Within the early morning hours of Sept. 29, 2021, Benjamin Elliott, then 17 years previous, walked into his twin sister Meghan’s bed room. It was one thing he had executed lots of of occasions. However on this morning, he had a knife in his hand and stabbed her within the neck whereas she was asleep. He would later say he was sleepwalking. When he realized what he had executed, he instantly known as 911.
“I simply killed my sister,” Benjamin advised the emergency operator. “Oh my God … I assumed it was a dream.”
Benjamin’s mother and father Kathy and Michael Elliott confronted a heartbreaking and unimaginable actuality: their beloved daughter, Meghan, was useless, and her adoring twin brother — their son — was accused of deliberately murdering her. They might not think about why, and neither may investigators. Correspondent Erin Moriarty investigates the extraordinary case of “The Boy Who Killed His Twin,” for the thirty eighth season premiere of “48 Hours,” now streaming on Paramount+.
“What makes you so certain that you just stabbed your sister when you had been sleepwalking?” Moriarty requested Benjamin Elliott in a jailhouse interview earlier this yr.
“I might by no means have executed that,” he replied. “I cherished her. … She was my finest and closest pal.”
Benjamin’s household, family members and closest pals agreed. “He and Meghan are so shut, you may by no means image something unhealthy taking place between them,” Drue Whittecar, a longtime household pal of the Elliotts, advised Moriarty.
“And the way did she really feel about Ben?” Moriarty requested.
“She cherished him,” Whittecar replied. “She appeared as much as him. … You’ll see her stroll up subsequent to him when she would really feel uncomfortable and simply kinda stand by him.”
Moriarty additionally interviewed the prosecutors, Megan Lengthy and Maroun Koutani.
“Have been you capable of finding any proof that there was an issue with … these twins?” Moriarty requested. “No,” Lengthy replied. “We positively appeared into it and tried.”
So how may such a seemingly loving relationship between the twins finish in an unfathomable tragedy?
That is what Benjamin’s mother and father — Kathy, a senior supervisor with the Lady Scouts of America, and Michael, a stay-at-home dad — and their eldest daughter, Elizabeth, wished to know.
The Elliotts initially feared {that a} psychological well being disaster was the trigger. But it surely turned out that Benjamin, and a few shut family members of the Elliotts, had a historical past of sleepwalking. Actually, a boyhood pal of the Elliott twins advised their mother and father a couple of slumber social gathering years earlier, once they discovered Benjamin consuming a donut on a sofa — whereas he was asleep.
Benjamin’s protection attorneys, Cary Hart and Wes Rucker, requested Dr. Jerald Simmons, a neurologist and sleep problem knowledgeable, to look at Benjamin. Simmons was initially skeptical. However after interviewing Benjamin, and listening to about his and his household’s historical past of sleepwalking, Simmons performed two sleep research on him, with {the teenager} hooked as much as gadgets that monitored his each motion. Simmons went from skeptic to believer.
He decided that Benjamin fell shortly into what is named slow-wave sleep, or when individuals can sleepwalk. That is necessary as a result of on the night time Meghan was killed, Benjamin spent hours scrolling the online on his mobile phone, aside from a 24-minute interval when his telephone was inactive. Simmons believes that Benjamin was sleepwalking throughout that interval, and unintentionally stabbed Meghan to demise.
“Do you imagine Ben killed his sister with out even realizing he was doing it in his sleep?” Moriarty requested Simmons.
“Sure,” he replied. “Ben positively killed his sister. He did it, there is not any query, he is the one which had the knife and he stabbed her. However … he did not do that voluntarily. There was no motivation.”
Surprisingly, sleepwalking has proved to be a profitable — albeit uncommon — prison protection. For instance, a Canadian man, Kenneth Parks, was accused of driving 14 miles to his mother-in-law’s residence, the place he killed her. He claimed he was sleepwalking all the time and was acquitted. And North Carolina father Joseph Mitchell, accused of strangling one in all his youngsters, stated he was sleepwalking in the course of the killing. He was additionally discovered not responsible.
The Elliotts had been relieved, and frightened, at lastly having an evidence. “It is scary as hell,” Kathy Elliott stated, including, “if that may occur to us, then that would occur to anyone with a sleep drawback.”
They hoped Simmons’ findings would finish the investigation into Benjamin. In spite of everything, prosecutors admitted they might discover no motive for the deadly stabbing.
However prosecutors had been nonetheless not satisfied. They questioned Benjamin’s account of that night time, his demeanor throughout an interrogation with a murder detective and that he stated he stabbed his sister as soon as. That was necessary as a result of the medical expert decided Meghan had two wounds to her neck — and one was 4 inches deep and severed key arteries, which prosecutors believed ought to have left blood spatter on the scene.
Regardless of receiving Simmons’ findings, prosecutors charged Benjamin with deliberately murdering his twin, and earlier this yr, Benjamin stood trial.
The Elliotts had misplaced their daughter. Nobody knew why. Now, they confronted dropping their son.
