- She was the daughter
of music royalty--
the only child of Whitney Houston.
- Bobbi Kristina wanted to be
the biggest pop star since her mother.
- But was Bobbi Kristina Brown
destined to follow her mother's heartbreaking path?
- I said something very terrible's gonna happen to her.
- There were disturbing parallels--
volatile relationships, substance abuse.
- There were numerous instances of her being seen on her knees,
out of it, stoned.
- Then a stunning double tragedy.
- I said, "Oh, God.
My worst nightmare is here happening."
- Coincidence? Fate?
Or was Bobbi Kristina the victim of a crime?
- There's no way in hell we should let it go.
- I'm Soledad O'Brien.
This is "Mysteries and Scandals" --
"Deadly Legacy: Bobbi Kristina Brown."
The similarity is almost too bizarre to be real.
In 2012, singer Whitney Houston drowned in a bathtub.
Three years later, her only child, Bobbi Kristina Brown,
was also found facedown in a tub.
Like mother, like daughter.
How could it happen?
Was this tragedy preordained,
or was Bobbi Kristina's death something more sinister?
The 911 call came from an upscale town house
in suburban Atlanta, Georgia.
It was January 31, 2015.
Bobbi Kristina Brown, the daughter of music legends
Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown,
was found alive but unresponsive.
- I heard the news...
and I just froze, like...
- I found out about her
being found facedown in a tub just like Auntie Whitney.
Immediately, in my mind, I said...
"Oh, God. My worst nightmare is here happening."
- The circumstances were very suspicious.
- The local police launched an investigation.
Was this a drug overdose,
or did someone deliberately try to hurt Bobbi Kristina?
Family members were convinced this wasn't an accident
and demanded answers.
- There was games being played on Bobbi Kristina.
She had demons around her, and she didn't even know it.
- The 22-year-old was placed in a medically induced coma
and clung to life for six months before she passed away.
- Bobbi girl.
She didn't deserve that.
- Whitney and Bobbi Kristina--
I don't understand how they both ended up in the tub.
I just don't-- I don't understand.
It's unbelievable. Like, what are the chances?
- So, if it wasn't a coincidence, what did happen?
Or was Bobbi Kristina doomed from the start?
- She's very cute.
- Bobbi Kristina Brown was born into a musical dynasty.
Her mother, pop icon Whitney Houston,
and her father, R&B singer Bobby Brown.
Her grandmother is Cissy Houston,
a famous gospel singer...
and her second cousin
is legendary performer Dionne Warwick,
whose son is successful music producer Damon Elliott.
- The entire family has been on the stage
and in show business since birth.
Bobbi Kristina always wanted to do show business.
None of us were pressured by the family at all.
- She didn't want to be Mommy or Daddy.
She was Krissy.
Jolly, always bubbly.
- For most of her life, Bobbi Kristina was raised
as an only child, living in the shadow
of her famous parents,
whose success came with personal troubles.
- Whitney had just attained stardom as a movie star,
as well as a singing star.
And her daughter was born amidst this phase.
But unfortunately, it was also amidst the phase
of escalating drug use.
- Bobbi Kristina was the light of their life.
But they had dual personalities,
both Bobby Brown and Whitney Houston.
A lot of the time, they were addicted to drugs.
- Bobby Brown had several run-ins with police,
including a DUI conviction
and jail time for a parole violation.
In 2003, he surrendered to authorities
on misdemeanor battery charges for allegedly striking Whitney.
He was released on a $2,000 bond,
and Whitney didn't press charges.
Bobby Brown eventually got sober, but Whitney did not.
- I know I'm not anything like the tabloids say I am.
I know that.
- Whitney, to your left! - To your left!
- Waking up to cameras in your face every morning--
that's the part of growing up celebrity, you know?
It comes with a lot of problems as well.
- In 2003, Bobby and Whitney moved the family from
from New Jersey to Atlanta,
which was becoming the new Motown.
But what was Bobbi Kristina being exposed to?
And what toll would it take on her?
- It wasn't the proper environment
for any child to grow up around.
- While Bobby and Whitney were living in Atlanta,
Cissy Houston showed up with two police officers
with a warrant.
Whitney had to submit to four weeks of rehab.
- After a turbulent marriage,
Whitney and Bobby divorced in 2007.
Whitney was clearly struggling when she got custody
of 14-year-old Bobbi Kristina.
Whitney's career was foundering.
Her income depleted, so she downsized her lavish lifestyle
and moved with Bobbi Kristina into a gated town house
in suburban Atlanta.
- Bobbi Kristina was never used
to seeing Bobby and Whitney apart every day.
I think she did the best she could to stay strong.
- Bobbi Kristina enrolled in public middle school
and became a cheerleader.
The 14-year-old was well liked and made friends.
One of them was an 18-year-old high-school student,
Nick Gordon, who would play a pivotal role
in the lives of Whitney and Bobbi Kristina.
- The official spin was that Whitney sort of adopted Nick,
that Whitney was friends with Nick's mom.
But it's not true.
Bobbi Kristina met Nick through a mutual friend
who dated Nick.
- Nick Gordon's mother moved away to Florida.
Bobbi Kristina-- and she had a basement
that he could move into, and so that's what he ended up doing.
- Whitney welcomed Nick into her home,
and Nick was like a big brother,
watching out for Bobbi Kristina while Whitney attempted
to get her career back on track with a new tour.
- Nick Gordon did fill a void that they had in the household
for both Bobbi Kristina and Whitney.
- He was just there basically
to keep Bobbi Kristina company and to hang out with her.
And Whitney believed that he was a good influence,
that Nick could keep Bobbi Kristina out of trouble.
- But according to Nick,
Bobbi Kristina started dabbling in drugs.
Was Bobbi Kristina already heading down the same road
as her mother?
After a lackluster tour and another stint in rehab,
Whitney planned a triumphant comeback
at the 2012 Grammy Awards in Los Angeles.
Bobbi Kristina went along
to celebrate her mother's return to the spotlight,
but instead witnessed her relapse.
- There were numerous instances of her being seen at the bar
completely hammered,
her being seen in the lobby
just on her knees,
out of it, stoned.
- Bobbi Kristina was with Whitney
when she interrupted a pre-Grammy interview
with singers Brandy and Monica
and Houston's music mentor, Clive Davis.
- Whitney bursts in in the middle of the interview
obviously high on something,
her hair half wet.
The look on the three people's face on camera
is one of disbelief.
Bobbi Kristina was with her all the time
and saw this erratic behavior.
- According to Bobby Brown's autobiography,
that evening, Bobbi Kristina had an experience
that was almost too surreal to be believed.
- Bobbi Kristina told us
that she was standing at the tub,
and Bobbi Kristina wasn't high.
She hadn't had a drink.
And Bobbi Kristina was running the bathtub
She said, and all of a sudden,
I guess she blacked out.
- Bobbi Kristina told me that she woke up...
and she was throwing up water out of her lungs.
And when she looked up
that there were a lot of security in her room,
and she was scared because she didn't know what happened.
- You know, we asked her, "Well, what happened after you got
out the bathtub? What did you do?"
She said, "For the first time in my life,
"Mommy and I slept together.
And Mommy held me all night."
- The mystery surrounding what happened to Bobbi Kristina
that night in the bathtub may never fully be explained.
Less than 24 hours later, her mother, Whitney Houston,
was discovered facedown in her hotel bathtub.
Paramedics arrived and attempted resuscitation.
But Whitney Houston was pronounced dead at the scene.
- By the time I got there, it was chaos.
I remember Bobbi Kristina sitting there,
and I saw it in her face.
It was like, "My mommy's gone."
I was trying to just hold her.
I didn't know what she was gonna do.
- Bobbi Kristina was in the hotel hallway crying...
hysterically, and she had fallen to the floor.
- When I got to the Beverly Hilton
and wanted to interview Bobbi, I was advised that Bobbi
was down the hall, was part of Whitney's entourage,
and that she had been drinking.
And she passed out, and they called paramedics
and transported her to the hospital.
So I never had a chance to interview her.
- I knew once Whitney was gone,
I knew that Bobbi Kristina was going to be next.
- Was there anyone who could save Bobbi Kristina?
What about her surrogate brother, Nick Gordon?
Or was Bobbi Kristina's fate already sealed?
- Almost anytime a high-profile celebrity dies,
suddenly there are conspiracy theories about foul play.
That's what happened when Whitney Houston
was found dead in her hotel bathtub.
But those allegations were shot down
when the coroner concluded Whitney died from drowning
due to heart disease and cocaine use.
The autopsy also found
prescription medication in her system.
With Whitney gone,
what would happen to Bobbi Kristina?
Was it her legacy to repeat the mistakes of her mother?
- And Bobbi Kristina clearly just idolized her mother
and was just beyond devastated when she passed away.
- Whitney's funeral was a tipping point
for Bobbi Kristina.
- That was a very tough day.
- Whitney's death--
I don't think Bobbi Kristina ever healed from that.
- One friend had recounted that she would sit in her room
and play the same Whitney Houston song
over and over and over again,
and that was just kind of her way of dealing with the death.
She really struggled with it.
- Bobbi Kristina was the sole heir to her mother's estate,
estimated at more than $20 million after her passing.
- In death, all of her albums jumped back
on the record charts into the top 10 or top 20.
So Whitney Houston is one of those stars
who became much wealthier in death,
and this really made this huge chunk of money
for Bobbi Kristina.
- Within months of Whitney's drowning,
Bobbi Kristina joined other family members to shoot
a new reality TV series, "The Houstons: On Our Own."
Also appearing in the show
was her unofficial 23-year-old brother, Nick Gordon,
who had lived with Whitney and Bobbi Kristina
since he was about 18 years old.
- The death of her mother made her very vulnerable...
very vulnerable, and I think that's when Nick came in.
- Nick was, I think, her fallback,
and she relied on him quite a bit.
- Family members began to wonder,
was Nick becoming more than just a so-called big brother
to Bobbi Kristina?
- On came this sort of flashy guy, Nick Gordon,
who just convinced her she'd be a star like her mother
and boost her ego beyond anyone's expectations, and...
and Bobbi Kristina went for the ride.
- After Whitney's death,
it seems like almost overnight,
Nick just popped up and became her boyfriend.
- He's definitely been my rock for years and years,
you know, before all of this.
Before all the glitz, glam,
you know, all of this, he was there.
- We move as one in how we do things together
and support each other as a family.
- At the premiere of the reality series,
Bobbi Kristina and Nick were caught off guard
when a reporter asked
if she was wearing an engagement ring--
a secret they were saving to reveal during the show.
- Final question--do you think Whitney would be happy
that you guys are maybe engaged?
- She would be very happy, actually.
That's actually what she wanted.
- I don't think that there was anybody
in the Brown family or the Houston family
that approved Nick and Bobbi Kristina's...
joining together, no.
I said, "Look, Krissy, be careful,
"because something is not right.
Something's not right."
- It was a surprise-- like, "They're together?"
He was like a brother to her.
I would always speak to B.K.,
and then Nick would be in the background.
I'd say, "Hey, man." He'd say, "Hey, hey, cuz, how are you?"
- The reality series focused on Bobbi Kristina
and other family members coping with the loss of Whitney.
Viewers observed Bobbi Kristina
clearly struggling, even drinking on camera.
- There are a couple of times when literally
Pat Houston takes a wine bottle out of her hand.
She says, you know, "You're not old enough to drink
and, no, you're not gonna be having wine at my house."
- And behind the scenes, Bobbi Kristina's life
appeared to be taking a dramatic turn.
- After Whitney died,
some of Bobbi Kristina's inner circle were undesirables.
- According to police reports, back in Atlanta,
a 911 dispatcher received a call
from Bobbi Kristina's downstairs neighbor
at an apartment complex where she was living temporarily.
No incident report was written by police.
However, several months later, another 911 call
about another disturbance at Bobbi Kristina's apartment.
Police showed up once again.
They said no incident report was written.
But clearly, law enforcement
was becoming a familiar presence.
Was Bobbi Kristina locked into the same pattern
she witnessed with her parents?
After several noise complaints,
Bobbi Kristina returned to her mother's town house.
And according to police reports, months later,
t another 911 call,
this time from Nick Gordon, claiming Bobbi Kristina fell
and became unresponsive.
She appeared disoriented and was taken to the hospital.
Police took no further action.
- Police were called to the house.
Nick labeled it "a seizure," which she had no history of.
- In January 2014, more than a year
after their surprise engagement
and a series of unsettling events,
Bobbi Kristina and Nick dropped another bombshell.
They were married.
Months later, in March 2014,
Bobbi Kristina received the first $2 million installment
of her $20 million inheritance.
- Now that Bobbi Kristina had inherited
the first part of Whitney Houston's estate,
she was the breadwinner in this group.
- According to "People" magazine,
tensions between Nick and the Houston family
reached a boiling point when Nick
wanted Bobbi Kristina's allowance increased.
Pat Houston, who was legal guardian and executor
of Whitney's estate, refused to relinquish the money.
- Pat Houston felt Nick threatened her,
that he made her feel unsafe.
- In April 2014, Pat Houston filed a protective order
against Nick Gordon after he posted tweets of himself
posing with guns.
According to court documents,
Pat Houston claimed that she feared for her safety.
But was Nick just being overly protective,
or was something more ominous going on?
- I said something very terrible's gonna happen to her.
- After the sudden death of her mother, Whitney Houston,
Bobbi Kristina Brown found comfort with Nick Gordon,
her unofficial big brother and now reported husband.
But family and friends voiced their concerns
about Nick's intentions.
Was he in it for love or Bobbi Kristina's money?
- Nick Gordon had money on his mind.
- According to court documents,
Nick allegedly manipulated Bobbi Kristina's bank account
so he could access her money.
- Nick Gordon had been taking money
out of Bobbi Kristina's bank accounts,
moving it into his own account
over a period of a year and a half or so.
- The court documents went on to say that Nick
installed security cameras inside their town house.
But were the cameras supposed to catch intruders
or keep an eye on Bobbi Kristina?
- Nick Gordon...
he controlled all of her interactions with her friends.
He basically alienated her from all of her friends,
including her father.
LaPrincia Brown, who is her half-sister,
was very close with her,
and from the point of Whitney's funeral until her death,
I don't think she had any interaction with her.
- Nick denied these accusations.
He insisted he loved Bobbi Kristina.
And the feeling seemed mutual.
- Knowing Bobbi Kristina as well as I did,
I know she really loved him.
And I know that she felt a connection to him
when her mommy passed because they were...
they were very close for many years.
- But as time went on, some family members
claimed their only contact with Bobbi Kristina
was through social media,
where she posted alarming pictures of herself.
- At this point, Bobbi Kristina looked emaciated.
- Was Bobbi Kristina already beyond help?
- I know that whatever she was battling, she was overcoming.
Fact.
Bobbi Kristina wanted to be
the biggest pop star since her mother.
She wanted to carry the legacy.
I was grooming her to be the next one.
I would go down to Atlanta and record her.
We were gonna work on her album.
You know, we were gonna do the single.
She was starting to work out, and she's so proud of that.
- Bobbi Kristina was very passionate
about doing her music,
and maybe passionate about her acting, too.
She just didn't have a chance, because she didn't have
all her loved ones around her--
those that really and truly loved her.
- By New Year's 2015,
Bobbi Kristina seemed to be surrounded
by Nick's circle of friends,
including Max Lomas and his girlfriend Danyela Bradley,
who moved into the town house with them.
- It was Danyela and her boyfriend Max
staying at their house
and all kinds of people coming through the house.
So it really became a free-for-all.
- During the last week of January, Bobbi Kristina
became entangled in a tumultuous series of events.
A security guard called 911 about another dispute
at her town house.
- When police showed up, no one was home, so they left.
And no charges were filed in connection with the call.
- Bobbi Kristina and Nick Gordon--
they were always arguing.
Things would escalate.
- On January 25th, two days after the 911 call,
Bobbi Kristina was involved in a car accident,
seriously injuring the driver of the other vehicle.
Bobbi Kristina's roommate Danyela,
who was in the passenger's seat, sustained injuries.
Bobbi Kristina was unharmed and passed a sobriety test.
- Bobbi Kristina-- she had her wits about her.
She didn't seem to be impaired in any way.
- They got into a terrible car accident,
and that sort of started this erratic week.
- According to court documents, two days after the accident,
Danyela Bradley allegedly witnessed an altercation
inside the town house.
- According to Danyela,
Nick was upset with Bobbi Kristina,
and so he punched her in the face
and knocked a tooth loose
and knocked her onto the couch, and she fell off the couch.
I think the couch was broken in the incident.
And she was on the floor,
curled up in the fetal position,
and he was kicking her.
Nick Gordon said to Danyela that, "I don't do this often,"
which indicated to her that, you know,
this had happened before.
According to Danyela, at some point,
he told her to go up to the master bedroom.
She could not get up on her own power because of the injuries.
So he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her upstairs,
and threw her in the master bedroom.
I understand there was blood on the walls
leading up to the master bedroom
from Bobbi Kristina.
- In response to the claim, Nick Gordon vehemently denied
that he ever abused Bobbi Kristina.
- I never saw them even fight and argue.
They seemed so happy.
I had no idea that there was any problems.
- Later that evening, after the alleged altercation,
Bobbi Kristina posted cryptic tweets.
And...
- I smelt it. I felt it.
I said something very terrible's gonna happen to her.
- Bobbi Kristina!
- What was the meaning behind Bobbi Kristina's tweets?
And did those messages trigger a devastating chain of events?
Coming up, a videotape deposition from a close friend
that's never been aired paints a disturbing picture.
- On January 29, 2015, after an alleged fight
with Nick Gordon, Bobbi Kristina Brown tweeted,
"On my own," and, "Let's start this career up."
According to court documents, the next day,
Bobbi Kristina reached out to an old friend
to discuss her relationship with Nick,
saying he was not the man she thought he was.
Was Bobbi Kristina ready to move on?
- Thank you.
- She wanted to get out of this life that she was in.
Bobby Brown and Bobbi Kristina had talked.
They had scheduled a trip
for Bobbi Kristina to come out to L.A.
She had some singing things
that she wanted to do that Bobby was going to help her with.
As far as I know, there was a plan.
- She called me, and she had called her dad,
and they had kind of made arrangements for her to come
so we can work on her music.
- Bobbi Kristina's plan to move to Los Angeles
would never happen.
On the morning of January 31st,
when a technician responded to a routine call,
roommate Max Lomas found Bobbi Kristina
in the bathtub facedown.
- Right now we're treating this investigation
as a medical call.
It is bizarre that the same type of incident
would happen involving a mother and a daughter.
- According to court documents, tests revealed
Bobbi Kristina had a cocktail of drugs in her system.
She was breathing, but her prognosis was grave.
Doctors placed Bobbi Kristina in a medically induced coma
to stop swelling and minimize any potential brain damage
from the near-drowning.
- I sent her a text,
'cause I didn't believe it.
And then I texted Nick, and...
and no response.
- From the point that Bobbi Kristina
was found unconscious and brought to the hospital,
Bobby Brown definitely had concerns
that Nick may have been responsible for what happened.
- According to a statement from Nick's lawyers,
Nick claimed he repeatedly offered to meet
with Bobby Brown, but Bobby's lawyers said
Nick would not meet the conditions set forth by Bobby.
- Bobby Brown asked Nick to tell him what happened
and, if he did,
that he would allow Nick to see Bobbi Kristina,
and he refused to do that,
which is what lead him to not want Nick to have any contact
with Bobbi Kristina after she was brought to the hospital.
- Then I started hearing all the rumors.
At first, I was like, "Nick? No, come on, Nick"...
I literally had no clue,
and I was very close to him.
- Nick insisted he had nothing to do
with Bobbi Kristina's accident.
According to court documents, two days later,
Nick went to the bank.
- It was February 2nd, just a few days
after Bobbi Kristina was found unconscious.
Nick was concerned about where he was gonna get money,
and he withdrew approximately $11,000.
He moved it from Bobbi Kristina's account to his.
- Family members kept a vigil by Bobbi Kristina's bedside.
Bobby Brown's lawyer checked court records
and made a discovery.
Bobbi Kristina and Nick weren't legally married.
So w did they pretend they were?
- She was never married. We know that.
That truth came out.
You know, when you're a teenager or you're young like that,
you want to say that you're married to your boyfriend.
- Almost two weeks after Bobbi Kristina
was found in the bathtub,
police obtained a search warrant for the town house
and launched a criminal investigation.
- Roswell Police Department will not talk to us.
They won't tell us anything that they did in their investigation.
We have no idea what happened physically on the inside,
what evidence that was collected.
- As months passed, family and friends slowly lost hope
that Bobbi Kristina would recover.
- Covering the Bobbi Kristina case has been
one of the saddest things that I've done as a journalist.
About five months after she was first hospitalized,
the family made the decision to move her to hospice.
And standing outside the hospice and watching people
come and go...
hug each other and cry.
- Six months after she was found in the bathtub
and suffered irreversible brain damage,
Bobbi Kristina contracted pneumonia and died.
- For a lot of people in Atlanta,
Bobbi Kristina passing away-- it was almost like mourning
Whitney Houston all over again.
There were so many tragic parallels
between the two cases.
- It's just a tragedy that she died at 22 years old.
Didn't even have the chance to really experience what she...
what she was supposed to experience.
- According to the medical examiner,
the official cause of death was pneumonia and brain damage
caused by drug intoxication and immersion in water.
The medical examiner's report also noted that Bobbi Kristina
sustained acute injuries,
including multiple scars.
But here's a key point.
The report said her death
was clearly not due to natural causes,
so the manner of her death was undetermined.
As family and friends gathered for another funeral,
there were still so many unsettling questions.
A videotape deposition that has never aired before now
may shed some light.
- Bobbi Kristina Brown suffered the same terrible fate
as her mother, Whitney Houston.
But questions remained about the manner
of Bobbi Kristina's death.
According to the medical examiner,
it definitely wasn't natural causes.
Family members were determined to learn the truth.
- I said, "I know, Krissy, don't worry."
I said, "I promise you. I'm gonna fight for you."
- After Bobbi Kristina's death, police in suburban Atlanta
wouldn't divulge any information
because it was an ongoing criminal investigation.
Bobbi Kristina's family believed
Nick Gordon was responsible.
They filed a lawsuit that claimed Nick's conduct caused
"substantial bodily harm and ultimately
the wrongful death of Bobbi Kristina Brown."
- It is not typical to have the civil suit
before the criminal case, but we didn't feel like
the district attorney was going to do anything with the case,
and we wanted to move forward
and pursue the wrongful-death claim
in order to get some justice for her.
- According to court documents,
the civil lawsuit accused Nick of giving Bobbi Kristina
a toxic cocktail, rendering her unconscious
before putting her facedown in a tub of cold water.
- There were claims for assault and battery
for the abuse that Bobbi Kristina was subjected to
by Nick Gordon in the days leading up
to her being found unconscious.
- Through his attorneys, Nick denied all the allegations,
calling the claims false, criminal, and frivolous.
But remember Danyela Bradley,
the roommate who was in the car crash with Bobbi Kristina?
Well, she provided disturbing information
that may shed light on the alleged abuse claims
In a videotape deposition,
Danyela offered testimony about the accident,
but she also answered questions
about Bobbi Kristina's volatile life with Nick.
- The first sentence--paragraph ten says the defendant,
which is Nick Gordon,
physically abused Bobbi Kristina.
Do you have any knowledge one way or the other
as to whether or not that is a true statement?
- Yes. - Okay.
Tell me what you know
about abuse of Bobbi Kristina by Nick Gordon.
- Nothing other than what she has told me.
- Which was what?
- That she had been physically abused by him before.
- Did she say in what way?
- Just hitting...
Pushing, throwing.
- Danyela was asked about an alleged altercation
that reportedly took place
a few days after the car accident.
- It goes on to state that afterwards,
he began kicking Bobbi Kristina...
In the side to the point that she was on the floor,
screaming and curled up in a fetal position
as a result of the defendant's attack.
Bobbi Kristina's tooth was knocked out,
and blood was on the floor.
Um...
were you a witness to that?
- Yes.
- It then states Gordon-- defendant, who is Nick Gordon,
then demanded that she go upstairs.
Bobbi Kristina began crawling on the floor
because she could not stand up
due to the injuries defendant inflicted.
Defendant then dragged her upstairs by her hair
and threw her in the master bedroom,
leaving blood on the walls and the staircase.
Afterward, Gordon stated to persons present,
"I don't do this often,"
indicating this was not the first time defendant beat her.
Did you hear that statement?
- Yes, sir.
- In court documents, Nick denied these accusations.
But according to her deposition,
Danyela claimed that wasn't the only incident
that allegedly took place.
Two days later,
in the early hours of January 31, 2015,
she and Bobbi Kristina were in the town house
when Nick Gordon returned after a long night of partying.
- What was he looking like and acting like?
- He was...
tired, angry...
drunk, um...
and maybe had, like...
And not--I don't want to say he was full of energy,
but he--he wasn't asleep.
He wasn't sleepy.
- According to court documents,
Bobbi Kristina and Nick got into a loud argument
that lasted about 30 minutes.
And then everything went quiet.
- Nick came out of the master bedroom
wearing a different set of clothes
than he had when he went in.
He went into a bedroom where Max Lomas
and Danyela Bradley were sitting.
He laid his head down on Danyela's feet
and at some point made the comment,
"Now I want a pretty little white girl like you."
- When did that statement occur?
- After...
after he had came out of Krissy's room.
- You didn't see Krissy again until it was...
till Max found her in the tub?
Is that correct? - Correct.
- Nick again denied the allegations
and claimed he tried to save Bobbi Kristina's life.
- The first thing that Nick did
was let the water out of the bathtub.
- The lawsuit says that he then later administered CPR
and was slapping her in the face and saying,
"Wake up, wake up, wake up."
- According to Max, he was just acting very strangely
and says, "Clean up, clean up."
Her lip appeared to be swollen,
and she had another loose tooth in her mouth.
At some point, she coughed up water.
At some point, somebody called 911.
- According to court documents,
the tub had been filled with ice-cold water.
And a bizarre detail--
there was a dustpan in the bottom of the tub.
But why would Bobbi Kristina take a cold bath?
- Ice-cold water with a dustpan in the bathtub with you--
it's, yeah, just kind of a strange set of facts.
She also didn't want to be around a bath all that often,
obviously because of what happened with her mother.
So everybody was kind of dismayed
by the fact that she was in a bath.
- Not only did Whitney die in a bathtub,
but don't forget Bobbi Kristina reportedly blacked out
and woke up in a tub the night before her mother died.
Whitney's death was an accident.
So what happened to Bobbi Kristina?
- 16 months after the death of Bobbi Kristina Brown,
family members appeared in court demanding justice.
They were convinced one person was responsible...
Krissy's boyfriend, Nick Gordon.
A wrongful-death lawsuit filed against Gordon claimed
Nick gave Krissy a toxic cocktail
before putting her facedown in a tub of cold water.
- She's definitely afraid of tubs
because of what happened to her mother.
- Nick Gordon's ex-girlfriend Sarah Gibson,
who first introduced him to Bobbi Kristina
when she was 14 years old, also appeared in court.
- She's a very dominant person, and you know, he claimed
to protect her so much, and I think that was the persona
that he tried to put on for everybody
and then, slowly but surely,
pushed every single one of her friends out of her life.
- I think that he was systematically alienating her
and making her feel like she had no one.
- When the time came for him to defend himself in court,
Nick Gordon did not take that opportunity.
- On September 16, 2016,
a judge entered a judgment by default
after Nick Gordon failed to appear in court.
Nick was found legally responsible
for the death of Bobbi Kristina Brown.
Nick was ordered to pay more than $36 million in damages
to Bobbi Kristina's family.
- There was a claim for pain and suffering,
a claim for assault and battery,
punitive damage claims for both of those,
and then the wrongful-death part of it,
the value of the life.
- Nick moved to Florida.
He maintained his innocence and claimed he can't come up
with the money to pay the judgment.
- We don't want Nick to ever benefit from her death.
And so, if he ever writes a book or goes on a show,
we want to be able to take whatever he earns
so that he's not able to profit from her death.
- In June 2017,
Nick was arrested in Florida on domestic-battery charges
following an alleged altercation
with his girlfriend.
- Nick Gordon denied the allegations.
- According to the state attorney's office,
the woman later demanded the charges be dropped.
The domestic-violence case was closed
after Nick completed an anger-management course.
In the meantime, the criminal investigation
in connection with the death of Bobbi Kristina
remains open.
- There's no way in hell we should let it go
because justice needs to be served.
- Bobbi Kristina...
She didn't do anything to anybody to deserve that.
She was a good young girl.
She had a lot of dreams.
- This is a young girl who lost her mom
and then lost her life
before she had the chance to pursue her own dreams.
Just--how can your heart not break?
- She wanted to always be with her mommy.
The peace for me is that she's up there with her mommy.
- Whitney Houston was 22 years old
when she released her first album.
Her only child, Bobbi Kristina, was 22 when she died.
It's impossible to ignore the tragic parallels--
the dysfunction, the drug abuse that caused so much damage
and contributed to their deaths,
the unbelievable way their lives were cut short.
But there was also incredible love and fierce devotion,
and maybe that's the real legacy.
For more on "Mysteries and Scandals,"
go to oxygen.com.