Grant Amato Case | The Interrogation & Trial | Pt2 — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00[Music]
2. 0:14oh
3. 0:18hey everyone uh chris here thanks for
4. 0:20stopping by i do appreciate it
5. 0:22today well today we're not gonna do a
6. 0:25coffee and crime because there is no
7. 0:27coffee involved today
8. 0:29this girl has already had a little too
9. 0:31much so we're gonna just
10. 0:33leave that part out but we are going to
11. 0:37dive back into the grand amato case
12. 0:40and kind of pick up where we left off
13. 0:44we're going to talk a little bit about
14. 0:46the interrogation and a little bit about
15. 0:48the trial
16. 0:49so where we left off now if you remember
17. 0:52grant amato had become obsessed
18. 0:55completely over the top in love
19. 0:58with a webcam girl named sylvia she was
20. 1:01from bulgaria
21. 1:03grant had pretty much stolen
22. 1:07not pretty much he had stolen hundreds
23. 1:10of thousands of dollars from his
24. 1:12family to pay for this webcam girl
25. 1:16and father kicked him out of the house
26. 1:20and where we left off on the last video
27. 1:23the police
28. 1:24show up to the house to do a wellness
29. 1:26check on the brother cody
30. 1:29and found that
31. 1:32margaret the mother chad the father
32. 1:36and cody the brother were all murdered
33. 1:39in the home
34. 1:52now on january 26 2019
35. 1:55the police find grant at a local hotel
36. 1:59and you know grant was very cooperative
37. 2:02he wasn't putting up a struggle
38. 2:05he was willingly going with
39. 2:08the police they wanted to bring him down
40. 2:10to the station for questioning
41. 2:12and he went and the weird thing about
42. 2:15that that i found was really strange was
43. 2:18never once did he even ask why he was
44. 2:20being taken in
45. 2:21or what had happened kind of weird
46. 2:25so they took him in for questioning they
47. 2:27sat down and
48. 2:28for the first couple hours they were
49. 2:31asking all
50. 2:32you know the basic questions what he did
51. 2:34for work what he did
52. 2:36for work in the past what his interests
53. 2:38and hobbies
54. 2:39were you know the basic stuff now
55. 2:43the cops at this point are really
56. 2:46trying to dive deep and get a very
57. 2:49detailed
58. 2:51description as to where grant was the
59. 2:5324th and the 25th of january
60. 2:56they want literally step-by-step
61. 2:59accounts
62. 3:00so grant answers all their questions
63. 3:02very casually so grant talks about
64. 3:05leaving his house
65. 3:06he talks about packing up his bags he
66. 3:08talks about leaving the house around 9
67. 3:1130 which on a side note later he did
68. 3:14retract
69. 3:15and said he left around
70. 3:18you know a little after midnight and i
71. 3:21think the reason he
72. 3:23retracted that was because the cops were
73. 3:26really pressuring him on this meeting
74. 3:28with his brother remember
75. 3:29in the first video i had talked about he
76. 3:32met his brother down the road
77. 3:34they had a talk and his brother was
78. 3:36going to take care of things
79. 3:38well when that wasn't all adding up and
80. 3:40grant was getting a little bit flustered
81. 3:42he changed his story to he left the
82. 3:45house
83. 3:46just shortly after midnight and that
84. 3:48meeting never even happened on the side
85. 3:50road he did say that he went to a local
86. 3:54store called
87. 3:55publix to use their wi-fi now publix was
88. 3:58already closed at the
89. 4:00time but their wi-fi was always running
90. 4:03he talked about going into panera bread
91. 4:07before checking checking into the
92. 4:08doubletree hotel
93. 4:10he does mention that once he does check
94. 4:12into the hotel he never left
95. 4:15he basically checked his emails and
96. 4:18wouldn't you know what surprise surprise
97. 4:20logs on
98. 4:22to message his webcam
99. 4:25girl sylvie i do want to point out
100. 4:29that during the interrogation
101. 4:32grant really kept reiterating the fact
102. 4:36that he was very scared of his dad
103. 4:39and that his brother cody kept telling
104. 4:42him he was going to take care of things
105. 4:44he kept talking about that an awful lot
106. 4:48and the cops were questioning him on
107. 4:50that because i guess at one point
108. 4:52the father when he had kicked him out
109. 4:53said you know if you ever come back here
110. 4:55i'm going to kill you
111. 4:56so he kept really reiterating
112. 4:59the fact that he was really scared of
113. 5:01dad
114. 5:02and that his brother cody was going to
115. 5:04take care of things
116. 5:06and you know don't worry about anything
117. 5:09so what i find really interesting
118. 5:12in this whole interrogation is
119. 5:16the fact that after two hours
120. 5:19two hours of talking to cody
121. 5:23questioning him getting answers
122. 5:26you know talking back and forth
123. 5:30one of the detectives finally said do
124. 5:33you even know
125. 5:33why you are talking to us well
126. 5:37grant replied quote i honestly don't
127. 5:40know
128. 5:41but i'm pretty freaked out at this point
129. 5:44and
130. 5:44quote now now i don't know if it's just
131. 5:48me
132. 5:50but i'm pretty sure most of us
133. 5:55if the cops showed up at your door asked
134. 5:58you to come down to the station
135. 6:00is questioning you for two hours don't
136. 6:03you think the natural response is to
137. 6:06start asking tons of questions like why
138. 6:09are you questioning me
139. 6:11what's wrong what happened is my family
140. 6:13okay
141. 6:14you know i would be asking a million
142. 6:17questions
143. 6:17never once did grant ask
144. 6:21why he was being questioned what was
145. 6:24happening if everything was okay
146. 6:25i find that so bizarre and
147. 6:29a little suspicious if you know what i'm
148. 6:32saying
149. 6:33so at one point during the interrogation
150. 6:36the detectives did bring up the fact
151. 6:38that
152. 6:39they were able to trace back his digital
153. 6:42footprint through his cell phone and you
154. 6:45know pinging off the cell towers and
155. 6:47stuff
156. 6:48and they place
157. 6:51him very close to the home
158. 6:55now grant admitted that he started
159. 6:57driving back to the house
160. 7:00but then changed his mind turned around
161. 7:03and left well the detectives then said
162. 7:05well if you were driving to the house
163. 7:07did you not happen to notice all the cop
164. 7:10cars
165. 7:11the news vans and all the commotion that
166. 7:13was going around your house
167. 7:15didn't that make you curious as to what
168. 7:17was going on
169. 7:19he he he didn't really
170. 7:22answer in a very specific way he kind of
171. 7:26just
172. 7:28well you know i didn't know he's he i
173. 7:30don't know i didn't know
174. 7:32he's always very nonchalant about his
175. 7:35answers he said that he went to panera
176. 7:37bread
177. 7:37he did a search for the top news stories
178. 7:40and found out that there was a shooting
179. 7:43slash murder on his street but
180. 7:46he said he didn't know what to do
181. 7:50didn't know what to do now if you
182. 7:52remember from earlier i mentioned that
183. 7:54he said he went back to panera bread
184. 7:56then went back to the hotel and messaged
185. 7:58sylvie
186. 7:59so my thought process through the whole
187. 8:02thing is
188. 8:03there's a murder on your street
189. 8:06he hasn't heard from his family and
190. 8:10grant decides his first priority is to
191. 8:13go
192. 8:14message his webcam girl sylvie
193. 8:19sounds a little off to me so during the
194. 8:22rest of the interrogation
195. 8:24the cops just proceed to just really try
196. 8:27to drill down his
197. 8:28answers because they do keep changing
198. 8:31slightly um and he just really proceeds
199. 8:34to say that he doesn't know what
200. 8:36happened blah blah blah
201. 8:39after the interrogation his brother
202. 8:43his older brother jason ends up showing
203. 8:46up talks to him for a few minutes
204. 8:48the next day he was released from
205. 8:52custody two days later on january 28th
206. 8:56the investigators did obtain an arrest a
207. 8:59warrant
208. 9:00and he was picked up and was charged
209. 9:03with three counts
210. 9:04of first degree murder so that's
211. 9:08basically it for the interrogation
212. 9:10um if you're interested in watching the
213. 9:12full interrogation i will post a copy of
214. 9:15the link in the description field below
215. 9:18and in the meantime we are going to jump
216. 9:22into a quick brief talk about
217. 9:25the trial
218. 9:34so here we are at the trial grand amato
219. 9:36has been charged with three counts of
220. 9:38first degree murder
221. 9:39and surprise not surprised
222. 9:43grant pleads not guilty
223. 9:46so there's just a few things i want to
224. 9:47talk about the trial because the trial
225. 9:49was
226. 9:50well i wouldn't say it was a long trial
227. 9:52but there was a lot of information given
228. 9:54a lot of witnesses a lot of experts
229. 9:58you know criminal analysis forensics all
230. 10:01that kind of stuff but there's just a
231. 10:02few things i want to touch on
232. 10:04that i thought were not
233. 10:07more important than others but maybe
234. 10:09just interesting
235. 10:11one of the things we have to remember is
236. 10:14when the police showed up
237. 10:15at the house to do the wellness check
238. 10:18there was no sign of forced entry there
239. 10:20was no broken
240. 10:22windows nothing was a miss
241. 10:26and everything was locked and secured
242. 10:30so that's the first thing another thing
243. 10:32that
244. 10:33was that really struck out
245. 10:36was the fact that he was home all day so
246. 10:40by his own admission grant talks about
247. 10:43the fact that he was home all day he was
248. 10:45packing
249. 10:46he was in the house and remember
250. 10:50we had talked about the fact that at
251. 10:51first he said he left at 9 30 but then
252. 10:53changed his story
253. 10:54to the fact that he left a little after
254. 10:56midnight
255. 10:57so during the trial
256. 11:00the forensics the criminal analysis
257. 11:04everybody shows that margaret the mother
258. 11:07was murdered at her desk in the back of
259. 11:10the head
260. 11:12chad the father was shot in the kitchen
261. 11:15still wearing his work clothes and it
262. 11:19was proven that he did leave work in the
263. 11:22afternoon and was home by
264. 11:24about 5 30 in the afternoon
265. 11:27during the trial it was stated that the
266. 11:30first
267. 11:31gunshot to the father did not kill him
268. 11:35and on the crime scene photos you can
269. 11:38see what
270. 11:39looks what appears to be the father kind
271. 11:42of crawling across the floor
272. 11:44and then it was a second shot to the
273. 11:47head that was the fatal one
274. 11:49cody the brother was shot in the face in
275. 11:52the hallway
276. 11:52by the garage one of the things that the
277. 11:56prosecutors really tried to dive
278. 11:58deep into during this trial was the
279. 12:01timeline
280. 12:02because if you piece it all together
281. 12:04none of it makes sense you know
282. 12:06the father mother works from home she's
283. 12:10at her desk but she's been shot last
284. 12:12known activity on her computer was about
285. 12:144
286. 12:1545 the father gets home from work he's
287. 12:19still in his work clothes
288. 12:20he's shot cody gets back to the house
289. 12:24the brother cody gets back to the house
290. 12:26around 9
291. 12:2730ish and he's shot as well
292. 12:31but now grant's saying that he never
293. 12:33even left the house till after midnight
294. 12:36so according to grant
295. 12:39he would have left the house after
296. 12:42midnight
297. 12:43and all this stuff would have happened
298. 12:45between
299. 12:47you know say let's just you know for
300. 12:49argument's sake say between midnight and
301. 12:516 a.m
302. 12:53so you you know you would have to
303. 12:54believe that the mother was still
304. 12:56sitting at her desk
305. 12:58after midnight dad is still in his work
306. 13:02clothes in the kitchen like none of it
307. 13:03makes sense
308. 13:05another thing that was really
309. 13:06interesting was the fact that the scene
310. 13:08was set up it was actually staged to
311. 13:11look like a murder suicide
312. 13:14they knew that wasn't the case because
313. 13:16after doing the investigation and
314. 13:18everything
315. 13:19they found that there was actually no
316. 13:20gsr no gunshot residue on anybody's
317. 13:23hands
318. 13:24and while one of cody's guns was found
319. 13:28at the scene
320. 13:29there were shell casings from that
321. 13:32gun placed around the bodies it was
322. 13:35proven
323. 13:36by forensics that the bullets that
324. 13:39killed the family
325. 13:40did not come from that gun and to this
326. 13:43day
327. 13:44the gun that actually was used to murder
328. 13:47the family has
329. 13:48never been found it was also stated in
330. 13:51the trial
331. 13:52that none of the shots that killed the
332. 13:54family were at close range
333. 13:55shots so if it was a murder-suicide you
334. 13:58would think
335. 13:59that the last person to kill himself
336. 14:03it would have been a close range shot
337. 14:06you can't
338. 14:07you know put your hand three feet away
339. 14:11and kill yourself that was also proven
340. 14:14in the trial
341. 14:15that there was no way this could have
342. 14:17been a murder-suicide
343. 14:19there was also a note found in grant's
344. 14:22car
345. 14:23written as cody but it was later
346. 14:26determined that it was you know grant
347. 14:27that wrote it
348. 14:29and prosecutors figure that it was
349. 14:32grant's intent
350. 14:33to go back to the house to plant this
351. 14:36suicide this murder suicide
352. 14:40note when he was heading back that's
353. 14:44when he noticed
354. 14:45all the cop cars and news vans
355. 14:49so that idea went out the window so he
356. 14:52quickly turned around
357. 14:53and left and that was a really key point
358. 14:58in what the prosecutor was trying to
359. 15:00drive home to the jury
360. 15:02you see how this is all kind of coming
361. 15:04together
362. 15:06another interesting thing that was
363. 15:07brought up in the trial is the fact that
364. 15:10dad's
365. 15:10phone was unlocked it was
366. 15:13unlocked after he was
367. 15:16murdered and you can do this one of two
368. 15:19ways you can either enter the code
369. 15:21or you can use your fingerprint
370. 15:24to unlock the phone now the prosecution
371. 15:28argues that someone
372. 15:33had taken dad's finger after he shot
373. 15:37wiped the blood off on his shirt
374. 15:40and you and place the finger on the
375. 15:42phone to unlock it
376. 15:45now why why do you think that would
377. 15:49happen
378. 15:50well it was also discovered later
379. 15:54that grant had accessed
380. 15:59chad the dad's bank account
381. 16:03and had made grant an authorized
382. 16:06user on that account
383. 16:09[Music]
384. 16:11not looking too good for uh old grant
385. 16:14there
386. 16:15so now it's 3am and
387. 16:18grant ends up at the publix we already
388. 16:20know this from grant's own admission
389. 16:22and not only from his own admission but
390. 16:26uh the it guy from publix had come in to
391. 16:29testify that they
392. 16:31keep the records of all unique addresses
393. 16:34logging onto their wi-fi they keep the
394. 16:36records
395. 16:38and it shows that grant had
396. 16:41accessed their wi-fi
397. 16:44from about 3 am to about 5 am
398. 16:49you wonder well what is this guy doing
399. 16:52in the middle of a parking lot in the
400. 16:54middle of the night
401. 16:58well surprise surprise he checks his
402. 17:01emails
403. 17:02and what does he do he logs on to
404. 17:04sylvia's
405. 17:05web page remember sylvia
406. 17:08his love his love life the girl he
407. 17:12can not let go of
408. 17:16yeah so the trial itself lasted several
409. 17:19days
410. 17:20uh like i said there was many witnesses
411. 17:22a lot of
412. 17:23expert testimony
413. 17:27it was it was a pretty good trial once
414. 17:30again
415. 17:30i will post a link to the beginning of
416. 17:34the trial in the description field
417. 17:36below for anybody that actually wants to
418. 17:38watch the full trial
419. 17:41i felt like the prosecution did a really
420. 17:43good job in their closing arguments
421. 17:46in the way they had
422. 17:49really told the story that there was no
423. 17:52other option
424. 17:53other than grant murdering his family
425. 17:58in this case they
426. 18:01really did a good job i felt of painting
427. 18:04the timeline
428. 18:06of how everything happened and how
429. 18:09grant's story
430. 18:11it couldn't even have happened the way
431. 18:14he had said it did
432. 18:15because of the timeline and all the
433. 18:17digital footprints
434. 18:19and where they had found the bodies the
435. 18:22location
436. 18:23everything else i thought it was done
437. 18:25very well the jury
438. 18:26came back after about eight hours of
439. 18:29deliberating
440. 18:30and found him guilty on all three
441. 18:33charges
442. 18:34of first degree murder now
443. 18:37grant still claims
444. 18:40that he is innocent and that he did not
445. 18:43kill his family
446. 18:47so that's the story of grant amato um
447. 18:50i hope you enjoyed it as much as i did i
448. 18:53found this case
449. 18:54absolutely fascinating if i got any of
450. 18:57the information
451. 18:58wrong or i misspoke i mean no disrespect
452. 19:02to the family or to anybody involved
453. 19:06i try to do my best to get the accurate
454. 19:08information
455. 19:09and like always if you're interested in
456. 19:12hearing about more true
457. 19:13crime stories and my take on them
458. 19:16don't forget to hit the subscribe button
459. 19:20and the little notification bell anyway
460. 19:23you guys i hope everybody's doing well
461. 19:26and taking care of yourselves and we
462. 19:28will talk with you next time