Page 12 - David Saacks News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Of murdering her daughter. >> shannon would look at me with this little smirky look on her face. she's very cocky, like she knew she was going to get off. no remorse. she didn't feel she had done anything. >> they had only been engaged for two months. >> reporter: assistant d.a. david saacks, an experienced, savvy prosecutor, would now square off against a younger court-appointed defense attorney named scott holmes. >> it's important, i think, to try to see the world, try to see the world from the eyes of shannon on the days that led up to and the day that this happened. >> the whole trial was...

Regardless of what department they're in. there are always that few, not many. >> reporter: to the contrary, assistant district attorney david saacks, who was assigned to prosecute, says he was extra careful in building his case against shannon precisely because jermeir was a police officer. >> i needed to make sure that everything was done by the book and we vetted everything as well as we could, and delved into everything as deep as we could because he was a cop. >> because if you clear him, you know you're going to get that criticism. >> absolutely. we ended up having to have several differ...

>> reporter: this is what? one big conspiracy? >> i hate to make it sound like that. >> it sounds like it. it sounds like it. >> reporter: assistant d.a. david saacks says the rape was properly investigated and seemed to be nothing more than a hoax. which also, for him, finally answered that lingering question of who was stalking whom. >> everything was pointing to her and the only thing that was pointing to jermeir was that he was in this affair with shannon. i do not believe he was involved in the murder. i do not think he was involved in the planning or the execution of this murder at all. ...

And she hardly looked like a killer. >> i thought she might be able to sell the story. i figured she'd be dressed real conservative, probably come in looking like she just landed off the mayflower, and that somebody would be sympathetic. >> reporter: from the beginning the prosecution portrayed shannon as a woman scorned, who couldn't have jermeir stroud to herself, so she made sure denita smith wouldn't either. shannon, suggested prosecutor saacks, was either carrying a torch for jermeir or trying to burn down his whole world by killing his fiancee and pinning it on him. >> for whatever reaso...

Where jermeir stroud still lived and worked for the police department. one night in july 2007, around shannon says she took her dog for a walk in the backyard. >> she came crawling into my bedroom, hysterical. and i'm asking, "what's wrong? what's wrong?" >> reporter: shannon told her mother she had been raped. who did she say had raped her? >> she said it was him. >> reporter: jermeir? >> jermeir, yeah. >> reporter: charlotte police were alerted and rushed to the scene. shannon was bleeding and appeared traumatized. she was taken to a hospital for treatment and given a rape kit exam. no witne...