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Bad Romance - Season 2 Episode 1 -No Tomorrow
#CinemaJourney
Transcript
00:00Weddings are all about the future, a lifetime of tomorrows.
00:20A woman in suburban Dallas was days away from that future,
00:24but for Laura Grillo, sadly, there will be no wedding,
00:27no honeymoon, and no tomorrow.
00:31Am I ever gonna love, gonna love, gonna love again?
00:35Am I ever gonna love, gonna love, gonna love again?
00:41Happy birthday!
00:43Happy birthday!
00:46Oh my gosh.
00:52Make a wish!
00:54My name's Heather Neighbor.
00:55Laura was my best friend.
00:58She was like a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day.
01:01Very giving.
01:03She always wanted to help people.
01:05Look at you and your bear!
01:08Her kids were her world.
01:10Are you wearing a brother's hat?
01:11So cute!
01:14I remember we finally picked out her dress and that perfect outfit for the perfect day.
01:22Making the wish, ringing the bell.
01:25I kind of talked her into that.
01:29I'm glad I did that.
01:31I really feel like she, for years, have been searching for home and she found that in Rowlett.
01:43Rowlett's a bedroom community.
01:45A lot of rooftops.
01:47A lot of people leave town during the day to work in the city.
01:50Yes, we have a lot of commuters that work in Dallas and then come back home.
01:56It's a quiet neighborhood.
02:01What did she like about Rowlett?
02:03She loved the community.
02:05And she wanted to lay down roots in this little community?
02:08Yeah, and she did.
02:10Did she feel safe in Rowlett?
02:13I think she felt really safe in Rowlett.
02:19Unfortunately, she wasn't.
02:21We got a radio call of an unconscious female.
02:40She's not moving?
02:41I think somebody might have...
02:45You think somebody might have watched her?
02:47I know this is going to look out.
02:51I'm not sure when you're talking to me.
02:57When we respond to any calls, we activate the body camera.
03:01When we arrived there, the fire department had made entry into the house.
03:06Looks to be a wound to the head.
03:08Focus not to block it.
03:10Shell-based camera.
03:11God.
03:12And they had backed out of the house because they located a shell casing.
03:17We got one down, shell casing on the floor.
03:20We made entry into the house.
03:22And began clearing it.
03:26Clear.
03:27Searching for people and victims.
03:30Got blood in the kitchen.
03:32Blood down this hall.
03:33Stay on me, Drew.
03:35Yes, sir.
03:36One victim.
03:38We located a victim laying face down in the kitchen with a lot of blood around her head.
03:45I don't have her information yet.
03:47That purse being right there next to her, I'm wondering if she just got here.
03:51She still had her purse and her keys in her hand.
03:54And her shoes were several feet away from her body.
03:56So it gave us the indication that whatever happened happened pretty quick.
04:01Inside the master bedroom, there was a safe on the dresser.
04:04The door was open and there was two plastic totes that were turned over on the bed.
04:09It didn't look as far as burglary that was interrupted or anything like that.
04:14It just didn't look right to me.
04:17Can you confirm CID in route?
04:19CID is the Criminal Investigations Division, which houses all of our detectives.
04:24Can you confirm that CID has been notified in route?
04:27I was pretty certain that this was going to be a major case.
04:31And I wanted to get those guys out there as soon as possible.
04:34We found one shell casing a couple of feet away from her body as well.
04:41That was the only piece of evidence that was left there at the scene.
04:44There was no gun.
04:45There was no blood that was out of place.
04:47There was no fingerprints.
04:49There was no DNA.
04:50So we had very little to work with.
04:54But we didn't touch the body, right?
04:57It looked like I thought I saw an entry wound in her forehead.
05:04There was a large police presence and first responder presence at the house.
05:09There were several neighbors that started coming out and wanting to know what's going on.
05:18As we were securing the scene, I was approached by a male who called me by my first name.
05:24In law enforcement, we call each other by last name.
05:27Okay, come here.
05:28Come here.
05:29Come here.
05:30Come here.
05:31We call me by my first name and kind of took me by surprise.
05:34And that's when I recognized John Macrus as the person that was calling me.
05:40Right now, all I know is there's somebody down inside the house that looks like a gunshot wound.
05:46John Macrus was a volunteer with the police department in a program called Vips.
05:52And I'd known him over maybe a two-year period.
05:56That is all I can tell you and that's all I know right now.
05:59Once I realized it was John's house, that made me start thinking that it was Laura that was down inside the house.
06:07Laura is John Macrus' fiancee.
06:10Laura was part of the Vips program.
06:12What does that stand for?
06:13Volunteer in police services.
06:16And she even tried out the emergency fire department ambulance program.
06:21You know Laura, right?
06:22Yeah.
06:23I did know Laura from volunteering, police, fire.
06:28Can you go and verify that?
06:31Sure.
06:32I can't right now.
06:33Happy birthday.
06:39Police are left to wonder why would anyone want to kill a 37-year-old mother of three eight days before her wedding?
06:48Was she a robbery victim or could she have been a target?
06:56We didn't have any idea what we were getting into on day one when we responded to this call.
07:01Come on, victim.
07:03This was, in our opinion, it was a whodunit.
07:16Looks to be a wound to the head, copious shots of blood, and a shell face.
07:21God.
07:22Go left.
07:24Victim down.
07:26Mystery surrounds the shooting death of Laura Grillo,
07:30at her home outside Dallas, Texas.
07:33And that purse being right there next to her.
07:35I'm wondering if she just got here.
07:37All right.
07:38Let's back out.
07:39At the very beginning stages of an investigation like this,
07:43obviously we have to talk to everybody that lives in the house.
07:45And then John, Macris, we just walked back.
07:48And we have to confirm their timeline of everything they were doing that day to rule them out as a possible suspect.
07:55I keep calling, calling, calling the answer.
07:57I call.
07:58And that includes Laura's fiance, John Macris, who runs his own construction company and is originally from Greece.
08:05I'll let you know everything when I find out.
08:08So at the time this happened, Laura lived in the house with her soon-to-be husband, John, and their three children, and Laura's adult brother, Brian.
08:15John's mom was also in town.
08:17Who all lives here?
08:19We both have three kids.
08:23Okay.
08:24And now my mom is visiting.
08:26Okay.
08:30We determined that there was no forced entry into the house.
08:33So that kind of tightens our circle down a little bit.
08:37And we felt this was somebody that was pretty close to Laura and was able to either get in the home or somebody that she let in.
08:44John Macris and his mother, who was here from Greece for the wedding, are together that morning but away from this house.
08:51Laura's brother Brian, the one who called 911, says he was asleep and did not hear a gunshot.
08:58So that throws up a red flag of, is he the suspect? Did he do this?
09:05We had to look at Brian, but what we found is that he's deaf in one ear and hearing impaired in the other.
09:13And if he's laying on his good ear, then that was the reason why he didn't hear the gunshot.
09:20Pretty early on, we eliminated Brian as a suspect.
09:25So Rowlett, Texas police detectives decide to take a closer look at Laura's relationship with her fiancé, John Macris.
09:37Liz Frog is Laura's younger sister.
09:39Laura was living in Georgia and she used to play a multiplayer online game.
09:44So you could talk with anyone and meet other people.
09:47And that is how she met John.
09:49And he was living in Texas.
09:51They began a romantic relationship online.
09:56Was Laura a romantic?
09:58Yeah, she was.
10:00In the beginning stages, I think it was more like an infatuation.
10:03They hadn't met in person yet.
10:06It was like the excitement of something new.
10:08Like she was happy about it.
10:10Laura has been married before and has two children.
10:15So she decides to take things slowly with John Macris.
10:20She was, you know, really adventurous.
10:22She was also really smart.
10:23She had her kids to think about.
10:25And just moving in with some guy that she really didn't know was not an option.
10:31She moved to Texas.
10:32She did.
10:33But she did not move in with him.
10:34Yeah, she didn't move in with him right away.
10:36Laura had a job lined up.
10:39She was getting at her own place.
10:41So they could start a relationship and see how it would go.
10:50Laura found out that she was pregnant within the first four months of being there.
10:55How did she feel about the pregnancy?
10:57A little surprised, but, you know, happy about it.
11:04He wasn't.
11:07And he denied that the child was his.
11:09He said that she was sleeping with somebody else.
11:12He made her get a paternity test and go to his lawyer's office with the results.
11:17She was really hurt.
11:18And he still wasn't really willing to have anything to do with her until he knew 100% sure that Maria was his.
11:25But when the baby's born, all that is forgotten.
11:31John Macris dotes on baby Maria.
11:34This suburban home in Rowlett holds the entire family.
11:39Laura's kids, the toddler, and Laura's mom and brother.
11:44Laura juggles raising the growing family and helping at the kids' school, as well as volunteering at the local fire and police departments.
11:54At Rowlett, we have a program called VIPS and it's Volunteers in Police Service.
12:00And they were a modified volunteer uniform.
12:04And these are citizens of Rowlett.
12:08They help us a lot.
12:10Both John and Laura completed our Citizens Police Academy in the fall of 2014 and had become VIPS members for our police department.
12:18When detectives asked John Macris to come in for an interview here at the Rowlett Police Department, it was a building he'd been to many times before as a police volunteer.
12:29In the interview room, Detective Cruz Hernandez breaks the news to John Macris that the victim has been identified.
12:39And I told John that I had confirmation that the deceased person was his fiancee, Laura.
12:52So what are they telling me that it is going to be Laura?
12:55I'm sorry for your loss?
12:57No.
12:59Detectives remember what John said at the scene when they asked him who lived in the house.
13:15He stated that it was him, the kids, his mother, and the victim's brother, but he never did say the victim's name.
13:28He never mentions Laura.
13:31That was a huge red flag because maybe he knew a lot more what was going on.
13:37Detectives asked John Macris what he and Laura did the morning of her murder.
13:42He told us that morning, Laura left with the kids to take them to school.
13:51He left at that same time with his mom and he drove to meet his two construction workers, Jesus and James, at a Home Depot in Dallas.
14:04Our very next step was to get in touch with those stores and pull the video surveillance to make sure that what he was telling us was actually true.
14:19And there he is at the Home Depot.
14:21It cleared John at that point of the investigation, we knew that John had not committed the murder.
14:30So who had killed Laura Grillo? Police asked John if Laura had any enemies.
14:37She had any problems with anybody lately? Anybody that would want to hurt her?
14:44He could not think of anyone that would want to hurt Laura.
14:49Nobody was mad at him. Nobody was, you know, after him for anything.
14:53Filled with questions and short on leads, Rowlett detectives keep digging and they find out something that they didn't expect.
15:05This case had lots of twists and turns.
15:08We had no idea at the very beginning of this what we were getting into and how much planning actually did go into this.
15:14They very well may have gotten away with the perfect murder.
15:28Detectives have been chipping away at the mystery surrounding the mother of three's death a week before her scheduled wedding.
15:34The morning of Laura Grillo's murder, her fiance, John Macris, was meeting two of his employees,
15:42Jesus Trevino and James Vieda at a Home Depot in Dallas.
15:47When John told us that he had met Jesus and James at the Home Depot,
15:52we brought them in just to confirm that John's story was correct.
15:57Jesus Trevino is not only John's employee, he's also going to be the best man in John and Laura's wedding.
16:13We were going to meet up at Home Depot. I went to James' house down the street from me.
16:17So he picked up James?
16:19He picked up James.
16:21What kind of vehicle are y'all in?
16:23In the Lincoln, a black Lincoln.
16:26You can see on the Home Depot video that they're driving a black Lincoln.
16:32It's like a time they were considered witnesses.
16:34We had no reason to believe that they were involved in Laura's death.
16:38Do you know anything about that would help us in our investigation?
16:41I just can't have only worked with them for three weeks.
16:43After the interviews, we did do some background investigating into James and Jesus
16:49and found out that they are both sex offenders.
16:54It's relevant to authorities because these two alibi witnesses for John Macris both have criminal pasts.
17:02We took off like at 8.30.
17:05Jesus told us initially that he was in Dallas all morning with his co-worker James
17:09and that they went from James' motel straight to Home Depot to meet up with John.
17:16What time did you get to the Home Depot?
17:19Like at 8.45.
17:21His phone records said otherwise.
17:23At the time that John and Laura were leaving the house that morning,
17:27Jesus' phone was traveling from Dallas east into Rowlett.
17:31Not toward the Home Depot, but to the suburban neighborhood where John and Laura lived.
17:38At that point, we knew that Jesus had a lot more information than what he was initially providing.
17:45We obtained a search warrant to seize Jesus' cell phone.
17:50Shortly after that, he fled the state.
17:52Once Jesus fled and we could not locate him, we needed the public's help.
18:01Police announced a person of interest, 30-year-old Jesus Emmanuel Trevino.
18:06We needed Jesus' face out there and let him know that he was a person of interest of killing Laura.
18:11If someone could provide us with information, that will help us in locating him.
18:15We really had no idea at that point he could have been anywhere.
18:20With the nationwide manhut for Jesus Trevino underway,
18:25John Macros is also on local television and he's saying he's looking for answers.
18:30Why somebody will do something like that to her?
18:33I mean, I'm not talking about Jesus. I'm talking about, in general, why?
18:37And I mean, now a name comes up, it's somebody that I know.
18:43It's like, the why now is even bigger.
18:47Why is the question the police have as well.
18:51So detectives turn to John Macros for answers.
18:57How have things been lately, relationship-wise, between you and her?
19:02She was happy. I was happy even.
19:04Of course, the couple has our arguments.
19:08Normal stuff.
19:09Normal stuff. Not really too many arguments.
19:13But detectives wonder, did this couple have hidden secrets?
19:19We were able to find one email that Laura sent to John that she wanted out of the relationship.
19:24In June of 2015, Laura had sent the email saying, I'm at my Wits Inn. I'm going to leave.
19:35She wanted to separate and she was trying to assure him that she's not out after child support and money and that he could still see the kids and that it's not a vengeance thing.
19:50It's just not working.
19:52And after that, out of the blue, John proposes to her.
19:55Right.
19:56Exactly.
19:58John counters Laura's breakup email by asking her to marry him.
20:03And she says yes.
20:04It was a little surprising when she agreed to marry him. I was like, okay, well, that kind of flip-flopped, but, you know, okay.
20:17She wanted to have a stable life for our kids. She felt like maybe it would bring her and John closer together.
20:26He proposes and four months later, the wedding is set.
20:30You were her maid of honor.
20:31Mm-hmm. Yeah. We had a lot of fun picking out the dress. We tried several on. It's always a long process. You know, picking out the cakes and the wedding flowers.
20:47And they were planning on getting married in November.
20:54It's just eight days before their November wedding when Laura is killed.
21:02That morning, her best friend Heather is shopping for Laura's bridal shower.
21:07So I was picking out cards and gifts when I got the call to go to the house.
21:17In an instant, Laura's friends and family go from planning for her wedding to planning her funeral.
21:27I was waiting to wake up from a nightmare. I'm like, none of this can be real.
21:33What was John's behavior like after she was killed?
21:36Well, it was like maybe just a little hiccup happened in his life. You know?
21:42He was just, he was way too happy. He was smiling. He was like, making jokes.
21:51The very day following Laura's murder, John moves the children back into the house.
21:59Rollet police released the house on Saturday and John moved the family right back in the house.
22:07You got to remember, Laura's been killed in the kitchen.
22:10And the suspect is still at large. And so we found that odd that he never asked for any type of security detail.
22:20He didn't seem concerned at all about whoever this random person might have been at the time coming back to his home.
22:27It's another red flag.
22:28But John does ask for help from the neighbors to clean up Laura's blood from the kitchen floor.
22:40One of the neighbors was there helping clean. And he said, hey, go get her toothbrush.
22:47And so they were using her toothbrush to scrub blood out of the grout.
22:52He made someone clean up her blood in the grout of the towel with Laura's toothbrush.
23:00He said she wouldn't need it anymore.
23:03Her toothbrush.
23:05He was also complaining how like that the funeral costs were so expensive.
23:13And even after Laura's dead, she was still costing him money.
23:16Laura's maid of honor says John wants to try to get refunds for the wedding cake and even the flowers.
23:26The bridal bouquet.
23:28You know, there was no refunding that.
23:32So he decided to use it for the funeral.
23:39The wedding flowers be turned into funeral arrangements.
23:44The pain and the grief didn't hit until I was at her memorial service.
23:52I was in seeing her picture and then this little box in front of it.
23:56That's what I went. It really hit. Like, that's my sister.
24:00I was never going to hear her voice again.
24:03I was never going to be able to hug her again.
24:05Detectives decide that John's employee, James Vieta, the one who'd only known him for three weeks, is the one most likely to cut a deal.
24:19And they bring a Texas Ranger into the interrogation room.
24:26What's that? What's that? What's that?
24:28Jim Holland is a legend here in Texas.
24:31He got dragged into something that he didn't know about. I know that.
24:34He is an expert at solving cold cases.
24:38You're not a killer.
24:39And one interview makes all the difference.
24:56Five months into the investigation, police are still searching for Jesus Trevino, that employee who met up with John Macris on the morning of the murder.
25:05If someone could provide us with information to get him located and return to Texas.
25:12Finally, a tip leads authorities more than a thousand miles away.
25:18Jesus was ultimately located in the Clearwater, Florida area and taken into custody by U.S. Marshals.
25:25Jesus Trevino is in custody, but he's not talking.
25:29So investigators turn again to John Macris' other employee, James Vieta.
25:37Hey, James.
25:39Jim Holland with the Rangers. How you doing?
25:41This time, police bring in an investigator with the Texas Rangers.
25:45How's life treating you today?
25:47Vieta, it seems, is starstruck.
25:49You actually remind me of the legend of the Texas Rangers I heard about.
25:54The old Wild West days.
25:56Yeah, yeah.
25:57They'll send all these marshals and sheriffs in there, and it took one Texas Ranger.
26:01One white one Ranger, right? Okay.
26:04James was infatuated with Texas Rangers, and that actually worked out to our advantage.
26:07If you've ever trusted anyone in your life, at that age of the day.
26:12Because there's no one else that can help you in this deal.
26:17You just want to go home, huh?
26:20There's an opportunity for that.
26:24You steer the boat, man.
26:26If you don't play, you're going to get a knife at the capital murder.
26:30James Vieta decides to play.
26:32And over the course of a four-hour interview, he paints a disturbing picture of a plot, a crime, and a cover-up.
26:41His story starts with a call from an old friend, Jesus Trevino.
26:46That other man from the morning Laura was killed.
26:49There was no conversation.
26:51It was later on that the job came up about John.
26:55Vieta says the conversation quickly turned from working a construction job
26:59to becoming an accomplice in a murder.
27:05So first he tells you, hey, you want to help me with the job?
27:08I'm going to shoot this lady.
27:10And I'll give you $1,000 for it.
27:12And what else does he say?
27:14That's when he tells me it's about John's wife.
27:17He's sending it out.
27:19Vieta says he was paid $1,000 just to drive Jesus to Laura's home.
27:25Jesus had approached multiple people.
27:27He said, I'll pay you money if you drive me to kill my boss's wife.
27:33And the first and second person turned him down.
27:37So I believe that James was brought in at the last minute to drive Jesus to Laura's house to kill her.
27:45James Vieta tells police Laura Grillo's death was no robbery gone wrong.
27:51He says it was a murder for hire orchestrated by the man Laura was just days away from marrying.
27:59John Macris.
28:00He mentioned that he and Jesus had driven out to Rowlett several times attempting to kill Laura, but there was always something that scared Jesus like somebody walking down the street or it was raining or something that made them feel uncomfortable.
28:15And they would go back to Dallas.
28:16James indicated that John was getting upset with his shoes because it's getting close to the wedding.
28:21And I need Laura to be killed before the wedding. Get it done.
28:24It's because I have got a suit. I'm not ready. I'm not doing anything for the wedding.
28:32You need a quick .
28:34Investigators find text messages. John Macris sent Jesus Trevino on the morning Laura was killed, saying, don't be late.
28:40It's a good day to get some work done.
28:45That information in conjunction with Jesus Trevino before the wedding, during the wedding, the wedding.
28:52The wedding just says it's hard to get it done.
28:55It's because we have got a suit. I'm not ready. I'm not doing anything for the wedding.
28:58I mean, the quick .
29:03Investigators find text messages. John Macris sent Jesus Trevino on the morning Laura was killed, saying, don't be late.
29:05work done. That information in conjunction with Jesus' cell phone records that show his phone
29:11was traveling towards Rowlett, we felt like that was the code for today's the day, you know, come
29:16get this done. Tell me where you dropped him off. Right in front of us. I'm supposed to park
29:23on the other block and where he comes out. Once Laura walked in, she went to the right,
29:31which goes towards the kitchen area. And that's when Jesus jumped out. When he gets back in the car,
29:39what does he say to you? Let's go. James told us when they were leaving north out of Rowlett that
29:47Jesus was throwing his shoes out. He was throwing his hoodie out along the roads. We were able to
29:55find one shoe and one hoodie that was still out there, flattened out in the grass.
30:00After we started heading to the home depot, that's when he starts talking.
30:08I scared her. She actually tried to run.
30:15And that's what I said. Yeah, he shot her. He just shot her. Right in the head.
30:22Vieda's confession may be a breakthrough, but police still have a problem.
30:34Cameras never captured Jesus Trevino and his black sedan anywhere near the crime scene.
30:40But James Vieda has an answer for that, too.
30:44Jesus had gone out and purchased a car for the sole reason for committing the murder.
31:03They brought the new car out, committed the murder, parked the car, got in their black sedan, and drove to the Home Depot.
31:14You can see on the Home Depot video that they're driving a black Lincoln.
31:18Vieda says he doesn't know what kind of car the new one is, but he does know where to find it.
31:27Investigators recover this silver Kia sedan in a local Dallas garage.
31:32And when police go back to the surveillance video in Rowlett, sure enough.
31:37We were able to find that silver Kia sedan leaving Laura's neighborhood in the morning that she was killed.
31:43James is finally deciding to cooperate and gave us the information that we needed to move forward with arresting John.
31:53I'm going to go arrest him.
31:57Police arrested the fiance of a mother of three found murdered inside her home in November.
32:03John Macris is in custody, and investigators are about to reveal just how far back they believe the plot to kill Laura Grillo goes.
32:13When Laura had sent the email saying, I'm going to leave, and we think that email signed Laura's death warrant.
32:25Bond is set at $3 million for a man accused of paying two employees to kill his bride-to-be.
32:33John Macris and Jesus Trevino were charged with capital murder.
32:37They pled not guilty.
32:39It was like there's going to be some kind of justice.
32:42We might never get closure, but there will be justice had for Laura.
32:46Yes!
32:49Finally.
32:51Hey, come on in.
32:52Have a seat.
32:53And now it's John Macris, Laura Grillo's fiancee, who's in the interrogation room with that Texas ranger.
33:01He denies having anything to do with Laura's murder.
33:05Sometimes I was getting angry or mad with her and stuff like that, but no, I mean, I didn't know what you killed.
33:13If you arranged for him to kill her, and then you changed your mind and said, don't do it, but he still wanted the money, so he did it, then that's something that needs to come out, John, because that's not what they're giving me.
33:25I didn't...
33:25Investigators don't believe him.
33:28They say John Macris is just playing the part of an innocent man.
33:37John did a very good job of making sure that he was captured on video as many places as he could be.
33:45That's when investigators become aware of evidence that they claim suggests Macris had been planning the murder for months.
33:57In December of 2014, an ex-girlfriend of Jesus had made a report to the Rockwild Police Department.
34:04That was the first time that it was known that Jesus was talking about committing this crime.
34:09According to the police report, a friend of Trevino's offered him $15,000 to kill his wife, or $5,000 to find someone who would.
34:21But according to the police, he didn't say who that friend was.
34:25This nearly a year before Laura Grillo was murdered.
34:30He didn't give her any names at that point, so she had no idea who the intended victim was going to be.
34:36The case was referred to the Texas Rangers.
34:40They declined ABC News' request for an interview.
34:44He had been planning this since December of 2014.
34:47So in June of 2015, when Laura had sent the email saying,
34:53I'm going to leave and I can't promise I'll stay in Texas,
34:57John, about 20 minutes later, he forwarded it to Jesus.
35:02Unfortunately, we think that email signed Laura's death warrant.
35:06And soon after that, John Macris proposes.
35:11But investigators don't believe he ever intended to go through with any wedding.
35:17He knew that time was running out and that he had to act quickly to keep her here.
35:21The motive here was he wanted to control Laura.
35:25He wanted sole custody of the four-year-old daughter.
35:28And because he couldn't control Laura, he decided to just eliminate her.
35:34When John is arrested, little Maria is taken in by Laura's friend, Heather.
35:41And in September of 2018, John Macris goes on trial in Dallas County.
35:48John's defense was that he had, you know, no involvement,
35:52and Jesus and James just went rogue and did this on their own.
35:55It didn't make sense.
35:58His defense doesn't make sense to the jury either.
36:03John Macris is convicted of capital murder.
36:07And so is Jesus Trevino, the man who actually pulled the trigger.
36:13They are sentenced to life without parole.
36:17But what about the driver, James Vieda?
36:20He, too, was charged with capital murder, but made a deal with prosecutors.
36:26Since James did cooperate with us and testify in both John and Jesus' trial,
36:32we did give him a lesser charge of murder,
36:34and he was sentenced to 25 years in the Texas Department of Corrections.
36:38I wrote a victim's impact statement on behalf of my sister because my sister no longer has a voice,
36:47so I'm speaking for her.
36:49And the people that did this to her, that took her life,
36:53needed to be put away and kept away forever.
36:56John Macris is now behind bars for life,
37:00but his next step is hard to believe.
37:04He's ready to go back to court,
37:06this time to keep Laura's best friend, Heather,
37:08from adopting his young daughter,
37:11the daughter she had been raising.
37:14What happened when you get that notification that John wants his daughter?
37:18I'm like, well, I'm fighting.
37:21I'm not giving up.
37:22That's my kid.
37:26That day that Laura was killed, the family,
37:36they stepped on the landmine.
37:40Laura Grillo was not the only victim in this brutal crime.
37:43So are her three children,
37:45including four-year-old Maria,
37:47whom Laura shared with John Macris.
37:49All of them have lost their mother and their home.
37:53After Laura was murdered and John was arrested,
37:56then the two older children were returned to their biological fathers.
38:02They lost the only siblings they knew.
38:05Mm-hmm.
38:06It was pretty horrifying.
38:11When John Macris was arrested,
38:14Heather, Laura's best friend and neighbor,
38:16took Maria in.
38:18I love Heather.
38:20She has such a caring heart,
38:23and she loved those kids.
38:25Laura did even say,
38:27like, if something happens to me,
38:28please take my kids to her.
38:30But Macris, convicted for capital murder,
38:33wants his daughter to be raised by his mother.
38:38He wanted Maria to go to Greece with his mom.
38:41Well, knowing what I know about John
38:44and how he liked to be in control of everything,
38:48I wasn't surprised.
38:49I was just wishing that the four-year-old could stay here in Texas
38:55because I felt that's what she knew.
38:58In 2019, the case went to trial.
39:07And the jury awarded custody to Heather.
39:12She's mine.
39:14I adopted her.
39:15Why was that so important?
39:17I wasn't going to give up.
39:19Move your feet.
39:20That's my kid.
39:22I need life.
39:24Good job.
39:29This case had lots of twists and turns.
39:31And, you know,
39:33I would characterize this case as a once-in-a-career case.
39:36We didn't have any idea what we were getting into on day one
39:39when we responded to this call.
39:42You know a letter, right?
39:44Yeah.
39:44You had a really sweet woman
39:46that did not deserve to be taken from her children.
39:51The only person who had the means and the motive
39:54to take Laura away from her family was John.
39:57The jury saw John for the man that he was.
40:02It was a feeling I'll never forget.
40:05ABC News contacted John Macris at the Texas prison
40:09where he's serving his life sentence.
40:11He declined our request for an interview.
40:17He thought he could get away with something,
40:19and, John, well, you know what?
40:22You stole something
40:23from a lot of people.
40:27And
40:28as far as I'm concerned,
40:31John Macris can rot in hell.
40:35Very pretty snow angel.
40:37I should still be hearing her voice.
40:40She got you.
40:41She was the coolest friend I ever had.
40:44My sister was an amazing person.
40:49Anything that she's decided that she was going to do,
40:51she did it.
40:52How often do you think of Laura?
40:55Every day.
40:59I can't help it.
41:01I mean, I got a little mini Laura in my house.
41:03You know, she reminds me so much of her mom.
41:05Maria and her siblings are growing up now
41:09without their mother.
41:10Mm-hmm.
41:11What do you want them to remember about Laura?
41:15She loved them more than anything in the world.
41:17She would want them to be happy.
41:35italia...
41:36I got a little bit of a cat.
41:38I guess I've Rudolf Michal far.
41:38I bet he pays Gandalf.
41:39I don't know.
41:40I might have fed about her.
41:41My brother in the world.
41:42I might be here in the metallica.
41:42My brother.
41:44He played a little bit of a cat.
41:45I just want it.
41:46I hope it's been a little bit of a cat.
41:47I thought I played dragon or a cat.
41:49I hope it was gonna be happy.
41:50I'm like Santa whatever he's up for me.
41:52yang or a cat kind of cat.
41:56He was a cat.
41:58His name is John Macriscio.
42:00Her 동생IE.
42:01He was a cat.
42:02She did.
42:03My brother in America was a cat.