- In the competition
- In the competition for fame,
no one scores like a sports star.
- Fans will know who you are. They'll know your name.
- But there's a dark side to sports glory
that can lead to destruction.
- The money, the admiration--
they probably do start to feel a bit invincible.
- Why, on the cusp of greatness,
did Aaron Hernandez kill his friend?
- Odin Lloyd might have known something about
Aaron Hernandez's personal life.
- How did Steve McNair go from Super Bowl star
to victim in a murder-suicide?
- They just said that there was an unidentified woman with him.
But I knew.
- What happened when Bison Dele walked away
from his basketball fame into a murder mystery?
- Only one person knew what happened on that boat.
- I'm Soledad O'Brien.
This is "Mysteries and - Players and Slayers."
Great athletes often transcend sports
to become celebrities, even heroes.
But when players mix fame with a feeling of invincibility,
that can be a deadly combination.
Aaron Hernandez was a star on the football field.
But did his celebrity make him think
he could get away with murder?
Or did something else trigger the violence
that led to his downfall?
April 19, 2017.
Former football star Aaron Hernandez,
convicted of murdering his friend Odin Lloyd,
was in the third year of a life sentence
when he was found hanged in his cell.
- The news of Aaron Hernandez's suicide mainly came out
in the early morning hours on the east coast.
And it's an absolute shock, and it's just quite possibly
the strangest turn in this whole story.
- Hernandez's death was as mysterious
as it was unexpected.
According to "Newsweek" magazine,
Hernandez left a note for a fellow prisoner.
The story led many to speculate
about a romantic relationship between the two men.
- Some tabloids went so far as to call him a gay lover.
It's-it's... hard to tell where that comes from.
And so there's still a lot of controversy and mystery
around the recipient of that letter,
and also Hernandez's relationships
with some of his fellow prisoners.
I think we have a sense, as football fans
and football reporters, that we know these guys
because we see them in the locker room every day.
We see them on the field every Sunday,
and we got to see firsthand how little we know
with Aaron Hernandez.
- Five months after his death,
the mystery became even more complicated.
- Aaron Hernandez's brain was evaluated,
and he had extensive CTE, likely as a result
of his having played football,
and probably received many, many concussions.
CTE stands for chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
Encephalopathy is "sick brain."
CTE could cause a person to be more impulsive,
or use less judgment in a given situation.
But it's hard to link CTE specifically
to any given behavior,
or to any crime he may have committed.
- Aaron's troubles began long before the hard knocks,
instant fame, and aura of invincibility
that came with football.
- Aaron Hernandez came from
a very, very rough neighborhood.
He was pretty violent himself, growing up.
And for a moment of time-- just a brief moment--
he was able to put that aside
and focus on his football career.
- In 2010, the 21-year-old was drafted
as a tight end by the New England Patriots.
- If you're taller and bigger and stronger than most,
and you could run with exceptional speed,
and hands like suitcases, you're better than most.
And that's what Aaron Hernandez was.
He was phenomenal. - His star was on the rise,
and many thought Hernandez could be
one of the all-time greats of the game.
- If you're a tight end and you're scoring a lot,
fans will know who you are.
They'll tend to know your name.
- The money, the admiration--
I think on an immature mind,
they probably do start to feel a bit invincible.
- But did Aaron's success on the field
let him get away with actions
that would've sidelined an ordinary player?
- There were a couple of failed drug tests
for marijuana in college.
There was sworn testimony at trial
that he was smoking up to an ounce of marijuana
a day throughout the season, all year long.
Marijuana is a banned drug in the NFL,
which invited a lot of questions about
how could he get away with this
if he was supposedly being drug tested?
- He had only been playing for a couple of years,
but coaches and people in the building
were kind of upset by Hernandez
being late for meetings or not showing up to practice.
If you can get away with some small stuff early on,
and maybe you get the lesson that you're invincible,
whether that's on the field-- but also off the field.
- Still, Hernandez always delivered.
He set records in his first three seasons.
The Patriots expected big things from him.
And in August 2012,
they signed Hernandez to a five-year contract
worth an estimated $41 million.
- Aaron Hernandez had incredible opportunities
put in front of him.
- But all of that stopped with the tragic killing
of Odin Lloyd.
It became clear that Aaron Hernandez
was living one life on the field
and an entirely different one off of it.
Hernandez was engaged to Shayanna Jenkins.
Shayanna's sister dated Odin Lloyd.
- Odin Lloyd met the sister when he was working
an electrical contract job in Connecticut.
He did not come from a family with a lot of money.
- Odin Lloyd was definitely one of my closest friends
that I have known.
- Fun-loving personality, big heart, a protector.
If you were on his side of the fence, he had you.
If you wasn't, he wasn't rocking with you.
- Like Hernandez, Lloyd played football,
after work and on weekends
with the amateur team the Boston Bandits.
- He had a huge passion for football,
but he did not have the talent that Hernandez did.
He was not earning a living off of this team
as Aaron Hernandez was off of his team.
- After the sisters introduced them,
Lloyd began spending time with Hernandez.
- Odin never said nothing negative about him--
about Aaron Hernandez-- never to me
or... anybody I knew, to my knowledge, ever.
- You got the sense that maybe he thought
he was getting in with Hernandez,
and, you know, breaking down that barrier of a guy
that is hard to become friends with.
And then all of a sudden, obviously,
things turned out totally differently.
- On Monday, June 17, 2013,
a high-school student went for a jog
through an industrial park in North Attleboro,
five minutes from where Aaron Hernandez lived.
The jogger made a gruesome discovery.
A dead body, lying faceup in the dirt.
The driver's license identified him as Odin Lloyd.
- Somebody stood over Mr. Lloyd's body
and fired multiple rounds into his back.
And at some point, he had turned--they had fired
a coup de grace shot into his front.
- I know people that maybe put themselves in a situation
for something like that to happen,
and if it would've happened, I wouldn't have been surprised.
But for Odin, it was a complete shock.
Like, last person in the world I would've expected
something like that to happen to.
- Saddest part is walking in-- walking in the house...
and the lady knows that you've been with her son,
and her first question is, "What happened to my son?"
What's your answer? What do you respond to that?
"Darryl, who killed off my son?"
- The police got to work, and incredibly,
found crucial evidence lying in plain sight,
including Odin Lloyd's cell phone,
along with keys to a SUV
rented under Aaron Hernandez's name.
- Hernandez rented a bunch of cars.
He lent them to people that... that were loyal to him
to some degree.
- Investigators found the black Suburban
still parked at Lloyd's home.
They learned that in addition to the Suburban for Lloyd,
Hernandez rented a Nissan Altima for himself.
- So, at the industrial park where the homicide occurred,
there were tire tracks.
These were later matched up to the Altima.
- The tracks seemed to place the rental car
Hernandez was driving at the scene of the crime.
And the same day Lloyd's body was found,
Hernandez turned in the Altima
with potentially damning evidence inside.
- When the manager cleaned the car after it had been returned,
she found shell casings in the back seat.
- Forensics revealed that the casings matched
the type of gun that killed Odin Lloyd--
a .45-caliber Glock.
- Mr. Hernandez was probably their top suspect at that time.
- But if Aaron Hernandez killed Odin Lloyd,
what was the motive?
- What could Odin Lloyd have done or said to make
Aaron Hernandez believe that he had to kill him?
- Why would a football star risk his career
and his freedom to commit murder?
As investigators search for clues,
another horrifying question arose.
Was there more blood on the hands of Aaron Hernandez?
- A double homicide had occurred in Boston
a year earlier.
Police got surveillance footage
that showed Hernandez.
- From day one, Boston police zeroed in
on football star Aaron Hernandez
after his friend Odin Lloyd was found shot to death.
Shell casings in Hernandez's car
linked the NFL star to the murder.
Did Hernandez think his fame
would protect him from suspicion?
Was the football champion really a killer?
And did Aaron feel
he was so invincible he'd never be caught?
Using recovered cell phone texts,
investigators documented almost every move
Hernandez made in the hours leading up
to Odin Lloyd's death.
- He had spent the day with his family,
and later in the day, he began texting Odin Lloyd
to make plans for that night.
- But Hernandez also summoned two other men--
petty criminals he knew from his old neighborhood.
- He was texting Ernest Wallace and Carlos Ortiz,
telling them to drive from Connecticut
up to Massachusetts to meet him that night.
- Wallace and Ortiz got to Hernandez's home
just after midnight on June 17, 2013.
Ironically, Aaron's own security cameras
recorded their arrival.
- Around 1:00 in the morning,
the three of them leave together in the Nissan Altima
that Aaron Hernandez had rented.
- Hernandez and the others arrived at Odin Lloyd's house
just after 2:30 a.m.
Neighborhood security cameras showed
Lloyd getting into the Altima.
What happened in that car may never really be known.
But after about 30 minutes, Lloyd took out his phone.
- Around 3:00 a.m., Odin Lloyd texted his sister and said,
"You see who I'm with."
Several minutes later, he texted,
"NFL, just so you know."
- He did not mention Aaron Hernandez, but he said "NFL."
- About one minute later, according to security video
and cell phone records,
they drove into the industrial park near Hernandez's home.
- People who worked adjacent to the industrial park...
reported--later on-- hearing gunshots.
After the car was seen entering the industrial park,
it's seen several minutes later
pulling back into Aaron Hernandez's house.
Wallace, Ortiz, and Aaron Hernandez get out
of the car, but Odin Lloyd is nowhere to be seen.
- Hernandez, Ortiz, and Wallace went inside,
where the security video showed the football star
holding a black object.
- I, myself, carry a Glock.
And what Mr. Hernandez had in his left hand...
sure looked like the same firearm I carry.
- So, while police never found the murder weapon,
they did find a lot of surveillance video.
The police also pieced together shell casings in the car
that Aaron Hernandez had rented.
And then after the murder,
there was video of Aaron Hernandez
holding what appears to be a gun.
It's a lot of evidence against Aaron Hernandez.
- June 26, 2013.
Nine days after the murder,
Aaron Hernandez was in handcuffs.
Hernandez was charged with planning
and executing Odin Lloyd's murder,
gunning him down in the industrial park.
The Patriots fired Hernandez the day of his arrest
as the news exploded across TV, radio, and social media.
- A great many fans showed up
to his initial arraignment in court,
and cheered as the sheriff's van left
the courthouse and drove him to the jail.
- He's a sports hero. He's beloved.
People choose not to believe it at first.
- How do you plead to this indictment?
- Not guilty.
- I was always seeing people tweeting:
"oh, he's so cute,
oh, there's no way he could have did this."
Like, yo, fam, you're talking about his looks,
when there's a life at stake-- a life is gone, taken away?
- Even as Aaron's fans wondered whether
their hero was guilty of murder,
there was a stunning development.
The day after Hernandez was arrested,
the press learned that he was also under investigation
for killing two other people.
One year earlier, in 2012,
there was a drive-by shooting outside of a Boston nightclub.
At the time, police couldn't ID the shooter,
although they thought they had a description of his car.
- A witness recognized what was a Toyota 4Runner,
and then surveillance video picked up
a Rhode Island license plate on that car
as it left the scene.
- But police couldn't find the SUV for months.
There were no leads, until Aaron Hernandez hit the news
as the prime suspect in Odin Lloyd's murder.
- Police got an anonymous tip, and he said that
the same person of interest in the Odin Lloyd case
was connected in some way to the double homicide
that had occurred a year earlier.
Police went back and got surveillance footage
that showed Hernandez at the Boston nightclub.
- He was possibly tied into a double homicide,
and that comes up only after he's arrested for the murder--
the homicide of Mr. Lloyd.
- With the tip about Hernandez,
police started looking
at the drive-by shooting again,
and came up with a scenario.
- What was alleged was that Aaron Hernandez was at a bar,
and a couple guys spilled a drink on him,
and maybe the guys smirked
at Aaron kind of the wrong way.
- Investigators looked into the theory
that Hernandez later caught up with these men
and fired shots into their car,
killing two people.
- Some people said that Aaron Hernandez got very angry
and took revenge at even a perceived slight.
- As police searched for evidence
in the Odin Lloyd case, they found the SUV
from the drive-by shooting...
registered to Aaron Hernandez, stored at a relative's home.
- The public was extremely shocked.
I was. His reputation was done.
- In 2015, Hernandez was tried for the murder of Odin Lloyd.
The verdict was clear.
- What say you, madam foreperson?
- Guilty of murder in the first degree.
- Aaron's friends Ernest Wallace and Carlos Ortiz,
the two men caught on tape with him
the night of the murder, were later found guilty
of being accessories to the crime.
But the prosecution never answered the question.
Why did Hernandez kill Lloyd?
- Prosecutors did not need to identify motive.
All they have to prove is knowledge and intent.
- Odin Lloyd might have known something about
Aaron Hernandez's personal life--you know,
the rumors regarding about whether he was gay or not,
or the double murder a year prior,
but it's almost impossible to know.
- Hernandez was sentenced to life in prison
without the possibility of parole.
For some who believed Aaron got what he deserved,
there was no relief.
- The minute that gavel hit down, I wanted a door
to open and Odin to come back.
That's the only way that situation would've been okay.
- My friend didn't come back from a guilty verdict, so...
- A year and a half later,
Hernandez was back in the headlines
for the drive-by shooting from 2012.
- Because of his history in the NFL,
the public started watching that case too.
- But this second trial didn't end like the first.
On April 14, 2017, Aaron Hernandez was found
not guilty of the double homicide.
- He had a life sentence in the Odin Lloyd case,
of course, but it was considered
a massive legal victory for him.
- Family and friends celebrated the verdict.
But joy turned to shock and grief when,
five days later, 27-year-old Hernandez
strung up a bedsheet
in his cell and hanged himself.
- I don't think anybody could've predicted
something like that.
- The Aaron Hernandez story
had one final twist.
Under Massachusetts law,
all first-degree murder convictions
are automatically up for appeal.
But Hernandez killed himself before his appeal was heard.
So, legally, his conviction
for the murder of Odin Lloyd could not stand.
- The judge said she had no choice
but to vacate the conviction.
Which means that, in the eyes of the law,
Aaron Hernandez is--
now that he is dead-- an innocent man.
- The law said Aaron Hernandez was not guilty.
The public reached a different verdict.
His former fans may never know
why he couldn't control the darkness,
but that darkness destroyed
everything Hernandez worked for,
and turned football fame into lasting infamy.
The public perception of Aaron Hernandez changed
after he was accused of murder.
But the image of football great,
Steve McNair, changed after he, himself, was murdered.
- It was hard to even grasp that somebody would kill him.
- Like Aaron Hernandez,
quarterback Steve McNair had a public image
that masked the secrets he kept from his fans--
secrets that were revealed after McNair was murdered.
Police said his killer was a young woman exacting revenge
for a broken heart.
But is the official story what really happened?
- I covered hundreds of murders.
It was definitely one of the more painful
and higher-profile crimes,
because it was just so unforeseen
and inexplicably sad.
- In a city known for music stars,
NFL great, Steve McNair, brought a new kind
of celebrity to Nashville.
As quarterback for the Tennessee Titans,
McNair took the team to the Super Bowl.
- It's a pretty big deal for the city of Nashville
to actually get to a Super Bowl.
So you have Steve McNair.
You have your hometown Nashville hero.
- Even after he retired from the game,
McNair was a major star in Nashville.
- He was always involved in the community,
whether it was charity basketball events,
church functions, whatever. Steve was there.
- Then, on July 4, 2009,
shocking news spread through the city.
- I was at the grocery store.
I very vividly remember...
this kind of, like, buzz through the grocery store.
It was very quickly spreading
that something really important had happened.
- Steve McNair was shot four times,
twice in the head and twice in the chest.
- The hometown hero was lying dead
on a couch in a condo he rented as a crash pad
for himself and his friends.
One of those friends found McNair's body
riddled with bullets and called the police.
- Steve was shot once in the left temple,
twice in the chest,
and then once in the right temple.
- He was so well-liked that it was hard to even grasp
that somebody would kill him.
So my first question is, "Who?"
My next question, of course, was, "Why?"
- McNair wasn't alone.
The body of a young woman
was lying on the floor next to the couch.
- She had one gunshot wound to the right temple.
- To police, it looked like the woman shot McNair
and then herself.
Steve was married to his college sweetheart Michelle,
but the other victim wasn't his wife.
- They just said that there was an unidentified woman with him.
That's how they described her: an unidentified woman.
But I knew. I knew it was her.
And when she didn't answer, or she didn't text back,
I knew it, I knew it, I knew it.
- Within 24 hours,
police identified the dead woman
as 20-year-old Sahel Kazemi,
nicknamed Jenni.
- She was awesome.
She was so much fun to be around.
Jenni was a great person. She really was.
- But why would Jenni Kazemi murder Steve McNair
and then commit suicide?
- I, you know, immediately started hitting the phones,
and trying to find out anything I could
about what was going on.
A story like this that has so much attention...
a lot of information is coming in
but it's all taking you in different directions.
And so a lot of it is chasing down leads,
you're looking for arrest reports.
And you're looking for all these different things
to try to figure out what's true
and what you can prove.
- Law enforcement and the media began
to unravel the threads of a secret relationship
that started around Christmas 2008.
- She was waitressing at the time
that she first met Steve McNair.
- So, Steve's with his family--
his wife, kids, mother, and a few others.
Jenni is actually his server.
- She was that firecracker that was gonna let you know,
"Hey, you got the best server in here."
And she was a very beautiful girl.
- After everyone's done and they leave the restaurant,
Steve says, "Oh, I'll be right back."
So he actually goes back and gives Jenni his number.
- He actually had come a couple of times,
and she actually used to brush Steve off.
He was persistent, you know?
But she finally gave him a little bit of her attention
and a little bit of her time.
- By early 2009,
Jenni was spending a lot of time with Steve
as their affair blossomed.
- It became very serious-- at least for her--very quickly.
- Steve would either see Jenni at the condo,
or he would go to her apartment.
Steve had taken Jenni to Las Vegas.
There were trips to Florida.
She's a 20-year-old... living the life.
- The waitress was swept up into the world
of the hero of Nashville,
a celebrity who gave her whatever she wanted.
- I remember her saying,
"Steve said he's gonna buy me my dream car."
- He put a down payment down,
but she was really insistent, according to her friends,
that she wanted to make the payments herself.
And so that seemed to contribute to
some of her frustrations around being in debt,
and wanting to be independent,
but also overspending her means.
- According to Jenni's friends,
she didn't want to depend on Steve for money.
But did she want to be more than just a girlfriend?
Did she want her famous lover to leave his family?
And did that desire lead to tragedy?
- Friend to friend, speaking with Jenni...
"Why are you dating a married man?"
"Well, he's married, but he's only there for the kids."
It was wrong, and I know that, but we just--we were young.
We didn't see the major problems
that could come from something like that.
- Not only was McNair married,
but reportedly, Jenni wasn't his only secret.
The ex-quarterback was juggling multiple affairs.
- There is speculation that Steve was seeing
at least two other women at the time he was killed.
Police actually interviewed the young lady
he was keeping in another condo
not too far from the condo he was killed in,
and she had speculated that Jenni followed her around
once she found out about her.
- According to police reports, Jenni complained to a customer
that Steve didn't spend enough time with her.
- I guess, from how I feel as a woman, I'd be jealous.
Everybody gets jealous over things like that,
especially in a relationship.
- Even when Steve and Jenni were together,
things didn't always go smoothly.
Around midnight on July 1, 2009,
Jenni was pulled over for a DUI.
- I want you to lift it about six inches off the ground.
- Steve was in the car with her.
He grabbed a cab and went home
while police took Jenni away to be booked.
- The DUI story, from what I have heard:
Steve abandoned her while they--
when they got pulled over, and she was resentful.
I do not think that was true.
I have seen, with my own eyes,
the police video where you get to see her in the back seat.
She was acting her normal self.
She didn't seem resentful at all.
- Within a few hours,
McNair bailed Jenni out of jail.
But was that the end of the story?
- According to an interview that the police conducted,
she was feeling really upset,
and that her life was-- was spiraling.
- Over the last five to seven days of Kazemi's life,
our investigation is learning
that she had become very distraught,
and on two occasions told friends and associates
that her life was all messed up,
and that she was going to end it all.
- A picture seemed to be emerging of a young woman
whose world was collapsing around her.
Money trouble, jealousy, and an arrest
seemed to be part of a fatal equation
that only needed one more deadly factor.
Was Jenni Kazemi at a tipping point
that would lead to a terrible act of violence?
- He sold her a handgun for $100.
- As Nashville police dug deeper into the romance
between ex-football star Steve McNair
and waitress Jenni Kazemi,
they learned that Jenni was upset about her finances
and McNair's wandering eye.
But questions remained, including how Jenni got the gun
that killed her lover and herself.
- Once the gun was recovered from the crime scene,
of course they ran the serial number.
It tied to a pawn shop in Nashville.
- Police traced the gun to Adrian Gilliam,
an ex-con who did time for his part in a robbery
in which an associate killed a man.
Further investigation revealed that
Gilliam first met Jenni Kazemi
outside a Nashville nightclub in June 2009.
According to police, on July 3rd--
the evening before her death--
Jenni asked Gilliam for a favor.
- Well, the official story was that she says,
"Hey, do you know where I can get a gun?"
- He sold her a handgun for $100.
According to him, she just wanted the gun
for personal safety.
- That same night,
Jenni had plans to go out with friends,
but those plans fell through at the last minute.
- I had to call her and let her know,
"Hey, I'm not home yet,
so we're not gonna be able to hang out."
I will never forget-- her exact words were,
"Okay, well, I had already told Steve
"that we were gonna hang out,
but I'll just see what he's gonna do."
Unfortunately, that was the last time
I spoke to my friend.
- Steve McNair and Jenni Kazemi
exchanged texts. Jenni said she was "stressed"
about money, that she could feel pain
in her chest and could hardly breathe.
McNair transferred $2,000 to her account,
and after putting his kids to bed, came over to see her.
He got to the rented condo,
the scene of many of their romantic trysts,
after 1:00 in the morning on the Fourth of July.
About 12 hours later, the bodies were discovered
by one of McNair's friends.
Police found the gun underneath Jenni,
and slight gunpowder residue on her left hand.
- After nearly four days of intensive investigation
that includes laboratory test results
and other investigative methods,
the police department has concluded
that Steve McNair was murdered by Sahel Kazemi,
and that in turn, Sahel Kazemi killed herself
with a single gunshot wound to her head.
- But not everyone agrees with the official version,
including Nashville cop
turned private investigator, Vincent Hill.
- I just don't believe Jenni was the person
that... committed the murders.
- One thing Hill finds
Steve McNair was wealthy,
but the dead millionaire was found
with just a few dollars in his pocket.
Was it possible that the murder-suicide
was really a deadly robbery?
- Steve was known to have a big wad of money
in his pocket. Even Lucille McNair
asked Nashville police who robbed her son.
Because when she learned of the $7,
her first reaction was, "You mean $7,000, right?"
She's like, "My son wouldn't be caught
without a few thousand dollars on him."
- Many felt the official story was a rush to judgment--
or worse.
- Another big thing is the fact
that they won't release the crime scene photos.
- Steve's family and close friends got to see
some of the crime scene photos,
but they were only shown 22 of 536 photos.
They haven't said why they won't release them,
just that "we're not going
to release any of these photos."
- There were also questions about whether Jenni
was really as depressed as police claimed.
- Jenni never stated... anything about financial trouble.
She didn't express that concern to me.
- This wasn't a young lady that was scorned
because Steve wasn't going to leave his wife.
Now, if Steve would've been stabbed 20 times,
then I would... wouldn't be here right now.
Yes, that was a crime of passion.
To shoot someone once in the left temple,
then twice in the chest,
and then once in the right temple...
The way Steve was killed was definitely an assassination.
It was a hit.
Whatever happened inside that condo on that night
didn't start out as a robbery.
But you figure, "Hey, he's dead.
I can take his money. Why not?"
- I'm a reporter, so obviously I'm a natural cynic.
I certainly would not just accept something
because the police said it was so.
But often, in celebrity deaths,
there's lots of interest in there being a deeper story.
I've never heard any credible theory that he was robbed.
This was a murder-suicide based on all the available evidence.
- I know for a fact...
woman intuition is really strong.
Mine is.
My friend... this was not a homicide-suicide.
It wasn't. All the interviews I've done...
I cry every time.
And whenever they print this story, they never put that.
They never include the emotion behind how me,
as her friend, feels. She was a sister!
She was a best friend.
Like, she was somebody to us.
- Were Steve McNair and Jenni Kazemi murdered
by someone who's never been brought to justice,
or did the Nashville police get it right?
One way or another, an illicit affair ended
in tragedy, and two families will deal
with that sorrow forever.
from two athletes who relished the spotlight,
to one who didn't,
but whose disappearance made him more famous than ever.
- For Aaron Hernandez and Steve McNair,
fame seemed to make them unbeatable...
until their lives were destroyed.
Basketball star Bison Dele made the surprising choice
to walk away from fame. But was it too late?
Did his celebrity ignite such jealousy
that sibling rivalry turned to murder?
At 6'11", Brian Williams was a star--
on the basketball court and off.
- Brian joins the Chicago Bulls.
They're on a string of championships,
and he helps them win another.
So he's out there dating Madonna
and being in the public eye a lot.
- It was the life Brian's older brother Kevin wanted.
But as a kid, Kevin couldn't play sports,
because he suffered from asthma.
He found himself in the shadows
while Brian went on to become a sports star
and a millionaire.
Ironically, Brian also wanted a different life.
- Brian feels like a cog in the NBA machine.
Kevin is unhappy for most of his life,
trying to get rich, trying to make a name for himself.
At the same time, Brian doesn't like stardom.
You have two souls that were very troubled.
- In 1998, Brian Williams changed his name
to Bison Dele.
"Bison," to honor his Native American heritage,
and "Dele," for his ancestral African tribe.
The following year, Bison quit basketball.
- He had a very good talent for basketball,
but wasn't in love with it.
- He left millions and millions of dollars on the table.
You know, I think, as regular people,
we might have trouble understanding that.
But he just walked away from the game.
- Dele wanted happiness.
He seemed to find it with Serena Karlan.
Serena walked away from fame, too.
She had been a personal assistant to Prince,
but wanted more out of life. She found it with Bison.
- Serena was kind of... hippie-ish.
B was kind of hippie-ish. They just meshed.
- In 2002, Bison and Serena decided
to sail the south Pacific on a luxury catamaran
piloted by a French captain, Bertrand Saldo.
- So they're in Wellington, New Zealand,
thousands of miles from home,
and all of a sudden, out of the blue,
his brother shows up.
- If I had one word to sum up the relationship,
it would be "tension."
- Bison's brother had also changed his name--
to Miles Dabord.
- Everyone's a little puzzled about Miles
suddenly showing up at the boat.
But from what we hear, Miles arrives there and says,
"Listen, I think it's time that we mend our relationship,
and I would really like to spend some time with you."
And so, I don't know
if there's any way that Bison could say no.
- The brothers and Serena ended up in Tahiti.
In early July, they set a course for Hawaii.
- As they begin this cruise,
they're staying in touch with their family and friends
back in the US by satellite phone calls.
- On July 6th, Serena checked in
with Bison's business manager, Kevin Porter.
- Serena said, "Everything's fine,"
and... the-the call drops.
- There's no more communication from the boat
for days, and then weeks.
At the end of July, a coin dealership in Phoenix
gets a call from Florida.
- The gentleman, he said,
"Do you follow professional basketball?"
And I said, "I do." He goes, "I'm Brian Williams."
Company owner Bill Haynes recognized
Bison Dele's birth name.
But Hayes didn't know that Bison was supposed
to be cruising the South Pacific.
The caller wanted to buy a large number of gold coins.
- I have a copy of the receipt right here.
In total, he was going to receive
460 one-ounce American gold eagles for $152,096.
- It took several weeks for the details of the gold deal
to be worked out.
During that time,
there was still no word from the catamaran.
In early September, Haynes heard
from the buyer again.
- He said, "I want to come to Phoenix and pick up the coins."
- Kevin Porter checks into Bison's bank account,
and he notices that a check has been written for $152,000
to buy gold from a shop in Phoenix.
- Porter called one of the phone numbers
written on the back of the check.
- It really freaked me out.
"This is B, leave a message."
It was Miles pretending to be Bison on a recording.
I'd left a message, and I said, "Hey, this is KP.
Give me a call back."
When Miles calls back, the first thing I said is,
"Where's Bison?"
And he says, "I-I can't talk right now."
And he hangs up the phone.
- Kevin Porter calls me, says, "Brian Williams
and his girlfriend haven't been heard from
in six weeks."
- I said, "Call whoever you need to call,
but do not give him those coins."
- On September 5, 2002,
Bill Haynes waited for the buyer,
with five plainclothes police officers.
- I can tell you, the moment
that he walked through that door,
my blood pressure went up.
He was almost as big as his brother.
- As Miles Dabord signed for the gold
with his brother's name, the police pounced.
Miles told investigators his brother,
who hadn't been seen or heard from in two months,
instructed him to buy the gold coins.
Kevin Porter flew to Phoenix.
Porter had his own questions for Miles.
- He tells me, "If we go to Mexico,
I'll tell you everything."
And I asked him, "Why don't you tell me everything now?"
And he says, "Well, Arizona carries the death penalty."
And I said, "Miles, why are you--why are you worried
about the death penalty?"
- Miles wouldn't say anymore.
The police didn't arrest him,
and Porter couldn't stop him from leaving town.
But Kevin Porter couldn't shake the feeling
that Bison wasn't just missing--he was dead...
and Miles was involved.
- You can only look at the facts.
The disappearance of three people,
the fact that Miles came back,
The fact that Miles tried to purchase golden eagle coins.
- Does he have plans of fleeing the country?
And gold doesn't automatically identify him
as an American on the lam.
It all looked very shady.
- One week after the failed gold deal,
there was a report from Tahiti.
The missing catamaran had been found
at a small, out-of-the-way marina.
Local police contacted the FBI,
and agents were dispatched to investigate.
Reporters followed.
- I get to Tahiti, and it appeared
that the back of the boat had sort of
hastily been repainted.
Someone had put a new name on it
so that it couldn't be identified.
- Who brought the catamaran to shore?
What about the suspicious circumstances?
And most important of all,
where on Earth were Captain Saldo,
Serena Karlan, and Bison Dele?
- Former NBA star Bison Dele tried to walk away from fame.
Now, the mystery surrounding his disappearance
made him more famous than ever.
Bison's brother Miles seemed to have information,
but he wasn't talking.
Had a missing persons investigation
become a multiple murder case?
During their investigation in Tahiti,
FBI agents discovered some crucial information.
On July 8th, two days after
the last satellite phone call from the catamaran,
Miles brought the vessel into port.
There was no one else onboard.
- Miles meets his girlfriend.
On July 19th, he flies back to the US, he starts this deal to buy the gold,
using Bison's stolen identity.
- On September 13th, the FBI and the Phoenix Police
issued separate arrest warrants
for Miles Dabord.
He had already fled the country,
but the chase soon ended.
- A few days after the arrest warrants are issued,
Miles is found unconscious on a Mexican beach.
He is suffering from an overdose of insulin,
plus he hasn't taken his asthma medication.
The authorities there contract the Red Cross.
As best we can tell, they turn him over to US authorities,
who then transport him to the hospital in California.
Only then do they take fingerprints
and discover his identity.
- When I heard that he was in the hospital, I said,
"Well, I hope he wakes up."
Only one person has the answers,
and he's on life support.
- But Miles never came out of his coma,
and on September 27th,
Dabord's mother made the heartrending decision
to take her oldest son off life support.
So the story of Bison Dele ends with a mystery.
- I played over-- and to this day--in my mind,
wondering exactly what happened.
- While Miles was on the run,
FBI agents interviewed his girlfriend.
She told them Miles claimed he shot his brother Bison
in self-defense during a wild fight on the catamaran,
in which Serena and the captain were also killed.
But the FBI found no forensic evidence of a struggle.
So that suggests another, more cold-blooded possibility.
- Miles decides he wants to kill him.
He grabs the gun and forces them overboard
in the middle of the night,
in the middle of open seas,
then turns and sails away.
That's pretty haunting.
There was only one person who knew
what happened on that boat.
It was Miles.
And that knowledge went with him.
- The waters run really deep in the South Pacific.
- Bison Dele, Steve McNair, and Aaron Hernandez:
all examples of the dark side of sports fame.
Athletes who think they can play with people's lives,
or make a game of the law,
or idols who suddenly find themselves targets.
Fierce competitors used to winning
sometimes end up losing everything.
For more on "Mysteries and Scandals,"
go to oxygen.com.