally, not many people live to tell about their involvement with the serial killer. The one man who helped break the case.

[Park Ranger]

Never before a face to face interview with the camera.

[Deborah Roberts]

Why now?

[Park Ranger]

Let me ask you, what do you think?

[David Muir]

Am I the evil culprit? The accomplice? I'd like to know how the audience views me. The Fox Hollow Murders, Playground of a serial killer. Now streaming on Hulu.

[Deborah Roberts]

Most people didn't know that Harold was married before and that his first wife had died. Her name was Lynn Henthorn.

[Harold Henthorn]

What Harold tells most people is Lynn died in a car accident. And most people aren't going to press.

[Deborah Roberts]

But I thought, oh, my gosh, you know, this is two wives for Harold that have died. Now, because we had some suspicions that Tony's death was not as Harold was making it sound, I made the phone call to the Larimer County Sheriff's Office. I did do it anonymously. And other people had done the same thing.

[Harold Henthorn]

The coroner in charge of Tony's autopsy, an investigative reporter at a TV station in Denver, the FBI, National Park Service were on the receiving end of what ended up being 17 anonymous letters.

[Deborah Roberts]

The consistent theme was Harold's first wife died in similar unusual circumstances. You gotta look into it. Remote locations, odd places. Why were they there in the first place? Harold was not injured in any way in either of these incidents, but his spouse was killed.

[David Muir]

Getting these types of anonymous calls and anonymous letters is unusual. That hasn't happened to me before. I've done about 8,000 cases now. It took me three months to get enough of the investigative details together that I felt comfortable filing the death certificate and I filed it as undetermined. Homicide cannot be entirely excluded. I've never written that kind of a comment before.

[Detective]

What did you learn about Lynn?

[Deborah Roberts]

Very religious. She and Harold married fairly young. Never had any kids. He really wanted a child with Lynn. We also learned that he was very controlling of his relationship with Lynn.

[Detective]

Was the control a red flag for you?

[Deborah Roberts]

Absolutely, because he drove the relationship.

[David Muir]

My first impressions of Harold was he was an outgoing, gregarious salesman type.

[Deborah Roberts]

And I'm being a salesman myself at that time, I was fine with that energy.

[Grace Rachel]

Harold is bigger than life.

[Haley Bertolet]

He smiles all the time.

[Grace Rachel]

He laughs all the time. So when I first met him, I thought, gosh, this is a great guy.

[Deborah Roberts]

When we were moving quickly towards Lynn's and Harold's wedding, it was clear that.

[Grace Rachel]

Harold was in charge.

[David Muir]

So Lynn and Harold got married. But then almost immediately, Harold was saying, we need to move to Colorado. So he takes her away.

[Grace Rachel]

I called Lynn one day and I said, can we talk?

[Deborah Roberts]

You know, this was a good time for me.

[Grace Rachel]

And she said, no, no, no.

[Haley Bertolet]

Can.

[Deborah Roberts]

Can you call back later when Harold's here?

[Grace Rachel]

And she said, as a couple, we've.

[Deborah Roberts]

Decided that whenever we talk to family.

[Grace Rachel]

We want to both be on the.

[Deborah Roberts]

Phone at the same time. Well, and I remember thinking again, that's so weird.

[Grace Rachel]

That's so controlling.

[Detective]

Lynn's sister in law, Grace Rachel also sensed something was off.

[Grace Rachel]

She confided in me and she said, grace, I don't know what to do. Like, we're having some marital issues, but he doesn't want me to talk to anyone. He would consider that disloyal. And she didn't know where to go, like, what to do.

[Detective]

While family members may have quietly had concerns about Harold and Lynn's relationship, her death is ruled an accident. And it stays that way for years until a local coroner in Colorado takes a second look at the night Lynn died and finds similarities between Lynn's death and Tony's.

[Mark]

Harold claims that he was driving the.

[Detective]

Road and the right front tire seemed.

[Deborah Roberts]

Spongy, so he pulled over to change the tire. There's two types of jacks involved in this incident. One is a regular car jack. The other jack was a boat jack, which is basically a tube with another telescoping tube that comes out of it and not safe for a car. His story is that this car jack, this more stable one, didn't work. So he used a boat jack to jack up the car.

[Detective]

So then he said he had taken the lug nuts off of the wheel, and he said that Lynn had a.

[Grace Rachel]

Cloth in her hand and he handed.

[Detective]

Her the lug nuts.

[Deborah Roberts]

He pulled the tire off. His version was that Lynn must have dropped the lug nuts and gone to crawl under the car to get the lug nuts, because there were lug nuts in the photos of the scene. There were lug nuts under the car.

[Detective]

And then he said he went to.

[Mark]

The back of the jeep and he tossed the tire into the back of the jeep.

[Deborah Roberts]

And that when he did that, it dislodged the jeep and he heard a scream. And he said he ran to the front of the vehicle and he could see that the vehicle had dropped and.

[Mark]

Was laying on his wife.

[Detective]

As the Coroner reviews the 1995 death of Lynn Henthorn, Beth Schott decides to double down and enlist Dave Weaver, an investigator with the Douglas. Douglas county sheriff's office, to also take a second look.

[David Muir]

I was given the Lynn Henthorn case to reinvestigate. In January of 2013. I discovered in the documentation one of the first witnesses on scene. But I called her up and I said, can you think of any reason why a detective from Douglas county would want to call you and talk to you? And her response to me was, that, lady, I still have nightmares about that.

[Detective]

The woman on the phone, Patricia Montoya, in detail. Montoya remembers that late Evening Drive in 1995 like it happened yesterday.

[Grace Rachel]

There's a man standing in the middle of the road with a flasher. We pulled over, and he told us that there was an accident, that they had a flap and his wife got.

[Deborah Roberts]

Stuck under the car.

[Grace Rachel]

We could see, you know, some legs, you know, coming out from the bottom of the car. We all got out of the truck, and we got her out of the car from underneath the car, and we were gently turning her over because she was on her stomach. We're doing a cpr, and her husband came over, and he started screaming at us, don't touch her. Leave her alone. You could hear the sirens coming. And that's when the guys started asking him, well, how did she get underneath that car? And when he heard the sirens coming, the look on his face was like in a panic, More of a panic instead of gladness, you know, that there's help coming for my wife. It was creepier than ever. There's no way that that was an accident.

[Detective]

Could the Jeep have fallen off the jack accidentally?

[Deborah Roberts]

Let's try this. Now.

[Detective]

A recreation puts Harold's version of events to the test.

[Deborah Roberts]

Nothing. So let me put a little pressure. This nothing.

[David Muir]

You can't replicate it the way he says it happened.

[Deborah Roberts]

Oh, we were trying to pull in elements of Lynn's death into our case.

[Harold Henthorn]

Laura Thomas is the coroner in Douglas county, and she has a lot of questions about Lynn's death, so much so that she hires someone to reconstruct the accident that took Lynn.

[David Muir]

Accident reconstruction is sort of like putting a jigsaw puzzle together. You take the pieces of information and factual information and try to put them together to see if they fit. Where was the vehicle positioned? What's the terrain look like? You look at the gravel surface that this Jeep was parked on.

[Deborah Roberts]

When Dave Weaver was assigned to the case, he opened it up as a possible homicide, and he was looking at it as. Is that even physically possible for someone to crawl under a car, to get lug nuts, and then have this jack collapse?

[David Muir]

We're going to replicate with this exemplar vehicle the layout of all the physical evidence that includes the lug nuts, the positioning of the bottle jacks, and then hopefully also replicate the vehicle's movement off of the bottle jacks. Yeah. There you go.

[Deborah Roberts]

Is that about right?

[David Muir]

Yeah.

[Detective]

Going by Harold's story, they try to recreate what he says happened that night.

[David Muir]

So one of the versions that Harold gave Lynn's here Six feet away from the Jeep. He takes the tire, he walks to the back, puts the tire in the back. Whatever he did caused the Jeep to fall off the jack. But look at the time interval from the time he picks up the flat tire, goes roughly 12ft to the back corner to put the tire in. She moves closer to the vehicle, then drops the lug nuts, allegedly, and then gets down on her stomach and crawls up underneath. So, I mean, that timing just doesn't make sense because it would take more time, I believe, for her to do all of those activities than it would for him to come around and put the tire in the back of the Jeep.

[Deborah Roberts]

No logical person would crawl under a rotor.

[David Muir]

The other inconsistency is both the medical people as well as the coroner's office. When they did the autopsy, there was nothing in her fingernails. There was nothing on her hands indicating that she was struggling.

[Deborah Roberts]

If I was Harold, who allegedly had a bad back, you wouldn't just pick the tire up and throw it in. But that's what he said he did, right? So I'm gonna pick the tire up, which is pretty heavy, and I'm gonna throw it in. Okay. Didn't do anything. Didn't knock it off. Realistically, if you were gonna put a tire in a jacked up car, you probably wouldn't throw it in. You probably nothing. So let me put a little pressure this way. Nothing.

[Detective]

If it wasn't the tire being placed or thrown into the vehicle that caused the Jeep to fall off the jack. What or who did?

[Deborah Roberts]

Let's try this now.

[David Muir]

Lowering the bottle J.

[Deborah Roberts]

Oh.

[David Muir]

That'S it. That's it.

[Deborah Roberts]

That makes a lot more sense. That's something Harold could control.

[David Muir]

You can't replicate it the way he says it happened.

[Deborah Roberts]

Our conclusion is Harold could have actually released that bottle jack and it could have lowered directly on onto her. Very rapidly. Releasing it down is the most controlled.

[Detective]

Harold Henthorn's attorney says the simulation doesn't prove anything.

[Deborah Roberts]

We're not proving that Harold killed Lynn, but we wanted to introduce Lynn Henthorn's death into our case of Tony's. As a precursor to killing Tony.

[Detective]

Harold Henthorn maintains that he did not kill either of his wives.

[David Muir]

When Laura Thomas got our report and finished her investigation, she changed the official cause of death from accidental to indeterminate on the death certificate and reissued that.

[Detective]

The official change on the death certificate doesn't change anything for Harold. He simply continues on with his life. He's not charged in Lynn's death, and the case is eventually Closed.

[Mark]

What was really important to me was.

[Detective]

For Lynn's family to know that the.

[Mark]

Death certificate had been changed so they.

[Detective]

Would know that Lynn was still remembered and that she wasn't forgotten. In fact, even after Lynn's death, Harold Henthorn stays close to her family, especially Lynn's sister in law, Grace Rachel.

[Grace Rachel]

I felt like my relationship with Harold got closer.

[Deborah Roberts]

I had gotten cell records and one of the individuals that kept popping up in the cell record was Grace Rochelle. Harold and Grace texted and called each other all the time before Tony died. And we had to ask the question, was Grace his paramour? Is this why he killed tonight?

[Detective]

And Harold's daughter says his need to be in control continues.

[Haley Bertolet]

That moment was horrible. And right after, he didn't want me to cry about it. He told me not to cry. He told me that people would be watching.

[Deborah Roberts]

I thought, oh, my gosh, this is. Two wives for Harold that have died now has some really eerie similarities.

[Park Ranger]

One is under a car in the middle of the night. And then Tony was on the edge of a dangerous cliff.

[Grace Rachel]

The last thing that Tony ever had going through her mind was him pushing her off.

[Detective]

Do you think he targeted Tony from the very beginning?

[David Muir]

Absolutely. Tony's next.

[Harold Henthorn]

Yeah.

[Mark]

OK. He had the person that he could control 1,000% above any wife or anyone else in his life, and that was his daughter.

[Detective]

So at this point, are you worried about Haley's safety?

[Mark]

The last thing I wanted was him going home to his child.

[Haley Bertolet]

I thought there must have been some mistake because he would never do that. Right.

[Grace Rachel]

I definitely felt that I could have been the third victim. I'm like, oh, my gosh.

[Park Ranger]

I believe that the closer you are to Harold, the more likely that he's going to harm or kill you.

[Deborah Roberts]

Within days of Tony dying, the park received a letter about Harold's first wife, Lynn Henthorn.

[Detective]

Harold's first wife, Lynn, died when she was crushed under a car during a roadside tire change. Authorities deemed it an accident. But when his son, second wife Tony falls to her death in Rocky Mountain national park, investigators aren't convinced that fall is just another random accident.

[Deborah Roberts]

A man having one wife die is tragic. A man having two wives die is suspicious. So we started questioning. Did he have a mistress? Did he have another family somewhere?

[Mark]

I seriously thought that there may be somebody else involved in this.

[Deborah Roberts]

At that point, I had gotten cell records and one of the individuals that kept popping up in the cell record was Grace Rachel. So Grace Rachel was Harold's former sister in law, Lynn Rachell, his first wife's brother's. Ex wife.

[Harold Henthorn]

Harold's relationship with Grace Richell and her four daughters starts off as totally understandable, with Harold being a more doting uncle and brother in law than just about anybody you'd ever meet.

[Deborah Roberts]

But Harold and Grace texted and called each other all the time. We had to ask the question, was Grace Harold's lover? Is this why he killed Tony?

[Grace Rachel]

They were very suspicious of me. And I'm like, I am an open book and I will tell you everything I know. I was not romantically involved with Harold. In December of 2007, my husband Kevin and I separated. So that was hard. That was difficult. We went through bankruptcy, foreclosure. I was devastated. I did not want my marriage to end. I had no savings, no nothing at that point. And I thought of my girls.

[Haley Bertolet]

Harold, Saul, I believe an exact way to fit in and bond with four girls, which was the fun. Goofy uncle.

[Grace Rachel]

Harold really began to step it up. He's giving me all this mentoring, budget advice, and he says, tony and I really, we just want to help you.

[Deborah Roberts]

Grace sat with us for five hours and talked with us. We pretty quickly determined that she was not Harold's paramour. Grace was concerned about her children's financial future. And Harold said, I tell you what, why don't you get in an insurance policy and we'll make the girls a beneficiary.

[Grace Rachel]

At first, the insurance policy seemed like a gracious gift that I could accept because it was for my girls. Yeah, there's that one. This is one of the things he would do is like, you know, the fun uncle.

[Haley Bertolet]

There's an odd sense of, like, we were the family that maybe Harold always wanted. There's another Christmas one where he just looks like. Like it's just always looks like our dad.

[Grace Rachel]

So in About March of 2010, the divorce was final. And I'm gonna move to Texas. And Carol and I got into basically a big fight about it. And Harold was trying to get us to come to Colorado. He gets really mad at me. He came back at me with, after all I've spent investing in you, and you're not grateful. I saw him as being very controlling at a whole new level. So I called his broker and I said, I am not going through with this policy. No way. I'm done.

[Deborah Roberts]

And then we dropped the bomb on her that Harold never canceled this policy. The policy had Harold Henthorn as the primary beneficiary. Her daughters weren't mentioned at all. And the policy was $400,000.

[Grace Rachel]

I said, that can't be possible. I told him to cancel it. That was done. She said, it's paid through till august of this year. I was just shocked. I definitely felt that I could have been the third victim. I'm like, oh, my gosh, what have I done? How have I not seen through this guy?

[Detective]

According to investigators, it isn't just grace rachelle's insurance that is set up to benefit harold. You actually found a pattern of this.

[Deborah Roberts]

Correct. When we looked at lynn's death, we found there was $600,000 that he received. But then we saw over time that harold had taken out several policies also on tony that nobody seemed to know about. The year that they're married, he takes out a $1.5 million policy on Tony. Then he takes out another $1.5 million policy in 2005, takes out yet another $1.5 million. So we're seeing this pattern of building up her net worth, so to speak. If she were to die at the.

[Detective]

Time she died, how much was she worth dead?

[Deborah Roberts]

She was worth dead $4.7 million.

[Detective]

This pattern with the insurance Isn't the only one that stands out to investigators. It looks to them like harold set his sights On a very specific type of woman to marry.

[Deborah Roberts]

Both women were described as extremely loving christian women, Successful, strong women, but at the same time, very controlled by harold.

[Harold Henthorn]

One of the things that toni's personal experience with christianity taught her Was that women are to look to their husbands as the authority in a marriage. That control is exactly what harold was after.

[Detective]

Do you think he targeted tony from the very beginning?

[David Muir]

Absolutely. I think that he was preying on and utilizing christian ideals to manipulate people.

[Deborah Roberts]

After toni moved to colorado, Harold started controlling her communication with the family.

[David Muir]

When I would call out there, he would answer the phone.

[Detective]

Did you see a change in your sister?

[David Muir]

When she moves to colorado, she's in the shadow, and she's now a different person. She's a trained person. She's almost like a beaten dog.

[Mark]

We started seeing things being taken from her One painful step at a time. She dropped out of her choir that she loved. She quit teaching Sunday school. He had asked her to give that up because it was taking away from their marriage.

[David Muir]

Tony's next. Yeah, okay.

[Deborah Roberts]

Merry christmas.

[Haley Bertolet]

If any of I flew in last.

[David Muir]

Evening from denver, colorado, I later found out from the neighbors, they said her face was empty. She didn't smile. It was kind of like a blank stare.

[Deborah Roberts]

Tony's mother said this wasn't the first time Something bad happened to tony.

[Harold Henthorn]

It looked like a freak accident.

[Detective]

Is it possible that harold henthorn had tried but failed to kill Tony before.

[Deborah Roberts]

The Henthorns a cabin up at Grand Lake. They had been up at the cabin and it was late at night.

[Harold Henthorn]

Nobody else is around. Haley's already asleep. And Harold, for whatever reason, wants to clean up outside almost in the middle of the night.

[Deborah Roberts]

It's a small one story cabin with a fairly sizable deck that goes to a sloping area. There's a broken light. Harold was outside on the deck and he called Tony to come help him.

[David Muir]

And she was bending over to pick it up.

[Harold Henthorn]

And what happens next, nobody really knows for sure.

[David Muir]

Something hits her in the back of the neck.

[Deborah Roberts]

Her story to the medic is that there was a broken light, and she was picking up the broken light bulb when her husband threw a piece of wood over the deck.

[Harold Henthorn]

It looks like a freak accident.

[David Muir]

We found out later that, you know, Tony's actually crying in the ambulance on the way over. And she said, what really happened to.

[Deborah Roberts]

Me, the final outcome was that she. She suffered damage to her cervical spine.

[Mark]

I really believe that was his first attempt at murder.

[Harold Henthorn]

There's no police report, right? There's no crime.

[Deborah Roberts]

As an investigator, you're looking at this, you're like, what else is he capable of? And that's what we really needed to dive into. So we needed to do a presentation to the United States attorney's office to see who we could get assigned to the case. And it was at that time that we got assigned Sunita and Valeria. And I said, look, you guys need to come up to Rocky Mountain national park and see the scene. So we hike up Deer Mountain and then we start going off trail.

[Mark]

And.

[Deborah Roberts]

They'Re like, wait a minute.

[Mark]

We just turned off at nowhere. There was no indication that there was a spot to turn off.

[Deborah Roberts]

His story that he told the rangers is they went off to have some romantic time.

[Mark]

There's just no way. We knew Tony Henthorn had bad knees. It just didn't make sense.

[Deborah Roberts]

And then we wander through the woods, and then we get to the lunch spot, and they had the aha moment. They looked down that rocky slope and they said, there's no reason for Harold and Tony to be here.

[Mark]

And as soon as Sunita and I saw the site, we were totally on board with them and said, okay, we're in 100%. What are we going to do to prove this case now?

[Deborah Roberts]

And so we realized we were going to have to do a search warrant for his house.

[Mark]

What Harold was, was a pack rat. And so every single piece of paper from the last 20 years was in.

[Deborah Roberts]

There, the boat, the cabin. How much is in this account? That account. There were tax returns which were very interesting to us.

[David Muir]

A fundraising consultant.

[Mark]

I worked with nonprofits, whether it be.

[David Muir]

Churches, schools, or hospitals.

[Harold Henthorn]

Over the course of 20 years, not only has he not set the world on fire in the suburb of Las Vegas as well, but Harold made almost nothing for two decades, almost zero dollars.

[Deborah Roberts]

He had posed for almost 20 years as somebody he's not and worked really hard at it.

[Mark]

I reached out to Special Agent Johnny Grusing of the FBI and asked him if he would jump in and assist and work with Beth.

[Park Ranger]

If Harold truly killed not only Tony, but his first wife, Lynn, and we had him still running around in society, we needed to act quickly.

[Deborah Roberts]

What'd you see? Friends and family told us that once Tony had Haley, it was almost like Tony was a third wheel in that family.

[Mark]

He had the person that he could control 1000% above any wife or anyone else in his life, and that was his daughter. So we all felt like we were dealing with a ticking time bomb.

[Deborah Roberts]

So then we had some really eerie similarities. The information that we did piece together from his childhood was little bits and pieces from friends that did speak with us.

[Grace Rachel]

My name is Myra Whitener, and I went to junior high school, high school with Harold. We remained friends throughout our whole lives, for all of us, honestly. He was obnoxious, but you just kind of overlook that because he was so charming, too.

[Harold Henthorn]

Casting around for ideas of why Harold is who he is. I think it all comes down to his dad. He was an alcoholic. He was violent. It was bad.

[Grace Rachel]

That's one thing Harold always said. I will never drink and I will never hit a woman, he said, which is why it's shocking. Harold always wanted to have a family. He wanted to be a family man.

[Park Ranger]

If you're going to be a good predator, if you're going to be a good wolf in sheep's clothing, you have to look like a sheep. Harold had to condition himself to show emotion.

[Harold Henthorn]

And he's all about presentation. He needed everybody to know how smart and how powerful and how rich he was.

[Grace Rachel]

He has lied to me about. About everything.

[Mark]

He lied so much that he forgot who he lied to.

[Park Ranger]

I think Harold is different than most psychopaths because he's not someone who's going to hurt a stranger. He's fine to strangers, but I believe that the closer you are to Harold, the more likelihood that he's going to harm or kill you.

[Detective]

So at this point, are you worried about Haley's safety?

[Park Ranger]

Yeah, we were very concerned About Haley. He wasn't treating her like a dad should treat his daughter. He was controlling her in a very unhealthy way.

[Detective]

But it's Haley who is in control now, and she's talking exclusively to 2020.

[Haley Bertolet]

My name is Hayley Bertolet. I'm ready now to tell the story that happened behind the scenes.

[Detective]

Hailey Burleigh was just seven years old when her mother Tony, died. You've never told your story before?

[Haley Bertolet]

I haven't.

[Detective]

She sat down with me to tell her story for the first time.

[David Muir]

We love you.

[Haley Bertolet]

We love you. I remember my mom. She was amazing. She was so intelligent and so wise and eloquent. You know, we always watched, like movies together and we played together. And I remember her taking me on trips sometimes. And I just. I remember her always being a warm and loving presence in my life. I just really, really loved her.

[Detective]

When you think about what your house was like when you were little, growing up, do you have any memories of what the interactions between your mother and your biological father were like?

[Haley Bertolet]

Yes. All of the memories that I have of me and my mom together with Harold were. I was always with him and she was separate. He was always holding me and she was standing there. The only times that I really got to experience my mom in her full capacity was when he was away. All she ever wanted was a baby. And when she finally got me, she just was ecstatic. And I think he wanted to squeeze her into a box.

[Deborah Roberts]

I see.

[Haley Bertolet]

Not really. Let her be. Be the mother that she wanted to be for me.

[Detective]

Do you remember your parents anniversary that day that they went on that surprise trip?

[Haley Bertolet]

I was at a soccer game and I remember I was picked up by his friends and we went to their house. And I definitely knew that something was wrong. Everyone was acting so weird to me and I didn't know what was happening. And after a while, they took me to a park where I met up with Harold. He sat me down and he told me that she had lost consciousness forever is how he put it to me. And I just remember that moment. It was horrible. And right after. He didn't want me to cry about it. He told me not to cry. He told me that people would be watching.

[Detective]

He told you not to cry?

[Haley Bertolet]

He told me not to cry about it, yes. As we walked out of the park, he wanted me to be fine. I remember feeling shameful that like I wasn't supposed to cry. Like something must be wrong with me if I do cry, because Harold told me not to.

[Detective]

Did you realize at that point that your Mother was dead?

[Haley Bertolet]

Yes. But for some reason, I thought she was coming back. Because of the way he phrased it. Unconscious, you know, in my mind, I thought that she might just be out there somewhere, and maybe they hadn't found her yet. And I'd pray at night that she would come back.

[Detective]

What was the point that you realized that she was gone?

[Haley Bertolet]

We had one funeral in Colorado and one in Mississippi. And that time was the time that I really felt like, you know, oh, man, she's really gone.

[Detective]

I know he told you you shouldn't cry, but were there moments that you cried?

[Haley Bertolet]

I mean, when I usually was alone, when he wasn't there. It was just a lot. And I didn't understand that it was okay to be emotional and it was okay to show that you're not okay. I mean, I don't think anybody normal is okay after the passing of their mom, and I certainly wasn't.

[Detective]

Did he ever talk about your mom after all of this happened?

[Haley Bertolet]

He never talked to me about her passing after that one conversation in the park. We never spoke about her in the.

[Detective]

Days, in the months after. What was it like in your house, just you and Harold.

[Haley Bertolet]

He definitely wanted to keep me acting normal. Like everything that we were up to was just as life was before. Except now my mom wasn't there.

[Detective]

I just want to show you this picture. Do you remember this?

[Haley Bertolet]

I don't remember taking this, but it looks like this was right after the funeral.

[Detective]

It's interesting to look at. For me, just kind of like looking at your hands. You look like you're clenching your fists.

[Haley Bertolet]

Yeah. I mean, that definitely could be some of the subconscious tension, you know, he's.

[Detective]

Holding you in this picture. Do you feel like he ever used you as, like, a prop?

[Haley Bertolet]

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely, yes.

[Detective]

How often did he actually hold you like this?

[Haley Bertolet]

Not ever. When we were alone. I can't remember a time that he ever hugged me if it was not in public.

[Detective]

Really?

[Haley Bertolet]

Yeah. Looking at that picture, I can't imagine that that wasn't staged.

[Detective]

Did you feel like Harold was controlling you?

[Haley Bertolet]

Not in the moment. I mean, I thought that was normal. I thought that's what all parents did for their kids. And I couldn't get, like, food or snacks or water for myself without, like, asking for permission. I couldn't play with my toys without asking for permission. He had to be there when I was playing with my toys.

[Detective]

You couldn't get, like, food or whatever?

[Haley Bertolet]

No, I couldn't leave my room, and he had a baby monitor in my room watching me. And so he Would know if I came downstairs to get anything before he said it was allowable. When he did allow me to socialize with other girls my age, it was always in a very strict setting where he could watch. I never spent probably an hour without him during my daytime, if it was a Saturday or a Sunday.

[Detective]

Were you scared of Harold?

[Haley Bertolet]

Absolutely. And I thought that was normal to be scared of your parents too.

[Deborah Roberts]

We were concerned that his relationship with Haley was almost to a point of obsession.

[Mark]

We thought, really, he's a danger.

[David Muir]

We were literally on bated breath. What's he gonna do with her?

[Deborah Roberts]

So Harold knew that we were investigating him and he had told people that he had a bag packed for when he got arrested.

[Detective]

Two years after Tony died, federal authorities finally have enough evidence to arrest Harold for her murder.

[Mark]

We needed to indict him pretty quickly. Harold was starting to move money, Hundreds of thousands of dollars. So that elevated our concern. We thought, really, he's a danger. This man has killed supposedly two wives and the last thing we wanted was him going home to his child.

[Detective]

By now, The Berlace say 9 year old Haley is being isolated from the rest of her family and she's completely under Harold's control.

[Park Ranger]

Our primary concern when we arrested Harold was that he was going to create some sort of hostage or dangerous situation with Haley if he knew his freedom was at risk. So we had FBI agents watch his routine from when he woke up to when he took her to the church, school, and then when he went back home. So when we got the warrant, we knew exactly what he was gonna do.

[Detective]

So you really did think she was in danger.

[Park Ranger]

Yeah, we did.

[David Muir]

A highlands ranch man already being investigated.

[Harold Henthorn]

For murdering his first wife.

[Park Ranger]

Arrested today, accused of murdering his second wife.

[Deborah Roberts]

Two years after her death, her husband.

[David Muir]

Harold, is in federal custody charged with first degree murder.

[Haley Bertolet]

The day that he got arrested, I was at school, and I remember that I got called down to the principal's office. At that point, my principal and the lady that worked in the office told me that my father had been arrested. I just remember feeling just so cold and detached because. Because I didn't know what was going on and I didn't know what was happening to me. And at this point, I thought there must have been some mistake because he would never do that. Right.

[Detective]

At a bond hearing the following week, A judge denies Harold bail, Declaring him a substantial flight risk.

[Haley Bertolet]

I stayed with a lovely family called the headaches. And they helped me to see that he was not the person that I thought he was.

[Detective]

According to the indictment, Harold willfully deliberately, maliciously killed his wife, Toni. Harold pleads not guilty.

[Haley Bertolet]

Little did I know that in the background, people were fighting for me from all over. From Mississippi, my family, the bertolets, were fighting for me. Beth schott, special agent, was fighting for me.

[Detective]

The thing both family and investigators are most worried about, A not guilty verdict would put Haley back in the hands of a man they are certain is a cold blooded killer.

[Park Ranger]

My superiors were wondering if we should strike some sort of deal with Harold ahead of time just because everybody's primary concern was haley.

[Detective]

With Haley's safety weighing on them, prosecutors begin building their case against Harold.

[Mark]

Harold turns out to be a not very nice person. That doesn't mean you murdered your wife.

[Harold Henthorn]

Toni was set to inherit a lot of money. She was set for life. She knew it, they knew it, and certainly Harold knew it.

[Mark]

Tony henthorne got regular royalty checks from her family because they're in the oil industry.

[Deborah Roberts]

These checks that Tony would get for oil and gas, Harold would deposit them. And at one point, Tony's father found out that all of the oil and gas checks went into Harold's account. And he confronted Tony with it. He's like, why don't you have your own account? Why don't you separate your finances from Harold? And that spurred Toni to open up her own bank account, and she actually took the next checks and she deposited them. Harold was not on that account.

[Mark]

I thought to myself, she is. She's about to leave him.

[Deborah Roberts]

Our theory is that Tony was starting to pull away from her, and if Tony were to ever leave him, it would all come out financially, that he didn't have a job, that he had been lying, and that he would probably lose custody of Haley. And we think that that would have been absolutely unacceptable for Harold, and we think that was the motivating factor to kill the money. The money and control motives started solidifying pretty quickly.

[Detective]

But prosecutors know they need more than motive. They have to be able to convince 12 jurors that Toni's death was no accident, that her fall was carefully planned and executed.

[Deborah Roberts]

I had a big pile of cell tower information as well as call information, and I gave that pile to Johnny. I said, try to figure out where held was going on these business trips.

[Park Ranger]

I think he had laid a trap for Tony, and he was committed now to carrying that through.

[Detective]

He'd found a spot.

[Park Ranger]

He'd found a spot.

[Harold Henthorn]

Hello.

[Deborah Roberts]

My name is harold hitler.

[David Muir]

I'm in the rocky mountains park. Okay.

[Haley Bertolet]

My wife has fallen from a rock.

[Detective]

Bethshot discovered a mountain of cell tower data Linked to Harold's cell phone.

[Mark]

So when you're using your cell phone, it is paying off the local tower. So we can find where your phone has been on given dates and times.

[Park Ranger]

Once I saw him using that tower, I'm like that. Planning goes back over a month and a half before her death. Everything else made sense from this because how Harold knew the location when he called 911, how he had geo coordinates, how he would know he even had cell service there, how he knew that there was a cliff there.

[Mark]

It started once Harold figured out toni had opened up her own bank account.

[Park Ranger]

On September 9th. He spent from 10:30am to almost 9:00pm in the park. 11 hours up there. I think this is when he found his spot. On the way back is when he started calling Tony's eye clinic. He started arranging everything for this anniversary trip. After this trip, after this trip, he wanted an isolated spot where nobody would be there to save Tony. And then here's where he starts making the calls. To set everything in motion.

[Deborah Roberts]

We had to strategize on what circumstantial evidence would be key to our investigation.

[Detective]

Why is it that circumstantial evidence is so tricky for jurors?

[Deborah Roberts]

Well, people want direct evidence, right? They want to see that it's an absolute. In a homicide case, it's even harder to show a jury circumstantial evidence and have them come to the conclusion of homicide.

[Park Ranger]

The planning that Harold put into this, you're not going to have a smoking gun. But that planning and premeditation points towards intent, which points towards first degree homicide.

[Harold Henthorn]

Harold hires an attorney named Craig Truman.

[Mark]

He's a very well respected criminal defense attorney in town who has decades of experience. I think Harold's lawyer strategy is to figure out what our case is and where he can poke holes in it. One of the things that we did legally was to make a decision that we were going to try and use the 1990 death of Lynn henthorn in the case. And in our case, it was to show that this was not an accident.

[Park Ranger]

To tie Lynn's death to Tony's death, we needed to show that they were similar in a variety of ways. Harold had a lot to gain financially because of the insurance money. One is under a car in the middle of the night. Tony was under in the middle of the night when the beam fell on her head. And then Tony was on the edge of a dangerous cliff.

[David Muir]

We went to the pre trial very concerned that the evidence was not going to be allowed in.

[Mark]

We were not proving that Lynn was murdered. They could only use it for the limited purpose, to show that it was not likely that Tony's death was an accident. Based on the similarities of Lynn's death.

[Deborah Roberts]

The judge agreed that yes, Lynn's death and the beam incident, the similarities are too strong to be ignored.

[David Muir]

We expect opening statements today in the trial against a Highlands ranchman accused of pushing his wife off of a cliff in Rocky Mountain National Park.

[Detective]

Three years after Tony died. Harold Henthorn now sits in front of a jury of his peers who will decide based on the evidence, did she fall or did he push her off that cliff?

[Deborah Roberts]

You know, this is it. There's no go backs.

[Mark]

We knew we needed to start strong.

[Deborah Roberts]

We showed the autopsy photos of Tony because he never mentions she's got a massive head wound and that she's bleeding out profusely. And so we wanted to ensure that the jury understood that there's no way he could mistake the injuries.

[Mark]

So Harold's lawyer recognized that you couldn't explain away all of Henthorne's quirks. He sort of embraced him and said, sure, he might be quirky, but that doesn't make him a murderer. Truman's strategy in general was to try to make Lynn's death seem very innocent. Law enforcement close the case within a week. So this is a big nothing. He kept saying, no need to look at this again. This poor man has lost two wives. How heartbreaking could that be? Harold, he's smiling at his friends and he enough of a narcissist that it's all about him. Because we couldn't bring the jury to the scene, we instead brought the scene to them.

[Park Ranger]

What I think had a big impact on the jurors was having about two or three park rangers talk them through how difficult it was to get up there and then how dangerous it was to be there.

[Deborah Roberts]

We're looking at the jurors faces and they had the aha moment.

[Detective]

So prosecutors rest their case. Now it's the defense's turn to argue for Harold's innocence.

[Deborah Roberts]

Craig Truman didn't bring in any witnesses. He just cross examined.

[Mark]

The prosecution gets two closes. I did the first close and Valerie did what's called the rebuttal.

[Grace Rachel]

I will never forget Sunita saying this is the man that is supposed to guard and protect his wife. And the last thing that Tony ever had going through her mind was him pushing her off.

[Detective]

In closing arguments, defense attorney Craig Truman says the government has not met their burden. They have not proven that Tony was murdered.

[Mark]

Truman really hammered home that you can't Tell the difference between a fall from a push. So after closing arguments, the case goes to the jury.

[David Muir]

I felt like we made the case.

[Deborah Roberts]

But there's still a lot of anticipation.

[David Muir]

A lot of, oh, my gosh, I don't know.

[Mark]

You sit down and you think, I hope we did it. It's a lot tougher than you think to get a jury to agree.

[Deborah Roberts]

And developing right now. The fate of Harold Henthorn is now in the hands of the Jul.

[Mark]

You're always nervous about what 12 people are thinking. You just don't know. The judge reads the verdict. In the matter of the United States versus Harold Henthorn, we the jury find the defendant guilty. There was like audible whoops of joy that came out of the courtroom.

[Grace Rachel]

I was just so, so happy.

[David Muir]

Just elation.

[Deborah Roberts]

All of this is to get justice for Tony, justice for Haley. And it's a really, really satisfying.

[Park Ranger]

The sentence was life in prison without the possibility of parole.

[Detective]

Harold Henthorn was not charged in connection with Lynn's death. The Douglas County Sheriff's office says that case is considered closed.

[Deborah Roberts]

I believe that putting Harold in a position where he cannot control anything is great punishment for Harold. He robbed Haley of a mother. The city is cold. We love you.

[Haley Bertolet]

We love you. That day was a really good day because I knew that I'd be going to live with my aunt, uncle, My.

[David Muir]

Brother and sister in law adopted Hailey.

[Haley Bertolet]

At that point. I felt like they were my family and that I belonged with them. In Mississippi, when Hailey came to us, she was almost afraid to do anything without permission. So it took her a while to figure that out. But it didn't take her long at all to, I think, attach, you know.

[Deborah Roberts]

I think she was hungry for a loving parent.

[Detective]

Have you spoken to Harold at all?

[Haley Bertolet]

Nope, not at all. And I don't regret that decision.

[Detective]

Were you worried yourself at any point that maybe there's a part of him that's in me?

[Haley Bertolet]

Maybe. But ultimately no. Because I know that I'm saved by Jesus Christ and that my personality comes from my mom. I'm just like her. And I know that no part of him is in me.

[David Muir]

She is a mirror image of her mama.

[Haley Bertolet]

I do dye my hair blonde. But I think that me and her and pictures that I see of me now, you know, I feel like I look so much like her. And I think that choosing every day to forgive Harold for what he did, not for his sake, but for mine, so that I know that I'm freed from him, from his control, that I'm my own person and that I'm grounded to do whatever I want to outside of his control.

[Detective]

It's so crazy to hear you say those words. Do you forgive him?

[Haley Bertolet]

I do. Yeah.

[David Muir]

Haley gives herself the gift of forgiveness and so she can lead the life that Tony wants her to have.

[Haley Bertolet]

Because if she doesn't forgive him, he.

[Grace Rachel]

Still controls her in her heart.

[Detective]

Is there ever things that you wish you could say to your mom?

[Haley Bertolet]

All the time. But I think that she is here with me. Being who I am is not something that came from easiness. You know, I had to go through something terrible to become as powerful as I am today. I want to use my story to good. Because I know that my story is similar to what happens to a lot of people. And I want them to know that regardless of what they've been through, there's always a way out of the darkness in everything that I am. Everything that I do, I want to do for the glory of God and for the legacy of my mom.

[David Muir]

For the most amazing, resilient young woman. Haley is now a sophomore in college.

[Detective]

She's actually majoring in nuclear engineering.

[Deborah Roberts]

Quite impressive, David. As for Harold Henthorne, he's now exhausted all of his appeals.

[Mark]

Thanks so much for watching tonight.

[Deborah Roberts]

I'm Deborah Roberts.

[David Muir]

I'm David Muir. From all of us here at 2020 and ABC News, good night.