rest of your life in florida state prison. >> after tony was let out of the courtroom, melissa's family went to their people and hugged them. >> my heart broke. it is a legacy for their family. >> melissa's own legacy is something called the garden of reflection. before her murder, she had worked for victims rights and raised money to build it. now, her name is inscribed there, too. the victim, as prosecutors told it, but in the end had nothing to do with knowing too much about it notorious scandal, but a victim simply of an all- consuming jealousy. that's all for this edition of dateline. and craig melvin. thank you for watching. watchin andrea canning: they were out for fun-- the beauty queen, the troublemaker, and the girl next door. she was really really-- cute blonde hair. >> they were out for fun, the beauty queen, troublemaker and

the girl next-door. >> she was really, really cute, blonde hair. >> one meant the guy of her dreams, love at first sight, but at second glance trouble, pregnant at 16. >> you wanted to be married. he didn't want to do that. >> one night an ambush, someone shot on the bedroom floor. >> help me. >> a teenage mom at the center of a murder mystery. >> fingers were pointed everywhere at everybody. >> who had a motive to kill? hello and welcome to "dateline." when 21-year-old ricky cowles and his teenage girl friend amy priestmeyer moved in together, her best friends moved in, too. at first it was like an endless sleepover, but then ricky was murdered. the killer bragged about the crime and police made a quick

arrest, case closed. not exactly. unraveling who was behind the diabolical plot wouldn't be nearly as easy. here's keith morrison with "mean girls." "mean girls." >> an interesting species, teenage girls. some are sweet. some are not. some are not. we call them mean girls and some in particular, as you're about to see, could be very mean indeed. it was 1997 when their story began here in the high desert north of l.a., lancaster, california. there was sarah chapin, then 18, a cheerleader and local beauty queen. you were a pretty popular kid in high school. >> i wasn't really popular, about the i was a cheerleader.

>> which helps. >> yes. >> amy priestmeyer 16, sporty, an a.p. student who looked like a girl next-door. >> amy and i were just two goofballs and we had a lot of fun. yeah, we partied, but things didn't get as serious until jennifer came in the picture and jennifer and amy became good friends. >> jennifer kellogg, 18, a little dangerous, catalyst for mischief or worse. >> jennifer was the wild child. she was on the dance team in high school and she always was the bolder one of any of us and she was always there for you if you needed her and especially if you got in trouble. she helped you get in trouble. >> she was the one your parents warned you about. >> yes. >> then there was shealynn cowles, 16, perhaps a little less street smart than the others, but drawn in by it all, too, even if some of the others

weren't that nice. >> they were fun girls, but they just always had an agenda on their mind of everyone owing them something kind of. their parents weren't going to tell them what to do and they just wanted to just be free. >> the girls just wanted to have fun, stay up late, meet guys, drink, do drugs. that was the time of freedom they were looking for and which they found in the summer of '97 along with the rest of what happened. >> 911. what's your emergency? >> help me. help me. >> so what did happen? it began just after new year's the previous winter. there was this house party. >> amy's parents went out of town and so amy said, "let's just invite some people over, have a good time." >> shealynn came along, of course. >> they were drinking, just kind of acting a little bit outrageous, you know, smoking,

drinking, partying. >> sarah was there and amy, jennifer, too. >> they were party girls. >> a little on the wild side. >> yeah. they wanted to be adults before their time. they wanted to grow up. they didn't want anyone telling them what to do. >> but one of the people at that party actually was an adult or close to it. shealynn's brother ricky came to the party. ricky was almost 21. he was done with school and he was working full time at his family's electricity business, high voltage lines, dangerous stuff, which paid very well. in fact, ricky was the proud owner of a new bmw and though he still lived at home, he was, if anything, mature for his years which mattered not a bit to the girls of the house party. to them he was tall and good looking and what else mattered besides that? >> amy and one of our other friends were kind of fighting over him. they both had a little thing

for him. >> right away boom, she wanted him? >> well, when you're a teenage girl and see a cute guy, of course, everything falls into place. >> it certainly did. was he crazy about her to begin with? >> yeah. he met her and it was like instantly. >> they were together from that very first night. it didn't seem to matter to ricky that amy was still in high school, was just a sophomore. they were in love. he took her away on trips, bought her lots of gifts, but when he introduced her to his parents, debbie and rick sr., they were not quite so bowled over by amy. >> she just manipulated him. she was really, really cute, really petite, blonde hair. >> wrapped him around her little finger. >> yup. >> you saw that happening? >> yes. >> but then we found out how old she was. that changed it a little bit. >> what were you worried about? >> at that point we were worried she'd get pregnant or something. she was a minor that, you know, if he didn't want to be with her or something, maybe he'd go to jail for rape or whatever.

>> rape, jail, what a place for a mind to go. looking back, debbie cowles says it was just some gut instinct that told her amy was up to something and whatever it was wouldn't be good for her son, ricky. so debbie tried to put a wedge between the two young lovers. ricky was living in his parents' guest house. his mom made a firm rule. amy could not stay over. >> she would be out there and try to hide in the closet and stuff like that. that's when it finally got where you can't live here. we can't have this. >> what were you trying to do? >> i thought he would say okay, you know, you are 16 and i don't want to move out because i'm living here with my parents for nothing in this house of my own. >> it's a story as old as young love. ricky's parents thought free rent would trump nights with amy. they were wrong. ricky didn't drop amy. he left home instead, rented an apartment in the sketchy part of town and amy, who had just finished her sophomore year at high school, moved in with him, but will it be happily ever

after? no. no, it would not be because now act two, the hard part, was about to begin. the light in the bedroom. >> coming up, the bffs move in with amy and ricky and that's when things turn deadly. >> she turns on a light in the bedroom, stands there for a second and then she looks down and falls against the door screaming. >> when "dateline" continues. sometimes your work shirt needs to be for more than just work. like when it needs to be a big, soft shoulder to cry on. which is why downy does more to make clothes softer, fresher, and better. downy. breathe life into your laundry.

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and is 2x more absorbent so you can use less. keith morrison: it was a love story that spring of '97, blooming here in the california desert. it was spring of '97 blooming here in the california desert, but in lancaster, like everywhere else, the unstoppable desire of young adults can bring out polar opposites in parenting styles. while ricky cowles' parents struggled to prevent what looked to them like a big mistake, amy's parents, georgia and larry priestmeyer, had a different perspective. >> i didn't think about it very much because i was 17 when i met larry. >> how old were you, larry? >> 24. so there was six years difference. >> and that worked out. >> 34 years. >> so the age difference did not worry them. they liked ricky. he was good to their daughter and amy's parents knew they didn't have much say in what

amy did anyway. >> she always pushed. >> maybe pushed the envelope. >> yes. always. >> of course, ricky's mom didn't know that when she called amy's mom looking for an ally in her effort to put the brakes on the love affair. >> i called her mother when i knew ricky was getting an apartment. i said, "she's 16. she needs to stay to them with you." >> what response did you get? >> she just says, "we don't have any plans with her moving in there," and that's how we left it and a couple days later she moved in and it wasn't a week later or so she moved her friends in. >> did the parents have any control at all over what she was doing? >> oh, no. >> no. >> but did you guess this? there was something else going on, big news about which ricky's parents knew nothing. amy was pregnant. it was her parents, georgia and larry, who got the news first. >> i was disappointed, to be honest with you. my kids knew about contraceptives even though they were raised to be abstinent until they were married.

>> you try to raise your kids to do the right thing. sometimes they don't. now amy was going to have to grow up fast, pregnant at 16, moving in with her boyfriend. was she ready for all this? maybe not. >> she was always very outgoing and liked having her independence. >> and girls just want to have fun at that stage. >> exactly. >> amy invited her two best friends, wild jennifer and sarah, the local pageant queen, to move in, too. neither one of them wanted to be stuck at home under parental watch and pregnant or no, there was fun to be had. they went to parties. jennifer stirring up trouble as usual brought her druggy friends over to visit, though amy insisted that because she was pregnant she wasn't using. did she seem at all resentful about the idea that she couldn't do the fun things anymore? >> well, a party girl becoming pregnant, it's kind of hard because everything stops.

>> yeah. >> especially when you're 16, you're still in high school. you're not grown up yet. >> but ricky by then was 21. he had different ideas about moving in together. he wanted amy home when he got back from his long day at work on those high voltage electrical lines. he wanted amy home alone. >> at some point they began to have some fairly serious problems and ricky, for example, complained that these girls had moved in and he didn't want them there. >> ricky decided to, you know, that he was done, that he needed them gone. >> which pleased the friends, jennifer especially, not one bit. amy wasn't happy either and so a couple months into this romance that started so hot and fast it seemed to be burning out. >> they'd been fighting a lot. she had thought about ending the relationship, but she was afraid that ricky's parents might take the child once it was born. there was a point where one night she just broke down and cried and said, "i don't know

what to do. i don't know if i should leave him. i don't know what to do." >> it was about then when ricky finally told his mom about his and amy's predicament. >> he goes, "i have to talk to you and dad." when he said, "me and dad," i'm like what about? "i want you to sit down and talk to you." he was really serious about some really bad thing and he tells me, "well amy's pregnant." and i said no, no. he goes yeah. >> exactly what she worried about and ricky was talking about breaking up with amy. >> he says, "i want to take care of the baby." i said, you will. that's your responsibility. he said, i need a way to tell amy we can't be what she wants us to be. i need a way to tell her. >> she wanted to be married. he didn't want to do that. now he had this big problem, just the problem you were worried about all along. and then turmoil. ricky and amy argued. he told her she needed to leave, go back home to her

parents. and then after she spent a weekend apart thinking it over, something changed. >> he said, you know, i'm so excited for our life now and i've just thought about everything and everything's just going to be fine. we're going to make it work. >> ricky was happy. >> ricky really was looking forward to being a daddy. >> because a lot of guys 20 or 21 years old who just met a girl and got her pregnant right away would not be reacting that way. >> no. but ricky was a little different from everybody. he seemed more grown up. >> by then amy had had a change of heart, too. >> she said, "i'm going to make this work. it's worth making work. i want my daughter to grow up with her daddy here." >> which brings us to august 12th , 1997. ricky left for work early. amy left a note promising to be back by 9:00 to spend time alone with him. then that afternoon she called him as he worked out in the hot desert just to confirm their plans and later when his dad

and he went to the county fair to set up lights, the calls from amy kept coming. when are you coming home, she asked him. of course, she had been out all day with friends. around 10:00 p.m. sarah in tow she headed home to see if ricky had arrived. >> she goes pounding up the stairs, gets up to the top of the stairs. i'm looking at her. she turns on the light in the bedroom, stands there a second and she looks down and falls against the door screaming. >> someone was lying on the floor still alive, a twisted, bloody mess. it was ricky. >> comingup. >> help me. >> how was amy? >> panicked. >> the new father to be helpless on the floor, what had happened when "dateline" continues. to—severe eczema, it's okay to show off.

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dispatcher: 911, what's your emergency? amy preasmyer (on recording): oh, my god. help me, please. keith morrison: after a night of running around, sara and amy finally went to amy's place 911. what's your emergency? >> help me. >> after a night of running around sarah and amy finally went to amy's place and found ricky cowles, just 21, lying near death on his and amy's bedroom floor. what did it look like there on the floor? >> he was kind of twisted up on the floor and all i saw was blood and so i said, "let's get out of here." >> what does it do to you to

see something like that? >> scares the crap out of me. >> 911. what's your emergency? >> help me. >> she was such a mess. >> she was hysterical. >> he's like bleeding everywhere. >> ma'am, i can't hear what you're saying. >> i grabbed the phone from her and i'm like hello and she's like this is 911. so i start freaking out. >> what's going on? can you tell me what's happening? >> we just got back into the apartment and we've been calling all night long and we haven't been able to get ahold of her boyfriend and we walked upstairs and he's lying on the ground. he's all bleeding. >> he's bleeding? >> he's not moving or anything. we just turned on the light and came downstairs and called you. >> hold on. i'm transferring paramedics, okay? >> by now jennifer and another friend were there, too. >> jennifer starts screaming to me ricky, i want to see ricky. i want to see ricky.

>> no. get downstairs now. amy, you don't need to see this, honey. i can't even stand to look at it. get downstairs. >> how's he doing now? >> he's twitching, convulsing all over. it looks like something went through his head. >> paramedics and law enforcement showed up. what happened then was hard to watch, intense, as sarah's video camera recorded a man struggling to survive. could he tell them what happened? >> when they came in the house, next thing you know they're shoving all of us into the kitchen and they carry him downstairs on his bed sheet and worked on him in the living room. >> did you shoot yourself? >> no. >> who did it? >> my neck hurts. >> who did it? >> my neck. >> his neck hurts. >> who shot you in the head? did you do it? >> as police tried desperately to get information from him, ricky became too weak to

respond. how was amy at this stage? >> just panicked. >> beside herself. >> yes. >> and sarah called ricky's parents. come quick. something had happened. >> by the time we got there there was so many people. i was screaming ricky, ricky. i knew he'd been shot, but we had no idea where or anything. >> or how bad it was. >> or anything until they brought him downstairs. i knew. i knew. i thought oh, no, no, no. >> it's like your whole life is disintegrating right under your hand. >> it did. >> then the paramedics brought ricky to a waiting helicopter. rick sr. rode to the hospital with his son. >> he was comprehending what we were talking about a little bit, but he was hurting pretty hard. i tried to tell him we'll be okay. we'll get to the doctor's, try to fix this. >> and they did try. as the doctors worked on ricky, his family gathered. amy was there, too, of course,

but whoever attacked him had done so much damage to his head, to his brain by august 14th, two days in intensive care, it was clear there was no fixing ricky. he was comatose now. only the machines kept him alive. his family went to his bedside to say their good-byes. amy was beside herself, hardly made sense. >> and she said why did you have to go ahead and die? you were supposed to buy me a car for my birthday. >> you're supposed to buy me a car. >> i'm thinking did i just hear that? in my mind i couldn't even fathom. >> odd, of course, but the cowles were far too distraught to try to comprehend what was going on in the mind of amy, 16 and pregnant. it was soon after that ricky died. his heart, kidneys, and liver were donated to people in need. amy moved back in with her parents to get ready to have ricky's baby and debbie and rick sr. vowed to find out who

did this and that's when a long journey began, long and as you'll see, very strange. >> coming up, on the trail of a killer. >> he actually told people, he said, you saw those helicopters that were over there? he goes, that was me. he said, "i did that." >> when "dateline" continues. (♪♪) this is a hot flash. (♪♪) but this is a not flash. (♪♪) for moderate to severe vasomotor symptoms due to menopause... veozah is the first and only prescription treatment that directly blocks a source of hot flashes and night sweats. with 100% hormone—free veozah... you can have fewer hot flashes and more not flashes. veozah reduces the number and severity of hot flashes day and night. for some women, it can start working in as early as one week. don't use veozah if you have cirrhosis,

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we're just hours away from the start of jury selection in the historic criminal hush money trial for former president trump. trump has pled not guilty to 34 felony counts says he intends to take the stand in the case. scottie scheffler took home his second green jacket the final round of the masters sunday. the world number one finished with a dominant 11 under. now back to "dateline."

the cops went through the apartment, but there was little ence to go on. ricky cowles was dead, but why? the cops went through the apartment, but there was little evidence to go on. >> they found a shell casing, 25 auto, i believe. >> a shell casing no, print trail no, useful dna, nothing missing and nothing in particular about ricky cowles that would lead you to think he'd be a murder victim. he's not the sort of person who would normally be a victim of that kind of crime unless maybe he owed money, a drug deal or he hadn't paid a gambling debt. >> that wasn't anything that was out there. >> tom harris and larry brandinberg, then detectives with the los angeles county sheriff's homicide, worked on the case. >> you always look at your victim's lifestyle because that usually tells you where to go and ricky worked all the time with his father. he drank some beer when he'd get done working and probably

smoked some weed every once in a while, but beyond that -- >> pretty standard middle class guy. >> he was a hard working kid. so he wasn't the type of kid that would have some big drug debt. >> but if the cops didn't have much to go on, that group of girls seemed to have some rather shocking ideas, though, of course, reporting this to the cops would be about the last thing any of them would do. >> from the beginning it was finger pointing here and here and here. jennifer's involved. shalynn's involved. she was mad at her brother or amy's involved or somebody else is involved or it was this, a home invasion. fingers were pointed everywhere at everybody. >> by? >> everybody else. >> months passed. the paranoia was palpable. amy and best friend jennifer weren't talking. sarah and jennifer weren't talking. ricky's family was just staying away from them all, convinced somehow they all knew something, but there was a price to pay for ricky's family staying away from amy. >> when she was in the hospital

having the baby, a friend of ours called us from the hospital and said her name's up on the board. your baby's going to come sometime today and i cried all day because i thought here's this baby i've never even going to see because my son's gone. >> about a month later the cowles impatient with the progress of the case decided to post a reward. shalynn, ricky's sister, went to amy's house to give them some flyers. amy's dad answered the door. >> i asked her father when he answered the door if they wanted any flyers and he said, "oh, why don't you come on in and see your little niece." >> there she was. >> i called my mom instantly and told her, "i'm holding your little grandbaby. she's just precious." i just knew i wanted a relationship with her and through her pregnancy we were able to kind of let things go

between our families. so i knew it would get to where it was easier to deal with each other if we were going to. >> it was. then grandma debbie got to meet the baby. >> a couple days later i went to their house to see her and i held her and cried my eyes out because is here she is, this gift, but i don't have him anymore. >> and a break in the case came soon, too. a 19-year-old who lived down the street from amy and ricky's place, billy hoffman, was arrested for ricky's murder. turns out, he bragged to loads of friends about what he'd done. >> he was proud of it. he actually told people there was a girl that he would carpool with, for instance, to go to work at k-mart. he said, "you saw those helicopters that were over there?" she goes yeah. he goes, "that was me. i did that." >> he denied it to the authorities, but he'd already told several people? >> several people. he had one person that actually helped him get the gun.

he had another person that helped him get rid of the gun. he would tell people that he did this i mean which obviously was his demise because i mean he got arrested shortly thereafter. >> billy hoffman was a drug user and small time dealer and it turned out there was some sort of connection between billy and wild jennifer. >> the cops came and said -- showed me a picture of guy the and said, do you know this guy? i said i'd met him once before at jennifer's birthday this year. she said this is who did it. >> sarah even snapped this photo of billy and jennifer there smoking pot together, which the cops were happy to have. shalynn recognized him, too. it was the weekend before he died. ricky was away deciding what to do about amy. shalynn went to the apartment to hang out with the girls and sitting on the living room floor was a quiet guy named billy. jennifer was high on acid. she told shalynn she should try some, too. it was billy who had the drugs.

do you remember how billy came to be in that condo? >> jennifer brought him over. >> a friend of jennifer's? she introduced the killer into the scene. >> yes. >> was jennifer somehow involved? remember, after she and sarah moved in with ricky and amy ricky wanted her out and she was mad at ricky for that. she was known for stirring up trouble, but murder? the idea seemed preposterous. anyway, it was billy hoffman who went on trial, not jennifer and he just clammed up, denying everything. no matter. he was convicted and got life without the possibility of parole. so story over? not by a long shot. g shot. >> coming up, a conversation with the killer, he has a

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it was easy, and inexpensive. welcome back to "dateline." i'm andrea canning. billy hoffman was serving time in prison, convicted welcome back to "dateline." i'm andrea canning. billy hoffman was serving time in prison convicted of killing ricky cowles, but it wasn't case closed. hoffman was about to spill a chilling secret that would set off a new investigation.

here again is keith morrison with "mean girls." >> lancaster, california, ticked into the new millennium nearly three years after ricky cowles was dispatched from all knowledge of time and two families that might otherwise have gone completely off the rails stayed intact because of an amazing gift, the baby daughter he helped create and left behind. the man who killed her father before she was born was in prison. the teenager who gave birth to her grew into womanhood and even ricky's parents, the cowles, who hadn't liked amy from the start developed a grudging respect for her. >> amy was really good. i can't say one thing bad about amy. >> as a mother. >> she was perfect as a mother. >> that might have been the end of the story. life does have to go on and their hours with their granddaughter were some of the sweetest they'd ever had, but they just couldn't erase their one nagging belief, that billy hoffman did not act alone when

he killed their son. >> even though billy was convicted, that wasn't the whole story. >> no. at billy's trial he didn't confess. he was convicted on circumstantial evidence. >> he kept saying, "i didn't do it. i didn't do it." >> yeah in. 2002 he wrote us a letter. >> oh, yes, the letter, the key to the whole thing really. without that letter, well, it was 2002 and billy hoffman had been in prison for three years when he wrote to the cowles that he was remorseful. he'd found god he said and with that a sense of obligation to say he was sorry. >> i'm reading it, reading it and then i'm crying and reading it and crying and reading it. i'm by myself. >> what did it say? >> that he was sorry, that he had done things that he shouldn't have and that he hoped that, you know, we would for give him someday. >> and then she went back to the beginning and read this one curious phrase.

he wrote, "i would like to begin by confessing my part in the murder of richard as the one who took his life," my part. when ricky's parents saw this letter and they saw apologizing for his part, that spoke volumes to them, i guess. >> oh, yeah. they took the letter to the d.a.'s office immediately and the d.a. contacted our office and it went from there. >> five years after ricky's murder the dormant investigation was revived. >> we're on tape now. the time is 1400 hours, the date september 12th , 2002. >> sheriff's homicide detectives went to billy's prison to ask him what did you mean by your part? >> you were convicted of murdering a richard cowles. >> yes. >> why don't you tell me from the beginning how did the thing happen. >> and finally billy hoffman grappling himself over what he'd done stopped denying

anything and told the cops his long secret story and for the very first time a certain name came popping out of his mouth. >> i can't remember exact days or anything like, that but i'd say a couple weeks before the murder happened i was at my house and jennifer kellogg asked me if i would kill somebody and i said yes, i would. >> astonishingly it was that easy. jennifer simply asked him to kill and he said yes, but listen carefully to billy's mono tone. as he tells her story, you'll hear another name. after all, mean girls don't tend to scheme alone. so who was with jennifer when she arranged the murder? listen. >> amy priestmeyer took me to the apartment and showed me how the layout was. >> amy is -- >> was cowles girl friend, mother of his kid. >> she also knew about it?

>> amy knew about it, but not just knew about it. right along with jennifer, she, the apparently loving girl friend, said billy had arranged everything. he recalled how they gave him a photo of ricky, told him to hide in the bedroom where he could peek through the crack in the door and see ricky coming up the stairs. the murder of ricky cowles was all set to go and then came the day august 12th, 1997, late in the day. jennifer and amy drove the 0.2 of a mile up the road to billy's house to pick him up. >> they dropped me off, let me in and then they left. >> billy sat there he said with a hammer, a knife, a gun, a pillow to use as a silencer, but remember, ricky ended up working late that night fixing lights at the county fair. waiting in the house, billy started to get sleepy. he started having second thoughts. >> i got tired of waiting because he ended up staying late at work or wherever he was and i didn't know what was

going on and i just kind of know what? i'm gone. so i left. >> and thus the murder of ricky cowles was prevented almost. billy left the apartment, shut the door, walked down the street toward his own house, had given up on the whole idea, but then -- >> i got to that corner, sure enough, amy and jennifer drive by and they're like where are you going? what are you doing? >> remember, amy had been calling ricky all evening trying to pin him down when he'd be home. >> they told me go back. he called. he said he's going to be off late. >> so billy told the cops how he obediently returned to sit behind that door armed with his tools of murder. around 9:00 ricky came home, needed a shower, went upstairs, entered the bedroom. he never saw it coming. billy hoffman attacked him with the clawhammer straight to the skull. ricky fought back. >> he showed up. he came inside and came

didn't knock him out. he turned around and yelled and i panicked and i just shot. he went down and i didn't know. i was afraid the gunshot made too much noise, didn't use the pillow or anything and i didn't know what to do. so i hit him with the hammer again. then i left the house. >> then billy gathered his things, walked home and paged jennifer. the signal that it was done. after the page jennifer and amy split up. jennifer took pot to billy. amy asked sarah to go home with her. sarah who didn't know anything about the plan, who was used as an alibi stooge, was used as the fool who would find ricky. why did billy do it? >> it was just glamorous kind of picture in your mind, you know, to be that person and cruising with your friends and

just at that time i think i pursued that. i wanted to be that guy. when people knew that, it was kind of like having a notch on my belt, you know. >> but in real life, of course, murder is not glamorous, not at all. that night billy went home scared. soon enough, he was arrested, consigned to life in prison and now it looked like two more arrests were called for. >> coming up, amy involved in the murder of ricky? >> did you have some dark nights of the soul where you look at each other and say she must have done it? >> when "dateline" continues. boat and rv all bundled with progressive you've got the peace of mind to really wander. yeah. yeah, i just hope it stays this way. once word gets out about these places they tend to -- -are you done? -aaand there it is. well, at least your vehicles are protected.

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keith morrison: justice, as everybody knows, tends not to roll quite so quickly as the movies justice as tends not to roll quite so quickly as the movies would have you believe. in the case of ricky cowles murdered in 1997, it rolled slow indeed. billy hoffman had his heart to heart with homicide detectives in 2002, but a case needs more than the words of a convicted killer. more investigation was needed. so they waited. everybody waited. ricky's parents knew they needed to protect their granddaughter if detectives made an arrest. >> all we ever told him was if

it comes to the point we're going to arrest amy, please let us know because i don't want that in her little brain the rest of her life that her mother is taken away by the police. just let us know. we'll take care of her and you do what you have to do. >> months and months went by. >> oh, years. years went by. >> and during those years the cowles held their breath and their tongues every week when they went to pick up their granddaughter and the woman they had come to believe had arranged their son's murder. >> we knew, but you know what? she superseded all that because i wanted her to have a happy life. >> it was easter 2005. love was in the air again. amy priestmeyer was just about to be married. her daughter was 7 years old, though we're only showing baby pictures of her, when ricky's parents got the call. an arrest was imminent and that set into motion a case in a completely different type of court. the cowles quickly phoned an attorney. >> we called and said we need to go tomorrow and get custody

of this little girl. >> the family court judge gave the cowles temporary custody and thus began a five-year battle between two sets of loving grandparents. >> there was so, so much turmoil between our families that we couldn't agree on anything. >> you say turmoil. >> there was no talking between either one of us. they blamed us for everything. >> they blamed you? >> they blamed us if we hadn't been persistent -- >> that amy wouldn't have been arrested, but she was. she was charged with murder, taken to jail to await trial. amy's parents stood by her then, still do. do you have some dark nights of the soul where you look at each other and say she must have done it? >> no. >> not a moment's hesitation? >> we have never, ever looked at each other and said she has to be guilty of something. >> but the jury did not agree. nearly ten years to the day after the murder of ricky cowles, july 30th, 2007, ricky's parents got the news

they had been waiting for, guilty. r, guilty. what was it like to hear that? >> finally relief. >> quiet crying, every emotion you want to scream and you can't. >> amy's family has cried, too, of course, just not for the same reason. >> everybody looks at us now like we're the bad people, you know. we're bad because of what your daughter did. i go i did nothing wrong. >> in fact, the judge gave you folks a lecture. >> she did that. she did that. >> at sentencing the judge looked straight at amy's parents and said there was a total breakdown of parenting, of moral leadership of any kind of sense of responsibility. what was that like for you to hear that? >> that was very hard because as a parent, i knew in my heart that we had done the best that we could do. >> amy priestmeyer got life

without parole, but in 2013 california put a new law in place. it said juvenile offenders sentenced with no chance of parole and who have since served at least 15 years may be eligible for a resentencing and that included amy. so her attorney struck a deal with the d.a. amy pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of second degree murder and received a reduced sentence of 16 years to life with the possibility of parole. jennifer, wild jennifer, the girl who loved to make trouble, she pleaded guilty to manslaughter and solicitation to commit murder, got 17 years. at jennifer's sentencing the judge blamed her for spurring amy on, but what made amy priestmeyer want to kill ricky? they did fight about her hanging out with friends when he wanted her home with him. they did talk about breaking up, but that hardly seems a reason to kill. even billy hoffman who so

casually agreed to murder a man did not seem to have any real reason why. >> did amy tell you exactly why she wanted him dead? >> i never got any specific reason. she mentioned something once about it seemed so petty, though. it said he wet the bed. i don't know why that would warrant murder. >> serving life without the possibility of parole, billy hoffman had plenty of time to think about his own role in the murder. after more than 18 years in prison, he asked the governor of california to grant him clemency, citing his youth when he committed the crime and his exemplary conduct in prison. governor jerry brown reduced hoffman's sentence to 20 years to life and two years later he was paroled. the cowles are unhappy that billy is free and still it remains the unanswered question. why did amy want ricky dead? was she so immature? is that possible? that she just -- the idea of killing somebody was like play

time? >> that's what i wonder sometimes. how do you go from living with somebody to thinking it's okay. we'll just have somebody else do it and it's fine. they're gone. they're dead. maybe it was being too young and immature to really fathom what was going on, the fact that you are really going to take somebody's life and you're really going to ruin other people's lives. >> when we sat down with sarah, she said she was deeply scarred by the betrayal of the girls she thought were her friends and struggled to make sense of her life. shalynn admitted she was often, frankly, a mess. you wonder what would have happened to you if that hadn't interceded? would you be a different person? >> yeah. i wonder, but the most thing i wonder is who my brother would be, you know, seeing people his age, you know, now. i'm thinking oh, how would my brother be in his life? >> and then there was amy and

ricky's daughter, the only good thing about the story. >> she's a wonderful little kid. she's not little anymore, but she's wonderful. >> does she get sad sometimes? >> that's not a part that she will let me see very often, but yes, she does get sad. >> the face she presents to the world is a happy little girl? >> yeah. >> happy, happy, happy. >> that's exactly what she does because she doesn't want to disappoint anybody. >> shalynn sees that quality, too. it reminds her of her brother. >> because my brother was the kind of person that didn't really talk about things that bothered him or, you know, he just was happy like her. that's the part that i get, that these a lot like my brother. she has his heart. >> after years in court the two families agreed to share custody of the little girl, though she spent a bit more time with ricky's parents. she also agreed, if unofficially, to leave the past behind for her.

>> we both love her. there's no doubt about it. we just love her in different ways. >> we want the best for her. they want the best for her. that's our goal, is to be the best for her. this is her life. >> of course, amy's parents, ricky's parents, wanted the best once before, as all parents do. could anyone have seen into those mean girl minds before two families paid the price? i'm andrea canning. thank you for watching. >> that's icall for this editio of "dateline." i'm andrea canning. thank you for watching. this sunday, striking back. iran retaliates against israel