Mother Throat
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Mother Throat
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June 1, 2019 / 10:15 PM
/ CBS News
Produced by Lisa Freed and Lauren Clark
[This story previously aired on Dec. 15, 2018. It was updated on June 1, 2019.]
"My neck's bleeding," Tiffany Mead told a 911 dispatcher from her car late on July 23, 2013. "I tried to commit suicide. Please help me."
"I knew she was in really bad shape," first responder Jason Sorenson tells "48 Hours" correspondent Erin Moriarty. "It was a really severe wound ... It was straight across her neck. All the way across."
Dr. Sheila Garvey, the Ogden Regional Hospital emergency room doctor who treated Mead, was also struck by the severity of the wound, noting most self-inflicted stab wounds are not as bad. "She was critical when she came in," Garvey says. "She just about cut off her head … There was no way she could have done that to herself and not that deep."
So severe was the cut, police responding to the scene also questioned whether it really was a suicide attempt.
"The blood all over the car was just, it was unbelievable," says Sgt. Bob Thompson. "I'm looking at this and I'm like, "There's no way that somebody's gonna be able to survive this. ... I'm thinking ... what am I lookin' at here?"
Just after midnight on July 24, 2013, Sgt. Bob Thompson arrived at the scene where Tiffany Mead had been found with her throat cut.
Erin Moriarty : And what did you know at that point?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : Absolutely nothing.
Tiffany had already been rushed to the hospital, but before she left, she changed her story — telling deputies that it was actually her estranged husband, Kris Ertmann, who attacked her.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : She told Deputy Sorensen ... "Keep him away from me. ... He did this to me. And "save my baby."
Erin Moriarty : If she's called this in as a suicide, and now she's saying, "He really did this," you don't know what to believe at that moment, right?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : It's a bit of a conundrum.
Tiffany's car was at the scene, but Thompson noticed something didn't look quite right.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : There was blood on the outside of the door. And I'm thinkin', "How did that blood get there?"
The detective learned Tiffany and her husband had first met up at a secluded park a mile away, where investigators found a second scene.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : I could see the blood … So now I know, "OK, this must have happened outside of the car."
Erin Moriarty : And before she started driving.
Erin Moriarty : …if this woman tried to cut herself and she's clearly injured, to get in a car and drive — did that make sense?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : Didn't make sense at all.
Thompson still wasn't sure what kind of crime he was dealing with — if any.
Erin Moriarty : Do you know whether it's an attempted suicide, an actual suicide, attempted murder or a murder?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : I have no idea.
He didn't know Tiffany's condition. However, there was someone in custody: Kris Ertmann.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : He hadn't been officially arrested, but … he was not free to leave.
Ertmann was photographed and his clothes were taken as evidence. And then, Thompson wanted to hear what he had to say:
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Why are you here tonight?
KRIS ERTMANN: Well, she — tried to commit suicide and I helped her out and her – and – and basically help her out, I tried to save her. I assisted in saving her.
Thompson learned that Ertmann worked for a painting contractor. He and his wife had been married five years and had two children, 2-year-old Noah and Wyatt who was almost 4. The couple was divorcing and had met that night so Ertmann could give her a child support check.
KRIS ERTMANN: We exchanged a few words and I don't know how she did — being able to put a knife to her throat, and —
KRIS ERTMANN: ... she's trying to say I slit her throat.
According to Ertmann, Tiffany was taking antidepressants:
KRIS ERTMANN: She has a history of being s — suicidal.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : people don't commit suicide that way. …And especially for a mother to do it in front of her child … didn't make sense to me.
And neither did Ertmann's oddly calm demeanor.
Erin Moriarty : Was he concerned about his – his estranged wife?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : Uh, no. …He didn't ask once how she was doing, and he never asked where his child was.
But what Thompson wanted most from Ertmann were details about what led to his wife's horrific injuries:
KRIS ERTMANN: That part — well, I don't remember it, but if you don't mind, I kinda really don't want to talk about it anymore.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : Why wouldn't you remember? It just happened a few hours ago. …And he can't remember any details?
Erin Moriarty : And what's going through your head?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : That he did this.
Ertmann was arrested and charged with attempted murder — attempted because somehow, despite the devastating injuries, Tiffany Mead survived.
Erin Moriarty : Show me where he cut you.
Tiffany Mead : He started over here [holding her finger to the left side of her neck and dragging it across] ... He went straight acrossed [sic], and he stopped right before my artery on this side.
It's been more than five years, but Tiffany is permanently scarred.
Erin Moriarty : Every time you look in the mirror, are you reminded of that night?
Tiffany Mead [nods to affirm]: I avoid looking in the mirror as much as possible.
Lt. Jen Daley : You know, this girl is strong. She is strong, Erin.
At the time, Lt. Jen Daley was Bob Thompson's partner on this case and his boss. She vividly remembers arriving at the hospital to get a statement from the 22-year-old who was in critical condition.
Lt. Jen Daley : I will never forget. I can still see her laying in that hospital bed. …I'm looking at that wound and the whole time I'm thinking … "How?"
Tiffany told Daley she had only agreed to meet her estranged husband because he promised to bring that child support check. Their relationship was now so toxic, they mostly communicated by text.
Tiffany Mead : He told me not to bring anyone. He kept reminding me to come alone. Come alone.
Tiffany texted that she would have to bring 2-year-old Noah. At the last minute, Ertmann picked an out- of-the-way park to meet. They parked — an empty space between their vehicles — and walked towards each other.
Tiffany Mead : I was terrified. …He had this look. He was so determined coming at me. I didn't know what he was gonna do.
She says suddenly Ertmann grabbed her in a bear hug and backed her up against her car door.
Tiffany Mead : And he had one hand on my mouth. And he pulled something out of his pocket. …And he slit my throat. And as he's slitting my throat, h — he says, "Shh, don't scream. Stay calm." And I didn't scream … And I told him I was getting dizzy. So he opened my car door for me so that I could sit.
Tiffany Mead : And he said, "You know what I want." … "Say it." So I said, "I love you, and I'll get back with you." …And then he said, "Seal it with a kiss." And he leaned in, and he kissed me as blood's pouring out of my neck.
Tiffany Mead : Then he said that we needed to come up with a story if I was gonna call 911. … So I said, "OK, I'll tell 'em whatever you want me to do."
But first Tiffany had to get herself out of the remote area.
Tiffany Mead : I had to get somewhere where I could explain to 911 where I was. …All I could think was I had to get my baby to safety.
Somehow, Tiffany managed to drive with one hand on the steering wheel, the other holding back the blood pouring from her wound. When she got to a bus stop, with her husband beside her, he let her call 911:
911 OPERATOR: What — what happened?
TIFFANY MEAD: I tried to commit suicide. Please help me.
Tiffany Mead : As soon as there were sheriffs between me and Kris, I let 'em know, "Kris did this. He tried to kill me."
Lying in the ambulance, near death, she called her mother.
Cheryl Mead : She — she called — she — that Kris had tried to kill her and she needed me to pick up Noah. ... I had no idea what she was going through at the time.
Tiffany Mead : As I was laying in the ambulance looking up at the lights … I was thinking, "It's over. Noah's safe. [Crying] I can die now."
Kris Ertmann was in custody and charged with attempting to murder his ex-wife — something unimaginable five years earlier when the couple first met online. Tiffany was a high school senior. He was in the Army.
Tiffany Mead : He was really sweet.
Tiffany Mead : I thought I was [laughs].
Just six weeks later they eloped. It wasn't long before they were parents. But when Ertmann returned from his deployment in Iraq, Tiffany says he became emotionally abusive and very volatile.
Tiffany Mead : He could change on the drop of a dime. …just little things would make him so angry.
Although he never hit her, she lived in fear of his rages.
Tiffany Mead : The biggest reason — I was scared. ... I didn't think I could do it on my own.
But in late 2012, Tiffany finally had enough and fled with her boys. They moved in with her parents and she moved on with her life, working full time and going to college at night. She even started dating a new guy.
Erin Moriarty : How did Kris take you leaving?
Tiffany Mead : Not well. …It was always, "Come back to me. …You're not gonna be able to do this by yourself."
But the facts of what happened that night weren't as clear cut as detectives Jen Daley and Bob Thompson thought.
Erin Moriarty : It's dark. No one sees or hears anything. And you have Kris Ertmann saying one thing and you have Tiffany Mead saying a completely different thing.
Lt. Jen Daley : He said, she said.
They didn't even have the knife used to slit Tiffany Mead's throat. Daley believes as Tiffany drove down the dark road holding her bloody neck, her estranged husband tossed the knife out the window into a deep ravine.
Lt. Jen Daley : It's so thick. …from years of the overgrowth and … We did everything to uncover that knife … metal detectors, cadaver dogs.. …again you think, "Oh, my goodness, are we gonna lose the case because of something like that?"
Erin Moriarty : I mean, if you had the knife and you could see whether his DNA was on the knife, that's gotta – help the case.
Lt. Jen Daley : — or fingerprints. Any of it.
Lt. Jen Daley : Yes. … It's very difficult without some physical evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.
Adding to Daley and Thompson's concerns — a month after the attack, the judge received an unsigned letter:
Sgt. Bob Thompson [reading letter]: "I am a good friend of Tiffany, but I can't see letting this happen to Kris for his kids' sake."
The letter writer claimed Tiffany had cut her own throat and was trying to frame Kris Ertmann — exactly what Ertmann had told police.
Erin Moriarty : Any side do you think, "Oh my God, that could be true"?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : We took this as something that was credible. I mean, obviously this needed to be followed up on.
The return address was from a Mary Olson in on Monroe Street in Ogden. But as the detectives soon discovered, the address didn't exist — and it seemed, neither did Mary Olson.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : I run the driver's license of every — every Mary Olson in the state of Utah that … roughly match Tiffany's age group. Nothing. There's nothing.
Tiffany Mead : I didn't even know anyone named Mary at that time.
Erin Moriarty : Who do you think arranged for that letter?
Tiffany Mead : There's no doubt in my mind that Kris did it.
Davis County attorneys Richard Larsen and Jason Nelson also suspected an Ertmann connection, but they still needed proof to tie Ertmann to the letter and to bolster their attempted murder case against him.
Richard Larsen : We were absolutely convinced that he had inflicted the injury. That wasn't the big question. The big question was what was his intent when he did it? …this case rose and fell based on that one question.
Was Kris Ertmann actually trying to kill his estranged wife or merely injure and scare her? The defense could argue that Ertmann let Tiffany call 911 and gave her his shirt to help stop the bleeding.
911 OPERATOR: Do you have a dry clean cloth that you can apply pressure to her neck?
Prosecutors feared without more evidence, jurors might conclude this was an aggravated assault, not an attempted murder, which meant Ertmann could be out of prison in a year.
Erin Moriarty : What's your fear if he gets out?
Lt. Jen Daley : He'll try it again.
Lt. Jen Daley : I was angry, internally angry … I couldn't even wrap my head around it that you could do that to a human being in front of a child, and a year later you're free to walk around.
Richard Larsen : She looked us — at us and said, "That's not good enough."
Jen Daley knew that making sure Kris Ertmann stayed locked up was the only way to keep Tiffany alive.
Lt. Jen Daley : …and I said … "I want to start listening to jail phone calls."
A month after Ertmann was arrested Daley started listening to his phone calls — something every inmate is warned about repeatedly.
JAIL CALL RECORDING: Hello, this is a prepaid collect call from [Kris] an inmate at Davis County Jail, Utah. … This call is subject to recording and monitoring.
Erin Moriarty : What's the chance he's gonna say anything incriminating on a phone call?
Lt. Jen Daley : Stranger things have happened.
Lt. Jen Daley : I really wanted a confession. …Because if we got the confession that that's what his intent was, then I knew we could put him away longer.
Lt. Jen Daley : So I listened, and I listened some more, and I listened some more after that.
Daley listened to hundreds of phone calls and watched endless jailhouse visits.
Lt. Jen Daley : And people would come in my office and tell me, "I can't believe you're still listening to it." And I would look at them and say, "Neither can I. I would like to stick pencils in my ears."
But with no revelations, after three months, Daley reluctantly gave up.
Lt. Jen Daley : My gut kept tellin' me … "You've got to keep listening. It's there. It's there."
So she started again, picking up where she'd left off.
Lt. Jen Daley : What if that's where his confession is?
Daley had gotten up to Ertmann's December 2013 calls – made five months after the attack. On this call from Dec. 11, 2013, he was on the phone with his father:
KRIS ERTMANN: Write down this name, Raymond *******
KRIS ERTMANN: Yeah. And tell Kenny to Facebook him and tell him that I'm in here.
Daley had no idea if the name had any significance, but she wrote it down on a yellow sticky notepad as she listened to more calls:
KRIS ERTMANN: Did Kenny ever Facebook that dude for me?
ERTMANN'S FATHER: I will tonight or tomorrow.
KRIS ERTMANN: OK. Um, did you hear, by chance, or call that one dude?
ERTMANN'S FATHER: No, I'll try to get it this weekend.
It was clear to Daley that for Kris Ertmann, contacting this "dude" was urgent.
KRIS ERTMANN: Can you send me that dude's address so I can give him a — write him too? If you can.
ERTMANN'S MOTHER: Yeah … What's his name again?
KRIS ERTMANN: Dad has it written down.
Ertmann only mentioned his friend's name once, but that's all Daley needed.
Lt. Jen Daley : I looked at that sticky pad. Still had that name written on it. And I pulled it off. And I remember it was stuck to my index finger. And I walked down the hallway into [Thompson's] office. …and I held my hand out and I said, "I need you to find this guy. …Find him for me."
Erin Moriarty : What's been the hardest part? What's been the toughest for you?
Tiffany Mead : Getting use to all my new fears, things that most people don't think twice about.
For Tiffany Mead, memories of that harrowing July night are everywhere.
Tiffany Mead : Driving at night, the sound of dripping water …
Erin Moriarty : Dripping water, why?
Tiffany Mead : Because I heard my blood dripping in the car into a pool.
Lieutenant Jen Daley was convinced that keeping Kris Ertmann behind bars was the only way to keep Tiffany safe. And she knew she was onto something with that sticky note.
Erin Moriarty : Whatever you heard in January of 2014 changed everything in this case?
Lt. Jen Daley : It took this case in a place that we never saw coming.
It turned out the "Raymond" Ertmann mentioned is a former inmate [we're only using his first name]. He had served time on a methamphetamine possession charge. Now out on probation, Raymond agreed to talk with the detectives on camera, although he wasn't quite sure what about:
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: So, Raymond, we want to ask you some questions about when you were in our jail.
RAYMOND: OK. … I spent 90 days in, like, Davis County. And so I'm doing pretty good because, to be honest, being skinny and weak and ridiculous all the time was kinda not my lifestyle.
Lt. Jen Daley : He's a character. … But when he talks … it's instantly credible. …he doesn't have anything to hide.
That is until Sgt. Thompson brought up Kris Ertmann, and something changed:
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Did you get to know any of the inmates in there? … What about a guy named Kristopher Ertmann?
RAYMOND: Oh. Yeah. Yeah. … He's a quiet guy.
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Did he ever talk about the situation that he was in with his ex-wife, and all that stuff?
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Tell me about that.
RAYMOND: What happened in jail stayed in jail, man.
But Daley saw a chance to appeal to Raymond's conscience – and it worked:
LT. JEN DALEY: There's a time to do what's right. …This is one of those moments in your life that you can start with that.
RAYMOND: OK. So! What do you want to know, specifically?
LT. JEN DALEY: Tell us what he told you —
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Just tell us about his conversations. What do you know?
RAYMOND: He just – admitted guilt, man, I guess …
LT. JEN DALEY: Tell me about him admitting guilt.
RAYMOND: Like, he said that he was guilty. Like, that he's the one that cut her throat.
For Prosecutor Richard Larsen, that was a crucial admission from Ertmann.
Richard Larsen : …up until that point he had claimed that he had had no involvement.
And that wasn't all. Raymond told them about a handwritten letter that Ertmann gave him to copy once he got out of jail.
RAYMOND: Saying that I was his wife, to the judge that was presiding over his case, saying that she admitted that she lied, and that the allegations were false.
It sounded a lot like the other letter from "Mary Olson;" remember, authorities suspected it was orchestrated by Ertmann, but they couldn't prove it. If they could find this letter in Ertmann's handwriting, they could charge him with obstruction of justice.
LT. JEN DALEY: Well let's get that letter.
RAYMOND: I have to find it, dude. I think it's in Ogden.
And while Raymond was getting things off his chest, Thompson took a chance:
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: did he ever ask you to do anything to Tiffany?
Sgt. Bob Thompson : That question was purely just a shot in the dark.
SGT. BOB THOMPSON: Tell me about that.
RAYMOND: He just asked me if I had the connections to arrange – for bad things to happen to her. I told him that I did not.
Sgt. Bob Thompson : …Jen all of a sudden leans forward, like, "Holy cow."
LT. JEN DALEY: You said bad things – what are bad things?
RAYMOND: To arrange her death. Specifically.
According to Raymond, Ertmann asked him to hire a hit man to silence Tiffany for good .
Richard Larsen : At that moment we realize that this has gone to a whole new level where, we've got somebody who's in cu
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