Page 12 - First Halee News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

>> i think that the fear was overwhelming. i kept saying, i hope that they make an arrest before her funeral. i don't know how i can stand there and wonder who's hugging me and who's coming through this line. you know, did they hurt her? >> reporter: but as heather prepared for her daughter's funeral, investigators were already talking to someone who'd surely be standing in that line of mourners, someone very close to halee. >> take a seat over there. coming up -- video from the night of the murder. police have a few questions for halee's friends. so you were thinking they think i might be i...

>> the romance didn't last long, though the two remained good friends. besides, 20-year-old halee was laser focused on her schoolwork. on a sunday in late april 2017, she was home studying for a big exam the next day. just hours later, the sun was rising and halee's mom heather was starting her morning. >> i was reading facebook, having coffee on a monday morning. just sitting on my porch, and i scroll across a news article. >> reporter: it was shocking. police had found a body in a soccer field near newburgh. >> it says it's a young female, so i immediately start looking for the younger two, ...

Kind of place you feel safe. this is newberg in southwest indiana. you can see the early days of the midwest in these historic buildings. open farmland everywhere, hometown, usa. a place for putting down roots. >> turn left on county road 475 west. then your destination will be on the left. >> then, there it is. what i have been looking for. a gravel lot by a soccer field. a spot to play sports, to hang with friends. not a place for a young woman to die. it's jarring to think that when a life ends, so much begins, a family's grief, a community's shock, and in this case, right here where i'm st...

>> he insisted he'd left halee alive and well at the soccer field with her wallet and her phone. but investigators questioned that too. their analysis showed halee's phone had been in the same location as isaiah's phone hours later when he was long gone from the soccer field. detective kruse pressed isaiah to explain, moving his chair closer. >> and that's why i need an explanation. >> isaiah's explanations kept changing. >> literally the only thing i can think of is it somehow got left in my car. i saw it. i saw it in the road. i saw her phone. >> he said that it just happened to catch his ey...

>> she was tall, and everybody, all of her friends were so short and always like she stuck out and didn't care. she wore heels and wedges and whatever and would go places and tower over us which made the mom thing more funny and huddle over the kids. people always -- like she was the first one they noticed. >> the world was like her catwalk? >> yeah, pretty much. >> beautiful girl? >> yeah. i love when i get told i look like her. it makes me really happy. >> oh, that's really sweet. but halee's beauty was more than skin deep. tattoos like this one on her back testified to her strong faith. >> ...