True Crime Vault: You've Got Jail

Because she played these games, my son died.

“He says I was so blind and so stupid and so much in love.”

So we need to add call, tell me the number. So like that, right? Hi, is this Sherry? Yes. Hey, Sherry, it's Juju, Chen calling, how are you?

I've fed Hario. I'm on the phone with Sherry Palette, Kitley Miller. She's a mom, she's a karaoke fan. But right now, she's at the women's here on Valley Correctional Facility in Michigan. So I get up in the morning, about 6-12.

“I have a real job that I go to eight hours a day, home bed, take a shower, make my food.”

I hate, lose, you always have to be doing something.

Sherry Miller is accused of using sex lies and the internet to get men to do what she wanted them to do, even if it meant breaking the law. It was like a video game. And she made a relationship with another level and each level was harder. Maybe it was again how much I could get away with, how much I could make somebody believe.

Prosecutors say that Sherry's online antics left two men dead. Sherry's attorney says she's only guilty of creating a complex online fantasy life. Most of it was sex chat that he would get very graphic. Very detailed about going through sexual encounters over the internet. And she would describe lesbian fantasies and it would go back and forth.

I spent an hour of part of our life talking to people. In fact, I wanted to be into the control of everything of the society, into the control of dad and dad. You are an online sex addict. Very much.

Sherry says she never told her whole story and now after years can prison,

she says she wants to come clean on 2020. And this is the first time you've been in this. You've got jail. Sherry was born in Flint, Michigan, which is a town about one hour northwest of Detroit. Recent years sadly, it's considered perhaps the epicenter of the Russ Belt.

When I grew up Flint was booming and there were upwards of 200,000 people here. The plants were going. We had over 80,000 general motors jobs. And all the ancillary jobs that went with that. You didn't worry about going to college or getting a trade degree or whatever, because GM was so big. Everybody was just about guaranteed a job here.

And when General Motors pulled out things turn, the 75,000 or so auto worker jobs were gone, down to about 75,000. Hi, I'm Michael Moore. You might hometown of Flint, Michigan. General Motors closed the factories.

“If you remember the movie Roger and me, that Michael Moore movie about all the layoffs at various”

GM facilities there, that kind of sums it up for that city at that particular period. When GM left, he tore everything down and it just plows the miles of abandoned empty land that used to be productive factories. As far as Where Shari was living, probably more rural. Where there's several junk guards where people go and take cars or sell parts and do that kind of thing.

Growing up where I grew up, it was like your normal middle-class neighborhood. Every summer they sent us to Florida with my grandma, Peppa, where it was my face they used to. She had a hard childhood, a product of several divorces that her mom had, different men coming and going in her household. She talks about being sexually abused.

However, you when you're first sexually assaulted.

I want to say probably three or four and kids you hate, uh, like everything you're like, I don't read as possible in a moment not understanding what I would be pleased with.

By the age of about twenty seven twenty eight, she'd been married twice.

“She had three kids. As a single mom with three children, Shari really had to hustle.”

She worked as a representative for Mary Kay Cosmetics. She worked in a nursing home. And she also got a job doing the books at a local scrapyard called B&D Auto that was owned by Bruce Miller. Bruce Miller was born and raised here in Flint, Michigan. Did what a lot of people did with someone they got out of high school,

went to work for general motors. Always in the cars. Yep, he actually, uh,

when he's, and I'm thinking he's first car because we used to have horses to stop. He traded a horse for his first car and 16, 17 years old. And it was always in trying to race cars, whatever he loved. He was a huge mass car fan. Dale Earnhardt was this, was his favorite driver. He just was a hard worker, went to work every day.

In fact, he stayed working on third shift, which is a hard shift to work 30, 40 years. But that shift allowed Bruce to tinker at the junkyard. He was really close to retired from general motors and he would have just had the junkyard to pull back on and do what he liked to do. To have a salvage art with all those parts and all that stuff for him to play with was just

his, his idea of having it. He also went through several marriages over his lifetime. He was married three times before. He had to be married, he had to be a married guy.

He always told me he knew where the corn hole was was.

Bruce Miller was a lot older than Sherry and he met her through the work at the salvage yard.

“Yes, thank you. So what was the spark who pursued whom?”

I pursued him. Why? Bruce was not interested, I pursued help. It was a short courtship between Sherry and Bruce and their courtship was maybe four months. As soon as they started dating, she moved herself in with the kids. Perhaps the 20-year difference in age between Sherry and Bruce might have raised some eyebrows, but this was a really solid man. It was a great family guy. He was a great husband.

It's he treated her kids as his own. He was an all-around, great guy. I think she didn't have really any place to live no real stability for the kids and so

Bruce provided that. I asked him, are you going to marry this one? That was the first thing I said.

He told me, no, well, wasn't Sherry up at that. They went to Vegas. They went to Vegas. We all, at home, thought. They're going to get married then. Sure enough, Bruce and Sherry alone at Las Vegas wedding chapel. There's a beautiful picture of Sherry sort of looking into a mirror there. There was an odd coupling just by visualizing it and by the age of difference, but at the wedding pictures he looked happy. He liked to be married and she seemed happy too.

That wedding photo was taken in Las Vegas on April 23, 1999, by the end of the year, Bruce would be dead. We opened the door while we were on the counter. Sherry Miller's life was very difficult. She said she was abused sexually as a child and to add to that pain, one of her own children became a victim of abuse. Today on Montel, we welcome Sherry, show. Three months before she married Bruce,

Sherry appeared on the Montel Williams show and shared how her ex husband had physically abused their infant son. Baby was crying and he had wrapped him in the kitchen of the floor and you

“couldn't get him to quit crying. So he threw him. I think he said four and a six feet against a wall.”

If you were a person who had a grievance and wanted to have a national audience listen to your concerns, you'd get to the Montel Williams show. How much time did you have with your family? Ah, four and I have one. Worked me late. Why did you appear on Montel Williams? Trying to change the laws of Michigan and the state of Michigan gave him visitation like

When she was on the Montel Williams show, I think that

“started her craving for more attention. She was expecting people to be really supporting her,”

but it she never really got the recognition that she wanted.

Compared to some of Sherry's previous lovers, her new husband Bruce was a gem. He offered her stability and as a mother with three kids that she needed to raise, that was attractive, but it wasn't enough. It didn't take long before she started taking advantage of all of this stability brought to her. She started spending a lot of Bruce's money, including plenty on clothes and toys for her children. You get everything you want,

but then you're spoilt, rhyme, brand. She's racking up his credit card. Very short period of time.

She racks up at over $46,000 in a credit card debt. And this is a man who's worked his whole life,

“paid his debts. Well, she started paying with things with one credit card and they could”

another credit card and pay him. That's all she was getting her with all Bruce no one, about money. I was on age a means free. I ran up Bruce's charge cards and took all the money in the house. It was like a continuous breeze that I was trying to fill. Despite her new marriage, it seems that Sherry still craved the attention of men. And she finds this brand new landscape to start searching for new connections.

It's called AOL and she is busy online a lot. The internet at that point was very new. AOL was the giant at that time and people were just getting their home computers and learning how to navigate their way through the worldwide web. AOL came about, chat room started coming on. She started using that and opened up a whole new world tour of talking to different people. It was so big. Everyone was so intrigued by this

whole platform that a Hollywood movie was made called You've Got Mail starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. I turn on my computer. I go online. Welcome. And my breath catches in my chest until I hear three little words. Today the nation's largest online service is going to get even bigger. America online with nine million subscribers. We'll add two and a half million more from computer. America online, the colossus of cyberspace. Everybody logged in AOL. And at that point it was the only

one in the industry. America online so easy to use. So easy to get started with the email, instant messages and a buddy list. It's the easiest way to keep in touch.

You've got the AOL does. You signed up. It always get a free AOL account. I still have an AOL account.

You've got mail. More and more people are going into internet chat rooms looking for romance

“and finding it. It's the new social avenue I think of the 90s.”

AOL at that time had these chat rooms where there would be a whole bunch of people talking about just about everything. Her screen names were all pretty sexy. She had a lot of screen names. There were over a dozen of them and they were all like, look at me, I'm sexy. Like sexy kid for you, just looking at her screen names, suggests that she was sexually active. She seemed to have a very high opinion of herself. How much time were you spending

online? I didn't get all from him from the computer. Bruce worked at the shop and he had his business. So he was gone a lot. So I just bet hours have had hours and why he was talking to people. While Starrie is perusing the internet, one particular screen name catches her eye. That's JLC 1006. The man's name is Jerry Casade. And it turns out he's a pit boss at a Reno, Nevada Casino. Hi baby. Who mobile is sex kid?

It seems all this online flirting was heating up the keyboards because it didn't take long for this to turn into an actual physical romance. Three months after she and Bruce got married, she's on her way out to Reno to meet Jerry Casade. She got all dressed up and went to the

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already developing an online relationship with Jerry Cassadais, who she's never met.

Your Cassadais grew up in the Kansas City area, Missouri. He was the youngest of the four boys. He was competitive. He thought he could do anything that his big brothers could do. A lot of good memories. Every year would go deer hunt. He had a special tree that he'll love to hunt out of and nobody could get close to that area. That was Jerry's area. At young age, he actually became a police officer and it was very short time. He was promoted to

Lieutenant. Jerry would meet his wife a woman named Barbara who worked as a dispatcher at his department. She had two sons from a previous marriage and then they had their own child together

“a son named James. That was better my father. I remember helping him get dressed in the mornings”

and watching him give his uniform on and it's just a sort of a person when he put on that uniform. He was enamored by the sheriff and the under sheriff, but he started to see a lot of discrepancies. He came to find out that there was some corruption going on. He believed the under sheriff had taken and falsified a document in a murder case. They brought in a special prosecutor. As a result of the investigations, County Sheriff was removed from office. In the

process of that, Jerry knew that his time as a police officer was pretty much up. It's hard for someone in law enforcement to go after their bosses. I mean that's career suicide

and in Jerry's case it was career suicide. He was never the same after that.

It spills over an every area life. Your purpose, your recognition is taken away. After he left the department, he got a job as security, but Harris, Casino, which was just opening in Kansas City. He continued to struggle. He really had a hard time grappling with the events of his life and he ultimately decided just to get that heck out of Kansas City. They transferred him, Harris did. They had a position open up and Reno, and he thought maybe a change of pace would be a good idea.

Jerry was looking forward to having a fresh start. And right away, he was promoted to a dealer. We worked at Harris property in downtown Reno, and we're both dealers. Two am detaining him.

“Graveyard. I remember meeting him. Someone goes, "Oh, you know, this is Jerry. He's going to be on”

your shift." And it was like, "Oh yeah, we'll have some fun."

It was Gloria Taylor and Carol Slotter. And they're kind of where like the big sisters he never had.

They tried to guide him through life, tried to help him. My own personal feeling was that he was just kind of going through a midlife crisis. You know, trying to start over, but it just wasn't working out. As far as I can remember, as he went to work for the cuisinos, that's when the drinking really picked up. He was depressed. In Nevada, drinking and gambling is entertainment. And it's not way to be. It's right out in front of the open for everybody to see.

And he started drinking way too much. Yeah, and he just spiraled. Mom was having a whole time trying to find a job after the money's getting tight. Let fights, let to owe humans. She moved back to Kansas City. I stayed out with him. At some point in time, during that, I guess he was meeting and conversing with women and stuff online. Jerry, of course, is newly single. And he's looking for love. He goes on to A.O. Allen.

Almost immediately finds the sexy Cherie Miller. And boy, does it get hot and heavy in the chat room pretty quickly? I'm all yours to do with me, whatever you feel fit. The amount of instant messaging and emails back and forth is enormous. Talking about everything under the sun. He's going through a divorce. He's drinking a lot. He's depressed. And he's having financial problems. She comes along. She's paying attention to him, giving him that ego

voice that he needed. But also, according to her, she's rich. She's telling him that she owns nursing homes, that she owns a junkyard, that she has possible lawsuit settlements coming up soon, that are going to give her riches, Jerry, who has money trouble. See somebody with money taking an interest in him. And, of course, he responds to that.

“I think she fulfilled his every fantasy. And he told me the himself that he said,”

"Mom, she is the woman of my dreams. I never dreamed. I would ever meet anyone like her."

Right after, the Christian I got married is when I met Jerry for the first time when I went to Reno with my friend Laura. What attracted you to Jerry? For me, like, back then, it was like family at home and then the danger side, so like... You were looking for danger. Right. The weekend that she came into town, we all knew that she was coming in. And he was so excited

and as soon as she hit the floor, he was taking her around and introducing her to Gloria and I. She got all dressed up, put her a best foot forward. I went to the table where he was dealing and played Blackjack, and we kind of played like we didn't really know each other at all. And I know I was drinking a lot that my felt like dangerous and little scared but excited by it. Not only does she meet him, but she sleeps

“with them. We knew the first time they spent the night together. I think the whole casino floor.”

The first night they spent together. At one point, she sends a photograph of herself wearing the

same clothes and she wore that night to Jerry's. Our first night together. Jerry returns home to Michigan to be with Bruce and the kids, but every opportunity she gets, Jerry is back online trying to keep that fire burning between her and Jerry. She remellers start sending pictures of her in different states of undress. Now he just sent him pictures. She starts sending him videos of herself masturbating.

She labels it for Jerry's eyes only, which is clearly something to keep his interest sustain. Most of the online chats between Jerry and Jerry consist of sex talk.

she announces to him online that she's pregnant with his child.

“Jerry is ecstatic about the pregnancy, but the news quickly sounds.”

So, she tells Jerry that Bruce found out she was pregnant.

I never thought I would ever tell you that he hits. I got in trouble because I was with you.

We are now into our next episode of We Know Taco and International Airport. She remellers is a newlywed with me, kids. This should have been a honeymoon period. But she's making multiple trips to Reno, leaving her kids with her in-laws, Chuck and Judy Miller. We just wonder why she was making so many so many trips and she just said she was to go and learn her moves. Had a lot of people buying her Mary Gays stuffed on her.

“Not only is she rehabbing an affair with Jerry, but she tells him that she's pregnant with his child.”

He was a static, overjoyed. They were making plans, you know, to get together, live together.

She sent me a long email. How madly in love she was with Jerry and how she wanted to make a home with him and all of the plans that they had going down. Sure, even since Jerry a video called my family, 1999. In this video, Jerry is watching images of her children playing, crawling, having fun, this beautiful, domestic setting. And she's trying to show Jerry that this is

what your life can be like if we are together and we raise our baby with my children. He's all excited. He's related. The woman he loves, he's going to have a baby with. They're going to be rich. They're going to live in these nice houses. But Jerry sends a joy and elation takes a daunting turn one day when they find some really shocking emails in his inbox. Jerry begins getting emails purportedly from Bruce Miller under his beauty junk email address from the business,

saying that he knows about Shree and Jerry and their relationship. So Shree tells Jerry that Bruce found out that she was pregnant and that he beat her and that cause her to lose the baby. She sends him a picture of her torso with alleged bruises all over her body. There's a lot of bruises you would have to beat her a lot. So Shree is now telling Jerry that her husband beat her so badly that she miscarried and in Jerry's mind, his baby has gone and

he's helpless to do anything about it. When you broke the news that that baby was gone,

“what did you say? I think I wrote him on a chat. I didn't tell him on the phone. He was”

devastated. Devastated. Devastated. Devastation. Absolute devastation. I mean he was like one minute he's the highest high and the next it's like what happened? You know and you you almost feel like you're scraping them off the floor. He tells Shree that she needs to leave her husband. Get away. Just leave Bruce. Come live with me. Bring the kids. We'll live happily ever after. Well she said that Bruce was involved with the mafia and would beat her. Well we know it's not true

because that wasn't Bruce. He's never been a woman in his life. You know what I'm saying?

And then she says he's in the mob. It was just getting ridiculous. What was going on there? We knew that wasn't Bruce. Shree was hot and cold. Some day she loves them. Some day she doesn't. Sometimes she wants to come to Reno. Sometimes she doesn't. He'll find us. He'll put a bullet in her head. I can't leave him. But on the same token I want to be with you. Despite the potential alleged danger from Bruce, Shree keeps making trips to Reno and once she's there

with Jerry, he is ecstatic. But when she goes back home to Bruce and Michigan, he falls into deep depression. All the turmoil involved in this relationship is hard on Jerry. He doesn't deal with it well. And one night after getting off work at his casino,

heated discussion. He gets belligerent and finally they call security to ask her a mother to the casino.

On the way out, he slams a door which hits one to the security people, which causes the police to come in arrest him. I hope him score that day. He wasn't there which was strange. I got online trying to figure out if anybody was. That's when I was able to mess with your friend of hers that he worked with. This son called me and he said, "Do you know where my dad is?" I'm like, "Uh-oh, the first phone call

I called him is the jail." And that's where he was. So his family kind of gather around him and say, "Listen, Jerry, you're not doing well all there. Come back, be with family." They helped him move back to Missouri, moved in to basement apartment and stuff with my cousin. He's got to work on his alcohol, addiction problems and so he begins going to AA.

He was telling me he was going to church again and it sounded like things were kind of coming back together for him, but he was, of course, still in touch with Shari. He carried that

laptop everywhere he went. First thing he would do is connect with the laptop and get back

on the answer to messages. It was a constant, constant deal and stuff. I might could tell he was in love.

“That's what he wanted to spend his time doing. Basically, talking with Shari.”

Jerry begins to receive word of the new pregnancies and in fact, it's twins. Twins, this is huge news. And of course, Jerry is over the moon, especially because it happened so shortly after Shari reported she miscarried. She was sending photos of the sonogram and her belly and Jerry was just tickled the death

to see and, you know, here's my kids and he was a static. Once again, Bruce storms into this relationship

with brutal emails. Jerry opens his computer, expecting you here from Shari. And he sees an email from B.D. Junk, tell him that Shari is going to rid of the two bastards in her belly that he had created. His babies, not only one, but then two twins, had been killed by Bruce Miller and that just enraged him as it would any man. We were good friends and Bruce got along right. I want to work for them.

“Down to Soviet Union. Framework, paintwork, mechanic work. Do you name it, I did it?”

He'd hear you the shirt off his back. That's just simple that gets him. But Bruce Miller's wife, Shari, is now deep into an affair. She tells her lover Jerry Cassidy that he got her pregnant and Jerry is ecstatic at the prospect of being a dad again. Then Shari informs him that Bruce's violence terminated those pregnancies. And that terrible news will set off a series of tragic events.

So Bruce Miller is just that work, a regular day for him. He's getting ready to go home, have dinner with his family. I had told Bruce that I had ordered pizza and gave him a specific time that they said it would be done. And it's getting later and later, and Bruce is ensuring up with the food. She calls Chuck and Judy Miller, Bruce's brother and sister-in-law, to go, please go to the junkyard and see if there's anything wrong. Well, she was all freaked out.

“She should have been home. And so it was like, oh my god, you know, where is he?”

Says, well, I'll jump in the truck and go up to the junkyard and, you know, let's see if he's around there. When we opened the door and walked around the corner, and he was laying on the floor. We're on a pool of blood, so I told her to call 9-1-1.

Okay, you need to find out if he's crazy. Made my hand on him with my head on his cold. They asked if we wanted to do CPR. The murder weapon was a shotgun. Bruce sort of took a blast right to the upper chest. There was absolutely no evidence at all. No fingerprints, no footprints, no tracks, nothing. So about 2 o'clock in the morning, I just went to Shree's house and informed her of what was going on.

“And she is desolate. She is wailing on the floor, right?”

When you go to make a death notification where you know there is violence,

you're always watching how people respond. And if you're trying to hide something,

it's not natural, so you gotta be very methodical. We're always looking at body language, we're looking at how they should respond with these circumstances. But she seemed very appropriate. She visibly upset. Crying, and after the first contact with her, I didn't suspect her. And he started asking me questions about who I thought it could be.

Shree had mentioned that Bruce had a province with a job and they had John Hutchinson. I remember me saying that John Old Bruce money, which he did, and that they had been arguing about it.

“He had borrowed a lot of someone money which ended up being $2,000, but I guess at that point,”

you want to say he was our number one suspect.

On the funeral, John Hutchinson shows up with his wife to pay his respects to his friend Bruce. Shree started screaming and crying because she thought for sure that John had did it. Mommy, mommy, daddy, daddy, get him out of here. He's the one who murdered my husband. So I went and asked John to leave, so she would quit. 'Cause I'm not welcome here after what's been done until this is cleared up, exact words.

Not was a sickening feeling. One of the big things that really helped us focus on John was his brother, Harold.

And we began talking to Harold.

“We're talking about the murder of Bruce Miller.”

Can you stay your whole name? Harold Hamford. Harold made the statement that John had called him the day after the homicide and said, "Everything's taking care of the Bruce." "You're the day he said he wasn't supposed to." "That was his words. Yeah, what did he mean by 'sote'?"

"He said he was gone. He got me into that." Not only that, Harold told police that he actually heard his brother threatening Bruce about that money he owed him. 'Cause he said he was going to kill him because of the money that he owned if he knew Sally was serious. No, I had no earthly idea where that comment came from, but yeah, that Harold said, yeah, 'cause Harold's not all there.

So now we've got more reasons to go talk to John. There was 50 police cars at my house surrounding me like I was a freaking criminal. And I had no idea how what was going on. Compensating guns, nobody could leave the house. It was a joke. They turned that place upside down every little dust ball was moved.

John did have an alibi to offer up police, but they did appear to be a questionable gap around the time of the murder. And they just say, "Hey, he's lying. They actually have the same question 100 times and answer was the same 100 times. No, I didn't have nothing to do with it." Police confront John Hutchinson with their suspicion that he might be involved in a scheme to overcharge customers at Bruce's lot.

John denies any involvement in the scheme, but for the police, at this point, he's still pretty much suspect number one in Bruce's murder, and the rope is tightening around his neck. So it looked bad for me, I guarantee it. And then a polygraph test definitely doesn't help his case. Me, like that, the polygraph machine in and says, "Oh, f**k."

"Bern boy, burn at!"

that will add the strangest twist to this case that nobody saw coming. He had sex, he had murdered, he had the internet, but you got mail or just dumped the first internet murder.

“And how did you feel once you knew that your husband was deaf?”

They found each other in an AOL chat room. She comes along, she's paying attention to him, giving him that ego post that he needed.

He saw himself as a white knight, and she was a damsel in distress, and they could never be happy

until Bruce was deaf. He was laying on the floor on a pool above, and he would not be the only one. Jerry had told his brother that if anything happened to him, there was a briefcase, send of the bat, get a hold of it, before anybody else did. There was a bombshell inside that briefcase.

This can't be happening. "That's a special caught at being." "How do you understand somebody who kills as part of a game?"

"I just wanted to do one right piece before I leave this world."

"We've got mail." When one call from B&D AutoCard reporting a possible DOA, they find Bruce murdered.

“Any type of these investigations when they're who'd done it, that's what this was at who'd done it.”

We had no idea who'd done it with. They wanted John Hutchison for the murder. That's the only suspect they had. I couldn't leave the state, couldn't leave the county, can't do this, don't do that. And then when you go somewhere, as I look at you like a cockroach on a birthday cake,

put yourself in my position, how would your life be done? Police give John a polygraph test, and the results are inconclusive, but they tell him he failed just to see what his reaction was. I believe at that time is when he looked at the polygraph machine and said, "Oh, I'm..." And then he took the test again, and he failed.

These denials are very weak, and he's given us deceptive answers with his body language. I'm not sure.

“Usually when you have some accused murder, they're pretty adamant about what are you talking about?”

Why do you think I had anything to do with it? I think you are either directly involved or know a lot more you're willing to give up. Investigations are very grueling for people because we have to use different tactics to elicit the truth. You did it, you know you did it, which is hard to hear it when you're in that box. It turns out that John Hutchinson had once had a brief affair with Siree.

Could that have caused more tension? He'd actually slept with her. I think before her and Bruce got together. Later on when Bruce started dating Siree, John was quick to offer some advice. I thought it would make a huge mistake because I knew she was good-rowed to go down for trouble. He said, "Don't worry about it, I got it under control."

Okay, I warned you. Now, investigators have been keeping the pressure on Hutchinson for months, but they just can't make a case. We didn't have any higher evidence against him. Nothing that actually said years ago, we're going to get a warrant for you.

The weapon that we'd taken from his house was a 16-gauge. We'd learned from the crime lab that the shotgun that was used was a 20-gauge. Shiree was upset about the lack of progress. I'm stormed into the Agency County Sheriff's Department demanding to find out what's going on here. What are you guys doing to solve my husband's murder?

At this point, the murder investigation has come to a halt until something incredible happens

800 miles away that changes everything. It involves that former homicide detective, Jerry Cassidy, who'd been in a hot and heavy affair

The silence in his life was deafening.

“And then it starts to play in like wait a second.”

I am being kicked to the curb here. Jerry was downstairs in his apartment in Odessa, Missouri. Jerry sat down at a big easy chair. Overlooking the lake, and he had a picture of his ex-wife, mother of his son. He had a picture of his son and he had a picture of Shiree Miller.

There was a wedding ring on the window sill and his divorce decree on a nearby table and Bible in his lab. He opens it to Matthew 5, which says, "You shall not murder and whoever murders shall be liable to judgment."

So you've got to think that he made his piece with God.

And at that point, he took a 22 caliber rifle. Put it in his mouth and pull the trigger. And he took his own life. So an extreme shock.

“I knew he had the issue of Jerry had the issues in his sort. I never thought he would, he would do this.”

You're not supposed to bury your children, but we were. Might got the duty to clean out clean Jerry's stuff out of the apartment. I spent some time just downstairs trying to grasp what was going on. He had told his brother that a faith thing happened to him.

There was a briefcase send of the bed. Get a hold of it before anybody else did. So I went into the bedroom and looked down to the bed and I found a black briefcase. [music playing] It's got three letters attached to it and a note do not open this alone. Mike, do not open. Contact General Connor.

The Attorney General Connor just knows of Jerry professionally. Didn't know if maybe he had pissed him off professionally.

“They were like, "Well, this could be booby trapped."”

Maybe the case is rigged. Maybe it's a bomb inside. So they have the bomb squad examined the briefcase. He made his piece, but he left a mess for the rest of us. From 30 for 30 podcasts. Ryan Patta, senior defensive lineman from Miami, gunned out. The key to this case, it's brighter.

Well, hey, let's grab that. Our before he died, he was on a phone. Arnold's about this might be a hit. You want to truth, they just want to conviction be in place in your rest. We had a killer amongst us.

Murder at the U. Listen now. I'm RJ Decker, a private investigator, uncovering the sunshine state's darkest secrets. Tuesdays, it's the premiere ABC's hottest new crime show. RJ Preakin Decker has that living breed.

He's a private eye. It's not standard murder. Some bigger and a public mass. Trying to get some back to prison state? You're gonna prison one time, it's only it's all the jokes.

RJ Decker, series premiere, Tuesdays on ABC and stream on Hulu. The end of the affair was Sherry Miller drove Jerry Cassadet to suicide. He left that mysterious briefcase. Not knowing Jerry's state of mind at the time, they were gonna X-ray it to make sure everything was safe there.

So they had the bombsquad, and actually opened the briefcase. Of course, there was no bomb. Now the family is gathered in the attorney's office. And we'll find out what's inside.

First, they read the suicide note.

He wrote to his mother that he had taped on the outside. Jerry writes that he finally realized that Sherry had been lying to him about her husband Bruce. Well, she said that Bruce was involved with the mafia. Was in the money laundering.

He'd already killed three babies and he would kill her.

He said I went to Flint and I walked in the door and I said hi. I'm Jerry and I shot him.

“There was so much rage that he made sure he brought a shotgun.”

He hated Bruce Miller at the time. And then he said, I found out it was all lies every bit of it.

Offer Sherry, and she never really loved me.

It was all a game. And Jerry goes on to say, I was just so blind and so stupid and so much in love. And he ends with, I'm so sorry, Mom, I love you. My God, this was almost worse than Jerry dying to find out why he died and what it was all about. Before he was justifiable homicide in his mind,

now it was first to remurter. He judged himself, found himself guilty and executed himself. That was his way of trying to make the man's as best he could.

“Now it's time to finally open that briefcase.”

We forced the briefcase open and there were just pages among pages of information and stuff there.

Records of airline flights, hotel rooms, emails and chat messages between Jerry and Sherry that seem to implicate her in her husband's murder. General Connor says we can lock this briefcase up, you can take it and throw it in a river. Nobody ever know, or we can turn it over to the Genesee County Sheriff's Department. And the family had a hard decision to make.

They're going to ruin their son's reputation forever. Calm him a murder or they can just shut the briefcase and go on with their lives. But that wasn't the point. The point was she should pay for what she did. Otherwise, two good man would have died in vain.

General Connor contacts authorities in Michigan and says, I have some information. You're going to want to look at it. I got a briefcase here that indicates a Sherry Miller may have committed it. I hung up the phone and said some rather loud words, but I shouldn't have said in the office. He was jumping around saying she did it, I, she did it.

The detectives hop on a plane to Missouri to bring that briefcase home. It was a treasure trove of evidence. It was a treasure trove of explanations they didn't have.

“I think the most damning thing in there is the instant message where they plotted the murder.”

A very intricate plan where they were going to meet at a rest area. And Sherry was going to give him her cell phone where to park at the junkyard. When you go inside, don't ask me any questions, don't say anything, just kill him. Great detail. I'm talking line by line, play by play, but their plan worked.

And he would not have been able to put any of that together without her being the mastermind behind it. Clearly investigators need to speak to Sherry Miller. But at the time, she's not in Flint, Michigan. Where is she? Well, she's in Reno, Nevada, partying it up with her new boyfriend. Why aren't you home morning? Why aren't you with your kids? Why aren't you with his family?

It's like, what the hell are you doing women? It's like, do you not feel anything? I mean, anything. The Shares Department, they were waiting for them at the Flint airport. Took her back to the department. And Sherry was pretty sure she was still in good shape. Yes, I do. Did you develop a relationship with him? No, that's it, no.

That's what I said.

You never had such a relationship with Sherry. It's like, with Sherry, you know, with Sherry.

You know, she had erased everything on her computer, but unbeknownst to her, Sherry had not erased everything on his. What I tell you here, but I told you to, to Sherry, the sweetest emails and some messages that you had had here. I would tell you that you can change them, and you know that, and everybody knows that. I can change any email that somebody sends me.

Did you realize that they had you? I still thought that there's no way that they're going to not believe me. If you say it, it's reality. We're true. We're true, we don't play.

I had to be email that losing out of her computer, it sounded like,

"Well, how are you in true capacity to plan to his murder?"

“That's why, why would Sherry think about changing?”

I don't have a clue. Maybe they didn't know his man, because I wouldn't have anything to do with him. I don't know. They're fake. That's my response. Stick with that theme, until proven otherwise. I did not write that stuff. I don't know. Root seems that stuff, but I did not write that. I didn't. I didn't. Sherry, no more eyes written. She's all in real life.

We can't be here tonight, though. That is bad. They were able to surprise her, which is a great interrogation technique. Catch 'em in their lives, and at some point Captain Compo decided it was time to arrest her. I said you're under arrest for the murder of your husband. I thought it was terrible. Miller was arrested Friday, charged with the murder of her husband.

She planned and helped to carry out that murder. But despite all those damning instant messages and emails, this is still a tough case to bring to trial. It's essentially circumstantial evidence. Sherry Miller, someone who is an experienced actress. She's duped a police officer. There's a concern that 12 jurors might very well believe her story.

She used manipulation to get everything from a free lunch to someone to commit murder for. Prosecutors say that Sherry and her lover Jerry plotted over the internet to kill Bruce. It was a little biased steamy sex charge internet romance. It was eye-opening to me about the power of the internet. It was what everybody was talking about. You had the glare of a national audience watching.

“In what is being dubbed the nation's first internet-related murder?”

This case is about Sherry Miller manipulating and using her lover to kill her husband. Bruce Miller. And Sherry, they dressed her very conservatively and modestly.

It's like that's her because she had this suit on that she never would have purchased.

They wanted her to look as innocent as stowby as possible. All the castidates were there and of course Bruce's family was there. We really didn't blame Jerry. I mean even though he was the one that pulled the trigger, we hugged and shed a couple of tears because we had both lost a son because of Sherry. Her lover, Jerry Cassidy, used a 20-gauge shotgun to kill Bruce Miller.

Marcy Mavery was amazing as a prosecutor. She used a computer and his emotions to get him to do it. There may not be a bloody trail of evidence but there's an electronic trail. And this is something new in the prosecutor's arsenal. There really are only truth in the whole emails was that she was married. And she was a female.

The jury needed to see while she may not have pulled that trigger, she was the mastermind. They bring in deputies to begin reading passages back and forth. It made it easier for people to understand what was being said. They just read the words but still it rang in here. That exchange was a dramatic part of the court TV coverage.

Want to make mad passionate love to you always. I am trying to leave.

I will. When I can. Honey, I hate that man. He will pay. No one is going to get away with the things he has done to you. Why did you want to have Bruce killed? If you got together, you got married and you decided, okay, this is a really what I want after all. Walk away. It seems that the only plausible motive is money but she got tens of thousands of dollars.

It wasn't a gold mine. I felt a little bit off balance because I couldn't understand.

“Why did she have to kill him? Why didn't she leave him?”

And his art position there. You know that the defense is going to bring that up. There's absolutely no motive for her at all to kill her husband. David Nicola is a great trial attorney. He is a flamboyant and he's just as big hair and

This was his moment and he was defending this innocent 28-year-old wife widow mother.

“He was not manipulated at all. He was the one manipulating.”

There's also the claim by the defense that Jerry is a jilted lover. What happened is he became bitter and hostile and vengeful torture. He made this all up because he was pissed off that he was duped and dumped and that he framed her out of bitterness. When she rebuffed his advances that he went after and then killed himself. We have a killer ladies and gentlemen in this case.

So the defense's theory is essentially that the real suspect is Bruce's former employee who owed

him money and didn't want to pay it back.

The real killer is ladies and gentlemen this John Hutchinson. So the defense puts John's brother herald on the stand and he repeats claims that he made to police during the investigation that John told him he did it. It made me look like crap. That there pretty well ended my relationship with him. We haven't talked long enough to have a hot dog since then.

I made several phone calls trying to find him to see if he dropped off a car someplace. The fatal mistake in my opinion that sealed her fate was when she testified.

“We had so many things that she said that she did in those emails that I think that she felt”

she had a testified to try to explain some of it away. She read myths on the stand that she wrote most of these exchanges but she also wanted the jury to understand that in her mind this was a fantasy world. You can make up whatever you want. But how does she explain all those messages to Jerry? Complaining about the terrible abuse she supposedly suffered at Bruce's hands.

I thought by writing stuff like that that he would leave me alone that at that point he wouldn't want anything to do with me. Ed and work. I want to just jump in and say you lie and it's not true. It turns out that

“she remiller lied about those pregnancies that brought so much joy to Jerry. Jerry believed”

that he had impregnated Sherry Miller and he believed that Bruce Miller had killed those children. She claimed that the reason why she told Jerry that she was pregnant was because he was depressed. That is so twisted and it was really sad when you learned in court that she had a tube side and it wasn't even remotely of hospitality. The defense claimed that those instant messages at the heart of the prosecution's case

her step-by-step plan on how Jerry should murder her husband Bruce. They claimed those were phony too. She was claimed that Jerry faked it and we found it out her computer. He couldn't have put it on her computer if he faked it. So David Nicole brought out an expert witness saying that emails can be easily faked. But when pressed by the prosecutor about these specific exchanges he says there's no indication that they were made up. Which kind of blue

all that out of the water. What you have is a cold, calculated, premeditated murder by Sherry Miller. On the day of the verdict I saw her all dressed up and made up and all that stuff I'm thinking she thinks she's getting out of here. We not only get a verdict we get yet another unexpected turn in the case. I was just like this can't be happening. It's just to be fun. The news season of scrubs Wednesdays 8/7 central on ABC and stream on Hulu.

It's the paradise podcast. I am your host Ryan Michelle Bethe with my husband, Sterley. Join us here on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus where we'll discuss each episode with the cast and crew of paradise. I'll be getting all the secrets from Dan Fogerman, James Marsden, Shaling Woodley, Julian Nicholson, and Sterling Helpy Brown. Paradise, the official podcast, is now streaming and stream paradise on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

The jury finds that the defendant guilty is charged to conspiracy to commit first degree

as anator and a man. You can't believe the feeling of relief when they read the verdict

“guilty. And then it was like you could actually breathe. You were shocked. Yes, like it's over.”

Like people really know what I am, what I did, I'm going to prison. She had been for there for six, seven, eight, nine years and then in stepped a federal judge. Shary Miller is free to post bond which would release her from prison. You're granted an automatic appeal on the state of Michigan. The judge determined that the suicide note shouldn't have come in and so she was to be retried. A tearful and emotional Shary Miller walks quietly out

of the Genesee County jail with her legal team at her side. I was just like what this can't be happening. She knew where we live, but we didn't have any idea where she was. Even her own family,

“they were kind of scared of Shary being an outer prison. They didn't know what she was capable of.”

What was that like to be free again? I tried to live. I tried to make the best so much. She had a chance to know her, her daughter, her grandchild and realized what she had done to Jerry's family. It pissed everybody off quite a bit, but in fact was, you know, this woman's not worth our time to think about. But you're still holding on to those lies. There was a whole bit of a player that was like hellest and slowly those skills were starting to fall off.

Clearly there was something wrong with that decision and eventually it was litigated. Prosecutors fought long and hard to get that conviction reinstated. After three years, they did. A court ruled that the suicide note was in fact admissible. So there will be no new trial for Shary and she's ordered back to prison. That day, when I had to walk through the door, it was when the full impact of

everything that I did to everybody just hit me really hard that day. Shary told me that saying goodbye to her daughter and granddaughter really changed her. But it would take another three plus years before the biggest change happened.

When she sent a letter to the judge and prosecutor for the first time,

finally admitting what she'd done. That was truly astounding to open up my mail one day and get a letter from Shary Miller professing her guilt. She said we got a couple things wrong, but for the most part we got everything right and that she was no longer going to file her next appeal. This is a copy of the letter. It's four pages long, typewritten and it reads in part. I don't want bruises or jerry's family to have to suffer anymore.

They have waited 16 years to hear me say, "I am guilty. I did it." In the fact that she confessed was a big deal because she had maintained her innocence,

“like it may be wonder why. Now, why do you think it took you so many years to fess up?”

Well, it was so much easier lying about it to myself. It's so much easier to look at yourself when you don't pass to look at yourself with the truth. She even says it right in her letter. I know I'm not going to get parole out of this. I don't know what her reason is.

I did it because it was the right thing to do. I've never thought the right thing. I just wanted

to do one right thing before I leave this world. And so you take responsibility? I absolutely do, not just for groups, but for jerry, that is well. At that moment, maybe for the first time ever, I had some amount of sympathy for Shereel Miller. I like to think that finally she realized what she had done. Everything she does, there's a scheme behind it. There's a plot behind it.

Who does it really benefit? Benefit's Shereel Miller. She wants everyone to believe that

I'm finally being honest. She's not really honest.

she goes much further. She goes into great detail exactly how she says the murder happened.

“We had been talking about it for a while. Was it days or weeks or months do you think?”

Probably weeks. On the day of the murder, jerry cast a day follows Shereel's instructions. He drives a Michigan and he meets with Shereel so that she can give him a cell phone to use. It was almost like a movie that we were just playing again. But after I met him at the truck stop, I knew this was going to happen. What was the plan moving forward?

I was supposed to cause make sure that Bruce was alone.

I will send you a signal by calling that cell phone and that means he's alone. Go do it. So that was the signal for jerry. Was you called rang once and hung up? Yes. And while I was on the phone with Bruce, this went through said that somebody was pulling off and that's when I knew that jerry was there. Jerry walks in and shoots Bruce. He had planned on saying, "Hi, I'm jerry." So that the

supposed abusive mafia criminal would know exactly who was killing him. So you weren't on the phone with Bruce when the gun was fired? No, but with it I mean it had to be a minute. Jerry had actually told me that she was on the phone with him at the time he did it, because she wanted to hear it done. That's a special kind of evil. And so how did you learn that the deed was done? After words he called by landline and led it ring once and hung up.

That was his signal to tell me he was on his way that circumstances.

“And how did you feel once you knew that your husband was dead? I think it was shocked.”

Even though I knew it was happening, it was still a shock. You're like this really happens. I really deserve it. Part of the plan was somebody had to discover the body. And she called his brother to go look for him. She set me right up there to go find you. It's just what she did. The hurt that she inflicts on people is remarkable. As if knowing that Bruce has been murdered is not bad enough. If we are to believe sherry, then we understand the

how. But what will come next is a shock to everyone. Her answer to the question of why. Why did you want to dead? It took a long time for me to try to put this into words. And yet there are plenty of people who knew you when you were lying all the time. Who think you're lying now, and that this is some sort of big act. I'm sure I can't make anybody believe me. All I could do is show him. She remiller told me she wanted to come clean about everything.

For example, she admitted for the very first time that she started contacting Jerry Cassadet online

even before she married Bruce. She also reveals that she used sex as a weapon against men.

“That's how I got what I wanted. It wasn't just Bruce or Jerry, it was any man. It was what”

you could see. You could get at me and to do. It was like a video game and each man and each relationship was another level. Sherry's manipulation of Jerry started with sex and moved on to more involved lies. All of it ultimately enough to convince a former homicide detective to commit murder. How did Jerry react when you told him that you were pregnant with his baby?

You had had your tubes tied earlier. How were you able to fake the belly bump?

I just pushed my belly out. Jerry wanted to believe it. So bad that I believed they see the pregnancy, even though it wasn't there. When you broke the news that that baby was gone, what did you say? I wrote him on a chat. He was devastated. Devastated. Devastated. And you told him not just that you'd lost the babies but that Bruce had beaten you to the point of losing those babies. I did. I did. And so Jerry saw red. Very, very much so.

I mean, you were a Mary Kay cosmetics consultant. Was that makeup on your belly? Yes, it was. I remember being a smear and just trying to make it be more real, trying to create more reality. She manipulated him into thinking that Bruce was a terrible, horrible person and that the world would have been a better place without him. She definitely took a page of Jerry Cassidy. There's no one to own. Said him right up. Come up here and show

“my brother. Why did you have to do that? Ruin people's lives to why you did?”

For what reason? What did you have to gain? I wasn't sure she was going to answer that question. But when she did, what she said really surprised me. If I could just say it was so I could get money, it wouldn't sound as bad as what it really was. Bruce was so close to knowing who I really was. Like, what was really inside of me, the consequence of Bruce died was smaller than what the consequence would have been if he knew that I wasn't who he thought I was. So rather than face

the truth, you were willing to have your husband be killed? Yes. Yes, it was a game, thank you. How do you understand somebody who kills as part of a game? It's hard to wrap your hat around. In her effort to, as she claims, be open and honest, Shari went on to say that after the murder, she not only knew that Jerry was suicidal, she knew he wanted to confess. Because he had been

“suicidal before I think that people just didn't believe, but I believed him. He told me about the”

briefcase. He told you he had a briefcase full of evidence against you. Yeah, but I felt like I could talk my way out of anything. And so when the trial was approaching, did you feel like you were going to be found not guilty? Yeah. I still, in my head, felt like there's no way they're not going to believe me. Shari said she felt so confident about her case that she rejected a plea offer during the trial. You could have saved yourself if you'd simply told the truth.

Yes, I could have, and I waited to tell the truth until I get nothing from it, but hopefully, hopefully, I've heard you say that you deserve to be in prison for the rest of your life. I do, I don't feel that I deserve to live life and be happy with they know that you know, they don't got that to you. What we didn't expect in our conversation was that Shari was going

“to share that she had written apologies to the victim's families. Would it be okay if I read them?”

Sure. For the very first time, the victim's families are about to hear from Shari.

I was kind of like to hear what she had to say. So when you're ready to just kind of push play and you guys can listen. There is no way how will they react. There's no way for me to change or undo what I did. I have turnedly hurt you and I am so sorry for that. Shari Miller read what she called letters apologizing to the people she hurt. So when you're ready if you just kind of push play and when we interviewed some of those victims

families, we asked if they wanted to hear the recording. My, Jerry brother, Jerry would have never heard

wanted to protect them of me. Bruce has been a breach that only have I responsible for

“the first week that I'm responsible for continuing to open the world over and over by lying”

for 70 years. Through it all, you showed us unbelievable amount of grace towards my families. For that, I thank you. My response to that letter, I just hope she writes in hell. That's where she belongs. It's difficult to believe anything that the woman has to say.

“I don't know if I could ever forgive her. I want to say that I can forgive her, but”

can't. I can't. Some things are not forgivable and she is not forgivable. I forgive her. I'm still my true skin and crawl knowing that there's people out there that can do these kinds of things. For all the ugly devastation in this case, I hope she comes out of it understanding what she did and with a genuine attitude of making a man's. One last question from me, which is how would you describe your relationship with your children

and grandchildren today? Amazing. Like, I can't believe how much I've put them through and they

have to love me. They still call me off. I cherish every one of those moments. And Bruce and Jerry don't get those. They don't get those. They don't. Jerry was a good guy all the way around. He loved to have fun. I've spent time with his family at the

lake that was Jerry. He never knew when he died that he was going to be a grandfather and he

would have made a wonderful grandfather. He never got to know any of that. It was just such a waste. Bruce is my brother. It's been twenty-two years, so it seemed like yesterday. He's never going to forget it. That's all there is to it. Bruce was a hell of a guy. I've never been replaced.

“I love him. And despite charemillers admission and apology, the only way she could get out of prison”

is if the Michigan governor actually grants her clemency. And her experts say there is virtually no way that will happen. From all of us here at ABC News in 2020, good night. You're a man of the same age. You're a man of the same age. You're a man of the same age.