Downloaded from YTS.MX
(somber piano music)
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
- (Narrator) Vera did as she was told
and went with her killers, knowing she was going to die.
- (Nicole) Then he was just like,
"Get your coat and shoes on now.
"We're leavin', we're goin' for a walk."
- When they told her to put her shoes on, you know,
she kinda, she was like yelling, "Why?
Ya know, like, "Why?"
"Why do you want me to get my shoes on?"
And Zachary went up to her and said,
"Just get your "effin' shoes on."
- (Narrator) Had she been given one final wish
it would've been to say goodbye to Willadean,
her precious little girl.
But instead her last farewell came
from the baby's grandmother who knew this was the end.
- And as I laid my head down all I seen was a vision
of Danny, Nicole, and Vera's purple hoodie,
of them walking outside on the porch.
And I said, "Goodnight, Vera," and she said, "Goodnight."
She said, "Goodnight, Sugar Babe," and I said, "Goodnight."
- (Narrator) She had 15 minutes to live.
(ominous rock music)
♪ I've got no sugarbaby now
♪ Got no sugarbaby now
♪ All I can do is seek peace with you
♪ And I can't get along this way
♪ I've got no sugarbaby now
♪ All I can do is seek peace with you
♪ What more can a poor boy do
♪ Who'll rock the cradle
♪ Who will sing the song
♪ Who will rock the cradle when I'm gone
♪ I've got no sugarbaby now
♪ All I can do is make peace with you
♪ And they'll send you to your mama next payday
♪ Who will rock the cradle when I'm gone
(train whistle blows)
- (Narrator) The case began on a cold spring morning.
- They had her layin', instead of having her layin'
on the rails they had her
layin' in between the tracks.
- It's like, here's the two tracks, she was in the middle
and he was goin' so fast with the train
that he looked down and thought
that it was a baby deer.
- And the engine and eight cars went over her.
- He stops the train, gets out, and walks back
thinking that he was gonna find the carcass of a deer.
Because the train, the cars were still over her,
looks under, sees that it's a human.
(phone buzzing)
- (Officer Biggs) Findlay Police Department, Biggs.
- (Chris) Hello, this is Chris with CSX Railroad.
- (Officer Biggs) Yes.
- (Chris) Hey, we just got a report
that we have a train stopped over near
Central Parkway.
Right in between there across from Blanchard River.
- (Officer Biggs) Okay.
- (Chris) We got a report that we have a train
stopped right now because they see a
naked female body laying in the middle of the track.
Appears to be deceased.
- (Narrator) The location of this grizzly discovery
could not have been more symbolic.
On a train trestle in the center of Findlay, Ohio,
a town once designated by an official act of Congress
as Flag City, USA.
It was known for its good schools, low crime,
and famous sports stars.
And little girls dream of becoming homecoming queens
and cheerleaders.
(crowd cheering)
- (Crowd) We're in it to win it so let's take the floor
of (mumbles).
(spectators cheer)
- (Narrator) But now someone had taken a knife
to this picture of all-American bliss
and left one little girl under the central overpass,
slashed, bruised, and slaughtered.
- After I found out, you know, she got murdered
and everything it broke my heart
because me and my sister did everything together.
(somber ambient music)
- (Narrator) Two months earlier Findlay Police
responded to a domestic violence call
at 300 Center Street.
This was not the first time Vera's abuse had been reported.
But if anyone was paying attention,
they would've seen the violence getting worse.
- I was there a few times when the cops was called.
They'd come,
be like, "We need to speak to Vera,"
and Zachary and Cheri and them would tell her,
"Don't say Zachary did anything."
Or be like, "You fell down the steps."
"You did it, it was your fault."
- (Narrator) Only this time the quote "I tripped and fell"
excuse would not work.
A problem soon solved with a better lie.
- When her boyfriend,
oh what is his name?
- They said it was a black dude, that I guess
she was supposedly dating,
but I believe he was a created character
as they call it in the video game world.
- I can't even think of his name now but it's...
Demetrius Jones I think it was.
- She made up the Desmond Thompson guy from Lima.
- And he had busted her nose.
'Cause she had to go out to the hospital
'cause she had a bump here and they said
she might have a concussion and bleeding.
- They come up with this story sayin'
that Vera had a boyfriend, a black man,
that was out of Lima or somewhere
and he come up here and got in a fight
and punched her in the face and broke her nose,
but that's not true.
It was her son Zachary.
- He came downstairs, went straight to his mom,
asked her what happened.
Cheri just came up with an excuse sayin'
that Vera was the one that pushed her own daughter
into the coffee table.
And Zachary just listened to what she said,
went over to Vera, and swung his fist
and hit her right in the face.
- (Narrator) Even more chilling is what happened next
when Zach and Cheri brought in a third party
to finish the beating.
- Zach had got a hold of his Aunt Sam
and when Vera didn't give her a straight answer,
Sam, Samantha, just straight up punched her
in the face again.
- And broke her nose. - And broke her nose.
- (Narrator) This January assault is a glaring example
of how the system failed Vera.
- They talked to me and Vera both together
'cause Vera wouldn't talk to nobody
unless I was there in front of her.
- She wasn't allowed to talk unless she was told
to talk by Cheri.
Nobody else, just Cheri.
Cheri had to be the one to tell her she could talk.
- That astounds me to this day.
That the police did it or
wasn't there a social worker there?
I mean, it's just sort of Police 101
that you say, "I wanna know what she's gonna say
"and I know that woman's gonna get in the way,
"so I'm taking her somewhere else and she's staying there."
They could've done that.
They could've said, "No, you're not coming.
"You're stayin' there."
- (Narrator) Except telling Cheri no
is easier said than done.
- You can tell me to do something but that doesn't mean
I'm gonna listen to ya.
(somber piano music)
- (Narrator) To say that Findlay P.D. was familiar
with 300 Center Street is an understatement.
Even on the day of the murder, earlier that afternoon,
police were dispatched to break up a neighborhood brawl.
- The cops wee there earlier because of a fight
that I guess broke out, 'cause I was woken up.
- (Narrator) And while they knocked at the door,
Cheri was busy inside.
- How I got woken up was Cheri, my mother,
sent Vera up to wake me up.
- They had to hide Vera
'cause the police woulda taken her out
if they'd have seen how bruised up she was.
- (Narrator) But the police were not there for Vera.
They'd been called to a street fight.
- There was a fight between Danny and my kids
with the people down the street.
- Zachary, Garth, Chuckie, Danny, and Nicole.
They all went down there
- Danny had got outta prison, like, three weeks before
all this happened.
- (Narrator) A detail that made the officers
immediately worried.
- Like, when I first met him I was actually kinda like
intimidated 'cause he has tears on his eyes.
- That lets other inmates know once you walk in the door,
See this?
I killed once,
I will do it again.
- (Narrator) The fight was finished
by the time police arrived.
And while they interrogated the other gang,
the Brooks boys were in the house getting ready to flee.
- You can't tell me Daniel and Nicole's the only one
that escaped the house because they don't know Findlay.
They're from Tiffin.
- He had went over to, um...
Dave and Sam's to hide out, is what I heard.
'Cause they, I remember seein' 'em jump out my window
and told Nicky, "Let's go.
And they jumped out the window
and went over to Dave and Sam's.
- (Narrator) Playing a much greater role
would be the third person who jumped out Cheri's window,
her son Zachary.
- (Nicole) Me, Danny, and Zach were actually
running from the police because Danny had pulled out
a knife on one of the Brooks's neighbors.
Zach had a warrant and I knew I had a warrant in Tiffin.
- (Narrator) In that short run from the Brooks house here
to the Schwabb house there, Zachary, Danny, and Nicole
began a chain of events that would end five hours later
with Vera dead on the tracks.
- And they ran to this house right here
and that's where Cheri even admitted they were at,
was right here, and how close is that to the tracks
where Vera was murdered?
- (Narrator) But right then police had one priority,
to find the guy running around Findlay flashing a knife
and wearing a teardrop tattoo.
(somber piano music)
In the first news reports it seemed that Daniel Bixler
was some crazy distant cousin who blew in from Tiffin,
a town 25 miles east of Findlay.
An impression supported by the fact
that only three weeks before he had been released
from Allen correctional after serving
almost three years in prison.
- He admitted he was in a gang at the prison,
the 211 boys as he called it.
- (Narrator) Once free, Danny went on a spree
of escalating violence, beginning at this park where,
in an act of twisted chivalry, he attacked
a teenager who had refused to give up a park swing
to his new girlfriend Nicole Peters.
It was this assault charge that sent the fugitive couple
on the lamb, fleeing Tiffin before Danny got arrested.
- Yeah, he ran away from it.
That's why he came to Findlay, to hide.
- (Narrator) The reason Danny felt comfortable turning
to Cheri is obvious.
He was not a distant cousin at all,
but a close member of the family.
Best illustrated by Cheri's relationship
with the other Danny Bixler, his father.
- Oh yeah.
Danny and I go,
they call us the kissing cousins.
- (Narrator) From this incestuous romance,
Cheri conceived the first of her nine children,
Scottie Emmons.
- Scottie Emmons belongs to Danny Bixler, Sr.
Her mother's sister's kid, he would be her cousin.
- The incest kind of stuff that's in our family.
- (Narrator) In 2008, Big Danny stabbed his wife's lover
and led police and sheriffs from three different counties
on a high speed chase in an 18-ton semi.
- When he gets a temper, both of them,
when they get a temper, you can't handle 'em.
- Even Danny had said it's in the Bixler blood.
I'm meant to kill, I guess.
- (Narrator) For a homicide that started out
with a naked dead woman with no ID,
no witnesses, no murder weapon, no suspects,
and no apparent motive, Findlay police
solved the case incredibly fast.
- She had been to the hospital before.
There was a social worker involved.
She had bruises.
She had been beat.
So, it's not like, you know, this was a surprise.
- I will make sure that they now that Desta Bixler, uh--
- Danny, when he was drunk, he kind of basically told her
every single detail
about the murder.
- While we were drinkin' they were smokin' all my cigarettes
so we decide to go down to the gas station,
which isn't that far from here,
and so we walk down there and we see the train has stopped.
And then I'm, like, sittin' here thinking,
like, why is the train stopped
at like three-somethin' in the morning?
I asked the lady at the gas station,
I'm like, "Do you know why the train stopped?"
I'm like, "Was there somethin' wrong with the engine?"
just bein' nosy, and she's like, "No, they found a body."
And I looked back at Danny and he's just staring.
Like, he's froze
and right then I knew.
I knew everything that was bein' said was true.
I mean, I was scared.
- (Narrator) In addition to Desta's information,
police also learn that there had been
an eyewitness after all.
- Across the street
from the Brooks's home, there was a camera out there
for surveillance
and they seen them walk across the street.
- (Narrator) The grainy video shows three figures,
Danny Bixler, Vera Reigle, and Nicole Peters,
in a single file line walking south.
- They did have the knife towards her.
If she was screamin' or anything that they would
stab her right then and there.
- (Narrator) Confronted with this mounting evidence
Danny first tried to push blame on others
then started making damning admissions.
By mid-afternoon he and his interrogators
were driving back to the train bridge,
returning to the scene
of the crime.
- (Narrator) There he pointed to the spot where
just 18 hours earlier he threw the murder weapon
into the water.
- The blade that he used was from the kitchen.
- Danny tooked it outta my knife set
and he was playin' with it and twirlin' and all that.
- (Narrator) For her part, Nicole was more tightlipped
and to this day exactly what she did
at the tracks remains a mystery.
But she still was not as skilled at lying
as the Brooks family and it did not take long
for her to implicate herself as well.
The detectives had caught the murderers.
- The people that were charged were Daniel Bixler,
Nicole Peters,
and then people that lied to the police,
which there's quite a few of those.
Zachary Brooks, Cheri Brooks,
Shannon Brooks, and Michael Brooks.
And then they have a juvenile son that also participated
in lyin' to the police and his name is Chuck Brooks.
- (Narrator) And so everyone zeroed in on Danny,
the out of control ex-con, and Nicole,
his bloodthirsty girlfriend.
- (Judge) How old are you today?
- 18.
- (Judge) How old were you when this offense was committed?
- 17.
- Some girls go for the bad boys.
Like a Bonnie and Clyde kinda thing,
but with a evil twist. (chuckles)
- (Nicole) I've known him since I was younger.
I met him at the Seneca County Juvenile Detention Center
and I used to hang out with his brother,
Richard Bixler a lot and that's how I met Danny.
- She was obsessed with this man.
Like, she'd constantly talk about him.
Everything, all of her letters were about how much
she was devoted to him,
how much she loved him.
She cared about him a lot.
- They had only been together for, like, a week and a half.
So, he was out for a week and a half
and then they started dating for the other week and a half
that he was out and then boom, he was right back in again.
(piano music)
- (Narrator) An indication of how authorities struggled
with this bizarre case from the very beginning
is that they did not inform the public for a day and a half
after the body was discovered.
- Vera's mom didn't even find out about it
from the police or anybody.
They went directly to Cheri first.
And I think that's a bunch of crap, you know.
The police department wouldn't go directly
to her own mother?
- No, 'cause Cheri already identified it.
Because Cheri told the police that Vera's parents died.
I'm supposed to be dead.
I've died like three different times
in three different states.
- Cheri.
- (Narrator) These deceptions, which she hones over time,
come in two types.
Lies to protect
and lies to instigate.
What happened next
is an example of the former.
- We met Larry one time because he stopped out front
of our house and Samantha, Schwabb,
was at our house and she went outside
and smacked Larry because they got into a fight
because they owed money to her and stuff.
And he started talkin' to us
and then next thing I know he started hangin' around
our house like a leech.
- The Larry Spencer guy shows up,
this guy who's been at the house
once or twice suddenly is,
is being accused of takin' Vera away
and probably killin' her.
- Because I've talked to Larry and Larry said
that they tried to tell the detectives
that it was him that killed her.
- (Narrator) To those who knew about Vera's life
inside the Brooks house, the story on its face
was ridiculous.
- They said, "Oh, she took off with her boyfriend.
Well, she wasn't really allowed to have a boyfriend
except for Zachary 'cause she wasn't allowed
to go anywhere with anybody.
- They wouldn't even let her have a cell phone.
- Cheri said that she didn't need one
because then she could get a hold of her mom
or she could talk to whoever she wanted to.
- (Narrator) After Danny and Nicole were arrested,
the cover story was modified to fit the changing situation.
- She'll basically change the story up
and she'll basically confuse everybody.
- And she's tryin' to cover up a murder, period.
- (Narrator) The witch's spell had worked like a charm.
- I believe that my own mother had this set up perfectly.
She knew exactly how to do it.
- She can get away with shit.
There are certain things that she's done
in her life that
shoulda been put her behind bars.
It was pretty much (hand smacks) slap on the hand,
go ahead, walk away.
- (Narrator) Gone were any questions about what role
she and her family played in Vera's death.
- You just not wanna say my name on there
sayin' that I had anything to do with this.
- (Narrator) Now it was as if
they were just passive spectators.
The only thing people wanted to know
was how they could sit there and watch Danny and Nicole
do something so barbaric.
- I asked her a million times.
Cheri, why didn't you call?
Why?
- I mean, even a five year-old knows,
if somebody's being hurt you call the police.
- (Narrator) And as the accusations intensified,
the truth of what happened got further and further away.
- Like someone's really gonna be there to help me say,
"Hey, go get the phone over there off of my computer stand
"so I can call the cops."
You know, they're not gonna,
Nicky's not gonna give me the phone.
Dan's not gonna give me the phone.
Scottie sure in the world's not gonna give me the phone.
And Shannon, her fat ass was sittin' on the couch
playin' with her phone.
- I wish I would've had...
my phone working because it was,
well, it was dead and I had no minutes
even though I know you can call 911 off of it, but...
(somber piano music)
- No matter her age, Vera was still a child.
- If there's a way she could do it, she would do it.
You know, never complained, always help.
She'd help ya any way she could.
- If you told Vera something she'd do it.
I mean, she didn't question.
Almost to the point that it was too much.
I wish she could've maybe
stood up for herself a little more.
- She was mentally challenged.
She was slow.
- And Cheri and them end up talkin' her into movin' in
with them and, you know, and then she end up
hookin' up with Cheri's son.
- (Narrator) For Vera, her old life was gone,
like she had joined a cult and got separated from her past.
- When Manson put ideas in his minions
to where he's pretty much the puppet master
and he's doing his puppets to do his dirty works for him.
- Brooks family being like the Manson family,
yeah, I would have to agree with that.
They are like that.
- They're a family that makes sense,
whatever she meant by that.
- Yes.
- It's a cultish type of thing and I really believe
they saw her as an easy target.
- We was at the Salvation Army and she came in
with the Brookses and she seen me and she kinda lit up
because she'd always smile, ya know.
Like that, ya know.
And she'd come over, she put her hood up
and then as she walked by, "Can't talk.
"Can't talk. Can't talk."
- She had stopped and I put my arms around her
and gave her a big hug and asked her where her baby was
and she said,
"Oh, she's at home," but boy she just run away.
I mean flat run.
It wasn't no stoppin' and talkin'
and that's not Vera.
- 'Cause they didn't want her to talk to no one
about what was happening
at the house.
That's what they were afraid of.
- They basically did not allow Vera to maintain
a relationship with her parents.
- (Narrator) It didn't take long for people to see a change.
- Before she started datin' Zach she was happy.
- She was pretty much outgoing.
I mean, she loved to sing, she liked to dance.
- Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton.
She liked all the older country.
- But once she moved in with them it just,
she changed real quick.
- What I can't see is the Vera that I knew
willingly massaging Cheri's feet.
- That was her job there, was to rub her feet.
She has foot problems, diabetes or something.
But that was her job.
- And when she did Mom's feet if she did somethin' wrong
Mom would hit her with the itchy stick.
- Well, Cheri had this like, uh,
it's not a backscratcher but it's a little bit thicker.
She'd just whap her alongside the head.
"Don't touch my baby."
- And Vera would just keep tellin' her, "I'm sorry,
"I'm sorry."
- She'd say, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
Why she was sayin' I'm sorry for, I don't know.
Because I guess she just felt she was doin' somethin' wrong.
- (Narrator) They even made her sleep with a pig.
- You're allowed to have a pig live in a closet
to where he urinates
and has feces all over?
- (Wilbert) "Oh no, I'd never make her sleep
"with the pig."
- Of course she did.
She made her sleep with the pig.
- They had the cops called continuously.
Children's Services called continuously.
And God knows why nobody done anything,
you know to even remove the baby itself
- Exactly. - out of that home.
I don't understand that.
- She was such a frequent flier as well call them
that you could answer the phone
and as soon as she says the first word
you know who it is.
You eventually become kinda desensitized to them calling
and it's not that people mean to do that,
it's just that you know that the major problems
are ones that nobody's gonna cooperate.
- Vera told the cops, "No, I'm not movin' back home
"with you guys."
And the cop said, "How old are you?"
- Vera's cognitive level I would compare to my daughter
who's eight years old, okay?
I wouldn't expect the police to take my daughter's word
for it, you know what I mean?
- Because Vera even told CPS when CPS asked her,
"Vera are you endanger here?
"Do you like it livin' here?"
Vera said, "I love Cheri.
"I love stayin' here with Cheri and her family."
She says, "Cheri's my family.
"She helps me out
and I would never leave Cheri."
- They came back here and told me
that they talked to her and because she was 24 years old,
even though her mind was an eight year-old mind,
they couldn't do anything because she was 24 years old
and she made her choice.
It was her bed, she needed to lie in it.
- (Narrator) It was total control.
- And they'd make her do, like, just pretty much everything
and nobody else would get up
and do somethin' around the house.
It was always her.
- They actually treated her like a slave.
- They wanted her as a slave and her SSI check
that she got first of the month.
- That was legal.
They got that done.
Don't know how they did it and who,
I mean they must know enough.
- 'Cause it sounds like they got a pretty good racket goin'.
Maybe I oughta go on SSI
and have people stay here with me
and they sign over their paychecks to me.
- And each of 'em gettin' around 700 a month?
Comin' in to one place?
- Cheri's on disability,
all of her kids are on disability,
and then everybody else that moves in with them
are on disability.
- (Narrator) But more than Vera's money,
Cheri wanted her womb.
- Everybody that gets pregnant that lives in that house,
you know, Cheri says,
"Oh, I hope you have a girl," you know.
- (Narrator) Vera Jo Reigle was killed
because of two conflicting motives.
- I have four kids of my own.
I have three girls and one boy.
Well, when I first had my first daughter
she said she wanted it because it's a girl.
- 'Cause in her mind any girl that she could get
she was gonna get.
- (Narrator) The primary motive was based
in Cheri's obsession with baby girls,
an abnormal perversion that began in childhood
when she, like Vera was sexually abused by her own father.
- And he molested her quite often, I guess.
- (Narrator) The man who nicknamed her Sugar Babe.
- That's her number one name right there, Sugar Babe.
That's what everybody calls her.
- Since I was a little girl my dad gave that name to me
before I was put in a foster home.
- I actually felt sorry for her.
She did tell me about, you know, her experiences
with her father and how he had raped her.
And I began to kinda understand a little bit
of how this woman come to be the way she is.
- (Narrator) As a young child, Cheri and her three siblings
became wards of the state.
- She was put in the children's home,
taken away from her mom, when she was, like, three years old
and then she came back when she was 16.
- (Narrator) It was then she made her first attempt
to take someone else's baby.
- She told us when she come home and she was 16
that she had a baby over here in Tiffin
and that Welfare wouldn't let her have it.
- And my mother would always say, "Did you have a baby
"while you were in foster care because if so
"I'm gonna go get it."
- Because it was Cheri's baby and that would've been
my first grandbaby so I was gonna get it.
But Bea and them said no it wasn't Cheri's baby
it was a foster baby there, too.
It wasn't her baby in the first place.
And then we talked to Sandy and Sandy Schneider
says, that's the welfare lady that was takin' her case
and stuff, said that she is an obituary liar
and that's why, she's a fantasy world,
she lives in a fantasy world like.
And that way whatever she thinks that's what really happens
in her world.
- Well see, she'll tell ya somethin' totally opposite
than what everybody else is tellin' her.
She'll lie.
- She many, many times has done it
and people have fallen in her trickery
and they believe everything she said.
- Because she's convincing about everything.
I mean, she convinces everybody everything.
(somber piano music)
- "Who will hold your hand as each one walks out
"of your home to pain that will put my mark
in your hand," and I'm talkin' about Cheri
losin' all of her kids one at a time.
- I'm really confused about all that because I thought
once you have kids taken that you're not allowed,
especially if you have five.
You have all those kids taken and then you have
a second round of kids and you're allowed to keep those?
- They removed Maria and two other,
well Scottie was one, Michael was one,
and then there was another one but I don't know the name.
- Which was Joshua, Michael, Maria, and little Cheri,
was all taken away from me.
- (Narrator) In three of the cases,
she lost custody at least in part due to reports
of sexual abuse.
- My sister was comin' over to pick her up,
wantin' to take her out to her house
and railroad tracks is right beside her house,
so there was a train goin' by.
She didn't hear my sister knockin'
and she was even hollerin' out Cheri's name
and Cheri didn't answer and she said
when she walked in there Cheri was supposed to be givin',
little baby bathtub thing there,
and she was holdin' the baby up like this here
suckin' its penis.
- She's sick enough that she even molested me
when I was younger.
- (Narrator) Cheri's first five children
were not removed as a group.
She would have one, lose it to CPS,
then have another over and over and over.
- I seen her more attached when the baby girl was born
than when she was with the boys.
I mean, when that girl was born
she wouldn't let her out of her sight.
Let no one hold the baby
or if someone did she would, like,
look at them until they put the baby down.
It was just like,
kind of obsess with Maria.
- (Narrator) By all accounts it was the loss of this child,
baby Maria, that was most traumatic.
- She'll always be my girl, my little girl, no matter what
in that she's my first daughter and that I always want her
to know that she's always welcomed here
to meet me any time she wants.
- Every other kid she had she didn't take care of right,
but Maria, she did real good with Maria.
We really was proud of her.
She kept her for a whole year.
- (Narrator) But in the spring of 1987
Cheri reverted to her old ways
and things went horribly wrong.
- My brother one night called me up sayin'
that we needed to take the baby to the hospital,
that she had been molested.
She was bleeding from the vagina.
- Somebody had raped our little Maria
because when she went to change her diaper
she was all bloody down there.
- (Narrator) That night Cheri reclaimed her baby
but the authorities were on her trail.
- They told her to take her to the doctor the next day.
Well, Cheri didn't take her to the doctor.
So, we went over and she says,
"Mom, take Maria home with ya."
- That was at Easter time one time.
I took Scottie home with me and I gave her Maria
to take home for the night.
- And she never let me take Maria home at all.
She says, "I'll keep Scottie over here
"and you take Maria home."
So, I did.
Knock comes to my door next morning
and here it was the sheriff wantin' Maria.
(somber piano music)
(train whistle blows)
- She wanted all of her boys to at least have one kid
by the time they were 16 or 17.
- (Narrator) An example of this is Gina Lopez,
a 15 year-old girl with a troubled family life
who fell in love with Cheri's second to youngest son, Garth.
- She was like, "Gimme a grandbaby.
"I like grandbabies.
"I want another grandbaby."
- (Narrator) And as soon as she was carrying a Brooks baby,
like Vera before her, the stalking and the threats began.
- I had a job at the time.
I was workin' at this little shop at the corner
of Center and Main Street.
I was workin' there and they would follow me.
- Cheri, Zachary, Garth, and Chuckie,
they all work as a team.
- (Gina) Chuckie would be the one that always followed me
most of the time.
Zachary would sometimes.
- And then when they knew it was time
for her to get off they would send,
it was mostly Chuckie.
They would send him down to like kinda spy on her
to see where she went after work
or if she came back to the house.
- (Narrator) Fortunately for Gina,
her pregnancy ended in a miscarriage
and she was able to reconcile with her mother
and move to Kentucky.
Putting a couple of hundred miles between herself
and the madness up in Findlay.
(train whistle blowing) (somber piano music)
- Vera loved that baby.
That was Vera's pride and joy right there.
- She was the one that was always babysittin'
for Stacy's little girl.
She always had her,
so I could see her really being a mother
to her own child.
- (Narrator) Except Cheri was in charge
and she saw things different.
- Cheri had a lot of boys.
I think she was really, really obsessed with girls,
especially since Maria
was taken away from her.
- And I think, you know, with Vera,
I mean she has a chance to,
you know, she has a chance to take that one
rather easily.
- Cheri's always wanted a baby girl again.
She was gonna have somebody make her a child,
another daughter, and then she was gonna try
to take 'em away from her.
- Cheri said, "That's my kid if you get a girl."
And she told Zachary it better be a girl.
- She did tell Zachary that if it turns out
to be a girl that she wanted him to sign off his rights
to her and he did that.
He said that was fine.
- (Narrator) And this was not just any womb
chosen for the assignment because Cheri once targeted
Vera herself to replace her lost baby.
- Yeah, I was there when she lost Maria.
'Cause we lived on
Sandusky Street, a white apartment house there
and her and her ex-husband Mike lived upstairs.
- (Narrator) For five months from the time
baby Vera was born in November
until the sheriff took baby Maria at Easter,
the two little girls lived in separate units
of the exact same house.
- She was trying to take over on Vera
when Vera was a baby and I told her,
"No, that's my baby."
- (Narrator) And so remarkable, Cheri ended up
taking the baby of the baby
she tried to get 24 years earlier,
claiming custody of baby Willadean before she was even born.
- Vera was like way out here.
You would talk to Cheri or you would see Cheri,
"My baby's in there.
"My baby.
"That's my baby, my baby."
You know, it's always "my baby."
- They kept on tellin' Willadean that Vera wasn't her mom,
that Cheri was her mom.
- And every time Willadean wanted to come to her mom,
like her learning how to walk,
she'd walk around and she'd see her mommy
and she'd wanna run up to her mommy,
and Vera would say, "No, no, no, I'll get in trouble
"if I touch you."
- See, I seen Cheri after Willadean was born,
maybe, I don't know, four or five months later.
"You see my new baby?"
I said, "Well, that's Vera's."
"No, it's mine.
"I adopted this baby."
So it was no longer Vera's.
Vera could not do anything with the baby.
She touched the baby, Zach hit her.
That was Cheri's baby, not Vera's.
- (Narrator) Another example of Cheri's control
appears in the date of the child's birth.
- Well, I'm November 3rd, she's November 4th.
- (Narrator) It is here we glimpse the true depth
of Cheri's madness.
- She gave her castor oil and orange juice.
- To have the baby come out earlier
than what it was supposed to be.
- (Narrator) According to a website
for the castor oil industry, the recommended dosage
for inducing labor with this old midwifing technique,
is two tablespoons.
- Because she gave her that castor oil,
gave Vera three bottles of it.
- And it was about three bottles, yeah.
- To make her go into labor
so she'd be there for her birthday.
- Well, it didn't happen on her birthday.
It was the day after.
'Cause she brags about that.
She said, "Well, we didn't get it on my birthday,
"but it was close."
- So, she was an early baby and she ended up
with having, in the hospital for a while
because she had heart problems.
- Supposedly her original date was supposed to be
December 6, that she was supposed to come out.
But she decided she was comin' out to have
pumpkin pie and mashed potatoes
with Mawmaw for Thanksgiving.
So she come out early.
'Cause she wanted to meet her Mawmaw. (laughs)
(somber piano music)
- (Narrator) The secondary motive was far more common.
- I don't think he really wanted to be with her anymore.
He wanted to be with other people
but he couldn't because Cheri wouldn't let Vera leave.
- And he just said that they needed to get rid of her
and that he was seein' some other girl.
- Completely over.
- She wanted Zachary because, well, they had a baby together
and she wanted Zachary for herself.
- Zachary, he would get really mad of her being jealous
and go over the wall sometimes.
- (Narrator) At first, before she got beaten
into submission, Vera would fight back.
- Vera sometimes could be rebellious.
She had a lot of anger.
- Vera could cuss you.
Vera could tear you up.
- Zachary ain't allowed to talk to a girl
or look at 'em or anything.
She was always mad.
- (Narrator) And when she got mad, he got mad.
- He whipped a phone at her face, like right here.
- Her eyebrow ring came completely out.
- Like, meat was hangin' out and stuff.
- I raised my kids not to hit a girl.
But if they're gonna put theirselves in a man's place
then yeah, then do it.
- (Narrator) In a normal family the father would step in
and stop this kind of abuse, but not Kevin Brooks, Sr.
- He's the opposite of Cheri.
Where Cheri was loud and up front and boisterous,
Kevin was a background person who liked to stay out
of everything and mind his own business.
- (Narrator) Even when minding his own business
meant letting Vera get beaten.
- No, he's a arch coward.
- And you think this thing's happen in one day?
It's been going on for moths and moths and months.
- (Narrator) And when it became clear that they were really
going to kill her, Kevin looked out for Kevin.
- He already did his 30 days,
but he had, at the time, waiting for his 30 days
to get in lock-up, he was like, "If you're goin' to kill her
"wait 'til I'm in jail so that way I have an alibi."
Those were his exact words.
- (Narrator) Crazy as it sounds,
if Vera was going to be saved it would have to have been
one of the Brooks boys.
- That was Punky.
He was the one that was killed in an accident.
- (Narrator) Unfortunately, the only one
with enough balls to stand up to Cheri was already dead.
- He ran that household.
Punky ran that household.
His dad and mom were both afraid of him.
- (Narrator) On July 3rd the summer before Vera's murder,
Punky was walking with his girlfriend
on a dark, rural highway.
- They were heading towards their town
to go see the fireworks.
- That's not what I was told.
- That's what Cheri told me, he was goin' for the fireworks.
But yeah, I know he was goin'
for a drug thing. - He was goin' to get
Heather's heroin.
- You know, cab drivin' by couldn't see him, then bang!
- She was really crazy because of him dyin'
and the ashes are still at the house and everything
and she won't bury him.
- My son's layin' up there on the bottom shelf
in that box.
- It seems like she'd gotten worse.
I mean, it's just like Cheri went crazy.
- I mean, you talk about Punky, Punky is like wow,
Punky you know, all the girls went wild for Punky.
- (Narrator) From the night he was hit
Cheri could not accept her son's death was an accident.
Now she was out for revenge.
- The accident happened 20 minutes before
they got any call
and Cheri was all mad about that
and then was tryin' to put the blame on Heather
sayin' that Heather pushed Punky.
- Cheri had told Heather, you know, "I just want the truth.
"Did you push him?"
And Heather looked at her and said, "No, I did not do it."
- (Narrator) But when it comes to Cheri's fantasies,
what actually happened doesn't really matter.
- Heather pushed Punky in front of the Accurate cab
to help kill my son that night.
- Cheri said that Heather is the one that killed Punky,
had it set up so that's why Cheri had Marsi
beat Heather up for it.
- Marsi was, I believe she was standing on the porch.
She was like standing by Cheri.
Cheri had whispered to her, she said, "I need you
"to do me a favor."
- That went down crazy.
- Then outta nowhere Marsi just takes her hand
and starts punchin' her in the face.
- Then took her by the head of the hair
and rolled her down the steps
and started beaten the hell out of her.
- They were like, "Bring her to the road.
"Curb stomp her."
- And at that time Heather's nose
was like bleeding really bad
and you could see that it was broken.
- All she kept sayin' is, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry,"
and she kept puttin' her hands up in the air
and Zachary said, "This is fucked up." (chuckles)
- Then Marsi told her, you know, that'll teach you
to ever mess with my family again.
- Because you killed Punky.
You had Punky killed and you took the best thing
away from us all when you had Punky killed.
- (Narrator) Like his brother Zach as well as Danny Bixler,
Punky was a member of the Crips street gang.
- Punky was supposably a Crip, and Zachary.
- Punky says that he wanted to get Zach to take his place.
To be able to fight like he does
and they wanna run this town.
- (Narrator) It was then that Cheri and Zachary
really turned on Vera.
- At times I live with them and everything else, you know.
They were gettin' along great, you know.
"Love you," kisses and everything else
and then all of a sudden Punky dies,
it's, you know, "I wanna beat her."
- (Narrator) The pattern began to take shape.
- There was a candy bar
in the room where they had
Punky's little memorial thing.
- I know (mumbles), he and Punky,
they were really tight together.
- I guess the candy bar was supposably for Punky
and Vera ended up eatin' it because she was hungry
and they told her she couldn't get out of the room.
- And Alyssa went off on her and she actually had her
on the ground and she punched her, like, maybe twice.
- (Narrator) This game of trumping up a charge
to get someone else to beat Vera
was not an isolated incident.
- He was thinkin' of people who could beat the crap
out of Vera badly, so he just got on his phone
and he started callin' people or textin' people
and as soon as they got the word they came rushin' over.
- (Narrator) Zachary Brooks, tough new leader
of the Findlay Crips, was texting his dead brother's
old girlfriends to come over and assault
his defenseless baby mama.
- Crystal pushes her down on the floor
and Zachary's yellin' at her, "Come on, hit her, hit her."
- (Narrator) And they do it.
(bell dinging)
(train whistle blows)
The location was chosen for a very personal reason.
- They tried to do the same identical thing to Vera
that happened to Travis.
Take her to the railroad tracks
and lay her out for the-- - Exactly.
- Train to run over her and cut her head open and you know.
- (Narrator) Travis Puckett was the son
of Cheri's baby sister Tabitha.
- My nephew Travis was 16 years old
and my sister told him to get the hell out of her house.
- (Narrator) The same age as Zachary,
Travis became part of the Brooks boys gang,
hanging out at a local park riding skateboards.
- He went takin' off down the road
and that's when he jumped the railroad tracks.
- 'Cause it was two trains comin' at the same time,
so he couldn't do nothin'.
- And went Travis went to jump, Travis slipped under
and (hands smack) and off came Travis's head.
- He looked back like this to see his brother Curtis
and when he did
the other train came and that's when he got,
she says like hamburger.
- And then he was smashed up like hamburger.
- (Narrator) But what's important is not
whether Cheri and Zachary consciously wanted
to imitate Travis's death, it's that they told
the killers about their vendetta against Vera.
- I think she was thinkin' about it
when Vera accidentally dropped a brick on her foot.
- I asked her to come outside with me and help me
clean the rabbit cage and I had a tarp
on top of the rabbit cage.
- And there was like four bricks to keep the tarp on there
so that way it doesn't blow away.
- (Nicole) She told me also that Vera had thrown rocks,
big huge like rocks onto her feet
and that's why her feet had to be wrapped.
- Zachary come runnin' outside
and he said, "What's wrong, Mom?"
I said, "Bitch fuckin' dropped that rock on my foot.
"I need help."
He said, "What?"
I said, "She fuckin' threw that rock on my foot
"and it hurts.
"Get it off."
- Zachary and all them, they're sayin'
that she intentionally did it.
- And I yelled at her, said, "You fuckin' bitch!"
I said, "You fuckin' hit me with a fuckin' rock,
"you fuckin' bitch."
- (Narrator) The slave had committed
a fatal error.
- Nope, she didn't apologize.
She never apologizes.
- (Narrator) From this point on things went downhill.
- It all happened, events after that.
After she got the bricks, was on her foot.
- The rock hit on Cheri's foot and then
that's when they were going to plan
on throwing Vera on the tracks.
(train whistle blowing)
- Cheri made a little joke about wanting to drug Vera
with her sleeping pills and Zachary wanted to get her high
and everything and then mix those together
and then let her walk the tracks at nighttime.
Eventually she would fall over and lay right
in the middle of the tracks.
- When she said you need to cut her up
and put her on the tracks, then she looked towards Vera,
smiled, and turned back.
- And there would be no way of the conductor
to stop the train in time.
- She thought if she did get squished by the train
then there wouldn't be any fingerprints
because you would be like hamburger meat.
- So basically she wanted to kill her.
(train whistle blowing)
(somber music)
- (Narrator) On Sunday March 20th,
Danny and Nicole ran from the assault charge in Tiffin
and arrived at the Brooks house.
That evening they met a being named Vera who,
already living in a perpetual state of terror,
could no longer be considered human.
- She stayed in her room 24/7.
She barely ever came out unless Cheri called her.
- She was basically like this.
Wouldn't look you in the eye.
Wouldn't talk.
If somebody walked in the house,
she'd go to the bedroom by herself.
- If she's sitting there and just curled up like this
and looking up like this every now and then
and then going back down, I mean,
you get this idea that she was probably
pretty much psychically dead anyway.
- (Narrator) Meanwhile, Vera's baby daddy
had found a kindred spirit bonding
with his long lost Crip brother.
- They seemed very dependent on each other.
They seemed very close for just knowing each other
for that little of time.
- (Narrator) For the next four days,
they unleashed an animalistic rage that is hard,
but not impossible, to explain.
- Cheri Brooks and the entire family
was telling Danny stories.
- (Narrator) For the past three years he lived here
at Allen Correctional.
- Guys who in prison had been raped
when they come out it's like they wanna get revenge
on somebody.
- (Narrator) And gang bangers and their bloody code
of survival is very, very real.
- Well, I know she's all about the Crip stuff
because when we were at dinner she was talkin'
all about Punky bein' a Crip.
And she had a blue bandana around his flowers.
- (Man) Do you think Cheri thinks she's a Crip?
- Yeah, for sure.
- (Man) So, as far as this gang affiliation,
who's the first Crip amongst the Brookses?
- Punky.
- (Narrator) This is why when interviewed
for this project, Danny's response was so chilling.
- When he mentioned something about Punky,
they all get this thing of
thinkin' that she's disrespectful to Punky.
- (Narrator) But she was being accused of more
than just disrespecting Punky.
Zachary and Cheri told Danny, who was in prison
when it happened, that she had murdered him.
In their most vicious lie of all,
knowing full well how he would react,
they convinced Danny it was Vera who pushed Punky
in front of the cab.
- Oh my God.
- No, but that
is just messed up just to tell anybody
Vera was the one to push Punky because there was a lot
of people that would take up for Punky.
- (Narrator) So not only was Vera a threat
to Cheri's precious baby, Willadean, she also
killed the Brooks gang's leader.
Now Cheri wanted something done about it.
- Nicole was just another opportunity for her
to do her mind games with.
- She wants to be a people pleaser so bad.
She wants friends so bad that she just,
she couldn't see it comin' at all.
Especially not with someone as conniving as Cheri is.
- From what she either says or does,
everybody else follows and just does what they're told.
- It was like the female Charlie Manson.
Like if Charlie Manson had a girl form it would be her.
- Cheri is the one that told him to do it.
He did say that.
- Since she knew Danny was in the Crips
and she believes that she is a Crip,
she pretty much put into Danny's mind,
like, hey, help us out.
- (Narrator) Then Cheri's little helpers got busy.
- Chuckie's pad lock from his school locker
was sitting on the stand and they just happened
to pick it up and hook it to the belt
and all of a sudden that's when they started
hittin' Vera in the head and the body with it.
- It was their weapon of choice after that.
That and a big long paddle with a number 3 on it.
- Nicole took the paddle and beat Vera's ass
and Vera had a bruise on her ass.
And all Vera had on was a t-shrit
and her underwear.
- (Narrator) And the more Vera screamed,
the more it became sexual.
- I think Nicole gets off of a lot of violence.
- And Nicky was like, like she was gettin' real excited
and then she'd go over and start kissin' on Danny
like she was bein' turned on for what she was doin'.
- I think once Danny started beatin' her,
he couldn't stop.
He got off on it.
Basically he says, now this is gettin' fun.
- When she got hit her hand went up like this
and it accidentally hit Nicole's boob
and Nicole said, oh, (hands smack) bam,
right across the face.
Now you're doin' a lesbian act on me?
- After the beatings Vera, they would run up
to the room where they were sleeping at
to pretty much get it on.
- The idea that after they had beaten Vera
they would go upstairs and have sex
would also indicate that there was
some sort of real psychological thrill about this.
- I don't know if you know, but almost every bone
in her face was broke.
A lot of that's from being slugged for lookin' at Danny.
- Nicole punched Vera right square in the nose like this.
- Vera was not even interested in Danny.
That was all brought up because Cheri kept sayin',
"Yeah, Vera will sleep with any of 'em.
"She slept with all my sons.
"She'll sleep with Danny, too."
- And then as soon as they would beat on her,
they'd run right upstairs and have sex
and then come right back down and beat on Vera again
like it turned 'em on.
- (Narrator) By this admission, when you consider
whose bedroom was downstairs, Danny and Nicole
were not the only ones getting off on it.
- It always happens in Mother's room
for some reason.
- (Interviewer) All the beatings were in
your Mom's room? - Yes.
- Cheri just spoke out.
She just said, "Hit her again."
- She thinks it's cute of Vera havin' black eyes and stuff,
said she looks like a little squirrel.
- Like, she wants everybody to know that she wanted her
to be hit.
- She kept hittin' her head like this
on the dresser and Nicky kept sayin', "Can I kill her?
"Can I kill her?
- (Narrator) And through it all, to quote Danny Bixler,
Vera just took it.
- That's when he pretty much mud stomped.
It's a southern term.
It's where when they're on the ground you just stomp 'em
until they're pretty much weakened
to where they can't even get up again.
- When somebody gets beat up in prison
they call it that way.
- (Narrator) Her injuries from the mud stomping
were all too evident the following day
when, amazingly, they took a break from beating Vera
and walked her across the street to lunch.
- Somebody else actually told us what she wanted.
It looked like her lip had been busted
right here.
- We talked about it after we were done.
After they had left we all says, "Man, did you see
"that girl's face?"
- I'd made the comment to Shane and a couple
of other people, I said, "Man,
"she looks like she went through the windshield of a car."
(dramatic music)
- (Narrator) As it became clear the legal system
was going to minimize the enormity
of what had happened to Vera, frustration grew
throughout the community.
This led to the formation of Voices for Vera,
an activist group dedicated to bringing the people
who brutalized her to justice.
- We don't understand.
We don't know why that there was only two people
that was charged with this murder.
There was so many people involved,
and there's only two people that's bein' charged with it.
Except for lying to the police.
Wow.
- (Narrator) Nor did anyone in the prosecutor's office
figure out the author of these lies,
evidenced by how the judge sentenced Cheri
for passing on secondhand information
that she herself had created.
- Mrs. Brooks has a relatively long criminal history,
mostly minor offenses,
those of a minor nature, but at least one
felony offense, albeit some years ago.
With respect to Ms. Brooks involvement in this particular
case it appears that Ms. Brooks participation
is slightly, and I underscore slightly,
less serious than that of the others who've been involved
because it appears that her crime involves the passing
along of secondhand information, which nonetheless
misled the officers, but it appears to be
more of a secondhand information that she passed along
as opposed to firsthand information.
- (Narrator) Not only was the court fooled
about Cheri's role in making it the cover story,
no one even bothered to determine
when she told her family to say it.
- Yes.
- When Vera was sleeping
from her bruises, 'cause I had to actually do
her dang feet that night.
- Yeah, there was one night I had to do her feet
because Vera was too wounded to.
- (Narrator) Scottie is talking about Thursday
following Vera's mud stomping.
- I believe yes, I believe he did do her feet that night.
- And that's when she said if they would kill her,
"I hope they don't."
Like, you know, throwing it off.
That we would have to have a cover story
to protect this family.
- They had to think of something and put blame
on certain people to still try to keep certain members
of the family out of it.
- The secondhand information means
that Shannon told me that they took Vera
up to the tracks and that they degutted her like a fish
and that they left her up there to die.
And Shannon said, "Don't worry about it
"because she deserved it."
- It's like this.
You're looking at this hand while something else
is going on in this hand.
But you're pretty much more interested in this hand.
- That's probably what was in her head,
was to take Willadean away from Vera,
get Vera out of the picture so that
she could have Willadean as her own child
and have her raise it
as hers and Michael's
and it's not her child.
I mean, there's nothin' wrong helpin' Vera with the child,
givin' it baths, helpin' her feed her
and helpin' her change her,
you know, taking care of her, but she didn't
have to kill Vera, have Vera killed
just to take her baby from her.
- (Narrator) Yet, incredible as it sounds,
this absurd projection of Cheri's own motive
became the basis of the state of Ohio's case
against Vera's killers.
- The official version of events,
Danny Bixler indicated he was upset
with Vera Jo for spraying
pepper spray in the home.
- Not that Shannon had no involvement
in Vera's murder, she did.
- (Nicole) It's not only Cheri that was manipulative.
Shannon Brooks, Michael Brooks's wife, also
said that she was three months pregnant.
She was never pregnant.
- Cheri, I guess, while I was gone
had told Danny and Nicole that...
I had miscarried.
I never told her that I was pregnant.
Not one bit did I say that I was pregnant.
- (Narrator) Except, based on these Facebook timestamps,
this claim is a demonstrable lie
because in addition to posting she was pregnant
two days earlier, Shannon was talking to Cheri
about it the morning of the murder.
- If you go with the flow, nothin's gonna happen to ya.
However, once you go with the flow
you do get involved into it and
there's sometimes no turning back.
- (Narrator) And then she saw a way out.
- They had said that Vera had sprayed
the pepper spray upstairs to where
it was really bad.
- No, Vera never did, but yes,
Shannon did come back furious.
- At Vera.
- (Nicole) Shannon was like, "That little bitch,
"if she made me lose my baby, I swear to God
"I'm going to kill her."
And when she got back she said she had a miscarriage
and that she had to get a D&C and everything else
that goes along with a miscarriage.
- (Narrator) Nicole had clearly developed
a bond with Shannon, but she didn't understand the game.
- Vera caused it.
Blame everything on Vera.
Vera already caused everything else.
Vera can cause this, too.
- (Narrator) And with Danny and Nicole
accepting plea bargains, the judge responded
to criticism from Voices for Vera.
- Obviously the facts and circumstances of this crime
have been the subject of much media and public attention.
- Then to hear the judge say, "Oh, we're gonna provide
"adequate punishment for the ones involved in this."
30 days deferred with five years probation
and two and a half years reserved.
Dude, put 'em in jail.
- Many interested persons have spoken out
in the news media.
- You think this is one step toward some justice?
I mean, what's going through your mind?
- I'm hoping it's one step towards justice.
- Others have used various forms of social media
to express their views.
It is of course the right of all of our citizens
to speak freely and openly, especially on matters
of great personal and public interest.
But while the sanctity of free speech is beyond question,
it must also be remembered that opinion
unconnected to fact, the law, or for that matter, reality,
must be rejected.
- (Narrator) But what is the reality the court accepted?
- Daniel Bixler, Shannon Brooks, Zachary Brooks,
Garth Brooks, Cheri Brooks, and I agreed
to kill Vera Jo Reigle on March 26, 2011.
We agreed to do this because Shannon Brooks
said Vera Jo Reigle caused her to miscarry.
- (Narrator) Only, was this really the motive?
Well, I guess if you believe the source
used by Nicole's lawyers.
- Nicky's lawyer had came to the house to talk to me
and was wonderin' why was Vera killed?
Was it because of jealousy because Nicky thought
she wanted Danny?
Or was it 'cause of the miscarriage?
And I said, well, for one,
Vera always will and always will love Zachary.
She went to her grave lovin' Zachary.
- (Narrator) So imagine Cheri's delight at being presented
with a smorgasbord of her own lies.
- Vera was killed later on because of
the miscarriage of Shannon.
- (Narrator) But events leading up to the murder
paint a very different picture.
For example, the first time Vera got stabbed
wasn't even that day.
- She went into the bathroom
and Danny and them followed her.
The first stabbing was when Danny stabbed her in the leg.
- Well, Cheri said she took her finger
and stuck it in the hole,
the hole of her sore where they stabbed her.
- My finger went that far into her leg.
- (Narrator) This is no nightmare.
This was Vera's final day of life.
- That is one of the ones that were
mean to Vera.
- Yes.
- She had to pick up the dog poop of Jackson and eat it.
- I think they said Chuckie made her eat
the dog poop.
- They're all sadistic.
They're all...
They all had to have been.
- I'm talkin' about they took a plunger
and put it up (grunts).
- They sodomized her with it, yeah.
- She was completely naked.
She was her on her menstrual period that day.
They took a toothbrush, they raped her sexually
with the toothbrush.
- And then she had to use it for her mouth.
- (Narrator) The following morning,
five hours before the Mace incident
they were trying to stab her again.
- Daniel actually
gave me a knife and asked me if I wanted
to slice her, you know, cut her up.
- (Narrator) This was during a visit
from Punky's baby mama, Angel Might.
- I do know Zachary was hitting her
and then I can't remember if it was Danny or Nicole
or both of them that actually started hittin' her, too.
- And tellin' her to, you know, "Shut up, bitch.
"Be quiet.
"I'm hittin' you," you know.
"Shut the fuck up."
You know, just hit her.
- Her and her mother and her brother
sat there for 45 minutes they said,
watching this episode goin' on.
- Not only Nicole
and Danny,
but then also little Chuckie started gettin' into it,
'cause I saw him with a fishing pole striking Vera.
- Cheri had made up this thing, I don't know
how true it was, but supposably Vera had given
little K sour milk.
- She had gave Little K the same milk
that he went to bed on instead of comin' out
and rinsin' the cup out and givin' him fresh milk,
she just went on and gave that to him and told him,
"Get back on the couch and lay back down,"
and covered him up.
- She was scared.
- All cru, I mean all... - All crunched up
in a little ball, like in a fetal position.
She lifted her head once and I saw a cut on her nose,
a split lip.
- (Narrator) A half hour after Angel and her mother left,
the street fight between the Brookses
and the rival neighborhood gang broke
out and someone called the police.
This sent Danny, Nicole, and Zachary
running to his Aunt Sam's, Samantha Schwabb's.
They hid there in the basement until the police left
and were next seen two hours later
walking in an alley three miles away.
- I was gettin' ready to leave to head over
to take my kids someplace and they was walkin' up
the alley towards my house and they were like,
"Where you goin'?"
I said, "Well, we're leavin'."
He goes, "Can you give me a ride to my house?"
- (Narrator) George Speck lives by the Brooks gang's
favorite hangout, the skateboard park.
- Nicole Peters, Danny Bixler, and Zachary.
- (Narrator) His house is also near something else,
the railroad tracks where Vera was murdered.
- Danny, Nicole, and Zachary was at Samantha Schwabb's house
over here, and walked down these tracks around 4:30.
Now, are you telling me that they did not
go and try to scout out a place to kill Vera
five hours later?
- (Narrator) From the bridge they continued down the tracks
toward Alan Cap's apartment, which is beside
that rail line, too.
So in addition to casing the murder scene,
they were also plotting their escape.
- (Nicole) And we just started walking.
We were gonna walk to somebody's house
and they were supposed to take us to Kentucky.
- (Narrator) We know this was their plan
because the following day after Vera was dead
and Danny and Nicole were arrested,
Zachary started desperately calling Gina,
trying to use the escape route for himself.
- Every time he'd call I'd be like, "No, you don't need
"to be comin' down here.
"They're just gonna put more stuff on you for runnin' away."
- Now mind you, Danny nor Nicole knew George Speck
or Alan Cap, so who's the ring leader?
And where is his sentence?
When is he going to get charged for all of this?
- (Narrator) By the time the three co-conspirators
were riding across town in the back of George's pickup,
they already had a cover story,
the murder scene scouted, and an escape plan ready to hatch.
By 5:15 the Brooks house was filled with pepper spray,
forcing a complete evacuation.
- The Mace was upstairs but it was comin' downstairs
once Danny opened the door.
- All the windows were open.
They were airin' the house out.
- (Narrator) Hospital records show Shannon arrived
at the ER at 5:32 p.m.
Around the same time, while the Brooks house
was being aired out from the Mace,
Danny and Nicole walked over to his sister's place.
- He told me that they just asked him all day
to do somethin' about her.
- (Narrator) But was he in a rage strong enough
to kill Vera?
- They were just, you know, sayin' how much they
just didn't want her around anymore.
And I mean, I just figured that they would
either kick her out or something like that
or just tell her to get her kid and leave,
but that wasn't even, obviously,
that wasn't what they were thinking.
- (Interviewer) From what I've been told is that
you were gettin' this kind of pressure before the Mace
ever went off.
- (Narrator) So by elevating Shannon from bit player
to a starring role, prosecutors got it backwards.
Like breaking her nose for pushing the baby
into a coffee table, or beating her to a pulp
for eating Punky's Kit Kat bar,
they needed a rationalization to blame the victim,
an excuse to punish her.
That means Vera was not killed
because they accused her of setting off the Mace.
They accused her of setting off the Mace
for a reason to kill her.
- (Narrator) At nine o'clock, Zachary summoned Danny,
Nicole, and his brother Garth to Scottie's room.
- I overheard the things,
I was pretty much like, nah, they're not really gonna do it.
- (Narrator) This meeting was to decide where to kill Vera.
Danny wanted to do it in a park they checked out
earlier in the day, which he felt was more secluded.
- You remember that park, Alan,
that me, you, and Garth went fishin' at?
- It's right over there by,
you know where Center Street's at?
- (Interviewer) Yeah.
- That park that goes down Center Street.
Right by the bridge.
- (Narrator) But Zachary wanted to go back to the bridge,
insisting they stick to the plan of having the train
turn Vera's body into hamburger.
- They wanted everybody to think that the train
- Hit her. - hit her.
- (Narrator) As the murderers went into action,
Vera began to panic.
- When they told her to put her shoes on,
she was like yelling, "Why?"
You know, like, "Why?
"Why do you want me to get my shoes on?"
And Zachary had went up to her and said,
"Just get your effin' shoes on," ya know?
So she--
- Zachary and Danny.
And then Nicole had come in and she was standing
right by Vera's door and she's like,
"You need to put your damn shoes on right now."
And then Vera didn't hesitate and she put her shoes on
and Zachary said he was gonna go with 'em.
- (Narrator) But apparently this was no comfort
because judging Vera's reaction,
she was just as scared to leave with Zachary.
- I think she knew what was gonna happen.
I was sitting on the couch right by her room.
She was lookin' at me for, like, a way out.
Like, she was tryin' to tell me to help her.
- (Narrator) When it became clear Shannon was no help,
she reached out to Scottie.
- She knew what's gonna come.
That's why she asked me to come along with her.
- Because she felt safe with him
and she wanted Scottie to walk with her.
- But I told her hold up, I would have to go upstairs
real quick to get my shoes.
Well, as I got upstairs
I pretty much was stopped
from leaving.
- I was supposed to say Danny.
It wasn't.
It was Zachary who stopped me.
- My mother.
But, like I said, Zachary's the one who stopped me,
not Danny, even though I told the police
it was Danny.
- That I think he already knew what was up
and he wanted to protect me.
- (Narrator) Scottie was not the only one
prevented from going.
- When Zachary was told to go upstairs
to get Scottie, it was right at that time
that she told Zachary, "No, you're not gonna be
"a part of what they're gonna do."
- (Narrator) Then they hustled Vera outside,
ignoring her pleas for her life.
- She said, "I don't wanna go.
"I wanna stay here," and she was cryin'.
Vera was cryin' wantin' to stay home.
Nicole said, "No, you're goin' with me now
"or I'm gonna crack your head right here on the porch."
- (Narrator) The temperature was below freezing
that night, yet Danny wore a borrowed pair
of dark blue gym shorts out of respect
for their former owner, Punky Brooks.
He also wore a blue Crips bandana
signaling this was official gang business.
- The ones that they believe happened first,
'cause then there was over, like overlay
where people had stabbed the same areas,
from what I heard, the first ones were weaker,
coming from a weaker person, a female possibly.
- She was cut from almost ear to ear
in a very sort of sawing motion,
it was described as by the coroner.
- (Narrator) This initial failed attempt
as Vera's recovered sweatshirt shows,
happened while she was still dressed.
- In one final act of humiliation that forced her to strip.
- Yeah, they found the clothes scattered around
in the trees and stuff, in the bushes.
They found, like, her panties and I think her shirt.
They took 'em off and then just threw 'em.
Didn't even try to hide that.
- A full day to day and a half
before the murder actually happened
that they were completely messed up the whole time.
Like, there was not one sober moment.
- He was heavily using alcohol, marijuana, cocaine,
and by his own account, an excessive amount to ecstasy.
- (Narrator) When questioned about why Vera
was made to get naked, Nicole Peters replied,
"It wasn't working at first."
Asked what his girlfriend meant by this odd statement
Danny Bixler explained, "That knife was dull as hell
"and she couldn't get it through the clothes."
Which, by strange coincidence,
is the exact same reason given by Cheri Brooks.
- The only thing I can think of is if
you take your clothes off, well then
you get to get to the bare skin and it'll go faster.
- (Narrator) These details told
in separate jailhouse interviews by two people
Cheri had not spoken to since the night of the murder,
are something only the killers would know.
- When they were stabbing at her,
maybe it wasn't that she was dyin' fast enough for 'em
because of the clothes.
When ya stab somebody that snags the clothes.
- (Narrator) So what appeared to be a staged sexual assault
was actually just laziness and they needed Vera's help
to make it easier to kill her.
- It's almost as if he's attempting
to minimize his conduct.
There's 21 stab wounds but he said he only did six.
But an examination of those six stab wounds
is also very telling.
First the legs.
Why was she stabbed in the legs?
He said it was to keep her from running away
so they could continue the abuse.
She couldn't get out of that situation.
- (Narrator) Then he mounted her from behind,
reached around and cut her throat.
- They tried to cut her head off
but couldn't get through this bone here.
So, it's like cut from here to the spine bone back there.
- I think they laid her out on the tracks
after they slaughtered her neck
to make it look like the train cut her neck like that.
- (Narrator) And then they fled, leaving Vera behind,
still alive.
- They left her to bleed out on the railroad tracks alone,
naked and in the cold, and from there,
he told the detectives,
he went to party.
- They were celebrating, yeah.
- They called me up and then they told me
what they did.
I thought they were messin' with me, so I walked
back to their house to see if it was true.
- I look at Nicole and she's got this big smile on her face,
you know, and she puts her arms out like this
like she wants me to hug her.
And she's like, "It's done, it's done.
"No more."
And I was scared.
And she just comes in and hugs me.
- When they did come back Danny went over to Zachary
and patted him on the back.
- When I go back in the living room
and Danny's in there high fivin' Zachary
and then they go into Cheri's room
and they're both kind of laughing.
- And I got there, they were talkin' about
how they killed her and stuff.
I didn't believe it 'cause after they said they did it,
Cheri was talkin' about how she was with Larry,
her boyfriend.
- And then that's when Nicole had said,
I got my first teardrop.
I finally got it.
- She says that to Cheri and she gives Cheri a hug
and Cheri hugs her back and they
start laughin'.
- (Narrator) And why wouldn't they celebrate?
To them Vera was the abuser of baby Willadean,
killer of Punky, smasher of Cheri's feet.
Now that evil bitch was out of Zachary's life
and she left without taking Cheri's baby.
- They came back and switched clothes
and then pretty much went out to get drunk.
- Cheri called me and said Danny wants to come back over.
- While Vera's body was still warm,
Nicole was visibly excited.
- She was excited and ecstatic.
She wasn't sorry.
You could see that in her face.
- She was smiling and happy and just,
you know, I've never seen somebody that happy before.
- (Narrator) But on the tracks, something was happening.
Vera was becoming an angel and she had a few surprises.
Using her last ounce of energy she pulled herself
off the rails and contracted into a ball
only 12 inches high.
- She curled up in a fetal position,
that's the way she always slept, in the fetal position.
- (Narrator) Miraculously this allowed
the front of the train, which police later found
to have a 13" clearance, to pass over without touching her.
- I started feeling like something was wrong
when Zach decided to pretty much drink the entire,
one entire bottle of vodka to himself.
- (Narrator) The angel started haunting Zachary
whose actions the rest of that night speak for themselves.
- Zachary said out loud that he only wanted to get drunk
just so he can forget about the whole entire thing.
- And he looked all depressed and upset about something.
Like he was involved deeply with his own thoughts.
- Zach was doing, like, weird stuff like,
like hit his head on walls and stuff.
- And I was talkin' about him.
I'm like, so, why is he so sad?
And I'm like, "What's going on?"
and that's when Danny decided to say,
"Well, I slit her throat."
And I was like, "What'd you do?"
He's like, "I slit that bitch's throat."
- (Narrator) So it was Zach's guilty conscience
that led Desta to confront her brother,
which ultimately broke open the case.
- They're sick.
They need help.
But when it's their time and they have to meet their maker,
hey.
- (Narrator) And when it came to motive,
on the final day of court, the judge admitted
he still had no idea why the murder happened.
- As we grapple to make sense of this,
perhaps as some have suggested,
that our community has failed Vera Jo Reigle
and I'm sure that debate will continue, but we must
also not forget that there were those
who were directly responsible for Miss Reigle's death,
and in particular defendant Daniel Bixler
who is here today for the court for sentencing.
The evidence reveals that on March 26th of 2011
the defendant assumed the role of self-appointed judge,
jury, and executioner.
For what?
Jealousy, revenge, unfocused rage,
some perverse sense of family honor?
It doesn't appear we'll ever really know.
♪ Of mine
♪ I'm gonna let it shine
♪ This little light of mine
- (Narrator) In the end, Vera is an angel,
one who's wretched life and bad death,
shines a light on the rest of us.
- And Your Honor, at this time I'd like to read a letter
that was found in Vera Jo's purse
after she was murdered.
And this is what it says.
It says, "I love you Willadean.
"You are a good little baby girl to us.
"I'm glad to be your mommy and I'm glad that I had you
"on November 4th at 4:16 a.m., six pounds 2 ounces,
"19 inches long.
"Mommy loves you."
- (Narrator) Worse, by not getting convicted
of a major felony, Zachary still had parental rights
to Willadean.
- Oh yeah, or they would not be makin' a reovocation plan
for Zachary to get his daughter back.
- (Narrator) A case already being discussed
when Zachary's friend Alan Cap arrived
at 10 o'clock on the night of the murder.
- Alls I heard is somethin' about them
wantin' to kill Vera about custody.
- She had that in her mind that that's her kid now
and Vera had it but that's her kid now
and she's gonna keep it.
And she had to
get rid of Vera because Vera wanted to move out
and take the baby, too.
- Like, I was right here and then their room's
like right here.
They were all in a group talkin' about killin' Vera.
- Like, if Vera dies then Zach gets custody.
- (Narrator) But why at this moment were they celebrating
Zachary getting sole custody?
According to the lawyers, it was all about
Shannon's phony miscarriage, wasn't it?
- They were talkin' about Zach havin' custody.
They never said anything about Shannon.
- (Narrator) A version of events confirmed
by the killer himself.
- (Interviewer) And did they give an indication of why
they wanted this done to Vera?
- (Narrator) It is a hope Cheri still holds strong
as she sits in great anticipation,
waiting for the return of her lost little baby girl.
- I added Daddy to the picture. (laughs)
Had to copy her daddy there.
'Cause I'm gettin' ready to frame it.
Still have to show him Zachary and her look alike.
♪ It is nearing the end of two
♪ And I just passed your birthday
♪ The first one that you spent underground
♪ And I really missed you
♪ So to feel close to you
♪ I visited your grave site
♪ But I just felt further from you
♪ Further than I understood
♪ I
♪ I miss you, but
♪ I
♪ I miss you, but
♪ And I'll be fine if heaven
♪ Isn't just a cloud
♪ And I'll be fine if we don't decay underground
♪ Forever