BBC SuDS.

Hey, h'm Maggie.

Just a quick heads up before we start.

The series does contain some descriptions of violence and deals with adult themes.

His ar murder has a Northwest Harance County neighborhood on edge.

A couple celebrating a wedding anniversary found tied up in Sanford closets.

The husband had been stabbed to death tonight.

Investigators have plenty of questions about this that happened, as we see on this.

So we get the news on and I see the newscasts of Jim.

When Tammy Armstrong switches on the evening news, she cannot believe what she's seeing.

And as that's their house, that's their house, and I was scared to death.

Her best friend, Sandy Melgar's place is wrapped in police tape and swarming with cops.

And that's where Local two is.

Andy Sirote is his lab with the latest on this story, Handy Bill.

Residents in this quiet community still baffled over a bizarre mystery involving two of their neighbors like this.

Then I just start screaming hysterically and crying, and Tom's turning it up louder and they said that he had been murdered in that house.

Tammy and her husband Tom had been entertaining friends that evening.

After they'd seen the last of their guests out.

They were ready to collapse on the sofa, but then their son in law called, urging them to switch on the TV.

Then I just start screaming, where's Sandy.

They're not saying a thing about Sandy.

Where's Sandy?

What happened to her?

What did they do to her?

Tammy rings sandy cell, no reply.

She rings the house again.

Nothing.

She tries over and over.

Next she rings around the hospitals in Houston, and.

I called all of them.

Then Tom called the policeations in the police station said, no, she's not here.

Of course she wants there.

What Tom and Tammy don't know is that Sandy's phone has been taken into evidence.

Well, she's questioned by the police.

And so then we could do nothing.

But I said, we'll stay dressed, We'll stay on top of the covers and just lay here and wait, saying prayers and crying and waiting to hear from my friend.

Tom's phone rang about I think four in the morning or something.

They're both still awake, lying fully dressed on the bed.

He picks it up first ring and he goes, yes, it's a minute, and he hands it to me and Sandy's voice is so faint.

She was Tammy.

I said yeah.

She goes, do you know, and I said yes, I know, sweetie, I know.

I said where are you?

And she goes, they brought me back here.

I said they who?

And I said you're at your house?

And she is yes.

The police dropped Sandy back at home at three forty five am on Christmas Eve.

And I said we'll be right there.

She says okay, and she clicked off and I told him, I said, I can't believe they took her back.

She's at the house.

And so we jump in the car and we drive over there and get there.

When Tammy and her husband arrive at the Melgar's house, they have to push their way through the massive reporters and cameras gathered outside.

Friends and relatives say fifty two year old Haimimelgar had no enemies, and tonight they are rallying around his broken hearted widow.

We're just trying to christ you know.

Reporters in front, and we go under the yellow tape and go in and Sandy's sitting on her sofa and she's holding her dog, Lola, the Pomeranian, and she's so so so pale, and her skin is so blanched and she can barely talk.

And I said, Sandy, have you had your medicine?

I said, you're going to have a seizure.

I said, and you're dry, you're dehydrated, running get a bottle of water on the fridge, A hander water.

So where's your medicine, honey, she says, And she can tell me.

So I started to go to her bedroom.

Don't go in there, and I said, I won't look.

Jim's body was found in a closet connected to that bedroom.

He was gone, but the blood I didn't see it.

I wouldn't look, but Tom said it was.

It was horrendous.

All they had done was removed Jim.

Lola had blood on her and fingerprinting stuff and all that was all over Lola.

She's pure white.

And her puppies were crying and barking in the yard and Sandy was just sitting on the couch with hardly anything on, freezing, just sitting there, shaking.

Tammy searches for draw for Fenno barbadal.

That's Sandy's prescription anti seizure medication.

She can't find any.

And I said, well, whoever did this obviously knew that phenom barbital is the drug take And I said, because that's gone.

She goes, oh, I had my full prescription.

Tammy locates some tablets tucked away and gives one to Sandy.

And I just grabbed a couple of things for her put on and wrapped her in a blanket and we got the dogs and got her out of there.

Tammy and Tom decide to take Sandy back to their house, hoping it will be a refuge from the crime scene and from the pack of reporters we're.

Just trying to get as a statement.

Sandra Melgar saw comfort today and the arms of a friend in the wake of her husband's bizarre murder.

She was and the lights.

They started taking pictures and she just started shaking and shaking it.

And I wrapped her tightly and threw the blanket even more of her head, and we get her into the car and you know, put it in the back, slam the door, and they're asking for a statement.

Thirty two years with the anniversary, there's Aunt that's Tammy.

She's sitting in the front seat of the car, shielding her eyes from the glare of the cameras, her face twisted in anguish, all for viewers at home to see as journalists cramble around trying to question her and Sandy murder.

She was unable to speak from the backseat of this car where we saw her wrapped in a blanket laying down Stewart.

And we left and they said, where are you taking it?

Where are you taking her?

Back at her house, Tammy put Sandy in a hot shower to warm up.

She's freezing cold, and.

She kept saying, I still smell it, I still smell it.

And I said, what are you smelling the here?

She has the blood, so much blood, Tammy, so much blood.

But when I was washing her hair for her, there was a bump, a big noot on her head as a Sandy, we need to go to er, and I said, I don't know what they did to you, and she said I can't, I can't, and she was crying, and don't take me to another cold, hard place.

So they try to get some rest instead, and.

I got her under the electric blanket and she slept with me and Tom slipped in the guest room and she stayed awake all night.

She was crying, saying, how could they do this to him?

How could they do this?

And then she said, what am I going to do without him?

He's everything?

And I said, I know.

Then at one point, all of a sudden, she goes tell me they think I did this.

And I thought she was just babbling, you know, shock.

I said, that's ridiculous, you were tied up.

I said, no one would ever think that you did this.

That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.

And I said, who thinks you did this?

And she goes the police.

I'm Maggie Robinson Katz and from BBC's Studios and iHeart podcasts.

This is Hands Tied, episode three, Homecoming.

I could have left a guy here this Christmas Day.

It was the twenty fifth when we landed.

By the time Liz and her husband land in Texas, her mom, Sandy, is already at Tammy's house and has already been quizzed by the police about her dad Jim's murder.

I think I was completely in shock the whole time.

I mean I broke down on the plane a few times, and when I was picked up from the airport.

I think that's when it hit me, but not entirely, because I feel like I was in shock for years.

A cousin picks them up at George Bush International Airport, and a wave of emotion and relief hits Liz because sitting in the backseat of the car is Sandy.

After hours of frantic worrying about her mom, at least here she is.

She's not in a good way, though.

Yeah, my mom just like falls apart and she's got bruises all down her arms, and asking her what happened, and I mean she was just bawling, she was just crying.

They get back to Tammy's house, which has become the gathering place for all of Sandy's relatives and friends.

So I didn't flat out say what happened because I didn't want to make her talk about this right if she wasn't ready.

Slowly, Sandy tells Liz what she remembers about the events leading up to Jim's death.

At that moment, I remember thinking, you're sitting in this bathtub right with the person that you think you're spending the rest of your life with.

You're talking about what you're about to do now that he's retired, your plans, all this stuff, and then he gets up to go let the dogs in, and the next thing you wake up and your whole life has been turned upside down.

And I just remember that thought going through my head over and over again.

Sandy tails Liz about the police interview.

Didn't they take you to the hospital.

No, you know, she thought she'd had a seizure, she had a bump on her head.

She said that they had interrogated her, that they wanted her to do a light detector test.

She said, no, I'm too stressed and frazzled right now.

I will not pass a light detector test.

It all felt very wrong.

Liza's head is spinning.

It's a lot to process.

Her dad is dead, and it seems like her mom is a suspect.

It's a lot.

It's more than most people can handle, too much for one person.

She's drained, exhausted, jet lagged, barely recovered from the miscarriage she's just had.

But now that seems like an eternity ago, and these most desperate of circumstances, she turns to the person who she could always rely on to keep a cool head in a crisis her dad.

My dad was always telling me how important it is not to get too emotional about things, and to step back and separate yourself and try and look at things from this perspective that isn't emotional or biased.

Like Jim.

Liz isn't a panicer, so she channels his calm, logical brain.

And there's her other superpower.

Those true crime books she obsessed over as a teenager, which led her to study neuroscience in England, knowledge which she has stored up and can now put to use.

It was definitely already cynical about the police.

I already was very distressing of them.

And you're taught to believe that they're going to help you, right there there to help you and they want to make sure you get justice or whatever bullshit that they tell you.

But I have.

Seen how they've treated other people.

And then you know, reading these like true crime accounts where sometimes the police have released victims back into their killers custody, or you know, usually they don't listen when it's somebody who is not white, or you know, who's not in authority.

I don't know, there's just different circumstances, right, So I was very familiar with these types of interactions, and we started from there.

Liz swings into action.

First, she wants to find out how her dad died, so she tracks down a number for the medical examiner.

I remember calling the NY's office and trying to get some information.

So I called the detective and they asked if they could come see me at Tom and Tammy's house.

I said, okay.

It's the day after Christmas, twenty twelve, and two detectives are outside Tom and Tammy's house in Houston.

They knock at our door.

Sandy's in the back, and she immediately starts trembling and shaking.

It's the same two detectives who interviewed Sandy, Deputy Carousel and Sergeant to say.

So, I stayed back there with her, and I'm like, you don't have to go out.

They'll be seeing to the front room.

You don't have to see them.

But it's okay because they're not here to see Sandy, they're here to talk to Liz.

Liz records the interview using a tablet she'd given her husband Anthony for Christmas.

This was twenty twelve.

Applets were high tech and more than a decade later, Liz and I are in my hotel room in Wimbledon, London, listening back to that recording Semumer.

Twenty six, twenty twelve, case number one two one seventy six two six' Nine Sean kerzelhairrishetty homicide Sixty henry forty two also with me as my, Partner sergeant do, say And i'm gonna let the other two witnesses here identify.

Themselves manage and identify, Yourself Elizabeth melgarth, okay and this is your?

Husband, yeah your Name Anthony.

Rose did they know that you were?

Recording?

YEAH i told THEM i was going to.

Record IF i was in your shoes in that, POSITION i don't THINK i would have the foresight to do.

THAT i really don't know what made me do.

IT i guess just like mistrust and making sure THAT i remembered what we had said and what we had talked, about BECAUSE i felt LIKE i was in such shock that you know, what IF i forgot EVERYTHING i had said AND i forgot something.

Important have you talked about been to your?

Mother what did your mother have to?

Say she's just in complete.

Shock she has a hard time remembering things as.

It is because of the.

Seizures she's got a well documented history of lucas and epilepsy for the past twenty something.

Years and she basically just told me that the, Police, well she woke up and she was trying to sit up and.

Get out of the, closet but she has had.

Hip replacements and she has a lot of joint, problems so she really couldn't, move and she didn't know how long she had been, There SO i mean.

She said that the police took her.

In, well they told my family that they were taking to the, hospital AND i spent hours calling hospitals trying to find, her and it turned out that they didn't take her.

There it wouldn't give her, medication and she was there for twelve.

Hours and stress brings on, seizures and so does lack of, sleep SO i was a bit worried about her.

Health she's quite in a quite gradual state right.

Now you sound so clear and so concise and so.

PRESENT i think it's probably.

Just like angry THAT i had to deal with these idiots and angry at the way they had treated.

Her time has not Softened liz's feelings towards the.

Police you do.

Know that we had a messenal that check her out, medication, Right but the doctor and them that saw her there at the, scene they had cleared everything before we even spoke to.

Her how can you, SO i see you shaking your.

Head, yeah because he's saying there was a doctor on.

Scene there was no doctor on.

Sine there were some mts On.

Zene Emergency medical technicians.

EMTs aren't, trained you, know to deal with this sort of.

Situation they're not going to have her medication for.

Her they should have taken her to the.

Hospital liz thinks That sandy was in no fit state to decide for herself if she needed to go to the, hospital she should have been taken.

Anyway she doesn't know what's going, on she's not thinking.

Clearly she should have never been in that room answering questions in that state and without a.

Lawyer, yeah it.

Was just it was very frustrating because they were just lying to my face LIKE i was this idiot who had no, idea and that LIKE i was just going to buy, it and it was so.

Insulting it was so insulting and just went like adding insult to.

Injury and you understand.

That we're not pointing fingers at anybody, here but we're trying to we're trying to get as much informational we can't because it's either.

Way we have either we're looking at a possible suspect entered her, home and we're trying to look at every angle.

HERE i just don't appreciate the way my mother was treated like.

That she, WAS i, mean she said that the police were basically we're just, saying you, know you did?

It was he?

Abusive was he having an?

Affair was this?

Happening was that?

Happening, no here's the.

DEAL i look At liz and pause the.

RECORDING i, mean.

He's denying, everything and then you get to the interrogation footage and Everything i've said is.

True the questions are, asked, okay but you have to, remember and it's how somebody perceives the.

Question we have to know if somebody was out to hurt your.

Father, okay the way you take that question is the way however you're going to take.

It but that's our.

Job we have to figure out kill.

HIM i think she probably had a seizure and that probably freaked out whoever was, there and maybe they thought they killed her by hitting her on the.

HEAD i don't, know, WELL i mean that could.

Be that could be the, case and that's WHY i need to.

Know like with her condition And i'm not saying that she could black out and all that.

Stuff it could, happen BUT i need to know if she's ever going to remember, it because if she could ever remember a, suspect that's the best thing for me and him because then we have a description and everything.

Else right, now at this, point we have.

Nothing i've been asking, Trying.

We're trying to solve the, case And i'm trying to look for answers just that anything that can help us out because that now we don't, know we know, nothing and everybody is a.

Suspect at a, point the police Till.

Liz they're keeping an open mind and that they need her.

Help they ask if she'll be going back to her parents', house do me.

A favor when you're, there get a tablet out anything you think is, missing because we need to start searching for the eydos that are.

Missing somebody came in and stole.

It if somebody come in and going to steal, stuff if you have OLD tv the manuals to them that has a serial, number or anything like that to it bring it all to, us because we can start searching for those items if they've been, pawned they've been sold.

So meticulous he has all.

That i'm sure he has all those things in his house.

Somewhere see and how your mother and father a?

Relationship how has it been in this past?

Great, okay they were just celebrating their thirty second money.

Anniversary, alrighty it's twelve.

Thirty he's gonna be the end of.

The interview lasts thirteen.

Minutes any sort of final thoughts after replaying that whole.

THING i was probably like too nice and like accommodating and just letting them get away with the bullshit that they were trying to feed.

Me hindsight's always twenty.

Twenty BUT i didn't know WHAT i know.

Now everyone kind of thinks they know how they'll react in a high pressure.

Situation we think we'll do the honorable, thing or we'll keep our composure in some way or something like.

That but when we're faced with the reality of it, ALL i think we'd surprise, ourselves and not always in the best.

Way i've mentioned before THAT i can kind of understand What lissa's experiencing BECAUSE i also took on an investigation around my own dad's.

Mystery growing.

Up my dad was a.

Businessman in, FACT i learned the word entrepreneur very early.

On he always wanted to be a, musician but pivoted that desire towards, radio owning several stations and even pioneering the first radio network to provide twenty four hour music programming via.

Satellite so a pretty amazing, career.

Right my dad was filled with stories from the time he turned down hanging out With paul, McCartney which was a major, regret to producing a radio program With John.

Candy and to answer the question that may have popped into your, head, YES i did grow up.

Rich but in twenty, eleven out of seemingly, nowhere my dad was diagnosed with colon cancer and died just a few weeks, later revealing a secret he'd been keeping for.

Years he was, broke the two thousand and eight real estate crash wiping him, out but there could possibly be something to pull him out of this financial.

Hole for over a, decade my dad would talk to this guy in The philippines about gold hidden in the.

Jungle this guy told my dad he represented the Former filipino Dictator Ferdinand marcos and was the executor of his.

Will he had access to treasure hidden in the jungle worth trillions of, dollars and with just a modest investment to help get said gold out of said, jungle my dad would be wealthy beyond his wildest.

Dreams my dad and the, sky almost eight thousand miles, away would have nearly nightly phone.

Calls my dad would take notes using pen and, paper keeping track of important, details numbers and, people but later he transitioned to taping them.

TAPES i got access to a couple of years after his.

Death thank you for calling the event street in, health.

Yes Mister, stuckey or in two or three.

Place there's hundreds of, them all following the same.

Pattern my dad, dials says the day and time on the, recording and the phone.

Rings this guy in The philippines picks, up and.

So what?

Happened, well and give some updates that really don't make any.

Sense generals decided.

They didn't want to take it up Until monday.

Morning general got afraid to do, it and just too many people get.

Killed for a.

While from that over, here as the years, PROGRESS i hear the timbre of my dad's voice start to shift.

Morning what started as maybe a fun hobby for rich guy became his last saving grace after losing all of his money in the market crash of two thousand and.

Eight if these deals can come, through then my dad would be back on.

Top don't don't get angry with.

Me it's for it's four.

O'clock it's with.

You i'm up with the.

World, well but what it's done to me has been.

Devastating you, KNOW i didn't ask for.

THIS i didn't ask for you.

KNOW i was told that this is all that pipe cinch and what it's doing is just slowly killing.

Me and and you, KNOW i feel bad for, you but this.

Is just.

It's it's been all these.

YEARS i just this is gonna.

Happen it's gonna.

Happen though.

Happen it's going.

WELL i hope so bad what he's.

Doing over here.

Now he never got the money and died thinking his family would never forgive him for losing.

Everything this didn't sit well with, me SO i decided to go on my own, quest fly to The philippines and meet this man on the other end of the.

Line SOMETHING i found myself Telling liz about years later in a hotel room In wimbledon In.

LONDON i, mean LIKE i, remember you, know like the PODCAST i did about my, DAD i like confronted my dad's con, artist and like this fancy hotel In, manila AND i had like a bodyguard because they told me that he was probably gonna kill me or like try to kill.

Me and there was a part WHERE i was kind of able to like disassociate and just like kind of be.

There but WHEN i listened to, it or like WHEN i listened to my interview with, HIM i thought the same thing about, myself WHERE i THOUGHT i was way too, nice way too, accommodating like really, friendly but ALSO i kind of like thought he was going to kill.

Me it's hard to be the one to take the call to try and solve the mysteries that plague your.

Family and WHILE i don't understand exactly What liz went, through there are.

Similarities we are both daughters searching for, answers and WHILE i didn't get, Mine liz hopes that she can find.

Hers back in twenty, twelve on the day After, Christmas liz does exactly what.

The police have asked her to, do but it's a tall.

Order SO i went back to the, house which was very, eerie and there's still a smell THAT i can't describe.

IT i think it's a mixture of the fingerprint dust and the.

Illuminol so luminol this is a chemical use to detect traces of blood that crime scenes that aren't visible to the naked.

Eye it glows blue in the, dark which indicates traces of blood that could have been left behind even after someone tries to clean it.

Up the crime scene unit used it in The melgar's bathroom.

And then these like big black trash.

BAGS i don't know if it's like that smell all mixed, together or if it's the chemical.

SMELL i don't know what it.

Is SOMETIMES i still smell it and it takes me back.

There but this house just had this smell that wasn't the.

Smell my house had all of the furniture that had been in my mom and dad's room was in the living room because they had to pull up the carpet and paint the floor because of all the blood and repaint the walls and.

Everything there was just black fingerprint dust, everywhere and it was just so.

Quiet she sees the house in, disarray the drawers left, open looking to her like they've rifled.

Through did it normally look like?

That?

NO i used to drive my mom crazy if anyone, left you, know cabinet's open or drawers, open and he drives me.

Crazy but, no we never left it like.

That it's hard For liz to tell what's missing and what the police have.

Seized the professional cleaners hired to clean up crime scenes have already come through and everything's been moved.

About she thinks the SMALL tv which was in her parents', bedroom, jewelry and her mom's anti seizure medication are all.

Gone then she goes into the, Garage jim's man, cave his happy.

PLACE i used to love to sit out in the garage with him and watch him.

Work Like i'd always asked him to teach me how to do, things and he was, like you're going to cut your hand.

Off there's no Way i'm going to teach you right.

Now but you can sit and.

Watch you can help in other.

Ways SO i was like familiar with his.

Workspace you, know he loved his, tools he loved, building and he loved you, know making things with his, hands working on, cars doing these types of.

Things it was crammed with expensive looking power tools and, machinery shelves and shelves of paint filler, sprays you, KNOW diy.

Stuff all the toolboxes had been, opened rummaged, through just like have, hazardly just left disorganized and jumbled.

Together and that's not how my dad was very organized with his.

Tools he was just somebody who had a routine and a set way of doing things and he just didn't deviate from.

It and so to see the way that the garage had been left was not my dad at.

All Then liz spot something, else something totally out of, place her old green and black backpack from middle school long, forgot and a closet in the, house sitting on the concrete garage.

Floor AND i thought that was, strange and SO i kind of stood over it AND i looked into, it AND i could see that there was an xbox in.

There BUT i didn't want to touch any of.

It liz knows from reading all of those true crime books that touching it could contaminate vital.

Evidence and SO i called the police AND i said he should come and look at.

This the detectives returned to the house and photograph the backpack and the other things, that according To, liz don't add, up but only the backpack and its contents are seats and taken to The Harris County Forensics lab for.

Testing inside there's An, Xbox xbox, controllers An xbox, game and more than twenty pieces of, jewelry including, earrings, rings and.

Necklaces valuables taken from the house highly pawnable items had they been stashed in the garage by burglars who had to flee the scene in a hurry when things got out of.

Hand could these hold the clues to who Killed liz's Dad Jim.

Melgar you've been listening To Hands, tied a new eight part true crime series FROM Bbc studios And iHeart.

Podcasts new episodes will be released, weekly so subscribe or follow on The iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts so you don't miss.

Out if you like the, show please help us by spreading the word or giving us a five star.

Review I'm Maggie Robinson katz and the producer Is Maggie.

Latham sound design and mix is By Tom.

Brignell our script consultant Is Emma weatherall production support is From Dan, Martini Elena boutang And Mabel Finnegan, wright and our Product Action executive Is Laura Jordan.

Raul the series was developed By Anya saunders And Emma shaw At, iHeart The Managing executive producer Is Christina, everett and FOR Bbc, studios the executive producer Is Joe kent