Talking Dateline: The Trouble with Sarah

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1:19Hi, everyone. I'm Lester Holt, and this is Talking Dateline. I'm joined today by Keith Morrison. And, Keith, this is a case I know you have been covering for years, and it brings us back to Baytown, Texas, where the death of Sarah Hartsfield's husband, Joe, ultimately exposed a much darker story. Multiple marriages, volatile relationships, and allegations of violence that stretch back for decades. The episode is called The Trouble with Sarah, and folks, if you haven't listened to the episode, you can find it in the Dateline podcast feed or stream it on Peacock. So go there and listen to that when you come back.

1:57Keith has some extra sound for us from private investigator Lynn Marie Garcy, who describes a surprising request she says that Sarah made after her conviction. And later, Keith will answer your question from social media. So, okay, let's start talking Dateline. Keith, just give us the overview, your view of this story. Well, this was a case that might not ever have seen the light of day. if a member of the medical staff in the emergency department of the hospital in Baytown, Texas, saw something that didn't look right and made a phone call to the sheriff's department. And a deputy went over to the hospital, talked to the people there, and was sufficiently concerned that he placed a call to the duty detective, who happened to be this young woman named Skylar Rocks, who was brand new to the detective service.

2:57She went over to the hospital, and after talking to Sarah Hartsfield, immediately smelled a rat. And she fussed around trying to get information for a while. And when finally it became apparent that she wasn't going to be able to make this a big investigation until she got some support, she went to the district attorney. DA happened to be a woman who's pretty aggressive in her treatment of crime. And also there was a female prosecutor. So the three of them together said, yeah, this is a case. We know what we're dealing with here. We've dealt with the word that they used with me was sociopathic female.

3:38So Skylar Rocks went about her investigation. And every rock that she turned over, she uncovered some more very interesting information about Sarah's life. It's still relatively rare that we see women as perpetrators in cases like this. You've covered a few, though. Lori Vallow, Pam Hupp, Sarah Hartsfield. Is this your specialty? Is this something you're able to look and— It seems like it's becoming one. It seems a little blunt. You know, I interviewed Lori Vallow some time ago, some months ago, when she was in jail awaiting trial for one of the murders that she was accused of committing. And she, first of all, she winks at the camera on the way in.

4:23She sits down. She turns on the charm like crazy. You can see why some people would have several husbands and lots of ability to attract men and their affections. But also that a woman might look at that same scene and say, oh, boy, somebody's getting snowed again because it's a technique that some people are able to use. Men are good at it, too. They're just good at it perhaps in a slightly different way. You know, I found it fascinating talking to the district attorney in Texas who handled this case. Interesting woman. But she was of the view that it isn't often that you run into a sociopathic female, as you call it.

5:10But she said they're very good, they're very slippery, and they're very good at persuading men that they're as innocent as the driven snow. but she was convinced that a lot of them get away with things that, you know, we never hear about because they got away with them. And it takes a woman. She told me over and over again that it takes a woman to recognize that sort of behavior. In fact, in this case, it took three women. Yeah. It's because this idea that Sarah has this, somehow this pull over men. Can you describe what it was about her that made her so appealing? Yeah. I asked the men who had had relationships with her, and there were lots of them, but those who had talked to us at least, described somebody who was vivacious, who was the kind of person you would fall in love with immediately.

5:58They described a beautiful woman. She could charm the birds out of the trees, especially if the birds were male. Yeah, when investigators look at Sarah's early relationships, they see the same cycle repeating, essentially. Intense, very intense emotional beginnings followed by deception and then chaos once a relationship starts to fall apart. Is that where the story really starts to shape for you, this pattern? Yes, and the pattern is you've described it perfectly. That's what would happen. She would attract a man. The man would fall for her. They would have a very intense first few weeks of the relationship, and then if they wanted to break off the relationship, that was no good.

6:41And so Sarah would take some sort of retaliatory action, attempting apparently to burn down Titus' house after he became engaged to another woman, or at least was discovered pouring gasoline all over his house. Then a boyfriend's house, her grandmother's house burned down. She was never charged in any of those cases, though, correct? No, she wasn't. When I was watching this, I was reminded of a recent interview I did for Dateline True Crime Weekly where I interviewed an arson investigator, and he talked about how difficult these cases are to prove. Yes. Arson is very difficult to prove. There are so many different possibilities for the reason it may have happened.

7:19And in Sarah's case, it was always kind of slippery. There was always some kind of reason why you would suspect it was her but not quite enough to charge her with something. Well, let me ask you about David Bragg. She shoots and kills him, then claims self-defense. At the time, police accepted that explanation. They didn't really look any farther into it, did they? There was an investigation. It wasn't just like a one-hour investigation. They went on, they looked at it, several agencies looked at it, and came back with the ruling that it appeared to be self-defense. But when this investigation looked into it more carefully, They could see that the relationship with David Bragg fit that perfect template that you cannot leave me, David Bragg.

8:02You cannot break up this relationship. Only I can. And the way I can break it up tends to be something you wouldn't like. Then you had David George. Yeah. David George took that long journey down to the place where the ex-husband was living, went up to the door, pushed the doorbell. You can see him on a ring camera. He had a bouquet of flowers supposedly for the wife of her ex-husband. Later on, he said he had no intention of ever shooting anybody. There was no charge. And that's another case that wasn't really a part of the central case in this story. Right, exactly. However, often we'll follow cases, and you know that somebody has behaved badly on a number of occasions, and those situations cannot be brought up in a trial.

8:49All the prosecution can do is focus on the specific charge with which this person is facing. And the details only concerning that particular act, the illegal act that that person is on trial for. But there's a rule in Texas that you can use past bad acts in the prosecution of a case. And that is what made all the difference in this case about Sarah. because the prosecutor was able to bring up all of these things in her past, all these relationships that had become violent. And the combination of all of those things made it apparent to anybody who was sitting in that courtroom that this woman would be found guilty.

9:28All right, we'll take a break. When we come back, Keith is going to play some extra sound from his interview with the investigator in this case and also hearing her describe what Sarah Hartsfield wanted done with Joe's ashes after she was convicted. We'll be right back. Need to pay a friend back for festival tickets or a morning coffee run? Apple Cash makes it simple. Just tap plus in the Messages app to find Apple Cash. No need to jump between apps or search for usernames. It's a private and secure way to send money. Send cash right in the chat with Apple Cash. Apple Cash services are provided by Green Dot Bank.

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11:48Keith, you know, you described so many instances where Sarah is able to, you know, charm or talk or cajole, whatever she would do to get out from these things. Do you think when it came to the death of Joe that she somehow believed she could work her way out of that one too? Well, I suspect that was the case. You know, we can't know what really was in her mind. Among the cases in her past, I suppose the one regarding Joe was easier potentially to solve, but Detective Rock certainly had to drill down on it. And was able to find out that in the many hours before Joe's death, while he was having a diabetic crisis and his alarm was going off every five minutes to tell Sarah that her husband was in diabetic shock, she claimed that she was asleep on the couch because she had just recently had surgery.

12:43And therefore, she just didn't wake up when the alarm went off. But when she was able to get access to Sarah's phone, she discovered that the times that Sarah claimed that she was asleep on the couch, she was actually up, walking around, making calls to other people, doing this, that, and the other. Certainly, she wasn't asleep. And certainly, she would have heard all of those alarms when they went off and chose to do nothing about it, which kind of formed, I think, the basis for the charges against her. Let me ask you about the children. Very often in cases like this, children are kind of left with a choice.

13:19You know, which parent are they going to back or support in this? The children were really pivotal ultimately in this case. They were. And I felt for them so deeply to have to go through life the way they did. It sounded like a pretty difficult way to grow up. The children that I talked to, though, seemed to be, you know, remarkably well adjusted or at least able to talk about what happened to them. Very clear-headed way. But as we know, Sarah actually appeals to Ashley for her support. Sure. They had a complicated relationship, those two. I think that Sarah really tried to manipulate Ashley for years and years and was obviously trying to do that in their conversations from the jail.

14:06The recordings that we heard, it was an effort to guilt Ashley into doing something on her mother's behalf. But at that point, Ashley was beyond it, and she wasn't going to get involved. Her mom apparently says, this isn't looking procedural. I think that came up during a voicemail. How damaging was that particular message? It was part of a pile of things. I think it was an indication that she was aware of the fact that there was a strong case against her, that she understood what that case was. So, you know, did it point to her guilt? Perhaps it did. I think the prosecutor was able to use that attitude as part of the case.

14:54It was an interesting trial, a fascinating case to look into. And yes, another one of those cases where there was a woman who did some bad things. All right, we have an extra clip that didn't make the broadcast. Yes, and the voice is Lynn Marie Garcy, who was the private investigator the defense brought in as an assistant to help with the case, to see how the jury was reacting, to make recommendations about how Sarah should behave in the courtroom. There was an attempt, I think, by the defense to at least gain a sense of what the jury was thinking so that they could come up with some sort of defense for Sarah.

15:38Oh, there was a story about Joe's ashes. She had a request. Tell me that one, if you don't mind. Well, I guess it has nothing to do with her case anymore, but she wanted them to be thrown in the trash can after she was convicted. And the four of us, we have hearts, and we have a little bit more integrity than that. And we're not doing that, you know. And so my understanding is, is that his sister got the ashes. Yeah, she just won't throw it in the trash can. That's pretty ice water in the veins to me. Yeah. Truly, it's taking retribution to its ends. Ice water in the veins, I think, is a pretty good description.

16:27It is, it is. She was, I think, frankly, horrified by this particular defendant. and she said she was relieved by the, and here's somebody working for the defense, but she was relieved by the fact that Sarah was convicted. She said she didn't know what would happen if Sarah got out and she said, well, I'm not too worried because I have a pew-pew. I said, what are you talking about, a pew-pew? She carries a gun, it being Texas. You carry a what? Pew-pew.

17:00Sorry. Yeah, I sat up for that one as well. A pew pew? I think a large part of this story is about accountability. What's the likelihood we'll see some of these other investigations bear fruit? Well, a couple of them have been opened. The shooting of David Bragg, particularly. I'm quite interested to see what happens with regard to that one. But jurisdictions in other areas are having a look. Will they come up with anything at this stage? It's hard to know. A good deal of that evidence may have disappeared. Some of those people have died. It seems to me somewhat unlikely that there be further charges, but certainly those departments are aware now and have been looking into it.

17:48All right, Keith. We'll stay right where you are. We have some questions in here from social media. We're going to give you a chance to answer some and to weigh in on some of what the viewers are pointing out. We'll be right back.

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19:36Okay, now for some social media questions. Most of them, frankly, are comments. But here's one from nctrigger85. She goes, wow, not too many dateline cases get under my skin as much as this one did. She is evil incarnate. Whether somebody's evil or not, I don't know. She's bad to the bone, I like to think of it. But she did have a pretty rough upbringing. And she was eventually sent to foster care, which was probably the only good family she had over the course of that time. Here's Geer is Herndon. I carry a pew-pew. I like that lady. She's hilarious, he writes. Yeah, she was hilarious. She was also no-nonsense.

20:19Very, very bright lady. I loved also her advice when Sarah came into the courtroom with the Bible. She said, you've got to get rid of it immediately. Are you crazy? They're going to know what a hypocrite you are immediately. Well, I was going to point that out. She talks about the Bible. She also talks about the fact that immediately her impression was the jury hated this woman. Yes, absolutely. Which is not a good start to your trial. No, no. Oh, here Beatrice Pembroke picked up on, she says, that always baffles me why previous bad actions aren't allowed at trial usually. That's the point. And I think a lot of us, you know, will watch a lot of trials and we kind of want a case where the jury gets to hear everything about a person.

21:05You do. You do. I find it frustrating. I was called for jury duty once and expressed that frustration to the judge when I was asked the question whether I could, you know, they asked a series of questions about whether you could serve on a jury. And I said, yeah, but I guess, sir. But boy, I sure want to know the whole thing about that person. I get very frustrated when a case happens. And you hear about this. So many things even about the specific incident are not allowed in court. So the jury doesn't get to hear that stuff. Drives me crazy. And I wasn't allowed on the jury, of course. But it's a good point.

21:44So it's Mike H. 1990 who writes, Sarah is the type of person that makes you stay single and enjoy every single life forever. Okay, we'll leave him to his opinion on that. And then here, Candace Smith wants to know, did she kill her 10-year-old brother too? Well, I was sure curious about that. I don't think it's possible. I think that she was with her foster family when that happened, I think. But it's a little unclear. There's a whole kind of overlap period where you're not sure where something happened. The incident involving her brother is very strange, but it seems unlikely she could have done it.

22:25Yeah. Vicki Irby weighs in so proud of these ladies and their team, obviously referencing the fact that it was an all-lady team. that really brought this case ultimately to justice. And they take pride in it too, by the way. They were something they talked up. Clearly they do. Well, that's it for Talking Dateline this week. Thanks, everyone, for listening. If there's a case you want us to cover or you have a question for our team, reach out anytime at social at Dateline NBC. You can also leave us a voicemail. The number is 212-413-5252. Or you can send us a voice memo and a DM. In the meantime, we'll see you Friday for an all-new Dateline on NBC.

23:06Thanks, Keith. Thank you, Lester. It was nice to see you.

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