48 Hours: NCIS | Full Podcast + Episode | Forensic Files

our whole life being turned totally upside down began on June 29th 2014 on a beautiful summer Sunday
morning Laura heavin was in her home in Tennessee with her husband bill they were getting ready to go to church when
they received an awful call my son-in-law called probably around 11:00 11:30 on Sunday morning morning and told
us that Aaron was missing and I'm like what do you mean Aaron's missing Bill and law hadn't seen their
daughter Aaron in a few months Aaron recently moved out of the Hein family home to start a new life in California
with her high school sweetheart and now husband John Corwin they moved to a small city called
29 Palms a blip in the middle of the Mojave what brought the Corwin there was the
Marine base John was a marine Corporal Corwin officially and Aaron was a Marine's wife
they lived on the base in a small apartment their first home together Bill and lur hadn't seen the
new place yet when John called lur had been planning a trip out west to visit Aaron later that week Aaron was 19 years
old almost 20 I was going to go out for for her 20th birthday but then no one knew where
Aaron was on the phone Aaron's husband John Corwin told lore that the last place he
knew Aaron had gone was Joshua Tree National Park and he told me that she had gone
out to Joshua Tree National Park the day before to look for um places for her and
I to go to take pictures and stuff when I came to visit in a few days my first immediate thought was
Aaron got lost Aaron is very directionally challenged Bill Aaron's father worried
that Aaron wouldn't find her way out I mean Joshua tree is just a desert there's nothing there there's no water
it's not like you're going to find anything there's no shelter of any type so you're just exposed to the
elements in addition to her lack of hiking experience Aaron was not particularly prepared for the
Outdoors she was a very petite 19-year-old um 5'2 maybe 115 lbs she um was very shy extremely
naive Bill and lore knew their daughter this didn't sound like her she wouldn't go on an overnight hike
spontaneously she probably wouldn't go on an overnight hike at all Aaron was a homebody she stayed inside her comfort
zone the heavin thought through what might have happened and quickly discounted some
possibilities no I never thought that Aaron had run away I didn't think that was even a remotely a possibility I mean
she just was not a risk taker worried lur pressed Aaron's husband John for more details the last time John said he saw
Aaron was early the morning before 4 he said she kissed him goodbye around 7:00 a.m. and he watched her drive off in
their car he went back to sleep a while later he got up and spent the day playing video games by Nightfall Aaron
still hadn't come home she was supposed to be back in time for dinner but John went to
bed the next morning according to John it had been 24 hours since Aaron had driven out of sight
John alerted the authorities then he called Lore he sounded concerned there wasn't a
lot of emotion in his voice but that's typical John it's hard to read him to know what his thoughts
are I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales this is 48 Hours NCIS where we take you inside a case NCIS agents say
they will will never forget episode 1 where is Aaron while his 19-year-old wife was
missing John spent most of the day at home he started wondering where is Aaron and tried to get in touch with her but
could not by phone he knows there is not good service in the desert so he didn't
worri too much but then by Nightfall he was worried Paul Arosa is a producer for
CBS News in 48 hours he reported on Aaron Corwin's disappearance LaRosa had a lot of experience telling true crime
stories he knew that generally when someone goes missing the first person investigators turn to when they need
answers is the spouse in this case that was John Corwin but he didn't do anything he
didn't call police he didn't really tell anybody on his base so to theor authorities it was initially suspicious
that John waited to report Aaron missing the sheriff's deputies and Sheriff's Office had a lot of questions
for him they were like Tell Us Where She Went you know how what did she have with
her why did you wait 24 hours to report her missing his version of the story is that
I thought from watching television shows that you have to wait 24 hours before you can report an adult missing but that
makes you uh seem suspicious in the eyes of of the investigators also he had no alibi per se I he was in his apartment
playing video games and he's an unemotional guy I mean he's not the kind of guy say my wife is missing you know
he's like unemotional and very flat affect once John finally did alert the authorities the local sheriff's
department in San Bernardino immediately opened up an investigation but they needed help for
this specific case the sheriff's department can't just go there and start talking to people they have to go
through protocol right they have to alert the military and when they do the NCIS gets involved NCIS the naval
criminal investigative service most of us may recognize this name from television
NCIS never heard of it that's embarrassing the television show NCIS follows a cast of characters including
NCIS special agents field agents forensic Specialists and more through 21 seasons of scripted Prime Time
television drama but the NCIS is a real life Federal agency NCIS is sort of like an in-house
FBI for the Navy there are only about a thousand special agents based all over the world
in Japan Singapore barin Italy and yes at the Marine base in 29 Palms California
they are stationed at the base and they get involved holding the sheriff's department hand to let them know how the
military operates NCIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr was alerted by the sheriff's department that a Marine's
wife was missing the initial story we received was Aaron had gone to Joshua Tree National Park to look for a nice
hiking routes for her and mother who was coming out later on that week that was the last time that corpal Corin had seen
her driving in their blue Corolla away from the uh installation the Marine base what
special agent Randolph called the installation was the largest Marine Corps Base in the world in addition to
housing at NCIS office there were about 900 families who lived on Bay by 2013 that included the Corwin
however the base was not exactly busy 48 Hours producer Paul Arosa remembered the
first time he ever drove by the base if you're driving through 29 palms and you make a left somewhere and you just drive
for about 30 minutes or less you'll come to the Marine base which is huge but there's a big gate there's a big gate at
the base because there's a lot of security and we we were not allowed out there if you were a resident of the base
like Aaron Corwin was every time you came home you passed through a large gated entrance with a security
checkpoint from there a sort of Main Street led to a small downtown area of buildings including offices a mess hall
a library a small hospital and even a bowling alley housing for the military families branched off this main area
into secluded Suburban plots and culde saacs from where ncis's office is located on the installation is not far
from where Aaron Corwin lived with Corporal Corwin uh practically a mile maybe two the rest of the base's immense
acreage almost 71,000 acres in total was taken up by vast military training areas
including airfields and shooting ranges you know they fire artillery shells there all the time and they have you
know people out in the desert and doing all sorts of things in the early 2000s the majority of units in the Marine
Corps deploying to a rock trained here not too far from the bases residential area there was a Sandy stretch protected
by mountains named mini Baghdad but when Aaron moved to the base her entire world shrunk to those few
miles right inside the Gated entrance in such Close Quarters special agent Randolph said he got to know his
neighbors well there could could have been a chance that you run into her at the grocery store or you pass her at the
gym I might have come across her and not even know it but there's that person that needs your help and you need to do
everything you can to [Music] help in his office special agent Randolf got to work his first step was to take
what the sheriff's department knew and ask him self what don't we know there was an immediate concern for what could
have happened to Aaron that she did not return uh as soon as he thought she was going
to special agent Randolph had questions what if Aaron didn't go where she said she was headed what if she just got on
the highway and drove but what if she actually was at Joshua Tree National Park the park is larger than the state
of Rhode Island how could they ever comb through nearly a million acres of land special agent Randolph thought
through all the possibilities with one main focus where where is Aaron you want to find where Aaron is from the moment
someone is reported missing and the last person to see that person being Corp cor
Aaron's husband you're racing the clock because you don't know the circumstances
that are involved in this person's disappearance there was one big problem working against the NCIS agents and
Aaron time you got to get on it quick because that person might need you sooner than later and time is not on
your side so special agent Randolph dispatched a team of NCIS experts I provided analytical support to Cliff
Randolf in the Aaron cor investigation analyst Ashley deelin was sent to the 20 9 Palms Marine base from
another NCIS office on the Camp Pendleton Marine base only a few hours away when she arrived in 29 Palms she
met her colleagues got up to speed on the investigation and Dove right into work I do a database checks regularly
review social media open source information so whatever's in the news and outlets and looking for information
she scrubbed through Aaron's social media it was 2014 and face Facebook was all the rage what was the last thing
Aaron posted on her profile when was she last active online basically going onto
the internet and searching for all potential information that could be of interest in your
investigation like special agent Randolph analyst delfen understood what was at risk if she missed any detail
that could prove vital I absolutely felt the pressure and the stress surrounding
Aaron's disappearance because is as Cliff mentioned we had limited time and we wanted to find her as soon as
possible so I got to work right away in order to find Aaron the agents needed to learn who Aaron was they
needed to understand her her personality her temperament what she liked and disliked and they needed to understand
her relationships her marriage and her family so they picked up from California and headed to Aaron's Hometown oakd
Tennessee where Aaron's life began Aaron was born on July 15th 1994 when she was 2 weeks old her
birthmother placed her in foster care but very soon Aaron found her home Aaron came to the house when she was 17 days
old she was an incredible sweet baby we were blessed to be chosen to be her [Music]
parents by the time Aaron turned three the havin family officially adopted her she joined a house full of siblings we
fostered several children we adopted five of them and Aaron was the fourth adopted child Bill and lore also had two
biological children they all lived together in a nice house in a small city of Oakridge about 25 Mi west of
Knoxville Tennessee it's a hidden city tucked along the black Oakridge mountains and
for much of its history it was kept a secret one of its nicknames is the city behind a
fence Oakridge Tennessee if you don't know anything about it was an atomic city um oakd
Tennessee did not exist before World War II and the military built oakd Tennessee
for people to developed the atomic bomb Paul Roa visited Aaron's Hometown and he
noticed a through line from Aaron's childhood in Oakridge to her future on the Marine base in
California you couldn't just leave oakd Tennessee and go for a drive out into the country everything there was a gate
everything was controlled it was sort of a sheltered closed town and Aaron herself was very sheltered she was
homeschooled so much of her life took place in the family home on Sundays the family went to the local church it was
the family and it was the church and it was the the horse ranch and that's it now the horse ranch the East
Tennessee Riding Club was Aaron's favorite place in the world as a child according to lore it was like her second
home Aaron spent all her time at the Stables you know in Tennessee I mean you know her mother mother famously said she
would sleep there if she could aon's mother lore said she was a quiet and shy girl and sometimes she seemed to be more
comfortable around animals than people Aaron loved the animals horses cats dogs rabbits guinea pigs but they
all loved her too she was like a calming force and they knew they could trust her
and they knew that she was the one to respect and listen to good boy Shake Aaron could even train cats this
was her leading her cat through tricks and lay down one more time good boy Aaron was an animal Whisperer she
could get them to do things that the average person would not be able to so when Aaron discovered the East Tennessee
Riding Club and began to experience working with horses she excelled when she first started I assured her we would
never get a horse and we ended up with two um we spent many many many many hours here another local family the
Corwin were also frequent visitors Aaron and John um met at the barn they met when Aaron was in fifth
grade she was 10 John was just a year older John's younger sister had a horse there also and Aaron went to their house
a couple different times in a small city with a sheltered life Aaron found the Corwin Family House
exciting she would go and play but she was always especially shy around John John seemed shy around Aaron too John
kin was a very quiet young man they grew up together slowly and patiently at first and then once she
Ed I think she was 15 and they kind of reconnected and you know did a lot of texting and messaging on Facebook and
that kind of stuff and they started dating on her 16th birthday and John actually asked me if it was okay if he
took her out on a date John was a serious and stoic teenager his aspirations were always
clear to him when they first started dating he already knew he was going to be a
marine at John began the process to join the Marine Corps he took tests for aptitude
and strength and he planned to go to basic training in boot camp the summer after he graduated high
school and meanwhile despite their young age Aaron and John became serious fast they started talking about marriage
Aaron full of excitement told her mom we knew how young and naive she was and we
had hoped that they would wait a couple years so that she could get a little bit
of more maturity under her belt the couple went to John's senior prompt together Aaron was barely 18 when
he proposed this may sound a bit early for marriage but it isn't that uncommon for
a military couple Young Marines who choose to enlist right after high school will move to whatever location the
military assigns them and for many young marines the ahead includes marriage married couples
get preference when it comes to securing housing on Bas the reason why they wanted to get married was to get on the
base housing list um and you had to be married and they knew John was getting ready to be
deployed so John like many marines before him wanted to start this journey with his high school
sweetheart but lur wasn't sure Aaron understood the reality of marrying a Marine
we had quite a few conversations on what life as a military wife would be um I tried my hardest to prepare her mentally
emotionally for what was in her future at 18 years old JN chose the Marines and Aaron chose John she went to
Las Vegas for the Marine ball and they got married well they were in Vegas on a beautiful fall afternoon in 2013
Aaron was stuck inside unpacking boxes the treelined view from her childhood bedroom in Tennessee was replaced with
the Sandy expanses and cacti of 29 Palms California by all accounts she was still
a newlywed she and John had not yet celebrated a year marriage despite a condo full of boxes Aaron was alone and
she moved out there got their apartment all set up before John got home from his
deployment John's deployment at okanawa Japan continued on for another few months and Aaron's New Life as a
19-year-old Marine's wife began if she ever felt isolated in Oakridge life on the Marine Base
challenged her even more Aaron went from living in a house full of siblings to An
Empty Apartment all she could do was wait for John to come home I think Aaron was enjoying some
aspects of being a marine wife and other aspects I think it was harder than what
she anticipated Aaron tried to develop a routine she went to the commissary a few
times a week to pick up groceries other wise she spent her time watching TV and scrolling Facebook she texted her
friends back in Tennessee often after a few months JN came home but not much changed for
Aaron JN was not deployed again after she moved out there but being in artillery he went out in the field every
month for at least 5 days sometimes more and so she would be home alone during those times that he was out in
the field she was lonely but one day according to her mother lore things started to improve
when Aaron made her first friend on base Aaron was busy unloading her saddle out
of her car when she bumped into her nextd door neighbor Nicole and Aaron clicked because of the horses Nicole Lee
lived right next door to Aaron and John she was a fellow Marine's wife and when Nicole saw Aaron carrying a saddle she
invited Aaron to come by the ranch where she kept her horse the White Rock horse
rescue it was just a 40-minute drive from the Marine base and with Nicole's invitation Aaron was immediately
reminded of her favorite place on Earth the Riding Club in Tennessee she probably felt a Pang of homesickness and
excitement Aaron first came here with Nicole to look at horses introduced me and said I want to find a horse I need a
horse I rode when I was back home she had a horse and she had to leave it and so now she was homesick and so she
decided that uh getting a horse riding it would give her some pleasure some happiness Isabelle megley is the founder
and CEO of this Desert Rescue Ranch but she was never tucked away in an office somewhere Isabelle preferred to be
outside with the horses and the people who volunteered to take care of them rehabilitate rescued horses that have
been abused and then I also take in horses that aren't abused and find them homes and then I always invite any
individual who would like to come and volunteer at the ranch to help me cuz we have no paid
employees 48 Hours producer Paul Arosa met Isabelle while he was covering Aaron's story he reached out to her for
an interview but she never got back to him he figured they'd visit the horse ranch any way so we go there and the
horses are everywhere right off the public road and the ranch itself is absolutely not fancy I mean it's very
rugged it's you know in a desert community it's out in the open and you know you just see horses running back
and forth there's a few structures that look like they're down in their luck while Arosa was videotaping the sites on
the ranch he noticed a small group of people approaching him it's sort of a rag tag bunch of young children and the
young young people and this older woman um and I said are you Isabelle megley I said we're from CBS News blah blah blah
I sent you an email I called you and she said oh yeah I meant to call you back I
just never got around to it and I said well we're here now and we want to talk to you so once we were face to face she
was happy to talk to us Isabelle is a very weathered uh person I mean she's been outside a lot
during her life you can tell Isabelle was exactly the sort of person Aaron knew well a fellow animal Whisperer with
a menagerie of pets following her around the land and when Nicole introduced the
two of them Aaron knew exactly how Isabelle could help her and so when she found her horse Aaron was with uh Cassie
it was like her partner it was decided Aon would volunteer on the ranch she would pay to adopt a horse and take care
of it and then she'd be able to ride many military families from the 29 Palms base enjoyed the ranch for Nicole
it was a family affair she'd spend the day at the ranch with her Marine husband Christopher Lee now that included Aaron
so it was like a threesome so when they would come they would all take their horses and play with them and then they
would leave together and they would have a good time the the three of them it was very rarely the
four so where was John Aaron was not supported by John for this activity cuz he was not
interested in it he uh would come here with his motorcycles or his things for play in the dirt and that's what he
would do why she would ride and she'd say please come over and watch me ride my horse he said I'm not interested so
they they were never cozy together I kept waiting but he was he was very difficult to interact with Isabelle felt
she came to know their relationship well Aaron was always fighting with John over
what John told her to do and so she would come here and say at least I'm free and she was a different person the
only one he couldn't control was her relationship with the horse Aaron would Pile in with the Lee family for the ride
to and from the horse ranch thanks to them she could see her horse whenever she wanted her relationship with the local
community grew while her marriage strained I'm a very good judge of animals and people go right along hand
inand with that Isabelle welcomed the Marine families onto her Ranch and she observed later she became a valuable
source for the NCIS agents work working to find Aaron [Music] Corwin on Monday June 30th 2014 Aaron
had been missing for 48 hours news spread across the Marine base quickly it was big news for such a small
area analyst Ashley delfen had her eye on Aaron's social media she made note of the people who seemed to be close to
Aaron who had recently tagged her in a post who had commented she searched through Aaron's Facebook friends and
looked through their friends to figure out how people knew each other there was a lot of useful information publicly
available analyst to chelin just had to determine which leads were worth following what was real and what was
speculation in such a small Comm Community this proved difficult early on everybody was talking about it everybody
was commenting on it on social media people were looking for her there was Buzz on base and at certain points it
even became like a bad game of telephone before long the news about Aaron reached Isabelle's horse rescue
the phone rings and Aaron corin's girlfriend called me says have you seen Aaron and I said no but she went missing
I said missing she said yeah and then the detectives started coming with that was an awareness of all
the things I had been watching that happened was a key part of the investigation with any missing person
you want to return that person to their family and their loved ones because they
care about that person and from working a case like this develop a care for the livelihood of that person you don't want
to see anything bad happen but in the back of your mind it's a Race Against Time and you know that you're running
out of it for a concerned mother the waiting game was Misery we really had no clue
what happened it was almost like we were walking in a different world kind of numb after the 48 hour mark with no sign
of Aaron it was all Hands-On deck for the NCIS agents as the days go by it's it's
becoming more and more likely that you're not going to find her alive NCIS paired up with San
Bernardino's search and rescue team they had three main objectives to determine a
safe plan of action to locate Aaron Corwin and to bring her to safety first they had to assess the
situation based on the story John told they needed to look for Clues special agent Randolph and his team
knocked on doors on base asking if anyone had any information about Aaron any other story to corroborate or
contradict her husbands was John Corwin telling the truth this season on 48 Hours NCIS the
search for a missing Marine's wife uncovers secrets that nobody expected on June 30th
2014 2 days after Aaron Corwin went missing workers with the local water department in the desert town of 29
Palms showed up to a job by the Marine base a crew member noticed a car which was strange they were in the middle of
the Mojave Desert the car appeared to be abandoned so they called it into the police it was a blue Toyota
Corolla the car Aaron Corwin was driving the day she went missing Aon corin's car was located
approximately 2 miles from the back gate of the military base and that's still significantly far from Joshua Tree
National Park's entrance but why is a car located close to base NCIS special agent Clifton
Randolph Jr and his team tried to make sense of this did Aaron walk all the way to Joshua Tree to scope out Trails for
her mom's upcoming visit they investigated the area prowled over the Sands and they noticed a second pair of
tire tracks another vehicle seemed to indicate she didn't go wherever she went alone NCIS and San Bernardino auth
authorities followed Aaron's shoe prints walking out of her car and into someone
else's and then they followed the tracks of the second vehicle with those tracks
ending at the black asphalt road out there it appeared that the second car drove off into the desert the terrain
out there it's it's like Mars I think they did some type of training for the moon mission somewhere in that area NC
analyst Ashley deelin remembers when they initially found the car where the vehicle was found was was a clue because
it was it was not found in an area you would think it was a much needed clue but still it's just a question of where
is Aaron in the days after Aaron Corwin was reported missing NCIS and the local police department exhausted all leads
once they found her car with clear evidence she was with someone else the search for the 19-year-old Marine's wife
gathered speed and urgency it was summertime which gets very hot it can be very forting that
there's no literally no water available in that area during the day and at night
there's nothing to light your way and many dangerous uh animals that are in that habitat the harshness of the desert
was troubling to say the least and time was not on ncis's side between myself cliff and our program support the three
of us were back and forth like working long days in and out and as new leads were developed and information came in
then we just kind of put our our heads to the next the next hurdle or challenge that we needed to overcome but some
challenges were insurmountable there was still no trace of Aaron after 48 hours and if she was
lost in the desert away from her car it was hard for lore aon's mom not to think
the worst when I found out they found her car without her that's when I knew something had
happened and I really kind of had that mother gut instinct that maybe she was no longer
alive now it was not just a question of where is Aaron it was also a question of
who had been with Aaron in the desert I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales this is 48 Hours
NCIS episode 2 the honeymoon is over this new information finding Aaron's car and the second pair of tire
tracks in the sand changed everything the authorities needed to go back over what they knew about aon's life in 29
Palms before she went missing they needed to look at 29 Palms as Aaron had and retrace her steps in order to
identify where she frequented and who she knew 29 Palms where Aaron was last seen
is a remote desert city over 100 miles outside of LA and it could not be more different 29 Palms is sleepy and sparse
Route 62 Cuts right through its Center there's a casino a few hotels a single Starbucks for a city there's a lot of
blank empty space across its 58 square miles that's about the same size as Disney
World but it used to be bustling a long time ago in the 1800s the area was teaming with gold miners Legend has it
after a long day's work they would make their way to the town's main water source a spring surrounded by 29 Palm
Trees so when the miners would describe where they had been they opted for 29 palms and it's
stuck you could drive through it in you know I don't know 15 minutes and maybe less here's 48 Hours producer Paul L Roa
who reported on Aaron's case it's the desert you know and the desert draws its own unique brand of
people there are two sides to 29 Palms the side connected to the Marines which is the majority of the population and
then there's a fraction of folks who are locals with no connection to the base the two worlds are starkly different and
yet they are constantly colliding it's kind of funky in its own way I mean you'd probably be surprised and you'd
probably want to visit some of like the sort of offbeat shops there the locals are known to wear cowboy hats and Sport
turquoise jewelry after all 29 Palms was once a mining town There's shops that sell crystals there's a few places to
eat then there's the Marine base the Marine base entrance is located in 29 Palms but the base itself is its
own entity that exists just outside of the city limits nestled up against a mountain
range the base eclipses the city in size at over 1,000 square miles Marines come
from all over the country to serve here at the world's largest Marine Corps training base and they bring their
families toward the base entrance it feels more like a small suburban neighborhood than a military site with
young families living in culdesac the grounds are pristine surrounded by desert and Mountain Vistas
there is one main strip of buildings where much of bass life takes place Bas like this you're going to go to the same
movie theater you're going to go to the same Watering Hole a lot of the events that are put on on base everybody goes
to and you're going to run into each other special agent Randolph knows firsthand the small town feel of 2019
Palms he lived in town and commuted to his office on base every day there are new people always coming in there uh
people always leaving there are people always returning uh even NCIS we we don't stay there permanently
but you become a part of the community if they were going to find Aaron they had to start looking at this particular
Community most of the population are transplants far away from their hometowns because the majority of people
are connected to the Marine base which means families are only stationed here for brief periods of time before a
marine is relocated or deployed bottom line military families don't stay in 29 Palms for too
long this is also true for NCIS Personnel who get bounced around depending on where they're needed like
analyst did chelin who transferred from Camp Pendleton California to 29 Palms because help was needed when it came to
finding Aaron Corwin it was my first time at an NCIS field office because prior to that I had started at our
headquarters analyst Delfin picked up on the close-knit feel of the 29 Palms Marine base as soon as she arrived
there's not a whole lot there so you really rely on that base life because if you're a dependent spouse and your
husband's deployed then you're you're socializing with other dependent spouses and everybody's talking
Aaron started making friends with her neighbors like Nicole Lee who brought Aaron to the nearby horse ranch and she
was also a Marine's wife so I think for a 19-year-old in that situation you're you're trying to
find your Social Circle you're trying to find your Niche and I think it's easy to
get emotionally invested in things that may not be in your best interest that you realize in hindsight
as the NCIS agents progressed their investigation into Aaron's whereabouts they zeroed in on these Social
Circles on a Marine base where everyone knows everyone the agent's investigation
revealed that not everyone is who they say they are when Aaron felt lonely in the
close-knit crowd she'd call back home it was a big adjustment to live away from home and in such close proximity to
other young military couples she'd tell her mom lore what her new life was like there was maybe six apartments in this
little quad it was a little two-bedroom apartment I mean didn't anything bigger it wasn't fancy but you know it met your
needs on the base housing is free for Aaron and John this was a no-brainer plus the base would be a secure enclosed
neighborhood giving Aaron's family back home much better peace of mind you know he was just starting out in the Marines
he wasn't getting a huge stien for off based housing so they probably wouldn't be living in the nicest area of 29 palms
and we just felt they and we felt like she would be safer on base their housing was on one of the many culde saacs in
town all the buildings look like desert homes minimalist Style with clean lines and neutral colors most were equipped
with Spanish tile roofs the ones with Clay shingles to manage the internal temperatures during those hot summer
days in the complex there were two couples in particular who Aaron and her husband John connected with first
ashleen and Connor Maliki who lived downstairs and second the family who introduced Aaron to the White Rock horse
rescue Nicole and Chris Lee the Le their kitchen's actually touched she also made friends with the
people that live below them young husbands and young wives living in the desert with not much to do she had had a
couple other people but these three couples were tight they did a lot together cooked out a lot would stay up
all night playing board games whatever and then would make breakfast together and the guys would hang out
together everyone in that complex was sort of like a military melrose's place this is Beth Ford Roth a public radio
reporter who covered Aaron's case once news spread that she was missing and it had spread to many local news stations
it seemed like the media could not get enough of Aon story The Missing Marine's wife she lives in 29 Palms with her
Marine husband Jonathan and he reported her missing on June 2ia where her husband is stationed anyone with
information Marine Corporal husband reported her missing the day after she disappeared as soon as Beth heard about
the case she followed it closely because it was right up her alley I am the daughter of a retired lieutenant colonel
in the Army Reserve and was interested in telling the story that a lot of people don't know which is military
wives Ser just as much as their husbands do she made it her life's work to write
about its intricacies and pitfalls so I I wanted to cover not just the dry black
and white stuff that goes on a barbecue or a parade or that kind of thing but just sort of what's it like to raise
children on your own when your husband's in Afghanistan what's it like when he comes back what kind of support network
do they have I was inspired by my mother who became an army wife just knowing that how alone she felt and didn't
really find a support system that she needed so Aaron's case felt personal as Beth covered the story she
came to know the people living in aon's apartment block well the husbands all Marines supported their families
financially the wives were Homemakers the Le from the horse ranch were older than the other couples by a few years
Christopher was sort of like the leader of of the group the guys generally got along the three Marines would have
cookouts every week they would drink and just you know have a good time together and they could sort of bond
over the the different aspects of what it's like to be in the military and where they were deployed or if they'd
been to okanawa if they'd been to Afghanistan now the three women were kind of different
of the three couples Aaron and John were the only ones without kids but Ashley Malaki from downstairs was similar to
Aaron in temperament shy and quiet just trying to be a supportive Marine wife I remember Ashley Malaki saying that her
husband had an open door policy which meant anyone could come in and out and she sort of went along with that now
Nicole Chris's wife was not very popular on bass she was known for being abrasive
and maybe even a bit distracted neighbors sometimes raised an eyebrow at her parenting of her
six-year-old daughter according to Beth Nicole would let her daughter wander around alone in the complex popping into
other people's Apartments unannounced so these three couples may not have seen eye to eye on everything
but in order to avoid total isolation they stuck together [Music] in different circumstances these couples
could have been in college in a lot of ways they still behaved like college kids according to multiple accounts the
couples partied often drank heavily and made questionable decisions spending their small stiens on luxuries like new
clothes and cars Aaron's days transformed from the quiet routine of church in her hometown
horse barn to the Rowdy world of young Marines so instead of dorm life it was Bas
life unlike most 19-year-olds whose lives revolve around themselves Aaron's life revolved around the Marines it was
an easy place to feel lost in the women sort of followed the men's lead because it's important for Marines to get along
with each other it reflects well and it might help their chances of getting promoted in the
future Beth Ford Roth says that the women also had a role to play so it's kind of up to the wives to make sure
they present a good front even if maybe they're not going to be best friends with someone because it's in their
husband's best interest to move up the ranks and the [Music] Marines Aaron did her best to play her
role as a marine wife she made friends with the other spouses did all the requisite socializing and when she was
asked she would happily have about her neighbors Aaron would babysit when Chris and Nicole would go out on dates Aaron
just cared for anyone who was vulnerable or smaller than she was and she really bonded with that little girl and wanted
a child of her [Music] own it was only a matter of time before Aaron joined her neighbors in motherhood
another duty of a marine wife but this she was excited for her babysitting on the base struck a cord in her heart back
home in Tennessee lur noticed her daughter nurturing children often she was very tenderhearted very attentive to
people like the younger kids at the barn and at church absolutely loved Aaron because when they talked to her she made
them feel like the most important person there it was in those moments that the true Aaron would come out of her shell
she looked at them she got on their level if they were younger and she wasn't one of those people that looked
around to see who else she could talk to while they were talking to her they were
her focal point Aaron missed her own childhood home full of kids after 4 months of living in 29 Palms she
couldn't wait to get back home for Christmas in Tennessee and spend some time with her
family we um got to spend I think like 10 days with them or so soon after the visit was over lur got a call from Aaron
and right after they got back she found out she was pregnant from the very beginning of
their relationship John and Aaron both wanted to have children and start a family together Aaron was very excited
to be pregnant they I mean they wanted and they're both great with kids it was the beginning of 2014 John and Aaron
couldn't be happier gushing about the pregnancy Aaron took to Facebook guess what I'm pregnant with images of a stor
flying through the clouds her Facebook friends people from Tennesse and 29 Palms congratulated her so excited for
her new chapter she was in her first trimester around 8 weeks and by the end of January maybe
the first part of February she miscarried Aaron was wasn't sure how to deal with
something like that I mean she was a baby for anyone a miscarriage is a painful experience but for such a young
couple it was devastating territory they were not equipped to navigate and I don't think either one of them knew how
to handle that grief process to lose the baby and the hormones doing crazy things
to you the miscarriage took its toll on John and Aaron but it was not the first issue they had in their marriage when
John finally arrived to 29 Palms after his deployment Aaron said she sensed a shift in him he wasn't the sweet boy she
came to love in Tennessee anymore he started to harden and became distant the two started fighting more and more
here's reporter Beth Ford Roth again they went from having sort of a sweet romantic dating relationship where
they'd go out for french fries and a soda to a fullon marriage with the possibility of
being parents or not being parents what it's like to have to pay bills what it's
like to have to get along with people who aren't from Tennessee and so that the change would
be difficult I think for anyone but they were 18 19 years old Beth thinks that at
19 Aaron and John were still trying to figure out who they were John as I think any teenage husband would have
difficulty communicating his sorrow his grief or understanding how his wife felt
and there was a a split there from afar Aaron's mother lore noticed the couple was
struggling I think that's kind of when things kind of started spiraling just over 48 hours after Aaron's
Disappearance in the Rolling Sands at the Mojave Desert the authorities gathered around aon's blue Corolla NCIS
special agent Randol needed to keep track of all the evidence found by Aaron's car looking around that vehicle trying
to find any clue that would have led to where she went to next from that location where that vehicle most part
and if anybody else was there with her the car was found just a Stones throw away from the Marine base it was clear
she was not alone when she left for the desert Specialists were called in to look at the tire tracks the desert sand
held the tread well and the Specialists were able to create three-dimensional impressions of the tracks the design of
the tread and its Dimensions can help positively match the tire to a type of vehicle investigators determined that
the car that had pulled up next to Aaron was a Jeep now this was something the NCIS agents could work
with but first they had to question Aaron's husband John again the last known person to have seen her when was
the last time you saw her where did she say she was going to go does she have any friends and that's where Jessica
comes in Jessica known as Jesse was Aaron's closest friend back home in Tennessee
Aaron and Jesse texted daily often hourly Ever Since Aaron moved to 29 Palms Jessica Trenton reached out to
John Corwin the day after Aaron disappeared she disclosed information related to those messages that she had
with Aaron because she was concerned that Aaron didn't return analist chelen knew it was time for NCIS to use its
Network and reach to locate Jesse and learn everything she may know we contacted our agent out there close to
Jessica asked him to get all that information from Jessica my name is sha Nash I'm a
special agent with NCIS assigned to the Memphis Tennessee office and I was asked
to run some leads on the Aaron Corman investigation the NCIS Tennessee office was small only two agents ran it in
including special agent Shan Nash we cover all of Tennessee and all of Arkansas so if there's anybody that
needs to be interviewed anybody needs to be interrogated uh evidence needs to be
collected that kind of thing if an NCIS office across the world needs something done in those two states they they call
us and ask us to do it for them special agent Nash made his way to Jesse as soon
as he got the call luckily Jesse was ready to tell all she told him that he initially she was nervous to share
information but now her fear for Aaron's well-being overcame her loyalty Jessica
was very concerned about her friend Aaron and was upset uh so she was very cooperative and helped us in any way
that that we needed special agent Nash's main objective was to copy everything off
Jesse's phone especially her text messages with Aaron the text mess Mees explaining the
locations she might have gone would be important timelines would be important the 29 Palms NCIS office was very eager
to get these because this would explain who she was with uh prior to her disappearance the NCIS has a digital
system for things like this the software itself can extract a variety of data from devices including call logs texts
photos browsing history and more we tried to uh download her information uh from her cell phone the system should
duplicate all the info and data from Jesse's cell phone onto the NCIS database special agent Nash linked
Jesse's phone to it using a laptop and tried to begin the download unfortunately there was a problem an
error message popped up she had just gotten a new phone brand new phone her other one had broken and
so the system did not have the updates for her brand new phone even with some of the best available Tech it was no
match for an updated smartphone they'd have to do it the old-fashioned way special agent Nash looked through
all her messages cataloged them manually by taking pictures of Jesse's phone with
his phone and during the manual search we identified several uh text messages that were important to the investigation
as he comb through Jesse's text with Aaron special agent Nash found a name Christopher Lee was a marine that was
the nextd door neighbor of Aaron Corwin at the time and there were some text messages that involved him and Aaron
Corwin according to the text between Aaron and Jesse Aaron was planning on meeting Chris Lee in Joshua Tree
National Park the day she went missing Chris Lee Nicole Le's husband and Aaron's neighbor
the day before Aaron went missing she had text her friend Jessica apparently this surprise trip is super important
you know I had heard of Chris Lee before I knew that they had hung out together it seemed kind of odd to me that she'd
be going out there with you know just Chris that's the question on everyone's mind why would Aaron go into the desert
alone with her neighbor Chris Lee what surprise could he possibly have for her and why didn't she tell her husband
about it you know cuz she was a secret so I could tell her my secrets that's next episode on 48 Hours
NCIS alone in a chilly room in the San Bernardino sheriff's department Corporal John Corwin sat with his feet flat on
the floor back straight and sensors wrapped around his chest and abdomen he was hooked up to a polygraph with wires
running from his fingers to the machine next to him the first suspect when Aaron went
missing was her husband John Beth Ford Roth is a reporter who covered Aaron's disappearance he waited 24 hours to call
to say that she was missing he said it was because watching True Crime programs he believed he had to wait 24 hours I'm
sure authorities always look at the spouse first so the authorities called him in once hooked up to the polygraph
machine they tracked changes in John's heart rate and blood pressure 48 Hours producer Paul Arosa heard how that day
went the sheriff's deputies and the Sheriff's Office had a lot of questions for him they were like you know tell us
where she went he didn't know tell tell us what did she have with her a Bott of Gatorade so far John seemed to be
keeping his cool he wasn't showing the type of physiological reactions people have when
lying the type of responses that polygraphs are known for exposing like increased sweating heavy breathing and
an elevated heart rate according to NCIS analyst Ashley deelen that was enough for the sheriff's department to
determine that John was telling the truth when s berardino County Sheriff's Department conducted the polygraph
examination on Jonathan Corwin they did not detect any deception John had passed
his polygraph examination and that confirmed what Aaron's mother lore already thought I never suspected John never
never crossed my mind the authorities floated another theory one that seemed to come out of left field was it
possible that Aaron had been planning to leave John maybe there hadn't been Foul
Play but instead she ran away Aaron's mother however didn't buy that theory at all remember lur had planned to visit
for her daughter's 20th birthday instead she ended up flying out after Aaron disappeared and you know when I got to
her apartment all those ingredients for the meals that she wanted me to cook were there she was pretty excited about
mom coming and and cooking her favorite meals Aaron was not planning on going anywhere so that means someone else must
have been responsible with her husband John Corwin ruled out it was time for the authorities to look at the next
suspect on their [Music] list I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales this is 48 Hours
NCIS episode 3 Russian Roulette [Music] lur heavin arrived in California shortly
after she found out that Aaron was missing she knew that the chances of Aaron making it out alive were not high
but still she was her mother she had to remain hopeful and she knew that if they
did find Aaron the very first thing she would want was her mother lur was staying at Aaron and John's Apartment
along with John's parents the first night we all spent spent the night in the apartment and the
sheriff's department had knocked on the door and they were going to interview us
so we all get up and they just took us individually and just you know pretty much asked us about our relationship
with Aaron despite their jurisdiction over all of San Bernardino County the sheriff's department couldn't just walk
on to the military base that's where NCIS came into play together they went door too taking hours to speak to
everyone they needed to Beth Ford Roth heard the details of those interactions after the fact the sheriff's deputies
went upstairs to talk to Christopher Nicole Lee and Chris answered the door he was
very nervous he said he was in a hurry and the sheriff's deputy asked him do you know Aaron Corwin and he said she's
my neighbor but I mean we're acquaintances I know her husband but yeah we're not we're not close and he he
had to go somewhere he just ended the conversation right away up until that point Christopher Lee
appeared to be a background figure in Aaron's life someone she knew Loosely from babysitting his daughter or would
occasionally see at the horse ranch with his wife Nicole but as we found out in the previous episode from NCIS special
agent sha Nash Aaron had told her best friend Jesse that Chris was planning some kind of surprise for Aaron a trip
to Joshua Tree National Park that in itself was not suspicious it was a pretty normal place to visit while
living on the 29 Palms military base but was it a trip that two acquaintances would make and without their
spouses San Bernardino sheriffs were not convinced so they brought Chris back in
to get a better sense of who he was and how he had met Aaron d details that they
hadn't been able to sus out in their first quick conversation with him he entered the sheriff's department
Chris was stalky with a round face and broad shoulders he was somber with dark hair and matching dark brown eyes he sat
down the interview started out slowly they needed to establish a rapport with him so he would be comfortable sharing
information that could help them down the line okay uh some some of the Fall questions stuff that I need to ask you a
little bit um just to kind of close up some of these gaps they talked for a while about his childhood he grew up in
Anchorage Alaska with a sister and two brothers and played High School football it was also where he met his wife Nicole
before he became a marine and moved to 29 Palms he couldn't recall answers to everything they asked about though like
past trips or mind things about his own personal life the police tape you're about to hear is a little hard to
understand my memor is really really bad fighting or football explosions he said his memory was really bad because
of football and his proximity to explosions while serving in the military unless he experienced something
impactful Chris generally couldn't remember it with that in mind officers moved on to what Chris had been up to
lately and his future plans he was set to be released from active duty on July 6
2014 just a few days away the process for being discharged had started months before this first Chris like all Marines
had to take a transition Readiness seminar then he needed to complete and submit an outbound review get that
review approved and complete a final physical even with all that done Chris and Nicole still needed to clear out
their apartment and ran a U-Haul to get it all back to Alaska he' had a lot going on in the
last few months and it was during this long transition period that he'd also met John and Aaron I met her she moved
in before he got back we didn't really like it's kind of like hey you're the new neighbor what's up didn't really
have any interaction with her until John got back from Oka they were neighbors but he didn't
actually interact with Aaron until John came back from his deployment in Japan it was then that Chris and Nicole
started hanging out with them as a couple along with their downstairs neighbors Connor and ashleen Malaki
Chris was already close with Connor and would regularly go out into the desert to go coyote hunting shoot pellets or
race their cars here's my road back here that kind of makes a really nice RAC track I like to see D Jeep on the
corners and stuff like that so out in the desert Chris said he liked to see how fast he could race his
Jeep when John Corin returned from his deployment he became a part of their group they talked about their jobs and
being in the military had cookouts together and bonded over being far away from their homes with few friends and
little to no familial support in California despite his blossoming friendships and the fact that he would
soon be out of the military Chris was struggling he had had one six-month Tour of Duty in Afghanistan but he'd been
back for a year and had become depressed when it became clear he would not be redeployed he told investigators it was
easier there in Afghanistan all you have to do is quote wake up stand post call patrols simple stuff with no real life
type responsibilities he came home and had a difficult time adjusting to life after
deployment like state was like I didn't anything I was just kind of falling apartment Chris said he was falling
apart mentally it was hard for him to be at home he and his wife Nicole had gotten used to being away from each
other and no longer knew how to communicate he said they'd argue over minor things like whether she made
dinner the right way when she told him she thought he needed help he didn't want to
listen there was a tension in the air he'd be drinking they'd occasionally blow up at each other it's weird like
you're there like you miss him a lot and you come back and it's like it's not the
picture perfect thing you had in mind and so like Beth Ford Roth recalled hearing stories about Nicole while
covering the case Nicole was not a well-liked lady in that area she was gossipy she had sort of a bad reputation
about things that may have happened in other housing complexes and relationships just gossip Melrose Place
gossip basically in the house and outside of the house Nicole was not the most popular person to many people on
and around the base she was abrasive strict and controlling telling Chris what he could and could not do according
to multiple people in Aaron's life her spouse John was also controlling of her spending and her abil to get a job when
she bought a puppy to keep herself company he made her get rid of it the greatest Solace she could find was at
Isabelle megley horse ranch but even when she was alone and away from John she still didn't feel free she felt like
she was being controlled that's 48 Hours producer Paul Arosa they had two cars but one one car broke down they only had
one car so sometimes Aaron was by herself without a car on this isolated mil military base so it meant a lot to
Aaron that Chris Lee would sometimes drive her along with Nicole to the horse ranch and as they got to know each other
better in the context of the neighborhood and the stable they realized just how much they had in
Comon back in the interrogation room Chris had finally started sharing information that was useful to the
authorities he had a lot to say about Aaron and John's relationship some that was frankly shocking even to
investigators he said Aaron was unhappy that she was scared of JN to Chris it sounded like a cry for help one that he
could do something about and in the process maybe she could help him too I was like oh I can fix this like
broken pieces fix each other so we just kind of started developing a bond that grew stronger
it was like she was like a distraction from everything else that was going wrong in my line Chris said they were
both distractions for each other Aaron had met someone who was passionate about her interests who understood how trapped
she felt and Chris had someone to nurture him to take care of him he told police something else that revealed just
how close to the edge he'd been I would I was playing Russian R like three four times a week not get care about anything
Chris told the sheriff's deputies that he was playing Russian roulette multiple times a
week he told them that he had stopped caring about anything including whether he lived or died but talking to Aaron
commiserating and playing video games together gave him something to care about something to live for over time
you know we started getting closer having longer conversations it wasn't difficult for
producer Paul L Roa to piece together how those longer conversations turned into something more it starts as an
emotional affair right I mean aon's depressed Chris is depressed they confide in each other they bond over
their love of horses he was in a lot of ways what John was not he was more emotional he was he had more character
he had more personality he was the polar opposite of John her husband but like many emotional Affairs it didn't just
stop there and then we ended up we kissed a few times at her place they had kissed multiple times at
Aaron's place they had now connected on an emotional and physical level that Aaron was missing with John Chris had
started writing poetry for her he sent loving texts he told her they were perfect together just like Paul L Roa
Beth Ford Roth could also understand exactly how this affair came to be H having been a 19-year-old girl myself
you fall in love like there's no tomorrow and I believe that Chris said all of the right things that eron needed
to hear he was a poet or a self-proclaimed poet and he wrote love poetry to Aaron I don't know any
19-year-old girl who wouldn't be impressed with that ESP especially if she feels like her husband is not
emotionally there for her at this critical time soon instead of Russian Roulette Chris was getting his Thrills
from Aaron he'd have an argument with Nicole and immediately Text Aaron she was an escape from The Real World where
he could make believe that he was in a happy place he could confide anything and everything in her you know cuz she
was a secret so I could tell her my secrets because she was a secret Chris could tell her all of his own
Secrets at this point Aaron Corwin and Christopher Lee were having a full-blown Affair mentally and physically and had
been for months they were able to keep it hidden at first but then Beth says things got a little precarious for
everyone so it was Valentine's Day of 2014 and the military families all sort of got together the the little military
Melrose Place got together to uh watch a movie Mulan Rouge they met at the Malaki
downstairs apartment at some point the party broke up John went back upstairs Ashley Malaki who had a six-month-old
baby went to her room to put the baby to bed Chris and Aaron stayed that's when ashleen came back out to fix a bottle
for the baby and saw that Christopher Lee and Aaron Corwin were still there on the couch together and she saw them
kissing Chris and Aaron had gotten so wrapped up in each other that they had actually kissed out in the open in their
neighbor's apartment they may have been living in a fantasy world but unfortunately the
consequences of their actions were about to get very real so after Christopher got up and left Ashley's apartment
ashleen went over to to Aaron who was still on the couch and confronted her and said I saw you kissing what are what
are you doing you can't can't do this and Aaron told ashleen that they weren't kissing that Chris was whispering
something to her he was trying to comfort her Ashley knew what she saw it's kind of hard to
mistake passionate kissing with Whispering it put ashleen in an incredibly awkward position she and her
husband Connor were friends with both the Le's and the Corwin they saw each other in the apartment complex every day
and now ashleen couldn't make eye contact with any of them she didn't know why Aaron wasn't
being honest with her because the two had shared a pretty meaningful friendship and Aaron basically
left and that was kind of the end of their friendship weeks went by and when it became clear that neither Aaron nor
Chris was going to own up to what they did ashleen could no longer keep quiet ashleen said that she told mcole and
John and that's how the spouses found out after that Chris said Nicole went through his phone she found their texts
came into the bedroom and threw the phone at his head things grew increasingly tense
within their small bubble the friendships they once shared were no longer to make amends Aaron and Chris
promised to put an end to their Affair but Nicole had already made up her mind about Aaron amiable
interactions turned into Stony silence trust that had previously formed while Aaron Babys the Le's daughter went out
the window Nicole went so far as to try to ban Aaron from one of the only places
where she had the freedom to be herself Isabelle megley horse ranch Nicole came to me and told me that Aaron wasn't
allowed at the ranch anymore she has done some unforgivable uh acts and that she was
she told her she couldn't come here Nicole's anger towards Aaron was so Dynamic the word she said I couldn't
repeat she said I wouldn't care if she died she said uh she unspeakable what she's done but never
would she say what she did despite his own tense relationship with Aaron Jon seemed more understanding of her
indiscretion and wanted to work together to leave it in the past according to Beth Ford Roth Aaron told John that the
affair was over they went to coup's counsiling John was under the impression that things were improving they were
trying to have a child and John believed that things were going in the right direction Aaron's mother lore knew that
Aaron and John were young and naive but she believed their relationship was solid when she came out to California
after her daughter was reported missing she was shocked to find out about the affair that Aaron had been carrying
on she'd had no idea that information had seemed was reserved for Jesse Aaron's best friend in
Tennessee Aaron definitely confided in Jesse in a different way than she confided with me I know now that Aaron
had shared about her affair with Chris to Jesse I feel like she she knew what she was doing was not
right and that I would probably try to talk her out of what she was doing whereas Jesse was going to be more
accepting for Shawn Nash the NCIS special agent who interviewed Jesse this was far from the first time he'd seen
something like this play out while I was stationed at cample Jour there was a lot
of 18 19 20-year-old Marines living aboard the base we had seen a lot of Young Marines get married before they
deployed and uh then they would leave their spouse for a long period of time there were a lot of instances where the
spouses would be cheating on their uh deployed husbands or wives and one of the common themes is uh the spouse Left
Behind is lonely and will reach out for other people for companionship it's important to
understand just how high the stakes are for for committing adultery while in the
military not necessarily for Aaron but for Chris NCIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr has seen what happens to
military members who engage in extramarital Affairs to have an extramarital affair is a violation of
the uniform code of military Justice someone that is found guilty of it would be subject to military criminal
prosecution [Music] adultery Falls within ncis's jurisdiction to investigate while it's
not a criminal offense for civilians the military doesn't take kindly to cheating
it can even lead to a dishonorable discharge forfeiture of all pay and allowances and up to one year of
confinement in a military Brig that may seem extreme and oldfashioned but the uniform code of military Justice exists
to ensure professionalism and discipline within the military a core component of this code
is the rule that any action that could discredit the Armed Forces can be prosecuted from adultery to bigamy even
writing bad checks it's a catchall intended to quote maintain the military's moral fabric it's as serious
as it sounds and everyone within the Armed Forces is aware of it so there's a very good reason reason why Chris may
have first lied about the extent of his relationship with Aaron a dishonorable discharge would put his entire future at
stake likely revoking his access to VA benefits unemployment and federal student loans and severely limiting any
postmilitary career opportunities it would follow him for the rest of his life and as someone
whose discharge from the military was fast approaching admitting to an affair wasn't something Chris could
afford and all of this in response to an affair that only lasted a few months after all Aaron and Chris ended things
after their spouses found out but according to Jesse that's not actually what happened Beth Ford Roth
recounted the full story she was the only one who knew that that relationship was still
ongoing Aaron's spouse John and Chris's spouse Nicole both had found out about the affair and everyone believed it was
over but it wasn't and from there things only got more complicated not only had they continued their Affair in secret
but special agent Shawn Nash and Tennessee had uncovered another shocking piece of information Jessica had told us
that Aaron was 3 months pregnant and that the baby might have been Christopher Lee Aaron was pregnant again
I did not know that Aaron was pregnant her mother learned about this pregnancy for the first time when she arrived at
the Corwin's place in California John knew about the pregnancy they found out on Father's Day and they told his dad on
Father's Day that she was pregnant despite knowing about her pregnancy for 2 weeks Aaron hadn't told her mother
anything she'd been open about her first pregnancy and miscarriage so why not this one aon's lack of communication
with her mother left everyone with questions what else had she been holding back and depending how far along she was
whose baby was it with John and his family Aaron had acted like the baby was his but with
Jesse Aaron was adamant that the baby was actually Chris Lee's at the prospect of having Chris's
baby Aaron seemed excited and hopeful happily ever after with John didn't seem to be in the card he was too cold too
controlling too uninterested in her Hobbies but Chris Chris made her excited Chris gave her purpose according to Beth
Chris he made her feel like she was the reason he was alive she was his reason for living maybe Chris could be her
happily ever after police even found information on Aaron's laptop about apartments in Alaska she'd been
seriously thinking about their future together so Aaron texted her friend Jesse in Tennessee that Chris was very
excited about it that he wanted to tell everyone he wanted to tell Aaron's mother it was going to be this big
announcement that Aaron was pregnant they were in love and they were going to move to Alaska together because Chris
was getting ready to leave the Marines and uh that's what Aaron thought was happening and that's what she conveyed
to her friend Jesse now Chris and Aaron's upcoming surprise trip to Joshua Tree made much more sense it was a
perfect place to be alone together something that was hard to come by in their apartment complex where they were
constantly under watchful eyes Aaron seemed thoroughly convinced that both of them were in it for the long haul that
much was clear to analyst Ashley deelin it seemed that Aaron was in love with Christopher Le because she was willing
to take that next step with him in her life and I don't believe personally that she would have done that if if she
didn't really care about him NCIS agents were now convinced that Aaron was in love with Chris she was serious about
their future but the question remained was Chris also in it for the long haul or did he have other
plans on the next episode of 48 Hours NCIS what else was chrisly hiding we're going to find Aaron right
now the Marine Corp base is helping us they're Gathering as many soldiers as they possibly can to go out and start
checking all these areas we're going to find her [Music] a warning to listeners this episode
contains graphic depictions of [Music] violence Chris Le was going to be out of the military soon he was just days away
from being honorably discharged while the cloud of Suspicion for Aaron Corwin's disappearance hung over him no
charges had been filed against him the Le had planned their move back to Alaska where Chris was from but before
they left they won't have a home because they're out of their Barracks that's White Rock horse rescue
owner Isabelle megley Chris and Isabelle had spent a lot of time together at the ranch so
they had become friends at this point when Chris was in a jam he asked Isabelle if his family could stay at the
ranch while they planned their move to Alaska we made this agreement I said well you can stay at the bunk house
until you leave 7 Days how in innocent was that but that's not how it turned out once Aaron Corwin went missing the
police had started to suspect that Chris might be connected but they still hadn't
found her and all the evidence against Chris was circumstantial or hearsay they needed something
firm the police were here the detectives were here he had his uh U-Haul here and
they were going they wanted to go through this U-Haul uh they had them handcuffed to
the chairs over at the house where they did this they checked my house uh they did not think I was involved but my
vehicles were involved because Chris Le had used them the police didn't find a literal or
figurative Smoking Gun in Chris's belongings but they knew a lot about him that he had been having an affair with
Aaron an affair that continued in secret even after they were exposed before Aaron disappeared she'd
been texting her friend Jessica or as she called her Jesse about her relationship with Chris but there was
one message that caught the eye of the police a text that gave them a clue on where they'd find
Aaron this is NCIS agent sha Nash who saw the text this text message referred to a
trip that Aaron and Christopher Lee had made uh the day before she went [Music] missing all Chris told Aaron was that
this trip was going to take a couple of hours and Aaron thought this meant she was in for some big romantic
gesture Aaron had text Jessica laugh out loud I seriously don't know why he would
drag to a very special place to be a dumb surprise Jessica had text back to Aaron uh some
Emojis with a ring and a diamond and then uh kiss symbols I would assumed that would be an
engagement R the detectives knew the trip would likely have been out to the Mojave
Desert surrounding Joshua Tree but they didn't know which specific part the search and rescue teams were
beginning to look for Aaron and learning where she could have gone with Chris could be the key to finding
her I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales this is 48 Hours NCIS episode 4 the perfect
[Music] mine Aaron's car was found on July 1st 20 4 a few days after she went missing
the car was parked just a few miles outside the 29 Palms military base with nothing missing or really any sign of
disturbance there was however another pair of tire tracks when san berino county Sheri's
Department located Aaron Coran's car the tire Impressions surrounding the car did
not match Aaron's car this is NCIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr who worked with the sheriff's department and
local detectives on Aaron Corwin's case special agent Randolph says that it looked like Aaron drove out to this spot
to meet up with someone in a second car then went out to the desert it seemed that someone drove out
to that location and she got out of the car got into to this other vehicle and went somewhere else
uh with those tracks ending at the black asphalt road out [Music] there investigators believed that the
tracks were left by a Jeep and it just so happens Chris Lee drove a Jeep this was one of the reasons that
the San Bernardino sheriff's department initially brought him in for questioning
three days after Aaron's disappearance you already heard some of what he said his issues with memory loss challenges
adjusting to life after deployment and how he met Aaron in video of the interrogation
Chris sat down under the dim hum of fluorescent lights in a t-shirt shorts and flipflops the detective sat across
from him at a small table and asked about his plans for the future I think we're going to live with her brother cuz
we got our two horses that we're shipping up there and then I'm going to use my GI Bill try to come on Chris told
the detective that in the coming weeks his family would be driving cross country to Alaska where he grew up to
start a new life yeah it's scary like I mean but and I'm ready for a change my wife she's defin ready
get this interview was a very important opportunity for the detectives on aon's case Chris wasn't named a suspect at
this point he was invited in to answer if few simple questions about Aaron the detectives had an opportunity to talk to
Chris without a lawyer and to get his story on the record they also could use information to their advantage Chris did
not know what the detectives knew that he'd been having an affair with Aaron her pregnancy and the possible proposal
and that the two had planned a mysterious trip out to the Mojave Desert just before Aaron vanished
then they started to talk more about Chris and Aaron's relationship Chris admitted that he and
Aaron became an emotional support system for each other and that the relationship
turned physical he also talked about his wife Nicole when she found out about the
affair and the effect it had on their marriage and during the time that you were
texting Aaron how was your relationship withle um it was under a lot of us a lot
of strain like she kept trying to like talk about things and I just kept shutting her out our relationship was
under a lot of strain Chris said she kept trying to talk about things and I just kept shutting her out he called
Aaron his make believe wife but while recounting their Affair Chris also seemed to downplay it they only kissed a
few times Chris said that's where things stopped according to him that was a reckoning point he broke things off with
Aaron after they got caught and then that was the end of it okay and was kind of like my Reckoning point where I
realized you know I was messed up and I needed to ask for help now the detectives tried to get
more details they wanted to get Chris to describe what he was doing in the days leading up to Aaron's disappearance
Chris did not know that the investigators had found Aaron's car car and that they believed he might have
been out in the desert with her the detective asked Chris when was the last time he saw Aaron okay and then you saw
her Wednesday of last week I think so% sure Wednesday that was 3 days before Aaron went missing but then Chris second
guessed himself I'm not 100% sure Chris said she and John had come out of the house but I would usually try to avoid
them when detectives asked for more specifics Chris's memory got hazy once again so when you would you see their
cars there on the weekend um sometimes um I really don't keep track of things and so like I said un like I she FES
something like wrong or different I don't remember sometimes I don't keep track of
things I don't really remember he said Chris referenced memory problems several times throughout the interview
sometimes blaming shell shock or PTSD then the detective started asking Chris about the desert while they talked
volunteers were searching the desert for any evidence of Aaron so the detective wanted Chris to piece together his
whereabouts where did he go around the time Aaron went missing maybe if he told them about his
trips out to the desert he'd give up a piece of information that might help them find Aaron the detective asked
about Saturday June 28th the day Aaron went missing okay I went to bed midnight one time to wake up Saturday uh
6 okay um cuz I was Chris said he woke up that morning and went coyote hunting and then he guided the police along the
Route he took so I went by myself and then I went down Adobe took left on Chris's story had morphed and changed
several times over the hours he spent in that interrogation room but it was couched in hazy Recollections and other
memory problems Chris said then Chris's story took a wild turn it's at this moment as he described
wandering around the desert coyote hunting that Chris said he heard gunfire and then I got kind of lost and
at one point in time I'm not sure the time of the day that I checked but uh I'm not sure if the individual shot at
me or if he was just like reparation shooting but there was an individual Chris said that he heard four booms
claiming that he saw someone out there with a handgun this boom and I heard four shots as I was coming
back down the bridge line I got out of there as fast as I could Chris said he said he couldn't tell if they were
intentionally shooting at him or not while Chris told this story he gave detailed descriptions of where he went
Chris talked the detective through his hiking trails that carve through the mountains and dunes in the desert he
even marked up a map that the interrogators brought in to show them where he went just put like an X where
your house is at okay and then so you go out that way to the 62 to a gold crown did you make any other stops prior
whether he knew it or not Chris gave investigators tons of details to work with evidence that could help the search
and rescue efforts for Aaron that were continuing in the desert Chris could be telling the police which parts of the
vast desert to focus on the Mojave Desert stretched on for thousands of miles and dotted through it
were the landmarks of a literal Golden Age the hundreds of abandoned M shafts that filled the
Horizon the desert is at the edge of two plates of the Earth's crust that Collision meant that this land was rich
with minerals ore for Iron and Steel but most importantly gold so during the Gold
Rush of the mid 1800s people started coming from around the world to scour this land for wealth more kept coming
and making money through World Wars 1 and two before the resources started to dry up the legacy of that time were the
abandoned Shacks Mills Railways and mine shafts carved out of the earth that dot
this Sandy landscape this is where the investigators were looking for Aaron Corwin she'd been missing long enough
that the teams had to prepare themselves for the possibility they were looking for her body the first aerial searches
via helicopter identified over 100 abandoned mine shafts that were big enough to hide a corpse the task ahead
of the search and rescue teams would be daunting so they Enlisted the help of an
expert a local Man by the name of Doug Billings Doug Billings who we called the mine Whisperer experts like Doug
Billings he's also been called The Cave Whisperer he knows all about every single mine that is out in the Mojave
Desert by day Doug Billings is a softspoken owner of his family's hardware store in his free time though
he was an experienced and Savvy cave diver the 48 Hours team went out with Doug to the desert where he showed them
the land that he knew like the best back of his hand as I stand here right now I'm looking at a beautiful turquoise
rock and I'm looking at another white crystal rock and I'm looking at the skyline and these black Iron mountains
and thinking about you know Prospectors who a hundred years ago were with a pick
and shovel trying to make a living out here there's nature there's history you know there's Wildlife out here you see
it is beautiful it's God's country Doug doesn't like to call himself an expert but his connection to
this terrain runs deep his grandparents had a homestead here as he grew up Doug started exploring the caves dotting the
very stretch of land where Aaron Corwin went missing many of the Mind chefs that the
search and rescue teams were looking at Doug had already been in and spent a decade or more going through every
single one of them reading journals about them mapping them taking inventories of what you could find in
them when Aaron went missing the search and rescue teams came to Doug to get his
advice on where to start looking and he ended up joining them the teams went out
into the desert in Red Hats and yellow jackets and traveled in small groups of two or three temperatures would swell
above 100° in the Sun so their days had to start Before Dawn at first the search
was being largely done by volunteers who had to rig safety equipment lights and cameras just to look inside some of
these mine shafts Doug and the team assigned numbers to every mine they could find
and they color coordinated which ones had been searched and which ones hadn't well the goal was to basically
check every mine until we we either cleared them or found her and and there was a lot of jumping around at the
beginning I mean you just had evidence and you had to decide of the evidence what was worthy and what's not all the
while the detectives interviewing Chris Lee were relaying information to the search teams those stories that Chris
Lee told about the desert were coming in handy you had a story of the suspect saying he drove up a canyon over here
you or some Ranger saw something funny in this mine over here so we were bopping all
around but as days turned to weeks without finding Aaron or her body Doug and the rest of the team had to go back
to the drawing board which parts of the desert could Aaron be in the answer might be found in Chris
Le's interrogation the interview you heard in the beginning of the episode The Detectives spent hours in
that interrogation room asking Chris questions and pouring over evidence they had already gone through Chris's phone
and computer where they found something strange um one other thing I want to ask
you about when we do an on your computers and your phones and all that stuff um are we going to see anything
about uh murder or anything like that um probably Chris admitted to something he
said that he had been doing research on the best ways to get rid of a dead body Chris chocked it up to harmless research
he did after an off-hand conversation with a friend I was having a conversation with one of the guys in the
duty that uh it came up randomly you know random Mar talk about the best way to [Music]
body as Chris talked to the police a detective asked more about his phone remember the search and rescue team was
trying to use cell phone data to find out where Chris may have traveled and when you took off Saturday
um did you have your phone with you mhm okay yeah but put it in Airplane Mode Chris said he did have his phone with
him but it was on airplane mode to save the battery then the detective asked about Aaron have you and Aaron ever met
in this area have you and Aaron ever met in this dirt area no does she know about this
area uh maybe I me if she drives on that way you can see it was in this moment that the cat and
mouse game between Chris and the detectives in the room changed things became more
confrontational and that's why I'm asking about uh her car okay cuz that's we found her car how did you yeah it was
parked in that dirt okay okay so any reason why she would have been parked in that dirt no not not
that I can think maybe she was meeting up with somebody the detective pressed Chris on his story all right Chris
here's the deal man we've been doing this a long time okay we found our vehicle okay we found your tire
tracks we know that you were going to meet her on Saturday we know that we know that you
were going to go take her for a long drive and it was going to be a surprise we know those
things okay and we also know that you were one of the last people to see her alive the detective pulled his chair
close to Chris sitting just inches away from him while Chris leaned back against
the wall stone-faced have you ever been up with her up in the mountains or in this area no I
haven't okay do you know if she's been in this area I don't but the police kept the pressure on only
problem is is there's so many different versions of your story that nobody's nobody can believe
you honestly then the police confronted Chris over aon's pregnancy I don't know what might have been going through
your head when you found out she was pregnant but I can only imagine if it were me I'd
have a hell of a lot to think about there' be a lot of emotions there'll be a lot of stuff
built up inside and I'm telling you manto man Any Man based in that type of situation has a lot to worry
about at every question he faced Chris denied any wrongdoing at this point it might have
felt like they had reached an impass but finally during a long silence several hours in Chris revealed a small sliver
of critical information I didn't see her on Saturday I just saw her vehicle I was at that way
when I was picking up more tires for a fire and I drove past it to see if she was in there but she wasn't he told
detectives that he did see Aaron's car the day she went missing I drove past it to see if she was in there but she was
wasn't Chris said I didn't actually ever see her on Saturday and I was worried that if I told you guys I saw her car
because of my previous relationship with her he would automatically assume I did
something I was worried that if I told you guys I saw her car you would automatically assume I did something the
interrogators tried to give Chris opportunities to confess I'm not here to play games with you but I can tell you
something happened out there something something definitely happened it's only a matter of was it
planned was it a cold blooded killing or did something just happen that's all it
is but Chris stuck to his story and without Aaron's body the police had nothing directly linking Chris to her
disappearance so they were forced to let chrisly go with warning we're going to find
Aaron right now the Marine Corps base is helping us they are gathering as many soldiers
as they possibly can to go out and start checking all these areas we're going to find
her after his interrogation Chris left the police department and went to Isabelle mey's White Rock horse ranch
his family had been living there as his military service ended and they prepared
to move to Alaska it was an awkward Arrangement Chris and his wife and daughter all living in a spare room at
the ranch the news about Chris and Aaron's Affair and his possible involvement in Aaron's disappearance put
the ranch's owner Isabelle megley in an uncomfortable position Chris never reacted to anything from the time she
went missing he never uttered a word to me never talk to me it was the strangest
thing I've ever seen in the days after Aaron's disappearance Isabelle was becoming
increasingly suspicious of Chris and she was thinking back to the odd things Chris would do when he was
around one time Isabelle remembered Chris taking a cattle prod and shocking people for fun he also made a garat it's
a small handheld Weapon made up of a nylon cord stretched height between two small plastic handles the finished
product looks sort of like a pair of nunchucks at the horse ranch Chris even showed some local kids how to use it he
was very proud of it so we would put it on their next and show them how to how to eliminate them he found great
pleasure in showing him Chris was no stranger to weapons he' grown up hunting he served in
Afghanistan and back in the States friends Rec called how he liked playing with explosives and shooting target
practice with his guns but something else stuck with Isabelle something Chris told her after returning from the desert
about a week before Aaron disappeared he said to me uh in a very exciting tone I found the perfect
mine he said no one will ever find it the mine was totally isolated he had to go off-roading for 2 hours just to find
it and I looked at the pictures uh that he showed me but I couldn't tell a mine at that time it was just rocks to me and
I wasn't interested to tell you the truth and then when she went missing I told the detectives
this was potentially a big lead the pictures of this mine that Chris Lee took could be the key to finding
[Music] Aaron Cave expert Doug Billings and the rest of the team were weeks into their
Surge and still scouring the desert for Aaron I was I was in the sheriff's office going over some of the evidence
trying to uh narrow down the search and we talking about is Aaron really in a m shaft and
he walks up to me and he pokes me on my chest a couple times says she's in a m shaft and he points to me goes and
you're going to find her I said okay let's do it over the course of the search Doug
dropped down 30 mins himself but the entire search effort covered more than 100 mines in total the teams were
fighting 115° day dehydration yeah I mean some of the other hazards we were encountering right
from the day one in addition to the heat was probably one out of every three mines we went into had a rattlesnake in
it and a few of them had giant black widow nests blocking them and uh you had rock falls and and we had even one
incidence where we had a big colony of Africanized bees basically infest our camp and the heat the heat was just
terrible you know it was just so hot you know and it slows you down eventually Doug was brought into
the crime lab to see the pictures that chrisly took during his trip out to the mines the pictures that Isabelle megley
had mentioned Doug saw them and recognize the area she has to be in that Canyon and as I started making a list of
everything there I really had a lot of areas where said I'm not sure everything in there was searched so I went back and
redrew up a new map and really highlighted of the areas that got missed the M shaft itself is small and
nondescript tucked between the desert and a small mountain range while the search and rescue teams made their way
toward this spot NCIS investigators and local detectives were trying to keep an eye on Chris Lee he no longer had
anything tying him to the 29 Palms military base and because they couldn't charge him with the crime Chris was a
Flight Risk things changed when Isabelle megley mentioned something else in passing to
the detectives she said that Chris borrowed Meg's car to run an errand and when he returned she noticed something
in the back this big metal contraption that she couldn't really make sense of I said what is that thing in my car it's a
potato launcher I said what's a potato launcher and out of the blue comes a detective he
came out he said said what did you say and and so we repeated it that it was in my car I don't know what it is I have no
idea why anyone would have a potato gun NCIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr again potato gun is a high-powered
destructive device that basically launches potatoes or projectiles of that type here's where a small part of
California law became very important to this story because in California that potato gun is classified as a
destructive device that meant owning one was illegal here's Isabelle megley again
he said that's a felony we will get him right away and so Chris Lee was arrested not because of
Aaron's disappearance but instead because he was in possession of a destructive device a potato gun it's a
relatively minor charge in the scheme of things but the important thing is that even if Chris made bail he'd have to
stay in the state of California as a condition of his bond it's a plan that investigators concocted to keep tabs on
Chris as they kept up the search for Aaron and as each day passed the pressure on those investigators was
building this is a person this isn't a case and CIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr again you put that
photograph of Aaron in your case and that humanizes the person that you're looking for you you can't forget that
this person has a family has a husband has a mother has a you know brother a sister a friend they wanted to know
where Aaron was and you can't forget that Aaron's case only captured local headlines at first
but on August 1st People magazine published a six-page cover story headlined pregnant and missing mystery
of the Marine's wife the front page featured a picture of Aaron and John John in his blue Marine uniform and
Aaron in a matching gown pasted next to a picture of Chris Lee in his cowboy hat
these faces were now plastered across magazines from coast to coast the Corin investigation had officially captured
the national Spotlight so the pressure on investigators was going to be higher than
ever around this time NCIS special agent Randolph stepped onto an airplane only to see row after row of passengers
reading that very People magazine story you see a sea of it walking down that aisle and I
remembered I think weeks after that I kept seeing that image in my head there and like constantly reminding me hey you
have a job to do with the national Spotlight on Aaron the search for her continued back in the
desert but six weeks into the search the sheriff's department scaled back their efforts saying there was too much ground
to cover and not enough manpower Doug Billings was helping the remaining search and rescue teams pick
up the slack they were still focused on finding that mine that chrisly visited before Aaron disappeared Doug had been
leading searches at spots that fit that description they were wrapping up a search on the evening of Saturday August
16th when a firefighter took one last look deep down one of the mine shafts a 10x10 Gap in the rocks that looked down
into a dark Chasm flashlights didn't reveal much but something stood out to the team as they approached
it the smell of gasoline and a smell of decomposition this is reporter Beth Ford
Roth again she says the firefighters were on high alert could this finally be it they wondered could this be Aaron's
resting place the mines were dangerous some didn't have enough oxygen for a human being to
survive so what the Searchers were doing they were taking buckets putting a camera inside the bucket and then
lowering the bucket down the mines Beth Ford Roth has seen the terrifying video taken during this
search she said you can hear the bucket scraping against rock as it slid down into darkness all of a sudden you start
to see color and you see a little flash of pink and you see you know what looks like Denim and
they realized that it was a body the firefighters then repelled down into the dark
Cavern there laying on a Ledge 140 ft beneath the Earth was Aaron's body identified by her tattered pink
shirt and denim shorts then they looked around because other things had been dumped down the
Min shaft as well basically um the person who killed Aaron used it as sort of a Dumping
Ground for every possible piece of evidence that would tie him to Aaron there was a propane tank a
makeshift torch a bottle of sprite some old tires and a Marine Corp t-shirt but when they were able to
finally pull Aaron's body out of the hole they found something else something wrapped around her neck a nylon cord
stretched between two pieces of rebar a handmade garant next time on 48 Hours NCIS while
aon's family Mourns her death The Manhunt for Chris Lee begins since Aaron's body had been found
in a desert mine authorities were finally able to charge someone for her murder and Chris Lee was suspect number
one before finding Aaron's body police were able to arrest Chris for possession of a potato gun he had made bail and was
told not to leave San Bernardino County this way authorities could keep tabs on him as they continued to search for
Aaron investigators knew Chris was staying at Isabelle meckley's horse ranch before he
was picked up for the potato gun so they made their way to the ranch after they found Aaron's
Body by the time investigators arrived Chris and his family were gone breaking the conditions of his
bail Christopher Le and aoli did disappear and nobody really knew where they went the family they were planning to
leave the area how are they going to do this they were were they going to move themselves were they going to contract a
moving company we needed to know that information and so that's when Cliff asked me if I could I could assist with
potentially trying to locate Lee in coordination with s Bernardino NCIS special agent Clifton Randolph Jr and
NCIS analyst Ashley delfen scoured their military database to gather everything they could on Chris and zeroed in on
where he might have gone but since Chris had just been honorably discharged getting an exact
location proved to be difficult if you move in the military usually there are contractors that can move you and those
are military records part of your permanent change of station however with outside contracted
military moves takes a little more digging to locate of how someone is going to move once a marine moves on
their own accord into civilian life the military no longer keeps track of them so NCIS Personnel sifted through more
than just military records well if you left 29 Palms how did he leave we did a little bit of research and found that he
had rented a car and appeared to have driven up to Washington State and then crossed over into Alaska
eventually NCIS was able to pinpoint where Chris had gone back to his hometown of Anchorage Alaska soon after
local authorities arrested Chris after finding him driving his mother's car while searching the vehicle they found
blue climbing rope several knives and a handmade garant during all of this investigators
made sure to keep lore Aaron's mom updated it probably wasn't 30 minutes after I
got that phone call saying that it was definitely Aaron that I got another phone call saying Chris was arrested in
Alaska Anchorage Alaska is Christopher Lee's Hometown he was a small boy here once playing in the snow learning
survival techniques like hunting and fishing as a teenager he played football on his High School varsity team once
Chris graduated he prepared to leave snowy Anchorage to join The Honorable Marine Corps it's also here in Anchorage
Alaska where Chris Lee was arrested for murder I think he was confident enough that they would never find Aaron's body
that he could just go on with life I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales and this is 48 Hours
NCIS episode 5 weapon of choice numb you felt numb you just go through the motions you just do what you have to
do lur had been preparing to hear the worst for weeks when she and her husband Bill finally got the call that they
found her daughter's body she did her best to stay strong for her other children you know it's midnight and
we're dis bill and I discuss you know there's no reason to wake them up a few of her kids still lived in the
house a few had moved out and started their own families they might as well have a good night's sleep so we decideed
we'd wait until the next morning to call them the weight of it all was unbearable a few weeks after they
confirmed it was Aaron's body in the Min shaft Laura and her family were able to
properly grieve in the middle of September of 200 14 we had a candlelight vigil at the
barn where she had kept her horse a final goodbye in honor of Aaron Corwin's life the barn was located at the East
Tennessee Riding Club in Oakridge it's small tucked away off the side roads there were posters hung all over the
walls collages of Aaron and her favorite things in life her animals and her family it was dusk everyone held a
candle and sat on the bleachers anyone who wanted to share a few words about Aaron was invited to do
so a couple of her friends spoke one of the youth leaders from church spoke and the minister that baptized her
as a child said the prayer over it John Aaron's husband was there as well but he
didn't say anything he held his candle looking stoic Beyond her friends and family
Aaron's tragedy touched so many there were so many people hundreds of people there I hugged so many necks of people I
didn't know the support that we got from complete strangers is just unbelievable lur was able to see the
beauty and strangers empathizing with her it gave her strength in the midst of her nightmare the body of a pregnant Oak
Ridge woman has been found 19-year-old Aaron corwell had been missing for nearly 2 months friends remembered Aaron
as a shy teenager Who Loved animals we need to remember that she's a person first she's a daughter a sister a wife a
friend Beth Ford Roth who covered aon's case for public radio remembers how media Outlets all over the country clung
to this story when you see a photograph of Aaron Corwin you know why because she
was sweet naive pregnant Marine wife a teenager from Eastern Tennessee a family who loved her there was the obvious
salacious nature of it all but Beth believes it was more than that she's a small town girl she doesn't
have a lot of experience with men and this is a crazy situation that she found herself in she looked to the wrong
person to help her get out of it most of us have fallen for the wrong person When
We Were Young most of us have made rash and dramatic decisions in our teenage years
but most of us get to learn and grow from them I think if women are honest with themselves and they look back at
how innocent or naive they may have been at that age it could have been any one of us but
we got to move on we got to suffer the Heartbreak and then move on and Aon never got that chance she'll never get
that [Music] chance police and NCIS had done their part and now it was up to the judicial
system to do theirs it was time to get a conviction and hopefully some justice for Aaron lore remembers the grueling
wait for trial to start it took almost 2 and 1/2 years for the trial to happen started October
2016 during that time Chris Lee had been held in a San Bernardino County jail he
was arraigned and pleaded not guilty to murder before the start of the trial lur headed back to San Bernardino to be
there in person her sister accompanied her Aaron's Father Bill would not attend I don't think I could have contained
myself unable to do that that would have put more stress on my wife she had enough stress with going to the trial
herself but to worry about how I would handle it would not be any better I attended every moment of the
trial the San Bernardino County Superior Court is only only 60 Mi outside of LA and 90 Mi outside of 29 Palms the
courthouse itself looks like any major municipal building massive and old with large imposing pillars at the
front the courtroom looks like a church rows of wooden pews facing forward toward the bench where the judge
presides Chris walked in wearing a white button-down shirt a blue tie khakis and a clean shaven face Chris sat down
calmly on the defense side of the courtroom lur thought he looked different Chris lost a ton of weight lur
had met Chris years ago during the investigation so when she first saw Chris enter the courtroom she was
shocked by his appearance I don't know that I would have recognized him if I was just
walking down the street and saw him he almost kind of looked scary [Music] based on court transcripts there was a
long list of witnesses who were called to testify for the prosecution this included Aaron's mom
lore her husband John her hometown best friend Jesse and the malakes aon's neighbors who live
downstairs laur's family expected her to report back about the trial daily but some of the information was so dense it
was hard for her to keep all the facts in her head during a break in the proceedings
Laura and her sister looked around the room they noticed a woman sitting behind them just a few feet away writing on a
notepad fervently it was reporter Beth Ford Roth that first day it just poured out of
me Beth published daily updates from the trial on her blog to sit so close to aon's family members she was their
daughter their wife and then also to sit in the same room with the man who ended
her life and it was I was filled with so much emotion I didn't know what else to
do so I wrote it down Beth had initially started as a public radio reporter covering the case but she had become so
attached to Aaron's story she decided to continue reporting on it through a personal blog she created called Justice
for Aaron Corwin Laura's sister approached Beth after court one day and said thank you
because of her blog lore did not have to retell every detail of the trial to the
rest of the family instead she could just send them over to Beth's website when I was attending the trial and
writing the blog my older sister was following it on the blog she hadn't heard the story before and she called me
one night after the day of the trial and she said oh my God Bethy that could have
been me and I said I know it could have been me Beth attended trial every day she said in a strange way the courtroom
reminded her of a wedding instead of the bride's family on one side and the groom's family on the other it's it's
Lor's family and friends on one side and on the other side it's the family friends of Christopher Lee the defendant
not far from her was the prosecutor my name is Shawn dhy I'm a deputy district attorney with sanino
County and I was the trial prosecutor on the case of people versus Christopher Lee sha Doty has been an attorney for
over 20 years and has exclusively worked on homicide cases since 2009 as soon as he heard of Aaron's case
it moved him DH asked to be assigned to the case the theory of my case is that chrisly was uh about to discharge from
the Marines that he had planned and told his wife that they were going to move their family back to Alaska but there
was a hitch as the result of his relationship outside of his marriage with Aaron Corwin she had become
pregnant and she had told him he was the Father which would interrupt not only his marriage but his plans Chris Lee
backed himself into a corner and the only way out was to kill Aaron prosecutor D appeared to have a
pleas plethora of evidence at his disposal he started by showing the video footage from inside the mine where Aaron
was found and then it sort of stayed on that image and it was kind of hard to make
out because of the fact that Aaron had been there for 6 weeks in the Heat and jurors were covering their mouths I I
was looking down eron's mother was looking down even the defense attorney would look up and then look down but
Beth noticed one person who didn't look away Christopher Lee was forward looking
like this the entire time and I was thinking I never met Aaron I can't look at this the jurors never met her they
can't look at this at the very least he had a friendship with her and he was almost like looking at his
handiwork with pictures and visuals prosecutor DH was able to ensure that the jury would see the gruesome end
Aaron met they stayed on a photograph of her hand and you could see the nail polish you couldn't really recognize her
but you saw the finger nail polish and all of a sudden it was like oh yeah she's a 19-year-old girl Beth kept an
eye on Chris Lee through it all he just did not show any emotion that someone who was friendly with Aaron let alone
someone who had an intimate relationship with her would have had it I I couldn't
believe it but then a guilty man doesn't know how an innocent man would [Music] act prosecutor DH continued on
establishing Aaron as a sweet young girl who could be easily influenced then went through each piece
of evidence in great detail the fact that Chris's story changed multiple times during initial questioning before
Chris was even brought to the station he was caught lying to the police when they
first asked him questions outside of his apartment building they inquired about his
neighbor Aaron Corwin and Chrisley's initial response was I don't even know her I know who she is but that's about
it later that day uh they found out that there in fact was a relationship and he
more than knew her once Chris was brought in for questioning he admitted to the affair with
Aaron in that same interrogation he would get tangled up in another lie at first Chris stated he did not
cross pass with Aaron at all that day she went missing he just happened to be in the desert doing his own thing but
then there were the tire tracks found by her abandoned car when investigators looked at those they looked visually
similar to Chrisley's Jeep they told him that they had that evidence and asked him if he wanted to change his story
Chris changed his story again he at that point said I didn't see her that day I did see her car in that
same interrogation Chris was asked if they would find anything suspicious in his search history if they checked and
Chrisley indicated that he had been searching for the best way to get rid of a dead body during the interrogation
Chris claimed that he and some fell Marines had a benign conversation about how to dispose of a body Chris said his
internet search was out of pure curiosity Chris started to describe the different tactics he had found online
here's a bit of that recording from the interrogation room the results what' you
find out um pigs pigs mhm what does it say pigs do they them are you serious I've never heard of that Chris said one
of the best ways of getting rid of a body was feeding it to pigs Chris continued on with his findings
describing one scenario that was particularly relevant to the trial He also mentioned burning a body with tires
or getting a body extremely hot and then later in the interview it indicated that
tires can become extremely hot when they're set on fire and remember tires were found in the mine shaft with
Aaron's body and a propane tank the same mine Chris had talked about earlier with
friends in town he was excited about having discovered these Minds that he felt no one knew anything about but it
wasn't just tires and a propane tank found in the mine authorities also found a soda bottle with DNA
evidence and on the mouth of the Sprite bottle was both Chris Le's DNA and Aaron
Corwin's DNA the matching DNA evidence was especially damning bit by bit all the
evidence was mounting up against Chris for prosecutor D there was no way Chris could explain all this all the
circumstantial evidence uh was somehow explainable it would make him essentially the unluckiest man in the
world from changing his story to the tire tracks that matched his Jeep to the DNA evidence placing him at the scene of
the crime things were not looking good for Chris the then the defense decided to do something very unusual put their
defendant Chris Lee on the stand as their one and only witness here's Beth Ford Roth
again when his name was announced there was sort of this electricity in the courtroom
because no one had any idea that he was going to testify with the defense having only one
witness who happened to be the defendant himself it seemed there was hardly a case to be presented it didn't make any
sense to Beth why they'd bring chrisly to the stand the evidence against him was so
overwhelming what could he possibly say maybe they're just trying to make him human enough it was shocking to say the
least Beth wasn't wrong the defense tried to humanize Chris in front of the jury Chris seemed ready to take the
stand [Music] he was wearing his his crisp white shirt and a blue tie and khaki pants and his
hair was cut short and he was handsome and he had a Charisma about him that wasn't captured in any photograph I'd
seen before the defense started to question Chris Lee asked about his childhood what his Hobbies were to make
him seem like you know he could be anyone's kid although his Hobbies were things like blowing things up they were
trying to make him seem like a oh gosh golly kind of guy and he loved his wife and he loved his daughter and he loved
his country and that's the only thing that meant anything to him was to be a marine and to protect his
country the questioning went on like this for a while nothing about the actual case nothing about Aaron the
defense pushed for the jury to sympathize with Chris the young patriotic Marine I I had a good feeling
in this case just based on how the evidence played out that he was going to have to testify and he was going to have
to either explain away all the circumstantial evidence against him or admit that he did it but come up with
some reason for why he did it and that's exactly what happened the defense attorney asked
Christopher Brandon Lee did you kill Aaron Corwin and Chris said yes I did that was the first time that he
admitted he had done it the courtroom was still reeling from Chris admitting that he killed Aaron it
was at this stage of the trial when everything came out in the open it was like slow
motion to it admit to the crime within a half hour of taking the stand after lying about it for years
was just I I mean my hand was shaking trying to take notes and trying to stay in the moment and realize this was
actually really happening he was confessing there was the truth according to Chris Lee and then there was what
really happened Christopher Brandon Lee made sure to match his story with with the evidence that was
found according to Chris Lee on Saturday June 28th Aaron met Chris by the Marine
base she climbed into Chris's passenger seat there was a particular place Chris wanted to take Aaron he had scouted the
spot less than a week earlier but it was a long drive and he wanted to be sure he
had the route down because they weren't heading to an official trail head they were on their way to a remote abandoned
mine Aaron had told her friend Jesse over text she was excited this all seemed very romantic to her he was
planning a trip with Aaron maybe he told her it was a big surprise but he actually was going to tell her that they
shouldn't be together anymore and he was moving back to Alaska and he was going to stay with his wife Chris says he got
the breakup over with in the car basically he claimed that he told Aaron when I move to Alaska it's over between
us and that they listened to music for 2 and 1 half hours until they reached the
point where the mine was despite breaking up with Aaron they continued on with the trip Chris Lee told the jury
that he took Aaron out to this area because he wanted to blow up a mine shaft which was sort of curious because
why would Aaron be excited about accompanying him to blow up a m shaft it's not every girl's dream to watch
this you know hunk a man shoot a propane tank and watch it blow up Chris said Aron was not phased by the breakup she
just wanted to spend time with the person she was in love with it was going to be a chance just for the two of them
to spend the day together alone Aaron didn't get a chance to get out often to use the car and and this was a chance
for her to spend time with him and to be together Chris drove to a mine in the desert he unloaded the car a propane
tank lighter fluid a torch when they reached that area Chris tried to blow up a propane tank this is
his way of explaining why there was a propane tank down in the mine shaft according to Chris he threw the
propane tank down the mine and a lit torch so that it would blow up but it didn't blow he had forgotten to put the
lighter fluid on the torch so it didn't burn hot enough and that was just one more sign
for him that his life was not going the way he wanted it to and he felt desperate and so he decided to play
Russian Roulette remember Chris was supposedly still very depressed it wasn't abnormal
for him to drive drive around with a gun in the back seat as he liked to hunt and
shoot at rattlesnakes and coyotes in the desert after ending his relationship with Aaron and having failed to
successfully blow up the propane tank allegedly this was the last draw now when he first explained all of this he
said he only brought this 22 rifle well there were enough gun experts out there to say you can't play Russian roulette
with a rifle it has to be a revolver so suddenly there was a revolver there so he took the revolver and he he told Aon
I'm going to play Russian Roulette and Aaron said well I I I can't watch this and so she in 110 degree weather with
sandals on walked into the mine shaft there were actually two mines in the area near Chris and Aaron there was
one that was a horizontal mine shaft that was more like a cave but then there was another mine that was like a deep
rabbit hole said the horizontal Min shaft is the one Aaron walked into and that she just waited in there
and then came back out when he was unsuccessful with ending his life playing Russian roulette after hearing
The Gunshot that's when Aaron walked out into the sun Aaron came over to Chris and wanted to go
home during Chris's testimony Beth was sitting behind lore in the courtroom I watched sort of the back of
her head just trying to imagine what is going through her mind laur's eyes were fixed on Chris as he spoke over the
course of the trial prosecutor Shawn dty had a feeling that the defense would call into question aon's character tried
to dehumanize her as they had humanized Chris dhy made sure to prepare lore for something like this
Sean had prepared me he said that he you know may put some allegations against Aaron and I had said
from the very beginning that if they're going to try to dig up dirt on Aaron they're going to have to make something
up but I never dreamt they would make up what they made [Music] up in Chris's testimony Aaron became so
upset from watching him play roulette that she broke down he said she told him that she wanted a life with him and his
daughter that the three of them could run away together Chris talks about how he and Aaron went on this ride and
everything and um how Aaron was talking about them getting together as a family and he says
well I'm not going to do that to my daughter aon's like well but I I love her and he actually said he was jealous
of the relationship that Aaron had with his daughter and it was at this point in
Chris's jealousy that he allegedly pieced together the story he found out something terrible something that would
throw him into a fit of rage something that had warranted murder Chris asks eron or he says he
asked her whether or not she had been molesting his daughter and Aaron I guess according to his
version kind of stammered a little bit and then he got louder and asked her again and she supposedly said
yes the courtroom was shocked silent Beth sitting in one of the front rows shook her head in disbelief Chris
testified that at that point 2 hours from you know the nearest phone no cell reception 110 degree
weather that pregnant Aaron Corwin 19 decided to confess that she had molested his
daughter with no way of of rescue or no way of responding if he was going to act
negatively that she blurted out this is what I did the jury now f face their decision
with new damning information did Aaron abuse Chris Le's daughter and any anybody that knows
Aaron knows that there is no way there's just no way absolutely no way Aaron would do anything like
that next time on the final episode of 48 Hours NCIS is there any truth to Chris's story
a warning to listeners that this episode contains graphic depictions of violence just over 2 years since Aaron
left the Marine base and never came back her family finally had the answer of what happened to her and who did
it Christopher Lee killed her for the first time they finally learned his story why according to Aaron's killer she
allegedly abused his daughter the court was shocked by Chris Le's testimony it was hard to
believe it kind of came out of left field it kind of seemed like it was this last attempt to paint Aaron in a in a
horrible light to make some type of excuse for his behavior and it was hard to watch NCIS analyst
Ashley deelin kept up with a case thanks to reporter Beth Ford Roth's blog and the national news coverage since ncis's
official involvement in Aaron's story had concluded the NCIS agents had done their
job they helped find Aaron and the person who killed her but special agent Clifton Randolph Jr said it was hard to
move on from a case they had worked on so intensely years before it never goes away especially when you you had such a
big role in it in the news coverage the agents remembered seeing a side of Chris
Lee that chilled them when I saw it his testimony I was surprised by what he said that he had
done to Aaron Corwin I was surprised that he admitted what he did in the detail that he did I I was surprised by
his facial expressions kind of like he was reading off a script yeah the scri it was shocking and almost
robotic but was Chris Lee telling the truth I'm CBS News correspondent Natalie Morales this is 48 Hours
NCIS episode 6 last breath the error in the courtroom when he testified I think initially uh became very very heavy
prosecutor sha D was seated at the prosecution's table the one closest to the jury when Chris testified you could
feel the emotions in the courtroom you could see it on the juror's faces could have heard a pin drop I
think very quiet very serious very heavy prosecutor dty said the court was silent when Chris claimed that many
months before he killed Aaron his wife Nicole was giving their daughter a bath when she notic something wrong and that
Nicole said I I think that maybe she's been molested and I think Aaron did it reporter Beth Ford Roth sat in her usual
seat in the courtroom right behind Aaron's mother lore she had watched every second of the trial making note of
every piece of evidence she didn't want to miss anything in her daily write up for the blog she knew the
rest of Aaron's family would be following along and this part would be especially difficult for them to
read up to this point the court knew that Aaron would sometimes babysit Chris and Nicole's daughter so it might have
seemed plausible to the jurors that something could have happened to the Lee's daughter and that Aaron could have
done it but the time came for prosecutor DH to cross-examine Chris and DH was prepared for something like this Chris's
last ditch attempt to save himself he spoke to lur first to prepare her for this possibility when Sean first told me
I was just like you know there's just no way absolutely no way Aaron would do anything like that sea had actually
asked him if they'd noticed any difference in their daughter's Behavior once this supposedly all
started and Chris answered no like why in the world are you even asking me this you
know Chris had made the allegation now he had to prove it Beth watched how quickly the claim dissolved
Under Pressure did they call military police no did they go to a pediatri rtion who
would have been required to call the police no there was no evidence entered in by anyone to say there's evidence
this child was molested special agent Randolph said the NCIS never received a report about the
Lee's daughter on the 29 Palms Marine base it was known protocol that anyone on base who has any sort of problem any
criminal matter could and should report it to n CIS there's at least one agent working
24 hours a day that can take any report of any wrongdoing especially on a military installation and we don't
operate in secret we interact with the commands and say hey we're here we're here to assist so that's why I was
shocked being in that area that was never reported to us clearly if Aaron actually abused the
Lee's daughter her parents didn't appear to take it very seriously to say well oh we thought
Aaron did it like six months ago but we kept letting her babysit and you know I was still having a romantic relationship
with her no we didn't tell anyone we just sort of Let It Go it didn't make any sense at all but as for why this
allegation came up now that made perfect sense well the reason to do this was to
get the jury to vote for voluntary manslaughter voluntary manslaughter is the crime of killing another person in
circumstances that do not amount to murder for example killing without premeditation that's what the defense
attorney in his closing arguments said that this was not premeditated very last minute he didn't think about it at all
until he was actually doing it he didn't really know what he was doing and it was
brought in by this incredible love for his daughter and protection for his daughter and therefore he would not be
guilty of first-degree murder not even second deegree murder but voluntary manslaughter when Chris Lee was arrested
he was charged with first-degree murder killing with a full intention to kill it's the most serious type of murder and
punished accordingly in California if you are convicted of first-degree murder you
face 25 years to life in State Prison if you are convicted of voluntary manslaughter it's a much lesser
punishment you face a sentence of up to 11 years in state prison and a fine of up to
$10,000 so if prison was unavoidable Chris wanted to do as little time as possible I argued during the trial that
he wasn't confessing out of some sense of remorse or sadness or anything else he couldn't care less about that or
Aaron for that matter he was telling them that story in the hopes that someone would buy uh the heat of passion
argument and in order for anyone to believe the heat of passion argument his child abuse allegation against Aaron
would have to be airtight the jury would have to believe it to be true it was horrifying because the only
thing worse than a murderer is a child molester and so Christopher Brandon Lee tried to make himself the second most
terrible person in this story and if Aaron was the worst person then he would have been Justified for what he did in
the courtroom Beth couldn't believe what she was hearing my reaction was immediate emotion I had to put my head
down because I began to cry this man not only broke this poor girl's heart he murdered her and now to save his own
skin he was going to try and ruin her name and turn her into some sort of monster it was so
horrific and I have a flash of looking at the jury and the jury's face reflected that it sounded like an
absolute complete and total lie there was no evidence Aaron Corin was molesting his daughter other than from
him uh his story was ridiculous even from the basic fact of a 19-year-old girl being out in the middle of the
desert with someone she loves and according to him confessing to a horrible crime just doesn't pass the smell test
at all in the very first row of the courtroom lur sat listening she watched Chris Lee admit to killing her daughter
and then she had to watch him try to avoid responsibility in order to shave off a few years from a prison
sentence Chris was trying to cover all his his basis trying to do whatever he needed to do to make things less
horrible for him prosecutor DH had one more thread to pull that he hadn't [Music]
already according to Chris's testimony he found out about Aaron allegedly abusing his daughter from his wife
Nicole Lee so Nicole was sort of this little Insidious thread throughout the trial the jury never saw her testify but
she was there and her name was mentioned and there was always a suspicion of what
did she know when did she know it there were no charges against Nicole and while she was kept on call as a
witness for both sides at points in the trial she was never called to testify spousal privilege means that wives don't
have to testify against their husbands and the defense never did end up calling Nicole for reasons that are
unclear she told more than one person that she didn't care if Aaron had died that if there's no body there's no case
and that they'll never find the body and that her husband needs to keep his story
straight so there's every indication that Nicole knew in my opinion but no charges have been brought against
her it was only when the judge was questioning Chris's heat of passion argument that Nicole was called to
court after Christopher brenon Lee testified that Aaron had abused his daughter and that was the reason why he
had killed her the prosecutor asked that Nicole be brought into the courtroom when Nicole
arrived in court she seemed at peace she had a big smile on her face she was wearing her husband's dog tags you know
she was dressed business suit makeup just everything was great Nicole stood in the middle of the court
in front of prosecutor DH and the judge D said if Nicole's daughter really was put in danger if Aaron really was
abusing her he was prepared to call the child to the stand as soon as the prosecutor said you
need to have your daughter available to be brought in as a witness she started to
shake and got very very angry I think she was absolutely shocked that the prosecutor sort of called their
Bluff and said okay if you're going to use your daughter as a tool to try and get your husband off of
murdering his mistress we're going to ask her questions if she was really abused that we we should want to find
out what happened to her according to Beth Nicole stormed out of the courtroom Beth felt Nicole's emotional response
wasn't out of concern for her daughter's well-being it was almost like at that moment she realized that that lie wasn't
going to work and that her husband was going to get convicted of murder so if Aaron was innocent why
would Chris kill her to prosecutor DH Chris's motive was clear Chris Lee killed Aaron Corwin
because he didn't want the baggage of a child with another woman and the fact that she was going to be a part of his
life for the rest of his life Chris when he was on the stand was talking about the fact that he joined the Marines
because he wanted to protect our country and he had several deployments but none of them involved him being in
action and he was very disappointed that he did not get to kill anybody he actually said
that he said that if that was painful for lore to hear the next bit was excruciating a warning to listeners that
what you're about to hear is graphic I knew about the grot before the trial it was still around her neck
as prosecutor DH cross-examined Chris on the stand he felt Chris's story and the
way he told it made murdering Aaron sound sort of sterile and one-dimensional doy needed to help the
jury better visualize the crime he had a strategy he had prepared lore for it as
he knew she would be watching in the courtroom Sean warned me that he was going to have Chris demonstrate how he
used the garot and I did not watch it when I cross-examined chrisly and we reached the point where I was bringing
out the dummy and the Gat uh I believe my question was show me how you did it show me how you killed
her reporter Beth Ford Roth was seated near the front of the courtroom as usual her eyes fixed on Chris she watched as
he stepped down from the stand the prosecutor had sort of a um it looked like a ra giant rag doll
basically a a sized doll and he asked Christopher Lee to demonstrate on the doll how he used the Gat on Aaron Corwin
I was absolutely shocked because he had no emotion about it it was kind of like oh okay yeah I'll do that Chris Lee
faced the court his back to the judge Beth couldn't look away we can see his face the doll is in
front of him he puts the G rot around the doll's neck and then he when he twists it he turns
around and the doll went up it flew up in the air Beth heard a gasp the demonstration was violent but Chris
didn't seem aware of this he continued when he twisted it he wasn't facing her anymore she was back to back
with him he didn't have to look at her when he was doing this the people in court didn't have to
imagine Aaron's shock or how her body responded because she was so tiny her feet would have flown up in the
air and they never did find her shoes when she was down there they must have flown off her
feet Beth's eyes moved from Chris to lore I sat there and and put my head down and closed my eyes while he was
demonstrating what he had done to my daughter and then the prosecutor timed what happened just so that the
jury could see how many moments how many seconds how many minutes he had to change his
mind and stop doing what he was doing to save Aaron's life earlier in the trial the medical
examiner had testified that it would have taken 20 seconds for Aaron to black out which means that for 20 seconds she
experienced pure conscious panic and so the prosecutor timed out 20 seconds of what she must have
experienced and I would ask him every 20 seconds or so could have stopped you could have stopped you could have
stopped the jurors reactions they're right in front of me they're squirming in their
chairs uh several of them were tearing up I think a lot of us hoped it was she didn't see it coming at least she didn't
know what was about to happen to her but she did the medical examiner testified that
it would have taken 4 and 1 half to 5 minutes for Aaron to die Chris stood with the dummy hanging
over his shoulder its legs kicked out and Limp he held the Gat taut until he was told to stop it was dead silent and
um I got the point across I I I did I I stopped they get it it was so brutal to know that he just stayed there after she
was no longer conscious and and held her like that for 4 minutes to make sure she was was
dead the demonstration proved that Aaron's death was no accident regardless of whether it was voluntary manslaughter
or first-degree murder what I was showing is the to the jury is he had plenty of time to think about life
letting someone live or think about killing them and once you've had that opportunity that's premeditation to
Liberation when you choose death and that's certainly what he did and and he could have stopped which even further
shows PR meditation Del Liberation in the desert with the Gat still around Aaron's neck Chris had to
get rid of her body the prosecutor asked how Aaron ended up in the mine and he said I
dragged her with the garat and she went down head first into the mine he didn't initially want to answer
and eventually he admitted that's the way he did it it was important for the jurors to hear that it was was important
for everyone to hear that but he he did he threw down like a piece of garbage lur kept her head down during
the demonstration but she knew she would never forget it one thing that does kind
of haunt me is what was going through her brain what was she thinking when he was joking her she was with somebody
that she thought loved her somebody she felt she could trust and my only saving grace is
I choose to believe that she was unconscious very quick that she didn't have much time to think about
it after three full days in court spread across the month of October 2016 the judge sent the jury to
deliberate the day the jury went out I was so totally drained that I literally was tripping just
walking I could not pick my feet up reporter Beth Ford Roth recalled that it didn't take long for the jury to come
back with a decision so the jury was given the case the last day of trial after the closing arguments that
afternoon and by the next morning they had a verdict it was just a very scary day cuz you just don't know you know
what are all these people thinking when the jury filed in I mean you're still very apprehensive you know I don't have
a good read on them the courtroom held its breath awaiting the verdict Christopher Brandon Lee was
convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without the possibility of parole
when they read that the verdict I you know immediately thought we've got Justice for you
Aaron prosecutor Shawn dar's strategies in court had paid off the special circumstance allegation in the case was
lying and wait and that is he essentially waited and watched for an opportunity to act to kill with the
intent to kill all the evidence in this case pointed that that's exactly what he
did Chris sat in the defendant's chair in handcuffs his expression did not change I didn't look over at him I I've
heard he didn't react at all behind him his mother started to cry lur Aaron's mother fixed her eyes on
Chris Chris would not look at me when he was sitting on the stand and saying how
sorry he was that he did this to her I literally stared at him during that time and he was would not look up at me you
know if you're truly sorry look at me and tell me you're sorry but he would not look at
[Music] me Chris was led away in handcuffs the judge returned to his Chambers and the
rest of the room filed out after four long days in court and two years since Aaron's murder perhaps the community
could finally start healing but but there would be no peace for lore not yet Chris wasn't done fighting he filed an
appeal on November 29th 2016 the day of the sentencing hearing in his appeal Chris claimed that had the jury been
more fully instructed it could have found that he did not premeditate and deliberate The Killing and therefore the
jury could have convicted him of second degree murder instead of first degree murder the Appellate Court
disagreed and affirmed the judgment and they're basically saying you have nothing to stand
on but then his attorney has a chance to reply again this could go on for years and
years and years and years it's just like you're going along just fine and then all of a sudden
someone rips your emotional scab off again today Chris is in prison in San Bernardino County since he lost the
appeal he filed in 2016 he has not filed another and since the day he was sentenced when he couldn't look lore in
the eyes it's not clear whether he feels any real remorse for taking Aaron's life
you he's stolen so much from us but I also talked about the huge ripple effect you know yes it affects us
it affects her siblings it affects her nieces and nephews it affects her friends but lore demonstrates an
unbelievable Grace I felt a peace that couldn't be explained pretty much through the whole
trial I had so many people praying for me that's the only way I can explain the peace that I
felt I have no hate or animosity towards Chris I've forgiven him a long time ago if I was hateful and bitter it
wasn't going to bother Chris at all it would destroy me and I decided he's already taken
enough from me he's not going to get my heart my mind my soul lore knows that Aaron is not the only victim here not
only did he throw Aaron under the bus he threw his daughter under the bus I mean
what's she going to think when she grows up and Googles all this with astonishing empathy lur thinks
of the rest of Chris's family you know when his mom gave birth to him and holding him the dream she had
for him and surely this wasn't one of her dreams and how proud was she of him when he played football and how proud
was she of him when he joined the Marines and how excited was she when he was getting discharged and coming home
not only did he destroy our family he destroyed his fames too following his sentencing Chris Le's
military service record was amended with a dishonorable discharge Beth Ford Roth with her
reporting background on military family life says this is a huge deal so you're never supposed to say that someone is an
xmarine he's an ex-marine after he was honorably discharged he was dishonorably discharged
with dishonorable discharge status the US government does not legally consider Chris Lee a veteran and therefore he
cannot receive veteran benefits it is an indelible mark on his service permanent
for the rest of his life and while this doesn't have a serious effect on Chris serving a life sentence it means his
family isn't eligible for benefits either but as far as we can tell Nicole is still married to Chris
we couldn't find any divorce records her latest address is listed as Chris's mom's house in
Alaska at the White Rock horse rescue where Aaron and the Lee family first came together Isabelle megley has
reminders of Aaron everywhere I had her horse her horse just passed away every time I saw that horse I thought of her
Aaron's murder changed how Isabelle runs the horse rescue I learned that anything
can happen that the friendship I had with a volunteer is now different I don't trust uh I I can't believe what
they say and it has changed me to be a little harder but for the best because it can
happen and you can see in this instant good went to bad in a minute Beth maintains that it was a
formative court case for her to cover as a journalist she thinks of Aaron often but there's this fun of oh my gosh it
all could have stopped at age 19 and it could have been me it could have been my older sister it could have been
any 19-year-old girl who fell in love with the wrong guy prosecutor Shawn DH still defends Aaron in a sense he
remembers how vulnerable she was I I've heard the sentiment that Aaron was at fault for having an affair um I just
always thought it was important to keep in mind her age and her lack of experience as for John Aaron's husband
he is as enigmatic as ever we know he was remarried after Aaron's murder and they had a child he's divorced
now the NCIS agents officially closed the case once Chris was convicted but Aaron's story stays with them
when you work a case like that everyone's ultimate goal is to get Justice for the victim and to
ensure that families have closure and obviously it was a very sad circumstance and a very sad thing that occurred and I
think my main focus was are we getting Justice for Aaron and her family and the people who loved
her in Aaron's case the NCIS agents helped ensure that Justice was served but her case was just one of many invest
tigations that the agents were conducting at the time Aaron Corwin was just one victim whose special agent
Randolph and analyst ditch hin fought for you're working cases simultaneously there's always male coming in you know
deliveries are going out but mail's coming in it's a constant process so there's no moving on really is
compartmentalized this is what I'm working with here this is what I'm working with here okay we got a
conviction here did we do everything we needed to do to shore this up and ensure
that we did everything on our part so you're never really over it like because I I still I remember that case I haven't
forgotten [Music] it we are at the Min shaft where aon's body was found in March 2018 almost four
years after Aaron's murder lur visits the place for the first time where her daughter took her last breaths she goes
with 48 Hours producer Paul L Roa I wanted the opportunity to be able to come up here to have like a memorial
service for her like you see the flowers on the side of the road when someone has
passed away I wanted to remember the last place where my daughter was alive in the desert Lura stands at the
opening of the Min shaft Wind Blows against the Sands it's hard to imagine how desolate it is here pictures don't
do it justice it's very desolate very vast but Beauty just a different kind of beauty Laura bows her
head Aron Renee our sweet precious daughter sister Aunt friend when you were taken from us we lost a breath of
fresh air shy loving nurturing trusting naive animal Whisperer you were such a wonderful young lady a gift from God we
were blessed to be chosen to be your family I'm sure the Angels were saying come to Jesus as you left us
here my Aon size hole in my heart is a little bit deeper right now to know that this was
where her life was taken from her didn't know that she had dreams that were stolen from
her memories that were taken from us in in this spot times that we could have spent
together do you feel Aaron here no Aaron's not here Aaron's in heaven [Music] from CBS News and CBS Studios this is 48
Hours NCIS original reporting by 48 Hours producer Paul Arosa Anthony Batson is the senior producer for 48 hours Jamie
Benson is the senior producer for Paramount audio special thanks to 48 Hours executive producer Judy igard CBS
studi senior vice president Rob luchow and Paramount audio vice president Megan Marcus our podcast was written and
produced by Jay venables Isabelle Kirby mcowan Cara shillan Max Johnston Megan adoli and Ian Enright additional
reporting and recording by Isabelle Kirby mcowan Jay venables and Megan adoli our executive producers are Megan
adoli and Ian Enright theme and music by epidemic sound original music from goat
rodeo with additional music from Paramount Final Mix by Rebecca Sidell Ian Enright is our fact Checker our
production manager is Megan adoli I'm Natalie Morales if you're enjoying this show be sure to give it a
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[Music] [Music] Jos Tree National Park is a very large and desolate area there's not a lot of water in these
areas and it gets very hot during the day and very cold at night it's a beautiful
area the Joshua trees are like something out of a Dr Seuss book Aaron Corwin was
a 19-year-old pregnant Marine wife on June 28th 2014 Aaron woke up up her husband John Corwin about 600 or 7
in the morning the initial story we received was Aaron had gone to Joshua Tree National Park to look for a nice hiking
routes for her and her mother John called and he said Aaron's missing and I'm like what do you mean
Aaron's missing and my first thought is she's gotten lost Aaron has no sense of direction I actually got a call from the
base commander saying that he had sent out troops to help look for her and they had found nothing it becomes very
drastic at that point she's not very large and she's not going to last long out [Music]
there there was a massive search and rescue to locate Aaron Corwin they searched in temper
that climbed as high as 110 [Music] 115 the dogs were getting heat stroke they even encountered Killer Bees it was
a really grueling tough search you don't know what the monster is in the dark in
the closet out there I think a lot of people first became familiar with Joshua Tree
National Park through the album Joshua Tree by the Irish band You2 that came out in in the
1980s and there's a song on that album called mothers of the [Applause] Disappeared but the words really spoke
with what I felt like Laura must have gone through not knowing where her daughter was and out in the desert where
the Joshua trees were she was out there somewhere it was big news for such a small area everybody was talking about
it people were looking for her there was Buzz on base we know that she is out there it's just a matter of
us trying to figure out exactly [Music] where John did tell me that he thought she'd taken a
Gatorade which is nothing in those situations he sounded concerned Ed there wasn't a lot of emotion in his voice but
John that's John there seemed to be evidence that he liked to keep an eye on Aaron and make
sure that he knew where she was you're not pointing fingers you want to find where Aaron is you're
questioning him of course when was the last time you saw her where did she say she was going to
go does she have any friends Aaron was not the type of person who would just leave and not tell anyone
her husband was calling her her mother was calling her her friends were calling her and it went straight to voicemail
that was a sign that something was wrong when they handed me that card that said special investigative homicide team
it just makes your heart sink [Music] the NCIS mission is global we're on aircraft carriers we're in foreign ports
we watch after each other we take care of each other NCIS deal with every type of crime cyber fraud
murder General crimes Counter Intelligence counterterrorism every crime is a tragedy involves sisters
brothers husbands that's the only way to find the truth we live in dangerous times and we're never going to give up n
the cases they can't [Music] forget I think agents become so attached to these cases yeah because it's such a
huge investment it's not a 9 to-5 job it takes so much Focus so much energy to stay on some of these cases to
follow them through to the end this is a person this isn't a case this is not a number this is a
human being you can't forget that this person has a family has a husband has a mother they wanted to know where Aaron
was and you can't forget that Aaron was one of our adopted children she came to the house when she
was 17 days old it's a lot to take in especially from probably your least adventurous
child a child that you would never expect something like that to happen to a helicopter took off Friday morning
the San Bernardino sheriff's search and rescue team paired up with NCIS agents for the massive job of finding Aaron
Corin last seen driving away from her home at the base for a trip to Joshua Tree National Park they had to comb
through more than 300 rugged Acres of desert pitted with more than a th000 abandoned mil
so I flew out the next day I was thinking when they find her she's going to be really in bad shape and she's
going to want her mom Aron was petite 52 small girl blue eyes dirty blonde hair very pretty of course I'm her
mom at first it seemed like a small story out in 29 Palms but for me it had a lot to do with photographs of her
Beth Ford Roth was a journalist with national public radio in San Diego when she first heard about Aaron Corwin the
story struck a cord you could see Aaron was a shy bashful sweet kind girl and I had a soft spot for her because of her
love for Animals it was hard to find a photo of Aaron where she wasn't holding a cat or with her
horse we are at East Tennessee Riding Club in Oak bridge this is where Aaron first really experienced horses when she
first started I assured her we would never get a horse we ended up with two this place was actually Aaron's
second home and I believe if she could she would have slept here Aaron and John met at the barn she
was like in fifth grade at that time she was 15 then they kind of reconnected and
they started dating on her 16th birthday John was great for Aaron he was a good kid he already knew he was going to be a
marine Aaron was 18 when she married John they got married in November of 2012 soon after Aaron and John moved to
the Marine combat base in 29 Palms California Jon took part in artillery drills that sometimes kept him out in
the desert for as long as a month at a time while Aaron was left to adjust to living on a military base 29 Palms
itself is very unique because it's in a desert community which is very remote and there's not a whole lot there
uh base like this is very close-knit you're going to go to the same grocery store you're going to go to
the same movie theater you're going to run into each other you're going to see everybody there all the
time no one on the base reported seeing Aaron leave so NCIS agents naturally began their investigation with her
husband he waited 24 hours to call to say that she was missing which seemed sort of suspicious at
first but JN had passed a polygraph test authorities also said digital evidence LED them to conclude that Jon
had been at the base nearly the entire day Aaron had gone missing shortly after Aaron Corwin
disappeared investigators found her car abandoned cor's car was located significantly far from Joshua Tree
National Park's entrance she was not with the vehicle it was a mystery to us why that car was parked in that location
and not closer to the park Aaron's mother Laura havlin sounded the alarm to aon's
friends this is not the time to be loyal if you've heard from her you need to let
somebody know I searched through a bunch of individuals Facebook friends including
erens and I was trying to find common links between who was friends with who and how those people knew each other and
I slowly grew to know Aaron from my research she started volunteering at the White Rock horse rescue ranch and that's
where she started meeting some people and slowly Gathering her Social Circle agent Delfin discovered that Aaron had
become close friends with her nextdoor neighbors Marine Corporal Chris Lee his wife Nicole and the couple's 5-year-old
daughter Liberty they all loved horses and spent a lot of time at the rescue ranch she came to the White Rock horse
rescue to find a horse for her own personal use and Nicole would come with her cuz Nicole had a horse so they rode
together Aaron also loved children and became a babysitter to the Lee's daughter and Aaron really took her in
and Liberty was very very fond of Aaron and she really bonded with that little girl I think Aaron was enjoying some
aspects of being a marine wife and other aspects I think it was harder than what
she anticipated harder and Full Of Heartache when after posting news of her pregnancy
on Facebook early in 2014 Aaron suffered a miscarriage I don't think either one of
them knew how to handle that grief process Aaron was devastated and really didn't have anyone to talk to and
Christopher Lee saw that as his in to Aaron he knew the right way to approach her because she was hurting so badly and
as he even said we were two broken pieces that fit together he took advantage of her being so
naive and he manipulated her I actually called Jesse and asked her about it Jessica trenum also known as Jesse was
Aaron's best friend who was still back in their hometown of Oakridge Tennessee Aaron definitely confided to Jesse in a
different way than she confided with me June 29th after Jesse and I had talked on the phone she texted me and said that
Aaron was going out to the desert with someone by the name of Chris Lee Aaron confided to Jesse that she and Chris Lee
had become close developing feelings for each other Christopher Lee was not happy
with the direction his life was going in and Aaron was a nextdoor neighbor who was beautiful and innocent and sweet
Christopher Lee prayed on the part of Aaron that loved to take care of things that were
hurting and he used that to get her to fall in love with him [Music] we have this responsibility to help
protect the war fighter and by extension the war Fighters dependence we take that very
seriously I remember being on an airplane every other passenger had that P magazine
cover with John Corwin and Aaron Corwin's picture I was like overwhelmed this is
so big and I'm a part of this that just also reminds you you have a job to do NCIS agent Clifton Randolph
had learned that a friend of aerons possessed important information about The 19-year-old's
Disappearance so he quickly dispatched agent Shawn Nash to the home of Jessica trenum back
in Tennessee I first meet Jessica at her residence we did a manual search of her
phone and we identified several text messages that were important to the investigation it appeared that Aaron and
Christopher Lee had a romantic relationship Jessica confirmed the information in those texts telling agent
Nash that Aaron Corwin and Chris Lee had been having a torrid love affair for months ever since Chris learned of
Aaron's miscarriage he made her feel important by saying I'm going through a really
tough time now too I don't connect with my family anymore I play Russian Roulette every morning that decides
whether I'm going to have another day or not and Aaron had a purpose now it was to keep Chris
alive Jesse was the only person who knew knew that relationship was ongoing to this day I have a hard time wrapping my
brain around that because that's not who Aaron was that wasn't the only secret Aaron
had been keeping from her mother I did not know that Aaron was pregnant I found out when I got to the apartment John
told me she was pregnant this new pregnancy came only months after Aaron's Miss carriage and John was
overjoyed he believed he was the father and had no idea that Aaron had secretly confided to Chris that the baby was his
according to Jessica trenum Aaron texted her friend Jesse in Tennessee that Chris was very excited
about it that he wanted to tell everyone at least that's what Chris apparently told Aaron in the in the
meantime he was making plans to move his family back to Alaska in late June 2014 Chris was under
pressure from all sides when he texted Aaron and invited her out to the desert for a
surprise supposedly he had a special surprise for her in response to her pregnancy Aaron texted
Jessica and he said he's honestly not sure how I'm going to react Jessica had text back to Aaron and some Emojis with
a ring and a diamond and then kiss symbols I would assume that would be an engagement
ring the strong bond between Aaron and Chris did not surprise Isabelle megley the owner of the horse ranch where the
couple spent so many hours Chris Lee loved to make people laugh on on and Aaron was somebody that gave him
the pleasure whereas Nicole was very strict told him what to do and that's what the problem was was that Chris and
Nicole didn't have that relationship but he found the relationship with Eric upon hearing about these Tangled
relationships investigators with the help of NCIS went to question Chris Lee he said that he knew Aaron but they were
just acquaintances and he knew her from the horse ranch detectives were also questioning
Isabelle megley and she told them about a memorable conversation she'd had with Chris the weekend before Aaron went
missing Chris was saying he went on an Excursion in the desert with his front and I said oh that must have been
funny he said oh wa you see my pictures and I found the perfect mine I found this mine that nobody will
ever find and I just said wow and then when she went missing I knew she was in a
mine so I told the detectives [Music] as NCIS agents and deputies from the San Bernardino sheriff's office continued
their joint investigation into Aaron Corwin's disappearance they discovered that Chris Lee had been looking at mines
the weekend before Aaron disappeared but which Minds josa Tree National Park and the
surrounding area they have thousands of [Music] Mines but investigators needed an expert
to help them comb through all those Minds search and rescue members pointed to one man Doug
Billings you guys okay back there you see belted in Doug Billings is is a expert in caves
and mines he actually grew up in the area of Joshua tree and as a child spent his
Summers there with his grandparents Doug Billings is the caveman then I'm just going to rig the rack he's also been
called the mine Whisperer all right everything looks good on the clip he knows all about every single mine that
is out in the Mojave Desert backwards we walk and he's the only human being on the planet who does there's a lot of
debris on The Ledges pretty crumbly I didn't even know Aaron's name at the beginning and then I shortly got a call
back saying as they found more information that there was some information about Abandoned mines
possibly being involved in the [Music] search there's so many M shafts out [Music]
there and so much vast territory where don't do it justice it's just a whole lot of nothing
out [Music] there but Doug and the sheriff's search and rescue team pushed on and then on
July 1st 3 days after Aaron told her friend that she was heading into the desert to meet Chris Lee investigators
brought the Marine in for a formal interview he was cooperative did not request a lawyer and honest enough to
admit that he and Aaron had been having an emotional affair she was someone that I could tell
stuff that I didn't want to tell anybody else you know cuz she was a secret so I
could tell her my secrets Christopher Lee had the advantage over Aaron Corin in a sense
that he was older he had seen combat he had more experience than her that he could manipulate the situation with
Aaron Corwin didn't neverone past kissing okay um any had never had any type of intercourse
with her [Music] no the first we went was making out and like hands moving across each other's
bodies I I thought I was in love with her but like it was just that make believe life that I was in love with
when you told her that you loved her did she tell you that she loved she did okay
and I honestly I kind of think she did 3 hours into the interrogation investigators changed
tactics all right here's the deal man I've been doing this a long time and we're going
to find out what happen to Aon she's not okay something happened out there and she's not
okay and we're not going to stop until the truth is out there we know that you met with her on
Saturday morning the day that she went missing we know that and we also know that you were one
of the last people to see her alive are you a cold blooded killer did something happen was there an accident I
didn't see better okay we're we're past that this moment okay this moment right now is the most important moment of your
life we can't change what happened in the past and we can choose our Fai for from right now if something happen
whatever it is we have to be honest you guys [Music] are because you know she was pregnant
with your child she wasn't pregnant with my child maybe you really don't know I don't
know that's what she's telling everybody detective strongly suspected Chris Lee had killed Aaron
Corwin but lack the proof to arrest him we'll meet your home right now right after 4 hours of
questioning you he's ARR investigators turned him loose by sheer coincidence Chris Lee
finished his tour of service with the Marines that weekend and with no charges pending against him he was honorably
discharged but the discharge meant he had to move out of base housing so Chris his wife Nicole and
their 5-year-old daughter Liberty temp temporarily moved into an extra room at Isabelle mle's horse
ranch it turned out to be very stressful the police were here detectives were here detectives were talking to megley
when she casually mentioned an item she says Chris Lee had left in her car a potato gun or potato
launcher like this one a potato gun is a high-powered destructive device that basically launches
potatoes projectiles of that type out of the blue comes a detective he said that's a
felony we will get him right away cuz he put it in your car so they went and got a ward based on
the potato launcher it actually qualifies uh in California as an explosive device that is how they got
got him arrested cuz they couldn't get him arrested without a reason after being arrested for
possession of a destructive device Chris Lee got a lawyer made bail and was ordered not to leave the
area with the desert temperature soaring and no sign of Aaron her mother who had held out hope
that their 19-year-old daughter would be found alive came to accept that Aaron was
likely dead murdered by the man who had stolen her [Music] heart they found on her laptop that she
had been looking for apartments in Alaska I believe he was probably leading her on I know he was writing her love
notes when the relationship was found out and they felt they couldn't see each other anymore he wrote her a poem that
was found actually in her materials after she disappeared like it or not you still hold a piece of my heart ready or
not we were going to get caught don't give up and I won't too hopefully like me you still think I love
you Aaron bought into it hook line and sinker but by winning Aaron's heart Chris had backed himself into a corner
how is he going to explain Aaron's pregnancy to his wife Nicole I believe at some point Chris Le
knew that the gig was up he knew that the only way he was going to be able to solve this problem was to kill Aaron
Corwin so he began figuring out the best way to do that without getting caught thanks to information provided by
Isabelle megley investigators had located these photos of abandoned Minds that Chris and a friend had taken the
week before Aaron went missing detectives presented those photos to Doug Billings and I looked at
them and I said yeah I know exactly where those are and describe the area Doug pinpointed a nondescript hole in
the ground called the rose of Peru mine and we just like she has to be in that [Music]
Canyon told it was the last mine of the day the way they conducted the search was to drop essentially a video camera
down to the bottom of the M shaft they were getting ready to end it for the day and at the bottom of this
particular M shaft they saw the body of Aaron Corwin and sure enough she was right
there she was steps away from me on August 16th at about midnight our time the phone rang and it was one of the
detectives telling me that they had found a body down a Min shaft and they were pretty sure that it was
Aaron I I would say it's a major miracle that they found Aaron was like finding a needle and a
thousand Hy Stacks detectives immediately went to the horse ranch to arrest Chris Lee but
there was a surprise in store Chris and his family had vanished after Aaron Corwin's body was discovered
in the rose of Peru M shaft an autopsy revealed that the 19-year-old had been strangled but Aaron's body was too badly
decomposed to determine if she was pregnant Christopher Lee uh strangled a in Coran with a homemade garat it's
pretty brutal it's horrifying it's a terrible thing to even imagine someone doing to somebody else let alone
somebody that they had a romantic relationship with somebody that they had been intimate with makes you wonder if
she knew who she was getting involved with did he ever really care about her Aaron's remains were turned over to
her husband John Aaron was cremated and John has her ashes a few of us in the family have a
few ashes in like a little pendant the Marines did Grant him leave he was pretty quiet that's typical John it's
hard to read him to know what his thoughts are John was part of the candlelight vigil later held at
the Tennessee Barn where Aaron first learned a ride I hugged so many necks of people I didn't know the support that we
got from complete strangers is just unbelievable in the days following the discovery of
Aaron's body NCIS agents and sheriff's deputies had continued the manhood for Chris Lee who had fled from the horse
ranch along with his wife and daughter that's when Cliff asked me if I could assist with potentially trying to
locate Lee in coordination with s Bernardino I have access to database checks and the average person does not
have access to those same databases NCIS agent Ashley Delfin was able to track Chris Lee to his home
state of Alaska and on August 22nd 2014 6 days after Aaron's remains were found Chris Lee was arrested for her
murder prosecutor Shawn Dy says evidence found in Lee's car further tied him to Aaron's murder when Chris Lee was
arrested in Alaska the vehicle he was pulled over in contained a makeshift garat that garat was similar to the one
found wrapped around Aaron's neck it was just one of several pieces of evidence discovered with Aaron's body that M
shaft turned out to be filled with evidentiary gold at the bottom of the mine was along with Aaron was a propane
tank that propane tank was seen by a neighbor a fellow Marine that morning in the back of Chrisley's Jeep he asked
Chrisley about it and Chrisley said he was going to blow up a m shaft that propane tank was borrowed
from a horse ranch that both Chris Lee and Aaron corn adopted and took care of horses at he saw my propane tank and
said can I have this and I said you can have it if you want it so he took it and
he never brought it back all of the evidence would point to him being at the M shaft with Aaron
Corwin and him committing the murder there was numerous pieces of circumstantial evidence there was a
makeshift torch which was a stick with a Marine Core t-shirt wrapped around it and there was only one person's DNA on
the t-shirt and that was Christopher Lee the most damning piece of evidence was a
Sprite bottle with the cap still on it and it had the DNA of only two people Aaron Corwin and Christopher
Lee in October 2016 after a change in venue and more than 2 years after Aaron had killed
kissed her husband Goodbye Chris Lee stood trial for first-degree murder in a San Bernardino courtroom Aaron's mother
was there filled she says with an eerie calm I felt a piece that couldn't be explained pretty much through the whole
trial I had so many people praying for me that's the only way I can explain the peace that I felt like everyone else at
the trial Aaron's mother was struck by the dramatic change in Chris Lee's appearance Chris lost a ton of way
I don't know that I would have recognized him if I was just walking down the street the prosecutor presented
a parade of witnesses and after 8 days of wrenching testimony the prosecutor ended his case by showing jurs the love
poem Chris Lee wrote to Aaron Corwin the evidence seemed overwhelming the defense would need
something dramatic to counter the state's evidence and it did not disappoint I just
felt so much hate so much rage I wasn't going to let anybody hurt my daughter [Music]
again no one was prepared for what Chris Lee would say when he took the stand in
his own defense but his testimony brought the trial to a stand still and I think that the jury saw
exactly what type of person Chris Le was I was surprised when I saw his testimony
what he said that he had done to Aaron Corwin and the manner and his facial expressions kind of like he was reading
off a script yeah the script the former Marine began explaining to the jurors that on June
28th 2014 in the desert surrounding Joshua Tree National Park he and Aaron were two
very different people with two very different agendas he claimed that he told Aaron
when I moved to Alaska it's over between us I sat there and put my head down and
closed my eyes but Laura havin says she heard every word Chris Lee in his direct
testimony essentially said that while he was out there he'd been having a hard time emotionally and struggling and at
one point while was there he grabbed a weapon and was playing Russian roulette Aaron became very disturbed by that
became upset she told him that she wanted to be part of his daughter's life that she wanted to be with him and
wanted to move to Alaska with him he became enraged and told her that his daughter was his and not hers and she
didn't have any right to want to be with her and asked Aaron if Aaron had molested his daughter and
Aaron said yes but that accusation came out of the blue but hit like a lightning
bolt the prosecutor says it was blatantly false because Chris and Nicole had never called police about the
alleged abuse and they had never taken Liberty to a doctor to report it his story was
ridiculous just even from the base fact of a 19-year-old girl being out in the middle of the desert with someone she
loves and according to him confessing to a horrible crime just doesn't pass the smell test
at all not only did he throw Aaron under the bus he threw his daughter under the
bus there's just no way absolutely no way Aaron would do anything like that but Chris did not back away from
his story he doubled down on it saying he was stunned by Aaron's supposed [Music]
confession I just kept choking her I don't know how long it was might have been 5 minutes 10 minutes it felt like
forever and I just kept choking her one thing that does kind of haunt me is what was going through her brain what
was she thinking when he was choking her she was with some somebody that she thought loved
her somebody she felt she could trust and my only saving grace is I choose to believe that she was
unconscious very quick that she didn't have much time to think about it then you threw her down a m shaft
didn't you I did like a piece of trash I threw it down the M shaft yes like a piece of
[Music] truck right is that a question yes yes important for the jurors to hear that it was important for everyone to
hear that that he threw down like a piece of garbage journalist Beth Ford Roth said
the courtroom became extremely quiet as everyone absorbed the horror of Aaron's murder and I had to put my head down
because I began to cry because it was so horrific to me that this man not only broke this poor girl's heart he murdered
her it was so horrific there was no evidence Aaron corn was molesting his daughter other
than from him but prosecutor dity was not done with Chris Lee prosecutor had sort of a
giant rag doll basically a a humanized doll he puts the garat around the doll's neck and I heard a
gasp and you were going to follow through that see yes okay that's about 10 seconds in you could have
stopped right no minute 20 still no huh no can let go can you let go now yes sir
seconds can drag on forever when you're just silent and I I think it was it was powerful and um I think it got his point
[Music] across at any time during that 3 minutes when he's strangling her he could have
stopped which even further shows premeditation deliberation during closing arguments
the defense strategy became clear was it murder when Chris Lee's lawyers argued his client was guilty only of
involuntary manslaughter we have to talk about what the evidence actually is not
first deegree murder he claimed Chris had not planned to kill Aaron the day the jury went
out I was so totally drained that I literally was tripping just walking I could not pick my feet up
it was just a very scary day cuz you just don't know you know what are all these people thinking by the next
morning they had a verdict guilty of murder in the first degree we the jury and the when they
read the verdict you know immediately thought we've got Justice for you [Music] Aaron Chris Lee received a sentence of
life without the possibility of parole it's a case I'll never forget it this is a case I won't forget either
because it's just something that hits close to home there were times where it was a little emotional because she's 19
and she had her whole life ahead of her Laura havin asked if she could accompany us to the m shaft where
Aaron's body was discovered she had never been there but wanted to see it for herself when you were taken from us we
lost our breath of fresh air I know without a doubt that you are walking the streets of gold with Jesus and I will
see you again nearby Laura also visited Aaron's Garden the makeshift Memorial Doug
Billings created near Joshua Tree National Park I want people to know that Aaron
was sweet naive and incred incredible young lady she was not a perfect teenager but you
couldn't have asked for a better teenager when Aaron was talking to you you felt like you were the most
important person in the room we just didn't have enough time with Aaron you know you're not supposed to bury your
babies she just he went too fast [Music] we have to show that if you murder a dependent spouse we will pursue you
relentlessly and at some point you will be brought to [Music] Justice 48 Hours don't miss an episode
[Music]

Erin Corwin, a pregnant 19-year-old Marine wife, was found dead in an abandoned mine shaft in Joshua Tree National Park after weeks of searching. “48 Hours” correspondent Natalie Morales offers unique insights into Corwin’s case, including the NCIS agents’ tireless efforts to uncover her body. Listen to all six episodes of "48 Hours: NCIS" and watch the episode, "The Marine's Wife."

0:00:00 Episode 1: Where is Erin? 0:32:01 Episode 2: The Honeymoon is Over 1:00:14 Episode 3: Russian Roulette 1:28:58 Episode 4: The Perfect Mine 2:04:18 Episode 5: Weapon of Choice 2:34:53 Episode 6: Last Breath 3:09:27 The Marine's Wife

Crime. Social justice. Impact. "48 Hours" investigates the most intriguing crime and justice cases that touch on all areas of the human experience including greed and passion. "48 Hours," which premiered in 1988, has developed a rich history of original reporting and impact journalism that has helped exonerate wrongly convicted people, caused cold cases to be reopened and solved, and along the way changed lives.

For video licensing inquiries, contact: licensing@veritone.com

Brief Summary

Aaron Corwin, a 19-year-old Marine's wife, was murdered by her neighbor Christopher Lee after a tumultuous affair; he was later convicted of first-degree murder.

Key points

The Search Begins. Authorities are alerted after 24 hours of Aaron's disappearance, raising suspicions about her husband John.
The Search Begins. Aaron Corwin goes missing, prompting an urgent search by NCIS and local authorities.
The Role of Marine Wives. Marine wives play a crucial role in supporting their husbands' careers, even if they aren't best friends.
The Emotional Affair Begins. Chris and Aaron bond over shared struggles, leading to an emotional affair.
The Search for Aaron. Authorities begin searching for Aaron after her disappearance, suspecting Chris.
The Desert Search for Aaron. Search teams comb through the Mojave Desert for any sign of Aaron.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I meant to call you back, I just never got around to it.

Isabelle's casual response to the missed communication.

25:42WatchDec 11, 2024

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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