If it worked, he could win his freedom. If it didnt, he could lose his life. They had your back. They had my back. At least you thought. Thats what i thought. The inside man. Welcome to dateline, everyone. Im lester holt. So why on earth would anyone volunteer to spend months behind the bars of a federal prison for the criminally insane . What if it was a convicts one chance for escaping a tenyear sentence and walking out of prison a free man . Before he would be sprung, he had a job do in that specially dangerous prison. Getting in was the easy part. Getting out alive was much harder. Two enemies who didnt trust each other faced off across a table. One of them in handcuffs, was a clever con named jimmy keen. The other a hardcharging prosecutor. In court he called me the giant of the prisoner was worried sick. The prosecutor who had just convicted keen and put him behind bars suddenly wanted to talk, a topsecret meeting no less. Whatmore could he do to jimmy . He was the last person i expected to hear from. He was my biggest fear. Keens fears went off the chart when the prosecutor slid an accordion file in his direction. On top was a grisly photo of a dead girl. I flipped to the next page and here is another young, dead mutilated girl. Im thinking, whoa, wait a second. He is probably thinking at this point that youre about to charge him with something else. Yeah, because i had been pretty rough on him in the initial prosecution. Jimmy was in the dark. He had no idea that crazy scheme the prosecutor had in mind. He says, jimmy, listen, this is something that we have another person on. He has killed many, many young women and i personally think youre the one that can help us with this. This turned out to be an investigation to try to catch a suspected serial killer. Beaumont, an outside the box thinker, believed this convict, jimmy keen was the one that could somehow crack the case. Taking on a unique and deadly mission. I realized how serious it was and i also realized the danger of it. But what he couldnt know is how such a Daring Mission would change his world and the person he was forever. If this all seems fodder for a hollywood movie, brad pitt would agree. The megastar who was benjamin button is interested in playing none other than than jimmy keen. Brad pitt likes that he risked his life to try to find what he could find. Clearly this guy is one of a kind, charismatic, conceded, courageous and complicated. From an early age, he had the personality, charm and cockiness that made him dream that a Hollywood Star might one day want to play him in the movies. His first big brush with fame came on the football field. I heard they called you the assassin in football. That was a good thing i take it . Yes. I was taught by my dad at a young age, son, if you do hit that kid first, hes going to hit you and hurt you first. A superstar athlete and mr. Popularity in high school, jimmy seemed to have it all as a big fish in the river city of kankeekee. I was most valuable player, i was captain of the Team Every Year i played. Jimmy grew up in the shadow of his father, big jim who was a cop, fireman and hero to his son. He was by best friend. All of keens grand potential could be put in payroll by a terrible choice he made as a teenager, he began selling drugs. He started small, pedaling bags of marijuana here in this park. Then he expanded to cocaine and at the tender age of 17, he moved to chicago where the business and profits exploded. He was now a big fish in a bigger pond. Lake michigan to be exact. He was his own incrowd. Fast cars, faster women and souped up living. All the hot spots. All the big nightclubs, all the owners i was in tight with. I would come in there and have kark blanch. Were you feeling invincible. Yeah. There was a certain point where i would say there was an invincible feeling. Did your pop know . Did he suspect . He didnt suspect it until much, much later. It would be a rude awakening to both his dad and jimmy that day in 1996 when jimmy was just relaxing at one of his chicago homes. All of a sudden, the whole door blew off the hinges and come flying into the house. All of these d. A. , fbi and locals came in in single file line with automatic weapons pointed at me, freeds, get on the ground. Get on the ground. He had been caught in a drug sting, spearheaded by that hardnosed federal prosecutor, Larry Beaumont. We scooped him up in an operation i ran, we called it operation snowplow. And in court, beaumont showed keen no mercy. He was coming at you on all fours, wasnt he . He was a bulldog. Jimmy was convicted and slapped with a tenyear sentence. It was pretty stiff sentence. I knew he didnt expect to get ten years in that case. Your father was in the courtroom. Right. I knew i had let him down in probably one of the biggest ways you could let somebody down. Keens future was bleak. He faced ten years away from his glamorous life, fast fancy women, big cars. The big bucks. When all hope seemed lost, his old nem nis beaumont came to him with an offer of freedom. Attached to that accordion file he slid across the table. In return, keene would have to risk everything and being an underground informant in springfield, missouri. It was a psychiatric prison with both hardcore killers and the criminally insane. These people all have life sentences. Theyre all in there in their crazy moons and they have Nothing Better to do but to try to hurt you or kill you just for some fun. If he accepted beaumonts offer, keenes target would be the suspected serial killer, the mysterious man in a van. Coming up every picture tells a story. When i put the picture down, he flinched, raised his arm up and refused to look at the picture. When the inside man continues. [ female announcer ] you never know what messes youll run into while dusting. Compared to a dry duster, a can of pledge picks up more dust and cleans 100 of messes. Pledge multi surface. Dusts better. Cleans more. Pledge multi surface. 3d white brilliancele with the toothpaste and boost. M crest after brushing, our exclusive boost. Polishes your smile and whitens with 3x the stain lifting ingredient. For a smile that dazzles. Only from crest 3d white. Several years before jimmy keenes arrest and conviction, his drug business was booming and his personal life, as he tells it, was nonstop fun and games. Lot of hot clubs here in the 90s. This was a place you were doing business as well . I worked and played right here, yes. And it was a good time. Back then, he had no idea about the danger lurking 150 miles south and a lifestyle away that would change his life forever. Rural tranquil georgetown, illinois, is where terry roach and her husband lawyer were raising their 15yearold daughter jessie and two other children, far removed from bigcity crime. Everybody knew who everybody was, so they were more conscious of what was going on usually. You could count on somebody to get after your kids if they needed it. In 1993, jessie was a high school sophomore, devoted to home and family. Jessie was really very much of a home body, so one bike ride up the road and back, she was done. Yeah. Then she would be watching gone with the wind. One monday in september, jessie went out for a bike ride, but just minutes later, her sister noticed jessies beloved bike down on its side in the middle of the road. On the side of the road, middle of road. Yeah. She would have put the kick stand down and bicycle down. I knew something was wrong. Deputy sheriff gary miller was dispatched to the scene. The more we learned about the family and the girls background, we just didnt feel that she was staying away by choice. The haunting image of a bike tipped over and abandoned terrified all the investigators and of course jessies family. I mean, you never lose the hope for them not to walking in. You still hope that. We knew she wasnt going to just walk away. After six weeks, jessies parents worst fears were realized. Her body beaten and sexually violated was discovered in a corn field. It could never be easy telling a parent that their child is dead. No, it wasnt. But at least we were able to tell them this is her, shes gone. We were able to erase all doubts. Gary miller had a murder case to solve and it was now a federal case involving prosecutor Larry Beaumont as well since jessies body actually had been found across the Illinois State line. For the next year, miller did lots of legwork but to no avail. Everyday you get up, are you thinking about this case . Oh, everyday. What have i missed . Exactly. I know this case really shook him from the beginning and he would check any and all leads that would involve young girls and kind of run them down. Then, in late 1994, millers persistence finally paid off. A man in a van had been reported chasing two teenage girls in jessies hometown of georgetown. Miller traced the van to a man named larry hall from wabash, indiana, a threehour drive from georgetown. Your heart beat starting to pick up. Oh, yeah. Im thinking, this has to be checked out. Miller learned that hall was a gung h o civil war reenactor. He traveled the midwest to fight fantasy battles. Miller immediately drove to wabash to interview hall who wasnt saying much. So miller showed him a photo of jessie roach. When i put the picture down, he flinched, raised his arm up and turned in its chair and refused to look at the picture. Convinced larry hall was hiding something, miller became obsessed with making a case against him. Days later, back in illinois, miller turned up a huge lead. He found witnesses who vividly remembered hall from a revolutionary war reenactment in the georgetown area the very weekend before jessie was abducted. To them, hall stood out for his bushy mutten chop side burns, but also for playing a soldier who was fighting the wrong war. He was wearing a civil war uniform and he had a civil war hat. At a revolutionary war reenactment. Exactly. Armed with this new information, Deputy Sheriff miller returned to wabash for a second strike at hall. Stressing that halls reenactors had southeastern him near georgetown. He came along to the point where he said, well, you know i go to so many reenactments i could have been there because i go to a lot of them. Hes giving more ground. Yeah. Miller sees the opening and kept at it. Finally he says hall came clean and obsessed that he abducted, sexually violated and strangelated jessie roach to death. How much detail did he give you . Very good detail. What he actually did and what took place. Not only that, miller says larry hall confessed to other killings, including a coed from Indiana Wesleyan University in nearby marion, indiana, named Trisha Wright ler. She said he was involved in wright ler. Deputy sheriff miller didnt know much about trisha, so he called on the local Indiana Police who had been handling that case, but when marion detective jk and other indiana cops arrived, hall was suddenly telling a much different story. He denied confessing to any killing, including jessies and trishas. Whats more, he claimed it was all a misunderstanding about disturbing dreams he had. He takes us out to a location where in my dreams i strangled her here and left her lay here. We searched the woods. We searched the area. And never really found anything. The indiana cops, who was familiar with hall, were not at all surprised by his actions. Some of them, like jk, thought hall might be a wanna be, a pretender who gets his kicks from confessing to crimes he didnt commit. Is it possible he simply obsessed with these cases but not involved . Theres no doubt in my mind that he does follow these cases, that he does read and has tracked the two cases all over the country. You know, so the question does come, is he a wanna be . Deputy sheriff miller and prosecutor beaumont, however felt certain they had a real killer on their hands, a serial killer, with a unique m. O. He would drive Cross Country to reenactments where he would play fantasy soldier then prey on young women and kill for real. The fbi started discourting girls that were missing at these various areas at the time larry hall would have been been there. The only case that they had sufficient evidence was jessie roachs. Larry hall was arrested. Hall went on trial in 1995. As a prosecutor, whats the best card youre holding . We had a statement, his confession, said he did it. Beaumont called Deputy Sheriff miller to the stand to testify that hall had indeed admitted that he abducted and killed jessie after he spotted her with her bicycle. She was walking her bike at that point. Miller testified that in his confession hall gave him a detail that only the killer would know. That jessie was not riding her bike but walking it, a safety precaution the roachs insisted she follow when she was on their narrow road. That was never in the press that she was walking her bike that day. Right. When you heard that, did that give more credence to the story . Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. That just sealed it for me. I knew he was the one. A jury unanimously agreed. It took just three hours to convict larry hall. But prosecutor beaumont believed this was just the tip of the iceberg. He felt certain hall was a serial killer and now he had to find a way to prove it. So he began investigating trish ya wrightlers investigation, a case that wasnt his for a family he didnt even know. I cant imagine sending my daughter off to school and never seeing her again. And he came up with an outside the box scheme to get hall, which would risk the life of that charismatic convict he had just put away for dealing drugs, jimmy keene. What happens when i got to deal with all these crazy killers and stuff . What if i get shanked. What if i get killed . I mean, am i going to survive this . Coming up a get out of jail free card with a price they had your back. They had my back. At least you thought. Thats what i thought. People typically dont admit murder, sexual assaults and murders to Police Officers unless, in fact, they probably have done it. So it was clear, we felt, he was responsible for the trish ya wrightler disappearance. She had such a zest for life. She would walk into the room and everybody knew she was there. Trish ya was on her way to becoming a family counselor. Her goal was to put families back together. Then in march 1993, her parents receive that late night phone call every parent dreads. A cop from marion, indiana, was on the line. He said, do you know where tricia is . In my heart i knew that something was drastically wrong. Tricia had walked to an offcampus supermarket and never returned to her dorm. Now nearly 20 years later, her parents are still waiting. You purchase a cemetery plot. Yes. No headstone. No. Not until we find her. And we have no answers. And somebody out there thats what eats at me. Somebody out there has that answer for us. Tricia wrightler wasnt prosecutor beaumonts case. He was deeply moved by her parents. That was a horrible crime to me. I knew about the facts of the case and i knew about the family. I never met them but i read all the newspaper articles and the accounts of them asking for help. Beaumont felt certain that suspected serial killer larry hall was responsible. Not only did hall live 25 minutes from indiana wesleyan, he had been identified chasing two coeds there just a week after tricia went missing. So in the summer of 1995, a month after convicting hall for jessie roachs murder, beaumont was leading a search for tricia. It was in the same indiana backwoods where hall told indiana authorities he dreamt he killed and buried tricia. I wanted to do everything we could to see if we could find her body. After two days searching in heat and humidity, tricias body didnt find out. Then beaumont decided to try something completely different. I came up with the idea of putting somebody in the prison cell with him to see if we could get him to tell us. They all think you were crazy. Most people did think i was crazy, yeah. But i was able to convince them that we should do it any way. Enter jimmy keene, the drug dealer beaumont had just convicted and sent to a lowsecurity prison. Why did he stick out in your mind . Because i knew he was kind of a con man. He was smart. If anybody could pull off, he could pull it off. You were trained in martial arts. You could make tan and protect yourself in an environment like that. In return, beaumont offered jimmy freedom, but first jimmy would have to exact more than a confession. I told him, unless we found the body, he would get no credit. No body, you get nothing. Jimmy was skeptical. He was a drug dealer, not a criminal profiler. And he knew this was a mission impossible. He said no. But then, fate intervened. Jimmys dad suffered a stroke. Weeks later, frail and sickly, he came to visit jimmy. My dad was in a wheelchair. Now, this is big jim. The guy that had been superman to me my whole entire life. We cried through the window to each other and we talked for a while and he didnt even know about the offer, nobody knew about it. Jimmy now realized that he had a onetime only opportunity to fix the mess he had made for himself and get out while his dad was still alive. As soon as we were done with the visit, i called my lawyer and i said, tell beaumont im going to take him up on his offer. The mission was on. So on august 3rd, 1998, federal marshals escorted jimmy into the psychiatric prison. Once they stepped out the door, i was on my own. Jimmys cover story was that he was a convicted weapons runner whose 40 year sentence pushed him over the edge and landed him in the psych prison a psych prison filled with killers. His one inside contact the chief psychiatrist couldnt protect him, nor could his outside lifeline, a female fbi agent who visited as his girlfriend to monitor his progress. I did have a hot line to her, too. So if i got caught in a dangerous situation i could get ahold of her. The deal was they had me out of there in 24 hours. They had your back. They had my back. At least you thought. Thats what i thought. When keenes mission began, it was all about him. His shot at freedom. He had few feelings, if any, about tricia wrightler or her family. All he wanted to was to get in and out with her location and as fast as possible. Day one, breakfast in the mess hall. Jimmy zeroed in on larry hall. I was waiting with my tray and i look over, there he is, 20, 25 feet away from me, sitting all by himself. It felt like a magnet was coming me to come to him. And finally i bumped shoulders with him on purpose. Jimmy explained he was a brand new inmate, needing directions to the library. Hall, obliged. I kind of slapped him on the shoulder, said thanks a lot. I appreciate that from a cool guy like you. After that, they occasionally talked. But the next step came when jimmy was invited to join halls breakfast club. Which in the prison system its a big thing of who youre invited to have your breakfast with. Keene thought he was making progress. But then prison politics got in the way. I left out of that chow hall one morning and a few really big muscular guys came up to me and