The Disturbing Case of Leila Fowler

today we are going to be heading to valley springs california a small town with a population of 3 000 people it's a quiet safe and family-friendly town it even has a low crime rate but one afternoon the community in valley springs was shocked when word spread that an eight-year-old girl was brutally murdered in her home about the case the deputies are telling us what they're doing right now to catch the killer victim eight-year-old leila fowler held hands leaning on each other for support sheriff of calaveras county made a promise we will not rest until we capture a responsible person on april 27 2013 12 year old isaiah fowler was at his home with his eight-year-old sister leila fowler she was in her room sleeping on the top bunk of her bed the parents barney fowler and crystal walter were gone as they were out attending a little league game that afternoon isaiah went to the bathroom and while in the bathroom he heard an unknown voice say something along the lines of hey i know you're in there and seconds later that's when he heard his sister scream he gets out of the bathroom and sees an unknown man running out from the back door of the home luckily isaiah did get a good description of the man he said the man had long gray hair white or hispanic and was said to be very tall at least six feet tall he was wearing a black long sleeve shirt and blue jeans he ran to his sister's room and that's when isaiah discovers his eight-year-old sister on the floor covered in blood she was stabbed 20 times the parents were notified of the situation to which they immediately rushed back home and before layla was taken to the hospital her father got to hold her in his arms he lifted her shirt and says that he could see blood seeping out of her chest barney says one of her arms dangled down and i had to pull it back up she felt light once finally taken to mark twain hospital in san andreas layla was pronounced dead an hour later calaveras county investigators say that they believed that this wasn't some random attack but rather a deliberate targeted action they were doing a house-to-house search and were occasionally checking attics and storages but it wasn't known at the moment that layla was even sexually assaulted divers were also called in to search for any local lakes and reservoirs fortunately a neighbor did come forward saying she saw the same unknown man running from the home giving out the same description as isaiah's the police were able to say that they did collect some fingerprints during the search and collected to what they believed to be dna crime scene we did collect some fingerprints during that search and we also collected what we believe to be dna kitchen knives were also collected to conduct forensic testing most importantly the police did mention that they were not going to rule out isaiah as a suspect the murder case had everyone scared that the killer might attack again for a while residents had to show identification cards before being allowed to pass barricades in the neighborhood due to the severity of the murder the case was prioritized the small community of valley springs gathered together with candles and sang to remember the eight-year-old girl i just want to thank the entire community and all of our family and friends for the overwhelming amount of support that you've given my family it will never be forgotten layla fowler's mom grateful to the thousand who came together tonight for her eight-year-old daughter 900 of them came by bus alone at this amazing community who's come together in tragedy but we'll move forward in healing healing from the way layla died stabbed to death inside her home it does not happen to a person you know much less a child you know and this cannot happen to a child in your very own class her dad consoles the 12-year-old brother who was home with layla that day he told investigators a stranger broke in and attacked his sister but police have made no arrests tonight they gathered with lit candles in hand to remember this young girl who made people happy by just being around them she always had a smile on her face she was just the nicest girl her heartbroken dad still unable to share his thoughts not right now not right now just thanks everybody and um but we can't describe nothing her grandpa also at a loss for words it's just overwhelming the way the communities come together her life was infectious on may 1st in placerville california just 50 miles away from the father's home a 44 year old man attempted to kidnap a toddler after forcing his way into a woman's apartment and tried to take her daughter they collected a dna sample from the suspect thinking this may be the same man but he looked nothing like the man described by isaiah in the end there was no match there were also two kidnapping attempts in yuba city california which is a hundred miles away from the fowler's home the first one happened on april 24th three days before layla was murdered a 17 year old girl walking to school says she heard a door slam and when she turned around she saw a man running at her luckily the girl was able to outrun him and the man ran back to his truck and drove off the second attempt was on april 30th when a 14 year old girl walking home from school says she saw a man pulled up in a truck and asked the girl to get in she kept refusing and the man drove off after her she ran several blocks to aurelie's parking lot for safety and the man drove off the two of these girls didn't know each other but gave the same description of the man he was described to have spiky balding hair driving an older white chevy pickup police were taking the case seriously in light on the stabbing death of layla but they don't believe the man who attempted to kidnap those girls was related to the stabbing to make things worse the neighbor who had claimed to have seen the suspect the day of the murder has stopped cooperating with the police tonight the crime scene the house where this all happened is empty and silent tonight a setback for detectives today though as they tried to create a composite sketch of the suspect from a second person who said they saw that suspect running from the scene during the composite sketch meeting the witness recanted her previous statements and her identification of the man she saw running away she also refused to provide a description to the sketch artist so that a composite could be completed with a sketch no closer to being done what was an important witness to the suspect is no longer credible the news was not what residents who have been living in fear since the murder happened wanted to hear i was like i was hoping they would have much more positive information for us i've got little children and i'm going to keep my doors locked and keep them safe neighbors who live across the street from where eight-year-old leila fowler was stabbed to death last week are just as frustrated it's disappointing i thought that we are on the right path it's a setback but i trust the calaveras county sheriff the sheriff's department says the woman who recanted her statement about seeing the suspect run from the scene did so after telling detectives about what she saw twice neighbors are upset that one of their own gave them false hope it's scary i mean i'm not sure why somebody would make a statement like that and then recant it in such a situation the police tell the residents to relax as they believe that the public is not at risk but they weren't buying that how can they relax knowing that the killer is somewhere still out there one resident saying i don't know how anybody can say that for sure if he's still in the area then i think we're all still at risk there was a flood of calls from customers ordering security systems to protect their families from an intruder residents were not calm and they had every right to be on edge a retired fbi profiler candace de long believes that the killer knew their victim and that it couldn't have been random she believes it had to be done by someone close either someone in the family or the neighbors candace responded to the police statement of telling the public that they're not at risk saying that statement sounded to me like the police were trying to telegraph information to the public that they knew who the killer was and that he wasn't roaming around free as for the neighbor who later stopped cooperating with the police candace does believe that she may have stopped because she was in fear of her life thinking that the killer may go after her next but she believes that her story could have also been fabricated and now the police have stated that isaiah is not considered a suspect anymore as he's been very cooperative there's still no leads and still no clue who the killer is on may 8 a neighbor who lived across the street came forward and said that he saw no one come out of the house on the day of the murder fbi investigators started early this morning removing wood from the garage at the home of slain eight-year-old leila fowler anybody that does something like that to an eight-year-old child don who didn't want to use his last name lives right across the street from layla's house he says he was in his front yard when the murder happened nobody came out that door plain and simple i got a german wolf 95 pounds every time somebody walks down that street they start barking when this all happened there was no barks nothing don says nearby neighbors have been told to keep their doors locked he recalls he would often see layla and her siblings playing outside the home the older siblings were into sports softball and all that and it was the 12 year old son or stepson that was always babysitting divers from stanislaus county sheriff's department continued today to search nearby ponds sheriff's investigators say they're looking for any evidence that will help find the person who stabbed layla 21 times in her own home of course other neighbors we talked to say they hope that the calaveras county sheriff's department and the fbi do find the killer soon now i did talk to the spokesperson for the calaveras county sheriff's department a short time ago he says the dive team will wrap up today and he says he cannot let us know if they found any evidence but on may 11th an arrest was finally made that suspect was 12-year-old isaiah fowler he's now facing homicide charges of course this shocked everybody who would have thought that the brother would have killed his little sister the residents that spent weeks living in fear are now angry but confused they felt betrayed and lied to they believed isaiah's story of an intruder this entire time and now their support to the family was starting to end a neighbor has said that they do feel betrayed by the parents because they feel like the parents knew all along people were mad because people have also called the police thinking they found the man who fit the description that isaiah told the police only to realize now that it was all a lie however the biological mother priscilla rodriguez doesn't believe this as she says they were close and that isaiah loved his sister so much and that he would never hurt his sister since isaiah is only 12 years old he will not be tried as an adult therefore he won't face a jury of his peers a judge will instead weigh the facts and determine a sentence that could be years of rehabilitation and education if he was to be convicted he would be held at a youth authority until he is 23 then be released as an adult on parole but that's not all isaiah isn't the only one the police are paying attention to it's the parents as well if they had tried to lie to investigators with misleading information then they would face jail time as well leslie whitten bauman a child therapist isn't involved with the case but she says if the allegations are true she believes the attack was not premeditated she thinks that isaiah may have had a moment of rage and maybe acted out on something that was modeled for him in his past there is some history with this family especially with barney fowler the family has always struggled financially and records show that he was involved in child support disputes with at least four different women he has a total of seven children he was even arrested back on july 16 2009 for breaking into a storage unit he said he did it because the owner of that unit owed him money he had to pay 300 in restitution and serve three days in jail priscilla receives 533 dollars a month in disability and pays barney 114 dollars a month court records show that she was largely cut off from layla and isaiah the two kids used to live with their biological mother father and brother in stockton until barney moved with his children to valley springs rodriguez acknowledged in a written statement to the court in 2012 that she had not seen her children much but gave a different explanation when i was no longer able to give money to barney fowler he then would not let me speak to the children anymore i am on ssi and barely able to survive i am homeless right now when i was giving him money last year i was going without food for myself i'm not trying to avoid helping my children financially but at this point i am unable to give him anything i am constantly looking for work to help i only wish to be able to speak with and see my children a former roommate of priscilla said that she never wanted to give up her children she really loved her kids and it was an ideal situation at least not for her on may 14th isaiah is now charged with second-degree murder the 9-1-1 call was also released but not the call from isaiah but the stepmother who as you can 911 by the phone call has been told apparently by the boy that there's been a break-in at the home this was all happening two and a half weeks ago but it appears that she doesn't know there's been terrible violence listen to that part of the call my children are at home alone and a man just ran out of my house my older son was in the bathroom and my daughter started screaming oh okay he came out there was a man inside of my house i need an officer there the man that's gone uh they said he's running out there now the total length of the call that we got was another 20 or 30 seconds but the rest of that conversation wasn't terribly clear who was saying what about what so we cut it off at that point now remember layla and her brother were home alone the rest of the family was at a little league game and we were first told the brother had seen a man leaving the home then two weeks exactly after that murder it was last saturday the sheriff's office here announced that the 12 year old brother and not a stranger was accused of layla's murder so the next big development here in san andreas now comes tomorrow and we expect the suspect to be arraigned in juvenile court and since he's being tried as a juvenile remember this if he is found guilty he will go free at the age of 23. and by the way on that official paperwork that came in late this afternoon we're told it is a second-degree murder charge with the special allegation of using a deadly and dangerous weapon isaiah declined that he murdered his sister but investigators say that there were no signs of an intruder breaking in or that anyone else was in the house besides isaiah and layla he was charged with second degree murder because they can't prove that he planned it so they're gonna go on with that but if they can prove that he lied during the investigation then that could change everything some neighbors even came out to say that they had a feeling that isaiah was a suspect all along and that the tall long-haired man was never real his father doesn't believe that his son did it he's innocent he didn't do it and stating that the family will be behind isaiah until they have the proper evidence to show it's my son district attorney barbara yuke suggests that isaiah had stabbed his sister to death before cleaning himself up and calling for help almost an hour later bradley swanson an assistant lab director of the california state department of justice testified that a drop of blood had been discovered in the kitchen sink blood was also found on the door that connected the kitchen to the garage even stated that the bathroom was much cleaner than the rest of the home he goes on to say that the attack had begun on the top bunk and that he either moved her to the floor or had propelled her off there were no evidence of sexual assault and no evidence of semen either in the kitchen they had found a bent kitchen knife that had evidence of blood on it isaiah's attorney had argued that investigators had bonched the initial collection of evidence at the home and that the pathologist had conducted a lousy autopsy he even went further to state that they ignored the signs of an intruder breaking in but the prosecution ended their case by stating there is no evidence whatsoever to support isaiah's story we know it's the murder weapon because the victim's blood was inside the handle layla's blood seeped into this knife why would the murder weapon be on the counter if an intruder did this why would an intruder clean it off when would an intruder clean it off on may 29th isaiah pleads not guilty to second-degree murder with a special allegation for use of a dangerous weapon attorneys aren't sure if the story of the long grey-haired man is true but even if it isn't true they say that still doesn't prove that isaiah is a true killer isaiah would remain in juvenile hall in a single cell still attending school in the jail he would continue to remain in jail for two years and then in october 2015 he was found guilty and was sentenced to 16 years to life at a youth correctional facility now legally he can't stay at the youth facility past his 23rd birthday he has already been in custody for two and a half years since his arrest back in may 2013 in the end isaiah will end up serving 11 and a half years in custody defense attorney steve blesser said the prosecution failed to offer a motive for the slaying adding it was unlikely that a 12-year-old boy would have enough criminal sophistication to clean a crime scene so well however in 2018 isaiah's conviction was overturned and now he could face a new trial leila fowler was murdered nearly five years ago her then 12-year-old brother isaiah fowler was arrested and convicted of her murder but today a u.s court of appeals overturned that conviction and concluded and ordered that a new trial must happen they've vacated the prior conviction so there's there's currently no conviction against this young man they hung their hat or the big point in the opinion today was that the interviews of isaiah fowler were absolutely blatantly unconstitutional the fowler family's attorney mark reichel says deceptive tactics were used during questioning of isaiah he was questioned by investigators three times before he was arrested it was in his third interview he was questioned for three hours with his father present he made a statement which was ambiguous at best and that's when he was arrested that's when he was tried based on the statement something along the lines of i guess i did it but i don't remember it if i did he also said before he was finished with that phrase but i really didn't do it his father hugged him and said i know you didn't son isaiah received a maximum sentence in 2015 and was ordered to be held until the age of 23. isaiah was the only other family member in the home on that april 27 day and claimed it was an intruder that entered the home and attacked his sister the defense team investigators spent years trying to prove this claim the forensic evidence in this case is incredibly strong for an acquittal there anyone who has exposure to 12 year olds can't believe that a 12 year old could have miraculously cleaned a murder scene in less than 20 minutes fowler's family has always believed he was innocent it has been a really long five years for our family and we're you know happy about the news isaiah is not guilty we've never thought he was guilty his attorney says what happens next is the case will go back to court perhaps in calaveras county if the d.a there decides to refile the charges for the death of young layla in sacramento melinda meza kcra 3 news on june 27 2018 in the retrial isaiah was found guilty for the stabbing death of his sister and then the situation became a little more complicated because at first he was going to be released on his 23rd birthday due to him being tried as a minor but on july 1st the law changed where he would stay incarcerated until he is 25. he would return to court on august 2 and the prosecutor would argue with the judge whether isaiah should be released at 23 or 25 it's been argued that he should be released at the age of 23 as he was convicted before the new law took effect despite isaiah still claiming he's innocent judge susan hartland believes that he is guilty of the murder of his younger sister there's no doubt you took the life of your sister you did so viciously and used thought and planning isaiah is still in jail and it's not certain when he would get out he was sentenced to 16 years to life but because he was only 12 at the time of the murder he is allowed to be released early and it isn't sure at the moment whether it will be when he's 23 or 25. isaiah's attorney said that in the second appeal he will seek the help of the innocence project a non-profit legal organization that works to exonerate wrongfully convicted people through the use of dna testing at the crime scene the knife that was used to kill layla was washed what points towards his guilt is that one of his shirts had some of layla's blood his shirt was placed in a hamper in his room another questionable thing is that out of all the 20 stab wounds that layla had on her only one was fatal which was a stab to the heart causing her lungs to collapse the rest were more like poking wounds as if it was to intimidate if an intruder did break in and attack layla in a short amount of time described by isaiah then it's questionable if such pokemons could have been inflicted but there was a male hair found on lelo's underwear but it didn't match with isaiah or anyone else in the family so the dna that was found on our body did not belong to our client anyone in his family any of the law enforcement or first responders or crime scene technicians who are in the house and no one who was in the federal database to this day it is unknown who the hair belongs to i'm curious about what you guys think did isaiah do it or was there really an intruder that broke in either way it's painful that a young girl lost her life in such a violent manner [Music] you

Channel: Haunted Autopsy

Views: 782,057

Keywords: horror stories, true crime, narration, true scary stories, haunted autopsy, leila fowler, valley springs, isiah fowler, leila fowler case

Id: CUSggYta25U

Length: 24min 30sec (1470 seconds)

Published: Wed May 19 2021