Transcripts For MSNBCW Dateline 20240616 : vimarsana.com

MSNBCW Dateline June 16, 2024



at them like what? i could not believe it. was he watching me? >> that fire was set to throw us off. he was very calculating. >> years before, his wife killed herself. >> yes, he claimed she committed suicide days before she was due to give birth to their first child. >> she was extremely excited for that first baby. >> it made me wonder okay, is he a murderer? >> so, now you are trying to prove a very old mother with pretty much no evidence. >> is a kind of gloating that he got away with it? >> he is thinking well, catch me if you can. we're going to do her and her family justice. we're going to solve this murder. >> hello, and welcome to dateline. meg purk was a young mom to be, over the moon to be having her first child. then, just days before her due date, she died of an apparent suicide. her family struggled to understand why, but in a strange twist, a house fire sat decades later would point to a possible answer and put investigators on the trail toward the truth. here is josh mankiewicz with secrets from the grave. >> wander through any graveyard and you will find them, mysteries etched in stone. lives cut tragically short by war, disease, misfortune and sometimes murder. many who rest in these peaceful places took secrets to their graves. but, some here are merely waiting, waiting for someone to take interest and ask questions, and as you are about to see, the dead can be exceedingly patient. our story begins on a frigid march night in 2009 with a house fire in stow, ohio. that fire was important, not for what it destroyed, but for what it illuminated. >> 911, where is your emergency? >> there is a fire. >> a house or what? >> the house. >> the caller was a 16-year-old girl who told the 911 operator that she, her parents, and her younger brother had all escaped, but barely. and then, her father took the phone. >> i don't really understand. the entire front of our house is just engulfed. >> okay. i'm glad everybody got out. >> that deb was scott purk. you will be hearing a lot about him. purk said his family had been sound asleep when he heard a loud boom. >> it was like we heard an explosion. >> you did? >> yup. and that's what woke us up. >> purk said he scrambled to get everyone up and out. by the time the first fire units rolled up, the purk home was a roaring bonfire. firefighters smelled gasoline as soon as they got out of the trucks , so a call immediately went out to stow police detective, ken mifflin. >> when i got there, i saw the fire department still putting out the blaze. someone had taken probably a pipe wrench to disconnect the gas line, and it was blowing out natural gas . it sounded like -- it was a very large roaring sound. >> at that point, the gas had not ignited. >> no. the person who set the fire poured gasoline all the way to the gas meter and on top of the gas meter. >> the idea was, fire starts at the gas line, goes to the gas main and possibly destroys the house and everybody in it? >> absolutely. >> mifflin found the purk family sheltered at a neighbors house and asked father, scott purk, to step outside. >> we actually went over to my unmarked detective bureau car and sat in my car where it was nice and warm. >> i guess, the first question is, who would want to burn down your house? >> exactly, and scott said he really didn't have any. there was no one he knew that was so angry at him that would want to try to harm him or his family, so you know, the investigation took off from there. >> perhaps it was the warm car on such a cold night, or maybe it was mifflin's warm manner. either way, scott purk was feeling chatty. >> he had lost his job about eight or nine days prior to this . things were not going well in his life. >> when asked how he and his wife, tammy, had spent the evening prior to the fire, purk responded with this little shocker. >> scott and tammy, they are swingers, and they spent the evening basically apart because scott was at home, but tammy was out with a friend of hers. >> another man? >> she was out with another man. she was dating their son's martial arts instructor, so she spent the evening with him and came home roughly around 1:00 in the morning. >> strange? sure, but trend -- scott purk was just getting started. >> he told you tammy brought him the leftovers from the dinner she had with the guy she was seen? >> right. >> this is just like you know, hey, honey, here's some leftover orange chicken that this other guy and i didn't eat. >> right. tammy went to bed first and scott finish off the leftovers. >> no detail, it seemed, was too small or insignificant for scott purk. >> it was like turning a faucet on. once you turned it on, he kept talking and i kept writing down the answers. >> at times, it was hard to keep up. scott purk kept offering answers to questions the detective had not asked. there seemed to be so much more he wanted to say. >> what scott purk said next would leave investigators stunned and wondering if he was more than just a distraught homeowner who liked to gab. coming up -- >> is doing almost everything he can to make himself sound like a suspect. as scott purk keeps talking, suspicion keeps mounting about this house on fire, and a burning secret. >> i was shocked, and it made me wonder okay, i need to look into this, and i'm looking at someone who i believe is an arsonist. now, i'm wondering okay, was he a murderer? 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the detective could not guess. he parked down the driveway well away from the burning home , the perk family van, cleaned up and ready for a road trip. according to scott, he and his son had been planning to visit family in north carolina. >> what drew our attention was what he had packed inside the van. >> i'm guessing it was not stuff you would typically bring on vacation. >> old family photos, cookbooks with family recipes for generations in their to which he could offer no explanation as to why those were in the van. >> it was a few days after the fire at scott purk's house that stow's chief arson investigator, jim idell, back from vacation, called detective ken mifflin. >> he says you've got to hear this. he played me the 911 tape. >> its union dale drive. there's a fire. >> mifflin had heard something on that initial 911 call from scott purk's daughter, something he wanted why dell to here, too. during a lull, scott purk can be heard calmly for spring to someone. he was talking about a pet ferret, and his tone seemed to be more rueful oversight than anguished alarm. >> that was a bit of a flag, you know. leading us to believe that there had been a plan, anyways, all along. >> in scott perks -- purk's money was in the idea that it would. his debt, lidel was presold on scott purk as a person suspect. ken mifflin wasn't finished. on the night of the fire, the tech -- detective told lidel, scott purk had added a tantalizing detail to his life story. scott just out of the blue says to me his first wife had committed suicide in 1985 and she was nine months pregnant. >> as if like you know, not only is my house in embers, but this is not even the worst thing that happened to me? >> i was shocked and it made me wonder okay, now i need to look into this. i'm looking at someone who i believe is an arsonist. now i'm wondering okay, was he a murderer? >> the two lawmen decided to pursue parallel investigations. lidel would take lead on the arson case. mifflin was suicide. >> you guys know each other and you get along. >> we do work very well together. we have a great relationship. >> mifflin knew his case had the highest hurdles. not only had scott purk's first wife, meg purk died 24 years earlier, but she had died in akron , only a few miles from stow, and a different jurisdiction. >> what is it like to go to the akron police and say hey, i'm from a much smaller department, that i think you got this case wrong back in the mid-1980s? >> you have to approach it very carefully, but we have a good working relationship with the police department in akron, and i had to make a phone call. >> instead of waving off the small-town detective, the akron cops were willing to help. >> i talked to a detective i had dealt with in the past. he said it's not a cold case, will send you a copy of the report. and he did. >> according to the original police report, meg purk was 24 years old and nine months pregnant on the day she died. >> scott stated that the morning of march 18th, 1985, meg had woken up sick and scott have made a doctors appointment for her to go see her doctor. >> later that morning, scott says he was taking a bath when he saw meg walked past the bathroom door. >> he gets out of the bathtub four, five minutes later and sees meg hanging from a rope in the stairwell of their apartment. >>'s story is that he cuts meg down and tries to do some cpr? >> yes, once he saw her hanging, he grabbed a steak knife from one of the tables nearby and cut the rope and then he started to do cpr. he calls for ems to respond and meets them at the door when they get there. >> meg's unborn baby, a boy, died that same day. meg lingered another 24 hours. she never regained consciousness. the detective had nothing to test or examine. in fact, even the police photos from the scene had been tossed long ago. still nothing about scott purk's version of the story felt right. >> most women who are nine months pregnant and carry their child full term typically do not commit suicide. that was the first thing. the second thing was he was in the apartment when his wife hung herself in the stairwell of their apartments. most individuals do that by themselves with no one around. >> all of those facts were available to the akron police back in 1985. >> they had their doubts that this was truly a suicide. however, they did not have enough. >> next, the detective examined the original autopsy photos. >> what stood out in my mind from the autopsy photos was on meg's neck, there were lines on her neck that looked like about mark was on her neck, not a rope mark. >> the detective figured the only way to find out what had actually happened in the apartment in 1985 was to learn all he could about scott in meg purk. coming up, something disturbing about meg's past. >> it was a note on the coffee table that said she had tried to hang herself. >> m, something dark from scott's. >> he was the ninja burglar. he would actually commit a is dressed up as a ninja. at least 10 burglaries, he would come into your bedroom and watch her sleep, then take your wallet or purse off your nightstand. >> when dateline continues. >> when dateline continues. for revolutionary support without underwires, and sizes up to a g-cup, find your new favorite bra today at knix.com a slow network is no network for business. that's why more choose comcast business. and now, we're introducing ultimate speed for business —our fastest plans yet. we're up to 12 times faster than verizon, at&t, and t-mobile. and existing customers could even get up to triple the speeds... at no additional cost. it's ultimate speed for ultimate business. don't miss out on our fastest speed plans yet! switch to comcast business and get started for $49.99 a month. plus, ask how to get up to an $800 prepaid card. call today! in the weeks after scott purk's house burned down, police in stow, ohio. and hearable from people who either knew him or knew of him. >> him and his wife are swingers. they go to the holiday inn. they have these and stuff. >> there was plenty of gossip and speculation and tip calls like this one, but occasionally, there was something new. >> his wife and child back in the 80s had been hit by a drunk driver. >> remember, purk until the detective his first wife had taken her own life. now it seems he told at least one of his former lovers an entirely different story. >> he told my girlfriend he went over there and kill the guy, cut them up and buried him and she's like you know, they just had sex, you know what i mean than he's confessing. >> the detective of course knew better. scott purk's wife and unborn son had indeed died in akron in 1985. her death was suicide by hanging according to the coroner's report. 35 years later, meg's memory is still fresh for dawn kracker. they were best buds in high school. >> she was quiet but people would always say she reminded them of janice jaclyn -- joplin and her kind of hippie, bohemian attitude but she was very much more reserved. she would come into a room or something and people just wanted to be with her. >> meg had been a serious student back there,, an amateur poet who managed to get several of her pieces published. meg's brother, mike metcalf. >> sometimes they were about status or about loss. even death. >> you ever worry about her? >> back then, not really. >> don, who had known scott since first grade, told the detective he seemed like a model boyfriend to meg. >> he did everything you would expect a good boyfriend to do. he opened doors for her, he took her out, he did everything like you know, you would expect from someone who is interested in somebody to do. >> though meg was charmed, her family never warmed to scott. when they married in 1981, her family was not invited. >> they did not run off and elope. there actually had a wedding ceremony in the area and reception. >> but, her family wasn't there? >> she knew how we felt. >> nevertheless, meg was over the moon when she learned she was pregnant. as her due date approached, she wrote this letter to her grandmother. it is a letter she never got the chance to mail. just think, any day now you're going to be a great grandmother, and i'm going to be a mother, a mother. it is even hard for me to believe, but i am looking forward to it. those did not sound like the words of someone thinking of suicide. >> she was extremely excited for that baby. that was one of the things she always wanted. she wanted to be a mom. she wanted a family. >> don was stunned when on march 19th, 1985, she heard meg had been rushed to the hospital. >> then i get the phone call. and kind of like the floor drops out from under you. it was a shock. >> who was it on the phone? >> scott. >> do you remember anything he said? >> it was dawn, i've got bad news. meg tried to kill herself. she's in the hospital. they don't know if she's going to make it. >> she did not. as for suicide, there had been times before she married scott >> has spoken of taking her own life. >> there was an incident one time where she was -- she had locked herself in a bathroom and said she was going to cut her wrists. that was over at a friends house, but after that, she came out. she had not cut herself at all or anything like that. >> dawn kracker says something similar happened once when she and meg shared an apartment. >> i came home and saw the miniblinds on the floor and there was a note on the coffee table and it said that she had tried to hang herself using the cord from the miniblinds. >> did that note explain why meg wanted to take her own life? >> there was not really an explanation other than she felt everybody would be happier if she was gone. >> to underscore his claim that meg had hanged herself, scott gave one of her poems to the akron detective investigating her death. >> at the very end of the poem, it says, and then she killed herself. >> maybe that is reflective of the way meg was thinking. >> exactly. >> except, according to family members, that paul was something megan written in high school and in no way represent her mood in the days before she died. scott, they felt, was using that poem to promote his own theory and her family was not buying. >> honestly, my first thought is what did he do? >> you know, investigators were getting information from family members that nobody could believe meg had killed herself. >> scott said he could not believe it either, and was as shocked as anyone. in fact, he told the detective he was so rattled by his wife's death that it changed him into a criminal. that's right, on the night his house burned down, amid all the talk of death and debt and his swinging lifestyle, scott purk told the detective he had been a famous burglar. dressed in black from head to toe, carrying nunchucks and throwing stars, scott had been so prolific he had been nicknamed the ninja burglar. >> that was a thing in stout? >> in stow and the surrounding cities because he burglarized homes and businesses and broken does cars and stole things from cars. at least 10 burglaries, at least for bnds he would come and your bedroom and watch you sleep then take your wallet or purse off your nightstand. >> once arrested, scott confessed, and started in 1986, did six years in the joint. he used the time behind bars to earn a degree in criminal justice. >> scott fancied himself as a very smart individual whenever i talked to him, and i think it was part of his strategy to try to show me how smart he was. >> of course, it was

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