Prelude

Mariet Ford won a place in sports history on Nov. 20, 1982, for his role in one of the most unforgettable moments in athletics. Mariet's Cal Berkeley Bears trailed their arch rivals, the Stanford Cardinal, 19-20. The Bears received the kickoff, pitched the ball five times, and -- with no time on the clock -- evaded the Cardinal's tacklers as well as the marching band to score the winning touchdown. The kickoff return has been ranked one of the most memorable replays of all time. It is so famous, it is known simply as "The Play." CNN and SportsIllustrated ranked it among "Our Favorite Games."

Mariet's life took a turn for the worse 20 years later when his pregnant wife and 3-year-old son were murdered and their bodies set on fire. Mariet was convicted of the crime. He has always proclaimed he was innocent. And the details of the case leave Monday morning quarterbacks room to wonder: Did he do it?

2. Tess & MoMo

Thrice happy state again to be

 The trustful infant on the knew,

 Who lets his rosy fingers play

 About his mother’s neck, and knows

 Nothing beyond his mother’s eyes!

 -Lord Alfred Tennyson

After his family didn’t answer the phone, Mariet Ford called and asked his brother to drive the few miles to his house and check on Tess, Mariet's 8-month-pregnant wife, and their 3-year-old son, MoMo.

Orrin Ford lived in unincorporated southern Sacramento County in a new development called Laguna that would incorporate in 2000 as part of the city of Elk Grove. Mariet’s house was on Silver Hawk Way.

With his wife and kids in the family car on the way to the family dentist appointment, Orrin parked outside his brother’s house.

It was about 8:55 a.m.

Orrin rang the bell. Tess didn’t answer.

Orrin knocked. He knocked louder. He peaked in the window.

They, the windows, were dark … as though blacked with some sort of film. Orrin cupped his hands and looked closer. He saw a light. An orange light. On the floor.

Fire!

Orrin tried the door.

Locked.

He ran to the side door.

Unlocked.

He ran past the lawn mower. He seized the knob of the garage door. Not hot from the fire. Unlocked as well. He pushed it open. Smoke rolled out.

It stung his eyes. It stank a toxic stink that was a combination of something synthetic and something he wasn’t sure what – but this stink was instinctually unsettling. Blinded by this noxious cloud, he felt his way past the laundry machine.

He ran down the hall.

“Tess!” he shouted. “MoMo.”

The smoke was so thick he could hardly see.

In the master bedroom, he patted the king-sized bed. He felt the covers and the mattress.

No Tess.

No MoMo.

Where could they be?

Running back up the hall and past the kitchen-dining room, he tripped.

Suddenly, from this vantage point beneath the lethal cloud of smoke, he saw … Tess … and MoMo.

Air.

Air.

He needed air.

He rushed to and opened the front door. Locked. He unlocked it, twisted the knob. Outside, he gasped.

Someone called 9-1-1.

4. Adultery

If you tell the truth,

you don’t have to remember anything.

- Mark Twain

Mariet’s most recent extra-marital affair had been with Lisa.

All the while, he was leaving a trail -- phone records here, credit card bills there.

Elaine picked up his trail soon after she started investigating the murder of Tess and MoMo. Mariet didn't cop to it.

Some detectives had a joke: How do you know when suspects are lying?

The punch line: Their lips are moving.

The truth was that regardless of race, religion or socio-economic bracket – Stevenson knows this much to be true: Everyone withholds information, especially after a murder. The innocent almost as often as the guilty flat-out lie.

Their reasons for lying varied. Some lied to deny an embarrassing detail they considered irrelevant to the murder. Others lied to protect their privacy … or to safeguard a loved one. But sometimes lies indicated something far more culpable. Sometimes the lies indicated guilt.

It was Elaine's job to find out why.

Five months after the murder, she called and requested a third interview with Mariet

On June 12, 1997, a Thursday with a high temperature of 82 degrees, Mariet brought defense attorney, William Gagen, to the Sacramento County Sheriff’s building on I Street. Both men wore somber dark suits.

Detective Elaine Stevenson had a lot of questions for Mariet. They would include some tough questions. If she asked them in the right manner and order, the defense attorney would let her build up to and leverage the most potentially damaging accusations. They wouldn’t be fun questions to ask. But Stevenson knew she would ask them. She had to ask them. Like the message scrawled on the Polaroid, she had to know who killed Mariet's son MoMo and the 3-year-old boy's mommy, Tess.

To figure it out, she needed to ask more questions, to ferret out the lies.

In a previous interview, she asked Mariet about an Oakland woman named Lisa George. Mariet said he had known Lisa for almost 20 years. They had grown up in the same city. When Mariet had been a teenage football sensation, they had attended rival schools. They had remained friends, nothing more.

Confrontation wasn't the answer. Some detectives may still beat confessions out of suspects. But that was never Elaine's style. Her method of interview was more subtle.

From all those years working sex crimes, she knew that one key to getting confessions was sounding understanding, never to voice to voice judgments in tone or so many words. She sounded world-wise and understanding enough to recognize that transgressions like adultery didn’t necessarily make anyone a murderer.

Elaine asked Mariet about his most recent extra-marital affair, with an Oakland woman named Lisa George.

She was someone I dated,” Mariet said. “But I wouldn’t say she was a girlfriend.” He said the last 10 years or so he and Lisa had been just friends.

From five months of investigating this case, Stevenson knew that to be another lie. “Do you remember the last time you saw Lisa?” Stevenson asked.

In the interrogation room, on the video tape, Mariet sat there, looking down. The hidden camera’s timer showed that about five seconds had passed.

The question hung in the silence: “Do you remember the last time you saw Lisa?”

“Mmm,” Mariet said. He confessed that he had last seen Lisa in December.

What was the circumstance?” Stevenson asked.

Rather than wait another five seconds for Mariet to answer, Elaine supplied the answer. Mariet was away from home, in Pleasant Hill at the Residence Inn for “business training.” Lisa George had come to see him at the hotel.

On the hidden camera in the interrogation room, Mariet’s left hand reached for his left eye, Mariet fiddled with his brow, just above where he had had the scratch on the day of the murder.

Mariet remembered that night. His life had been so much different back then, 16 months earlier, two months before the murders, 10 days before Christmas. Tess had been pregnant with the baby they'd planned to name Marcellus. She was home alone their 3-year-old son, MoMo, when Mariet had welcomed Lisa into his hotel room. This was not something Mariet was eager to discuss.

“She came by,” he said. “Yes.”

“Did you guys just visit in the lobby,” Stevenson asked.

No,” Mariet said. “We went up to my room.”

He told Stevenson nothing serious had happened between him and Lisa in the hotel room.

Another lie.