Talking Dateline: Secrets Unmasked

Summary

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Dateline NBC: Talking Dateline – Secrets Unmasked (June 24, 2026)

Host: Andrea Canning
Guests: Keith Morrison, Tim Eulinger (Producer)
Main Theme:
A deep-dive discussion into the Dateline episode "Secrets Unmasked," unraveling the decades-long mystery of Regina Hicks's murder in small-town Ohio. The hosts and producer explore the emotional, investigative, and sometimes bizarre twists in the case, including the challenges of cold-case storytelling, a surreal arson plot, and the consequences for all involved—including a reluctant witness who broke his silence after 25 years.

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Episode Overview

• Purpose:
  To dissect the most recent Dateline episode featuring the murder of Regina Hicks, offering behind-the-scenes insights, personal perspectives, and audience Q&A.
• Central Mystery:
  Regina Hicks disappeared in Willard, Ohio, while en route to pick up her son from her estranged husband, Paul. Days later, her car was found submerged; her body was in the passenger seat. The episode follows the investigation, a strange arson scheme involving masks and burner phones, and the eventual resolution—marked by a key witness's cooperation decades later.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Setting: Small-Town America

• Significance of Small Towns
  • Crime in small towns is both shocking and magnetic, as tight-knit communities are deeply affected.
  • Quote: “If you look at all the famous crime novels, most of them occur in small towns... It’s a little place where this sort of crime doesn’t normally occur. You expect it to happen in a big, scary city and not in a sweet, bucolic little place... That’s why we’re really interested in it.”
    — Keith Morrison [03:13]
• Personal Impact:
  • Andrea shares how a murder near where she grew up in Blue Mountain, Canada, offered new insight into community trauma.
    [04:03]
  • “...when the verdict came in, guilty, she could feel it in her toes.” – Regina’s cousin’s emotional response highlighted [05:38]

2. Portraying the Victim: Regina’s Story

• Humanizing Cold Cases
  • Hosts discuss the difficulty in telling stories with limited photos or video, relying on family accounts.
  • Quote: “The thing that makes me glad we tell the stories... you get to know the person at the heart of it, which is generally the victim.”
    — Keith Morrison [06:26]
• Family Determination
  • Regina’s mother kept the case alive with billboards, a public show of resolve that ultimately fueled the investigation.
  • Quote: “It cannot be overstated how important it is for families in a cold case to keep at it, to keep pushing. And it helps the police too.”
    — Keith Morrison [10:55]

3. The Investigation: Puzzles and Roadblocks

• Initial Mystery
  • Regina’s car found in a pond, body in the passenger seat, death ruled as drowning with “manner of death pending.”
  • Quote: “How do you figure that? ...How do you figure that this is anything other than a homicide?”
    — Andrea Canning [08:24]
  • The coroner was cautious, changing the official cause to homicide only years later. [09:36]
• Delayed Justice:
  • Movement in the case was bittersweet as the victim’s mother didn’t live to see homicide officially recognized. [10:04]

4. Bizarre Twists: The Arson Plot

• The Mask Scheme
  • A plot involving lifelike masks, phone spoofing, and a staged arson, described as "the weirdest darn thing."
  • Quote: “You have a plan where you’re going to use your current girlfriend to wear your ex-girlfriend's face to burn down your house.”
    — Andrea Canning [14:30]
  • Company selling these masks is no longer in business. [14:24]
• Investigative Breakthroughs
  • Fire investigator Zach McCune pieced together the arson, spoof cards, and false leads.
  • Quote: “In all the things he’s done in his career ever, he’s never seen anything like this.”
    — Tim Eulinger [15:13]
• Perpetrator Profile
  • Paul, the estranged husband, described as a manipulative leader with a circle of loyal followers (“minions”), often recruiting vulnerable or impressionable people to do his bidding.
  • Quote: “He would always pick up a kind of a satellite. Somebody who was enthralled with him, who would do whatever he wanted them to do, who would be afraid of them, but wanting to attach to them at the same time.”
    — Keith Morrison [16:26]

5. Witnesses, Allies, and Enablers

• Steve Gates – The Witness
  • Steve, Paul’s former friend, broke a 25-year silence to testify, ultimately helping to convict Paul.
  • Quote: [To Keith Morrison]
    “I was young and just... I was stupid. I was a young, stupid kid.”
    — Steve Gates [23:21]
  • Steve describes living in fear of Paul’s circle, only recently feeling safe and free.
    [22:03 – 23:02]
• Community Reaction to Steve
  • Regina’s family had mixed feelings: grateful for justice, but resentful Steve waited so long. He remained in the community and faced local backlash.
  • “He still lives on the same farm that he did back in 2001.”
    — Tim Eulinger [25:21]

6. Justice Served?

• Outcome for Paul
  • Paul received only misdemeanors for the arson—no jail time and an unpaid civil judgment—largely due to deceased witnesses, pandemic-related delays, and rotating judges.
  • “They just wanted to wrap this case up and get him on something, and they did. They got him on misdemeanor ... I don't think he ever paid it.”
    — Tim Eulinger [20:28]
• The Verdict
  • The murder conviction for Regina’s death finally came after Steve Gates’s testimony. The guilty verdict was quick—another Dateline case resolved within the typical three-hour jury window.
  • Quote: “Three hours is like ... the magic number for juries with quick verdicts for guilty.”
    — Andrea Canning [27:19]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote / Moment | |-----------|--------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:13 | Keith Morrison | “If you look at all the famous crime novels, most of them occur in small towns... That’s why we’re really interested in it.” | | 05:38 | Tim Eulinger | “She could feel it in her toes.” | | 06:26 | Keith Morrison | “...the thing that makes me glad we tell the stories are because you get to know the person at the heart of it, which is generally the victim.” | | 09:49 | Andrea Canning | “When they changed that to homicide, I was so glad for her family. To me, that was movement that was like acknowledging, we believe Regina was murdered. And now it’s official.” | | 14:30 | Andrea Canning | “You have a plan where you’re going to use your current girlfriend to wear your ex-girlfriend's face to burn down your house.” | | 16:26 | Keith Morrison | “He would always pick up a kind of a satellite. Somebody who was enthralled with him, who would do whatever he wanted them to do... wanting to attach to them at the same time.” | | 22:03 | Keith Morrison / Steve Gates | “I don’t think he has any more minions... I don’t think that they’re a danger to me, his connections. ... I’m not afraid of him anymore.” | | 23:21 | Keith Morrison / Steve Gates | “Once you decide not to be afraid of somebody... you just look at the brute in the face and say, f you, I’m going to go tell the cops.” — "I was young and... stupid." | | 27:19 | Andrea Canning | “Three hours is like ... the magic number for juries with quick verdicts for guilty.” |

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Audience Q&A Highlights

(Timestamps: [29:50–34:21])

• How did Paul kill Regina?
  • Exact method unknown; witness saw her crumpled in passenger seat, likely rendered unconscious (possibly a blow to the head), then drowned when car was driven into the pond. [30:18–31:43]
• Steve’s Complicity:
  • Mixed emotions about his immunity deal but acknowledged as instrumental in convicting Paul. Without his testimony, the case would likely have remained unsolved. [31:43–32:56]
• Arson Mask Video:
  • In hindsight, the mask in surveillance footage looked odd; surprising that initially it fooled investigators. [34:03–34:21]

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Final Reflections and Tone

• Tone: Compassionate, journalistic, and at times incredulous, especially regarding the complexity of the case and the enduring pain for Regina’s family.
• Hosts reflect on the emotional ripple effects in tight communities—how cold cases are kept alive by family determination, and how justice comes with compromise.
• The episode closes with praise for the ultimately satisfying outcome and gratitude for audience engagement.

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Segment Timestamps

• [01:02] – Introduction and case setup
• [02:16] – Discussion: Small towns and emotional impact
• [06:02] – Portraying the victim and challenges of cold cases
• [08:00] – The investigation: initial puzzles, forensic challenges
• [10:13] – Family advocacy and billboards
• [13:47] – The arson plot and mask scheme
• [15:13] – Investigative breakthroughs; fire investigator McCune
• [16:26] – Paul’s manipulative relationships
• [17:01] – Terry Sweet’s mysterious death and suspicions
• [18:30] – Women drawn into Paul’s orbit
• [20:16] – Weak legal consequences in arson
• [20:57] – Steve Gates, the reluctant witness
• [22:03] – Steve’s reflections on fear and coming forward
• [23:30] – Community reaction and family response to Steve
• [27:19] – The verdict and its resonance for the family
• [29:50] – Social media Q&A (method of murder, Steve’s deal, mask video)

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For more in-depth cases and behind-the-scenes stories, follow Dateline NBC and stream full episodes on Peacock or your favorite podcast platform.

Transcript

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[Andrea Canning]

Hey everyone, this is Andrea Canning and we are talking dateline. And today we are joined by the legendary Keith Morrison and his legendary producer, Tim Eulinger. They are here to discuss their Dateline episode, Secrets Unmasked. This episode is about the murder of Regina Hicks, a 25 year old Ohio woman who disappeared on the way to pick up her son from her estranged husband Paul. Days later, Regina's car was found submerged in a pond with her body in the passenger seat. What followed was an investigation spanning two decades, a bizarre arson scheme and a reluctant witness. If you haven't seen the episode yet, you can stream it now on Peacock or listen in the Dateline podcast feed, then come right back here later. We will have an extra clip from Steve Gates, the witness who kept his silence for nearly 25 years, reflecting on how he feels about Paul now. And we will answer some of your amazing questions from social media. Okay, let's talk Dateline. Hey, Keith and Tim.

[Keith Morrison]

Hi. Hi, how are you? Andrea, Nice to see you. Hi, Andrea.

[Andrea Canning]

It's always nice to see you guys since you're out there in California, Southern California. So I don't get to see you very often.

[Tim Eulinger]

It's great to see you.

[Andrea Canning]

So let's dive right into this episode. The first thing that I thought of as I was watching was I'm always struck by just the opening lines, right? And in the, in the body of the episode and in this one, you know, we're talking about Ohio. What is it? Willard? Ohio.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah.

[Andrea Canning]

And you know, I was an anchor in, in Ohio, so I know those little towns. It's not super little, but it's, it's not, it's not huge either. And it always strikes me how these, most of our date lines happen in these small towns. You Know, they don't happen in the big city. In fact, yeah. I've done, I think, one Dateline in New York City, and I've done a lot of Datelines. So, I mean, how. What's your take on that? That these crazy things happen in small town America, like in this episode?

[Keith Morrison]

It's because it is a small town. I mean, there's even a genre called murder in a small town. Right. I think.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah.

[Keith Morrison]

TV show called that. But. And if you, if you, if you look at all the famous crime novels, most of them occur in small towns. Agatha Christie loved those country mansions, didn't she? And there's a reason, because it's a little place where this sort of crime doesn't normally occur. You expect it to happen in a big, scary city and not in a sweet, bucolic little place that everybody. Where everybody knows everybody else. Because it does. We're really interested in it.

[Tim Eulinger]

One of the things about the small towns is that because they are small towns, relationships are tighter.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah.

[Tim Eulinger]

More people, like, everybody knows everybody and emotions and things like that. I have found in stories like, like this, people are tighter. There's more emotion.

[Keith Morrison]

That's a big part of it. Yeah, I agree with you.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah. And Keith, you know where I am from? Blue Mountain.

[Keith Morrison]

Yes.

[Andrea Canning]

In Canada, which is on Georgian Bay. It's part of Lake Huron, the Great Lakes. And so this was, you know, as I'm watching the opening of this episode, I'm thinking to myself, you know, I finally know sort of what it feels like, you know, to have a murder happen in a small town like that and for it to affect you, because I am from a very small town. And we did have a murder that was a diabolical murder that we featured on Dateline in November. And it was the fire captain who had murdered his wife Ashley. And it was. It happened three miles from my house where I grew up. So it's a new perspective for me.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah, it would be. Yeah.

[Andrea Canning]

And, you know, along the lines of what we've been talking about the Regina's uncle Regina, the victim in this story, her uncle said something that struck me, and he said there's no way to explain it until you experience it yourself. And you don't have any idea really what these people are feeling. What, when someone they love has been murdered.

[Tim Eulinger]

Right. Even though this case occurred 24, 25 years ago now, the scars are. They're not healed. The people are still hurting. They're still emotion.

[Andrea Canning]

You could see it.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah. And those things never heal. And as they say, the ripples go out a long way, but they also last for generations. So people, even somebody who was a small child, who you'd think would grow up and forget all about. They don't forget about it. It informs everything in their lives.

[Andrea Canning]

Regina's cousin said, you know, when the verdict came in, guilty, she could feel it in her toes.

[Tim Eulinger]

When she told me that, I was like, oh, my God, you could. She still. I saw her that day. I was there for the verdict, and I saw her that day, and she. The tears just kept coming, and she just couldn't believe that. Finally. Finally. But the emotion, it's still right on the surface.

[Andrea Canning]

You really brought to life Regina in this episode, especially with the challenges that we have sometimes telling these stories when they're so old because we don't have video and all the. The crystal clear pictures that we have now, it's. It's more of a challenge. So it's the people. It was the people that you interviewed who were the ones who did such a good job of bringing her life into focus. Regina, bringing her to life.

[Keith Morrison]

I will. I will not deny that frequently when. When I. I'm just speaking for myself, Launch into a story, one of the kind of stories we do, I'll get a sense of, oh, no, not again. We have to invade somebody's grief, and we're going to do this story about the worst thing that ever happened to somebody. And in the end, the thing that makes me glad we tell the stories are because you get to know the person at the heart of it, which is generally the victim.

[Commercial Announcer]

So true.

[Keith Morrison]

And in a way, in a strange way, it's like you are celebrating a person who. Who died a long time ago.

[Andrea Canning]

I agree, I agree. And. And also, Keith, they looked like they wanted to be there talking about Regina. You could feel it.

[Tim Eulinger]

Yeah, they did. Regina's brother, for instance, Chuck Rowe. I hit it off with Regina's brother Chuck because he was wearing a Marine cap, United States Marines with a snowy.

[Andrea Canning]

We love Marines. We love the Marines in this Marines.

[Tim Eulinger]

Yes, I know you do. So I. I met Chuck. He's wearing this hat. And I introduced myself, and I said, you're a Marine? Really? And then I asked, like, you know, where'd you serve? And he goes, well, one of my foreign deployments was in Somalia. It was like, Somalia, 1992, Somalia. And I said, were you there on the first day? First wave? He's like, oh, yeah, yeah. All the TV cameras were in my face. I said, oh, my God, that was me. I was there on the beach. We Literally.

[Andrea Canning]

Funny how paths cross, isn't it?

[Tim Eulinger]

Cross. So we hit it off, and it was like. But it was very funny. Anyway. That family is really very, very nice people.

[Andrea Canning]

Nice. The crime, it starts out with, you know, she goes missing, of course, Regina.

[Tim Eulinger]

She.

[Andrea Canning]

They find her car in the water, and the cause of death is ruled as a drowning. Manner of death, however, is pending. And I'm thinking to myself, this poor woman is in the passenger seat.

[Commercial Announcer]

How.

[Mint Mobile Announcer]

So.

[Andrea Canning]

How do you figure that? And she's got marks on her. How do you figure that she. That this is anything other than a homicide? I didn't really get that.

[Keith Morrison]

It was a source of puzzlement to a lot of people, I think. Yeah.

[Social Media Commentator]

Yeah.

[Keith Morrison]

The coroner may well have felt that he would be sticking his neck out a little too far if he went to declaring that it was a homicide.

[Andrea Canning]

How else does she get in there, though?

[Keith Morrison]

Well, you know, there are ways and ways it's possible that she could. She could slide into the passenger seat when things are at least remotely possible. That, you know, a good many in the law enforcement community quite probably, quite rightly, are saying, well, we can't quite go with that yet.

[Andrea Canning]

It's interesting, though, because we were talking about the case in Blue Mountain with Ashley, with her husband, who was the fire captain, and her body. So he was. He had pushed the car into the ditch during a snowstorm to make it look like she had had a car accident. But there she is in the passenger side again. It's another story where the victim is in the passenger side. So how did she, you know, drive herself into the ditch? Right.

[Tim Eulinger]

It.

[Andrea Canning]

It didn't add up exactly right.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah. And then later on, of course, much, much later on, years and years and years later on, that manner of desk has changed to one that I think everybody, you know, was able to sign onto, and that made all the difference.

[Andrea Canning]

I don't want to say this in the wrong way. When they changed that to homicide, I was so glad for her family. To me, that was movement that was like acknowledging, we believe Regina was murdered. And now it's official.

[Keith Morrison]

Sadly, it came after Regina's mother was dead, and she had campaigned for that for years and years, but didn't survive to see it, which was a real shame.

[Andrea Canning]

And her mom, Regina's mom, had put up billboards to keep the case alive. And I covered the Crystal Rogers case last year, where that became a real focal point of this were these billboards of, you know, where is crystal? And they believed also that they knew who had killed her, even though she'd never been found. I think the billboards, I think they're so effective because it not only does it show how much the family cares, right, that they're not giving up, but it's in your face every day. If you live in these areas where these billboards are like, you cannot ignore it. And in the Crystal Rogers case, they put up a billboard right next to the sheriff's department.

[Keith Morrison]

It cannot be overstated how important it is for families in a cold case to keep at it, to keep pushing. And it helps the police too, because it, you know, they, they may seem annoyed, but the fact is they need to have cover sometimes to continue an investigation that otherwise they wouldn't be able to afford. But if somebody's really ramping up for it all the time, then their bosses are going to say yes, spend the money and so things get done.

[Andrea Canning]

When we come back, we will have an extra clip from Steve Gates, the witness who kept his silence for nearly 25 years.

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[Andrea Canning]

Let's talk about the other half of this story that just really went off the rails in a lot of bizarre ways. You know, from the beginning of the show where I see somebody with this long hair and they've got glasses on and then there's a fire, I'm like, where is this going?

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah, well, exactly. It's what anybody looking at the story would think.

[Andrea Canning]

You guys had me hooked.

[Keith Morrison]

It was the weirdest darn thing.

[Andrea Canning]

You know, I wrote down the name of the. Actually, I don't even want to get. Maybe I shouldn't even give it any publicity. But, like, where you can get these wearable masks, I'm not sure they even sell them anymore.

[Tim Eulinger]

That company that was involved in our story, Andrea, is no longer in business. They were based in the UK and they are no longer.

[Andrea Canning]

I'm kind of actually glad about that. So that's my face, but it's. That's my face. Yeah. You know, it's one thing to have like a Halloween costume or something, but, like, you have a plan where you're going to use your current girlfriend to wear your ex girlfriend's face to burn down your house.

[Commercial Announcer]

What?

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah, it was a stretch.

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

The other thing that was in this,

[Keith Morrison]

which was the spoof card, to be able to call people, and it appeared to be coming from a different number altogether. And until they did a real deep dive on that, it looked as if people who were innocent were guilty and vice versa.

[Tim Eulinger]

The Claremont County, Ohio, Sheriff's Department, you know, started investigating this case, and they did a pretty good job. And then using some of their information, this insurance investigator named Zach McCune, he was like the super investigator, and he got to the bottom of this, and every time, like, he learned something he couldn't believe. The next thing he learned, you know, he was literally. He was like, in all the things he's done in his career ever, he's never seen anything like this.

[Keith Morrison]

Could have listened to that guy all day long. He was.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah, he definitely had me at hello. I was like, okay, I'm interested in this person, in this story, and I always like it when people have specialties, you know, so he. He's saying right out of the gate, my specialty is. Is fire investigators. Arson.

[Tim Eulinger]

Yeah, yeah. He. He's a certified fire investigator. As if, you know, like a fire

[Andrea Canning]

marshal would be the second person in the house lighting the fire. Do we think that was Paul then, or do we not. Do we not know or do, you know?

[Keith Morrison]

Don't know.

[Tim Eulinger]

We don't know who.

[Mint Mobile Announcer]

We don't know.

[Andrea Canning]

Okay.

[Tim Eulinger]

No.

[Andrea Canning]

Oh, well, Paul's tall, so you would know, Right, if it was Paul.

[Tim Eulinger]

Right, right. And Paul had an alibi, a perfect alibi. He was at a hotel three hours away.

[Keith Morrison]

The thing about Paul was this, and it's central to the story. He was one of those guys who was always the leader of the pack in a small town. If he'd gone to the big city, he would have been, you know, shot down pretty quickly if he went to work for IBM or something. But, you know, he was a railwayman. He knew other people around town. They'd drive around in his cars. He would always pick up a kind of a satellite. Somebody who was enthralled with him, who would do whatever he wanted them to do, who would be afraid of them, but wanting to attach to them at the same time.

[Andrea Canning]

Right. Kind of like Steve.

[Keith Morrison]

There you go. Yeah, sure.

[Andrea Canning]

Terry Sweet is another person, you know, who went along with Paul.

[Keith Morrison]

Right.

[Andrea Canning]

I should say, allegedly, Terry Sweet. But she died. Right. So she died.

[Keith Morrison]

She died the very day the insurance inspector was going to talk to her.

[Tim Eulinger]

Talk to her again. And, Andrea, this is funny. This is something we can bring up. I mean, obviously we attempted to get the death certificate and to see if there was any investigation, but that's.

[Andrea Canning]

How did she die?

[Tim Eulinger]

Apparently, according to the little information out there, is that it was probably alcohol related and it was, quote, unquote, natural causes.

[Andrea Canning]

Do people think otherwise?

[Tim Eulinger]

Well, there may. You know, there could be, but nobody is gonna talk about it.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah. On the record, there are some people who believe that coincidences happen and other people who believe coincidence is unlikely to ever happen.

[Andrea Canning]

Law enforcement generally doesn't believe in coincidences. As I always say on this podcast, it seems like an awfully big coincidence that she would. The timing of her death. However, Paul was never, we should say, was never charged with Terry's death, Was never arrested.

[Tim Eulinger]

Absolutely not. Nope.

[Keith Morrison]

I mean, Paul was really a charmer, but when it came to choosing girlfriends, and I mean no disrespect to any of the girlfriends he may have had over the years, he would choose people who would be very pleased to be with such an. A handsome, virile guy. He would pull them in and. And they would do anything for him.

[Andrea Canning]

You said to Kelly, you said you were in love, and she said, lust? Like dead.

[Tim Eulinger]

Yeah, yeah.

[Andrea Canning]

Like, she was not. She was not happy.

[Tim Eulinger]

She said in our. In our interview that she really liked him at first. Like, he was really nice. He was.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah.

[Tim Eulinger]

That he was super charming. He was fun. He gave the appearance that he was going to be taking care of her. You know, Kelly is very upfront about that. In the main interview that we did with her.

[Andrea Canning]

Why was Kelly's face obscured in the police video?

[Tim Eulinger]

Because at the time, she wasn't. Ended up not being charged.

[Andrea Canning]

So they didn't want to.

[Tim Eulinger]

When they released that they didn't want to have. Right, right, right.

[Andrea Canning]

And then also the detective. I mean, poor Kelly is there for a child handoff at Kroger, and Tasers are being pointed at her. I mean, I can't even imagine. Then she's in the interview room, and the detectives talking about the woman in the fire. She's rather large. And then Kelly's like. You hear Kelly say, oh, my God. And I'm not sure. I can't tell if she's talking about her saying she's rather large or the whole situation. I was like, what?

[Tim Eulinger]

That interview occurred probably seven to 10 days after the arrest, and the female detective, they are starting to realize. I don't know. I'm not sure this is the same person either. You know.

[Andrea Canning]

Interesting.

[Tim Eulinger]

Yeah. Yeah. But at first, it was very. There was a lot of, you know, feeling that that was Kelly. You know, that.

[Andrea Canning]

I mean, there's a mask and the hair, and also, you know, nighttime security camera from a house. It's never gonna be that crisp and clear. You could have gotten away with something like that potentially if you had just an, you know, not. Maybe not a strong investigator on it.

[Keith Morrison]

And by the way, you know, he wasn't convicted of any serious crime. He got misdemeanors, and so no jail time.

[Andrea Canning]

So that made me really, actually angry that he got this slap on the wrist.

[Tim Eulinger]

But what happened is, first of all, the main witness that would have been is deceased. They're missing that element. And then we had the pandemic. There were, like, two or three changes of.

[Social Media Commentator]

Of.

[Tim Eulinger]

Of judges, and they just wanted to wrap this cap case up and get him on something, and they did. They got him on misdemeanor and. And the civil case, he ended up supposedly having to pay $400,000. But I don't think he ever paid it.

[Andrea Canning]

All right, can we talk about Steve? So Steve, as we mentioned, Steve is, I guess, the old friend who admitted finally that he was there that night. He says he didn't see the murder happen, but he went along with Paul to cover it up. And it took him a really long time to do the right thing.

[Keith Morrison]

Yes, it did. And he would say that even years and years later, when Paul was living in a different part of the state altogether, hundreds of miles away, he couldn't go to the police, in his opinion or his view at the time, without Paul finding out immediately. And somebody in Paul's circle of friends and acquaintances in that little town would, you know, make life very difficult indeed for Steve. He lived in fear that whole time, he claimed. You know, given the sort of personality that he presented to us and the role that he played in that relationship, I can kind of see it.

[Andrea Canning]

We have an extra clip from your interview with Steve.

[Keith Morrison]

What do you think about him now?

[Steve Gates]

I don't think he has any more minions that are work that will pull any weight for him. I don't think that he has anyone left in his corner. I think he's powerless at this point. I don't think he has the reach that he used to have. I'm sure he still has connections, but I don't think that they would. I don't think that they're a danger to me, his connections. Mm.

[Keith Morrison]

You don't get that little itch in your back anymore that somebody might do something to you someday?

[Steve Gates]

No. No, I'm. I'm not afraid of him anymore.

[Keith Morrison]

Interesting, isn't it? Once you decide not to be afraid of somebody, does it make you look back and say, jesus, why wouldn't I? Why didn't I have this attitude, you know, 20 years earlier, 24 years earlier, you just look at the brute in the face and say, f you, I'm going to go tell the cops.

[Steve Gates]

Right. I was young and just. I was stupid. I was a young, stupid kid.

[Tim Eulinger]

The whole idea of him coming forward and him giving this, you know, according to the jury, very believable testimony that solved the case that found justice for Regina's family. But Regina's family are still not very happy with Steve Gates. They feel that he waited way too long. They feel that their mother could have had justice while in. In her lifetime. There's still some hard feelings there.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah. I mean, the one thing I'll give Steve is we are dealing with a killer. Paul is a convicted killer and a

[Keith Morrison]

skilled manipulator who can make a Manipulator.

[Andrea Canning]

And also, you know, this arson business, you know, then his girlfriend shows up dead. We don't know how, but. But all these things, I think I'd be afraid of Paul, too.

[Tim Eulinger]

I. I get it. I get it. And I'm just, frankly, I'm still surprised that Steve came forward to us when he was in court testifying at the, you know, that Dave Newman of the trial. He didn't want any audio recorded. He didn't want any video. And under Ohio law, if the witness requests that, the judge can grant that request, and he did. So the fact that he ended up talking to Keith was. I was kind of surprised. And the reason, Andrew, I think he has essentially, you know, decided to come forward. I made a special trip out to Ohio to talk to him in person with his attorney, Bernie Davis, and I think he wanted the community to know that he suffered with this, but ate away at him for 24 years and that he. Sorry that he waited so long. And, you know, his family in that region has gotten a lot of pushback from that community. He still lives on the same farm that he did back in 2001.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah. Can you imagine going on with the rest of your life, having now gone public finally with that story and the feelings a great many people must have about it is you've still got to go to the grocery store every day. You're still going to go and see other people around this small town every day. And you know that they're probably whispering behind your back. And it's a tough to deal with, for sure.

[Andrea Canning]

We often hear from people from our stories right after they air through a text or a call. Did you hear, have you heard anything from Steve about the reaction to him doing this interview?

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

Yeah, no, I'm not.

[Keith Morrison]

No.

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

I think that probably it's a good

[Keith Morrison]

thing that he has done and I think it might be recognized.

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

I hope it is.

[Keith Morrison]

Because, you know, even now, if you're not afraid of anybody, but you're afraid of how the public might feel about you, I'm sure.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah. No, I, I personally, the way it came out, I think it was a good thing that I think he needed to get some of that out. And I'm sure a lot of people in that community were watching your Dateline.

[Tim Eulinger]

And I think the fact that he, Keith's pushing him, apologized to the family. Keith had to drag it out of him a bit, but he said, I'm sorry I didn't come forward earlier. And you could tell he meant it.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Andrea Canning]

Apologies go a long way. I think they're big if they're sincere, you know. And I have to say, given the ride that we went on in this story and all the things that, you know, Paul was accused of doing,

[Commercial Announcer]

it

[Andrea Canning]

was a very satisfying arrest and verdict to see that, you know, to see that car on the video, you know, get pulled over and the jury. Yeah, three hours. That's three hours. Three hours is like the, I swear it is the magic number for juries with quick verdicts for guilty.

[Keith Morrison]

Seems to be three hours in there too, right? Two hours plus lunch.

[Andrea Canning]

Yeah, exactly. They were like, yeah, you're done. You're done, Paul. And up next, we have questions from our loyal viewers and listeners on social media that we are going to answer.

[Steve Gates]

Okay,

[Keith Morrison]

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[Andrea Canning]

Okay, now Keith and Tim are going to answer some of your questions and they also have comments from social media. So these are coming from People who caught your excellent program Friday night or over the weekend.

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

Great.

[Andrea Canning]

Ready?

[Keith Morrison]

Yep.

[Andrea Canning]

Linda Beloglo. Abrams says, how did he kill her? Meaning Paul, before he drove her into the water. I think I missed that. Do you know exactly how Regina died?

[Keith Morrison]

Well, I guess we don't really know exactly how she died because nobody saw it except the killer. The, you know, the friend who eventually told the story of what he saw that evening didn't see that part of the activity. What he saw was when he walked back to the car, he saw her crumpled in the passenger seat, and Paul told him, she's dead. Although at that point, she actually wasn't dead. But clearly he had done something to her. And it wasn't clear exactly what.

[Andrea Canning]

Didn't they say that she had marks on her body? I mean, I don't know if that's related to her death or not, but which could.

[Keith Morrison]

Marks on her body, which could have meant any number of possibilities, I think. And strangulation was a possibility, I think, wasn't it, Tim? And blunt force, it seems a more

[Social Media Commentator]

likely thing, is that some type of blow to the head was the possible thing that made her unconscious, but the cause of death was actually drowning. They know that from water being ingested.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah.

[Mint Mobile Announcer]

Yeah.

[Andrea Canning]

So they believe, though, that some things happen before the drowning.

[Keith Morrison]

Yeah, she knocked her out, and then he put it in the passenger seat of the car, and then he drove the car into the pond. That's how it worked. So the observer, the witness, saw the car going over a hill and into the pond, but didn't see what happened to her beforehand.

[Andrea Canning]

Okay, so this. This one is Ill Hughes from Facebook, and she's talking about Steve, the man who made the deal and testified. She says, what a jackass. He should do jail time as well, because if you don't tell about a crime, you are complicit.

[Keith Morrison]

Well, there's. I mean, it's an argument that could have been made. All right. But in the end, they really needed to solve that crime, and. And Steve was a way they could solve it.

[Steve Gates]

So.

[Keith Morrison]

So he was able to, you know, make that arrangement with them, that he didn't go to jail. And he was a lucky man in that sense.

[Social Media Commentator]

And I do think Andrea and Keith, one of the things that everybody involved with the prosecution of this case feels is that if Steve Gates did not come forward, this family would not have had justice. No, we would have been on year 25 or 26. If he had not come forward, this case wouldn't have been officially solved. They didn't really have anything more than him.

[Keith Morrison]

Yes, exactly. And the other cases, remember, he got misdemeanor charges. He never did any jail time. So this would have been a guy wandering around scot free for any number of bad acts.

[Andrea Canning]

We see this a lot. It's a double edged sword. Right. I mean, you need them.

[Keith Morrison]

But yep.

[Andrea Canning]

At the same time, you know, maybe they could have done things differently, you know, from the beginning. It's, it's hard. Do you think Steve would have come forward without the immunity deal?

[Social Media Commentator]

ANDREW and KEITH I think any defense attorney would not have let their client speak to police without a, some type of deal for immunity before they talk because his client Steve was, you know, at some risk for some type of charge, including, you know, obstruction of justice perhaps. So I don't think there was any way he was going to be talking without a deal.

[Andrea Canning]

And that's very normal. Robin Stevens west says once you know, it's a mask, you can tell. Hindsight is 20 20. You look at this security, this surveillance video and it kind of looks bizarre. But then, you know, when, when you actually have the luxury of knowing who maybe this was, does it change it for you when you watch that video?

[Keith Morrison]

It never looked real to me. And I was a little surprised, frankly, that investigators could have looked at it in the first place and thought, yeah, that's, that's Kelly, that's the ex girlfriend, not the current girlfriend. I didn't make sense to me, but apparently it worked for a while.

[Andrea Canning]

Thank you both for joining us and giving us all your insights.

[Social Media Commentator]

Thank you.

[Keith Morrison]

Thank you, Andrea.

[Capital One Bank Announcer]

It's been a delight.

[Andrea Canning]

It's been a pleasure. It's been a pleasure. Well, that is it for Talking DATELINE this week. And thank you all for listening. Remember, if you have any questions about our stories, you can DM us your audio or video on our socials Aine NBC or leave us a voicemail at 212-413-5252 for a chance to be featured right here. And you can watch the video version of Talking Dateline on Peacock or YouTube or subscribe to the NBC News app. And before we go, be sure to check out Keith's new original podcast series, five Miles from Home, the story of the murder of a high school track star in a small desert town. All six episodes are available now or you can see subscribe to DATELINE Premium to binge the entire series ad free. We'll see you Friday for an all new DATELINE on NBC.

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