The House on Badger Lane

When it comes to sports in school, who gets to compete with the girls?

And how much power does the president actually have to hire and fire at independent agencies? These are some of the key questions before the U.S. Supreme Court this term. And as any good lawyer knows, whether you win or lose in the highest court depends on

“the facts, the evidence, and how you frame your arguments, but that's not the only thing”

that matters. I'm Laura Jarrett, Senior Legal correspondent at NBC News, and this month, in a new series for our here's the scoop podcast, I'm talking to legal experts and lawyers whose past legal victories are now the building blocks for the biggest cases still left to be decided. I want to know how they condense the court they were right when the stakes were high,

what special sauce locked it in, and what could be different this time around. Join us for here's the scoop Supreme Court edition. New episodes, every Saturday, you can find here's the scoop from NBC News on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, it's Kate Snow, NBC News anchor, and host of the NBC News podcast, The Drink.

And this month, I'm grabbing a Hugo Spritz with former reality star, Lauren Conrad. Here at The Drink, we love learning about someone's journey to the top, and Lauren and I we go back to the very beginning of her extraordinary story.

We talk about why she always saw a reality TV as temporary for her.

The scrutiny she faced in the public eye, and why she says she'll never watch Laguna Beach again. Hope you'll join us for the drink, listen and follow wherever you get your podcasts. He was coming towards me with his arms raised, I started pushing back, he grabbed me. I was shaking, I said stop, stop, what are you doing, stop?

They had a charm to life by the beach, surfer death. He was a stud, you know, I don't know how to lie to him. She would do family oriented things. And a picture perfect home, tucked away on Badger Lane. This is our little American dream.

He wanted a lifestyle where he could be there for his family for his kids.

“That's what made what happened so startling.”

It was dark when they got there, they found the body upstairs in the master bedroom. The victim was clearly shot with a handgun. The kids are missing, Julie was missing. This is this a case of murder. This is our neighbor, these are friends.

You're just in other shock. There were secrets in that house. Who? What unlocked them? I didn't want my family to know, I didn't want my neighbors to know.

Devious and manipulative. Our best friend, it didn't have to end like this. I'm Lester Holt and this is Date Line, here's Keith Morris. Brief, like the ocean, rolled into their lives and waves. Ride the waves or sink, it seemed to say, ride them again and again.

Just a shot to the heart. Once there were four fast friends, four tall men before it all went down of the waves to come to our new meaning. It didn't have to end like this. No except it did.

When you did? just feel like someone hitching a stomach of it hard and you wanted to cry. What could they do? Ride. It's what harp would have wanted after all. harp.

Jason Harper, sports loving, outdoors loving, California boy. With a childhood best friend named Paul Severn, who as they grew became tall, Paul.

We were always together, you know, in the early years he was always taller than me, but

then I caught up to him, like we were both the two tall skies in school. So when they got to high school, there was one sport that were very well suited to play. Volleyball.

“harp was a stud, you know, I think I lied to you, I'm not going to show you a good idea.”

He was, you know, MVP on the team. Yes, and went on to play at UCLA, where he met Jeremy Brandt. We're the art together on UCLA Bruins Talk on public access TV. Everybody came back and we're not going to lose or whatever and came back and they haven't lost since then.

We can be a lot of teams out there, you know, we could definitely be a final four contender. I always say we ran the same speed and so we would run the warmups the same speed and we would end up talking together and we became roommates throughout college and just a great guy, a great friend. Quiet mind you, shy, at least around the girls.

He wasn't quite the ladies name, you know, I'm not going to lie to you.

at a party. Tall Paul was there too. The girl's name was Julie Syhack. She kind of zoned in on harp right off the bat and started talking to him. So I get the impression she picked him.

Yeah, exactly. One pretty fast after that and why not? Julie was pretty and smart and from a well to do family.

Still, when harp proposed just three months after he met this first real girlfriend.

I felt like it was the first girl that he really loved and there's a lot that goes with that and I just didn't want him to be how the the wool pulled over his eyes. But they stood up for him. The marriage at San Diego's historical tell, Del Coranada, was a great happy party.

“I remember the first dance, they were in his giant ballroom and they did a very nice ballroom”

dance, you know, and harp had a small space. They moved to the seaside. The car was bad California, just north of San Diego. And Jason Harper signed on as a math teacher and volleyball coach at a local high school. Jason was your typical southern California, surfer, beach volleyball, public school

teacher. He met the third of those tall friends, Andy Tomkinson, and he and his wife, Kristen, taught it the same school, Carl's bad high. On a campus of 3,000, 2,500 students, you tend to notice other people who are at the same I level as you and Jason being six, six and myself being six, nine, there aren't too many

people at the same I level as you. No, no. So you do notice after a while, do they are? The two became fast friends, surfing, pick up basketball, poker, guy things.

And then Jason and Judy started a family, Jake first, then Jackie, Jay names.

Even if that meant not playing cards with the boys or going on a surf trip, those kids always came first.

“So were there times when you wanted to do something with them and he said, no, sorry,”

they don't. Absolutely. Yes. Oh, was here in the terraces at Sunny Creek, a brand new gated place, not far from the beach. These were their neighbors.

So many neighborhoods now. You don't even know who your next door neighbor is there, but that's not like this place at all, right? No, not at all. Julie ran the mother Todd Griff in the neighborhood, so she would actually organize all

this activities. She was a good mom. She was really involved with her kids. And heart to no, he's actually why things changed.

After Joshua, their third was born in 2011, Julie just didn't seem the same.

And as time went by, you would see less and less and less of her. She would say hi and get in a car and drive away, really quick. Which, like she was hiding from everybody, but Jason, he was part of the permanent landscape of our neighborhood. He was there every day, I mean, literally every day, very hands-on father.

While I look out my door to see if he's out there in way, if, you know, then we walk over. Bring the kids over and walk on the drive and the kids start playing right. We got home from school. And then it was an August morning in 2012. You don't know what's happened, but you know it's not something good.

You're stomach kind of sinks. Didn't take a rocket scientist. Something was awfully wrong. There was crime tape. My house is inside the crime tape and there's a police officer station at the base of

my driveway. I asked the police officer, "Is everything okay?" and he said, "No, no, it's not." What had really happened that morning? When we come back, they say that they found a body upstairs in the master bedroom. The kids are missing.

Julie was missing. We're all in shock. What are you talking about? Do you worry about their kids? Absolutely.

They're safety. Number one, they're safety. Are they okay? At 7.30 in the morning on the 8th of August 2012, Michelle Cullen gazed on the police car, the crime scene tape, and asked the cop in her driveway.

What's happening?

“You need to go inside, you need to turn on your television.”

And say what? He told me that. Yes. What are you talking about? That was apparent soon enough when they wheeled out the body bag.

One of our colleagues and friends called us and said, "I think something really bad has happened." They say that they found a body upstairs in the master bedroom and it looks like it's Jason's house. Bit by awful bit, Andy and the rest of them heard the details.

The body had been hidden under a blanket, another debris. One bullet still lodged in the chest.

The victim was the beloved member of that tall quartet.

The neighborhood dad, Jason Harper. That was terrible enough, but it was not. The kids are missing, Julie was missing, and as details unfolded, we are in complete shock. Officers continue their investigation at the Harper residence. They still have grown shock.

Jason's dad, we're flipping out and they're saying we're missing this woman and flashing her plates and her picture on the news. So what happened?

“Home invasion, kidnapping, murder suicide, did you worry about their kids?”

Oh, that was the worst part, absolutely. Absolutely. They're safety. Number one, they're safety. Are they okay?

But the Carl's Bat Police Department had one piece of information the neighbors lacked, which

came in a strange phone call at 11pm the night before. Sergeant Jeff Smith was the lead detective. The watch commander, working that night, got a phone call from an attorney, asking him to go, or the police department to go do a welfare check at a residence. A welfare check, seem like an odd request.

Who was this lawyer who called? It was attorney Paul Finch's. That Paul thinks he just happened to be the XDA and now criminal defense attorney who knew the police department very well. He called an internal extension that, unlike a 911 call, was not recorded.

The cops went to the house and they found Jason's body, but not Julie in the kids. They were gone. So police talked to Paul thanks again, who said not to worry Julie and the kids were fine. Julie was not a victim. She was his newest client.

He arranged the safe return of the children to a local children's hospital, and then 15 hours after the cops discovered Jason's body, thanks to orchestrated Julie's surrender at her father's house. Did she talk to you? No.

But her attorneys spoke with local reporters. She's very upset. She's upset about her children. She's upset about her health.

“She's upset about seeing basically at this point her life is in shambles.”

It's a catastrophe all the way around. So it was. But what happened in the bedroom? Neither Julie nor attorney Finch would say. So the police launched an investigation to figure out what was Julie guilty of if anything.

To begin, they had specialists interview the two older children ages 8 and 6. He said, their day started out like a typical summer morning, and then sometime between 8 and 9 a.m. When you were watching cartoons, you just came right and you heard the loud clunk. A thund.

A thund. That's all we could tell you. I've allowed to. They know at that point that their father was dead. I don't believe so.

It must have been very confused. Yes. Right. Young children.

“And the only things you know are there's a guy with a bullet hole and the kids heard”

a thump. Yes. Not a lot to go on. Not a lot. So what did you do next?

We talked to neighbors who possibly seen things. One neighbor said that they saw this harbour leaving right around 9.05 in the morning and exiting that their gate of community. And then now you know when they left house any roughly. Now that a tech does did what they could to retrace Julie and the kids' movements.

During their interviews, the kids said their mom took them to a coffee shop first.

From that point, they went to a local play works or a jumpy type house place. And from the kids' accounts, that's where they stayed for a short period and played. And we were able to cooperate with cell phone analysis. Which led to a disturbing thought. If the thud, the kids heard, was Jason being shot.

Then the coffee run and the play date happened afterward. Well, he lay wounded or already dead on the bedroom floor. An August 9th, two days after the shooting, a medical examiner conducted an autopsy and recovered the bullet that killed Jason. It came from a 38 caliber handgun.

We did find a gun in the home where Mr. Harper was found. But it was not the gun that killed Jason. So no murder weapon and the only suspect wasn't talking. We believed that there was an argument between the two and a gun was produced in Shishanam. And we were, we didn't know why.

Oh, there wasn't answer. But do you think anyone intended to review that? Coming up. I don't understand why any of it happened. You know what I mean?

New clues. She was preparing for a change in her life. Private journals and secrets in the attic.

My wildest dreams I would have never expected that.

When date line continues. Hey guys, Willie guys here, reminding you to check out the Sunday sit down podcast on this week's episode. I get together with one of the most influential voices in the country right now. Mel Robbins on her rise from rock bottom to an empire with a top podcast, best selling

books with the message. Let them. You can get my conversation with Mel for free wherever you download your podcasts. By the time Julie Harper's attorney arranged for her to turn herself in, her husband Jason had been dead for a day and a half.

For reasons nobody could understand they appeared to be a solid couple why would she shoot him?

“That's what Carl's bad detectives were determined to figure out.”

Julie wasn't talking. So they interviewed friends and family and peeled back the layers and sergeant Jeff Smith learned that a whole year earlier. Julie set a friend some envelopes for safe keeping what was in the envelopes. Journals, writings, bank statements, personal history.

In that personal history, signs of a marriage that wasn't as perfect as it seemed. Julie wrote that Jason yelled at me and maybe divorce is the answer. It appeared that they were not happy with each other and that their marriage was going towards the end or divorce. Whatever was going on, Jason tended to keep to himself, said his teacher friends, and

he and Kristen.

He would never say Neil words about things.

We kept it very personal and private, but it was pretty clear they said the marriage was winding down, arrangements were being made. Jason's parents actually bought a house down here and it had enough room for Jason and all the kids. They were preparing for him to be able to leave.

Julie seemed to be getting ready to get out too, so it's art and Smith, in fact, she filed for divorce five days before the incident. And that same week made some unusual financial transactions. Days prior to, Ms. Harper had taken out about $10,000 in cash out of a dormant account that was under her daughter's name and she had written $4,500 checks to herself and it was

against a credit card in Mr. Harper's name. Julie had pulled out nearly $20,000 cash. We found that to be very suspicious. Deputy District Attorney Keith Waternabe was assigned the case on day one.

“Did it suggest you that she had been hoarding money in anticipation of something?”

She was preparing for a change in her life. But did the change involve divorce or murder? Julie's father, John Syhack, lived here, 30 miles or so from Jason and Julie's house. This apparently was where Julie and the kids spent the night after the shooting. So, Sergeant Smith got a search warrant for dad's place and found nothing useful.

There were other guns, but none of them fired the bullet that killed Jason.

Perhaps a little frustrated, eight days later, he got a second search warrant.

At this time, there was something new. Dr. Way and the garage ought to get a spot they searched the first time around. A blue backpack must have been hidden between searches. They opened up this blue backpack and they discovered Julie Harper's wallet, credit cards and ID, her passport, a different gun, and Jason Harper's last will-intestimate.

Also, Jason's cell phone, it's batteries removed and called and text history cleared. The backpack gun was also clean. Not the one used to shoot Jason. This had to be a getaway bag, the prosecutor decided. She must have backed it up after she killed Jason.

That's the only reason to take a person's last will-intestimate, it's because she realized he was dead. Julie's actions before and after the shooting raised all sorts of questions.

“The foremost for the prosecutor was, "Did she plan this?”

Was it pre-meditated? And if so, for how long?" We believed we could prove first-degree murder, not on the theory that she had planned this murder the days or weeks before the shooting had taken place. Instead, we were relying on the theory that even during this argument, she took enough steps

Even if it was only for a minute or two before the shooting. And that's not. In California, that qualifies as first-degree murder.

“So that's what he charged her with, first-degree murder.”

Julie pleaded not guilty, but otherwise kept her mouth shut and sat in jail. But strange details kept coming out, like what Julie's dad said at her preliminary hearing about the blue backpack. Her head actually been $39,000 inside that backpack. Julie's father admitted that he found the cash in the backpack and gave it to Julie's

lawyer to help pay for bail and legal fees. What did you think when you heard that?

In my wildest dreams, I would have never expected that.

By the way, Julie's dad testified at the pre-lim only after being granted immunity, initially pleaded the fifth. Even though bail was $2 million, Julie's family eventually coughed it up. And after more than a year in jail, she moved back into the house on Badger Lane, three doors down from Michelle Miller.

She knocked on my door to let me know that she was back. And that we're going to have a good talk someday when this is all over. What did you say to her? I was just completely shocked. I couldn't believe it.

All those comfortable notions about her neighbors, maybe Michelle didn't know them at all. I don't understand why any of it happened. You know what I mean? He was our friend and he's gone and I don't know who she is.

And when Julie finally did start talking, well...

Coming up. I said stop, stop. What are you doing? Stop. And her life on the line.

And... Yeah, our fool. The year now.

“Secret recordings from behind closed doors.”

September 2014. Two years after Jason Harper's death, his wife, Julie, the mother of our three children, went on trial for first-degree murder. She didn't look like a murderer. Yeah.

If there's such a thing.

And even though Deputy D.I. Keith Wattnabe had never been able to talk to Julie, had never heard

her story, he was confident. His theme was something he called the deterioration of Julie Harper. Her life had become a disaster, both in terms of her marriage, her children, her health, her financial state. And we believe she was seriously abusing her prescription medication.

Look at this. You told the jury, pill bottles. Though Julie suffered from an automobile immune disease, he said. This made it clear she was abusing powerful medications. And said the prosecutor, look at the mess in Julie's bedroom, as if a hoarder lived

here. When Jason's body was found, it was hidden under a blanket and surrounded by debris. The bullet that killed him entered from a side rear angle so he was shot pretty much in the back. What happened?

Julie must have shot Jason between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. said the prosecutor, well the kids were downstairs watching cartoons. And neighbors saw Julie leaving just after 9 a.m. And she was at La Costa Coffee Roasting, 40 minutes later. She wasn't crying, she wasn't upset, she didn't ask anyone to call 9-1-1.

It showed that this woman had a calist heart. She was capable of murdering her husband and really had the wear with all to be able to go out into public and appear to be perfectly normal. It was clearly murder. It's a deputy DA wasn't obvious, but was it?

“Remember Julie did not talk not once to the police or the prosecutor because the attorney”

never allowed it. But now it was time. If that's attorney Paul Face called just one witness, Julie Harper. And she said yes, she did it, she shot him, but she said it wasn't murder. Why?

Because she said, Jason Harper, so beloved by friends and neighbors and colleagues was in private an angry abusive husband. Did you videotape Jason telling you? And here was her proof, she said. Here was her secret recording of Jason losing it over money.

I don't want it. Enable your horrible money waste and your poor credit score and everything else. I don't want to enable that.

Yeah, our poor bitch, to hear it out, can't help it if you're too dumb to do it.

Too lazy. Well, you know, at least I have more words than I look at the others than you think.

“I think it's like the B.I.T.T.H. is the only word that you can use.”

That's right, right now. That is darn right. That's what you are. But, Julie, it got worse. It got physical.

He grabbed my wrist and my hand so forcefully and twisted it so hard that, I mean, it was hurting into the next day. Remember, Jason was a six foot six athlete, about a foot taller than Julie. But then they slept in separate rooms and sometimes she said when he got angry, he came to her room and the abuse turned sexual.

“I was slamming me up against the wall, face first and I said stop, stop.”

What are you doing? Stop. Julie told the jury that Jason raped her about 30 times. She said she was so frightened. She stashed a gun under her pillow just in case and she woke up the morning of the shooting

she said to the sound of Jason yelling and screaming. He was, you know, using some curse words and I got him so sick of this shit and, you know, where's my fucking computer? Jason believes that Julie that she'd hidden his computer. And his face was all red and he was just, you know, his nose is crushed up and he was

“ice-footing and he just hit this look of absolute rage and hate, but this was, I don't know”

this, but this was bad. This was bad. What did you attempt to do to that? He grabbed me and began yanking my top off. I started pushing back and somehow managed to sort of wiggle my way free pulling away as quickly

as I could moved from there across the room to my bed. What did you do when you got to the bed? I grabbed my gun from under my pillow. I'd deranged your 38 caliber handgun. He was coming towards me with his arms raised and he said, "I'm going to kill you

f*ck bitch and I was shaking and I was holding onto my gun tightly. Next thing I knew, I felt my hand jerk and heard loud noise and he was still coming forward at me and then all of a sudden he froze completely and just like a tree in the forest just fell forward at me." Just like a tree, Jason, the tall man, the athlete, the volleyball coach, the math teacher,

was dead.

So that finally was Julie's story that she was an abused woman who shot her husband

in self-defense. "Hi, that day, did you still love your husband?" "Yes. Did you have, did you want him to be dead?" "No."

But now for the first time, Julie would have to face a prosecutor with a lot of questions. Coming up, the crime recreated in court. "Do you need a moment in this Harvard?" But did the witness outmaneuver the prosecutor? "This was the smartest woman that I had ever crossed examined in my life."

He was coming towards me with his arms raised.

So finally Julie Harper told her story, her husband, Jason, was an abuser at she killed

What did you think when you heard that? "He hurt my stomach.

“She could say anything she wanted because there's two sides to everything and he's”

not here to tell his." The story was not a big surprise to Deputy DA Wattenabe, but as a prosecutor who'd specialized for years in spousal abuse cases, he just didn't believe it. She was saving her own skin and she was willing to throw her dead husband under the boss and ruin his reputation in order to do so.

"Well, that's your point of view. Maybe it was true." We consider that possibility, but it simply didn't stand up under the scrutiny of truth. It was when the prosecutor began his cross-examination that he discovered, Julie was ready for him.

"As you sit here today, do you believe that your shooting of Jason was justified based on your need to defend yourself?" "I didn't even intend to shoot him, I only wanted to scare him or to get him to stop and not rape me, not hurt me or possibly worse."

“This was the smartest woman that I had ever crossed examined in my life.”

"Darging and weaving." "Well, she was able to think on the spot." Those pill bottles all necessary for her medical condition and prescribed by her doctor

she never abused them, she said, "But if as she said, Jason was coming out of her when

she shot, why then the prosecutor wondered, did the bullet enter from the back?" "Do you mind stepping down here and I'm--" "Prossigator whatnot," he said, "up a courtroom recreation." "I'm going to have Mr. Carstandian for Jason just." The things didn't quite play out the way the prosecutor hoped.

Did Julie use this moment to her advantage? "Right, there would be a crime now, do you need a moment, Mr. Harper?" "Okay." "Position is hands where they were." She broke down and started crying and was visibly upset in front of the jury.

“"That was maybe not the best strategy in your part then, as it turned out."”

It was a powerful moment for her because it allowed her to really retell the story in an emotional

way and bring the jurors into her story. "Julie was on the stand for three days and then the jury had to decide, was she a murderer or a victim and fear for her life?" "I was juror number three in Julie Harper's trial." Joseph Dile said, "He knew early on in the deliberations.

It wasn't going to be easy for quick." Within 15 minutes we had taken a vote and it showed we were way away apart and we would argue each points to where there was nothing conclusive." On the second day of deliberations the judge called everyone back to the courtroom. "We're seeing no from the jury this morning at town 6am, the note reads, "We are unable

to reach our verdict on some of the counts, we are deadlocked." Deadlocked. "On some of the counts, but they had been able to reach a unanimous verdict on one count." "It's free in the jury." "This was the moment of truth. Did the jury believe Julie?"

"I'll ask the court to read the verdict." "Burn it. First the green murder. We need the jury in the above entitled cause. Try to defend it. Julie Harper, not guilty of the crime of murder and violation of police." "Yes, they did believe her. She did not pre-plan and deliberately kill her husband so it

couldn't be first the green murder. But was it second degree? Not pre-meditated, but still intentional?" "That the jury was hopelessly deadlocked. The judge declared a "mistrile." "The fence attorney Paul thinks." "Obviously when there's a murder trial and you get any formal acquittal, that's a good

thing." "She would have hoped for a total acquittal. So with a hung jury and bail already established, Julie walked out of the court house, a free woman." "Did she do it? Yes, she did it. Was it self-defense? It certainly was after

who knows how many years of the toxic relationship they had and his incredible cruelty."

"I felt like I've lost a little bit of faith in the justice system." "Face in the front just couldn't understand it." "Just felt like you're a little kid and someone hitched you in the stomach or they hard and you wanted to cry, but you weren't going to cry and your eyes started tearing up."

"It was very, very surreal, I guess. You know, emotional." "Well, the prosecutor thought about whether to charge her again." "Julie went on with life, back at the house on Patrick Lane." "And then she just comes back in the neighborhood." "Down the street."

"Just like we were. We're like, is this ever going to end? Are we ever going to end?"

everyone. Coming up." "Really that devious?" "She's really that devious." "Another bombshell and another trial."

“"I didn't want my family to know, I didn't want my neighbors to know."”

"What would the verdict be this time?"

"Julie Harper was walking on an air, acquitted the first degree murder. A jury deadlocked

on second degree, it tasted like sweet victory. As Keith Wattonami bit down on frustration." "The images of her walking out of that courtroom as a free woman were tough for me to swallow." "So, what he could do was try again." "Of course, first degree murder was off the table now, but he could go for a lesser charge of second degree murder, which he did. A new trial date was set for six months later,

April 2015. And then, one month before that trial was to begin. Surprise, Julie had some astonishing news for the judge. "The retry across that woman accused of killing her husband, Brittany says she is pregnant." "Seven months pregnant. God, everybody vice-surprise that did."

"She intentionally got pregnant in order to interfere with our retry."

"Ready that devious in your mind."

“"She's really that devious and well-planned and manipulative."”

"What's more, Julie's pregnancy was highly intentional in vitro fertilization." "The judge, no choice, really." "Delayed Julie's trial for five months." "Her doctor was born in April 2015, no father listed on her birth certificate." "The neighbors on Badger Lane watched and wondered."

"She decided she was going to walk the baby in the stroller through the neighborhood." "It was like nothing happened in her mind and everything was fine and she, you know, my life 2.0." "Well, not quite, of course. In September 2015, Julie, the judge, the attorneys, all assembled before a brand new jury." "12 new strangers to win over." Except this time, prosecutor Watinabe knew what was coming from Julie.

And so he canvas the witnesses. "Did they ever see signs of abuse?" "This is Jason's mother Lina." "Did Julie appear in any way to be fearful to you?" "No." "Did you see any bruises or marks on her?"

"No." "Naver Michelle Collins saw Jason and Julie together, five days before Jason's death." "Did you ever see anything that led you to believe that she was being physically abused?" "No, never." "So why would the jury believe Julie's claim that Jason did rape her violently and repeatedly?"

When Julie testified, she asked the jury to look at entries in her private journals and day planner. Whenever they saw the word "sex," said Julie, "that was code for rape." "Are you making notations of the days that you had?" "Course, sex?" "Yes."

“Prosecutor Watinabe, of course, didn't believe that. But when he challenged her, was this real emotion?”

"No, have you ever called the police on Jason for any of these incidents?" "No, I was very embarrassed. I was very embarrassed that he was doing it. I didn't want." "I didn't want my family to know. I didn't want my neighbors to know. I didn't want my friends to know." "Mindiculation? Or the awful truth?" "Once again, a jury was asked to pass judgment on Julie Harper."

"In the superior court of the state of California." "Everybody waited." "Baited breath." "We the jury in the above entitled cause, find the defendant, Julie Harper, guilty of the crime of murder,

and fix the degree they're of as murder in the second degree."

"Gilty of second degree murder." "On went the handcuffs, just like that." "Jurie number two was not at all like jury number one." "No doubt at all." "No, no, no, not at all." "No, no, no, no."

"No disrespect to the first set of jurors from the initial trial." "I just don't understand how they could know how found their guilty." "And so we made an appointment to talk to Julie by then behind glass in a San Diego County jail." "I don't think you expected this result at all. Would I be right about that?" "You'd be correct and that yeah, what was really so shocking was that they could ignore all of that

By that, she met the recording of Jason Yelling and her claim that in her diary, sex-man rape.

And despite with the jury thought, she has big plans. "Because of what I've gone through with my husband and the abuse that I've suffered, I am planning and working with a couple of people to start the Julie Harper Foundation as a charity benefiting victims of domestic violence and their families."

“"The first of all, you have to start with getting a jury to believe that you were a victim of domestic”

violence and that was your problem."

"Well and that's where you go, like the first jury did believe that. There's different people that

process information, the same information, the same evidence in very different ways." The way Jason Harper's friends processed it was the Julie tormented a good and decent man and then threw him under the bus to save her own skin.

“"The hardest thing I think for me was the rape allegations. It's just no way. No way. Not harp."”

"You know, harp's gone and you know, we miss them and we love them, but you know, for her to be put away, it helps. It helps heal." And Julie, she was sentenced to 40 years to life in prison. "As soon as I'm 42 years old, it's a death sentence." "Very true, which brought up a question on a lot of minds. Why did you get pregnant?"

“"I was such a good parent and I had that love to give to another child and really wanted”

to be able to give and share that love with my daughter who I love more than anything in the world." Julie's father sent us a statement repeating Julie's abuse claim and saying, "The verdict is unjust." We asked him and Julie's attorney and her friends and siblings any of them. "Disciple this on camera and talk about Julie if nothing else did offend her." "All declined." "Thank you very much." "Barring your successful appeal. Julie Harper will die behind bars along."

"That's all for now. I'm Lester Holt. Thanks for joining us." "I'm Craig Melveter." "Cheers." "Cheers."

"I've always been a glass half-full kind of guy and now I'm talking to some people who look at the

world that way too. Some really fascinating folks who share their defining moments, their trials, challenges, their stories, their funny and my candy. So I hope you'll join me each week and who knows. You might just come away with your own glass half-full." "Search glass half-full with Craig Melveter From today, on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts.