"48 Hours Mystery": Deadly Prophecy

Source : http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/31/48hours/main5478688.shtml

A Woman Writes About Her Own Death Before She Drowns - Was It an Accident, Suicide or Murder? "She was my best friend... sometimes she was my only friend. I wish every single day of my life that I could have my mom back," said Faylene Grant's daughter, Jenna. "My mom died when I was 11. Some people think it was an accident… some people think it was a suicide. But I know it was a murder. "My step dad murdered my mom," she said. "Faylene is a good person," Doug Grant told "48 Hours Mystery" correspondent Susan Spencer. "I have never hurt anybody in my life - ever!" Friend and Physician's Assistant Chad White said, "Doug called me very frantic. He just said he found her in the tub and that she was not responding to him." "I had my hand on the door handle to her bedroom as it was happening," Jenna explained. "I’ve been working on this story for a number of years," said Reporter Paul Rubin. "By all accounts, Faylene Grant is a wonderful woman. Very, very close to her family - and especially close to her church. "This is something my mom wrote in her journal, '…it is Heavenly Father's will that I leave this mortal sphere to fulfill a mission on the other side of the veil.'" "She also wrote: 'I must have faith in Doug's vision. He dreams it every night now ... that I will get to go to the Celestial Kingdom." According to Prosecutor Juan Martinez, "Douglas Grant used organized religion in killing Faylene Grant… The motive in this case is a married man wanting to be with a younger woman." "I’m the lucky one. Think what you want to think, that’s fine," said Hilary Grant, the woman Doug married after Faylene's death. "Have there been other women in his life? Yes, but he is not a murderer," said defense attorney Mel McDonald. "I know that my brother Doug is innocent," Tammy Fuentes said. "I mean, if you saw the volumes of letters that she wrote [in] her journals, it's bizarre!" "Here is woman who has talked to God, God has told her that she is going to die," said McDonald. "She did not want to die. But it was Mr. Grant's vision that she would and she accepted the death sentence that was meted out by her husband," said Martinez. "I didn’t kill my wife - never in a million years," said Doug. "This one is a classic," Rubin said. "It's got this epic sweep of sex and drugs and religion. Homicide, suicide or accident? Was there even a murder here?" "Things I want to have in a spouse: Loves the beauty of the earth, sunrise, sunset… I will be with you always," reads an entry in Faylene Grant's journal. It sounds very poetic, but eight years after Faylene's death, her husband, Doug Grant, is fighting for his future - on trial for her murder. Doug swears he's not guilty. "I was just yelling Faylene! Faylene!" Doug said on the stand during his trial. "Objection. Relevance. This has nothing to do with Faylene. He just wants to tell a story," said Prosecutor Juan Martinez. Indeed he does want to tell his story - one that begins in 1993, the second he laid eyes on a striking, 27-year-old single mother named Faylene Eaves at his gym near Phoenix. "She was a great person, loved life, loved her family," said Doug. At the time, Doug Grant was a 27-year-old divorced, single dad and a rising star in the world of nutrition. He had a growing list of celebrity clients, like Charles Barkley and Danny Ainge of the Phoenix Suns. Doug remembered Faylene from high school. She'd recently divorced and had two kids, Austin and Jenna. "My mom was the type of lady you meet and you're like, 'Wow. I wanna be friends with her!'" Jenna told "48 Hours Mystery" correspondent Susan Spencer. "I came home one day and I had a new CD. And it was that song 'Ain't no mountain high…' and I grabbed the shampoo bottle. She had [the] telephone and we were jumping up and down on the couch, playing the song over and over again…singing. That’s my mom." At first, Doug's sister, Tammy Fuentes, said it seemed a perfect match - especially since they were both Mormon. "Faylene is a lot like Doug," Fuentes explained." She also loved nutrition and helping others…" They married four months after their first date. "She's a good person and brought out the good in Doug," said Fuentes. However, Jenna worried that Doug wasn't bringing out the good in her mother. "He’s the man of the house and she listens to what he says," Jenna told Spencer. "So there was never any question as to who was ruling the roost here?" Spencer asked. "It was always Doug," she replied. Doug needed to guide Faylene, according to Fuentes, who was becoming alarmed by her new sister-in-law's mood swings. "She was either really up, really happy, or she was really really sad or depressed. But never would admit that she needed help," Fuentes said. "I would go to their house and she would be in her bedroom with the door locked. And the children would just be there… and I would want to see her and they would say, 'No …don't bother her.'" Fuentes said Faylene spent much time alone writing in her journal - not uncommon in the Mormon faith - or praying at the temple, sometimes for hours. "I do feel it was fanatical," said Tammy of Faylene's behavior. To the point that by the late 1990s, she said Faylene had lost touch with reality. "She said, 'I’ve been to the temple and God has told me that I need to divorce Doug,'" Fuentes recalled. God even told her why: Doug had a girlfriend. Faylene had no proof of an affair, but God's word was enough. She filed for divorce. "He was devastated!" Fuentes said. "He is truly a family man." "She thought you were having an affair," Spencer said to Doug. "Yes," he replied. "Was that true?" "Not at the time." Maybe not right then, but Doug had had affairs, including one with a Louisiana beauty queen. Then in 2000, in the midst of his divorce, along came more temptation. Hilary Dewitt, 19, was the new receptionist at his company, and a great person to feature in his promotional materials. Doug Grant fell hard. "I became romantically involved with Hilary right at the divorce with Faylene," Doug told Spencer, but not before the divorce. In fact, after his divorce from Faylene, Doug said he'd cleaned up his act, gone through church counseling and planned to marry Hilary. "I don’t know that I can express my love, my devotion. I’m in awe of him to be honest," Hilary told Spencer. In August 2001, though, those plans hit a big snag. Fuentes explained, "Faylene had had revelation in the temple from God that she needed to put her family back together." For the childrens' sake, God was now telling Faylene to marry Doug all over again. Doug claimed nobody was more surprised than he was; the divorce hadn't been his idea after all, and he said he wanted to believe. "I knew I had to give it a shot," he told Spencer. "Well, you certainly did a 180 on this didn't you? You ended up not only marrying again, but marrying the person you had divorced!" said Spencer. "If I have the chance to make things right and get back with her, absolutely," Doug replied. To celebrate their new beginning, the Grants vacationed in the Timpanogas National Park in Utah. Doug said they were hiking on Sept. 24, 2001. According to him, at one point during the hike, Faylene had some sort of vision - she saw something off in the distance. He said she climbed over a rock wall down to a tiny ledge for a better view. "She looked up and she could kind of see the image of Jesus in the clouds," Doug explained, even taking a picture of his wife seconds before disaster struck. "She said 'Come out here.' And so I started going over that wall to go out there…and she fell." It was a 60-foot drop. Doug Grant said he was sure his wife was dead. "I yelled and I screamed and she said, 'Shut up.' I mean those were her exact words. I knew she was alive," he told Spencer. "So you knew she was OK," said Spencer. "I knew she was alive," he replied. Doug took Faylene to a nearby hospital, was very banged up, but alive. Given how far she supposedly fell, that made no sense at all to Chief Park Ranger Michael Gosse. "The height of that fall, the jaggedness of the rocks below… a fall of that serious nature, a person would have some severe injuries…" explained Gosse. "She definitely thought she was gonna die young," Doug said, "but it was an accident... it was an accident." But Doug's sister, Tammy, was about to discover, it may have been no accident at all. Read complete story at : http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/31/48hours/main5478688_page2.shtml?tag=contentMain;contentBody Liked it ? Want to share it ? Social Bookmarking Discuss article | Article Link | More unsolved mysteries on Unexplained Mysteries