She Recorded Everything: Patricia Birmingham | Killers Caught On Camera | Forensic Files

NARRATOR: This time on "Killers Caught on Camera." In Texas, a marriage in turmoil--
- Hey, Rici, where'd you get that bag that I gave you for Christmas? NARRATOR: --ends in a lethal altercation.
KELLY MARSHALL: Her drunk husband-- PATRICIA BIRMINGHAM: You're embarrassing yourself.
KELLY MARSHALL: --is chasing her in broad daylight, half naked. - I'm mad enough to just pull it.
TIMOTHY HAYES: Spouses argue as to who's going to take out the trash. COREY BIRMINGHAM: You're going to meet Jesus.
- Not whether or not somebody's going to kill somebody that day. - I didn't believe he was capable of killing her.
NARRATOR: And in the UK, a woman goes missing. - Marta not turning up for work set off alarm bells.
- Clearly, there's a significant danger that she's been harmed. NARRATOR: And her husband is discovered
with severe injuries. OFFICER: He's got a knife in his neck. MAN 1: It just sounds like something
bad is happening to her. WOMAN: We know what happened because the video tells us what happened.
MAN 2: I heard some gunshots. - Drop it! Whatever it is, drop it! - That does not prove that I killed my wife.
DETECTIVE: The camera doesn't lie. NARRATOR: In Harris County, Texas, close to the city of Houston, the suburb of Spring.
- Spring is in the north end of Harris County. It's a relatively populated area.
A lot of subdivisions, neighborhoods, things like that. - It's a well-off community.
It's an idealistic place to live and grow up. NARRATOR: This pleasant Houston suburb was home to 48-year-old
Patricia Birmingham, her husband Corey, and their 16-year-old daughter Olivia. In 2021, Patricia was working as a high-flying real
estate agent. - Hello, everyone. I just wanted to come on real quick and tell you guys about a new listing that I have coming up.
NARRATOR: Former work colleague Shely Hernandez remembers first meeting Patricia.
- We showed up at one of her projects, and we just kicked it off, you know. She was just very outgoing, joking about everything.
The first impression that she gave me is that she was just very outgoing and a very fun person.
NARRATOR: Patricia's life in Houston was a far cry from her tough childhood in Orlando, Florida.
MARY DEES: My first true memory was when I was six and she was three. My mom and dad were going through a divorce,
and at that time, it was the three of us, my mom, my sister, and I, that kind of took care of each other.
NARRATOR: Patricia had shown a determination to succeed from an early age. - Anything that she wanted, she knew it took work.
If you asked her to go sell 100 boxes of cookies, she would do 200 boxes. - What are you looking at?
- Stop videoing. - Even though I used to work for her, it didn't even feel like she was my boss at sometimes,
you know, 'cause we would call each other or text or, you know, just joke about things.
She was a very humble person. She was a very down-to-Earth person more than anything.
[LINE RINGING] NARRATOR: But in December 2021, 911 handlers received a call from a concerned neighbor
in a state of distress. [SIREN WAILS] NARRATOR: Law enforcement and emergency medical services
arrived on scene. OFFICER: So far, one of my-- TIMOTHY HAYES: The scene was a two-story residence,
a long driveway, a couple cars parked, and the victim was lying on her back in the driveway with a tarp next to her feet.
OFFICER: Charles, go have EMS roll up. - She had sustained an apparent gunshot wound to the head.
NARRATOR: Standing next to her was a man wearing only a bathrobe. [RADIO CHATTER]
NARRATOR: The man was heavily intoxicated. - And I'll sit down and tell you the whole story.
NARRATOR: He identified himself as Carey Birmingham. Carrie and Patricia met in 2003 after she'd
moved to Texas for work. Carrie was nine years older than Patricia. - He seemed to be a good man.
He was a young gentleman, professional appearance. He spoke highly of himself. You know, he was his best friend.
He made sure that I was aware of these fine things that he had and his career in insurance,
and I was happy for my sister. But at the same time, that doesn't impress me. But I never had a reason to doubt her choice.
NARRATOR: The couple soon tied the knot in a lavish ceremony aboard a cruise ship, a second marriage for Carey.
- He wasn't planning on having any more children. However, my sister was determined
to have children of her own. NARRATOR: In 2005, Patricia gave birth to her daughter, Olivia.
MARY DEES: Olivia was everything that she wanted. The day she was born, that was the happiest
I've ever seen her. NARRATOR: But life in the Birmingham home had begun to deteriorate.
Overwhelmed by financial problems, both Patricia and Carey were drinking and had frequent arguments.
- Whether it was a gathering with friends, whether it was dinner, whether it was them coming to Orlando
or visiting, drinking was always involved. - Alcohol literally makes your brain function less effectively.
It makes you particularly bad at regulating your emotions, at filtering the things that you're doing and saying.
And so that inhibition of what's called your prefrontal cortex, the front of your brain,
means that you're going to say things in a way that you wouldn't say otherwise, and you're going to interpret situations as more hostile.
[RADIO CHATTER] NARRATOR: The victim was quickly identified as Carey Birmingham's wife, Patricia.
NARRATOR: At the scene, investigators located three shotgun cartridges. Two had been used to take out the tires of a white Tesla
parked on the driveway. The other hit Patricia in the right eye, killing her instantly.
[radio chatter] - So you're primary? TIMOTHY HAYES: When I turned up, I spoke with Mr. Birmingham.
- He appeared to be slightly intoxicated. - My impression was that he was pretty
relaxed about the entire situation given what we were dealing with and being only several feet away from his wife's lifeless body.
[RADIO CHATTER] OFFICER: OK. - It gives me the impression that there's no remorse, at least initially, about what he has done
or care about the situation he's put himself in and the situation he's put others in.
NARRATOR: While Carey Birmingham was transported to the Harris County homicide office to sober up,
Detective Timothy Hayes began to unwind the events of that morning. TIMOTHY HAYES: Just because someone tells us
they did something doesn't always mean they in fact did it. There still has to be an investigation that takes place.
Physical evidence has to be recovered, eyewitness testimony, video surveillance footage, which
would either corroborate or not corroborate what Mr. Birmingham had told us. NARRATOR: Detective Hayes knew from experience
that a neighborhood like this would be covered by lots of home security devices.
TIMOTHY HAYES: I started talking to neighbors who may have video surveillance footage.
While it may not be the entire case, it may help piece together what led up to a certain situation, what happened
during the time of the crime, and then sometimes what happened after as well. NARRATOR: Across the street, a house with a camera
that recorded everything. TIMOTHY HAYES: This is Patricia Birmingham walking down
the sidewalk holding her purse and what appears to be her cell phone, pointing it in the opposite direction of something
coming down the street. Her demeanor here at least appears to be calm. She's just walking pointing the camera.
NARRATOR: Investigators knew they needed to find her cell phone. What it contained could unlock this investigation.
First, detectives had to speak to Patricia's family. - My phone started ringing.
I answer the phone, and all of a sudden, I hear, "This is Detective Hayes." He said, "Your sister has died."
Everything is kind of blurred. One minute I was fine, and the next minute I was hysteric.
What happened? Where is she? What's going on? And he said, "Her husband killed her."
[RADIO CHATTER] NARRATOR: It was late afternoon by the time a judge granted a search warrant
for the Birmingham property. TIMOTHY HAYES: We entered the residence through the side door of the house,
and we observed a Benelli shotgun leaning up against the corner of the kitchen area right
by that door. Based on proximity to where it was to Patricia Birmingham's body, it could
have been used in this case. There appeared to be more firearms inside of the house.
NARRATOR: Forensic analysis would later prove the shotgun found by the door matched
the shells found outside. But it was in the garage that investigators uncovered the most critical piece of evidence.
TIMOTHY HAYES: On top of some water bottles, we had located what appeared to be Patricia Birmingham's cellular device.
NARRATOR: Was this blood-stained phone the same one seen in Patricia's hand? Investigators applied for a warrant
to access the cell phone. Meanwhile, they received new footage recorded by security cameras on another neighboring property.
- You obviously see Patricia Birmingham right here with her cell phone in her left hand.
And if you keep playing the video, we end up seeing Mr. Birmingham coming from the left frame
of the screen here. It appears she's running now away from Mr. Birmingham. It didn't appear to be the typical domestic relationship.
There's some kind of disturbance happening. It's not normal behavior to be out there in the middle of the day just
wearing nothing but your bathrobe. NARRATOR: Three days after Patricia's death, Detective Hayes was finally granted a warrant to access
Patricia's cell phone. - The first data I found on the phone was the audio recording that was
about 30 to 40 minutes long. NARRATOR: Assistant District Attorney Kelly Marshall
worked on the case. - It started at 9:58 AM, and we can hear at the beginning of the audio recording the defendant
is accusing her of recording. And you hear that she's fearful. [KNIFE CLINKS] - What she's doing here, where she presses Record on her phone
to pick up the audio, is she's trying to document the situation. And that could be because she's trying to create this evidence
to show family and friends so that they believe and understand how bad the situation is.
[CLACKING] - Mrs. Birmingham says in this recording, "Go get your gun," which led me to believe that this might not be the first
time that Mr. Birmingham has either threatened her with a firearm or pointed a firearm at her.
SHELY HERNANDEZ: The last lunch that we had, we talked about business. We talked about personal stuff.
She opened up about her situation, and she even admitted to me that Carey had pulled a gun several times before in the past.
She left me in shock because, like, how a successful woman is dealing with something like that?
- A lot of times, you know, spouses argue as to who's going to take out the trash or not,
not whether or not somebody's going to kill somebody that day. - Fat-shaming is common in intimate
partner violence situations. It's a type of psychological abuse where the perpetrator is trying to feel
more powerful than the person they are trying to humiliate. It's not just her fault that she apparently
doesn't meet his standards. He's also blaming her for his weight. NARRATOR: Ultimately, the argument
centered on Carey's suspicion that Patricia was having an affair. [CAREY LAUGHING]
- It speaks to me as to what's a normal day and language with Mr. Birmingham and his wife.
- This threat that he's going to kill her, she obviously doesn't take it seriously
because she says go ahead, and that's this downplaying of a real threat. And that could either be because he's repeatedly
threatened this in the past, or she just doesn't believe that he's capable of that.
NARRATOR: Also on the phone were several video recordings. - This is moments after the argument
that they were having on the audio recording. It appears that she's trying to remove herself
from the situation inside of the home, and he's continuing to follow her, walking down the street away from their house.
- That Christmas bag. - She clearly feels threatened enough that she needs to put distance between herself and
the defendant, because this man had every ability to choke her and kill her if he got close enough to grab her.
TIMOTHY HAYES: We see her filming Carey going up and down the street, which corresponds
with the surveillance footage we recovered and kind of adds a little bit more context as to what was going on,
because not only do we have the footage, but also audio as to what's being said.
[PATRICIA LAUGHING] - You can hear Patricia almost laughing at the absurdity of the situation,
that her drunk husband is chasing her in broad daylight in their neighborhood in front of their neighbors,
half naked, as the bathrobe comes open, and she knows to put distance between herself
and the defendant, who has been threatening to kill her for the last 30 minutes.
- Generally, when people know they're being observed, they change their behavior.
And so in this case, he might be thinking, well, I'm not going to be quite as ridiculous
or I'm not going to be quite as aggressive in this situation if she's filming me.
But if she is banking on that, that is clearly not what's happening. And if anything, he seems to be annoyed by the fact
that she's filming him, and he certainly isn't taking it as any kind of real threat.
NARRATOR: The next disturbing video captured the last moments of Patricia's life.
- When I first saw the video of Carey Birmingham pointing a shotgun at Patricia Birmingham, it took me aback.
He's clearly intoxicated to a huge degree, pointing a shotgun at his wife, and she's filming him.
Some people may think that, well, why are you filming? You should run away. But the thing is, he's holding a weapon that's
capable of ending her life immediately, and at that point, the best defense she had was her cell phone.
- Mr. Birmingham's-- now he's looked in one direction because she has mentioned the neighbors
could witness this act. He looks that way, showing that he's fully aware of the situation and what's going on outside.
And then, furthermore, he checks his firearm to see whether or not the action is on safety
or not, to manipulate the firearm to make sure it's in a position to where it can be fired.
[GUN CLICKS] - He shoots her once in the head. The second two shots that are heard on that video,
he actually turns the gun and immediately in seconds, takes out the front tire and the back tire of her vehicle.
So she's shot one time in the head, meaning that she had to have a closed casket funeral.
Her eye was gone. Her face was blown off. And the defendant, in the same second that he blew off
his wife's head, even incredibly intoxicated, made perfect aim and took out the front
and back tire of her vehicle. - Carey Birmingham had the intent to murder his wife,
and he did it. [HEAVY BREATHING] - It sounds like he lays down next to her, and then you can hear heavy breathing.
And then he moves the phone into the garage area. [CAREY GROANS] - It's incredible that this footage exists,
and that was what was so unique about this case. You got to see behind closed doors.
You got to hear the audio. You got to hear him planning over 30 minutes that he was going to kill his wife.
JULIA SHAW: He's clearly accepted in his mind some sort of challenge, and he decides
that he is going to prove himself by shooting her. Certainly he knows how to use a gun,
and you can see that here as well as he very much, even in his incredibly drunk state,
is able to use and fire and hit his target exactly where he wants. NARRATOR: Carey Birmingham was charged with Patricia's murder.
He chose not to explain his actions to investigators. - Patricia was very smart.
She was. She recorded the last 30 minutes of her life where that we can objectively look at everything
that happened leading up to the moment where Carey Birmingham murdered her. To be clear, there was no evidence
presented at trial that Patricia Birmingham had an affair. All that we had is that the defendant
was accusing Patricia Birmingham of cheating, of being involved in an affair. There was no evidence of that.
NARRATOR: Carey Birmingham's case went to trial in March 2024. Unusually, the jury was comprised completely of women.
- I came to trial wanting to forgive him. I didn't believe he was capable of killing her.
He was controlling. He was conniving. He was narcissistic. He was a functional alcoholic.
I never thought he could lose that type of control and do that type of violence.
You know, looking at the shotgun to make sure that the safety was off, positioning it,
pointing it at her, and then ultimately, you know, wishing her goodbyes and telling her to go
meet Jesus, that was chilling. It was never anything I could have ever imagined.
NARRATOR: Carey Birmingham pleaded not guilty. He claimed the killing happened in the heat
of the moment, a defense known as sudden passion. - Sudden passion is not license for murder.
It's absolutely not. It's not sudden revenge. It's not something that you can plan
for up to 24 hours or up to 30 minutes before the crime. NARRATOR: Despite the weight of video evidence presented,
the jury accepted the sudden passion defense. - I thought I misunderstood when the verdict came back
that they agreed that it was sudden passion and that they're going to sentence him barely over the minimum.
And they said they're going to give him 10 years in prison with the possibility of parole in 5 years.
- In terms of the surveillance video footage, the video recordings from the cellular phone, and the audio
recordings from the cellular phone for them to reach that type of decision and then to sentence
him to only 10 years. - Is that what Texas is about? Letting people walk for unrepentant murder?
It's crushing. It's defeating. It's something that makes you question why you do this job.
- She was a beautiful woman inside and out. Knowing, you know, there's not going
to be any future memories, just that, you know, I had the privilege of knowing her entire life.
[CHATTER] - What are you looking at? - Just knowing that her life was shortened because of someone else's selfishness and she's not here
to experience Olivia graduating and going to college, getting married herself and having children--
there's so many losses, so many things that, you know, she'll never have the opportunity to experience.
So that's sad. NARRATOR: Carey Birmingham's violent escalation was documented by his partner, but
the evidence wasn't uncovered until it was too late for Patricia. But digital devices can be a vital tool for victims.
- Technology now allows people who feel threatened in relationships to gather evidence in a way that was never possible before.
It can allow them to track perpetrators movements in a way that protects them. Victims can use it to document evidence of hostility
or aggression or abuse. NARRATOR: But the same tech that can keep you safer can also be exploited.
- Perpetrators often use technology to monitor, threaten, intimidate, and control their victims and to keep their victims
dangerously close. NARRATOR: In the UK, in Northamptonshire, Kettering, a market town with a large Polish community,
it was home to 31-year-old Marta Chmielecka. - Marta was kind-hearted. She was friendly and very kind and is always smiling.
She loved going out with friends. She was very gregarious. She wanted to have fun.
NARRATOR: Marta grew up in the Polish city of Bydgoszcz. ALISON BAGLEY: Marta's father was a musician,
and Marta took after him. And she was a great singer. And she would sing at weddings, and she would do karaoke,
and she'd even enter competitions. NARRATOR: In 2016, in Poland, Marta married Pawel Chmielecki.
ALISON BAGLEY: He loved cars. He liked travel. He liked drinking with his friends.
He seemed to like boxing. He would go to boxing matches. And he liked Marta, but he liked showing off Marta.
NARRATOR: In 2017, Marta and Pawel moved to the UK, close to Marta's brother and his family in Kettering.
ALISON BAGLEY: Marta was described as a fantastic Auntie. She was really close to her nieces.
Family was very, very important to Marta. They would do everything together, go on holiday together.
NARRATOR: But over time, Marta and Pawel's relationship broke down. ALISON BAGLEY: He was very jealous of other people
being with Marta. If she wasn't there, he would phone her all the time. He would constantly call her.
His controlling behavior poisoned their relationship. NARRATOR: Stephanie Collins is a forensic psychologist.
- She was very much the trophy wife. He liked what she looked like. He was proud of being with her.
But he overstepped the mark in terms of control. She became something that belonged to him.
NARRATOR: Pawel's controlling behavior turned physical. PETE LONG: There'd been a number
of reports of domestic violence between Pawel and Marta. These were reported both by Marta and by third parties.
But the cases were discontinued. NARRATOR: And things escalated. ALISON BAGLEY: He punched her.
He punched her in the face. He bruised her. He broke her lip. And that was in public, you know.
Someone behaving like that in public-- that is a massive concern. STEPHANIE COLLINS: Often, domestic violence
is quite a private affair. It is generally done behind closed doors. But it feels in this case that Pawel just doesn't care.
He doesn't care what other people think of him, and in that respect alone, makes him a dangerous individual.
NARRATOR: In 2020, Marta decided to end the relationship. She moved out of the home that they shared together.
ALISON BAGLEY: It takes a lot to leave your partner, especially when you're in a different country
that you've set out to make a new life together. Marta really was very brave in acknowledging
that this relationship was toxic. NARRATOR: Marta moved in with friends and started to build a new life.
ALISON BAGLEY: Marta was beginning to come out of her shell. She was smiling again.
She was happy again. NARRATOR: But Pawel refused to accept that Marta had moved on.
He continued to text her, to monitor where she was and who she was with. October 2021, Marta's mother was visiting her from Poland,
and Marta was planning a trip home to see her father. Thursday, October 14, 2021, Marta
went to work as normal at a logistics warehouse in the town of Corby. - She was working 4 on 4 off day shifts.
NARRATOR: And on Friday, October 15th, Marta spent the evening with friends in Woodlands Court
on Wood Street in Kettering. But after Marta left her friends at 10:40 PM that night,
she went missing. PETE LONG: Marta left Woodlands Court, and she was not seen again by her friends
from that point onwards. Over the subsequent days, attempts were made by her family to contact her by telephone.
And other than one text message received back from Marta's phone that the family suggested
was not in the usual language that Marta would use, no contact was made with Marta at all.
NARRATOR: On Tuesday, October 19th, Marta unexpectedly missed her shift. - Marta not turning up for work set off
alarm bells for her family and for her friends and for her work colleagues. Where is Marta?
NARRATOR: Marta's sister-in-law went looking for her. She visited Pawel's place on Wood Street
and knocked on his door. There was no reply. She called the police and reported Marta missing.
Pete Long was the senior investigating officer. PETE LONG: In cases of missing persons, every hour is crucial.
In this instance, where Marta hadn't replied to her family's attempts to contact her for four days, then
clearly there is a significant danger that she's been harmed. NARRATOR: Police searched for surveillance
cameras in the area where Marta was last seen. The residential street had many door cams and
high-tech rotating cameras. PETE LONG: They'd spend so long looking in one direction,
move further around, look in another direction, and so on. Although the quality is extremely high,
unless the control room are aware of an ongoing incident, there's always a risk that you will only
pick up parts or even none at all of the incident that you're interested in. NARRATOR: The first time Marta was captured on camera was
on Friday night at 10:45 PM. - We see Marta, having left the social events in Woodlands Court, walking along Wood Street.
She appears to be walking very, very well. There's no signs of her being intoxicated.
So for a woman to be walking alone in Kettering at this time of the evening is not unusual.
Marta appears to be walking home. No issues, no problems. NARRATOR: As Marta made her way along Wood Street,
a separate camera captured a man leaving his home. PETE LONG: We see a male further
up Wood Street walking in the direction of Woodlands Court. NARRATOR: When the man reached Marta, he tried to grab her.
PETE LONG: You can see from her body language that she pulls away. This clip is very concerning.
It clearly shows that Marta intends to get away. She doesn't want anything to do with him
and clearly walking off down Wood Street. NARRATOR: But he caught up with Marta.
PETE LONG: The male grabs hold of Marta and appears to pull her between the cars.
Her body language is saying I need to get away, and she's pulling away from him.
NARRATOR: The rotating camera panned away at a crucial moment. 90 seconds passed by before the camera covered the scene again.
PETE LONG: When the camera pans back, we can see the male leaning over Marta. Clearly something's happened.
NARRATOR: The camera's view was obstructed, but police suspected that Marta was on the ground.
As they continued on Wood Street, the man was seen dragging Marta along with him.
- This is Ring doorbell footage that shows Marta and him walking along. Marta is clearly distressed.
She collapses to the floor. She's coughing. He's leaning over her, seemingly unbothered by what's happening to Marta as he
casually checks his phone. She's lying on the floor clearly in a lot of discomfort.
- It would seem that some form of violence or assault has been enacted on her. It's hard to know from the footage
whether it was intentional that she collapsed by a device that she knew was being recorded,
as her overriding emotion would be that of total fear. She would have known, especially from having possibly
just been punched or kicked, that it wasn't going to stop there. PETE LONG: The fact that he says not far now--
PETE LONG: --suggests that he's got a plan of where he's going to take her. We see Marta going for a mobile phone.
Is she trying to raise help? Or is it that she's just stalling for time? NARRATOR: The rotating camera captured what happened next.
PETE LONG: Clearly, she suffered some kind of injury. She's unsteady on her feet, which
is totally different to how she was prior to meeting the man, and Marta's being frogmarched by the man in a bear
hug kind of movement. She's clearly unable to control where she's going herself,
and he's dictating where they're going to. The tragedy here is that she really needs help,
and there's nobody here to help her. - The footage is quite disturbing, really, seeing a young woman being dragged along by her arms
obviously in some sort of discomfort. Something horrendous has happened. And when you see that, you're completely powerless to help.
It's really very, very upsetting. PETE LONG: The final part of this journey shows Marta still unsteady on her feet, clearly restrained
whilst being pulled along the street, and this is the last sighting we have of Martha.
NARRATOR: This last glimpse of Marta on camera was very close to Pawel Chmielecki's residence.
The next day, the cameras on Wood Street captured Pawel leaving his home. PETE LONG: On Saturday, the CCTV
showed that Pawel left his house for a short period of time and Martha was not seen.
He appeared fine and we weren't able to establish where exactly he went to. A short time later, Pawel's seen return along Wood Street.
NARRATOR: The following day, on Sunday, footage recovered from a local store showed Pawel wearing clean shoes and clothes.
PETE LONG: It's two days after Marta went missing. And to the casual observer, it's quite a remarkable.
He's in the local shop buying beer and whiskey. This is the last time Pawel is caught on CCTV.
NARRATOR: Police decided it was time to talk to Pawel to see if he knew where Marta was.
NARRATOR: The neighbor showed them the stairs that led to Pawel's apartment. - The police attending had no idea whether Marta was in there
or not. - Police presence alone may cause an offender to cause injury to any person.
The fact that Pawel wasn't replying to their request to open the door heightened those worries.
- The officer's attending had to make a very quick decision. PETE LONG: If Marta hadn't been injured--
PETE LONG: --time was of the essence. - Upon entry, they find Pawel with a knife in his neck
and a number of injuries to his neck, and Marta is deceased on the bed. - Marta was found partially undressed, and she was wrapped
in a blood-soaked duvet. - It was obvious that Marta had been dead for some time.
NARRATOR: Marta's family were notified of her death. Pawel was taken to hospital.
When the police checked Pawel's phone, they discovered a series of photographs. PETE LONG: Pawel had been taking
photographs on his phone of messages contained on Marta's phone. He was convinced that she was in a relationship
with other people and was driven by jealousy. It's suspected that a number of these photographs
were taken after he'd killed Marta due to blood that was found on Marta's screen.
NARRATOR: The autopsy report revealed that Marta had died from multiple stab wounds
to the neck. - She'd suffered 32 incised stab wounds, seven of which were to her neck.
This says to me that it was a prolonged and frenzied attack. One can only imagine the horror that Marta would have gone
through whilst she was a victim of that assault. STEPHANIE COLLINS: 32 stab wounds is by any means
excessive in intimate partner murder. There's a sense that Pawel was trying to almost depersonalize
Marta by creating and inflicting so much damage to her that she would be unrecognizable so that he had the ultimate control
both in life and death. NARRATOR: When he was taken to hospital, Pawel's injuries were found to be non-life threatening
and self-inflicted. Police went to the hospital to arrest him. NARRATOR: Pawel later admitted he stabbed Marta
to death in his room after confronting her about dating other people. He had kept Marta's body in his room for four days
before she was discovered by the police. STEPHANIE COLLINS: This is clearly a murder that has been driven by very, very strong emotions
from Pawel. The fact that he kept her body for four days suggests to me that that sense of you still belong to me,
regardless of whether you're alive or dead, and nobody can take you away from me.
ALISON BAGLEY: In court, he was just sat there in the dock. I would say he was impassive.
He didn't show any emotion whatsoever, nothing at all. NARRATOR: Pawel Chmielecki was sentenced to life in prison
with a minimum term of 18 years. - Marta was a young lady with a love for life. It was just a pointless waste.
In cases like this, you do despair that a life has been taken that had so much to offer.
ALISON BAGLEY: After Marta's murder, it galvanized the community to come together.
And there was a march to mark her death. - Marta, age 31, was murdered inside a home.
These acts are not OK. We have to take a stand. We are here to ensure that this doesn't happen again.
- And people shared their stories, and people were given practical advice about how people could get out of these toxic, horrendous,
awful relationships and how they could support each other to do that and how to recognize
the signs of violence. [RESONANT MUSIC]

In 2021, police in Spring, Texas respond to a 911 call and discover Patricia Birmingham’s body in the driveway of the home she shared with her husband, Carey Birmingham. Investigators seize Patricia’s cellphone and uncover a cache of chilling video evidence—including a harrowing recording of her final moments.

In the UK, 31-year-old Marta Chmielecka is reported missing. When investigators uncover concerning CCTV footage of Marta struggling with her husband Pawel, they fear the worst. Upon searching their apartment, they discover a deeply disturbing crime scene.

Killers Caught On Camera is a true-crime series with a voyeuristic twist: video footage from home security cameras, CCTV, and dashcams take center-stage, helping detectives catch perpetrators in moments of criminal intent to acts of pure evil. Family members of victims and law enforcement provide first-hand accounts of how these chilling events unfold while experts like Criminal Psychologist Dr. Julia Shaw dissect the darkest corners of the mind.

Brief Summary

Two domestic violence cases highlight the tragic outcomes of controlling relationships and the role of technology in documenting abuse.

Key points

A Marriage in Turmoil. In Texas, a marriage spirals into chaos, leading to a tragic altercation.
The Fatal Incident. Patricia Birmingham is shot in a shocking act of violence by her husband.
The Aftermath. Carey Birmingham's actions lead to a trial that raises questions about justice.
Marta's Brave Decision. In 2020, Marta decided to end her toxic relationship with Pawel, showcasing her bravery.
The Tragic Discovery. Marta was found deceased in her home after Pawel's violent outburst.
Community Response to Violence. After Marta's murder, the community united to raise awareness against domestic violence.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

You're going to meet Jesus.

A chilling threat made during a heated argument.

0:32WatchMay 27, 2025

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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