Just say you've been thinking about this thing for the past 13 years. A man who now lives in Wisconsin is accused of drowning his wife in the bathtub of their suburban home. You just saw 70-year-old Frank Bushower. For 13 years, Frank has lived a free man after the mysterious drowning of his wife. And now, as this old man cries and begs, I knew she was in there. Reached out and picked her up and saw her face. I knew she was dead. you will realize that there is no escaping the past. Frank, if you had something to do with this, um, you're going to have to let us go now. I felt it was a mistake, but we live with our mistakes. On February 28th, 2000, just after 2:00 a.m., South Bington police in Illinois received a frantic 911 call. Frank Bushau, a chemical engineer, claimed to have discovered his wife, Cynthia Risco, dead in their bathtub. Patrol officer Bryant Hanzoski was the first to respond. And even with the few investigations he had done, red flags were waving. Cynthia was lying dead beside the tub, which had plants, glass containers, and drinks on the edge, despite her body supposedly being frantically pulled out of it. Cynthia, who was a holistic doctor, had a lot to live for. She and Frank had adopted a son who was less than a year old from Russia, and he was the center of her world. But in an instant, he lost his mom, and there was no one to answer how it happened, aside from Frank. Frank was questioned for 13 hours, after which he requested counsel. From there, the case went cold. That is until 2011 when Bryant Hanzoski, now a sergeant in the homicides division, asked to reopen the case. After two years of investigation, police gathered enough evidence to have a real case. When officers approached Frank and asked to speak with him in 2013, he said he was willing to and had always wanted to find out what happened. Unknown to him, Sergeant Hannoski had, too. The following footage was provided to our team by the South Bington Police Department via foyer request. It took so long just to learn. We had to make our own coffee. Frank can make your own. Yeah. Nobody here. So, all right. Um, you want to jump in the middle? Okay. We can lay our books out and stuff like that and kind of go over things. Hey Frank, do you go by Frank or Okay. And again, my name is Okay. And that's Frank. As you can see, Bryant has been working on this thing for a while. He put these nice books together. We'll put everything in a chronological order. um different people that he's interviewed and stuff like that are in the book and we'll just kind of go over that. Uh back in 2000 when this thing first happened, uh you were interviewed by people from the state police, right? And their interviews in the book also. Okay. So, and what they did back then, they read read your Miranda rightites. Okay. And what we'll do now, we're going to read them to you again. Right. So, just, you know, just so everybody's covered in stuff like that. Okay, you want to kind of follow along here. Brian has actually been working on this case for much, much longer than Frank can possibly imagine. He's been waiting for this moment just as long as Frank has been dreading it. And when Frank's eventually confronted with that, his story will crumble. For now, police read him his Miranda rights and try to get him comfortable because they know he won't be for much longer. Hey, we can take breaks at any time. This is informal, okay? So, um if you need to use washroom or if we need to use washroom, you want to get more coffee, water, whatever. If you get hungry, you let us know, you know. So, we want to make this comfortable for all of us, you know, all three of us. So, okay. Well, I hope this doesn't take too long. I have a son in school. Yeah, we know that. That's why we wanted to stop by your house early this morning. Okay. So, we wanted to get this thing done before there's any problems with your son. Okay. What time does he get out of school? About He'll get home around 3:00. So, does he get a ride home sometimes or Well, that's the bus. He'll take the bus home. Oh, that's nice. Then you don't have to pick him up. He likes a ride in the morning, so I give him a ride. Nice, huh? Yeah. What time does he usually get home? The bus drop him off? Drops him off about 3:00. 3:00. Okay. And he's how old? 14. 14. Okay. All right. You know what? We'll get we'll get kind of uh your pedigree a little bit. Make sure we got everything correct. I don't know as much as he knows, you know, because he's been working on this, you know, and like I say, I've been working on this on and off and stuff like that with him. If he has any questions or anything like that, then um you know, we'll put our heads together and stuff like that. Brian has done a lot of interviews on this and stuff like that with people back from those days back there. He's put a lot of work in tracking these people down and reining them and stuff like that. And uh we'll kind of go through some of that stuff, too, if that's okay with you. Okay. All right. So, uh we might as well kind of just start from the beginning, you know. Let's go back. Let's take you back all the way to that day. Now, this happened 13 years ago. Do you know what the date was? I called on February 28th. Mhm. Um I know that um well that's when I called early in the morning. I think it was around 2:30 in the morning. Okay. 2:30 in the morning, I think. So all right. So February 28th, 2000. 2000. Okay. That's when this happened, right? Okay. All right. Worst day of my life. Yeah, I can imagine. Very traumatic, right? And at that point, how long were you guys married? We were married about 3 years and 3 months. Right around that time. Okay. Yeah. I know I've talked to a couple people, but how did you initially meet Cynthia? We were in the dating service. It was called Hearttoart. Okay. And we met that way. She actually was the one that initiated the the contact with me. Okay. Yeah. And then back then you you guys weren't living in South Bington. No, no, she was living with her mom in uh in Noridge and I was living in Display Plains. Okay. And then when did you guys get married? We got married on October 5th, 1996. Okay. And then at some point you made your way to South Bington. Can you tell me about that? What happened? and like the decision to move out there and all that. Well, um my house was small and uh we decided well my wife made a lot of decisions so she decided she didn't want to be in a a small house and we were looking around for a number of different at a number of different places and finally found some property out in South Bington. decided to have a house built and uh that was probably the beginning of a lot of our problems be having a house built. Problems is the understatement of the century here. When I hear problems in a relationship, I assume you're arguing about cleaning the dishes or a coworker who's giving your spouse the eyes. This was much, much more than that. According to Cynthia's friends and family, Frank and Cynthia's relationship was so strained and he was so furious with her that she was terrified he was going to take her life. And you mentioned earlier when you guys decided to build the house that was kind of the beginning of the of you guys when you were first married everything was good or Yeah. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? Well, you know, when you're building a house, well, I had first of all, we hired my cousin to build the house. What was that? my husband. Okay. And uh probably a mistake to hire a relative to do your work. And so we uh you know we got into it cost a lot of money over overruns and cost and it was my cousin. We were my my wife was very disappointed in in the progress being made at the house and rightfully so. Um, and so there would, you know, family is important to me. My cousin is important. I still love him. Uh, respect him. Um, was she right about them not being competent? The people he hired, I I don't I trusted my cousin. The people he hired, I'm not sure did. Um, let let me see. I I I think they may have pulled the wool over his eyes and by doing so had cost overruns on our house and it caused a lot of conflict between Cynthia and myself. So, and when you mean cost overruns, how much are you talking about? Well, another little bit might be okay. How how much are you talking about? Well, we're talking about a house that cost us $800,000 to build. Okay. That was the final price. That was right around the final price. Okay. Uh when I unloaded it before I moved out, uh it it I lost about $150,000. So yeah, you know, there were cost overrides because how how can you have build a house for a relative or cousin and say, you know, you can get your money back out of the house. Um, and she priced houses around the area and said, "You know what? This house is nowhere near that cost." And, uh, she was right. Now, when the house was being built, were you still living in the Plains? Yeah. Okay. A house did you say you had there? Yeah. Okay. So, were you going back and forth, you know, kind of keep an eye on the progress of the house and Cynthia also? Yeah. Yeah. Maybe more her than you. baby her more than me. Yeah, because you're working. I'm working. She's not really working besides doing the nutritional. Yeah, she would do a nutritional consulting and she didn't I mean, she didn't have a full contingent of clients. So, she would work maybe two, three days a week. Plus, you're building this house to be built around her business, right? So, she's really interested in this house and getting it built and getting having it done as quick as she can and having it done right because she's going to be bringing clients out that way. And she wants to impress everybody and you know, so she wants to make sure that this house is pristine, you know, the money that was paid to build this house, was that primarily from you or from her or combination? Combination. Did you have to take out a loan or did you get any money from anybody? Yeah, we got a loan from my mother-in-law. So, we and we paid her back. I paid her back actually even after my wife had passed away. I had some debt yet and I paid her. Yeah. How much did she loan you guys? I think I think it was like 150,000 or something like that. So, a good size loan. Good size loan. But you said you paid it back. Paid it back. Okay. Mhm. Nice. That was nice of her. Yeah. It was a little more than nice of his mother-in-law to loan him $150,000. According to one of the many letters that Cynthia wrote to Frank, their inability to pay back the money that her mother loaned them actually forced her to sell her house and move into lowincome housing for the elderly. It seems that the conflict surrounding the house was causing family issues on both sides. The officer asks if Cynthia got along with Frank's cousin who was building the home. His name is redacted in order to protect his privacy. So, did she get along at all? Yeah, we got along quite well initially. I mean, even even to the point where his his son was stood up in my at our wedding. So, yeah. So, you guys were married what a year before you started building this house? We were married a year and we were also going to Dr. Watson as a marriage counselor. We because this was causing a lot of problems, you know, and then it got that bad. You know, the problem with that is, you know, your cousin, you're kind of getting stuck in the middle. Yep. She's yelling at you. You're trying to keep peace with him because you love him. He's your family. and uh things are getting kind of crazy, huh? Pretty crazy. So, it got to the point to where you guys probably you needed some counseling, right? Either through Willow Creek and then you had this guy in Hoffman Estates. Yeah. Helping you guys. Yeah. I think he was recommended from Willow Creek. Dr. Watson was Yeah. And uh it you know at first I didn't want to go but after going to him and I think it was the right choice for both of us. Yeah. Uh they had you guys writing letters to each other or something like that. Yeah. What was the deal on that? Well, you know, with with Cynthia, everything I said, I I felt like I needed a lawyer when I talked to my own wife because, well, you would say this, you know, and then she'd keep track. And I said, you know what? Uh, let's just write down, you know, what we said and why we said it. And u and Dr. Watson was certainly in favor of me doing that. And so, actually, we were the week that she died, we were scheduled to go in and talk to Dr. Watson that week. And I had my thing written out and was ready to respond to her questioning. and she had given me a list of questions and and comments and I I responded in writing to them so that I could think about it rather than trying to respond out of emotion, right? uh at the at the moment I could think about what her questions were, respond to them in a calm and uh thoughtful manner rather than responding as a u defense mechanism. So these letters were written I think Brian's got a copy of these letters. We'll take a look at those but they were written prior to the counseling. Prior to the counseling. Okay. not in the counseling session like that. Okay, you write a letter, you write a letter, you know. Yeah, she wrote these. Was that her suggestion um to write these letters or questions or whatever? I think it was Dr. Watson actually. I mean, I I said, you know, I a lawyer to respond to you. Did he feel that was going to be therapeutic for you guys or? Yeah, he he thought he was in favor of it. And I was looking actually looking forward to going to the meeting because I had all my responses and Mhm. written out and was ready to answer, you know, her her thoughts and her concerns. According to the letters that he wrote at the time of these arguments with his wife, it wasn't just harsh words that he was worried about exchanging with her. In one letter, he wrote, "Our arguments have been extreme at times where rather than withdraw, I'm on the attack. If we can't resolve our conflict in a constructive manner, then divorce is better than assault or murder." The officers carefully go through the pages of the letters they found at the crime scene, but not the content in order to cement who has written what. That gives them the confirmation they need in order to dive into what the letters really say and the horrible reality that they suggest. So reading these letters, uh, she's referring to you as a second person. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And then you're responding back to her with your letter. Now, reading these letters myself, there's a lot of conflict, you know. Sure. In these letters. Absolutely. I mean, some of them, these letters are pretty heated, you know, between the two of you guys. Mhm. So what what's the deal with that? What is what's all the conflict about? Well, obviously about uh she wanted me to pursue uh actually a lawsuit initially against my cousin. Okay. Mhm. Obviously, I did not want to do that. I don't want to go to court taking my cousin to court. And uh she eventually came up with a much better way. And that was through mediation. And we were trying to actually we never Yeah. through mediation. And we actually were going to try to get my cousin into mediation. So we we met with my cousin the one time and just Cynthia um myself and my cousin and we went over some of our differences and uh um came out of that uh much worse than when we went in because who was that with? You mediated that with who? We didn't we did not have a mediator. Oh, you never did. we didn't have a mediator and that's why after that meeting we actually needed a mediator and she saw the need for it because uh she like my cousin told me you go to talk with your your friends and your relatives you don't lecture at them and Cynthia initially said uh it was more of a lecture lecturing my cousin on what his morality was and what his, you know, position was. So, it was more of a lecture to him than a conversation back and forth. And that's part of the reason why I needed to respond to her with writing because it would have been more of a one-way street. Well, how' that make you feel when you were in that meeting? And and by meeting, I mean, it's not a formal meeting. You guys were just sitting around kitchen table. wood. Yeah, we were at I think we were at my cousin's house or I don't I don't recall exactly where we met. Mhm. But it was more of a lecture. And uh was she upset with them, yelling at him? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very. And what were you doing at that time? Just kind of sitting there like I was kind of sitting there just uh trying to keep the peace. Trying Well, my Let her vent or Let her let her vent. My cousin let her vent and you know just went away and said they just just agreed to dis he agreed to disagree. She I I don't recall all the details of that meeting but it was not good. Well, how that make you feel when you're sitting there and she's attacking. It sounds like attacking. Oh yeah, attacking. Yeah, it's an attack. How did that make you feel yourself? Well, obviously it didn't make me feel very good, you know. I mean it's I I certainly resented it. I mean the fact that she would do something like that. I mean um you you discuss you uh you might you agree to disagree if if there there's something there and then you know you don't you don't accuse somebody of being immoral or or I don't know what exactly the words to use. If someone had cost me hundreds of thousands more dollars than I was expecting to spend, I would probably be lecturing them, too. And to be frank, Cynthia seems to have had plenty of reasons to resent him, too. Despite her mother reportedly being forced to sell her house because of their inability to pay her back, Frank admits to detectives that he loaned his cousin's wife $30,000 in order to help them stay afloat as their business struggled. Cynthia only found this out after seeing the money come out of their savings account. It seemed that that was another stepping stone towards the end. Trying to establish the timeline of their demise, police tried to determine when exactly the letters were written and exchanged between the couple. How about these letters? How long before those were two or 3 weeks? Two or 3 weeks. Yeah. And then how about the mediation when the three of you guys were sitting together? Oh, that was not We never got into mediation. We never got to go into No, between the three of you. Oh, between the three guys meetings, I guess the meeting or whatever you want to call it at his house. I remember that might have been that might have been five, six months pro probably a month before I wrote out this check. Oh, okay. So, maybe 4 months the meeting went together. Yeah. And then how long after that was the check written? Oh, I don't know a month. maybe month after that. So, and things were not things kept on getting worse. Yeah. Yeah. To the point you guys are now going to counseling. You you got this stuff going on here with these letters. I'm building up. Is this an everyday thing with her in this house? I mean, it sounds that way. I mean, pretty close. Um, I mean, yeah, it's it's like I would I described it as being nibbled to death by a duck. Really? For you? For me? Yeah. Because she would it would be a, you know, constant reminder, a daily type thing. Was this going on as soon as you woke up in the morning? Boom, she's on you. Well, no, not not quite that bad. No, not quite that bad. I mean there were a few days especially after we had gotten I mean after came into our lives um and we were trying to make things work you know and uh so I mean she had everything she wanted. She had the house, she had the office, she had the child and so I think things were actually getting a little bit better. Yeah. What was the deal with? Was there negotiation about adopting the child? What was that all about? Well, it was um we had both wanted children. We were older and we were no longer physically capable. I mean, we were we were looking to have children. And uh she said, "Well, you know, if you you love me and want to be with me, you know, you could, you know, you were willing to you know, you were willing to have with me, you know, to have a child. Why not have a child from Russia?" And and I said, "Well, you know, I I certainly was not objectionable to it because I I do like children. I have worked with children and I thought it would help us and not only help us but we thought we could help a child in in this world. Did you think it would help your marriage because she's this is going on? Yeah. Yeah. that because it was you she did wasn't getting what she wanted there and maybe I could give her something that she didn't want that was kind of take her mind off the things maybe kind of deflect or equally as important well you keep her busy and she doesn't she's talking about the baby and not the house I mean was that the motivation more or less I mean obviously you know for us now we're all a little bit older I mean even for myself having a child um right now you know you worry about your age and stuff like that. Sure. So, it was the hope really that this would calm things down for you and give you that time to get through that whatever was going on, as you call it, nibbled by a duck. Yeah. I just wanted to let her know that I was still totally committed to her and uh that I was willing to, you know, even go as far as having a child with her just because I was committed to her. Now, did you guys or did you draw up a contractor some agreement that if you adopted um who's from Russia, correct? Right. Um that she would drop No, no, no, no, no. That that's that shouldn't be part of the deal. I mean, was that brought up by anybody? No. No. Did was there any discussions that you know? No, I don't think there wasn't a letter. Was there something in the letter about that that you know I'll agree to adopt this child if you agree to lay off the stuff with the house? You'll have to show me because I don't recall that at all. Hopefully you know this, but having a child is never a way to save a marriage. That unfortunately couldn't be more obvious than in this case. Just 3 months after their son was adopted from Russia, Cynthia was killed. He never got to know the adoptive mother who wanted nothing more than to raise him and watch him grow up. Though Frank paints a bit of a different picture. I think she loved money more than she loved me. Really? Mhm. She loved her money. Are you sorry you married her? Yes. Yes. Even to this day? To this day. You wish you would have never married her? Yes. Why? Well, obviously she loved money more than me and I want I want to be the in the focus of any marriage that I would go to. Of course. Yeah. Hard to take, right? Hard to take. And she's nagging you every day. Well, not every day, but often enough. A lot. But I mean, it's often enough. some of these letters, Frank. I mean, I'm just seeing the way that you're writing and I could feel your your frustration and your anger about what's going on. I mean, talking about um you know, what makes you think you're my I mean, things like that. I mean, it's mentioned quite a bit that you know, controlling. Yep. And stuff like that. Um, go here. Um, from letter number eight, I'm just going to read this little paragraph real quick. When we are in church, you will write out a check for the amount that you want and hand it to me. Put it in the offering plate. My mother did this to me as a child. Maybe saying you that you treat me like a wrong like a child may be more appropriate. I am not your child, nor should I be um make I think made to feel so. I could I mean when Bob and I read these letters, we could feel I mean I could feel the way that you felt about the situation, you know, and I can kind of, you know, put myself in your spot. I mean, if you're not feeling loved, I mean, how did that make you feel? I mean, I could I could see it on the letters, but how did that make you feel? Because you mentioned it quite a bit. Yeah. Well, I mean, if you don't feel loved, you don't feel good about the relationship, but [Music] um I certainly felt that uh love isn't love is not just an emotion. It's it's something you work at. Mhm. And that's what we learned at Willow Creek that you work at a relationship and if you make a commitment, you keep working to make that commitment better. And so, uh, I felt that our marriage should be more not not even other centered, but because we were Christians, it should be Christ centered. And so, our relationship and once our relationship would be Christc centered, then we could maybe be other centered and each other centered. So I thought that we should be working on that relationship. I'm not entirely sure that someone in a Christ-c centered relationship should be accusing his wife of treating him like an in-word. Perhaps it's not surprising, but the hypocrisy continues. You went in the adoption thinking that you shouldn't have married her or when Yeah. Yeah. I mean that it was a mistake. I felt it was a mistake but we we live with our mistakes. We often live with our mistakes and I just you know felt that divorce I don't I don't see divorce as an option for marriages. I I think that's it's a poor choice. I mean if at all avoidable uh it should be avoided and that people should work at their marriages. I mean there are everybody has a marriage and there are difficult times in their marriages and uh they need to work at it. Frank doesn't believe in divorce but from the sound of things he believes in something much more drastic. Officers ask for Frank's retelling of events the night that Cynthia was murdered. I was reading the book and uh put it down for a while and fell asleep. Do you know about what time that was? It was maybe between 10 and 10:30 somewhere around there. M cuz that and work is the next day and so I fell asleep there and u didn't wake up until I heard crying for which was about 2:30 in the morning or so and I rolled over to I mean thought it was her turn to you know take care of him and you know said Cynthia you want to go into you know the other room and roll over and she's not there. Mhm. And then I hear the the motor in the the top going she was in there. How did you know she was there? Well, the motor was going. It was like, "Oh, no." You know? So, I got up and ran in there and found her. How did you find her, Frank? I went in there and I was looking and and the the top of the top was covered with scum of some sort. Apparently, it was her vomiting. And uh I looked forward and the water was still running in the tub. and I didn't see her. And then I reached down and was looking and I think it was at the opposite end. And I reached down and picked her up and saw her face and knew she's I knew she was dead. How did you know? Well, I mean, she wasn't breathing. She would been been on there there and then I I pulled her out of the tub over the side and onto the floor and uh then I just left and went into the uh bedroom and made the call. Do you know how long before the time you pulled her out of the tub till you called 911? Uh I matter of minutes, five minutes. Okay. Was she face up, face down? Do you remember? She was definitely face up. And they told me that wasn't possible the last time I interviewed people. And I'm saying no way. She was face up. Face up in the She was face up. I saw her. I pulled her out and she was face up. Do you remember if she was face up or face down on the floor? Oh, I don't remember. I don't remember. I mean, maybe think about it, you know. Yeah. Don't recall. Don't recall. If you placed her down, face down or face up. Pro probably face up. I mean, I would way, but would I put her face on the floor? I mean, into the floor. I mean, Mhm. I probably put her either on on her her side or on her back. Mhm. Um, did you try doing any rescue efforts? No. CPR, mouth tomouth? Why? Cuz I knew she was dead. How? I mean, what? When you when you leave the bedroom and you know it, it's this has been going since when she went in at at 10 or 10, whatever it was to 3:30 in the morning and you hear this thing running. I mean, Did she have any signs of death other than maybe no holes that you saw or no? Signs of death. I don't know what would be a sign of death. Mortise liidity. No, I didn't notice anything like that. Okay. Just so I can understand too. Could you just if you don't mind stand up and just show me how you actually got her out just so I don't mistake it. Okay. Okay. Well, so like say this is the tub right here. Okay. If this is the tub right here, I was down like this. Bent over. Is this the actual like outside here and there's a step? You're saying there's a step there. Okay. So, you go here and then what did you do? I pick her up. I pull her over to the side helping with the her with the tub supporting her on the side of the side here. Putting her down on the floor of her hair. Was she directly in the front of the tub or She was no probably towards the back on the side there. Okay. And then when you were pulling her out, did you knock anything down? Because from looking at the pictures, there was a lot of stuff around the side. Um some glass jars and looked like a coffee type deal. She had a dispenser, right? Was that I mean, if you're going in that way, just looking at the picture, I'm just wondering, did you knock anything over? No. in uh you know a rush that you know you just discovered her and there nothing nothing. Okay. So did you pick her just up? I pic picked her up pretty much. I mean she has the buoyancy of the water of a full tub. Okay. Mhm. Uh she's under 100 lb. So picking her up, you know, not a real big deal. Police have successfully gotten Frank to lay out everything without him even realizing. He's given them multiple motives. his established timeline of what happened and how Cynthia's body was discovered. He has no idea that the officer asking him these questions is a man who was forever affected by what he saw in Frank's bathroom over a decade ago. A man who has been waiting patiently for the moment you're about to see. And then the police got there quickly or it took a long time or they got there pretty quickly. Yeah. Um 15 maybe 15 minutes to half an hour maybe. They got there 15 minutes later. Yeah. After you called. Yeah. 15 minutes maybe. The police The police got there about that time and then there were other people who came quite a bit later. Oh, okay. But the first officer that the first officer that got there maybe maybe 15 minutes or so. 15 minutes after you called? Yeah. Okay. Do you remember what that officer looked like? No, it was me. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, okay. I met you at the door. Okay. I might not have as much hair. Okay. But I'm the first officer that got there. Okay. And I got there within a minute. I remember that. Okay. And I didn't know what it was. And you greeted me at the door and said you went. So, okay. Uh, do you have some pictures? Have you seen pictures? Did they show you any pictures? What happened? They showed me some pictures and they showed me that her knuckles were scraped and I I really don't know how she got all those injuries. Mhm. Well, let's take a look. Let's take a look here. There's a couple of them. I got some smaller ones, too, but these are just the big ones. Do you recall? Here's Now, you can see the whirlpool in this one. And she's laying next to the tub there face down. Okay. Do you remember uh putting her in that position? I don't remember putting her in that position. I mean, all I remember is bringing her out of the tub here and onto the floor. Where were you standing at, Frank? Well, I had to probably get up on the step here in order to do that. The step or way up there? The step right here? Oh, the first step. for a step. Okay. Okay. So, you're standing on that step initially. You stand on a step. You look in the tub. Don't see her. And then what do you say? You start feeling for her cuz the water's high. Mhm. And then you feel her. You see her face up. And then you reach in, pull her by under her arms. Probably under her arms. Yeah. Mhm. And kind of pull her head first over here. Yeah. And then just kind of slide her. Mhm. Or did you lift her up and place her down there? Um, as far as I recall, I slid her out, but I don't recall lifting her lifting her cuz she's not that heavy, you know. could lift her do it with no problem. Right. Probably. Mhm. And then maybe with the adrenaline flowing or something like that, you might have a little extra strength. Pull her out. Okay. The one thing I remember when I got there is that the tub was not full, right? And the motor was still running. And I remember that the motor was bothering you and you wanted it shut off. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Yeah. Do you remember the water was running at that time? No, not when I got there. The water wasn't running and the water was just a little bit higher than this level, which is right around the the jet, the lower jets area, the big jets, the main jets, I guess you'd say. Um, and then I saw her in this position just like she didn't change. We didn't move her when we took these pictures, stuff like that. Okay. Um, anything that I'm telling you is incorrect? Not that I'm aware of. Okay. So, when you got there, the water level maybe below the jets. Is that why it's making so much noise? It could have been. The motor was definitely running and no bubble in. No. And if it was, it was just from spray going over it. Um, but I know um that later on thereafter, not that long actually, um, you asked to have that motor shut off. And I think we ended up shutting it off at one point, obviously, because it's not running right there. Um, let's see here. Okay. So, is this how you found her or No. Okay. the tub was way up and you can see right here on this one in this picture in this part on ropole but there's actually some of that scum that you talked about either it's vomit or feces I'm not sure what it is but it was at that level right so I could see that the water was at that level at one point at one point it was at that level but when I arrived there within a minute or two after you calling And I mean, I was right down the street. I was actually at the movie theater down the street. Okay. Um when you call it, so it was, you know, at 2:00 in the morning, there's no traffic, so I got there real quick. Frank, how does the level get from being way up there to way down there within a few minutes? How did that happen? Well, apparently I shut off this spot because it was running and uh u whether it took me five minutes to call make the call and whether it took you one minute to make it there I don't know. Okay. What do we have next? This is actually um I'll put this is um we'll put this office one. It's actually a copy of one of the letters that were in the trash. Um, and that's where we first saw the letters um when we were at the house. Okay. So, this just talk it's just copies of basically what we went over earlier and we can talk about them a little bit more um coming up. But um we found that in the trash. Do you know who threw that in the trash? No. No. Okay. And then also um just of some of the ones that I blew up. Um this is actually um after um Cynthia passed away, we grabbed um some of the garbage and actually found um the original adoption papers in there. And I'll put this as adoption one. Do you know why? I mean, you can see the different ink and stuff in it. Well, I have my back. These are the all the adoption papers. So, right. Do you have any pictures of Cynthia and she had on her? Yeah. Let's take a look at those two. We're going to call this roll one dash one. And These are just the smaller pictures of some of the ones I've already shown you. Same thing again with the view from the bedroom where actually here the bathroom with her covered there. Okay. Is it refreshing your memory that you might have covered her? Because I did not. Okay. And when I went up there, I remember specifically and this this whole incident is is pretty well burned in my brain of when I remember. Um, I do not recall putting it on her, but obviously I must have. This is the equivalent of a child getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Faced with photos that directly contradict his retelling of events, Frank has no idea what to say. But how is he going to react when he's faced with scientific evidence that confirms that there's no way this was an accidental drowning? And the interesting thing here is when you look at the body, you see that there's actually pooling of blood, which is withinity. I'm sure you understand that. But it shows us that she was in that position. For me as an investigator, when I'm looking at something and I see pooling of blood, it tells me that body has been at that position for some time and that the blood has gone with gravity to the direction of where the body is. So you can see here there's heavy pooling of the blood here in the breast area and then even in the face and she was actually um to me lying on her stomach. Looking at this picture looks like there's some injuries on her knuckles. You say that you may have seen something like this before? I saw this. Yeah. Back then I have. Okay. And do we know how that happened? I have no idea. Prior to her taking this whirlpool pa bath, was there any injuries on her? No. Prior to that, no. You guys didn't get in any kind of scuffle or anything like that prior to her taking the whirlpool? No. That one's Cynthia A. This one's Cynthia B. Again, it just shows those knuckles right there. Do we know how that happened, Frank? No way. Looks like there's a little scratch on her there on her torso on her left. You can't see it as well in this photo. This is Cynthia. See, but she had cuts here on her bridge of her nose and then down here by her mouth along with a scrape here on her chest. So, it just appears that there's numerous amounts of injuries to her, you know, from what we're seeing. She hit something in her leg down here in her leg as well. You can see the line right there below her pelvis. Cynthia had over 15 abrasions all over her body. Unfortunately for Frank, police know exactly how she got each and every one. Do you remember her having any of these injuries prior to going into We know how these injuries happened. Here's Cynthia D. [Applause] And you can see on her right knee, there's a pretty good fresh cut right there. Did she have that? Like Bob was asking the other one, did he have Did she have that before? No. Do you know how she would have gotten that? No idea. Okay. Um, looking at these pictures and stuff like that, there was an autopsy done on her. Okay. And the pathologist at the time took pictures also and he found that these um pictures was suspicious also. So that's why uh at that time um there was the ruling that was made at at this at that time uh warranted further investigation. So, uh, we've had experts look at these pictures, you know, and we've actually met with experts that, uh, we've been working with, too. And what's happening now, this case has been ruled a homicide. It's not accidental, you know. So there was injuries on her neck too where there was a big hemorrhage hemorrhage on her neck to where it looked like somebody had her by her neck and pushed her under the water. So and we're believing at this point that maybe you know that you may have had something to do with her getting pushed under the water and drowning. So that's where we're at at this point. There's three medical examiners which are all experts in the area of water related death along with two experts that are um in the field of water death investigation have all written opinions that's saying there's no other reason for this uh what happened to Cynthia other than a homicide and that she was forced under the water. Uh the hemorrhage on her neck indicates that she was held under the water for a period of time where she did drown. She did drown, but it was because she was held under the water. And then during the uh medical examination, the me also noticed that there was peticia in the eyes in the scalp, which indicates the same thing, a type of strangulation type thing or forced under where someone's actually struggling to breathe. So, we've in the last three years had five experts extensively. We've reconstructed the crime. Um, and they all concluded and written wrote opinions that led to the change of this to a homicide. Frank, if you had something to do with this, um, you're going to have to let us know. Now, you know, say you've been thinking about this thing for the past 13 years. So, we want you to tell us the truth and exactly what happened here. We know that you're a good person and we understand what was going on in the background, but I know it weighs on you and you know what happened. I've always wanted closure on this. Now, I can tell you one thing. Um, my son one time came down to the kitchen and he opened a cabinet door and he peed inside the cabinet and I slapped him on the butt and sent him to bed and cleaned up. And the next day I asked him what happened and he said nothing. He said, "I don't remember you slapping me on the butt. I don't remember doing it. The only way I could have done this would be that without any recall because I don't recall anything. And that's the truth. Not remembering isn't a good defense, but it's one Frank has kept up for over a decade. In his initial interrogation back in 2000, which lasted for 13 hours, Frank said that he could have killed Cynthia, but that he didn't remember. He asked the police if they could give him a truth serum. If they could have, I can promise you that interrogation would have lasted 13 minutes, not 13 hours. You got to say something. You can't just say, "I had no recall." Plus, with with Bryant being there so fast, the water being low, uh, looking at her body, she's dry. You're dry. She's dry. There's no water on the floor. The only indication that she was in the water, her hair was damp. There had to be some time between the time you pulled her out of this tub and put her on the floor that you call 911. It wasn't an instant thing like that. You didn't call 911 and 2 minutes later he's there. First thing he noticed, everybody's dry. How does that happen? And then her legs are up in the air, which is a sign of rigamortis, right? If you look at the positioning of her body, it couldn't have happened the way you're saying it happened, the way you're telling us. Now, if you look at her here, she is lying on the floor. Her legs are in the upright position, uh, her body is thick. Uh, to drag her over the side of the tub, her body wouldn't have been like that. Plus, this indicates to us that she was face down in the tub. There's levidity like Brian talked about on her bottom. If she was face up in the tub, her whole back would be red. You know, the beidity would be on her back. Everything's on front. Um, putting her back in the tub. If she was back in the tub in this position, her feet would be sticking out above the top of the tub. So when you walked in there initially, you would have definitely seen her. There was no feeling around for her. The lighting was, you know, basically the way it is right here. Um, and what you see would be like the way you're saying, the legs are actually formed in in um, rigor mortise to the actual shape of the tub. Her head was where you said it was, but she was face down and the legs were going up on the side of the tub and they rested there for a period of time until you pulled her out and they remained in that position. They don't just when you take her out, they don't just go up. They have to stay in that position or if you like you said it would have been flat. You would have not seen this. This tells me a lot and I remember that specifically. The one thing I remembered that when I walked in that room, I knew she, like you said, she was deceased, but I checked for a pulse and I saw that these two legs were in a fixed position, which would indicate along with that levity that she's laying face down opposed to what you're telling us is face up. The tub was still in the house. And we actually had someone the same size as Cynthia get into the tub. And when they put their legs in that position and their head in that position, the legs actually go up and where you could see them out of the water. And then also we I consulted with somebody who's uh been a role expert for Jacuzzi for about 40 years. And he says even with a bubble bath soap in there, you still would see a human body. I'm sorry, but I remember what I remember. I You got to think back cuz we're here to help you through this thing. You got to think back like it was yesterday. You know what I'm saying? You know, the last time I went through an interview with this, I was asked, "How did I put my hands around her neck and how did I do this and how did I do that?" Mhm. I didn't as far as I recall. Mhm. And I don't recall any of this. Do you recall? I recall. Do you recall being in the bathroom when she's taking a whirlpool? I recall, all I recall is pulling her out of the water at about 2:30 in the morning and I recall the tub being full and the water running. Um, and the vomit on the top that I couldn't see her that I recall. But that can't it can't be true what you're saying. That's that's what I recall. I'm not I'm not arguing with you. You know what I'm saying? But it's just looking at the physical evidence and then what you're saying. The physical evidence doesn't match what you're saying, right? And you're you're an engineer, so you kind of understand where we're coming from. We're using facts, non-emotion facts to tell you what we believe happened, backed up by three medical examiners who have done thousands of autopsies, specifically more or less with water related death. And they say there's no there's a zero chance for any other possibility. There's zero chance. And we took photographs of the outside of the house, so nobody broke into the house. So, if it wasn't you, then who was it? No idea. No idea. I mean, Frank, listen, you're a religious person, right? Mhm. Cynthia's got to rest in peace, but we need to know the truth here. Yes. You know, we do need to know the truth. And we believe listening to you now, you're telling the story, but when it comes to the whole story, it's seems to me like you're leaving something out. The part where you don't remember and stuff like that, I don't believe that part. The test that police ran with the tub revealed a shocking amount about the crime committed against Cynthia. Not only did the subjects they had recreate the scene in the tub get the exact same injuries as Cynthia had at the time of their death, but every single person who picked the subject out of the bathtub got absolutely drenched with water. After running the test dozens of times, it was determined that it would have been impossible to remove Cynthia from the tub without getting wet, regardless of the individual's strength. Frank was bone dry when officers arrived on the scene. We actually had the bathtub. We took the bathtub out of the house and recreated it. You know, we know the bathtub was leaking. We know how much it was leaking. The rate it was leaking. They did a leak test on it. And um we know how much the water the drain didn't seal correctly. So, they did a leak test on it to see how long it would take to drain down to that level. Uh, and what you're saying doesn't match the work that uh, Brian did on this case. So, we had somebody, we filled up a tub. We put somebody in it and we actually did all kinds of simulations to figure out what happened. But, you know what? We need to hear from you. And I know that you want to say it and I know you don't want it to break your lips, but for your closure, what you know is true. You guys were having arguments about this house. Oh, yeah. It was heated. Those letters were exchanged. There was most likely an exchange between you guys when she was in the tub and you just blew because the next day you called somebody else and said you might have done it in a fit of rage. people that we've talked to, they all believe that you had something to do with this. And I've got from reports back then that this wasn't the only time that Cynthia was threatened. There was some physical like were you getting really fed up, you know, and this you got to stop this with you just got to stop this or I'm just going to leave you. I'm going to divorce you or I'm going to kill you. You know, one of those things left your lips. And like you said before, the marriage was a mistake. But we need to come to closure on this because everybody and you're a man of science or engineering, you could see by what we're telling you, it does it makes sense. It's not illogical from what we're telling you. I mean, no person that drowns has 17 wounds on their body, including a hemorrhage in their neck. You don't just get that by falling asleep in a tub. There's got to be force applied to it to cause bleeding inside. And it was too up here. And it doesn't have to be forceful, just enough to hold it down and to cause a hemorrhage. And sometimes it can be just a little bit of pressure. And that would explain these injuries on her also, you know, cuz she's trying to get out of the water and you're pushing her into the water. So, there's got to be a struggle going on here a little bit. Not some massive struggle or anything. I thought about getting a uh hypnotist or something to try to find out, you know, what happened. I maybe to recall the details better. But no, I I I just don't they don't recall. Cynthia's close friends didn't need a hypnotist to remember how scared Cynthia was of Frank. In their interrogations, almost all of them had a story to tell about Cynthia and Frank's relationship. One friend disclosed that Cynthia said Frank was like Jackal and Hyde and that he would fly into rages. Another friend told police that shortly before her murder, Cynthia had told them Frank threatened to kill her if she pursued a court case against his cousin. So these letters, just to go back real quick, um letter number eight, it said going to the peacemaker, flight may be a legitimate response in extreme circumstances when it is impossible to resolve the conflict in a constructive manner. Our arguments have been extreme at times to the point where rather than withdrawal, I am now on the attack. What does that say to you? What does that mean to you? If you're the one, you're the author of that. What does that mean? That doesn't necessarily mean physically, but No, but I I think it speaks to what you're just not going to take it anymore. You're either going to leave, get a divorce, or as happened before, if she keeps bringing up these issues, you might do something else. Because she told her friends that on a number of occasions, you took her your hands around her neck and said, "If you don't drop this, I'm going to kill you." Um, and it's not just one person telling us that. I did it once. I it was only once. Okay. But I did Yeah, I did do it once. And can you explain that for me? We had a meeting with and um and it was in the kitchen of the new house. It was before it was complete. And oh, there was something with the the countertop that didn't put in the proper doors or whatever it was. And uh she got I was so upset with him. She wanted the whole thing redone and she made a big scene out of it. And uh I was very angry with her afterwards and and did I think I I put my hands maybe on her on her neck, maybe on her shoulders and and shook her and said, "You know what? I could I could kill you." And I did say that and I regret it and I always did and I told her that. But yes, there was one time. I mean, she shared with a lot of her friends that she was actually afraid of um that you were going to do something physically and then harm her. The officers forced Frank to sit in silence, looking at the photos of his wife and the scene of her murder for just under 10 minutes. It seems that gives him enough time to think about what's to come and to somehow come to terms with it. What do you think, Frank? What are you thinking? What's that? What's that? Her mother. What mother? How does she respond when she finds this out? Because I have tried to keep her her grandson in her life. and who's going to keep her him in her life and how things going to work out. He'll be fine. We'll make sure he's taken care of, right? 88 years old. The next stop from here, that's where we're going. Okay. Explain things to her. What are we going to do? We'll take care. Don't worry. School right now, right? So, we're not going to deserve that at all. Still early enough, you know. We'll take care of Don't worry about her. She probably knows anyway. You think so? Yep. Guaranteed. Mhm. Because she's been interviewed way back when and I read her report and she's got her suspicions also. She doesn't believe that uh she just looked she didn't believe this was an accident from day one. Okay. But she cares for you too. Care for her? Mhm. But she she knows that there's a Dr. Jackal and a high factor. That's the way she explained it way back when. Mhm. That's what it said in her report. You told someone the next day that you did it in a third of rage. See, you told someone the the day after you were interviewed that you might have done it in a third of rage. So, you believe that it was it's possible? I believed it was possible. I knew it was one of three things. It was either or an accident or I killed her. That was one of three things. And the medical examiners that we went to, the three experts, including reconstruction, is all said. Those first two, zero chance. Ruled them out. There's nobody in the United States of America that has died with those two things that you're talking about. But that's not you have a mark on the neck about a with a hemorrhage. It someone forced her down. So there's a zero chance. And number three is the only possibility. It's 100% certain that that's what happened. Looking at it like we're looking at it. You agree that this is a homicide. At this point, I'm going to just have to stop the conversation here. I probably need to ask for a lawyer. Um, you know, cuz I can't go any further with this. Why not? What do you mean? Well, are you going to We're not going to put any We're not putting any pressure on you or nothing like that. We don't want you to say anything that you know you don't want to say. Okay. Am I being accused? Am I under arrest? Uh, right now we're just talking to you about this here, you know. Yeah. So, I think you're looking looking too far down the road, you know. We We need to get past all of this here. Detectives here. Okay. Sorry. Oh, excuse me. Want some more water? Uh, yes. You got to go to the bathroom. You know you're good for right now. Okay, hang in there. Okay. At the publishing of this video, Frank is hanging in there at Illinois River Correctional Facility. Shortly after this interrogation, he was arrested for firstdegree murder. In 2019, he was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison. By the time his sentence is up, he will be 99 years old.