[dramatic music playing]
[Michael Arntfield] This ambush style execution...
- [gunshot] - ...suggests, number one, it was personal.
[Det. Robert Milby] He was a young man who was trying to do
the right thing by his family.
They were making a life together.
[suspenseful music playing]
[officer] Sheriff's office.
[Det. Milby] He is reaching out to people to see
if they will keep that weapon for his girlfriend,
so now we believe he has more to do with this homicide
that he's letting on.
[Christine Callanan] Custody battles over children
bring out the absolute worst in people.
Is this a warning sign that leads towards violence?
[Arntfield] A conspiracy of two is still a conspiracy
regardless of who pulls the trigger.
[suspenseful music playing]
[narrator] Every day in North America,
dozens of people are murdered.
The key to solving the toughest of these homicides
lies in the final 24 hours of the victim's life.
To crack the case,
detectives must reconstruct that critical timeline.
The minutes and hours containing evidence
that can help unlock the mystery
and catch the killer.
[dramatic music playing]
[narrator] Sodus, New York,
a charming lakeside town in serene oasis,
on the shoreline of Lake Ontario.
Sodus is a pretty small suburban community.
It's nestled between the cities
of Rochester and Syracuse, New York
and within the village limits,
there's right around 2,000 is the population.
Everybody, uh, pretty much
knows everyone within the community.
[It. Joseph Croft] The crime rate in, uh, Wayne County
is typically a lot lower than you would see
in Rochester or Syracuse.
We don't get too many major felonies.
[dramatic music playing]
[narrator] One October afternoon,
that calming environment is thrown into chaos
when Sodus Police get a frantic phone call
from someone claiming to have witnessed shots
being fired at the neighbor's house.
Right around 2:00 PM on October 22nd, 2018,
a 911 call came in.
Someone had shot someone in their driveway
and there were multiple gunshots reported.
At that moment we immediately started to respond to the scene.
I was only several houses up
so the response time was very quick.
I would say less than a minute.
[Callanan] The investigators saw a male
deceased under a truck
and then in the vehicle that was parked,
they observed a female that was deceased
in the driver seat.
[Dep. Matthew Carr] I saw that there was a toddler in the vehicle,
I'm glad to see that he was live in the back,
holding the chicken nuggets, at the time,
I didn't know if he was, uh, a nonverbal autistic,
I just thought he was in shock
and we took him to a safer area.
[narrator] The victims are identified
as Josh Niles and Amber Washburn,
a young couple and devoted parents to three children.
[Det. Milby] Josh Niles was 28-years-old,
he and his girlfriend Amber,
had recently moved into the neighborhood,
he was a young man who was trying to do
the right thing by his family,
he had started a new business
and was a good father.
Josh had two other children from a previous relationship,
they were nine and seven-years-old.
Amber was a devoted mother,
she doted on her son Josh Jr.
Whom she of course had with Josh,
and they were making a life together.
[narrator] Heading up the investigation
into the brutal double homicide
of Josh Niles and Amber Washburn
is Detective Lieutenant Robert Milby
aided by Lieutenant Joseph Croft
of the Wayne County Sheriff's Office.
[Det. Milby] When we're responding to a crime scene like this,
the fact that it was in close proximity to the local school,
one of our first responsibilities
is to make sure that school is locked down,
the other thing that we have to do
is gather resources in order to start a manhunt.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[Det. Milby] SWAT team members were brought in,
K9s were brought in,
we had a coordinated effort
to attempt to find the shooter.
[Callanan] There's panic in the area.
[officer] Sheriff's office.
[Callanan] Facebook posts started going up
about hearing shots fired,
there was a complete shutdown
like you would see in a movie
when there's a manhunt going on.
[narrator] With the hunt for the killer underway,
detectives speak to Tiffany Fair,
the next door neighbor who claims to have witnessed the shooting.
[Det. Milby] Tiffany Fair shared a driveway
with Josh and Amber.
And when the shots first rang out,
Tiffany was in the kitchen,
she was looking out the window and she saw
Josh talking with an individual in the driveway,
Josh Niles got a relaxed posture,
he was leaning up against his pickup truck.
She went about preparing a meal for her child
and had seen Amber pull into the driveway
which was normal for that time of day.
And that's when the shots rang out.
[gunshots]
[Det. Milby] She saw Josh grab his chest,
saw that Amber tried to leave the scene
- when she was shot. - [gunshots]
[Det. Milby] At that time, several more shots rang out.
Tiffany describes the shooter as a white male
who was wearing a dark colored hoodie,
while we're still not sure
who it was that committed this crime
we know Josh and Amber's time of death
which is at 2:00 PM.
[Dep. Carr] Josh was laying under
the rear bed area of the truck,
we could see that there was, uh, several shots,
uh, into the dirt, into the back of the truck,
and, uh, into Josh.
[Det. Milby] He had suffered several bullet wounds
to his front and his back,
through eyewitness accounts and through the evidence that we had on scene,
it was determined that Josh was trying
to escape his shooter.
Originally he had been shot in the chest
and when he started to go to the ground
he observed his girlfriend get shot,
at that time he started to crawl away
and the shooter immediately returned to Josh
and shot several more times.
[gunshots]
[Det. Milby] There were quite a bit of shell casings
that were found both on the driveway
and in the grass behind the truck,
due to identifying marks,
we're immediately able to determine
that those shell casings came from a nine millimeter.
[narrator] In their analysis of the scene,
detectives notice a stark difference
between the injuries to each victim.
[dramatic music playing]
[Det. Milby] It's readily apparent that
this was not a random shooting,
whoever did shoot Josh Niles
was very determined that they were going to kill him.
[It. Croft] You could tell that Josh was clearly the target,
he was shot multiple times
where Amber was only shot once.
[narrator] To find Josh and Amber's killer,
detectives will need to piece together
the couple's final 24 hours.
The fact that Josh is gunned down
in broad daylight in his own driveway
in a... in a quiet suburban neighborhood,
that in itself is a huge lead
in terms of possible motives,
this ambush style execution
suggests, number one, it was personal,
probably preplanned but also consider
the brashness and brazenness,
you're dealing with somebody with nothing to lose,
that they don't care about being seen.
[narrator] As the coordinated manhunt continues,
investigators get their first break in the case.
[Det. Milby] Some detectives were assigned to canvas the neighborhood
and ask each and every neighbor
if they had any surveillance cameras,
we were able to gather
through some of those surveillance systems,
video footage of who we believed to be the shooter.
We're able to see the person that matched the description
at 1:57 PM walking towards Josh and Amber's residence,
just minutes before the crime took place
but we were not able to see the face
of who we believed to be the shooter.
Shortly after we started that K9 track,
we discovered the ski mask
that had been freshly dropped
in the direction that the shooter had been seen running.
[officer] We got a black mask, approximately 30 yards
east of North Street and Elmwood.
[policewoman] Copy.
We believe that that could've been,
uh, a piece of evidence.
[Callanan] Ultimately, the K9 track ended up
falling off in a public parking lot.
So at that point it was believed
that where the K9 stopped,
there must've been a vehicle
and he was able to get away
prior to the perimeter being set-up.
[dog whimpering]
[Det. Milby] We believe that the shooter conducted surveillance
to get a layout of the land and look for escape routes.
[Callanan] At this point, the community was panicked,
panicked that this kind of crime could happen there,
panicked that they didn't know where the shooter was,
and panicked that the community might not be safe.
[narrator] With a violent killer on the loose,
Detective Milby questions Josh Niles' parents
to learn more about who might've wanted to harm him
and his partner, Amber Washburn.
[Det. Milby] And police were always looking for a motive,
and obviously someone had intent to kill Josh Niles
with the amount of gunshots and from the evidence
that we had found on the scene.
So we knew that somebody
had a beef with Josh Niles.
When we first contacted the family,
we asked if there was any enemies
or anybody who would want to harm Josh and Amber
and we couldn't get any immediate answers
as to who would wanna do that
but we discovered a normal daily routine
for Josh and Amber would be that Josh would drop off
the two older children
at school right around 9:00 AM,
and then later on during the day,
Amber would pick up Josh Jr.
In Belgium, Newark and then bring him home right around 2:00.
One of our detectives actually wound up calling
the family court just on a hunch to see
whether or not there was
any pending family court matters
that concerned Josh or Amber
and we discovered that there was.
Josh had been in a family court custody battle
with his ex, Charlene Childers,
the mother of two of his children
and that Charlene had actually lost custody
of the children to Josh.
[Callanan] Josh and Charlene's relationship was young love,
they met, fell in love quickly,
and found out they were pregnant
with their first child pretty early on
in their relationship.
Josh's family was always helping as much as they could
with the children,
trying to keep Josh and Charlene
as a coherent family unit,
but it became pretty clear
towards the end of the relationship
that there was a toxic element
to them being together.
[Det. Milby] At one point Josh's mom had told me
that she didn't believe that Josh and Charlene
were very good for each other.
There had been several calls to 911 to their residence,
both by Charlene and by Josh.
So it was a pretty rocky relationship
by a couple of people who had had children young.
After Josh and Charlene dissolved their relationship,
Charlene moved to Texas where her mother resided
and there was shared custody.
[narrator] As Detective Milby reviews the evidence,
he receives a phone call from Josh's ex-wife,
Charlene Childers.
[Det. Milby] What I was met with in that phone call
was a very demure Southern belle,
she seemed very nice,
only concerned about her children,
she had seen the house where the incident occurred
on social media
and knew that that was Josh and Amber's home
and that's where her children lived.
Charlene said that she was going to be leaving Texas
to take custody of her children
and I asked her if she knew
who might've committed this crime
against the father of her children,
she denied any knowledge,
I had asked her when she did get into town
if I can meet with her.
When she was on the phone with me,
I believe that she was in Texas,
I believe she was on her way
to take control of the children.
We were able to verify that through investigation
that she was in fact at work during the time of the crime.
[narrator] With Charlene's alibi placing her in Texas,
investigators press her for details
about her history with Josh,
hoping it will reveal clues about his murder.
[Callanan] Charlene made it very clear
that Josh was abusive to her
both verbally and physically,
and that was ultimately the reason
she ended the relationship and got out of Sodus.
Initially when Charlene and Josh break up,
she is the primary caregiver to the children
and they reside in Texas with her.
In May 2018, Charlene's husband Timothy Dean
was brought up on abuse charges of his child.
Charlene had elected to stand by her man's side
and as a result of that, lost custody of her children.
Her husband Tim Dean also lost custody of his child
and Josh immediately picked up his children
and brought them home,
and that's when the custody battle ensued.
[Callanan] Josh was granted temporary primary custody of his two children.
So when that decision is handed down,
Charlene indicates that she's going to divorce Timothy Dean
in the hopes that that would be looked favorably upon
by the court to get the children back to her in Texas.
[narrator] Investigators dig deeper into Josh and Charlene's troubled past,
hoping to find clues about the murder.
[Callanan] The investigators looked back
into the history arrest that they had made
between the couple.
It was very apparent
that it was a abusive relationship,
but that the police calls and reports
had both Josh as a suspect and a victim
and Charlene as the suspect and victim.
[Keira Stockdale] When we learned about Charlene
and we learned about her history
and being involved in relationships
that are conflictual or involving domestic violence,
one in three women are the victims of domestic violence,
so this may not be as rare as folks think.
That being said, I wonder, is this a warning sign
that when these patterns start to cycle
that this leads towards violence?
And I think in this case, high conflict situations
such as custody or abuse
could precipitate violence.
[Callanan] The investigators have a person of interest in Charlene Childers,
but at the time of the murder she's on video at her job in Texas.
But based on learning her history,
the issue with the custody of the children,
the husband she was separated from, Timothy Dean,
they still had reason to believe
that she was involved in some way.
But they knew ultimately
she could not have been the shooter.
[narrator] While Charlene makes the drive from Texas to New York,
she asks police to release her children
to a man named Casey Miller
who lives in the New York area.
[Det. Milby] Casey Miller is a prior boyfriend of Charlene Childers.
Back when she was 14, they had had a relationship.
Casey was 19.
He was convicted of having sex with a minor
for that relationship.
And he is on the sex offender registry.
She named Casey Miller as her boyfriend
to come and pick up her children.
That kind of, uh, you know, set off a couple of flags
with us once we looked into Casey Miller's background
and his relationship with Charlene.
Knowing what we knew about the custody battle
between Josh and Charlene,
we begin to focus our efforts on Casey Miller,
because now we had a motive to explore.
[Callanan] His relationship with Charlene, her motive,
and their apparent rekindling made him a suspect
with motive and opportunity
to kill both Josh and Amber.
[Det. Milby] We started to look into Casey Miller
and his physical characteristics
are right about the same of the suspect
that was described to us as the shooter.
[narrator] In the brutal double homicide
of Josh Niles and Amber Washburn,
detectives are zeroing in on their first real suspect,
convicted sex offender, Casey Miller.
[Callanan] Initially, the working theory
once Charlene Childers is ruled out as the shooter
is that Casey Miller could have been the gunman.
[Det. Milby] Casey was cooperative with us.
He was quite confident in himself
and he didn't appear to be anybody
who had anything to cover up.
Casey told us that he didn't have
anything to do with the crime
and he didn't know anything about the crime.
Through his job at a local pizza shop,
he was actually out on delivery
at the time that the crime occurred.
We were satisfied at that time
that Casey had nothing to do with the actual shooting.
[narrator] Casey leaves the police station
having been cleared as the shooter,
but 24 hours later,
he's back on their radar.
[Det. Milby] Shortly after an interview with him,
it became known to us through some witnesses
that Casey was trying to get somebody
to hold on to a nine millimeter handgun
for his girlfriend, Charlene.
And a nine millimeter handgun
was used to kill Josh and Amber.
Casey told us that Charlene had forgotten
to leave that at home when she came to New York
to pick up her kids.
And so he was looking for somebody
to keep that handgun safe
because she did not have a license to carry
that weapon in New York.
[narrator] Detectives tracked down the weapon
and send it to the ballistics lab to be tested.
[It. Croft] The evidence tech test-fired the gun
to make sure it wasn't a match to the, uh,
shell casings that were recovered
from the crime scene.
[Det. Milby] And we were able to determine that
that was not the weapon that was used
to shoot Josh and Amber.
While we're not able to tie Casey directly to the crime,
we kind of wanna keep tabs on him
just in case we need to re-interview him again.
But at that moment, we still don't have a way
to tie Charlene to the crime.
[Callanan] We have a feeling she's involved,
but we're not able to prove it yet
or put it together.
[Det. Milby] We certainly know that there's motive
for Charlene to get her children back
to have someone help her get custody of her kids back.
So then we start to focus on
who else Charlene has a relationship with,
and that would be with her husband, Tim Dean.
Charlene kept saying over and over again
that she was no longer part of Tim Dean's life.
They were getting a divorce.
They're no longer live together.
But we were still very interested
in where Tim Dean was at the time of the crime.
[narrator] Because Tim Dean is living in Texas,
investigators reached out to the Texas Rangers for assistance,
checking into his background.
[Det. Milby] The marital residence between Tim and Charlene
was in a very small town called Sunray,
which is in the panhandle of Texas.
I believe the population is right around 2,000.
Their police department is not very big.
It's a three-man police department.
And there's not a lot going on in Sunray.
[It. Croft] Tim Dean was a chief of police
in Sunray Police Department,
a normal every day guy.
But as we dig in with the law enforcement from Texas
and get more information from them,
we're really finding out more of
the he's not the typical police officer
that you would think that you know.
[Det. Milby] We actually got a hold of a Texas Ranger
who was able to tell us
that he had personal dealings with Tim Dean.
There was an investigation into a child abuse allegation
where he was videotaped
abusing his very young daughter.
And as a result to that investigation,
Tim Dean was arrested and he lost his job
with the Sunray Police Department.
The fact that Amber is shot once in the head
with reasonable accuracy
through a car window
speaks to a certain level of experience
and comfort with handguns.
And the fact that Tim is a former chief of police
and has been training and carrying a gun
for his entire adult life, I mean,
these two things seemed to now be...
obviously coalescing.
[Det. Milby] Through our discussions with the Texas Rangers,
we found out that the videotape
that was taken of the incident
that he was accused of abusing his child
was actually taken by Charlene Childers.
She had sent it out to two of her friends.
One of those friends turned it into authorities.
And what was interesting is that
there was a message that accompanied the video
and that message had said
that she was going to take Tim Dean down.
Custody battles over children
bring out the absolute worst in people.
The ultimate love that a person has
is for their children
and if they believe that the courts
aren't going to help them,
they ultimately are willing based on that love
to do whatever they have to do to get their children back.
[Det. Milby] Tim Dean was the reason
Charlene Childers had lost custody of her children.
It became pretty apparent to us that
not only that Charlene have motive to kill Josh,
but Tim had motive
to try to win those children back for her.
[intense music playing]
[narrator] In the murder of young parents,
Josh Niles and Amber Washburn,
investigators are working a new theory
that the killer could be a former chief of police
in Sunray, Texas named Tim Dean.
[Det. Milby] We started to formulate the idea that
Tim Dean was trying to do the chivalrous thing
by his wife who supposedly wanted
nothing else to do with them anymore.
Maybe he felt responsible for them breaking up
and maybe he was going to try to do whatever it took
to get her kids back to her,
because that was the most important thing in her life.
[narrator] With a potential motive established for Tim Dean,
investigators worked to uncover
how he might've committed the murders.
The difficult part of the investigation
was how would Tim Dean get from Texas to New York
committing the murders.
[Det. Milby] We're able to find out
that Tim Dean was not in Sunray, Texas
at the time of the homicide.
He had actually been involved
in a motor vehicle accident
on October 20th, 2018,
two days before the murder in the state of Kansas.
[narrator] Detectives learned that
after his car accident in Kansas,
Tim Dean called 911 for help.
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[Det. Milby] Tim Dean was trying to perform a U-turn
and wrecked the car in a culvert.
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[Det. Milby] As a result of the accident,
the car is no longer operable.
He has to get a ride with a tow truck operators into town.
So he started to unload some of his baggage
and one of those items is a tote.
And Tim describes the items that are in the tote
as weapons, ammunition,
a sidearm, and a shotgun
that he's going to take back with him to the hotel.
Deputy Nicolet doesn't really ask much about
the weaponry or the shotgun
because it's Kansas
and it's not out of the ordinary
for people to have those items with them.
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
Once we find out that Tim Dean had wrecked the car
that he was five hours away from Sunray, Texas
that he was en route to New York,
we got excited.
He became a primary person of interest for us
as a suspect.
During that interview that Deputy Nicola has with Tim Dean,
he discovers that
Tim Dean is not named on the rental agreement.
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Tim speaking]
[narrator] For Wayne County detectives,
the account of Tim Dean's rental car accident
changes the course of their homicide investigation.
[Det. Milby] We found out that Tim Dean
tried to rent another car,
but he wasn't able to do so.
He only carried cash with him.
But on October 21st in about 1:32 PM,
Tim Dean is able to rent a second vehicle
and we're able to find out
what the plate number is on that vehicle
that Tim Dean started the rest of his journey in.
We put that plate in a plate reader system
to see if it comes up anywhere
and we were able to actually get a match on that plate
as it entered New York State.
So on the night of the 21st at 10:52 PM,
we find that Tim Dean actually enters
Chautauqua County, New York.
And the morning of the 22nd,
the morning of the murders at 5:25 AM,
we got a second hit
as he comes up New York State Route 390
out of Dansville, New York.
On October 22nd at about 3:30 PM,
we also had a license plate reader hit
on the same vehicle headed south out of New York
on Interstate Route 390 in Dansville
which is about 90 minutes away from Sodus, New York.
So we're also able to ascertain that
about an hour and a half after the homicide at 3:30 PM,
that vehicle that Tim Dean was renting left the area
by way of the same license plate reader in Dansville.
[narrator] With confirmation that Tim Dean's rental car
traveled into New York
around the time of the murders,
Detective Milby travels to Texas
to find more evidence of a possible criminal conspiracy
between Tim Dean and Charlene Childers.
[Det. Milby] So five of us
pile into a couple of vehicles
and we make the same drive that Tim Dean did to Texas
where we're met by the local authorities
that are ready to conduct a search warrant
on Tim Dean's residence.
[officer] Hands up. Anybody in here?
[Det. Milby] We discovered a few items of interest to us.
Tim has several handguns in the residence.
Some things discovered were actually with him
in the vehicle during his drive to New York,
including the tote that we believe was used
to carry the weapons in.
We learned that things were kind of going downhill
for Tim Dean.
He was having trouble making bills.
He wasn't able to make his mortgage.
And he'd started selling
a lot of his personal possessions.
So we've got a very, very intricate picture of a man
who's very self-righteous.
He's a man of small stature
but he carries a heavy hand
underneath his own roof,
especially with the investigations
into the child abuse.
He's desperate. He's careless. He's emotional.
And frankly, Tim Dean at that point in his life is a mess.
[narrator] Investigators request a copy
of Tim's cellphone records
to confirm his location near Josh and Amber's house
at the time of the murders.
[Det. Milby] Tim Dean's cellphone hit off of a tower
outside of St. Louis, Missouri
at about 10:15 AM on the 21st of October.
Cellphone records tell us the phone was put back on
at around 3:30 PM on the 23rd,
and that was outside of Missouri.
And he was back home in Sunray by 11:27 PM
on the 23rd of October.
We're able to ascertain that around 2:00 AM
when the phone is turned back on,
Tim Dean has 36 missed calls.
These phone records indicate to us,
they actually screened to us
that he did something intentionally
to try to mask his whereabouts for that 28 hours.
[narrator] When Tim's phone records come in,
they reveal a surprising new detail.
There are two phone calls between him and Charlene.
One, during his accident in Kansas
and another after the murders.
[Det. Milby] Two of these phone calls
that are pretty interesting to us,
the first call, Tim Dean makes to Charlene
when he has his accident in Kansas,
and then when he turns the cell phone back on
after the homicide occurs,
his first phone call is to Charlene Childers.
This is interesting to us
because through our interview with Charlene,
she first tells us that
she no longer wants anything to do with Tim Dean
and that they're no longer a couple.
[It. Croft] Not many people have a 16-minute conversation
with a soon-to-be ex-wife,
so it was shooting some holes in her story,
as far as her getting a divorce from Tim Dean.
[Det. Milby] We now know that Charlene is lying to us deliberately.
There was actually still a full-blown relationship
going on between Tim and Charlene.
So now we believe she has more to do
with this homicide than she's letting on.
[Callanan] She came up to Kansas
to help him get the second vehicle
and this contact showed that she was assisting him
trying to get from Texas to Kansas
and from Kansas to New York.
[narrator] With inconsistencies in Charlene's testimony,
Detective Milby zeroes in on a suspicious detail
from their initial contact.
[Det. Milby] Charlene had said that she had seen
a post that was on Facebook of a house
with crime scene tape in front of it
and that it was a picture of Josh's residence,
and she knew that Josh was a victim.
At that point, no victims have been identified
as being involved in the shooting.
The news camera footage was actually showing
a neighbor's house across the street
and not the location of the homicides.
The only way she would've known
that Josh and Amber were the victim
was because she had something to do with the crime.
[narrator] Based on the multiple lies from Charlene,
and the new evidence tying her to Tim's actions,
detectives believed she could be the true mastermind
who orchestrated the murder of Josh and Amber.
[Callanan] Timothy Dean wasn't doing this by himself,
it became very clear that she was behind
not only the crime,
but exactly how this crime was going to be committed
and what the plan was for him.
[Det. Milby] She was willing to do whatever it took
in order to make sure she got her own way.
[narrator] In the horrific double homicide
of Josh Niles and Amber Washburn,
detectives have refocused their investigation
on proving a criminal conspiracy
between Tim Dean and Charlene Childers.
Motive is the reason behind the crime,
conspiracy is acting in concert with others
to commit that crime.
[Arntfield] If Charlene and Tim were in fact working together
in a plot to travel out of state, kill Josh,
so Charlene could reclaim the children
regardless of who pulls the trigger,
they are both mutually culpable.
[narrator] To build their case
against both Tim and Charlene.
Detective Milby moves on to question the person
who Tim says facilitated his first car rental,
Bron Bohlar.
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Det. Milby] Bron Bohlar is a police officer
in Sunray that idolized Tim Dean
and became friends with Tim and Charlene
when they lived in Sunray.
[It. Croft] Every profession,
but especially law enforcement,
you have leaders and you have followers
and I think Bron is a follower.
He would do anything that Tim asked him to do.
Bron had to be convinced during that interview
that he needed to tell the truth
and is to what his role was.
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[Callanan] The investigators appeal to him,
not only as a member of law enforcement,
but also as a father with children,
and then shortly after
Bron Bohlar provided the true story.
[Bron speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[detective] Okay.
[Bron speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Bron speaking]
[Det. Milby] Bron Bohlar knew full well
that there was going to be a homicide in New York
and he agreed to do this
while he was in uniform as a Sunray police officer.
Through our interview with Bron Bohlar,
we were able to determine that Charlene was actually
the mastermind of this whole thing.
With her setting up and actually taking Bron
to rent the first vehicle
and through her taking the time and effort
to drive all the way five hours from home
to make sure that Tim Dean could complete his trip.
Painted a picture to us of a very determined woman
that was using quite a few different pawns
in her scheme to get her children back,
and she was gonna do this at any cost.
[narrator] With Bron's testimony
that Charlene and Tim conspired
to have Josh and Amber killed,
police enact dual operations across the country
to arrest Tim in Texas
and Charlene in New York.
[Det. Milby] The reason that we wanted to handle
Tim and Charlene at the same time
was so that they could not communicate with each other
to try to fabricate a story.
[Callanan] Charlene Childers was taken into custody
on weapons charges in New York.
A SWAT team surrounded Charlene and Tim's home
in Sunray, Texas, breached the door
and are able to successfully take Tim Dean into custody.
[Det. Milby] During initial contact
with law enforcement in Texas,
Tim is pretty smug.
Tim isn't gonna talk.
[Tim speaking]
[Det. Milby] Eventually, he makes some sort of admission
that he came to New York with all that weaponry
to commit suicide.
[Tim speaking] [bleep]
[Tim speaking]
[Det. Milby] The average person only needs
one weapon to commit suicide.
That was a lie.
[detective speaking]
[Det. Milby] We tried to appeal to his senses
and he was completely shut down.
[narrator] Meanwhile, back in New York,
detectives questioned Charlene Childers.
[Det. Milby] We were relatively certain that
Tim Dean was the one who pulled the trigger.
The hurdle that we had to get over was
connecting Charlene as that puppet master.
We circle the wagons a little bit
and just to see what comes out.
[Christine speaking]
[detective] Mmm-hmm.
[Christine speaking]
[Det. Milby] During that interview, we focused completely
on Tim in coming to learn the person that Charlene is,
it's not that far of a stretch
to think that she's gonna throw him
completely under the bus,
which she does.
- [Charlene speaking] - [detective speaking]
[Charlene speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Det. Milby] Wanting to hurt Josh
because of the allegations that she's made in the past
about being abused by Josh.
So she's trying to paint the picture of a motive
that Tim has to commit this crime.
She says this is completely Tim's idea to get this done.
[Charlene speaking]
[Det. Milby] Charlene is very charismatic,
manipulative woman.
And she got the impression that
if she repeated a lie more than once
that people would believe it.
She didn't realize she was dealing with
seasoned detectives.
And finally she tells us that she had said at one point,
it would just be better off if Josh was dead.
[Charlene speaking] [bleep]
[detective] Mmm-hmm.
[Charlene speaking] [bleep]
[Det. Milby] And eventually
we get a confession from Charlene.
[detective speaking]
[Charlene speaking]
[detective speaking]
[Charlene speaking]
[detective speaking]
[narrator] Detectives are now able to piece together
Josh Niles and Amber Washburn's final 24 hours.
In May of 2018,
Charlene loses custody of her children to Josh.
Charlene is devastated,
and ultimately Charlene tells Tim,
Josh needs to die.
She begins to develop a plan
in order to get that custody back.
And that starts in the garage in Sunray, Texas,
when her, Tim Dean,
and friend Bron Bohlar are present.
Bron agrees to rent the vehicle.
Charlene drives Bron to the Amarillo Airport
in order to pick up this rental vehicle.
And Tim takes it from there.
Tim actually does start his trip on October 19th,
but wrecks his rental vehicle in Kansas
on October 20th at about 4:00 AM.
[Callanan] On October 21st, Timothy Dean called Charlene
to make her aware that he is stranded in Kansas.
She drives up to Kansas
helps him rent another vehicle
and tells him that he should not come home
unless he has done what he's supposed to do.
On October 22nd,
license plate readers pick him up
at about 5:25 AM,
90 minutes outside of Sodus, New York.
At 1:57 PM, home surveillance cameras
catch Tim Dean walking through the streets of Sodus.
[Callanan] Timothy Dean walks down the driveway
of Carlton Street and confronts Joshua Niles.
There's a brief discussion
before Timothy Dean pulls out his gun...
[gunshot]
...and shoots Josh Niles once in the chest.
[Det. Milby] At that same time,
Amber pulls into the driveway with her son, Josh Jr.
In the backseat.
Amber tries to leave the driveway.
Tim immediately turns to her
and shoots her in the head.
Tim then turns to Josh
where he shoots him nine more times.
[gunshots]
[dramatic music playing]
[narrator] Tim Dean, Charlene Childers, and Bron Bohlar
are charged with the murders
of Josh Niles and Amber Washburn.
For conspiracy in the second degree,
Bron Bohlar is sentenced to one to three years.
Tim Dean is convicted a first-degree murder
and sentenced to life without parole.
Charlene Childers is found guilty
of first-degree manslaughter
and sentenced to 28 years.
She is eligible for parole in 2042.
[Callanan] I think of that afternoon on Carlton Street,
Josh Niles completely ambushed in his driveway.
The last thing he saw
was his fiancee being killed
wondering with his last moments,
what was going to happen to Josh Jr.
[It. Croft] I have young kids too.
I can't imagine what that would do to a young child.
To be in the backseat
and be a part of the actual incident,
it's got to be tough.
[Det. Milby] We're quite proud of the fact
that we were able to bring
Josh and Amber's killers to justice.
But we have kids out there
who now don't have parents
and for what?
Because of someone who got told
that she wasn't allowed to have things her way.
That's the tragedy.