Shattered Dreams | Full Episode | Forensic Files

[music] >> Hi. Hello. I'm Maureen. [music] Maureen, hi. David. Thank you for agreeing to talk to us
today. Obviously, this is not a normal setting for when we would do an interview. Tell
me your name [music] and tell me where we are. I'm David Ditto and I'm at this detention facility.
I met my wife Karina. I was on vacation from school, my junior year in college. She was his American dream and she had
always thought she would [music] live in the United States with this handsome American.
Just a really amazing, beautiful, friendly, happy, faithful human being. She was a relatively [music] sheltered
girl living in La Paz, Mexico and she immediately fell [music] head over heels for him. The closer I got, the more I
got to know her. There was something right from the beginning. She loved her life. She loved her
[music] husband. She loved her children. She was a beautiful, loving wife. From the outside looking in, the Ditto
family looked like it was the perfect [music] family. My wife fell stuff on the downstairs.
Can you bring an ambulance? I heard a horrible falling down the stairs. Bang, bang, bang, bang coming down the
stairs. I jumped up and ran over and found Karina laying at the foot of the stairs. When
the paramedics walked into the house, Karina Ditto was laying on the floor in the foyer. She had her hands to her side
and she was covered in blood. Did you believe that Karina was going to make it? I kept asking them,
you know, is she okay? Is she okay? Does she have a pulse? It was a fall. It was
suspicious. Karina had many bruises all over her body, and she had a laceration to the back of her head. Were you ever
violent with Karina? No. I don't believe that David ever [music] hurt Karina. That's all just lies. David Ditto
controlled every single [music] aspect of Karina Ditto's life. This portrayal of her as being afraid of
David, >> [music] >> that's just not true. They're making me out to be a monster. Did you get
anywhere close to having a physical altercation with her? >> No. So, then [music] what are you doing
here? I don't know. I'm Maureen Maher. Tonight on 48 Hours, Shattered Dreams. San Diego Police 23, what's the address
of your emergency? 7723 Canyon Point Lane. It was the early hours of March 12th, 2011.
My wife hurt herself going down the stairs. When David Ditto found the lifeless body
of his wife, 38-year-old Karina. Please send an engine. >> How old is she? I don't
I do not want you to hang up. When first responders arrived at the Ditto home in Mira Mesa, a San Diego
suburb, I started asking her, "What's wrong? What's wrong? Are you okay? Honey, are
you okay?" An emotional David told them his wife, Karina, had somehow fallen down the stairs and struck her head on
the tile floor. She wasn't moving. Uh wasn't talking. So, I I grabbed her and and held her, lifted her
into my lap. Um and was was holding her and trying to get her to come to. And she she didn't
respond or didn't move at all. Karina was rushed to the hospital, unable to breathe on her own.
For 2 days, David and his family stood vigil as she clung to life. [music] I mean, I was told that first day that
she was brain dead. And then it was was almost impossible that she would ever recover.
Then, you know, the next doctor or nurse with the next doctor would tell me, you know, there's it's
still the same situation. She's not She's not going to recover. And It was really hard. I think he at first
it was just so hard for him to believe. You know, they had their life planned ahead and it was just so hard to
accept that this actually was happening. Well, there was a >> David's mother, Pat, couldn't believe
what had happened to Karina, the beautiful young woman who had captured her son's heart 20 years ago. This was
the girl. This was the one that that was going to be his wife. It was the summer
of 1993. David was on college break, vacationing in Mexico. On his way to Cabo San Lucas,
he stopped in the tranquil resort town of La Paz. Stopped to have uh to have lunch on the
waterfront. And uh was parked in my car, looked across the street, saw pretty lady with
pretty eyes and a beautiful smile and she caught my eye. Karina was a shy 20-year-old girl. She smiled at me once
or twice and I got up the nerve to go over and talk with her. Would you describe it as love at first sight?
As close to love at first sight as as you can get, I believe. Yeah. When she was eight or nine years old,
she'd say that she wanted to date an American. Karina's mother, Silvia, owner of a beauty salon in Mexico, knew her
daughter was instantly smitten with David. She, however, was not. At first, I didn't trust him.
>> Why? He was too good-looking and I said, "No. It's not possible for him to fall in
love with a person like my little girl." And I asked him, "Why her? She's Mexican
and has different customs." Karina spoke no English [music] and David spoke little Spanish, but often
love has its own language. >> [music] >> The two sparked up a long-distance love
affair through phone calls and letters and within a year, they married. [music] They first had a civil wedding in La Paz
with Karina's family and [music] then a traditional ceremony in San Diego with David's family.
My stepdad Bill walked Karina down the aisle since her dad wasn't here to walk her down the aisle and that was really
special. David's sister, Maggie, was one of Karina's bridesmaids. It was a It was
a beautiful wedding. It really was. Uh the pictures and when I look at them now, you know, I
think, "Oh, Karina's so young. My brother was so young." I remember he had cut his hair, I think probably to please
Karina's parents >> [laughter] >> or her family more. Newly married at the tender age of 21,
Karina left her family [music] and all that was familiar behind to start a new life with her new [music] husband.
I really respected the choice that she made to come up here, leave all her family, come to a new country.
Um where you don't speak the language, you're not familiar with the culture. How did she adjust to life here in the
States? There was some difficulty. It was uh completely different. She was you know nervous and like a stranger in a
strange land. While going to school to learn English, the newlywed was completely dependent on her husband. And
so he helped her a lot and kind of guided her at the beginning. Give me a kiss. Karina [music] devoted herself to
learning everything she could about life in America. >> [music] >> And she was particularly devoted to
building her life with David. Karina really wanted to be a mother. It's something that she knew almost her
whole life that she wanted to be a mom and she was really good at it. In 1996, they had their first child, a son. A few
years later, their daughter was born. As the couple was starting their family, David was also starting his career. He
took a job as a lab researcher at the University of California, San Diego. We were, you know, financially just kind of
starting off. It was a little bit of a struggle, didn't have a lot of money, but we had, you know, enough to pay the
bills and you know, have have food and and everything. It seemed Karina was actually living the
life she had always dreamed of as a little girl in Mexico. From the perfect husband They had great plans for this
place. to the perfect home that David spent years saving up for. She wanted this house.
She wanted this house and David, you know, made every effort to get this house for them and they did.
They were just the ideal family and everybody thought so and just, you know, thought
what a wonderful family. [music] But appearances can be deceiving as revealed [music] in Karina's letters to
her mother. "Sometimes I don't know why I married him." >> [music] >> wrote Karina. "I'm in despair."
As Karina [music] Ditto was fighting for her life, David Ditto was describing to
first responders [music] the events leading up to and immediately after his wife's horrifying [music]
accident. Earlier that evening, the kids went to bed and Karina and David settled in for
the night to watch Braveheart, one of Karina's favorites. We got our snacks and candy and chips
and drinks and stuff. Um and we were watching the movie. At some point, they paused the movie so
each could use the restroom. David used the bathroom downstairs, Karina went upstairs.
David returned to the living room. What happened next was simply [music] unthinkable. I heard the cat screech at
the top of the stairs and I heard just really noisy bang bang bang bang coming down the stairs.
And I jumped up and ran over and found Karina laying at the foot of the stairs. And she wasn't moving, wasn't talking.
David says he grabbed Karina and pulled her away from the stairs. Kneeling [music] by her side, he shook her. When
she didn't respond, he began CPR. Finally, [music] Karina started moving. She was grabbing on me trying to pull
herself up and I was holding her up. And and then she just stopped moving. She just kind of collapsed and was was
laying there lifeless in my arms and I didn't know what to do. Um I I laid her back down and I don't remember if I
started doing CPR again or not, but I realized that I just didn't know what was happening to her.
And that is when David made that 911 call. My wife hurt herself on the bottom of
the stairs. Okay. Can you bring her out to the front? Okay. Are you with your wife right now? I need to go get her. I
need to go get her. It was just after midnight. First responder, Lisa Challender, was on duty.
We were expecting to see a fall. We were definitely not expecting to see a cardiac arrest.
Karina's heart had stopped and she was covered in her own blood from a gash to the back of her head. The amount of
blood surprised the experienced paramedic, [music] but it was the location of Karina's body
that immediately made her suspicious. The stairway was here and the patient was over here. So, you
don't fall down the stairway and then bounce around the corner. From the blood pattern around Karina to
these scratches [music] on David's face. He said that when he was doing CPR at one point she had come
back to and then he got the scratches on his face from that. Lisa felt the scene actually suggested
there had been an intense struggle [music] and that David's story didn't add up. She had so much blood on her
face that if he had put his mouth over her mouth, he would have had her blood on his face. Given their concerns about
David's behavior and the suspicious nature of the scene, first responders called the police. But, here at the
house that night, David repeatedly told them Karina's injuries were the result of a fall down the stairs.
So, police allowed him to leave the scene to be at his wife's side at the hospital. What the cops didn't know at
the time is that over the years, there had been problems in the Dido's marriage. When you fought, would it get
verbally abusive? There's only one time that I can recall and it was you know, more than 10 years ago. Karina
and I were were arguing about something and she was really upset and she asked I
just want to know one thing. I want to know if if I make you sick or if I'm sickening
to you and I just said, "Yes." One of the few people who knew about the problems in David and Karina's
relationship was Karina's mother. He wants to tell me what spoons I should use when it's time to eat. He wants to
tell me how much water I should use to water the plants. He punishes me with money. He takes it
away for months. Karina confided in letters to her mother that David had become impossible to live
with and that she wanted to leave. There's times that I don't even want to speak to him. I don't want him to touch
me. I have to tell him that sometimes I can't stand the situation. Would she have described you as
controlling of her? I don't think so. She had freedom to, you know, do the things that she wanted to. Were you
strict with her about what she spent and where she spent it? We were on a tight budget at times and
I managed the finances. So, we didn't have a lot of money sometimes to spend on clothes or, you
know, going out to eat and things like that. Did you make her pay you back for diapers and other
goods for the kids? I don't think so. I I I honestly don't remember for sure. I don't think so.
By 2009, their marriage had reached a breaking point. [music] I said, "Well, maybe we
should look into separating because she was clear that she didn't want things to
continue the way things were." But David Ditto wasn't about to give up on all that he had invested in his marriage and
asked Karina for a second chance. And what did you ask for a second chance to do? What did you want a another chance
at? To do the things that she said that she missed from the way things were before.
According to David, their relationship did improve. But he noticed a change in Karina. Did you feel like you were in
charge in the relationship and now suddenly she was trying to be in charge? I wouldn't say suddenly, but
yeah, she was taking charge of of some things. Taking charge and continuing to assert
her independence, for the first time in 15 years, Karina got a job working at a nearby department store. She was making
money and friends. She was very nice. I would one of the nicest person I've ever
met. She struck up a relationship with a young coworker named Jonathan Moda. So,
you were friends? Yes. Did you have a flirtatious relationship as well? >> Yes. It was flirtatious, but in like a
fun way. It was just, you know, playful banter, just sexual jokes here and there
and stuff like that. Moda says their flirting never got physical. But it did get personal. Did you ever text her a
particular picture of your private parts? >> Yes, I did. Why? She asked for it. Moda also made suggestive comments on
one of Karina's Facebook photos, comments that David read. The comment was something like
how about you and me, or how about you and me, girl, or how about you and me, baby, or something like that. Did you
think there was anything going on between them? No. But just a few months before, Karina's
mother, Silvia, says David worried that she was going to leave him. In August 2010, while visiting the
family, [music] Silvia says her son-in-law turned to her for help, something David strongly denies.
He cried a lot and said Karina wanted to leave him. He told me that I have a lot
of influence over my daughter and wanted me to speak with her and plead for her not to leave him. So, I told her, "Give
him another chance, my love." The next time Silvia would see her daughter was 7 months later.
She says David only told her that Karina had been in an accident. It wasn't until
she saw with her own eyes the seriousness of the situation. I began to hug her, talking to her,
telling her to please open her eyes. After being in a coma for 2 days, Karina's life came to an end.
Were you there when they took her off life support? Yes. >> [snorts] >> Did it seem impossible to you that
your healthy wife had fallen down the stairs and now she was gone? Yes. From a fall? It was unthinkable.
>> [snorts] >> Shocking, surprising. Equally shocking, however, is what David did-o did just 15 minutes before his
beloved wife was taken off life support. With his cell phone, David took this photo of his once stunning wife, Karina.
She'd been covered with paintings of her own hand prints, and it was for a reason, says San Diego prosecutor
Claudine Ruiz. The only reason that I could come up with for why David Ditto took that photograph was as a trophy.
To remember what he had done to her, that he had the final word. >> [music] >> He controlled her life, and he
controlled her death. I know what happened that night, and I know that I didn't kill her. I know that
she fell down the stairs, and she obviously hit her head and hurt her head. For veteran San Diego homicide detective
J.C. Smith, Karina Ditto's brutally bruised body told a different story. Karina had many bruises all over her
body, and she had a laceration to the back of her head. She also had um bruising and swelling to the front of
her face, both of her eyes. Smith says Karina struggled violently until the bitter end. So violent that it left
marks on David Ditto. That was consistent with domestic violence, with a fight, with a woman
scratching and fighting for her life. >> Reaching up and and clawing? >> Yes. But if there was a violent struggle that
night, wouldn't the commotion have woken up their 14-year-old son >> [music] >> and 10-year-old daughter? Both the
children were upstairs sleeping. You would think that with all the noise of a struggle,
with the paramedics coming, the firefighters responding with with lights and siren,
all these men coming in with equipment to work on a victim, The children never woke
And David had access to narcotics, and we thought possibly he used the drugs on his kids. Did you
give your children anything that night to make them sleep? No, absolutely not. And what do you think about that
accusation? That's a pretty strong accusation because it clearly implies premeditation. It's baseless like most
of the insinuations and accusations. By now, detectives were having a tough time
buying any part of Ditto's story. So these are the stairs inside the Ditto home.
It shows 11 carpeted and padded stairs with tile floor at the bottom. Now, I know that this photo obviously was taken
a few months after the incident. Do you remember seeing any scuff marks along the side, the
banister being pulled off, the railing having any sort of marks on it, any blood, anywhere around here? Just a few
days after the homicide, we inspected the walls and the railing and the floors and the carpeting. There was nothing. No
blood on the carpet at all. The railing was fine, no damage, no problems at all.
Investigators also say one of the most disturbing red flags was this large bruise found on Karina's thigh.
I think David stomped [music] on her and kicked her. And that right there really made me and the other detectives
think that we're dealing with an assault and not a fall. Were you ever able to find a shoe that matched that in the
house? We didn't find a shoe that matched perfectly. Detectives may have strongly suspected David Ditto was
lying, but they needed more solid evidence. And they got it from the San Diego County Medical Examiner, Dr. Othon
Mena, who says Karina Ditto did not accidentally fall down the stairs. Instead, Dr. Mena says she was beaten
and strangled. There were too many injuries to be explained by what we were told happened. Therefore, I have to find
what what it was the reason her heart stopped. And in my opinion, it's because she was and uh asphyxiated either by
strangulation or by uh smothering while also being beaten. Three days later, David was arrested.
Visibly shaken at his arraignment, David Ditto went from a grieving husband to a
man charged with his wife's murder. David's mother, Pat, couldn't believe it. When the judge
uh stated that um the medical examiner had said blunt force trauma and strangulation. We
hadn't dreamed of that at all. Before March 12th, 2011, there was no known history of abuse. No physical abuse,
that is. In Karina Ditto's life, it was more about power and control. It wasn't until she started to break free
from that relationship that he lost control. San Diego County prosecutor, Claudine
Ruiz. But he was not the type of abuser who would lose his temper and beat his wife.
He was a cold, calculating man. And he made the decision to kill her. When you hear these words, violent,
controlling Well, there was no violence. There was no vio- violence. >> not words that you associate with your
Absolutely not. Even the one person who knew Karina best had her doubts. Karina's mother, Sylvia, believed
David's story at first, until she returned here to La Paz and began to think about all those letters from
Karina and all those bruises on her daughter's body. Eventually, and somewhat reluctantly, Sylvia had a
change of heart about her son-in-law. Why did he have the heart to cause a person so much harm? He could have
returned her to me or divorced her, but not kill her. Those letters may have suggested motive,
but detectives [music] believe it is the physical evidence that proves murder. She had blood in her hair that had
coagulated, and then the blood around her had already began to dry. Says to me that she had
been down for a while. David had time to think about what he was going to do if he needed to straighten up the house
before the paramedics came cuz he knew he was going to be under scrutiny. And just like first responder Lisa
Challenger, detectives [music] were equally troubled by inconsistencies at the scene. It's not consistent with a
fall down the stairs. The all the blood, everything is 3-4 ft away from the bottom of the staircase. Here's the most
unexplainable element of that story to me. Okay. When you look at the pictures at the bottom
of the stairs, Yeah. there is no blood. >> That's wrong. David's defense attorney
Keith Rutman argues it's absolutely plausible that Karina's head landed exactly where David says it did. You're
saying this is where she landed, and there is a blood splotch there. >> Correct.
And it depends upon how much blood you're looking at. Remember, if David is is kneeling
next to her, his pants had blood on them. That could have absorbed some of the blood. No one saw her fall, so you
can't say how she fell down the stairs. But every single one of the people that treated her and dealt with her, every
single one of them said, "These injuries are inconsistent with a fall." And every
day you hear of medical events that no one has ever heard of before. So, you believe that every one of those people
was wrong? Yes. Every one of those people? Yes. And do you then believe this was just a
freak accident? >> Yes. But no one other than David knows for sure what really happened that night.
>> [music] >> Did you strangle her? No. He fooled people. People don't want to believe
that there is that side, that dark side. It's just it's not me. It's not true. Karina Ditto was 38 years old.
She would have been 39 today. As David Ditto's murder trial begins, prosecutor Claudine Ruiz wants
the jury to focus in on the horrifying details of her version of this case. She scratched at him with both hands.
But he pinned her arms back. And he restrained her with his body. Then he slammed the back of her head.
And her head started bleeding. Ruiz marches witness after witness to the stand. >> I do.
forensic Experts, first responders like Ray McQueen. Based on that cardiac rhythm, that's the complete dead heart.
Witnesses make the case that Ditto's story of a fall down the stairs just didn't add up. Medic Lisa Challender.
And so for somebody to have fallen, excuse me, fallen onto a to the tile surface,
how come she was injured on both sides of her face and then the back of her head also? But David's lawyer Keith
Rotman says the evidence points to an accident, refuting the police version of the scratches on David's face. The first
element they say is that just does not make sense that somebody who's being given CPR would even be able to move
their arms and reach up and scratch. Because that's why you're giving them CPR. They're not breathing, they're not
moving. >> What? Right, but David testified she came to, so at that point you would
imagine that he would stop giving her CPR, giving her the freedom to move about. Rutman says investigators came to
the wrong conclusions because they did a sloppy job. If you're conducting a criminal investigation into a a murder
of your wife by a husband while his kids are upstairs sleeping, you have to do it
right. In court, he tries to show the jury that procedures were not followed. The right questions were not asked. Did
you ever hear anyone ask him to explain how the blood got all over her body? No, I never heard anybody ask him that.
The biggest oversight, Rutman tells the jury, was that the county medical examiner, Dr. Mina, did not have
complete information when he examined Karina's neck. And his immediate explanation is that's consistent with
what we see in strangulation cases, so it must be strangulation. What Mina didn't know, according to Rutman, is
that a resident doctor at the hospital accidentally punctured an artery in Karina's neck while trying to give her
blood to revive her. Never knew that that arterial puncture had occurred, so was never able to discount
that. Rutman says it was that puncture that caused her neck to bruise, not being strangled as Dr. Mina testified.
The puncture was discovered by Rutman's star witness, renowned medical examiner Michael Baden. He reviewed the autopsy
report, and he reviewed all the medical record from the hospital, and he was the
one who first noticed that there was a potential contributing source of blood from the arterial puncture. How does he
believe Karina died? Well, his testimony was actually to be to be technically correct about it was that her injuries
were consistent with the fall down the stairs. But Dr. Mina says he was aware of the puncture. The defense believes
that the mistake of the resident is the hemorrhage that you saw, that you believed was strangulation. No, it
cannot be because those two hemorrhages were separate. The hemorrhage that was by the
because of the resident placing a line, that was down here by the clavicle. >> Mhm. The hemorrhages that I saw were
over here by the thyroid gland or by the voice box. Karina's injuries tell a story, says Mena.
About what happened to her that night. What's the story you were able to piece together by the condition of her body?
Her body told me that she was beaten because she had way too many injuries to be explained by a fall downstairs. And
that is exactly what the jury heard him say. But then Rutman took a big gamble. He did something that is rarely done in
a murder trial these days. He put David Ditto on the stand so jurors could hear from David directly and judge for
themselves if he was telling the truth. Karina was here at the base of the stairs.
Her head was on the tile floor. Her shoulders were flat on the tile floor. And then he
addresses a key point to the prosecution's case, how Karina's head got to where the blood was on the floor.
So, I was holding her and I I lifted I lifted her up her head her head and shoulders
and kind of just pulled her and then just kind of took steps with my knees and pulled her
and pulled her several times until she was laying alongside the thing. Okay. Thanks.
Did you try to give CPR to Karina? >> [snorts] >> Yes, I did. Was she moving? No, she wasn't. Was she
talking? No, she wasn't. I I just picked her up and held her in my arms. Just her head and her shoulders.
>> [snorts and clears throat] >> I just said, "Honey, honey, are you okay?" Trying to wake her up.
Were you able to wake her up? No. Hey, David David also got emotional when he acknowledged there were problems in
his marriage, but said both he and Karina were working hard to save it. We talked a lot and cried a lot.
But she said yes and she wanted to try again. Jurors had to weigh David's testimony
against that of Karina's mother, who told them of his controlling ways as described by her daughter. For example,
you water the plants at a certain time. La comida talesora. Food at a certain time. Telefono.
Tenia tiempo para hablar con nosotros. The phone, she had set time to uh talk to us, to call us.
Good afternoon. In closing arguments, Rotman tells jurors that even if there were problems
in the Dittos' marriage, that is not enough evidence that he killed her. What she would tell her mother, "Sometimes I
feel like I want to be single again." Everybody feels that way. Everybody. At one point or another when you're
marriage, everybody feels that way. And he says the fact that David Ditto's story is so odd is precisely why it had
to be true. You'd think if he planned all this, he'd have a better story put together. The blood would be
in the right places. The injuries would be consistent with what he saw. That's not what he said.
Addie backs up his point that it was a freak accident with some mathematics. If it's a one in a million chance that
Karina Ditto fell down the stairs and hit her head in just the right way. It's a one in a million chance. That
means it happened to 311 people last year. A thousand if it happens in China. But Claudine Ruiz isn't buying any of
it. She wants the jurors to believe it was cold-blooded murder. This was no accident and the bruises all over her
body tell you that. After four weeks of testimony, [music] the case against David Ditto was now in
the hands of the jury. His attorney, Keith Rothman, was feeling optimistic. I was confident that we had
presented the best case that existed and that they had left too many unanswered questions for 12 people to conclude that
David just up and murdered his wife in the middle of the night with his kids upstairs. Unlike Rothman, David's
sister, Maggie, was not as optimistic. After our attorneys closing argument, that's when I felt
worried. Our closing argument just was not it didn't drive the points home. It took only one day for the jury to
reach a verdict and that made David's mother, Pat, very nervous. I felt that um because they came to a decision so
quickly, they did not consider all of the evidence. We, the jury in the above entitled
cause, find the defendant, David Patrick Ditto, guilty of the crime of murder. Guilty of first-degree murder. The
verdict stunned everyone who believed David was innocent. I never dreamed that they would um find him guilty of
first-degree murder. I mean, that was over the top. I was shocked. But no one was more shocked than the defendant.
>> I really didn't think there was any way I would be convicted. I didn't think it
would be possible to convince a a jury of 12 people that I killed her when I knew that it wasn't true and I knew
that some of the evidence, you know, looked suspicious and I saw some some problems, but it
didn't prove anything. I it didn't prove that I that I hurt Karina in any way. Was there a
particular piece of evidence or someone's testimony that came to the forefront right away? For
me, it was the medical examiner's evidence. We sat down with three of the jurors. Francine Fullman Miso found that
Karina's injuries told an undeniable story. Just seeing the pictures, you know, of her. Just seeing that because
that was so objective and um and convincing for me. Juror Christine Ellis. Even though we had all the
testimony about their relationship and everything, I was trying to go on the actual physical Yes. evidence that they
brought forward. And it just didn't seem that they could possibly be from a fall
down the stairs. And I lifted her up. And held her in my arms. Nor was juror Patricia Well convinced by
Ditto's story. I found his testimony disingenuous and it seemed very disconnected from the context of the
situation. I was troubled by that. Sad to think that someone went through that kind of pain at the
end of their life, you know. Do you believe justice was served? I do. Prosecutor Claudine Ruiz says the last
chapter of Karina Ditto's life may have ended very differently if not for the first people who stood up for her." The
patient's head was right here. The paramedics were really the unsung heroes in this case
because they arrived on the scene knowing nothing. And when they walked in, they immediately knew something was
wrong. Is it possible then he could have gotten away with murder and called it an
accident? He very well could have. I saw my role on this call as providing care for Karina Ditto. Every person that
was involved in this had a part to it. I know that we were the first people to draw attention to it. This is a tragic
case. Nine months after David Ditto was found guilty of first-degree murder, It's tragic for the victim.
It's tragic for the children. Do you understand? >> Judge Kenneth So sentenced him to 25
years to life. Now 45, David Ditto will most likely spend the rest of his days in prison.
When the case against David [music] finally came to an end, Silvia was back home in La Paz, Mexico, where it all
began for David and her daughter. I felt guilty. Even today I still feel guilty because had I told her to pack
her things and leave him, this wouldn't have happened. As Silvia looks through a photo album
full of memories, she hopes and prays she won't [music] lose touch with the grandchildren she
loves dearly but has not seen [music] since the trial. It's very difficult when I speak to them
on the phone. I can't control myself when hearing their pretty voice. They are not alone. They have a lot of family
here and we love them. The children are now living with David's sister, Maggie, >> [music]
>> and her family. You still have photos of David and Karina in your salon and all over your house.
How do you feel about David Ditto today? I only see him as a son who left. A son who made us feel good at one time.
A son who behaved badly. But I have him in my heart. I don't hate him. I forgive
him. 48 hours. To miss it would be a crime. Were you at all prepared [music] for
what happened in this case? >> [music] [music] [music]

Would a husband drug his kids so they wouldn't hear him kill his wife? "48 Hours" correspondent Maureen Maher reports in this episode from July 2013. Watch more full episodes of "48 Hours" on Pluto TV.

True crime. Real justice. "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.

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Brief Summary

David Ditto is convicted of murdering his wife Karina after a suspicious fall, revealing a troubled marriage and hidden abuse.

Key points

Shattered Dreams. A chilling account of the Ditto family's tragic events surrounding Karina's death.
Love at First Sight. David recalls meeting Karina in Mexico, describing it as love at first sight.
The Perfect Family?. From the outside, the Ditto family appeared perfect, but appearances can be deceiving.
Suspicious Circumstances. First responders question David's account of Karina's fall after observing the scene.
A Shocking Revelation. Medical examiner reveals Karina was beaten and strangled, contradicting David's story.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

She was a beautiful, loving wife.

David describes his wife Karina.

1:21WatchJun 9, 2026

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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