And this is "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Her name was sarah, a sweet, single mom,
The baby in a big-hearted family.
- Try to protect her any way that we could.
- A family turned army when she vanished.
- This is how many people we have, right now.
- We just started searching.
- They just wanted to find her.
That kind of emotion really drives you.
- Where was she?
- Was someone followin' her?
Did someone attack her?
- Under scrutiny, the ex-boyfriend.
- People are pointing fingers at him.
- And three others she encountered that night.
- I was scared.
- How many times did they come and talk to you?
- 30+.
- Two tantalizing clues, a handprint...
- The subject had blood on their hand.
- And a trail on twitter.
- Incredibly powerful.
You can almost see this happening in real time.
- Could she help solve her own mystery?
- She's fighting him off.
- It was so emotional.
- I wanted to jump out of my seat.
Never in a million years
Would you expect somethin' like that.
♪♪
- Hello and welcome
To "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
Sarah goode had a zest for life and poured her energy
Into raising her young daughter.
There was no shortage of people looking after sarah either.
That's why her family was mystified
When she went missing.
Sarah had posted cryptic social media messages
Directed at someone, but who remained a secret.
Now, her family warns the person responsible
For her disappearance would pay.
Here's andrea canning with "finding sarah goode."
♪♪
- On long island,
About ten miles down the shoreline
From the mansions, the fancy cars,
And the elite of the hamptons, is a blue collar beach town
Some call the poor man's paradise,
But life was rich for these brothers and sisters
In mastic, new york,
Filled with the love of a large, tight-knit family.
♪♪
All that was taken away one warm evening
When evil rolled in with the summer tide.
Their youngest sister was missing.
- We just want you to come home safely.
- And for better or worse, this family would go
To extraordinary lengths to find her.
- We're gonna scour those woods, right now.
- We were our own investigators.
- Here's me and five of the biggest guys
You could probably imagine knockin' on your door.
You know, we want answers.
- If you do not have a group, come right here!
- Have you ever seen so many people
So involved in a case before, non-law enforcement?
- Gratefully, no. [chuckles]
Missing person cases, especially missing girls,
They always get everybody's emotion
Because it's just so horrible.
- I always tell her I'm sorry
That it happened to her. [crying]
♪♪
- 21-year-old sarah goode
Was the little one with the big personality.
Her older sisters, samantha, lizzie,
Tabitha, and jennifer,
Say even though sarah could take care of herself,
They still saw themselves as her protectors.
Was everyone kinda looking out for her,
Her being the baby?
- Always, yeah. - Oh, yes.
- How many children in your family?
- Well, there's nine of us. - Nine siblings.
- And 20 grandchildren.
- 20? [laughing]
- Yeah. - Oh, my goodness.
How does your mom keep up?
- I don't think any of us keep up.
[laughing]
Every day, there's somebody askin',
"how many of us are there, again?"
- Seven sisters and two brothers.
Jennifer, who was 12 when sarah was born,
Fondly recalls that day.
- I just remember going to the hospital after she was born,
And mom let me change her first poopy diaper.
[laughing]
- So, she was like your little baby, too,
It sounds like. - She was.
I would wake up with her
In the middle of the night and feed her.
- That is a sign of a big family
When big sister is feeding the baby
In the middle of the night.
- Yeah, and she screamed until you stuffed
The bottle in her mouth. [laughing]
- As sarah grew older,
And her siblings started to marry,
Her sisters' husbands also looked out for her.
Her brother-in-law, nick giannetto,
Appointed himself chief protector.
He met sarah when she was just 3 years old.
- She was very outgoing, and talkative,
And very fun to be around.
Uh, whenever I cooked something,
She was right next to me
And wantin' to learn how to do it or--
Or taste it.
- You two really bonded. - Oh, yeah, absolutely.
I was always there for her.
And if someone bothered sarah,
Sarah would definitely come to me
And-and let me know.
- I heard a little story about you.
- About?
- Big, strong nick would paint sarah's fingernails.
- Oh, sarah's nails, yes, yes, yes.
[laughing] - where does that come from?
- I-I-I mean, it was just, you know, some of the sisters
Would always be painting their nails,
And, you know, me ownin' a hardwood floor business,
Being very particular on how I laid my finish out
And how nice and neat everything had to be,
I said, you know what?
How hard could it be to paint the fingernail,
You know?
- It was just another way nick took care of sarah.
But even under watchful eyes,
The unexpected can happen, and it did.
After a long romance with her high school sweetheart,
At 17 sarah got pregnant.
Was she excited to be a mom?
- Yeah, she was.
A little nervous, but everybody's nervous
The first time they're a mom, but she had so much experience,
You know, her sisters and brothers
Having so many kids.
She was always babysitter number one.
- Allaura cicero and sarah grew up in the same neighborhood
And quickly became best friends.
Allaura says she was especially happy
To hear sarah was having a girl.
- I was like, "oh, you're gonna have a little sarah.
Like, she's gonna be just like you,"
And turns out that's what happened.
She always put jocelyn first.
Everything was always about jocelyn,
As it should be.
- Jocelyn's dad couldn't be there when she was born.
He had joined the army and was deployed overseas.
When he returned home,
It became clear his relationship with sarah
Wouldn't survive the challenges of grown-up life.
- I'm not really sure what happened there.
I guess they grew apart. [laughing]
- Sarah was now a single mom raising a baby girl on her own,
With the help of her family, of course.
- She was just, like, a natural mother.
You know, she knew what to do and how take care of her
And love her up every second, and that's what she did.
- It had to be easier for her, too, with all of you.
- Oh, yeah. - Mm-hmm.
- And then all this family. - She had built-in babysitters.
- Sarah didn't let teenage motherhood stop her
From following her dreams.
- She graduated from high school,
And then she went to college and graduated from there.
- She landed a job as a medical technician
And still managed to be a hands-on mom
To her now 4-year-old daughter.
♪ birthday dear jocelyn ♪
- Describe sarah when she would see jocelyn.
- Her eyes would light up
Even for not seeing her for an hour.
Like, when she, like, held jocelyn
And kissed her on the cheek and stuff,
You felt it in your own heart.
It was amazing.
- Sarah was a great mother.
You know, she really stepped up to the plate for jocelyn.
- So did nick, who was jocelyn's godfather.
He was there for her first Halloween.
- Just look at big uncle nick, you know, carrying jocelyn
To her first house, you know, gettin' candy.
- And he helped in other ways,
Like when sarah decided she needed to buy a car.
- "okay. What kinda car you want?"
"I want a bmw. I want a bmw."
- It just so happened one of his friends
Was selling a 1999 bmw.
- We go over there and look at it.
You know, she loves the car, and I'm like, you know, let--
Let's just sit back, you know, a day or two.
Think about it, you know, 'cause they break down.
It's-- it's expensive to fix. - No. I don't see her
Sitting around thinking about it.
- No, not at that age. [laughing]
She comes over, like, two days later.
She's like, "you're comin' with me
To get this car, right now. I want that car."
- And so she got it.
Did she post her brand-new bmw all over social media?
- Oh, my god, yeah, all over social media.
[laughing]
- Was that how you could tell sarah was happy,
By looking at her instagram, twitter, facebook?
- Yes.
Besides that, she was just so happy all the time.
You know, to get her to be mad was, uh, very hard.
- And on the night of Friday, June 6, 2014,
Nick says sarah was happy.
She had recently broken up with a boy
She'd been dating for two years
And was looking forward to a night out with friends.
Nick had agreed to babysit jocelyn,
And nothing seemed out of the ordinary
When sarah came by his house to drop off her daughter.
- I came home from work,
And, uh, she's like, "paint my nails."
And I was like, uh, "ahh, leave me alone.
I'm-I'm tired. I'm goin' in the shower."
She was like, "no, I want you to paint 'em, now."
So, I was like, "all right. Come on."
Like, and we laughed, and we talked.
You know, she was goin' out for the first time in a long time.
- Before she left, sarah posted on instagram
A smiling selfie showing off her freshly painted nails.
Did she have any parting words as she left the house?
- Um, "I'll see you guys tomorrow. I love you."
Kiss, kiss, kiss, jocelyn kiss,
And, uh, very happy,
Got in the car, and-and left.
- Say, "cheese."
- But nick didn't see sarah the next day.
No one did.
She was supposed to pick up her daughter
At a family birthday party, but she never showed,
And all calls and texts to her phone went unanswered.
That's gotta be an awful feeling.
- Yes, in your mind, and in your heart, your soul,
Uh, you're-- you're saying to yourself
This is not normal.
You know, this is not sarah.
- Coming up...
- I need to report her, now.
- The first clues to the mystery:
Her car near the woods
And her messages on social media.
- Was someone followin' her?
Did someone attack her?
- Very creepy what she posted.
- Very creepy, yes, very creepy.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪
- On Saturday, June 7, 2014, single mom sarah goode
Didn't show up to a family birthday party
Where she was supposed to pick up
Her 4-year-old daughter, jocelyn.
No one in the family could reach her all day.
Her sister, lizzie,
Says she knew something was terribly wrong
When sarah didn't respond to messages
That her daughter was asking for her.
- Jocelyn was like, "oh, I miss my mom."
I said, "we'll call her,"
And we called her, and it went to voicemail.
So, that's when I--
I just thought somethin' was not right
'cause she would always answer,
Especially if you mentioned jocelyn.
- It's heartbreaking when you think
That a little girl wants to talk to her mom,
And you can't find her. - Mm-hmm.
- When sarah still hadn't appeared by Sunday afternoon,
Lizzie went to the police station
To report her missing. [sirens wailing]
- I said, "I need to report her, now."
- That report set things in motion.
Prosecutor janet albertson, since retired,
Was on this missing persons case from the beginning.
She learned that on the day
Sarah was a no-show at the party,
A woman had spotted a blue bmw
Abandoned next to a wooded lot.
- Police officer had responded to that location
Thinking that maybe this is a stolen car.
The plates were-- were bent.
- Albertson says the bmw was found
Less than a mile from sarah's mother's house
Where sarah and jocelyn also lived.
- The officer, uh, ran the plate number.
It came back to sarah goode with an address,
And, after that, he went to sarah's home,
And there was nobody there,
Because, as we would later learn,
They were at the birthday party.
- Around the same time
Lizzie was at the police station,
That officer noticed the abandoned car
Was still in the same spot.
- The officer radios it in, again.
And at this point now, sarah's family
Had reported her missing Sunday evening.
- So, things were really clicking now.
- Exactly. Once it came back as a missing person,
Well, now they've got a reason to really pay attention.
- And her beloved car was the biggest clue.
Detectives needed the spare key,
So they headed over to sarah's house.
Her sister, jennifer, was there,
And she desperately wanted to know.
Where was the car?
- I just remember overhearing one detective
Tell the other detective that the car is in eagle estates,
And then I was on the phone with nick,
And that's when I told him.
Like, he said-- - he said, "eagle estates."
- He said, "the eagle estates," and then we all followed them.
- You went straight there to where the car was.
- They told us not to go follow him.
- Yeah, we were following them anyway.
- And I said, "I don't care if you have to arrest me.
I'm following you." [chuckles]
- Eagle estates was a place they knew well
Because it was so close by.
A large entourage of sarah's family
Headed over there and tried to approach her bmw,
But police wouldn't let them get too close.
What was that like seeing her car there?
What did that tell you? - It was scary.
- It was hard and scary. - I was--
- They wouldn't let us go to it. - They would not let us near it.
- The police had a job to do, so things got heated.
Sarah's sisters say they shouted at detectives,
And detectives shouted back.
- We were yellin' at them.
I was like, "open the trunk."
They were like, "we're not doing anything."
- Yeah. We were yellin', like, "is she in there?"
- "we're not doin' anything until you leave."
- They were yelling at us. "you guys have to leave."
- But did you say, "no, I'm not leaving,
Or did you leave?" - yeah.
- We did, but they threatened they would arrest us.
So, obviously, we don't wanna be arrested,
So we-we did leave and-- - we kind of left.
- Kind of. - Kind of.
- 'cause we kept on circling around in our cars
Instead of our feet. [laughing]
But I wasn't gonna leave her if she was in there.
[sirens wailing] - later that night,
The family finally got some answers.
Detectives told them sarah was not in the car.
- Were you trying to hold onto hope?
- Yeah. - Trying to. Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Hope turned to action,
And the family got organized in a big way.
- Everybody came to my house, and then we--
We just started searching.
Just anywhere we thought to even just go,
We just went.
- How many search volunteers are we talking about?
- There was at least 200 the first day.
- Pretty humbling 'cause you can see
How many people that she touched and--
- Care about her. - Yeah.
- We just put it together in an hour
On, you know, um, social media.
- Facebook, social sites. - And, you know,
This how we-- how many people we have right now,
But there's more people on the way,
And there's already people searching.
- Searching.
- Beyond searching,
This large family started its own investigation,
Making calls and combing through social media.
- Checkin' facebooks,
Making sure she didn't update anything.
- The professional detectives were also looking
At sarah's online life, piecing together clues
From the Friday night she went missing.
They started with that picture she posted on instagram
Of her freshly painted nails.
They learned she was at nick's house around 6pm,
And from the picture,
They could see what she was wearing.
- And she had on tank tops
And this very unique tank top over it with an owl face
And her little headband.
- Police then confirmed
That after sarah kissed her daughter goodbye
And left her brother-in-law's house,
She drove to a friend's place.
- She hooked up with a-- a friend of hers,
A childhood friend, uh, by the name of jason flores.
- A timeline was coming together.
She picked up jason in her bmw.
- She and jason had referred to each other as cousins
Because they had been neighbors growing up
When they were younger, but they had drifted apart.
She had really just kinda connected with jason
About two weeks before.
- At 6:51 pm, a second selfie.
- Jason took a selfie of the two of them
Where you can see sarah driving, and she's so happy.
I mean, she was just beaming.
You know, she just looked like a happy kid,
Like, for her first night out in a-in a while.
- They picked up brandon allen, a good friend of jason's
And a new friend of sarah's, and headed over
To a small gathering, a dozen or so young people
Hanging out in this front yard.
Investigators estimate they stayed there
About 40 minutes.
Before they left,
They took this group shot at 10:18 pm.
That's sarah in the pink sweatshirt
Next to jason.
Where does she go? Does she go home?
- No. At that point,
She and jason are going to go back to brandon's house.
He lives on-- only around the corner.
So, sarah drove jason and brandon
Back to brandon's house
Where they watched "the hobbit," the movie.
- Around 1 o'clock in the morning,
Jason, sarah's childhood friend, wanted to leave.
Sarah agreed to drive him home.
After she dropped him off, he sent her a text at 1:17 am.
- Basically saying, "are you home okay?"
And she responds, "yes,"
And we know that's on jason's phone
Because the police have taken his phone
To download the information.
- All this seemed routine.
Then something ominous.
On sarah's twitter feed, her brother-in-law, nick,
Learned that days before sarah went missing,
She had tweeted, "so, you know I live on a dead end?
I see you creepin'!"
And a second one, "getting threatened for days now.
Is that the new thing to do?"
- Dead end part really is the one that--
That got to me.
Like, was someone followin' her?
Did she get to the house and someone attack her?
It's a dark dead end, very dark, where she parks.
- They're very creepy, what she posted.
- Very creepy, yes, very creepy.
- No one had any idea
Who or what she was referring to.
There were so many questions,
And sarah's brother-in-law wanted answers.
With the help of some large friends,
Nick went looking for anyone who was with sarah
The night she vanished.
He sounded more like a detective
Than a floor refinisher.
- Who was she talking to?
Who'd you see her talking to?
Who'd you see her last leave with at the party?
Who she-- who she was socializing with.
- I mean, you're big, strong nick.
- Mm-hmm. - Did you wanna be like,
You know what? I wanna put this to use
And go find out some information here.
- I did. I wanted answers.
You know, and here's me
And five of the biggest guys you could probably imagine
Knockin' on your door.
- Was anybody getting you really hot under the collar?
- No, no.
I wasn't gettin' nothing from anybody.
- So, that's gotta be frustrating in itself
That nobody is standing out. - Yes.
Nobody is standing out.
Everybody was really sincerely tellin' the truth.
- But there was someone in particular
Nick wanted to question, sarah's ex-boyfriend.
Their 2-year relationship had just ended,
And sarah's family was getting suspicious.
- No one can say what was really going on between them,
Why they split,
But we thought we knew him well enough to--
You know, we thought he was a great guy,
And she loved him.
- You don't know everybody. - Yeah.
- You know, you don't know exactly what someone
Is capable of doing. - You don't.
It's not easy to just trust people that way.
- And he didn't show up to work the day after she went missing.
- Yeah. Uh-uh.
- Coming up, new questions about the ex.
- There were a whole bunch of rumors going around
About dj and his family.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- If you do not have a group, come right here!
- Three days after single mom sarah goode disappeared
From her home on the south shore of long island,
Scores of searchers continue to comb the woods,
Post signs, and follow leads, hoping to locate her.
- Your baby girl can't wait to give you
That great big hug when you come home.
- So far, detectives were revealing
Only one clue to the public.
- The fact that, uh, her car was found unoccupied,
She-she loves this car,
Somethin', uh, is, uh, is suspicious here,
And we wanna find this girl.
- Nicole allegrezza covered the story
For "the advance," a local long island newspaper.
- It was the biggest story that I had gotten yet,
And it also hit home
Because she was about the same age as me,
A little bit younger.
- What was going on social media?
What were people saying?
- Well, there were hashtags created almost immediately,
#sarahgoode, #findsarahgoode.
There were postings on where they were going for searches,
Who was going for searches, how many people were searching.
Everybody was looking for sarah.
- And nicole says during the searches,
The gossip mill was buzzing with rumors
About sarah's recent breakup with her long-term boyfriend.
His name was dj.
- There were a whole bunch of rumors going around
About dj and his family,
And that things were not going well in their relationship,
And that they had just broken up,
I think ten days they said, before she went missing.
- So, nicole was a bit taken aback
When she spotted the ex-boyfriend
While she was out covering the story.
She saw him in a crowd of searchers.
- As a reporter, I felt like I had to talk to him
Once I knew who he was,
But I also was a little cautious to go near him
Because I was like,
What if he actually had an involvement in this?
- Investigators, who were working around the clock
In hopes of finding sarah alive,
Heard about the ex-boyfriend.
Did he need to be looked at?
- I think everybody should be looked at
Because when you don't know what happened,
You can't exclude anybody.
- There was an anonymous call on the crime stoppers tip line.
Detectives learned a strange and disturbing story
About the ex-boyfriend, dj, and his mother.
Apparently, the breakup with sarah had gotten ugly.
Dj had left a threatening voicemail.
- Mm-hmm. Yeah.
The message that dj left, um, in the voicemail
Wasn't physically threatening bodily harm to sarah.
It was more "take that post down, bitch."
- "that post," albertson says,
Was a message sarah put on her facebook page
Insulting dj and a member of his family.
She says the message upset dj's mother so much
That the mother called sarah and threatened to kill her.
So, sarah called 911.
What is her complaint in the call?
What-- or what is her concern?
- I-I think her concern in the call was just
To make a report,
Um, and-and really the report she was looking to make
Was that the mother had threatened her
About this post.
- The prosecutor thought this might explain
One of sarah's strange tweets, the one she posted
Just four days before she went missing.
"getting threatened for days now.
"is that the new thing to do?"
- The tweet was clearly associated, um,
With the phone call from the ex-boyfriend
About take the post down and the mother being upset
That she had put the post up.
- But she wasn't sure what to make of the other one.
"so, you know, I live on a dead end.
"I see you creepin'."
- Obviously, her and dj had broken up.
I don't really know what the-the tweet was about.
- Detectives questioned the ex-boyfriend, dj,
And took his prints.
And continued their investigation.
- All right, let's go.
- Sarah's family also kept digging.
At first, her brother-in-law, nick, didn't think
Dj had anything to do with sarah's disappearance.
After all, he was one of the first people
To volunteer in the search.
- He was there from day one when sarah went missing.
I mean, immediately came to my house
'cause I was gettin' a bunch of friends together,
And we were gonna go out lookin' for sarah.
- That was until nick heard about dj's angry words
On sarah's voicemail.
- Once we found out, he kinda stood away.
The detectives really didn't want us talking to him.
- So, were you thinking about him
As you're learning this information?
- At that point, I really couldn't rule out dj.
The detective did say to me,
"nick, you really can't trust nobody at this point, right now.
"so, maybe you wanna just leave him alone."
- What did you think when he said that to you?
- Um, you know, a lotta things, you know.
A lotta bad things I guess you could say.
You know, hurtin' him-wise.
- But he followed the detectives' request
And stayed away from the ex-boyfriend,
For the time being.
Nick and the rest of sarah's family
Had others to question.
Anyone who was with sarah the night she disappeared
Was on their radar.
- They threw me up against the car
And started screamin' at me and all that.
- Really? - Yeah.
They were blaming anybody who was there that night.
- Coming up...
- Tears were rollin' down my eyes.
I says, "if I find the person who hurt her,"
I said, "I will bring him to you."
- Pain and rage--
A family hellbent on getting answers.
- They knew I was really serious.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow.
Where was sarah goode?
As search teams scoured the woods,
Investigators combed for clues in her social media accounts.
There they discovered sarah's ugly war of words
With her ex-boyfriend.
Meanwhile, her family,
Including godfather nick giannetto,
Was conducting their own investigation,
And it was no secret nick would go to extremes
To get the truth.
Back to "finding sarah goode" with andrea canning.
- Sarah goode had now been missing for four days,
And her family was doing everything possible
To find her, and then some.
- We just stayed up all night goin' over the same things
Over and over again, talkin' amongst ourselves,
Like-- - what can we do tomorrow?
- Mm-hmm.
- You guys are all in the dark about this investigation.
- That's why we had to do everything ourselves.
- That's why you decided to start investigating.
- Right. - Yeah.
- And as for sarah's brother-in-law, nick,
Police were worried he might be taking things too far.
- I'd get called back into the precinct.
They'd tell me, "you gotta calm down.
"you're gonna hurt somebody."
- But nick wasn't ready to back down.
- As, uh, tears were rollin' down my eyes,
I says, "if, you know, if I find the person
"who hurt her or harmed her in any which way,"
I said, "I will bring him to you."
- You're almost like nick the bounty hunter in a way.
- Yeah, yes, yes,
And they knew I wasn't playin'.
They knew I was really serious at that point.
- Think you could have brought that person in alive?
- Uh, I don't-- at that time, no.
- He was determined to get answers.
His mission was to find anyone who might know
Where to find sarah.
That included sarah's childhood friend, jason flores,
And her new friend, brandon allen.
All three of them had been at brandon's house
Watching a movie the night she disappeared.
Luckily for brandon, the police got to him first.
Detectives called him in the middle of the night.
- He came down to the police station voluntarily,
I think, on that Sunday night.
Brandon was questioned by the police for hours.
- Any red flags with him?
- I don't think so, really, early on.
Uh, I mean, he-he didn't have that much contact with sarah.
He didn't have that deep a relationship with her.
- Brandon shared his story with us.
He says all he wanted to do was help find sarah.
- At that point, I'm thinking,
"all right, there's somethin' wrong here.
"we gotta go and help as much as we can."
Just figure out where she is.
- What kinda questions were they asking you?
- When is the last time you seen sarah?
When is the last time you talked to her?
Basic questions like that.
- And what were you telling them?
- Whatever they wanted to know.
- What's their tone? - Aggressive.
- Did you start to get a little worried?
Like, do they think I know where she is?
- Yeah, at some point, I did feel like
I had to convince them.
- Detectives also asked him to give a dna sample
And something else he didn't understand at the time,
Handprints.
He agreed to both.
Did you have anything to do with sarah's disappearance?
- No.
- Brandon says he had only met sarah a few weeks earlier.
He did know her ex-boyfriend, dj, though,
And had heard about the breakup.
He and dj had gone to high school together.
Were you friends? - We were acquaintances.
I would see him around school and outside of school and stuff.
He was all right.
- Was he kinda known around the school
Because of his athletics? - Yeah, yeah.
I would say so.
- Did sarah ever talk about him?
- Nah, she didn't really mention him,
'cause I'm pretty sure when she started hanging out with us,
That's when they first broke up.
- And brandon says sarah didn't seem worried
About her ex-boyfriend or anyone else that night.
Instead, she looked happy and carefree
As she left his house around 1:00 a.M.
She goes on home, and that's it. You don't hear anything.
- Yeah, that was the last time I ever seen her.
- The police let brandon go
But told him to stay in the area.
He left the precinct, he says, and joined the search for sarah.
Why did you feel the need to be there?
- Just because I felt like I had an obligation.
- He had no idea his presence would cause such a stir
With some members of sarah's family
Who were also out looking for her.
- You know, they threw me up against the car
And started screamin' at me and all that.
They didn't know who to blame,
So they were blaming anybody who was there that night.
- They knew that you had been with sarah that night.
- Yeah. - What did you say to them?
- At that point, I was just, like, beggin' for my life.
Like, I'm sorry. Like, please don't hurt me.
I don't know where she is.
You know, like, let me go.
- Did you really think they were gonna hurt you?
- Yeah. They were telling me,
If I didn't tell them where she was,
They were gonna kill me. - Wow.
- And there were witnesses there who I was with
Who can back that up.
- Were you really afraid? - Mm-hmm.
I was really scared, traumatized.
- But while brandon was saying he had nothing to do
With sarah's disappearance,
Police received puzzling information
On the crime stoppers tip line.
They heard about brandon's brother
Posting this picture on social media,
And the brother also mentioned in another post
That sarah had been at their house
The night she went missing.
So, brandon's brother had posted
His bloody knuckles on facebook
And said that sarah had been there?
Is that odd? - Well, there were--
There were two different posts on two different days.
- The posts, she says, were not related.
The picture of the knuckles
Had nothing to do with sarah.
- He was not there the night that this occurred.
He's not at the party with these kids,
And-and he wasn't at the house with them
Watching "the hobbit".
- Detectives chased down more tips
And questioned more people,
But, so far, nothing was bringing them closer
To finding sarah. So, they pressed on.
Along with her ex-boyfriend and her new friend, brandon,
Detectives were looking at someone else.
They asked him to come to the station.
- It goes from mr. Nice guy
To, "we know you know where she is,"
Smackin' me, chokin' me, spittin' on me.
- Coming up...
The last known person with sarah that night in jail.
- I was crying myself to sleep.
- Did you feel like you were enemy number one?
- Most definitely.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- As one day passed, then two, then three,
Four, and five, still no sign of sarah.
For her family, the not knowing was unbearable.
- I think deep down you hope, like,
If you found her, like, maybe she was still alive,
And she was breathing, you might be able to help her.
- Mm-hmm.
- Each night, sarah's sisters, brothers, cousins,
Her entire extended family piled into one house,
Comforted by the closeness.
- We all stayed at my mom's house
Every single night, on the floor, couches,
Kitchen, rooms-- we were--
Everybody was in there. - We didn't even sleep.
- You heard the helicopters, we went back out to search.
- Oh, yeah, we were out at--
We were out all hours of the night.
If we heard a helicopter, we all jumped in our car
To follow it, or if we heard a police car,
We were-we were goin'. We were gonna find it.
- They were relentless.
Using the hashtag #findsarahgoode,
They organized a massive search effort
Covering miles and miles.
How grueling was the search?
- It was horrible. - It was bad.
It was raining. Some days, it was steamin' hot.
- Even if it was hot, you were still in layers
Because you were in woods, and you didn't want
The ticks all over you.
- And every day, no answers. - And no-no.
- Family and friends searched places like
The smith point county park sarah loved
And the tick-infested woods
Near where her car had been found.
For three of her six sisters,
Jennifer, tabitha, and samantha,
The search was especially difficult.
All three of you were pregnant during the search?
- Yeah.
- That must have just added to how heard it was.
- Yeah. - It was hard.
- We were probably worse because, I know,
By the end of the day, my feet were so swollen,
I didn't even wanna move off of the couch,
But I knew I had to because I wanted to find her.
You feel sick to your stomach, but you couldn't tell
If it was sickness from pregnancy or sickness
Because you're afraid you're gonna find her,
And she's gonna be dead.
- In what seemed like parallel investigations,
Everyone detectives talked to,
The family tried to talk to, as well.
One person her sisters hadn't been able to reach
Was sarah's childhood friend, jason flores.
He was the one sarah dropped off
Before going home that night.
Since he was the last person known to be with her
Before she vanished, they called his cell phone.
- We tried to, but he never answered.
- Did anyone worry that he could have been involved
Or know something? - Yeah.
We don't know how or why, but we just thought
He was there with her,
And we just speculated
He had to have something to do with it.
- Not about to sit around and wait for jason's call,
Sarah's brother-in-law, nick, and his large posse
Went out looking for him.
You couldn't find him? - No.
- Do you think that was on purpose on jason's part?
- I think, at that point, the word was out that,
You know, we were out looking,
And we were gonna do whatever it had to take
To, uh, get answers.
So, whoever got the word were hiding pretty good.
- Do you think jason was nervous, worried that
You were out looking for him? - I would-- yes.
Yeah, yes, absolutely.
- Because he wasn't making himself readily available,
Did that say anything to you?
- Yeah, that's where you gotta say to yourself,
"does he know somethin'?"
Obviously, you know, she was with him.
He's gotta know something.
- What nick didn't know was the real reason
Jason was mia.
He was behind bars.
Detectives had brought him in for questioning
And discovered he had an unrelated harassment warrant.
So, they were able to detain him.
Two days jason was with investigators.
- Yes, he spent a significant amount of time
With 6th precinct detectives.
- Did they feel like, "hey, if you know--
We have to find sarah." - mm-hmm.
- If you know something, tell us.
- Oh, absolutely.
He's the last person that she drops off.
So, you know, at this point, you have to
Look at-at these people very seriously,
And you have to make sure that they're telling you the truth.
- Prosecutor albertson says jason's story
Was consistent,
And he was adamant that he had no idea
Where sarah was.
Did they take his dna, as well?
- They did. He consented,
And he gave them his handprints.
- Again, handprints, not your typical police request
In a missing person's case.
The reason police were collecting them
Would soon become clear.
Jason also agreed to turn over the clothes he was wearing
The night sarah went missing.
His encounter with police all seemed very cooperative.
- Everything is not what it seems.
- But when jason flores sat down to speak to us,
He says his visit with detectives at the 6th precinct
Was like a scene out of a bad cop film.
- The detectives called me, and I willingly went there,
Obviously, 'cause why would I not go?
You know what I mean? Like--
- To the police department? - Yeah.
So, we get there, this and that.
It goes from, uh, mr. Nice guy
To, "we know you know where she is,"
Smackin' me, chokin' me, spittin' on me.
- Wow. - And, uh,
I was scared. I was scared.
Even though I knew I didn't do anything,
They still had me, like, thinkin' in my head, like,
What the (bleep) is goin' on, right now?
You know, I didn't get no phone call.
No one read me my rights.
- What were they asking you? What kinda questions?
- It went from, uh, "how do you know sarah?"
To, "where the (bleep) is she?
"you ----in' little mother----er,
"we know you know where she is.
"yeah, you were in eagle estates.
"where the (bleep) were you last night?"
Like, just rippin' my mind apart.
- And he says it didn't get easier when he was
Left alone in the jail cell.
- Make me go crazy and cry in the cell all night.
- You actually were crying?
- Yeah, I was crying myself to sleep
On a roll of toilet paper. That was my pillow.
- What were you thinking about as far as sarah?
- Uh, I was worried. I was concerned
Because she had a lot to lose,
Beautiful baby, beautiful family,
Nice job, good career goin' for herself.
- Did you have anything to do with sarah's disappearance?
- Not one bit.
- After two days, they let him go
But warned him to stay close.
Did you feel like when you were
Walking out of that police department
That they weren't done with you?
They still felt like-- - oh, I knew.
I knew they weren't.
- How many times did they come talk to you?
- Thirty-plus.
- The police declined to comment on jason's claims
Of how he was treated by detectives.
As for sarah's family,
They had their own suspicions.
- Her family was convinced it was me.
- They were? - Yeah.
- How did you know that?
- The cops made it seem like that.
- Did you feel like you were enemy number one?
- Most definitely.
I felt so targeted,
And, uh, it wasn't a good feeling.
- Sarah's family and friends were becoming
More and more desperate.
They didn't know who was behind her disappearance,
So they kept digging,
And finally hit a solid lead.
- Coming up...
- There were so many unanswered questions.
I just had to find stuff out.
- A best friend's hunch and an eagle-eyed neighbor...
- I was wondering, "what is he doing?"
- ...Help put someone new on the radar.
When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Sarah's family had made it clear
They weren't going to be spectators
In the search for their sister.
- That's where her car was found.
- They were actively investigating her disappearance,
And so were her friends.
You decided to play detective a little bit.
- Um, yeah, I guess.
- Sarah had left a trail of cyber clues,
And her best friend, allaura cisero,
Was determined to follow them.
What was it that made you decide,
"I need to do something more here
"than-than just search?"
- There were so many unanswered questions.
Like, I felt like I just had to find stuff out.
- And she had an idea of where to start.
Turns out sarah was on allaura's
Family cell phone plan.
That meant allaura had access to sarah's phone records,
So she pulled them up on her cell.
What did you find?
Anything that jumped out at you?
- Just random numbers that I've never seen before,
The same numbers over and over again,
Like, back and forth.
- Did you start calling any of the numbers?
- I did.
- And what kind of response were you getting
When you would call?
- "last we seen her was at the party."
That's about it. Nobody knew anything.
- As allaura scrolled through sarah's call log,
There was one number that caught her attention.
- It was a number that kept reoccurring,
So we wanted to figure out who it was, you know?
So, we called and then... - Who answered?
- Dante.
Just the same response as everyone else.
"I don't know where she is. "haven't seen her."
- Dante taylor was a friend of jason flores
And was part of the group sarah was hanging out with
That Friday night.
His name wasn't familiar to her,
But allaura's boyfriend had heard of him.
- My boyfriend was like, "oh, I think
"that's the kid up the block."
So, that's when we realized that that was the neighbor.
- Did your boyfriend's family wanna keep an eye on dante?
- I guess we were lookin' out for him.
Lookin' out for everyone, you know?
It's just like, when you're in a situation like that,
Every little thing that happens,
You're paying extra attention to, at this point.
- Her boyfriend's mother, delia mckernan, heard about
Sarah's connection to dante,
So she decided to pay extra attention to him.
He lived with his mom a few houses away.
What kind of things were you seeing?
Anything suspicious?
- Um, you know, at the time,
I wouldn't know if it was suspicious.
- Like when she says she thought she saw
Dante cleaning out his car.
- Yeah, on two different occasions,
Um, I noticed that he had all of the--
That he had the car doors open,
The trunk open.
He was in and out of the vehicle.
Just unusual behavior, you know?
Just wondering-- I was wondering, "what is he doing?"
- Did you feel like, "I should tell
"sarah's family what I'm seeing?"
- Oh, well, I was always in contact with them.
- Not content to sit back and just watch,
Delia became dante's part-time shadow.
You actually followed him on occasion?
- I actually-- I did. I actually did, um,
Because, honestly, I really, really thought
He would lead us to sarah.
- Weren't you nervous? - Um...
- I mean, if he really did have
Something to do with her disappearance,
Then that would make him very dangerous.
- Uh, yes, and, you know,
Sometimes you think with your heart,
And you really hope for the best,
And you think that this-- if this could
Lead you to sarah, then yes.
- You're following him where, then?
So, wh-- what kind of places are you ending up?
- Um, he went to an auto parts store
On one occasion.
He stopped at a gyro shop.
He stopped in the parking lot of a shopping center.
I just kept thinking, "okay, sooner or later,
"he's going to make his way back to sarah.
- Did you feel at all like
Kind of an amateur private detective?
- I-I felt like a mom,
And it was extremely personal because of the connection
And the, um, the history
That we have with sarah's family.
- Delia had known sarah since she was a little girl.
Who was the sarah you knew as a child and beyond?
- Feisty, independent, loving.
She had a beautiful smile.
She was very family oriented.
She loved, adored her daughter.
- When nick, who was running out of patience,
Heard about dante's number showing up
On sarah's call log, he started following him.
Nick had heard the police wanted to talk to dante.
So, when he spotted him outside his house,
Nick called 911.
- But nick didn't wait for police to arrive.
He was about to take matters into his own hands.
- Coming up...
A dramatic turn in the case.
- You felt helpless.
It's, uh, it's a big pill to swallow.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
Continuing our story, sarah goode,
A young, single mom was missing.
- It was horrible.
- In your mind, and in your heart,
And in your soul, you're saying to yourself
This is not normal.
- Her family wanted answers. - We just started searching.
- We were our own investigators.
- Under scrutiny, her ex-boyfriend
And three others she was with that night.
- Did you feel like you were enemy number one?
- Most definitely.
- Where was she?
A break in the case was coming.
- You can't ask for better evidence
Than your bad guy's print in blood.
- I just wanted to rip his heart out of him.
♪♪
- Welcome back to "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow.
Sarah goode's loved ones were growing increasingly desperate.
Searching her phone records, sarah's best friend discovered
Someone had repeatedly contacted sarah
The night she disappeared.
A fuming nick giannetto wanted to have a conversation
With that man.
Soon, the investigation would take a turn,
Answering one dark question for sarah's family,
But raising a host of others.
Here again with "finding sarah goode,"
Andrea canning.
- Sarah goode disappeared after a night out with friends,
And her brother-in-law, nick, suspected one of them
Knew more than they were telling.
He soon learned that a partygoer
Named dante taylor called sarah's cell phone
Several times that evening,
And police wanted to talk to him.
So did nick.
- Ultimately, nick finds him
And t-tails him, like in the movies.
And when, uh, dante taylor goes to his mother's house,
Nick calls 911 and demands a police presence
To immediately come down and identifies him
As an individual who, you know, is potentially wanted
By the police in connection with the missing girl.
- With police on their way, nick went right up to dante
And confronted him.
- I was like, "get against the car, you...
"blah, blah, blah, blah." you know, ever curse word,
And he seemed pretty, uh,
Like, confident, like...
- You must have wanted so badly
To get this man to tell you where she was.
- Yes. - But the police show up.
- And I-- there was nothing I could do.
- As the detectives approached dante,
Nick continued yelling.
- I'm just cursing at him and, you know,
Vocally being nasty to him.
He wasn't saying nothing back to me.
- By this time, a whole entourage of sarah's family
Had shown up.
- The police respond.
More family came down, and it got chaotic.
- With nick and the rest of sarah's family
Now shouting at dante,
The police worried about his safety.
- Mr. Taylor was ultimately transported
To the local precinct,
And then, subsequently, he was interviewed by detectives.
- Was dante taylor giving them anything?
Was he helping?
- He provided the police with, uh, his palmprints,
His fingerprints.
Uh, he provide with a buccal swab.
Um, he gave a consent to search his phone.
- And when detectives confronted dante
With phone records showing he had been talking
To sarah the night she went missing,
He had an explanation.
- He was calling not to speak to sarah,
But to speak to jason, and that sarah picked up.
- And they confirmed dante was telling the truth.
Sarah's childhood friend,
Jason, had been using sarah's phone that night
To communicate with dante
Because his own phone didn't have cell service.
- Mr. Taylor was, uh, was released, and he was free
To go home while the investigation continued.
- Did that say something,
That he willingly gave his prints
And was talking to the police? - Sure.
You know, it's always interesting when somebody
Gives you, um, their samples.
- And he had even been supporting the search,
Posting this on twitter.
It was a real whodunit.
Six days and still no sign of sarah goode.
Her brother-in-law, nick,
Had run out of people to question,
So he did what many others do when they start to lose hope.
He went to church.
- I get on my hands and knees,
And I say, "you know what, lord?
"you could not give me anything else in this lifetime.
"uh, let me bring her home.
"you know, I wanna find her."
- Later that day, nick met up with a search party.
By now, he and the rest of the family had exhausted
Every possible lead.
So, they decided to retrace their steps
And went back to the woods not far from
Where sarah's car had been found.
- I park.
I get about a half a block over.
I get a phone call.
They think they see a-a body in the woods.
So, we all start runnin', and now there's--
I-I couldn't tell ya, maybe 15, 20, 30 people
At the end of the woods.
And, um, the smell was really bad,
So then you knew it was a body.
- Nick and sarah's brother, frankie, took a closer look.
- Yeah, everybody is screamin', and yellin',
And cryin' on the floor, and--
- Was something telling you it was her?
- Mm-hmm. The sweater--
It was a total indication.
So, uh, me and frankie look at each other
And say, "we're gonna tell 'em it's not her."
- Why?
- We still wanted hope that she was alive.
- Nick and frankie left the woods
And later ran into one of sarah's sisters.
- And I just remember screaming at him. Like, the--
Like, you have to tell me if it's her orr not.
And she-- and I just remember my brother was like,
"it's not her," and he just kept walking.
Like, they just didn't wanna talk about it.
- Did you believe him? - I didn't believe him.
I-I know it was her.
- Sarah's family and friends had never stopped looking.
Their tireless efforts had finally paid off.
They had found sarah's body.
Any last bits of hope were gone.
One of the searchers called 911.
[sirens wailing]
When sarah's sister, tabitha, heard the sirens,
It became all too real.
- It was like a white noise, like, you just felt go
Through your body that you knew something,
Whether it was sarah or something of sarah's,
It was found.
- How do you get that official confirmation
That it really was her?
- They made us all go back to my mom's house
'cause it was around the block.
They just stood us all in a circle
And just said that they believe it was sarah.
- They think it was sarah. - Mm-hmm.
- They couldn't confirm it yet.
- Yeah.
- They wouldn't say it really was her.
- As chief of the homicide unit
For the suffolk county d.A.'s office,
Janet albertson headed straight to the scene.
- Unfortunately, you know, her body had decomposed
A significant amount in that short six-day period.
It's just sad.
You know, you're just standing over this
What was, clearly, six days before,
A beautiful, young girl,
And what you had left was a horror.
- Albertson says she didn't need to wait
For test results.
She knew it was sarah.
She recognized her clothes from these pictures.
Did the shirt match the photos?
- Yeah, and when the medical examiner, um,
Removed the garments, and she laid them out
On the gurney to be photographed,
You could visualize each of the tank tops,
Including the owl shirt and the pink sweatshirt.
♪♪
- The same crowds of family and friends
Who had searched for sarah had now come to say farewell.
Nick was back at church, this time for sarah's funeral.
How was everyone handling the news that this--
This part of everything has now very tragically
And sadly come to an end?
- It just really, you know, punched you in the face.
It just, uh-- you're mad almost.
You're mad at yourself, you know,
'cause you couldn't do not-- like, you felt helpless.
- And you've always been sarah's protector.
- Yes, uh, that's how I felt, like I failed.
- And you were the last member of her family
To say goodbye. - Yes.
It's, uh, it's a big pill to swallow.
- You helped her get ready.
- For her night out, and I painted her nails.
Yes.
- You never coulda known.
- You never know.
You should always tell your loved ones you love 'em.
You really don't know.
- His deep sorrow was clouded by anger and suspicion.
Now that the search for sarah was over,
It was time to find her killer.
So far, detectives had made no arrests,
But nick had his eye on someone.
- He was the only one that I just wanted
To rip his heart out of him.
- That's a big deal.
- It's a tremendous deal.
- A telltale piece of evidence.
- It's almost like it was the killer's calling card.
- It was his signature.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Sarah goode's family and friends walked the beach
In mastic, new york to say their final goodbyes
At a place that had always brought her such joy.
But as they tossed flowers into the ocean,
They felt no peace.
Weeks had gone by with no word on who killed sarah.
You're trying to grieve the loss of your sister,
And there's the realization
That there's a killer on the loose.
- We weren't told anything, basically.
We were just told that they were looking into people,
And they have people in mind.
- Yeah, like, we called almost every day
To see if they found somebody
Or if they're questioning more people,
And we just got the run around.
- That's gotta put the whole community on edge.
- Mm-hmm.
- What the family didn't know, was police were getting closer
To finding her killer,
And now sarah's body gave investigators more clues.
They could tell it was a brutal murder.
She had been stabbed more than 40 times.
- This young lady has six sharp force injuries
To her forehead, a broken nose,
A-a stab wound that went through and through
The front to the back of her shoulder.
She's got a-a stab wound into the clavicle.
She's got two stab wounds to her lower leg.
- The prosecutor had a theory as to what started
This vicious attack.
- The killer wanted something from her
She didn't wanna give up,
And he was pulling her towards him.
- Albertson believes sarah had resisted a sexual advance,
So her attacker raped her before stabbing her to death.
- It's very clear when you looked at it that
He landed on her from behind, pinned her down,
And afflicted those injuries
Because she had bruising on her legs, front and back,
Inside the right and left thigh
That were inflicted while she was alive.
- Semen was found in sarah's body,
And leaves and twigs had been stuffed between her legs
In an attempt, the prosecutor surmised,
To cover up dna.
- This is brute force. This is an animal.
- And when they looked at the forensic evidence,
The prosecutor says it was clear the struggle began
Inside sarah's bmw.
- There was a significant amount of blood
And a large clump of-of her hair, um, in the door jam.
- It's a frightening discovery, finding hair and blood.
- It-it is, and the amount of hair that was out--
Hanging out of that door jamb was significant.
- Sarah's bmw had been towed to
The police department's impound yard
Where forensic experts went to work.
- They spent quite a long amount of time
Going over that car.
- Besides blood and hair,
Something else caught their attention.
- They noticed almost immediately on the hood
Of her bmw was red-brown staining.
- Karen oswald, a fingerprint expert,
Worked the case.
She says once investigators visually inspected the staining
On the hood, they dusted it for prints.
- There were a few handprints that were developed
On the hood. - And were--
Were you able to get prints off of them?
Was it-- was it a usable handprint?
- They weren't usable, uh, the way they were
With just the white fingerprint pattern.
There weren't enough characteristics
To compare it to somebody else.
- Then they did a second test using a chemical
Called amido black, and, this time,
There was enough detail.
One of the handprints was usable for comparison,
And the test told them something else.
So, if there is blood on this palmprint,
It's gonna now show up with this chemical.
- Hopefully, yes.
- And what happened when you put the chemical on it?
- It did develop.
- So, the palmprint turned blue.
- Yes, it did.
- Which means that there was very likely blood
In that palmprint. - Correct.
- And that's a big deal. - It's a tremendous deal.
- While oswald and her team examined the prints,
Other investigators tested the blood
To see who it belonged to.
- The blood came back to sarah goode.
- Oswald believed the killer had attacked sarah,
Got her blood on his hands,
And then carelessly left his prints.
So, that's why detectives had been gathering handprints
From every potential suspect.
The prosecutor says they knew if they could find a match,
They could likely solve this crime.
It's almost like it was the killer's calling card.
- It was his signature.
- The print specialist was able to compare
That bloody signature with those of potential suspects
Detectives sent her way.
- You don't always know homicide's level
Of interest in somebody.
You're going to compare these prints to anybody they ask.
- And one by one, she checked for possible matches,
Helping police cross names off their list,
Like sarah's ex-boyfriend, dj.
His prints did not match.
Neither did brandon allen's.
It was his house sarah had been at that night.
He says, once he was cleared,
Detectives started treating him differently.
- They just wanted to know what we know.
- You could feel that. - Yeah.
- They're not really looking at me.
They just want me to help. - Mm-hmm.
- And someone police had kept in jail for two days,
The last known person to see sarah alive,
Jason flores, was also cleared by his palmprint.
- And they come to my house and, uh, tell me.
- Who came? The detectives.
- Yeah, because they know how much I went through,
And they knew, like, I mean, this wasn't easy for anyone
To go through,
Especially someone you're accusing of it.
I'm just thinking, like, wow.
I just really feel sarah, like, with me, right now.
- As oswald cross-checked palmprints,
Delia mckernan had been keeping a close eye
On her neighbor, dante taylor.
Remember, he'd been with the group
Sarah was hanging out with that fateful night,
And his cell number showed up on sarah's phone records.
Were you glued to your window?
- Absolutely.
As crazy as that might sound, yes.
- Even though dante had been questioned by detectives
And let go,
Delia continued to watch him.
Using her high-powered binoculars,
She kept an eye on his house.
Were you looking for every little anything you could see?
- Everything, everything.
Even if it was an article of sarah's clothing,
Or perhaps a-a woman's bag,
Or something that was out of character for him.
- And sure enough, one thing caught her attention.
She watched as dante tried to hide his car,
At least that's what it looked like to her.
- At one point, he actually put garbage pails
Behind his vehicle and, um, kinda thought that
That would help conceal it.
- And then, one night coming home from dinner,
Delia says her street was blocked off.
A police flatbed was towing away dante's car.
- We were unable to access my street
Because the, uh, tow truck had-- was blocking it, and, also,
The officers were not allowing anyone,
Even if you lived here,
They weren't allowing down the street.
We thought, at that point, okay, this is really serious.
Like, this-- this is-- this could be it.
- But weeks passed and nothing happened.
Police didn't arrest anyone.
Meanwhile, from the time sarah had gone missing,
Dante had been hanging out with brandon and jason.
They'd all been friends for years.
What kinda guy was he?
- He was definitely a ladies man.
Uh, he was very jealous.
He was a jealous type of man.
- Did the ladies like him? - Yeah.
I guess it was his eyes.
That's what I always heard, was that they liked his eyes.
- And-and did he like the attention from women?
- Yeah, he liked to be the center of attention
All the time.
Anywhere we were, he would try to be on the spotlight.
- And brandon says dante was trying
To make something of his life.
Why did he wanna go into marines?
- Um, probably just like anybody else,
To serve their country.
- But dante dropped out not long after basic training
And had recently returned home.
And while sarah was missing, brandon says dante seemed off.
- It's hard to explain.
You know, you would have to see for yourself, you know,
Like, bein' around him and getting the vibes.
It was just-- it wasn't right.
Somethin' wasn't right. - Talk about those vibes.
- Creepy, like-like, he'll stand there,
And just stare at you.
- Did that make you uncomfortable?
- Um, I would just look away.
- But yet, you all kept hanging out with him.
- Yeah.
- And jason thought maybe dante's short stint
In the marines had changed him.
- We were actually good friends, at one point,
And then he went away,
Came back, and then he was just weird.
- Jason remembers a weird incident one day
When they were at a barbecue
Not long after sarah went missing.
Dante got into an argument with another one of their friends
And pulled out a shotgun.
- So, dante popped his trunk and started pointing
The gun at him, and then brandon ran up to dante
And pushed him back with the gun,
And dante put the gun back in his trunk,
And that was that. Like--
- What did you think when he pulled out a gun?
- I was just on the roof. Like, I'm stayin' over here.
I'm not going near that gun.
I don't like guns.
- He had just bought it? - Yes.
- To his friends, dante's behavior seemed erratic,
But there was something else to consider.
Just as jason, brandon, and the ex-boyfriend had done,
Dante willingly gave his handprints.
If his prints had matched,
Wouldn't police have arrested him?
There was more to this story, so much more.
- If you follow it, it's amazing.
- A deep dive into sarah's cell phone records
Reveals a secret early morning rendezvous.
- You see sarah is home,
And all hell broke loose from there.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- On the night sarah goode was murdered,
Detectives already knew she had dropped her friend,
Jason, at around 1:00 a.M. And, a few minutes later,
Texted him that she had made it home safely.
But it wasn't until they combed through sarah's phone records
And checked cell tower data
That they started to figure out what happened next.
Those cell phone records were really telling you a story.
- It's incredibly powerful.
If you follow it, it's amazing.
You see sarah is home.
- Lawrence opisso, an assistant district attorney
With the suffolk county d.A.'s office,
Worked the case.
- And jason texted her.
"are you home? Are you home safe?"
And-and she says, "yes,"
And all hell broke loose from there.
- He says, after that text,
Sarah got a call from someone else.
- Somebody is speaking to her, and there's conversations
Going back and forth.
- When detectives tracked the cell phone movements,
They could see whoever was talking to sarah
Started off in mastic, new york
Then traveled about ten miles north
To where sarah was living, near eagle estates.
- She's home, but we see this phone number,
The cell instrument with this phone number,
Move very deliberately right up to sarah goode's home
Where the phones come together.
- Once the cell phone pinged near sarah's house,
All phone communication stopped.
Prosecutors believe that's when sarah and her caller
Started communicating in person.
- She receives a call from-from a young man,
And at 1:30 in the morning, you know,
She went out to meet him.
- Albertson theorized sarah, who was 21 and a single mom,
Wanted to make the most of this rare night out.
So, when she got an offer to keep the party going,
She took it.
- I think her decision was just kind of naive
And-and foolish and, unfortunately, you know,
It turned out to be fatal.
- So, who was this person sarah met up with
On the night she was murdered?
Police traced the number.
- It ultimately, uh, was identified to dante taylor.
- Nineteen-year-old dante taylor,
The handsome marine corps dropout--
When police had questioned him back when sarah was missing,
He told them he and sarah never got together
After the group split up that night.
- He maintained that he asked her to hang out
And that she said, "no." she wasn't gonna hang out.
Um, and he was confronted with phone records
And cell tower information that said otherwise,
Uh, and, you know, he basically said,
"those records must be wrong."
So, records are not wrong. [chuckles]
You know, people are liars. Records aren't.
- And even though sarah and dante were part of the group
Hanging out together the night she went missing,
Their mutual friend, jason flores,
Says the two barely interacted.
He didn't make any comment, "oh, she's cute,"
Or anything that--
- He came up to her car, and we were sittin' in her car.
- He says the three of them had a short conversation.
- And then he walked away, and that was the only thing.
- The family had also been suspicious of dante.
When they called him while looking for sarah...
- We talked to him twice,
Once at night when we first started
And then in the morning.
I think he just switched that either he did
Or didn't see her. I don't remember.
- He might not have gotten his story straight.
- Yeah.
- Police already had cell records
Linking dante to sarah.
So, what about his palmprint?
Karen oswald remembers when dante came in
To give his prints.
- He was a regular guy.
He was polite, helpful.
Um, he was a nice guy.
- When someone acts like that, do you think,
Oh, it probably wasn't him?
- I don't make a-a, uh, determination on whether
I think it was them or not.
I've seen enough, um, people who have done really bad things,
And, to your face, they're--
They're polite. They're respectful.
But demeanors change.
- Oswald carefully compared the ridges
From the bloody palm print to dante's.
Finally, a hit.
- It matched to dante taylor.
- How did that feel to make that match,
That now you've potentially caught the killer?
- In one instance, it feels great
Because you always wanna be, uh, part of that team
That gives the evidence that, um, catches somebody
Who's done something this awful, but the reality is,
You never actually wanna work a case like this.
You never wanna hear the story of what happened to sarah.
You immediately think, you know, she met this guy at a party.
That could have been me, or any of my friends,
Or my sister.
- But even with the palm print and the cell phone records
All pointing to dante as sarah's killer,
Police didn't arrest him.
There was a problem and a brand-new lead.
- Coming up...
- We received information that there might be
Another victim out there. - Another victim?
- He had a knife. He had it at my throat.
He just kept saying, "I'll kill you."
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
Welcome back.
Justice for sarah goode seemed close at hand,
Or was it?
A major setback was in store,
One that could jeopardize the entire investigation,
But a new player was about to enter the story,
A brave soul with a stunning secret to share.
Here with more of "finding sarah goode"
Is andrea canning.
♪♪
- As detectives built their case against dante taylor,
The prosecutor worried about a key piece of evidence,
The bloody palm print dante left on the hood of sarah's car.
She wasn't sure she'd be able to use it in court.
Remember when police brought dante in for questioning
Back when sarah was still missing?
- You have all the family members
Screaming and yelling and the potential for a weapon.
- That was the time when nick had called police,
And when they showed up, they handcuffed dante,
Brought him to the precinct, questioned him for hours,
And got his hand print,
But they never read him his rights.
- Because the detectives believed
They'd made it clear to him that he was not under arrest,
That he was, in fact, free to go.
- But albertson knew there was a strong possibility
A judge might not see it that way
And could suppress dante's palm print,
Meaning the most damning piece of evidence
Linking him to sarah's murder would be thrown out
Because police never read him his rights.
For now, dante walked free.
His neighbor, delia, continued to spy on him.
And one day, as a car drove past her,
She saw something alarming.
- He was hiding, crouched down in the backseat,
And so I made it a point to slow my vehicle as I passed,
And I looked into the vehicle,
And that's when I saw dante hiding in the backseat.
- What did you think of that?
- I thought, wow, he's going to get away.
He's going to go on the run. He's gonna leave.
- Did you tell someone immediately?
- I did.
- That's how albertson learned dante was leaving for florida
On a one-way ticket.
- We were grateful for the observations that she made
Because that's what led us to the one-way ticket.
- Since detectives weren't ready to charge him with murder,
They couldn't stop him from leaving town.
Instead, they kept working the case,
Hoping for a plan b, and then...
- We received information that there might be
Another victim out there.
- The information came from sarah's friend, jason flores.
During one of his many interviews with police,
Jason told them about another girl who
Said dante had attacked her.
- This girl, um, she messaged me, like,
A couple months after me and dante hung out with her.
She was like, "oh, how can you let him do that to me"?"
I was like, "what are you talkin' about?"
She's like, "he put a knife to my throat
"and tried to rape me in the room."
- Did you tell the police about that?
- Yeah. I showed them the messages.
I printed them out for them.
- The girl was nicole lucas.
- He just kept saying, "I'll kill you.
"don't (bleep) with me."
- The incident happened about two years earlier
In dante's house.
Jason says she told him she was so afraid of dante
She never reported it to police.
Now, the police went looking for her, and what she told them
Sounded like an eerie echo of what they believed
Happened to sarah.
- And he kept trying to touch my body,
And he opened the zipper to my shorts,
And then he had a knife above his bed,
And he had it at my throat.
He was, like, waving it around.
- Nicole shared her story on video
With a report from "newsday," a long island newspaper.
- And he said that he would kill me,
And he said, "are you scared?"
And I said, "no," 'cause I was just trying to,
Like, I didn't wanna show him fear.
And then he got--
He actually touched my throat with the knife.
- Nicole says they struggled.
He punched her several times, and then she panicked
And hit him in the face.
- That was my chance to run 'cause he was, like,
He was, like, on his side.
He was just in shock that I smacked him.
- She escaped and, for years,
Tried to forget it ever happened.
- I didn't wanna talk about it.
I just wanted it to be left alone.
But what happened to sarah goode,
I wanted to help them in a way.
- Nicole was now willing to press charges,
And detectives hoped her case might give them a second shot
At dante taylor.
If they could get a warrant to arrest him for attempted rape,
They would be able to take his palm prints, again.
This palm print could hold the key to this whole case.
- Correct.
- So, detectives tracked down people
Who corroborated nicole's story, and this, the prosecutor says,
Gave police what they needed.
Was this kind of like a do-over?
- In a way, yes.
- Now, they could arrest dante on the attempted rape charge
And use his new palm prints in sarah's case.
- It helped protect the case.
It helped to protect the integrity of the evidence.
- Hey, dante, how ya doin'? - Why did you do it, dante?
- So, more than a month
After sarah had been brutally murdered--
- Are you sorry?
- Detectives flew down to florida armed with a warrant
And brought her suspected killer back to new york.
- Why did you do it, dante? - Why'd you kill her?
- Where he was charged with rape and first degree murder.
Sarah's brother-in-law, nick,
Heard about the arrest from police.
- The detectives called at night, very late,
And said that they were bringing dante taylor back.
He was the one who murdered sarah.
- What was it like to hear that?
- A lot of emotions.
Just, um, just wanted to get a hold of him, really.
[chuckles] - mm-hmm.
- You know, just give him to me.
Don't even, you know, worry about anything else.
- The court of nick. [chuckles]
- Yeah. Yeah.
- He wasn't surprised to hear who it was.
- He was the only one, the only person,
That when I got to him face to face like me and you,
I felt something,
That I just wanted to rip his heart out of him.
It was just real bad.
- Sarah's sister, lizzie,
Will never forget hearing the news.
- The detective called me and said that, "we arrested him,"
And then my body just, I guess, I went into shock
'cause it just felt like
The blood drained out of my body.
I don't know why.
I was freezing cold, and then I was sweating,
And I didn't know what to do. [chuckles]
- The family's rage against dante taylor
Would slowly simmer
During the two years before his trial,
And when they finally entered the courtroom,
It would take all their strength
To keep their anger from boiling over.
- You had to hold yourself in the seat
'cause he was right there.
If you just picked up your hand--
- And every time we walked in,
That smirk he had on his face is--
You just wanted to jump over and deck him.
- Coming up...
An explosive claim in court.
- From the very beginning, you can't trust the police
And the district attorney in this case.
- And one haunting detail her family never heard.
- I wanted to jump out of my seat.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Say, "cheese."
- Just shy of two years after sarah goode was murdered,
The case against dante taylor went before a jury
In riverhead, new york.
He had pleaded not guilty.
On may 11, 2016, sarah's family and friends
Packed the courtroom
And continued to fill the seats every day
During the five-week trial.
You had tee shirts made up, "justice for sarah." - mm-hmm.
- The judge told you to tone it down a little bit.
- A little bit? All the way.
- With our signs that we had hangin'
Around the neighborhoods, we had outside of our houses,
On the main roads, on cars. - On our cars.
- The judge obviously said that was not allowed, you know?
- 'cause of jurors, was that the idea?
- Yeah, to influence.
- He didn't want, yeah, he didn't want them
To influence the jurors in case they saw it.
- Her family complied with the judge's order.
They sat quietly in the courtroom
While the prosecution laid out its case.
With all the strong evidence, was this a slam dunk?
- No, you never say it-- it's gonna be a slam dunk.
- Prosecutors took the jurors through the timeline
Of the night of the murder. No detail was too small.
They began with sarah's selfie showing off her red nails.
- Mm-hmm. - It's amazing.
If you look at the social media in this case, and the--
The instagram, and the-- and the twitter,
You can almost see this happening in real time.
- To further bolster the timeline,
Prosecutor lawrence opisso also showed the jury
Sarah's cell phone records and cell tower data.
They illustrated that not only was dante taylor
The last person to be with sarah,
He'd also returned to the scene of the crime.
- The records tell really a story of, uh,
A killer who went from his home to her home
And returned there several times in the course of the--
The next few days, almost to see what was happening
And how the investigation was developing.
- Their theory?
After dante taylor lured sarah out of her house,
He savagely beat her in the car,
Then dragged her into the woods, raped her,
And stabbed her more than 40 times.
The jury saw photos of the blood and hair found in sarah's bmw.
And to support the theory of rape,
A crime lab expert testified that dante's dna sample
Was a perfect match to the semen found in sarah's body.
- This was about complete domination
Of that young lady because she ends up in the woods,
Face down, the way the jury saw her,
With her legs slightly splayed out.
She's naked from the waist down.
Her upper garments are on but pushed up,
And her little black sandals are zippered
And strapped to her feet still.
- The prosecution painted a portrait of a brutal killer
Who had carelessly left his calling card.
Albertson showed the jury dante's hand print
Covered in sarah's blood.
And there was something else investigators had discovered
That albertson also believed was irrefutable evidence,
A drop of blood in dante's car.
- One small blood stain--
That blood stain came back to sarah goode.
- A fact janet albertson ended with
In her closing argument.
- One blood stain from a dead girl
Is one blood stain too many.
- Coming up...
Dante's defense team drops a bombshell.
- You think the police made mistakes
From the very beginning. - Mistake is being generous.
It was no mistake. It was intentional.
- What will the jury believe?
- The family is getting more and more upset
And anxiety-ridden, um, so it's really nerve-wracking.
- When "dateline: Secrets uncovered" continues.
♪♪
- Prosecutors had meticulously laid out
Their evidence against dante taylor
To prove he brutally raped and murdered sarah goode.
Her brother-in-law, nick, listened to the testimony,
And there was something he found especially hard to hear.
He was the one who had lovingly painted sarah's nails
Right before she went out that night.
- When janet said to the jury,
"we have no more fingers no more,
"but we have her fingernails that were painted,"
And I wanted to jump out of my seat
And strangle him.
- But according to defense attorneys
John lewis and debra buxbaum, nick's rage was misplaced.
They claimed dante taylor was innocent.
- There's no direct evidence that--
That links dante taylor to this crime.
- I felt like this really was
A case of classic tunnel vision where,
From the get-go, this seemed to be targeted
At dante taylor.
Everybody thought it has to be dante taylor,
And any information that they came across
Or that they uncovered during their investigation
That didn't point to dante taylor
Basically got swept aside or kept--
Or got ignored.
- His attorneys acknowledged to the jury
That sarah and dante did meet,
But they said it was simply a sexual encounter
Between two consenting adults, and dante left her unharmed.
They called a former medical examiner to the stand
Who testified there was no physical evidence
On sarah's body that proved she had been raped.
- There is no evidence that that semen was placed there
As part of a forcible compulsion.
- And then an explosive claim.
Lewis told jurors not only had detectives
Botched the investigation,
But he believed they were unethical.
You think the police made mistakes
From the very beginning. - Mistake is being generous.
It was no mistake. It was intentional.
- You believe he was framed by detectives.
- I believe that the evidence, okay, is questionable,
And that's the issue.
The issue is, I don't know what the truth is,
And if you don't know what the truth is,
Then that's problematic, don't you think?
- The defense accused the police and prosecution of
Withholding information for a year and a half
About other possible suspects, like the crime stoppers tip
About sarah's ex-boyfriend's angry words.
Why do you think they were withholding
All this information from you?
- Because that's the way they operate.
- As for the drop of sarah's blood
Found in dante's car, lewis questioned
How it got there in the first place.
- I don't think that was competent evidence to begin with
Based upon the fact that
Four detectives searched that car
For over an hour before releasing it
Back to dante taylor and never found any blood in it,
Um, sarah goode's or otherwise.
- He says it wasn't until days later
When police searched the car again that they found the blood.
And that bloody palm print on sarah's car?
The defense didn't deny it was dante's print.
Instead, they disputed whether or not
It was actually a bloody print.
There were discrepancies in the testing.
The first sample from the print came back positive for blood.
The second, done more than a year later,
After the print had been chemically processed,
Came back negative.
But wasn't it red or brown?
- I don't believe that that's the case.
- It's gonna be hard for the viewers to understand.
Like, what else could it be? - Well--
- Okay, so, nobody-- nobody owns photoshop.
None of your viewers know what photoshop is?
- Well, but now you're accusing the police
Of changing the color of the photo.
- I'm-I'm saying, from the very beginning, uh,
You can't trust the police or the district attorney
In this case.
- There is no proof that they planted blood
Or photoshopped pictures of the-the palm print.
I mean, these are-these are just allegations by you.
- I'm not saying they did, or they didn't.
I'm saying I'll never know whether they did,
Or they didn't, and that's the scary part.
- Police and the prosecution unequivocally deny photoshopping
Or planting evidence.
They say this was all part of the defense's smokescreen.
And as for withholding evidence, they say turned over everything
In plenty of time for trial.
- The defense attorney just kept saying,
"you can't trust the police.
"you can't trust the prosecutor."
And it's really the only argument he made.
- After more than four weeks of testimony,
The case went to the jury.
- There was not a seat in the courtroom
For deliberation.
There were lines of people outside.
The family is getting more and more, you know, upset
And anxiety-ridden, um, so it's really nerve-wracking.
- Three days went by
Before the jury reached a verdict.
Dante taylor was found guilty of rape
And first degree murder.
- I felt like sarah was just right here,
And I could-- I could see her and picture her saying,
"we got this piece of sh--."
- Is this closure? I mean, what's the emotion?
- I wouldn't say closure. She's not coming back.
- It's never gonna bring her back.
So, it's-- - but we got him.
[laughing]
- Family and friends poured out of the courtroom
And gathered outside to show jurors their gratitude.
[applause]
- There's never going to be--
- Then they visited sarah's grave
As if to let her know justice had finally been served.
- The ways of truth and love have always won.
- Stand up.
- A month later, in front of a packed courtroom,
Dante went before the judge to hear his sentence.
- Dante taylor, for your conviction
Of murder in the first degree, on count one,
Your sentence is life imprisonment
Without the possibility of parole.
[applause] - quiet.
- Your punishment will be the maximum,
The only appropriate punishment for the evil man that did this.
You may make chalk marks on the cellblock
And your walls in the cage in which you will live,
And they will have no significance.
You may circle dates on the calendar,
But they will mean nothing 'cause there is no date
For you to get out.
- Since dante received the maximum sentence,
The d.A.'s office decided to drop the attempted rape charge.
Sarah's family says the judge's words
Were exactly what they wanted to hear.
- It was nice to know that he's on our side.
He wasn't on his side.
- And he was emotional, too. You could--
When he started reading what he was trying to say,
He was trying to hold back tears.
You could tell.
- A little more than a year into serving his life sentence,
Dante died by suicide in an upstate new york prison.
His family is now suing several prison staff members.
In the lawsuit, dante's family claims
Shortly before killing himself,
He was brutally beaten by corrections officers,
And, they argue, medical staff neglected to
Monitor dante despite his history of suicide attempts.
The new york department of corrections
Said it does not comment on pending litigation.
For sarah's family,
There is little comfort in dante's passing.
They say her death has left a giant hole
In the fabric of this tight-knit family,
One that can never be mended.
- I would trade places with her in a heartbeat
If it meant that she could come back.
- We were supposed to be her protector.
- I always said that the older ones
Were supposed to go first, not the younger ones.
- What you just said, is--
Is something that a parent would say.
- She was like our baby. She was our baby sister.
- I guess she was like a-- just like my own kid, I guess,
'cause I was older than her.
You know, try to protect her any way that we could.
Well, you know, well, everybody--
Do it for each other.
- And now, they focus their attention on sarah's baby.
Her daughter, jocelyn, is being raised by their mother,
But, like everything else, it's really a family affair.
- We find comfort goin' to mom's house
When jocelyn is there, and, you know,
Her spirit is just like sarah's,
So it's like sarah growing up all over again.
So, I believe sarah, you know, left us this gift.
She's our other little angel that was given to us from sarah,
So her spirit can live on.
[laughing] - give me a kiss.
Thank you. Can I have another kiss?
- That's all for this edition
Of "dateline: Secrets uncovered."
I'm kate snow. Thank you for watching.