With the video, the lab report, and the recording, we went to the police, and Detective Mark Sullivan reviewed the evidence with a hardened expression.
He said, “We will arrest her immediately,” and I returned home ahead of the officers with my heart racing.
An hour later the doorbell rang, and Detective Sullivan’s voice carried through the house as he informed Vanessa that she was under arrest for attempted murder.
She screamed that Logan was dead and that we were delusional, and then the detective played the drone footage on a tablet in the living room.
When Vanessa saw herself on the screen, her composure shattered and she collapsed into a chair while officers placed her in handcuffs.
The trial drew attention across California because the story of a presumed dead son returning alive captured public imagination, yet for me it was simply the end of a long nightmare.
Vanessa eventually pleaded guilty when confronted with the arsenic analysis, the audio recording, and the video evidence, and she received a lengthy prison sentence that ensured she would never approach me again.