Dinner Ben News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

>> she's starting to lose jobs. it's like all hell broke loose in her head. >> reporter: but murder? remember, the police went to see dawn just a couple of hours after ben was killed, found her fast asleep. >> what time did you think you went to sleep? >> oh, god. i watched the movie "the depart departed" and i don't know, about 4:00. >> in fact, she happened to be sharing her bedroom with a 21-year-old family friend named james matlian. >> we watched a movie and went to bed. >> yeah, that's her story. that's it. >> reporter: not exactly a convincing alibi. any more than the obvious fiction th...

>> reporter: dawn. dawn oxley. ben oxley's ex-wife, alyssa's mother. even as more than a few local gossipers pointed suspicious fingers at melissa, ben's best friends told each other -- >> everything in me said that dawn had something to do with that. >> reporter: of course, just a few years back that sort of thinking would have been unimaginable to dawn and ben's best friends scott and cindy graham. not dawn. dawn, the force of nature, the center of any room she was in. >> i don't know if it's manipulating or what, but everybody agreed with dawn. as long as dawn was happy, then we're all happ...

>> i pulled the trigger. >> reporter: but james matlean did not shrink from it. he murdered ben oxley in his sleep and must live with what he did for the rest of his days. >> i'm afraid to deal with what i actually did. >> reporter: he told his story in court last december. it was after the d.a. took the death penalty off the table and james decided to plead guilty. and that's when melissa sitting in the courtroom heard for the first time about something else. james was supposed to kill her, too. >> dawn asked me if i would kill melissa. i just automatically said yeah. >> reporter: there was a...

>> reporter: alyssa was 6 by this time, was the only person who remembered seeing anything unusual. she told the detective right away. >> well, i was fast asleep. i woke up and i heard this creak. i saw someone walking in. and i just -- i went back in. >> do you know who they were? >> i don't know who it was. >> she saw a shadow in her doorway looking at her and then the shadow left. she went back to sleep and then melissa came in and grabbed her and was talking to 911. >> reporter: the detective discovered the bullet that killed ben was a number 8 bird shot. same ammunition they discovered in...

>> yeah. that's what it feels like because you have no idea. >> reporter: how was it possible melissa hadn't seen the person who'd shot ben? she'd been lying right next to him. why was she unharmed? >> that's kind of a testy little red flag popping up. you start thinking, okay, this doesn't seem right. >> reporter: and had craig, melissa's teenage brother, truly slept through the whole thing as he claimed? >> i opened my eyes and right in my face was a bunch of barrels from a machine gun. >> reporter: it was police guns he was looking at, police who had already discovered shotgun shells on cra...