palisades cliff to take in the view. but a short while later, jody fell over the edge and questions about what really happened that night began to mount. here s chris jansing. reporter: it was the worst night of his life and now steven sharp in the early morning hours of september 21st, 1992, had to tell his 10-year-old son jonathan his mother was dead. i said, come on, jonathan. we need to take a walk and i told him and he immediately burst into tears and i cried. i cried like a baby and i wasn t ashamed. reporter: he remembers his distraught son s reaction but little else from those dark hours. were you sleeping? were you eating? drinking. you were drinking? i lost my wife, my son lost hi mom. reporter: there was plenty of sympathy among family and friends to be sure for the man newly widowed with a small child to raise on his own.
base pointing flashlights north. finally about 30 feet away the beams landed on something white. it was jody lying motionless next to a tree. there was a lot of blood on that tree and the blood was actually draining down the tree. that s where severe impact took. that s where she really, you know jody sharp had not survived the fall. to cioffi it was clear she had slammed into that tree. as they began to move the body, he noticed something else. she had an odor of an alcoholic beverage that emanated from her body. when you smelled that did you think well maybe she had had too much to drink and fell? that entered my mind, yes. reporter: at that moment, steven sharp was sitting in a room at the police station waiting for someone to tell him what had happened to his wife. do you remember what s going through your mind at that point? how badly is she hurt? where is she? why isn t she calling back to me? reporter: that s when an
maybe he s in shock? no, i ve seen people who lost loved ones and i ve never seen anybody act that way. reporter: but it was a particular moment later inside the station house that really caught the officer s attention. and he asked if he could get a direct from the water fountain, he was looking like over his shoulder and splashing his face and made it look like he was crying? you thought he was faking tears. absolutely, absolutely. a death scene where the pieces didn t connect. a husband who appeared nonchalant. from a cop s point of view, things were adding up and not in steven s favor. not just one thing, it was like the totality of the circumstances. everything every little thing was clicking in my mind, i m saying to myself, this isn t right. something is wrong here. reporter: gut instinct is one thing but evidence is quite
usually they re going to go south or they re going to go right down. should have been right down where i got off the ropes. reporter: someone else was scratching his head about that night for different reasons. it had to do with steven s behavior while the search was under way. officer walter serrie was surprised steven was willing to leave the lookout as rescuers were still looking for jody. did he give any indication, i don t want to leave, my wife could still be alive down there? no, not at all. reporter: serrie says he couldn t believe how willingly steven sharp got into his patrol car. if i tell you if it was my wife, girlfriend, they would have to pry me away. he willingly got into your patrol car. without a word state. reporter: stranger still how calm the husband seemed. when the officer heard steven describe how his wife had fallen, he made a mental note. there was no emotion in it. i mean no emotion at all like he was reading a script. did it occur to you, w
alcoholic beverage that emanated from her body. so when you smelled that did you think maybe she had had too much to drink and fell? at that moment, yes. steven sharp was waiting in a police station for someone to tell him what it happened to his wife. do you remember what goes through your mind at that point? how badly is she hurt? where is she? and that s when an officer walked into the room and broke the news to steven. jody was gone. i don t even remember who came in and told me. and what your reaction? how could this happen? that question would haunt him and many others. and it would take years for the answers to finally come. coming up. he was rubbing his eyes to make it look like he was crying. you thought he was faking tears? absolutely. curious behavior puts a