What makes the case of jennifer pan unique among others in the true crime genre is the overabundance of raw footage freely available in the public domain there is over 11 hours of material that not only recounts her entire life in meticulous detail but gives us considerable insight into her psychopathological state jennifer herself will narrate her own story in this video which is the reason the Following lead up segment will be condensed as a brief outline is all that is needed before delving into the extraordinary mind of this individual jennifer was born in markham ontario where
she was raised with her older brother in a middle-class household her parents beak and han were originally from vietnam and their method of parenting was strict very strict what some might even class as authoritarian success and achievement From their children were seen as outright obligations whether it be in academics or extracurricular activity and some might argue these expectations took precedence over the well-being of the children themselves jennifer initially took the imposed pressure in her stride and put everything she had into figure skating she had exceptional talent and at one point was expected to compete in
the winter olympics but she suffered a serious knee injury at the Age of 14 and was told she could no longer compete her dreams were cut short but of more concern was that her parents expectations now had to be met through the more traditional round of education and the issue was that jennifer wasn't anywhere near as academically gifted as she was athletic she was averaging a c-minus when her parents wanted straight a's so rather than communicate with them she decided to meet their expectations under false pretenses and began faking Her test results this led to
her faking her end-of-year report cards which eventually led to her faking a high school diploma and then a university acceptance letter to study pharmacology in the abstract world of her parents jennifer was on her way to a noble and well-paid career in medical healthcare when in reality she was a high school dropout living with her drug dealer boyfriend whom she had been dating in secret for almost eight years she was Eventually found out in 2010 when her parents discovered she had been living a double life and was then given an ultimatum at 24 years old
she had to choose between one of two options option one was that she had to live at home under a strict regime cease all contact with her boyfriend and only leave the house to go back to school and pursue an education option two is that she could do whatever she wanted but she would then be disowned from her family she Could never return home and all financial support would cease immediately jennifer evidently decided neither option would suffice so she created option number three she had her boyfriend arrange a mock home invasion where three of his
acquaintances would enter the pan household and stage a robbery gone wrong the two instructions were to first ransack the home and then murder the parents the planned date was monday the 8th of november with the Scheduled time being roughly 11 pm jennifer would unlock the front door and three figures were caught on a neighbor's surveillance camera entering the home in 1105. they were then seen running out just under 18 minutes later it was at that exact time 9-1-1 received a call from the same household [Music] hello ma'am i like pops i don't know what's happening
I'm tired upstairs big pan was shot twice once in the neck and once in the head she was killed immediately the father han was also shot twice once in the shoulder and once in the face he astonishingly survived and was put into an induced coma once he arrived at the hospital jennifer was taken to the same hospital as a precaution but was soon cleared of injury she sat by her father's bedside for roughly three hours before she was Taken to the markham police station to give a statement as a witness i want to go through
a form with you it may seem kind of you know why you're doing this but this is a it's it's like you're you're swearing to tell the truth about what you're going to talk to me about and it's also going to explain to you the penalties for not telling the truth i don't expect you To help me but for a homicide investigation anyone who's very close to the investigation we do this with okay so this isn't suspecting that you're not going to tell the truth this is more of a feature that you understand the importance
of telling the complete truth jennifer is not a suspect at this moment she is only giving a voluntary statement under oath she has Not read her right to silence but instead informed of her rights as a witness she is basically told that fabricating evidence with the intent to mislead is an offense after reading the notification off paper the detective gives jennifer a more human explanation of the instruction what i've just explained to you is you're here voluntarily to help us that you don't have to talk to us if you don't want to but the importance
of Talking to us and if you're talking to us the importance of telling the truth and if you don't tell the truth there's criminal consequences for not telling the truth that's all that all that stuff had to deal with okay the investigator then leaves to get the commissioner of oaths which is for the purpose of swearing in the witness but he first brings in a box of kleenex this is universally recognized as getting startled yet the official term In neurophysiology is the startle reflex via auditory stimulus hyperarousal from a traumatic event can often exaggerate this
response in a manner similar to how jennifer reacted to the sound of the door hello my name is andrew laspiro i'm the commissioner of oaths with york regional police i'm here so you can give a truthful statement either by solemn affirmation or swearing on the bible which do you Prefer the bible just put your hand on the bible do you jennifer pan swear that the evidence you shall give on this investigation shall be the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god i do once jennifer is sworn in the lead
investigator returns to collect the statement now i want you to sort of take yourself back to earlier on Today uh yesterday meaning the 8th of november and tell me about your day okay start at any point in time where wherever you feel comfortable and then we're going to move we're going to move forward okay um yesterday probably around nine o'clock in the morning Nine nine thirty um my mother she woke me up and she told me that she was going to going to visit my grandfather throughout the day jennifer explains that she practiced piano studied
piano history talked on the phone with her friends and had dinner with her parents her mother left for line dancing at 8 pm and returned home at about 9 30 at which time jennifer was alone in her room watching tv ready to Go to sleep and then suddenly i just heard my mom calling for my dad to come down and that's when i lowered the volume on my tv and i could hear the voices weren't any voices i was very familiar with and so i was scared and i couldn't move i just sat in my
room for a while And then i thought i heard them all like leave the top floor and i peered out of my bedroom door and a guy was there and he came at me and had string in his hands and tied my arms back and said i have a gun behind your back do what i say if you do what i say then no one will get hurt where is the money show me where your Money is my mom kept trying to get up and they kept telling her sit down and so i didn't want
her to get hurt i told her mom sit down they were trying to find her wallet but she her english thinker so she kept saying first they kept pushing her down onto the chair okay take your time take your time All this is very important so take your time jennifer's non-verbal communication up to this point has made sense and the reflection of her mother's last moments seems to push her over the edge it could be assumed the detective still considers jennifer a victim at this moment but in the next moment he will start becoming suspicious
they kept all the lights off on the main floor The only time there was light was when they opened the fridge door to see if they could find where my mom's purse was take yourself back to a moment in your life when you have been overwhelmingly upset about something and at the same time we're trying to explain to someone why you were upset you wouldn't quietly and reservedly convey the events you would likely blurt them out in a forceful and disordered manner your sole focus would be on processing Your thoughts and conveying them into speech
the emotional turbulence of severe hysteria and grief makes it very difficult to convey thought into actual dialogue and the simple wording of a sentence becomes very challenging jennifer seems to find her words easily and executes her sentences perfectly one of the gentlemen asked my father if he had money in his wallet and where his wallet was so they took me because i was next to The stairwell they took me up the stairs to show them where my father's wallet was but i'm i didn't know they had turned the room upside down i didn't know where
his pants were at that time the intruders retrieve eleven hundred dollars from the master bedroom and then tied jennifer to the upstairs banister next thing i know i think i heard my parents going down the stairs and my mom was asking them for me to come with them They wouldn't let me come with them and after he said the last things i heard them say was you lied you lied to us you lied to us and then i heard two pops my mom screamed i yelled out for her and a couple more pops take your
time take your time And i think i heard my mom say a moan or something and they did one more before they left and then one of the guys said we have to go now it's been too long and then they ran up the door and i think once they were out the door i heard my dad go up the stairs and at that point jennifer has clearly gotten her story straight beforehand yet in the Next moment appears to realize how unusual it is that she was able to make a phone call when her hands
were tied behind her back to a banister she hesitates stutters and even looks to the detective for approval twice before she quickly moves on i had my phone in my poc in my on me behind me that i had hidden there that they didn't know about so I had my phone in my poc in my on me behind me that i had hidden there that they didn't know about so when i when i when they i thought that they had heard them i'll leave and my dad ran up the stairs i whipped up the phone
and i called and went but i still hadn't heard anything from my mom and all i could hear was my dad running on the street just moaning of me sounds The detective then breaks the event down into components and has jennifer go through each moment in more detail the first of which is the appearance of the intruders jennifer now describes the one who appeared to be in charge the only thing i can remember was him was he had dreadlocks he had dreadlocks so are you can you describe his race to me he was black did
it was his head covered was his face covered do you remember anything about that just that His dredge blocks were like kind of like flopping all over the place i couldn't really see his face and they kept the lights dark as much as them as much as possible did he have a gun yes did you see the gun i only saw the top part of it what did it look like um kind of it was black yeah Do you know where the other guys involved in this are i know one stayed with my parents downstairs
okay um the other one i'm not at that point in time i was more focused on him like he was seeing me and he was coming after me so you're saying there's three for sure yeah that's all you saw a total of three at one time you saw three People together yes when i went downstairs i saw three shadows she details the appearances of the other two assailants whom she asserts were also black males the detective then brings her back to the one in charge now the first guy who spoke to you what kind of
did he have any accent is it clear was it clear english english unbroken unbroken no accent From the terms he used i didn't get to pick up an accent no short phrases he sounded he sounded canadian i would say yes he was born here he was born here she asserts that the second intruder didn't speak while the third had a caribbean accent she then goes on to say she was taken downstairs for a brief moment and saw her parents under guard in the living room her father was asked Where his wallet was and he told
them it was in the master bedroom jennifer was then taken back upstairs alone with two of the assailants to help them find it they don't find the wallet but instead retrieve a pile of cash from inside the nightstand jennifer was then tied to the upstairs banister and left alone as the intruders went back down and the next thing i can hear are them telling my parents to move to the basement okay And i'm asking them why where are you going and my mom's yelling to me i want my daughter why can't my daughter come too
i want my daughter jennifer then hears one of the intruders yell you lied to us who do you hear yelling you lied to us or to that extreme number three to my i'm assuming it's to my father because he was the one asking for the Wallet now you hear this commotion downstairs you said you heard two pops and you heard who screamed your mom and what was she screaming do you remember me get out it was kind of like a cry cry yell so it was just okay they had made the first round or pop
pop and They had they had said okay that's enough let's go who said that whose voice is that number one okay and then i heard one more after that and they're like that's enough let's go okay and again that's number one yes so what do you hear next after you hear the scrambling they're gone Because you're hearing no more i gather that's how you assume they're gone is because you don't hear then you hear your dad i i reach for my phone okay and you call okay when your father exits you hear the door open
because you hear your daughter and then i can hear like the outside noises okay like the wind coming in and i just hear my dad I think you think that he's sustaining some kind of injury because he's not you can't understand what he's saying okay what about do you hate can you hear your mom okay where does your dad go do you know where you never see your dad again until when we're at the hospital i think that's what you said right I saw him when he was on the grinny is there any reason to
suspect or anything that's happened in the recent weeks leading up that would have you guys be a target of some type of incident like this you live a straightforward kind of almost routine life whenever jennifer smiles it takes her a Couple seconds to realize she's not exhibiting the correct behavior and she then snaps back into her solemn stare what in your opinion would cause people to target your house to think there was a large quantity of money i'm not sure now you say your mom drives a lexus it could be because of the aesthetics yes
what about your dad he drives a mercedes and he loves that baby is that right The questions end here and the detective leaves the room for half an hour to double check if he needs any more information after 15 minutes of jennifer waiting alone were gifted with another performance of the startle reflex only this time it's slightly less convincing if investigators were certain of jennifer's innocence this would have been the first and last time she would have been questioned in such a manner police are extremely careful in how they Involve victims and investigations as to
not cause further unnecessary trauma but on this particular occasion it would come as no surprise that jennifer's psychological well-being was of less concern she was officially still a victim and witness but unofficially a leading suspect she was called back in to give another statement just two days later at 9 00 am she was told the reason was to collect more details but you'll notice that the line of questioning and The answers they attain have little to no use for anything outside of jennifer's culpability the actual reason for the second statement is to collect further information
to use against her at a later stage in this interview alone they already start the process of cross-examination and start to catch her out in previous lies jennifer is still a witness at this moment and the exchange is void of any direct confrontation yet she is still put under a modest amount Of pressure and the holes in her story start to become ever more apparent take that first interview that we had which was you know hours after what what had transpired put it aside it's almost like we've never spoken before okay so we're starting to
fresh we're starting from new that way you're not gonna say i think i already told him that don't worry about what you've already told me do you jennifer penn swear to clear that the evidence that You give in this investigation shall be the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god yes we're going to see if we've learned or if you've remembered anything else and there's some questions with respect to that statement that i'm going to ask you about okay but i'm going to let you start again and and let's
let's move forward from any time in that day where you want to start if it's the time you woke up or if it's the time that your First interaction it's your choice okay i'm just i'm very nervous and i why are you let's why are you why are you nervous tell me about why you're nervous because i don't want to say the wrong thing oh so that day was a lot you're right and i've been Scattered and so bits and pieces are here and some pieces aren't here and i'm just so i want you to
sit back in your chair okay just sit back in your chair take a deep breath okay close your eyes just follow my line just sit back in the chair for a second sit back relax is the best you can close your eyes And just breathe for a minute okay the most curious detail you've probably come to notice is this it's known as a self-pacifying gesture a person who does this is most often uncomfortable and sometimes fearful of what lies ahead it's a coping mechanism to dissipate stress and afford self-assurance what i can remember is when
i woke up i had some breakfast She practices on the piano studies piano history plays games on her phone and speaks with her friends on facebook during the morning hours her mom leaves to visit her grandfather at around noon and returns at 3 p.m to prepare dinner her father comes home at around 4 30 from work and dinner is served one hour later her mother leaves for line dancing at seven then returns at 9 30. jennifer at this point is in bed talking with her friend on the phone and her father is in The computer
room she then hears her mother loudly call out to her father what is she saying she's calling him by his name to come down okay so give us verbatim what do you hear her saying in vietnamese she's like hannah someday she's clearly aware that she has to appear mournful over the subject matter and sensibly draws out this emotion at the correct moments yet What's fascinating is how she's unable to maintain this emotion when inquired over the same elements in this very moment she appears completely grief-stricken but when the investigator inquires further this supposed grief rapidly
dissipates it's extremely difficult to convincingly act out an emotion while evaluating a question it requires two completely different parts of the brain which is why most people can only do one of these things at a Time this is exactly what you see in the next moment and continuously throughout this interview what does that translate to uh it's my father's name han come down here does she say anything else associated with that with that i can't hear clearly because like i was on the phone and the tv was on but that's what i heard is she
yelling or is it um It's a loud it's a she's not yelling but it's a loud tone okay she then hangs up the phone with her friend once she hears the commotion as i'm hanging up the phone with him i hear footsteps going up the stairs okay but they're not they're heavier footsteps than what is to be expected from my parents okay jennifer hears unfamiliar voices so she opens her door to investigate she has spoken for two minutes up to this Point without being interrupted and once again manages to build up her emotion to correlate
with a supposedly terrifying event yet as soon as the detective interjects with a question we once again see this emotion dissipate i peered out and there was a person in my what would have been my brother's room and where's your brother's room located uh just a little bit down like i Could see my from my doorway to his doorway just a little bit down the hall okay the first intruder then robs jennifer at gunpoint before taking her to the ground floor where she then sees her parents sitting next to each other from where i was
standing my father was sitting on the right and my mother was sitting on the left sitting where on a couch on our couch sitting on the couch Are they looking out towards you no their backs are towards me okay and you're now on the ground level are you on the floor or on the sitting on the floor i'm sitting on the floor all right where are your hands they had tied my hands so let's go let's go back up to the stairs remember we said her emotional display in seeing her parents in distress gradually faded
After each interjection but you'll now see it completely cease altogether once she realizes that she made her first mistake everything she had said up to this point correlated with her initial statement but she had just forgot to mention that she was first tied up before being taken downstairs and only brought it up when reminded by the detective take the other statement and whatever we've said before i said it earlier she didn't say she was Tied up earlier she completely forgot to mention it and seems to be trying to convince the detective otherwise it's a moment
of slight panic which becomes far more pronounced when you compare it to her supposed grief stricken recollection five seconds earlier the detective doesn't challenge this as it can be used against her at a much later stage and the main objective at this point is to collect as much conflicting information as possible okay then we must let's Let's get back to that area i think you might have touched on it we went back into the description so where does he where do you get your hands tied and where does the string come from i'm not sure
where the string comes from but he had the string okay and he after i gave him my money that's when he tied my hands she is then taken downstairs where she sees her mother being interrogated by the second assailant over the whereabouts of the Cash according to her first statement the second assailant never said a word the entire time he had pushed her back onto the couch and she pushed her number two okay it was pushing her back onto the couch and she she kept saying where's my purse where's my purse i think i kept
telling her to sit down and i didn't want my mom to get hurt how many times does she get up and get pushed back down I'd say she got up twice has number two uttered a word at this point in time i can't remember hearing him okay so we're just correcting what you said earlier because you said earlier that it was number two who was asking where the purse is what are the purses and now you've said now it's number one guy who would initially No no it's all a purpose the purpose here is clarifying
what you're saying so number one number one is the one who's doing the talking about the purse number three is focused on your dad's wallet okay jennifer continues to make contradictions and is forced to correct herself multiple times after she notices the puzzled gaze from the detective he Inquires over the appearance of assailant number two who was wearing a hoodie according to the first statement you get a good look at number two now of what he's wearing all i could tell was he had a vest and his face was like a long oval face get
a vest no hoodie okay uh dark hoodie okay did did you see them recover anything inside your mom and Dad's room i did not see anything no are you sure because uh we would when we spoke the last time there was some mention of some other money that went missing i believe when they were looking for my father's wallet they had opened the drawer and there was a it was in an envelope what drawer would that have been in on my On the if you're in at the doorway where i was standing on the left
side the bedside table whose side of the bed is it that's my mother's side of the bed okay more than likely a total coincidence yet she almost appears to be praying that she gave the correct response fortunately for her she was correct on this occasion and approximately how much money I'm not sure how much she took out for our our trip but i cannot i can only estimate about a few hundred dollars few hundred because at the time the last time you told me you were pretty adamant about about eleven hundred dollars so i'm curious
to know how you came up with that number i believe is when we were at the border we and we stopped at the duty free my Mother was deciding whether to use her u.s currency or her [Music] her us currency or her canadian currency so it was at that time you remember hearing eleven hundred dollars and that's what is that the inference you're saying is that because you're pretty solid saying that it was eleven hundred dollars that went missing that was it was taken And that you saw it when we spoke and who took it
who took possession of the money i'm sorry it's all right the detective lets the contradiction slide once more jennifer is then brought to the moment where the intruders had just left and she is tied to the upstairs banister let's come back to now you're being taken to the banister in the upper don't apologize okay i'm gonna Try and ask you questions to try and clarify points okay if you don't remember you don't remember okay so don't there's no apologizing the only reason you would apologize to me is if you lied to me no okay so
then in this case then don't apologize to me it's okay okay i'm going to ask you questions to clarify points you're now bound to this to the to the railing can you show me can you stand up and Turn around and tell me just show on the camera how your hands are bound and how you are against the railing you don't have to sit down i just need to see how you were just telling me the only reason that i'm trying to i need to do this is that i'm also going to ask you is
that it so take this back to from take it out of a traumatizing event which it is and put yourself in a more clinical position because i want to See how you could physically get your phone out of your waistband we're obviously going to need to know that it's very important so traumatize a way now put yourself into a just a state of i need to mechanically show how i can get access to my phone okay because that's obviously very relevant we know you made the phone call but questions are going to obviously raise is
that if my hands are bound and I'm against the railing how do i talk to a 911 operator okay so clinically this is now a clinical demonstration just stand up focus in on how you did it and i want you to stick that in your waistband as an example okay so take your just take your sweat off because this will be a very smooth very quick thing it's a one-time demonstration i'm not going to ask you to repeat it the Two critical parts of this demonstration are where jennifer states she was tied and the movement
of her arms as she takes her phone out of her pocket the investigator is hoping the mechanics of the two components would be illogical and contradict each other he tied my upper arm yes around the banister yes but my hands are bound together so your hands bound together and this is the arm that's the the strings wrapped around Against the banister okay so now how can you get to the phone and how do you make the phone call whether it be a stroke of luck or that jennifer had prepared for this moment this actually made
sense had her arms gone left or the point of restraint been below the elbow none of this would have been possible it's perhaps the single moment where jennifer's statement was somewhat beneficial to her defense we know jennifer was tied up when police Arrived but the assumption was that she had her phone in her hands the entire time and wouldn't have had to retrieve it from her waistband she can now argue that this portion of her testimony is genuine 911 and do you talk down like that yes i'm yelling at the phone like this and how
can you hear i turned the volume on max yes so that's exactly the way that you're talking to her against the railing Okay that's good enough sit down jennifer is then brought back to the moment just before she heard the gunshots at this point i started hearing my parents get up and they're moving and my mom's yelling where's my daughter i want my daughter where's my daughter i'm yelling your mom i'm here here jennifer take a clean accent just Take a minute you'll notice that she doesn't wipe her eyes or blow her nose just buries
her face in the tissue which the detective later testified remained completely dry okay so we're now down in the basement they're down on the your know your parents are down in the basement i heard pop and then my mom you heard her squeal Multiple pops occur thereafter before she hears the intruders leave through the front door was the door closed i heard my father he ran up the stairs and all he could hear was moaning yeah once i heard him starting to move i that's when i pulled up the phone and i was trying to
call 911. this is untrue she only realized her father was alive midway through the 9-1-1 call and in that exact moment you can actually hear genuine fear in her voice compared to her fabricated panic the moment before where are you what avenue avenue road yeah [Music] the final part of this statement is collecting information to set up the main strategy for jennifer's interrogation that will take place 10 Days later they go through jennifer's past and gather intel to lay the foundation for what's known as the how and why solution which will be explained in further
detail at a later stage what i want to do now is i want to go into your past okay and start talking about things that have been going on with you the detective now morphs into a therapist and what's fascinating is how Jennifer doesn't once question the new line of inquisition many argue that it was the first time jennifer was even asked about such matters giving reason for her willingness to open up this may have been the first time in her life she was able to process her frustrations and vent to someone who appeared to
care the first topic is her parents and the expectations and pressures she was under to succeed which led to her faking her grades and then her college degree as to Not be a disappointment how did you feel about that how did you feel about having to lie to your parents i felt guilty but every time i tried to bring it up there was just so much so much expectation did you have any resentment towards them for this i chose what i chose um but in the end i chose my family She just referred to the
ultimatum she was given by her father the choice to live at home and go back to school or be completely cut off by her parents and live with her boyfriend information gathering on jennifer's past goes on for roughly 2 hours and 20 minutes the detective then ends the exchange by putting her under some pressure it's not a direct confrontation but it's by far the most uncomfortable position she's been in up to this point the detective Subtly switches back to the home invasion and how the intruders were able to gain access without breaking in like you
didn't hear you didn't hear a doorbell you didn't hear a door knock you didn't hear a door kicked in you didn't i was i said i was watching tv on the phone i i don't know how yeah i i know we went over that back and back and forth we don't know how so Somehow they got into your house by getting through your mom down in the lower level right because she's the only one who's down she's the only one down there so it's very confusing generally random events are not in most cases random there's
a rhyme or reason why they've come to your house but from what you've told me inside the House the only thing that you hear them saying to you is they're looking for money they're not looking for a specific quantity of money no so you're telling me that you you had no involvement in what happened meaning not saying how the outcome came but you you had no involvement in in any type of illegal activity that would have drawn you or the attention of you to have bad People come to your house looking for large sums of
money you're not involved in this any which way because the question obviously stands jennifer is you're upstairs and they're downstairs right so it's a natural concern When why would they leave you alone why would they not do the same to you you can't answer that question the only thing i can say is he said i cooperated but i asked him to take me the number one guy the number one guy said you cooperated okay who's to say this whole thing isn't a lie that what you're telling me is a lie Because if you are lying
it's the most cold-blooded thing that i have ever faced in my life there is nothing that you've said to me today is a lie now back to another very difficult question but if i don't ask it i'm gonna be you it's an obvious one the resentment that you had that you may have had towards your parents for the interference in your relationship and Your life and essentially locking you down in your house at the end of the day i love my parents and i chose to be with them and if i wanted to i could
have just left but i didn't i wanted to stay with them and take care of them so this wasn't some evil plot that you thought up to oh my god no no interaction no belief no you didn't have anything to do with this thing at All whatsoever you don't engage in a legal activity no because you know that it'll be very easy it will be a very easy thing to discredit you on right we're in the process of trying to add credibility to what you tell us and that's through the process of asking people and
doing whatever through that same process it will be very easy to find the flaws in what you've said which again then turns the focus back to You okay i don't it's a natural progress it's a natural thing that investigators do we eliminate people or we draw our attention to them it's a natural thing it's not brain surgery okay the detective leaves the room for 20 minutes to allow jennifer to stew in her own thoughts before they end the statement he comes back to add one last Bit of psychological pressure that he carefully disguises as reassurance
jennifer will leave terrified but still believe the police are on her side okay we're we're done essentially how are you feeling sorry you really scared me did i would i scare you about sit down sit down and take a load off tell me how tell me how you're feeling and how i scared you i don't want you walking away from here thinking i'm evil i want you to walking Around from here thinking that this guy is helping investigate my mom's murder and he's going to turn over every stone possible to make sure that we catch
the people who do that that's what i want you feeling so i don't want you walking away from here thinking that i'm i'm i scared you or i'm i'm a bad man sometimes we have to ask very very difficult questions but it's my job okay You're our only link you're it until your dad regains he is back and being able to be be spoken to right now you're our only link to this case her father had bullet fragments lodged in his face that doctors couldn't remove and a shattered neck bone at the time of this
interview the consensus was that if he did regain consciousness he would be useless as a witness due to Irreversible brain damage so where we may rely on you heavily until we can speak to your father okay so don't be afraid if you've told the truth the last thing you should be afraid of is is anything if you've told the truth and you've been truthful through this whole process then you're helping you're doing your part okay And don't be afraid of me i'm just afraid because you know like i know everything is just all pointing negatively
right now and i i don't understand why i'm just i feel that like the way you're you're speaking to me it's kind of like i know you said that you had to say those things but it's It's here and i've already said it to the special victims yesterday but there's like ideas in my head yeah and i'm afraid to say it out loud but ideas about speculation of what happened how it happened unfortunately uh at times some of us have to point the finger seem like we're pointing the finger and it really is just to
provoke you to see what you're gonna do how You're gonna respond okay so it's only a question and it ha it's been answered and if you've been truthful okay you have nothing to fear absolutely nothing okay police kept jennifer under close observation from this point forward a surveillance detail was assigned to track her every movement and she was even monitored at her mother's funeral Three days later according to reports she was emotionless the majority of the time only showing what appeared to be feigned grief at certain moments she never shed a single tear and kept
her eyes to the floor or completely shut for the entirety of the service jennifer's father had in fact awoken from his induced coma the day prior and miraculously seemed to remember everything from the night of the incident he would give an official Statement in secret on november 16th and multiple parts of his story contradicted what jennifer had told police the most significant detail was that she was never tied up but instead walking around freely and talking with the intruders as if they were friends he actually spoke with jennifer over the phone but was informed by
investigators to act amnesic and not to confront her only to ask her if she thought her ex-boyfriend was behind it she stated that she was almost Certain he wasn't the only issue with han's statement was that he had suffered minor brain damage from the gunshot which could be used by a defense team to refute his testimony in court or even get it thrown out altogether furthermore it was essentially his word against jennifer's and their turbulent relationship would also work greatly in the defense's favor york regional police knew they needed a confession for the best possible
chance at securing a Conviction so they assigned their most experienced investigator to conduct jennifer's interrogation she was called back into the markham police station on the 22nd of november at 2 30 pm a week and a half after the incident took place so just for the record it is the uh 22nd november 2010. we're at the five district station in the town of markham my computer right now says 2 39 In the afternoon okay uh just for the record my name is detective william gates you can just call me bill here today and what do
you like to be called what do you prefer jen or jennifer either okay so jen um you're aware that the um audio tape and everything's on um it's the same as last time okay You've been here on two other occasions i understand on the 9th of november and i believe again on the 11th of november is that correct okay and you know why we're here today regarding what yeah what happened okay and a result of that home invasion um your father uh and pam was actually shot And your mother uh and was actually killed is
that correct yeah you'll have to speak up a little bit just so i can hear you yes what's unique about this interrogator is how he immediately adopts a no-nonsense approach yet manages to build rapport and remain sympathetic at the same time you'll see that he has far less patience compared to the previous investigator yet seems to create a stronger Connection with a suspect it's a hard thing to explain but easily observed as you'll soon find out so that's what we're gonna discuss here today jennifer this time around has read her rights to silence rather than
her rights as a witness if she knew anything about the law in canada she would be wise to the fact that she is now a suspect fortunately for the investigator she remains completely naive to the situation throughout the opening phase Of the interrogation making her far more susceptible to the strategy he is about to employ okay just hold on a second okay we're having technical difficulties here okay so that's why they interrupted me what we're going to do is if you don't mind holding tight there i'm just going to move my equipment to the other
room okay and then i'll come over and we'll move over there next door Okay okay i'm going to be right here though okay with respect to interrogations it's common knowledge that the psychological manipulation begins before a single word is spoken the physical layout of the room is designed to accelerate the sense of discomfort and isolation and it's fascinating to observe how each interrogator has their own unique methods of setting the tone knowing how this interrogation plays out allows us To realize this detective's procedure the considerable distance between him and the suspect will keep her relaxed
enough to be influenced by phase one but this same distance will intensify the pressure once he eventually closes it during phase two you'll notice this detective is slow with his first strategy but swift with a second he takes his time in building trust and establishing rapport yet once this initial connection is secured the Transition to aggression will be abrupt and ever-increasing from that point forward jennifer takes a seat in the room 15 minutes since she was first informed of her rights it's important to note that she is still free to leave at any time at
this point she is unknowingly a suspect but not under arrest so just for the record this room is being videotaped on your tape just like the other one okay And i'm just going to grab my chair from across the way okay okay the detective goes through jennifer's history of teaching piano and her earlier years of high level figure skating which was cut short due to injury if you didn't get injured would you still be doing it yeah that's nice and did you as far as that did you do uh like competition skating or okay And
how did you do with that it wasn't at the top of the pack yeah sounds good though but you did actually enjoy it it was more than just going for a competition you enjoyed actually i was petrified as a competition okay all right do you have any students right now or okay and why not uh the students i were teaching They went to high school oh okay yeah too big for panel yeah i took it in grade school too but uh i think i got i went to grade seven in it i think like in
when i was in grade seven i stopped taking it but uh i still remember swans on the lake i don't know how to play that that's about it the detective then goes through jennifer's work history as a server Before touching on her future plans in education jennifer mentions that she plans to go by her parents wishes and pursue a career in healthcare at which point the primary strategy is initiated the how and why solution the detective gradually begins to shift the blame away from the suspect and on to another set of circumstances that prompted the
suspect to commit the crime he starts developing a theme that will afford her a psychological justification in doing It and this theme will be further established as the interrogation progresses it starts off subtle so that she remains oblivious to the agenda now if you can pick any job yourself i'm not talking about anybody else but if you could pick for yourself what would it be i'm going to be a fan teacher on like when i come home but in the daytime i'd like to have a simple maybe like a lab technician job Just work like
eight hours a day and i come home this is an answer the detective was hoping for jennifer's preferred career choice is at odds with what her parents wanted so he now builds on the concept of the overly controlling parent and the unfair limitations it causes the child he then links this concept with the subject of jennifer's boyfriend and how She was kept from seeing him now eventually you were discussing daniel what's happened with that relationship i hate it for my parents at first because i didn't agree with me having a boyfriend okay and once they
found out they didn't like the fact that he was of mixed race okay and uh he told me to stop seeing him Okay and how did that make you feel and he was the person who just filled an empty void for me so i felt that a part of me was using when you broke up you felt the heart was missing is that what you're saying when they first told me to stop seeing and stop talking to him i just i felt like a primary was missing how did they find out um One day when
my mother came to pick me up she saw me he had dropped off okay dropped you off uh and my mother was coming to pick me up okay and somehow they saw each other i guess oh my mother saw me um okay i gave it away what happened next i tried to bring him home my mother at first like you know bring him home let us eat him When i brought him home they didn't they automatically didn't like it for some reason okay and that's when they told me okay until you were told to uh
stop seeing him so what happened then at first i stopped for a while um but like i said i just felt really empty and i felt depression and jennifer then goes on to explain in further detail how she carried on the Relationship in secret and how it became more and more of a struggle hiding it from her parents now how is daniel taking it when your parents said that you couldn't see him anymore how did he take it and how did you feel she then goes on to explain that she was living with daniel at
his parents house for two years while her own parents thought she was studying at a university and his parents were i guess more Liberal than your parents parents and they recognized that you loved each other jennifer recounts how she bought a fake diploma for five hundred dollars to show her parents and the many other avenues she went down to keep the lie going she eventually gets to the day she was found out how did you end up back home i guess they Called up my friend who i said i was staying with in the middle
of the night and uh she's groggy and i forgot what day it was so she's like isn't she home and i wasn't home okay she messed up i don't blame her a bit no Jennifer then goes on to explain the ultimatum she was given and the restrictive measures that were put in place so that she wouldn't be able to see her boyfriend so how that felt being under those guidelines for the last 18 months it was okay like it wasn't the best feeling in the world because you know i'm just feeling trapped but It's what
i chose to be with my family okay and so you made a choice between what um living out of my own mcdaniels and staying did you feel you really had a choice or not there was no choice because family was confused okay and where do you get that from Where do you get that belief okay the family's number one yeah the detective then brings up jennifer's earlier assertion of being depressed and then affiliates it with the restrictive measures she was living under did you ever feel that they expected too much of you also comparison to
other people okay so who would they compare you to Like classmates club mates companies and so some of them have been successful recently okay and what did they say to you you could have been that person okay so that's pretty hard right hard to take for you what i've heard on my life nothing Did you ever feel like i know you're smart and they believe you're very smart but did you ever feel you weren't as smart as what they thought that you were okay i get that feeling that it's pretty tough to live up to
their expectations okay like your dad ultimately would like to see you be like a doctor those were pretty high standards for Anybody not everybody can be a doctor okay and but they may have acted like you could have done it no problem their expectations were so high that few people would be able to reach that expectation i'm not just talking about you i'm talking about anybody and it started at a young age the detective further explores the Stresses of living with overly strict parents and jennifer explains in further details the way she would cope which
for the most part was lying about her grades and living a double life with her boyfriend how did it feel having to lie to them all those years like i wanted to tell them but just they always looked down and disappointed okay i'm sure there were days when you Actually planned that this is the day i'm going to tell them and then you just couldn't spit it out the opening strategy of the how and why solution has now been executed a connection has been attained and the desired narrative established the next phase of the interrogation
is about to commence which is first set up by a two-step strategy step one is to induce fatigue step two is to induce fear now When's the last time you spoke to your dad this morning see if my brother has made it into school and what have you and your father discussed about this case he just asked me if daniel was behind it and i told him i don't know 100 but i don't think he did okay Why would he ask that because you believe that he still talks and that he would go to anyone
to be with me what do you think about that i know that he's moved on so i don't think he would he would lead like to be with me the detective has jennifer go through the entire incident once more but unlike the first investigator offers no Reassurance nor consolation jennifer starts fake crying again yet this time is given no tissues to wipe away her non-existent tears now do you think there's any reason why they tied you up and didn't tie your parents up i don't know does that seem odd to you why does it seem
odd because i was away um up here separation of time and Does it make sense that they would leave a witness behind if they were going to kill somebody does that make sense just thinking about it but it makes sense for somebody that was going to kill somebody to leave a witness behind that could describe them does that make common sense for killers what do you think do you think that was a mistake they made then I don't know they kept saying that they're running out of time take a long time to kill someone i
know i i don't know jennifer's dramatics intensify as the discussion of the home invasion continues she's trying to give off the non-verbal cue that she wants to move past the incident the detective doesn't respond but continues to go over the different stages of the night in more detail he jumps from the beginning to the end to the middle back To the end and then back to the beginning again none of this is for the purpose of information gathering he is inducing mental fatigue as to diminish jennifer's critical thinking this is often done before a direct
confrontation as it can diminish the suspect's ability to consider the long-term consequences of a decision jennifer will get stressed and tired not because she is traumatized by the event being recited but because it's exhausting keeping up such an act When it's not genuine and this performance eventually starts to dwindle and becomes gradually less convincing how did the conversation end with that i heard my father my mother calling for my father and then what you have to go through okay when you went to bed was your mom home yet she'd just gotten home and i went
down i Told that i'll be right back and i i went down i said hi to her and now it's back up to my room were you injured at all during the whole process not really anything step two of the confrontation setup will now commence the detective employs what is known as the futility technique he will tell jennifer that he has an abundance of resources at his disposal And even fabricate much of what he asserts he's indirectly telling the suspect it is useless to resist due to the overwhelming evidence against her now the reason why
i'm here today okay is that i'm an expert okay in what we call truth verification i talk to thousands of people okay And i basically know when somebody's not being straightforward with me okay i can tell by the language they use how they answer the questions their body language how they treat the question that something's wrong here okay this doesn't make sense the detective then gives jennifer an eight-minute narrative on police tactics and forensic technology some of which is embellished but for the most part true he then asserts that police are able to use Infrared
satellite imagery to see the occupants inside a household this is entirely false and basically if people are moving around in a house it's like an x-ray okay and basically we're able to tell you know are those movements are those actions that number of people consistent with the story that we've been told um are the people in the positions that the witnesses are telling us they were in Uh or are they different okay and if they're different why are they different is what what our question becomes right and so at the end of the day okay
there's so many resources available to me that at the end of the day i'm going to know if a person's telling me the truth or not the detective is now about to initiate the confrontation but first Brings the entire setup full circle by re-establishing the notions of reasoning and rationale the suspect is fatigued and scared but still needs to feel the detective is on her side now i can tell you that nothing surprises me in this job okay i am well aware that anybody on this earth is capable of making a mistake Okay i don't
care who they are i don't care um if they're a priest i don't care if their school teacher i don't care what the situation is given a certain set of circumstances everyone has the capability jennifer making mistakes doing the wrong thing Okay the key though when i talk to people is when they made a mistake okay that's one thing right the key is to not keep making the same mistake and to get that information out and get it off your chest okay you understand what i'm saying so at the end of the day from this
case and i can tell you i've spent literally a week on this case going over Information after information accessing all these sources speaking to every other expert on the case and at this point jennifer i know that you've not been truthful with the police okay you've not told us everything that you know purposely you've spent a considerable amount of time in the Last seven years telling half truths and i can understand why okay you've had a tough life what's happened to you to me equates to abuse and all the stresses that you've had and forced
to lie i can understand why you did it okay but you're in another situation here where you're under another tremendous amount of stress and it doesn't feel good inside does it It breaks down the person that you are because at the end of the day you're a good person i know that you've got a good heart in this case though you've made mistakes okay and you're involved in this i know that okay there's no question about it the only question right now is are you going to keep making mistakes are you going to go on
the route that you've gone on over the years and try to Pretend that things happen that never happened okay are you gonna not face reality here we know that you're involved we've done our homework okay we have to resolve that now here today i need to know from you what really happened and i know why this has happened you have spent your whole life trying to live up to expectations that you can't make Okay and that stress the hell out of you you're a 24 year old woman being treated like a 15 year old okay
what you've never done anything that terrible in your life but you're being treated like you have you're not being treated like the adult that you are yes you made some mistakes big deal you're not the first person that has gone out and not told their parents that They're dating a guy because in your culture they don't accept it i understand that i've talked to people in here that have kept that secret for their whole life from their parents okay so that's not abnormal but that puts a lot of stress on you right that's not easy
for you is it no now what we'll need to get down to here Today jen is what really happened you need to tell me what went on because you know who was in that house that night you do jen there's no question about that okay while remaining empathetic and understanding the detective still needs to keep jennifer's confidence low he watches for denials and stops them Immediately letting the suspect deny her guilt will only increase confidence and morale this needs to be stripped away as much as possible as early as possible there's no question about it
okay the focus is kept from the magnitude of the crime and concentrated on the justifications of why someone would commit it yes their intentions might have been good but they're not realistic they're not dan were they again their expectations weren't Realistic were they you couldn't live up to them could you you tried to right am i right and finally you had to bite back right you had no other choice you felt like you had no other options this is canada we're in the 21st century here you cannot take everything out of a person You can
have expectations for your kids but you can't expect them to do everything the way you want it doesn't feel good to have secrets does it no you have to let me know what happened here okay okay but you were involved right that's the part we need Okay we need to hear that from you because we know you were the detective appears to be getting nowhere so he now lowers the gauge of admission a confession to a lesser offense is far easier to attain but once it is attained can be used to build on the more
damnatory elements of the case you'll also notice that he uses broad terms that infer guilt yet don't directly accuse jennifer of murder you knew before that night that this was Gonna happen i'm gonna make that easy on you that's a true statement right you knew before that night that they were coming right ken it's not worth it anymore it's hurting you she seems to be on the cusp of giving some form of admission yet wants reassurance as to what it means for her own sake she asks this question nine Times throughout this interrogation it's one
of the few things investigators can't actually lie about as it's been used countless times in the past to get a case thrown out under misdirection they can avoid the question yet they can't afford any false promises with respect to sentencing i need to know the details i can't even say but i can tell you one thing is that we already know so you can't change that I know you did but it got too far ahead of you right you didn't see you didn't think this far ahead did you but once they started once they came
in you couldn't stop it could you could you jen i know why didn't they stop for you yeah i don't know who they were But you were part of the planning right you have to tell me that part and then we're going to work through it together you know what i'm saying you didn't want this you wanted to stop and you have to prove that to me now because at the end of the day we have to stop this from happening to someone else right again we're gonna have to deal with it one Step at
the time okay i'm going to be honest with you i need to know what you did and then you and i are going to work through this together because the most important part is of this whole thing is that we do the right thing for your mom right i am her voice right now i'm working for your mom that's my job and i have to get to the bottom of this For your mom appealing to compassion isn't necessarily uncommon when the crime is first degree murder yet it can send a mixed message when a justification
for the crime was a focus point early on the detective takes his chance with it which at first appears to work jennifer initially responds in a poignant manner but you'll soon come to notice that her empathy alongside her concern is solely focused on herself Oh we gotta start what happened well i don't know at this point okay because i don't know what you're going to tell me other than that you were involved but i need to hear it what this all was was a latch this effort to live your own life to be your own
person to make your own decisions look at all your friends Look at all the people around you does anyone else have a curfew for nine o'clock at 24 years of age you had no choice here again i know that and anybody else in your situation would have done the exact same thing the only thing different is i would say that they'd done it a lot earlier they would have looked for a way out when did you first start planning this when was the final straw what was the final straw So that's what this is all
about you want to be a good person here jennifer knows exactly what questions to answer and what ones to ignore anytime a question is non-incriminating she gives a response yet when they are incriminating she remains silent she is no doubt feeling the pressure but still very aware of the situation and the potential ramifications of her words and you know when a good person makes a mistake They have to face that mistake right right what do you think should happen i don't know you're going to prove to people that you know what the right thing to
do is that's what's just going to happen that's what your mom wants right now she's watching us here she's wondering is jen going to make the right decision here and jen after all of this gonna come out On top doing the right thing i'm here for you jen i'm here for your mom well you have to tell it's one of those situations you know what we know that what you did okay but you have to be able to explain to me what happened okay i can't tell you what's exactly going to happen to you you
just have to be brave here you have to be brave Three hours 20 minutes and 26 seconds the exact amount of time it took for jennifer to display genuine emotion the investigator would later testify this was the first moment the suspect was being authentic he allows her to fixate on whatever thought brought this on and remains completely silent for just under two minutes okay we're supposed to take you what So you're supposed to take the whole family out no just me what went wrong the detective now has one foot in the door it's not an
outright confession but jennifer has now admitted to planning the home invasion all along and although she asserts that she was the intended target while her parents were meant to be spared the information she has now given is enough to place her under arrest jennifer is no longer going home After this interview the detective now presses for more information on the amended storyline it's essentially step one of day one all over again but from a more powerful position he knows she is still lying and now locks her into as many lies as possible within the new
narrative what happened why did it change okay what do you know how come it was supposed to be you that was a disappointment Okay you made mistakes but nothing that couldn't be corrected so who did you get to do this then over here okay and what's his number i don't memorize it she skirts around the questions surrounding her accomplices and gives multiple fake names she stated that she got the number of the supposed hitman from an acquaintance named rick and that She took everything from there over the phone it becomes apparent she doesn't want to
give up or even mention her boyfriend so for the time being the detective allows her to recount her amended narrative in the manner she pleases so what did you ask him to do then come take me out in the meat okay why did they do it when you were um When your parents were there then never alone okay so that meeting you had with rick you told him what you wanted no i just said that i wanted if you knew anybody who could take care of something that i needed and he said what here's the
did he have the number with him that day okay What did he say he would do he just like come and take care of it so he does come into the house and you're the obvious only young girl there right okay when he came to her your room what discussions did you have with the guy that came to your room the real discussions you had not what you told us where was the money and i showed him where the money was Okay but he obviously said i'm here to do what you asked he never said
anything what did he say just like hands behind your back did he discuss ways with you how he would do it no did you request any way for him to do it make sure no one else goes around okay why didn't they do it the way you want i don't know i asked them i asked them To take me with my mom when they took them away it doesn't seem to make sense i know it doesn't make sense to me because the detective wants an outright confession and the second direct confrontation is about to commence
only this time it will be a lot more aggressive as he doesn't have to worry as much about the suspect locking up or requesting counsel she is under arrest And going to jail after this interrogation no matter what look at me okay what i do believe is that you went to somebody and i do believe that night you paid them the two thousand dollars but what's not true is it was never for you okay jen no okay you went to this person and you asked them to do a job and the job was for your
parents you asked them To do this job on your parents gym okay let's be truthful okay nobody's gonna come there and get the wrong people you made a specific request and the job was for your mom and dad okay nobody's gonna come in there and do the wrong job okay nobody's gonna do that they came You paid and they did what they were supposed to do and the plan was for your parents okay jen you have to be honest with us this is the only thing that's in contention here okay you made the mistake okay
everybody understands everybody in this police department Feels sorry for you i can tell you that right now okay because they've seen what you're going through it's so obvious okay that all this tension you put out it basically is like a volcano all right and at one point it was just too much and you erupted okay and you made a bad decision okay and once you hired this guy there was no Turning back now in the original story you said that you hid your cell phone okay if it was for you you wouldn't have hid your
cell phone that would have never happened so it's in conflict it's just i i put it there naturally it's what i'm actually doing but you said on tape that you hit it there and that they Didn't know about it that's your language not mine jen all the ones with so much success out of you they were not even looking at you as a person they were looking for a success story instead of just saying whatever jen wants is what's good for us whatever she's happy with as long as she's happy in her life i'm happy
with it if she wants to work at eastside mario's for the rest of her Life that's fine if she wants to be a piano teacher that's great if she wants to continue figure screening that's wonderful why would somebody shoot someone they didn't have to shoot i don't know i can't figure that out and actually not shoot the person they're supposed to shoot i don't know if i'm trying to figure it out okay why didn't You tell us this that night though look scared scared of what telling the truth yes the good thing about this is
your dad did live and that went against the plan if you could make this decision over you would change it okay you would change it right of course Because i knew i was gonna get hurt of course i wouldn't jen you knew who was gonna get hurt that's the whole issue here okay that's the whole issue here you gave them the plan for your parents right that's all i need to hear no jen tell me what happened i told you what happened okay all of it okay all you have to do is hear is tell
me right now That bill yes i made a mistake his plan was for my parents the detective gets no further admission from this point forward so he leaves jennifer alone for three minutes to play with her hair before he comes back and charges her with first-degree murder okay i need you to listen close to me okay again at this point in the investigation okay i'm going to be arresting you for murder Okay also attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder do you understand that just have to tell me if you understand those charges just say
yes or no yes okay so what we're gonna do right now is do you have your own lawyer oh no Okay do you have a lawyer you would like to speak to that you know of okay would you like to speak to duty counsel okay so who would that be i don't know so do you have a lawyer you said that you were on my side what would you like to do i don't have any idea what to do do you want me to call duty counsel for you okay Okay or is there any other
lawyer that you would like okay so at this point you wish to speak to duty council then sure okay so what i'm going to have to get you to do is actually empty all your pockets on the table here i'm going to make sure that they're making a call to duty council and we'll line that up and you can speak to the duty council in private okay we've uh made a call to duty council and We're just waiting for them to call back okay i need a drink of water or anything what's that uh i
do have to go and speak to these officers but i'll come back and speak to you okay but we had to get we got to take care of the lawyers okay that's the priority right now okay the next time jennifer would see this detective would be when he testified at Her trial it began on the 14th of march 2014 and jennifer plead not guilty to all charges her interrogation tape was one of the more damning pieces of evidence put forward by the prosecution yet the most damning were the 116 text messages between her and her
boyfriend in the six hours leading up to the murder they thought using burner phones to communicate would cover their tracks yet forensics were able to uncover the entire discussion just one month after The incident they spoke in detail about how the crime would be carried out and it was enough to convict them both as well as each of the intruders who were linked to the crime via dna evidence and witness testimony they were all found guilty of first-degree murder and given a life sentence without the possibility of parole for 25 years jennifer pan is now
34 years of age she is currently serving her sentence at the grand valley institution for women in kitchener Ontario she will be first eligible for parole in november of 2035.
