BBCD.

Hey, I'm Maggie.

Just a quick heads up before we start.

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

How many tattoos do you have a lot?

I have a physics equation tramp stamp.

I thought that would be funny, funny.

I love a physics tramp stapp.

High brow lowbrow.

Is my love language, and that is the epitome of hy braw lowbrow.

That would be kind of ironic.

So what's the physics equations?

The Dirac equation.

It kind of brings like quantum physics and relativity together.

It just like explains everything, and it kind of talks about like dark matter and I don't know antimatter.

I can't even remember.

It's been so long.

I'm sitting next to Liz on her oversized, well loved teal colored couch in London, nodding my head, pretending I know exactly what the Dorac equation is.

I have no idea what the Dorac equation is.

I love.

Liz starts to roll up her sleeve, showing me her other tattoos, her mood changing as she does.

This is beautiful.

It's just got touched up.

But most of this was done by a Mexican toutoo artist, and it's hard to see.

Liz pivots her body further, lifting the fabric up and revealing a kaleidoscope of colorful flowers inked on her arm.

So there was like a rose up here for their last name.

She's now Liz Melgar Rose, taking the name Rose from her husband Anthony.

And there are others, each flower representing a different member of her family.

And then these.

Are for my parents and stergazer Lily's.

This is my mom's birth flower.

This is the sacred mind flower.

This one, yeah, a deep purple aster with its brilliant yellow center.

There's a violet a sunflower.

This is my daughter's birth flower.

My son's a chrysanthemum.

And the poppies are my dad's.

And then this is a simplest cheese or a miracle and those are used young Day of the Dead.

So that's like me wearing my altar all the time.

Her tattoos her altar are not just devotions to her dad, but to their shared my inheritage.

Something she says, Jim was deeply proud of having grown up in Guatemala.

When I was a kid, He was always trying to teach me about our culture and tell me I should be proud of where we've come from, and you know that we've come from nothing and look at where we are.

And I really didn't appreciate it at the time.

I really didn't.

I was just oh, my god, Okay, I get it.

I've heard the story a hundred times.

What would he tell you about living in Guatemala.

He would just talk about like the absolute poverty.

He would always tell me that, you know, you don't know how good you have it or how lucky you are.

My grandmother she used to live in like straw and mud houses that they would have to rebuild every year.

Her first language was a Mayan dialect called Kikichi, and then she learned Spanish later on once she got older.

But they were very, very poor.

So when I was six, we went for six weeks and I remember that trip vividly.

Yeah, tell me about it.

Yeah, I mean, we get there and in the middle of the courtyard there's like this shit and that's where everyone showers.

But you know, I was like, there's no hot water.

How am I going to take a bath?

So my grandma got like one of those metal clothes, washing bins, and heated hot water on the stove so I could have a warm bath.

And my dad said that as soon as we got there, I said, there's nothing cool to drink.

I'm ready to go home.

I mean understandable.

I think I would feel the same way at age six.

But as Liz gets older, her interest in her indigenous roots continued to grow, and after her dad's murder, that interest becomes a passion.

I guess I'm trying to get to know the culture because I don't know.

I guess it makes me feel more connected to my dad and my family.

Liz is planning another test you to honor her kek Chi spirit.

Do you know what you're going to get?

Just a red band on your wrist?

Yeah.

Cool.

It's supposed to signify the blood that's been shed from the genocide of the Mayan people.

A symbol to mark the oppression of the mind people, which is no doubt an incredibly heavy thing to have inked on your body.

But this red band also symbolizes a message of resilience and survival against acts of cruelty, And if you've been through what Liz has, I can see why this message would resonate so deeply.

She's already lost one parent, and to rewind back to the summer of twenty fourteen, she feels like she's about to lose another.

It's been eighteen months since Jim's death.

Liz is at the new home she shares with her mom and husband, a high of flyers from various lawyers in her hands, all offering to represent Sandy.

I can't imagine what Liz is feeling.

She's trying to come to terms with the loss of her dad and now this all while just becoming a mother herself.

I just had my daughter, so I was kind of all over the place.

Liz is likely sleep deprived adjusting to her new life as a mom.

Maybe this is all a mistake.

Could this really be happening.

She keeps checking the records on the district attorney's website.

Clearing the page and then searching for her name, like this has to be a mistake, and like doing the search a couple of different ways just to be sure that I had the right information.

But it's no mistake.

Sandy had been indicted for Jim's murder, and right now Liz is going to need every fiber of her keck che Warrior Spirit to keep her mom out of jail.

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

This is Hands Tied Episode five Warrior Spirit.

Liz has entered what feels like a parallel universe.

Her mom is no longer Sandy Melgar, but the defendant accused of first degree murder and things are about to get even worse.

We all served to Houston together so that she could turn herself in and be processed.

My mom was in tears, and she's never been rested before, She's never gotten in trouble.

I was terrifying for her.

At nine am on July twenty ninth, twenty fourteen, in Houston, Texas, Sandy is arrested and the formal indictment is read out.

Sandra Melgar is accused of unlawfully, intentionally and knowingly causing the death of I may by and I quote, stabbing the complainant with the deadly weapon, namely a knife.

Sandy is granted bail.

You don't know what's going to happen.

You don't know how to prepare for that.

There is no one you can really talk to you because not everybody goes through that.

You know, it's very isolating, it's very it's it's hard.

I think we all have expectations of how justice moves from what we've seen on movies or on TV.

You're indicted, then it's straight to court.

But the truth is the legal system often moves really slowly.

You're on hold, you can't do anything, You're just in a holding pattern.

Weeks turn into months, months turn into years.

It never gets easier, but you learn to live with it and you learn how did you know?

Yeah, have it be part of your life.

In life, no matter how difficult March is.

On the following summer in twenty fifteen, Liz and her daughter move out of Texas, thousands of miles away to Seattle after her husband, Anthony, lands a job there.

I just tried to focus on my daughter really and I just felt like I didn't have a bandwidth to really deal with everything.

I was just like, Okay, well this is how it's going to go.

Now, like one foot in front of the other, what do we do?

Sandy stays in Houston but tries to see Liz and her grandchild as often as she can.

We actually spent a lot of time together.

She spent a lot of time with my daughter, and I think that.

Helped her a lot.

And sixteen, four years after Jim's death and two years after Sandy's indictment, Liz is pregnant again.

And my son was born, and she came and helped.

She came and stayed with my daughter while I had him in the hospital.

On the surface, Sandy's doing remarkably well.

My mom is really good at like compartmentalizing, I guess, just pretending like that's not guess being in denial.

I don't know, I don't know what you want to call it.

But she's just good.

I'm like, everything's fine.

But everything's not fine.

And Liz can see right through.

It, obviously, like she was still under a ton of stress and still trying to process everything that happened and dealing with her own health not doing well, and stress also makes things worse, both the lupas and the epilepsy.

So she struggled a lot.

And what about Liz.

She's filled with anxiety about the future.

There might be some people who are listening who feel like accepting.

The murder of your dad is horrible.

That to accept that your mom killed your dad is way too horrible to entertain.

So you can even like think about that possibility.

But you have to, like, how can you not?

You have to because it is a possibility, right, There's a ton of possibilities.

Unfortunately, that is one.

She's just a very warm and loving person.

She's a mom.

Like when you picture a mom, at least, I picture someone who gives you hugs and who's affectionate and who you can talk to and who you feel comfortable with.

According to Liz, Sandy was always nurturing, constantly doting on her only daughter.

You know, they're making you food, and they're feeding you, and they're making sure you're okay, and you know, it's just someone you can trust.

Liz says.

Sandy was the peacemaker of the family, especially during shall we say Liz's more rebellious years.

She was always the.

Buffer between me and my dad, and she was always telling my dad to just you know, it's okay, just give her some space.

It'll be fine.

I felt like my mother was somebody I could genuinely talk to, not about everything, but about most things.

I think a lot of daughters feel that way about their mothers.

They don't need to know everything like, you know, maybe the time you flirted with shoplifting when you were a.

Little too old to be doing that.

Just me.

My mom is an incredibly calmon, easy going She never complains.

It was always about other people, and you know, she just wanted everyone else to be okay.

And I think she came last a lot at the time.

But I think that's a lot of moms.

I feel like throughout this podcast, we've talked a lot about Sandy's situation, but who she is, what she likes, dislikes, her favorite foods, you know, the things that make us us.

All of that feels a little fuzzy to me.

I want to see if I can understand her a bit more where she comes from, so I seek out some of her family.

The age difference between Sandy and I is about thirteen fourteen years.

We grew up together, so she was raised by my grandmother, as was I, So Sandy has always been in my life.

Diana is Sandy's cousin.

Her mom and.

My dad were siblings, but in reality they're more like sisters, just like Sandy.

Diana says she was abandoned by her parents, so they both grew up in Laredo, a town in Texas near the Mexican border.

At any given point, that could be like seven kids in a tiny house.

It was just fun for me having so many people around, so much love around.

But it was difficult.

We were poor and we struggled for food, and you know, we would go hungry.

I could see pictures and look back on it now and see the conditions we were living in, how I was dressed, how malnursed I look.

Sandy was Diana's role model, caring, reliable, sensible.

She even taught Diana to drive.

She was such a goodie two shoes, like I don't know how else to put it.

She wasn't a rule breaker, you know.

She we followed the law.

She barely had a speeding ticket.

Diana followed Sandy from Laredo to Houston and lived with her in Jim for a.

Couple of years.

She says it was her first experience of living in a peaceful home.

Sandy and Jim, they had a good life, like they had made it, you know, out of the whole family, she was the first one to have a nice home and a good marriage, like we didn't grow up with, you know, examples of a good marriage.

Besides my aunt.

Everyone else was broken home.

You know, my dad, his marriage didn't work out.

Her mom, you know, their marriage didn't work out.

So they were a perfect example of what we all strive to achieve one day, you know, the financial stability, the good marriage, you know.

I it's just still so crazy that out of all of us, she is the one that ended up in this situation.

Maybe it's unsurprising considering how much Diana revered Sandy, but you can't think of anyone less likely to murder their husband.

It was devastating that anyone could think that she was capable of that, and that she would do something like that to Jim.

And I think maybe she was afraid that, you know, we were going to think the same thing, But it just it never entered my mind that Sandy could be capable of that.

But in the summer of twenty seventeen, Sandy's murder trial is finally scheduled, and Diana braces herself for what might come out in court.

What if she got it all wrong?

You know, I believe in science, I believe in evidence, I believe in law enforcement.

And so before the how started, I prepared myself.

I prepared myself for the possibility of Sandy actually doing this crime, Like I was not blind to the fact that it is possible, you know, And so I prepared myself that I'm going to be sitting there, you know, during the trial and I could find out Sandy is guilty.

That's how I looked at it, because I was prepared to see the evidence, you know.

I believe that if they charge someone that they have the evidence to back it up.

And I thought, well, what am I going to do if she's guilty, Like, what am I going to do?

And I knew that, Okay, if she's guilty, then she deserves to be in prison, and I'm not going to turn my back on her.

You know, She's been there my whole life, so I will support her however I can.

But she definitely deserves to be in prison if that's what she did, if she's guilty of this.

So that's how I went into the trial, knowing that I could get some devastating news.

Mac and I wholeheartedly, without a doubt, believe in Sandra's innocence.

This is, no doubt a helpful sentiment if you're going to defend someone against the murder charge, and Sandy's lucky She's got Allison Seacrest, who, along with her uncle Mac Seacrest, will be representing her in court.

I was honored and delighted to step in and represent Sandy at trial.

Mac is my uncle and like a second father.

She lived with me and studied the law and learned to have a cook.

I had a cook, Oh gosh, amazing salads, you know, lovely fish, all kinds of things.

He's an amazing chef and more importantly, a great friend and excellent mentor.

George McCall c Chris Junior, or Mac as he prefers to be called as in his late seventies.

Now, he's one of the big guns of the Texas legal world.

He's been practicing since nineteen seventy seven, and he wrote the book on law.

No really, he's the author of O'Connor's Texas Criminal Codes plus a kind of Texan legal bible.

And Alison is not only his niece but his protege.

I had the opportunity to go to court with him when I was gosh, probably fourth grade or so, and just thought it was really fascinating seeing him interacting with judges and lawyers and his client.

Alison cut her teeth as a prosecutor in the Harris County DA's office before going into private practice.

After taking on Sandy's case, they request the Melgar police files and began acquainting themselves with the various details.

We spent hours and hours with Sandy, hours and hours with her daughter and with other witnesses and family friends that we called, you know, as a young defense attorney, not the experience that my uncle had.

Obviously, it was hard not to get involved.

You know.

I think a lot of doctors and lawyers and probably some other professions have to learn to compartmentalize and not become attached.

But I like Sandy.

We did a deep dive into all of her text messages and understanding what their relationship was like, what a sweet, loving family, and it wasn't possible for us to not get emotionally involved.

But soon mac Alison, Liz and Diana, we'll see how this will all play out in court.

A local mark case.

That grabbed national attention is headed.

To trial Jerry's selection starting today in the trial of Sandra Melgar, who's accused of murdering her longtime husband then trying to cover it up.

The media circus picks into high gear and presents viewers with a familiar setup of a lurid them fatale murder trial.

This is a case that began in twenty twelve and Sandra Melgar stands accused of murdering her husband, hi May Melgar, then staging a home invasion as a cover up.

It happened on December twenty third in northwest Harris County.

Sandra and her husband were both found tied up.

He was found dead, stabbed thirty one times in a closet.

She was found bound in a bathroom.

Melgar originally had told investigators that she blacked out in a bathroom and woke up tied up in a closet, but nearly two years later she was arrested and charged with murder.

Now Melgar has been free on a fifty thousand dollars bond.

If convicted of murder, she faces up to like in prison.

On Thursday, August twenty seventeen, the State of Texas Versus Sandra Jean Melgar begins Harris County Criminal Justice Center, Franklin Street, Downtown Houston.

A busker greets the study flow of people as they climb the stone steps and pass through the glass doors of the imposing twenty one story building.

Attorneys, journalists Jim and Sandy's family including Liz, Anthony and Diana, and members of the public all wait in line at the airport style security.

Laptops are laid neatly in trays, pockets emptied.

Today the line is longer than usual.

A noisy knot of law students join the line.

They've just finished their bar exams and for the first time in months, they've got some downtime.

What better way to spend it than setting in on the opening day of what promises to be an extraordinary case.

It was just like one of the most surreal moments of my life.

It just felt like this, like a snowball that just was gathering momentum.

Liz attempts to navigate the swirling frenzy of the media.

Cameras aren't allowed inside the courtroom, so the TV crews linger.

In the hallway, and there's just this camera guy from one of the news stations and he's just like he hits somebody in the head of his camera.

My husband is trying to get him the way to block him.

The guy's walking backwards and my husband's like in front of us I'm trying not to trip over my crutches.

As if things aren't complicated enough covering from surgery and hobbling around on crutches.

I mean, there's just like it's just pure chaos in this whole way.

And I mean I'd never experienced anything like that before.

But Liz isn't allowed to watch the trial because she's going to be called as a witness.

Well, yeah, they put you in a witness room and you just have to sit in there all day, every day and wait because you don't know when you're going to be called.

Liz is going to miss the moment she's been waiting years for when the detectives finally reveal their evidence against her mom, why they think Sandy killed her dad, even though she was.

Found with her hands tied.

It's the same for Sandy's cousin Diana, who's also being called as a witness.

That devastated me because I wanted to hear the evidence firsthand.

I wanted to see it.

I didn't want to read it.

I wanted to see what the jury was going to see and hear.

I wanted to exp experience it just like they're going to.

And so the State of Texas versus Sandra Jean Melgar finally begins.

First, they need to select a jury, feeding even more breathless coverage in the press.

Both the prosecution and the defense spent the morning going through sixty five prospective jurors.

But after going through that selection process, it couldn't come up with a group of twelve that they were looking for.

Sandra Melgar is charged.

Both sides get a chance to quiz potential jurors, trying to weed out anyone with a conflict of interest or an obvious bias.

If you've read MAXI Christ's book, you'll know that the legal term for this is war dyer.

The potential jurors are reminded that the defendant, Sandy is innocent until proven guilty, and that it's the prosecution's job to prove her guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

But what they don't have to prove is motive, which isn't quite how I remember it from all those courtrooms dramas I've watched.

I mean, I'm looking at you Law and Order Detective Olivia Benson, where whole episodes revolve around exposing someone's motive.

But this is real life, and there's no legal requirement to prove motive.

You can find someone guilty of murder without ever knowing why they did it.

So the potential jurors are asked, could they convict someone without a motive, and some say they do have a problem with that and are upfront about it, admitting they wouldn't be able to find someone guilty without knowing their motive, so they're out.

Others don't make the cut for other reasons.

They're into day two of the trial before they finally select eight men and four women who will sit in judgment of Sandy Melgar.

It's part of my life, part of my history.

I got called into something I didn't want.

I resent it, but I was to do it.

I did it because that's of my civil responsibility.

That's what I would want the government to protect me and make sure if I was in her situation and somebody was there protecting me.

Once they picked all the jurors that were gonna sit, I just remember my cousin saying, there they go.

Those are the people that have your mom's life in their hands, And that's when it hit home.

Liz watches the jurors file in before we're treating to the cold airless witness room, like I kept.

I was like trying to look at them and like get a read on them or figure out like please, please, just be a good human, do the right thing.

That's what made it real, Like that was the moment.

Once again, she'll be drawing on every ounce of her Kekchi warrior spirit to get her through the nerve shredding days ahead.

It was made to be a sensationalis trial, I think because it was so unusual.

What will the jurors make of her?

Mom Sendra Melkar herself would limp into the courtroom every morning.

When we sat down, she usually put her head down and she didn't look at us very much.

And how will they determine Sandy's fate?

I want to believe somebody is innocent until the state can prove them guilty.

And is the state doing their job improving this person guilty?

And we all place that at the forefront of our deliberations and our discussion, saying let's do this the way we're supposed to.

We're here to decide innocent or guilty.

That's next time on Hands Tied.

You've been listening to Hands TIEDE, a new eight part true crime series from BBC Studios and iHeart Podcasts.

New episodes will be released weekly, so subscribe, 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 Brignoll.

Our script consultant is Emma Weatherall production support is from Dan Martini, Elena Boutang and Mabel Finnegan Wright and our production Executive is Laura Jordan Rawl.

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.

James Cook is the creative director A Factual for BBC Studios Audio and the Director of Audio at BBC Studios is Richard Knight.