01x02 - A b*llet With Her Name On It

[bunniefuu]

[reporter 1] Sarah Pender was doing 110
years for a pair of Indianapolis murders

in October of 2000 before escaping
from a maximum security prison.

Investigators say Pender had help and is
being passed around from friend to friend.

The Department of Corrections,
Indiana State Police,

and the US Marshals Task Force have worked
nonstop in trying to apprehend Pender.

[reporter 2] Also tonight,
a convicted k*ller is on the loose

and a prison guard's now under arrest.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

[reporter 1] Sarah Pender was serving
a 110-year sentence at Rockville.

Prison officials say that Spitler
drove a prison van inside the gates…

[Pender breathing heavily]

My heart dropped.
I did not know what to do.

[knocks on door]

[reporter 2] It was a shock
to Steve Stultz.

[Pender] I was absolutely scared,

and I was afraid
to look out the little peephole

because I thought
I'm gonna get shot in the face.

[reporter 3 speaks indistinctly on TV]

And I thought, "This is it."

[door creaks]

And when I opened up the door,
it was my friend Thea.

[chuckles]

Thea and I spent time in prison together…

and Peggy had told Thea where to find me.

And so Thea showed up and she said,

"b*tch, what are you doing?"

I said, "Well, I did it."

[chuckling] She said, "Yes, you did.
Oh, my God, yes, you did."

She said, "We gotta get
the f*ck out of here."

So I said, "Well, let's go."

[motorcycle rumbling]

[Pender] Thea and I drive to her house.

[laughing]

That night, Thea fixed me
pork chops, potatoes, green beans.

It was delicious.

It was the best thing
I'd had in eight years.

[laughing]

I remember just poking at my food
with this real fork

and feeling, you know,
the metal on my teeth

and thinking, "Oh, my gosh, this is real."

[reporter 3 on TV]
Sarah Pender is still on the run…

[Pender] These were the most
normal things. Like, I was at home.

[reporter 3] Pender was serving time
for a double m*rder in Marion County

back in 2000.

[Pender] I remember I was sitting in, uh,
a La-Z-Boy chair and feeling the cushion

and just knowing that
the harshness of prison was behind me.

[siren wailing]

[horn honks]

[Harmon] In a fugitive investigation
such as Pender, you can't sit.

Every lead, I went and checked out.

[siren wailing]

My visit to her friend Peggy
maybe didn't bear fruit.

But, um, I left my business card,

and she said she would call me
if she heard from Sarah.

I said, "If I find out
that you're helping her,

it's gonna be a bad situation for you."

That's how I rolled. Show a presence
and then get them to work with you.

Like setting a bird trap.

I was setting areas out there for me
that would hopefully spring

and would generate a capture.

[siren blaring]

I was chasing down these lines
and meeting these offenders,

but I'm also profiling her.

She got someone to give her a phone
and help her on the run.

She's good at getting people to do things

that are outside
the normal human behavior.

Does she get people to do things

up into including putting
two bodies in a trash dumpster?

[reporter 4] Pender was convicted in 2002
for the m*rder of her two roommates.

Police say she helped her codefendant
dispose of the bodies

in a South Side dumpster.

I thought,
"Would Rick Hull play ball with me?"

Richard Hull was the codefendant.

That was her boyfriend
at the time these murders happened.

He was in Pendleton Prison
doing his own 100+ years for the murders.

[officer on radio] Unit One…

[officer 2 speaks indistinctly]

[officer 3] Checkpoint Six, copy.

[Harmon] I thought Richard
would know her better than anybody else.

I also thought he may know
where she would probably go.

So I introduced myself.

I told him I was with the US Marshals
and I was looking for Sarah.

He got a smile on his face.
He goes, "Oh, yeah?"

[Hull] I had mixed emotions
about her escape.

I was happy for her.
Go enjoy it while you can…

you know, but I was…

really hurting and… and frustrated
because I looked at my life as being over.

I mean, I'm at a maximum prison

because of Sarah.

And, um, they tell me that…

I will probably end up dying
in this place.

Ryan asked me to help,
but it was just like,

"How can I help you…

when I don't know anything?

I don't know where she is."

I mean, Rick knows her so well.
So I said, "Where could she go?

Do you have any theories
about where she may run to?"

He thought about it.

Rick told me the name Thea
and that she did time with her.

And that would be someone
she would turn to on the run.

It was a hell of a lead.

[Pender] At this point,
my money's cut off.

I don't know how I'm going
to support myself, and Thea…

gives me a suggestion.

Thea was a stripper,
and she had been spending time

with one of the clients,
uh, outside the strip club,

and she knew that
he wanted to have a threesome.

She suggested that we have sex with him
and that he would probably give us money.

At the time, I was willing
to give up my body, absolutely.

My body, my attention,
my affection for freedom.

[knocks on door]

[Pender] That night, Thea arranged
for us to meet at this motel room

and introduced me to Tom.

He was a businessman.

He was clearly in his late 50s,
but he was well-built,

he was dressed nice, smelled wonderful,

so I didn't have any worries
about him being this dirty old man.

Thea told him that my name was Brandy

and that I had just been released
from prison

and that I needed to make some money.

I retired about five years ago.

I had a freight brokering business.

I don't have anything to do

and my wife travels a lot.

I'm playing golf.

After a while, my golf game
got down in the seventies.

What else can you do?

[chuckling]
I was pretty damn good, you know, so

I started actually
living in the strip joints.

Bottom line was, sex is my drug,

and it just, it took me over.

So I was sitting there going, hey

let's get a threesome going, huh?

I want a threesome.

I mean, she comes up and gives
you a nice hug and

sweet as this and you know
and then it's like

okay, and so we had this rendezvous.

[distorted laughter]

[Pender] After the threesome,

Tom asked me what I was going to do
for the rest of the evening,

and I told him that I didn't know,
I didn't really have anywhere to go.

And so he said that I could stay in
the room because it was already paid for.

[Welch]
And so, I was kind of asking her

so what are you going to do, you know?

She goes

"Well, I think I'm gonna go

on the stripper circuit

find a job or something like that."

[Harmon] I feel like I'm on the scent.

Thea was working
in the strip club industry,

and Rick had told me that
if she really needed to get means or help,

she would go to Thea
or go to there and start hustling.

I didn't know specifically
where Thea was working,

but there was various strip clubs
here in Indianapolis,

and I went out there and spent some time
in these places to see if Sarah was there.

At this point, you don't want them
to think you're law enforcement at all.

So you go in there like a baller
and a shot caller, you know,

and what I mean by that
is you better have your money with you.

The more money you spread,

the more they're gonna see
you're just a normal guy.

One of the distinguishing marks
on Sarah was, um,

she had a tattoo of a bull's-eye
on her butt cheek,

and I went out there looking for tattoos,

looking for anybody
that looked like Sarah.

I stayed out
until I couldn't stay up anymore.

I saw a lot of a*s,
but I didn't see bull's-eyes.

I was frustrated.

But I didn't feel defeated by any means,
because I will find out who's helping her.

TOM WELCH:
After the first day I was with her

it was like eating a Lays potato chip.

You can't just have one, I was hooked.

[Pender] The next morning, Tom came again,

brought me McDonald's for breakfast.

And he offered to pay for
another night at the motel room,

so I had somewhere to go
and that he would keep me company.

So I said yes.

Tom and I were laying in bed,
and he turned on the TV

and was flipping through the channels.

[reporter 5] Investigators say
Sarah Pender is on the loose

and dangerous.

A Marion County jury convicted her
in the year 2000 in a double m*rder.

Pender escaped from
the Rockville Correctional Facility

allegedly with the help
of a correctional officer.

TOM WELCH: When I saw that on the news

that's when I started going, holy sh*t.

This is so far outside
of my realm of life.

I feel like a damn goldfish
swimming with sharks.

I can't comprehend this.

I don't know what to do.

I honestly don't know what to do.

I was like, "Damn."

[inhales sharply]

[exhales]

[reporter 4] Pender was convicted in 2002
for the m*rder of her two roommates.

[Pender] I didn't want
to tell Tom the truth,

but I didn't know what to say,

and I'm a terrible liar,
so I told him the story.

The evening that Drew and Trish
were m*rder*d,

Rick and I were out
with my dad and stepmom.

When Rick and I came home,

Drew and Rick immediately started arguing

about money that Rick's sister
owed to Drew for drugs.

Rick's talking about, you know,
"f*ck this m*therf*cker."

And, you know, he said,
"You probably want to leave."

And I told him, "I have nowhere to go.
Where am I supposed to go?"

And so I walked around the neighborhood.

When I came home…

everything seemed really quiet,
like extra quiet.

And the house was dark.

And it felt wrong.

I heard a noise.

I didn't understand what the noise was.

And I called out for Rick,
and there was no response.

And I looked.
I didn't see Drew or Trish or Rick.

There was blood on the floor.

And when I got to the living room,

I saw Rick.

Rick was bent over.

He was…

putting Trish's body into a blanket.

I do remember being very afraid.

And thinking, "What do I do now?
What do I do?"

Because I didn't know.

I said, "Ricky…"

And when he stood up, he turned around
and he just looked at me.

For a moment,
we just stared at each other.

And I clearly thought to myself,
"I'm about to die."

And so I just froze.
I just froze there and I waited.

And then I put my hands up and I
just said, "What do you want me to do?"

Rick told me to get another blanket,
and so I did.

I remember Rick dragging Trish's body
across the floor to take her out.

And when he put her body
in the back of the truck…

I saw that Drew was already in there.

I didn't know what to do…

except stand there.

I just felt so helpless.

Rick told me to get into the truck…

and I did.

I remember very clearly thinking,
"This is not real,"

and making up that everything was fine.

Rick drove only a handful of blocks away
to a dumpster behind a building.

[footsteps]

I only saw when I looked
in the rearview mirror.

And I didn't want to see anything else,
and so I just looked forward.

And I pretended not to see.

[siren wailing]

[horn honks]

[Hull] Sarah says
she had nothing to do with this,

that I was the one that did it all.

And that's not the truth.
That's not what happened whatsoever.

Drew was my friend.

He was my brother.

As far as the night
that this all took place,

um, I'm still in the middle
of some of my appeals,

so I can't get into the full details

of everything that took place,
but I did not…

I did not, uh…

I did not m*rder Drew or Trish.

When I was talking to Rick,
he openly said he walked in

and returned home and Sarah was
rocking back and forth holding a shotgun

while two dead bodies were there.

That's what he claims.

[Hull] Who are you gonna believe?

Me with my background, knowing that
here it is, I'm a drug dude,

been in the business,



bald head, goatee, looking like this.

Or some girl that's
kind of innocent-looking,

just working her way
through being a young adult.

Who you gonna believe?

Those females won't lie.
They're not gonna be deceiving.

[chuckles]

[laughs]

Sarah

she was saying,

"Tom, this is all bullshit.

I wasn't at that m*rder.

I wasn't even there at the house."

I said, "What do you mean?"

She goes, "Rick had a temper."

"Rick k*lled them."

POLICE OFFICER: Did she ever mention
that, that day that they were k*lled

she went and bought the shotgun?

[Welch] I don't think so.

[officer] Mmm.

Rick just asked me to buy a g*n
and… I said yes.

I didn't…

I didn't question why he would want it.

Um, there wasn't
a lot of discussion about it.

Um…

Rick couldn't buy a g*n
because he had a previous felony.

So, at 7:30 in the morning,
he drove us to Walmart, and we walked in.

He picked out the g*n
and ammunition that he wanted.

And I bought it,
paid with a check and my ID

thinking that this was
what I was supposed to be doing.

[water lapping]

[g*nshots]

-[camera shutter clicks]
-[g*nsh*t]

[camera shutter clicks]

[g*nsh*t]

[Hull] Did I know if Drew or Trish
was going to get k*lled with that shotgun?

No.

Sarah was playing her game,

was pointing everything at me
at the very beginning.

I just don't know what really happened.

What I can say is that
Sarah wanted that shotgun.

It was Sarah's idea
to go for the protection.

I mean, uh, I was in the drug business.
If I wanted a g*n, I could have one.

[chuckling] Okay?

I mean, getting a g*n was not a problem.
Would not have been a problem.

Um…

[police chattering on radio]

[reporter 6] The victims,
a white man and woman,

were discovered last night in a dumpster

behind the Teamsters hall
in the 800 block of South Meridian.

The two had been shot to death.

It's not an everyday occurrence to have,
uh, bodies in a dumpster in Indianapolis,

let alone two bodies in a dumpster.

Once we identified our victims,

Andrew Cataldi and Tricia Nordman,

we were able to connect the location
of where they had lived,

and we knew that the home was being rented
by Rick Hull and Sarah Pender.

Rick clearly was a suspect.
We knew Rick had been dealing drugs.

[reporter 7] Police came to believe
that this man, 22-year-old Richard Hull,

who lived with Cataldi and Nordman,
was the likely m*rder*r.

He was placed under arrest and charged
with, uh, Andrew and Tricia's murders.

We just didn't know if Sarah was involved.

DETECTIVE: Okay.

Can you please state and spell
your first and last name?

[Pender] Sarah Pender.

S-A-R-A-H

P-E-N-D-E-R.

[detective] Okay.
And can you please tell me your age?

[Pender sobbing] I'm 21 years of age.

[detective]
At any time did it occur to you

to tell the cops

or anybody in law enforcement
what happened?

[Pender] Yes, I wanted to tell
the cops when it happened.

I was scared.

I was torn between protecting myself and

and telling the truth,
because I'm not a liar. [sobs]

I am such the most honest person
and kindhearted, gentle person

that anybody will tell you.

[Finnell] She was flipping her hair

and fixing her blouse
and fixing her shirt.

I thought she was the type of woman

that maybe thought
she could talk her way out of this.

But we knew that Sarah
had purchased a weapon.

She helped conceal the evidence.

I felt like she was more involved
than she let on.

She was saying, "Tom,

I was 20 years old, I was stupid

I was the stupidest thing in the world."

But see

and you probably found this out

she is extremely intelligent.

I mean, I don't know if she tests out
as a genius or whatever

but her IQ has got to be up there.

POLICE OFFICER: Yeah well,
she majored in physics at Purdue

and that doesn't just take anybody.

[Welch]
Yeah I mean, she's a smart cookie.

I stand firm in my convictions
that she is a very, very dangerous person.

Uh, she's capable of doing about anything.

After Sarah escaped from prison in 2008,

my daughter said, "Well, Dad,
aren't you a little worried about

what she might do,
and you're the one that convicted her?

Don't you think we ought to be
concerned about her coming here?"

I said that I think Sarah
is a dark evil demon within.

I think it's a good thing
for Indianapolis and everybody else

that she's found as soon as possible

because I don't know
what she's capable of doing.

When I was a youngster, I was an actor.

Then I realized a little later on,
you need to be gainfully employed.

So I fooled around in the practice of law
and eventually ended up working

as a deputy prosecutor
in Marion County prosecutor's office.

Sarah Pender
had been charged with two murders.

I was getting to prosecute.

And I loved that.

I felt pretty good
about the evidence in the case.

[Prosser] I tried to feel optimistic
about the trial…

the best I could because I had no idea
what the evidence was.

And I just didn't know what to expect.

[Pender] Before the trial,

I thought that they just made a mistake
and everything would be okay,

that it would be fixed.

I remember sitting there thinking,
I couldn't wait to get home,

lay in my bed, eat lasagna

and figure out how I was going
to move forward with my life.

[Sells] When the trial started,

Sarah was trying to convince the jury

that although Rick
did all these horrible things

and committed these murders
and that she was with him,

that she didn't actually participate.

She said she was scared.

She thought Rick Hull might sh**t her,
but she didn't help him.

And I argued to the jury,

she had that opportunity
to leave the day after the shootings,

to go to law enforcement.

Just why in the hell
didn't you get out of there?

Leave, go.

But she didn't.

I've covered lots of m*rder cases.
I'm a journalist.

I look for evidence. I look for facts.

And in Sarah's case,
the facts Larry put forward

were really compelling.

Larry introduced a witness
named Floyd Pennington.

Floyd had been, uh, locked up in jail
on a robbery charge.

She had some sort of steamy
pen pal relationship with him

while they were both locked up in jail.

[Pender] When Floyd entered the courtroom
from the opposite side,

I wanted to yell out,
"Why are you doing this?"

Floyd was charming, and he used
proper spelling and grammar… [chuckles]

…and that's unusual
for a lot of people in jail.

After seven months of writing,
Floyd and I decided

to organize a trip to the hospital.

[Sells] They, uh, feigned some sort of
illnesses so they could talk in person.

[monitor beeping]

He told her that he wanted to have a…

a better, stronger relationship,
and she did too.

But he needed her to confide in him,

tell him the truth about the murders
of Andrew Cataldi and Trish Nordman.

[switch clicks]

[Ryckaert] So Floyd said
that Sarah had told him

that she wanted
to get rid of the roommates to…

you know, for money or drug dealing or
whatever it is they were into at the time.

And then she bought the shotgun.

She got Rick angry enough
and convinced him to commit these murders.

I wanted to scream out like,
"This is not happening. He is lying."

How could anyone believe this man?
How could anybody believe him?

[Sells] And I said she had
a Charles Manson-like ability

to convince people to do bad things.

[Ryckaert] During the trial,
Larry came out and told the jury

how there's also this one letter.

It painted a picture of Sarah,

and not as a, you know, innocent victim.

It was something
that was certainly shocking.

[Sells] "My dearest Richard,

I just snapped,

I didn't mean to k*ll them,
it must have been the acid."

[Pender] There was nothing I could do
to defend myself,

and all I could think about was,
"I didn't write this. I didn't do this."

[Sells] "I'll never forget you.
I love you and I miss you so much.

Love always."

[Ryckaert] Larry,
in his closing arguments,

sort of gave two possibilities
of ways of proving Sarah's guilt.

In one, it was that,
like that letter said,

Sarah was the one who had actually
pulled the trigger and shot the victims.

And the other scenario Larry put forward
was Floyd Pennington's statement

that Sarah had manipulated Rick
into doing these crimes.

It doesn't matter.

If the jury believes one or the other,
um, she's still guilty of m*rder.

[Sells] And I said, "You have
a responsibility to convict her."

And they did.

The jury came back in,

and the judge wrote
that she was guilty of both murders.

-[gavel strikes]
-[water splashes]

Sarah Pender was sentenced to 110 years.

All I remember is crying.

[Prosser] Oh…

I cried, you know, because what do you do?

I felt like my heart was ripped out.

[Pender] I was lost

because there was no way
that I could sit in prison for 110 years…

[sobbing] …for something I didn't do.

[siren wailing]

[reporter 5] Investigators say
Sarah Pender is on the loose

and dangerous.

A Marion County jury convicted her
in the year 2000 in a double m*rder.

[Pender]
Tom stayed with me for a few days.

Our relationship deepened.

And I just trusted that Tom was not
going to go home and call the police.

He was all these things that,
from the outside looking in,

was a very normal, upstanding citizen,

but in his private life,
Tom was a sex addict,

and he saw an opportunity
for me to be his sex pet.

Clear as day, I remember he asked me if…

This is the oddest thing.
He asked me, "Do you love me?"

I said, "No."

He said, "Do you think you could love me?"

I said, "Yeah, I think I could love you."

He said, "Okay."

He said, "Do you want me
to take care of you?"

I said, "Yeah," and so I began
to look at the relationship as,

"I need to play a role."

She was tremendously compassionate
and seemed like she cared and all that.

And I'm starting to think, I hate
to say it. I started to have feelings.

You know, he's my sugar daddy.
And I never got greedy.

I never wanted him to think
that I was using him.

I always wanted him to know
that he was using me.

[Welch]
I don't know if when in prison she

learned psychology, hypno… I don't know
because she trances you.

[Pender] Tom wanted to go to a casino.

He enjoyed gambling

and wanted to show me off
as something like a prize.

I was worried that
someone would recognize me,

but I had cut my hair, dyed it.

I was made up in this little black dress
and a necklace.

It was a very reckless thing
to go to the casino,

but it made him happy
and it made him want to keep me.

One of the things
that made me valuable to Tom

is that I would do
whatever he wanted me to do.

And so when Tom wanted to go out,
I said yes,

because I would have said yes
if he asked me to turn the sky purple.

But every moment was tainted with knowing

that someone that had seen me
on the news could spot me.

[reporter 5] Others have talked to police
saying they think they've spotted Pender.

I became more paranoid.

[reporter 8, reporter 9] Sarah Pender.

-[reporter 10] Sarah Pender.
-[reporter 11] Sarah Pender.

I realized it was important for me
to keep moving

and get out of Indianapolis.

[siren wailing]

So I asked Tom to help me.

Tom fixed me up with a job
down in Cincinnati,

working with a friend of his,
uh, that was a general contractor.

It was really hard to be away
from my friends

because they had become
such a support system.

And so, that sort of solitude

was difficult.

[Darlington] One day at home…

-[doorbell rings]
-…the FedEx guy came

and I thought
Mom might have ordered something,

but she said she didn't order anything.

And then I got to looking at it,
and it had my name on it.

[envelope rustles, rips]

Then I opened it up
and I seen it was a little track phone,

one that can't be traced.

And then I looked in there again

and seen there was a little note
in there from Sarah.

[Harmon] It was roadblock after roadblock
after roadblock, but you can't give up.

I've got certain things in place,
and then boom.

[phone buzzes]

I get notified by Peggy.

[phone buzzes, beeps]

She was nervous and she goes,
"Sarah mailed me a phone

and she's gonna call me this Thursday.
What do I do?"

I was like, "Don't do anything.
I'll be there Thursday."

So when Peggy reported that to me,
that took me from cloud one to cloud nine.

I was excited.

It gives you that shot of adrenaline to
keep on going 'cause I'm getting closer.

When Peggy got her phone mailed to her,

I called down our tactical operations
truck from Detroit.

He came down for this
because once the phone came up live,

we needed to track
where she's bedded down at.

When we got to Peggy,
you could see Peggy was nervous

and God love her, here we are,
federal agents, and this is a big deal.

We're all waiting
for this thing to start ringing,

and all I told Peggy was, "When she calls,

be normal."

[rings]

When the phone rang,
it scared me. I jumped.

I didn't know what to expect.

[ringing continues]

[Pender] Eventually, Peggy answered

and I immediately felt relief,
uh, from this tension that I had.

I mean, she was talking really
kind of like quiet, you know,

so I don't know where she was at.

[Pender] Peggy was crying, and she's like,
"They know that I helped you.

I don't wanna go back to prison.
Please just turn yourself in."

That was so hard, to hear her be scared.

[beeps]

[Harmon] My colleague was
out in the truck,

and he was trying to locate which tower
and which antenna, where she was at.

I'm trying to keep Peggy on the phone

because the longer
I had the conversation going,

the better it was for us
to get where she was at.

I begged her to turn herself in
because they had orders to sh**t to k*ll.

[Pender] I told her,
"I can't turn myself in.

This is what I chose to do,

and if I go back,
I'm just going to k*ll myself."

And I told her,
"If they find me and they sh**t me,

they're only gonna do me a favor."

[Harmon] Those are words I'm sure
Peggy didn't want to hear,

and it was the first indicator that Sarah
didn't want to go back alive.

That goes beyond me speculating.

I heard it from the horse's mouth

that she's accepted violence
as opposed to a peaceful surrender.

I remember apologizing to her.
"Peggy, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry."

And then she hung up.

And I believe that was the last time
I talked to her.

[Harmon] After the phone call,

I literally took a beeline
out to the truck.

The, uh, technical guy finds out
it's on a tower

outside of Cincinnati, Ohio,

near several motels.

So we'd have to only conclude

she's bedded down somewhere,
one of these rooms.

I mean, God, that made perfect sense.

We had the nest.

[squealing]

[police chattering on radio]

I felt that urge, that excitement.
It's like a dog on the scent of a trail.

[chattering continues]

So US Marshals from Cincinnati
went out and canvassed the area

where Sarah was making this phone call.

I was confident I'd get her.

[buzzes]

But the Marshals called back
from Cincinnati and basically said,

"Hey, we've canvassed all these places
and nothing. No one's seen her at all."

Looking back, I was g*dd*mn close to her.

[grunts]

But a good hunter will never give up.

I've never had to sh**t anybody.
Never have.

But I can assure you, as I'm sitting here,

the magazine that I carried in my g*n,
that first b*llet had her name on it.