Chapters
Shownotes Transcript
At Leidos, a brilliant mind is smart, but a brilliant team is smarter. A ship that finds enemy subs is smart, but an autonomous fleet, that's smarter. Defending against cyber attacks? Smart. Stopping attacks before they start? Smarter. And using AI tools is smart, but integrating trusted mission AI into your technology is smarter. We're not just making technology solutions and national security and health. We're making smart smarter. Leidos.
Tonight on Dateline... He comes in to the frame. That's Tiffany's son. After Tiffany is shot and killed in her bedroom, he's looking for someone, looking for help. Two years old. That hits home.
All they're saying is it was a home invasion and Tiffany was killed. The fact that the kids were in the house, heartbreaking. I still couldn't get over it. Such a loving mother. She was very, very proud of her work. Ambitious, had the goals, had the career. Both had great jobs. Mr. Pugh was a DJ in the Atlanta area. He's pretty well known.
There were probably five, six cameras in the home and outside the home. He had reason to be concerned. Apparently so. There was talk about the other DJ who was murdered. It's way too coincidental. They were both working at a really prominent club named Onyx. When he got killed, it just hit me different, you know, why him? Everybody's saying, wait, is this a DJ thing? Was it an angry customer? Was it an angry artist? Who actually pulled the trigger? My heart dropped.
I said, whoa. A businesswoman, a mom, a target. Who killed the DJ's wife? I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline. Here's Stephanie Gosk with Sound and Fury. Atlanta 911, operator 607. I need somebody to link you to the way right now. 6 a.m. November 23rd, 2014. A 911 call rattled the pre-dawn stillness of a quiet Atlanta suburb. Stephanie!
The caller said he had raced home after his home security company notified him about a possible break-in. When he went inside, he found his wife dead. Oh, my God. He's not dead back today.
The frantic man on the line was Andre Pugh, a well-known DJ in Atlanta's hip-hop club scene. As officers arrived at his house, Andre placed another desperate call to Tamika Smith, a close family friend, and told her to come to the house right away. We just went there. Got in the car and we just went there. By the time Tamika arrived, it was daybreak. Describe the scene for me at the house.
You know, you had the EMT in the driveway. You had quite a few police cars, detective cars were there. Did you have a feeling it was bad? I knew it was bad because of the tape. East Point, Georgia, Police Sergeant Alan Glover was the first detective on the scene. At the time, I knew of a burglary in which there was a person dead inside, a homicide. He entered the house and saw the body of Andre's wife, Tiffany Jackson Pugh.
There was a lot of blood. Miss Pugh was obviously deceased, and she was shot once in the chest, and then it appeared to be that she was shot at close range in her eye. You have to be a pretty cold-hearted killer to shoot someone who is awake looking at you at close range, don't you? Yes. Yes, for sure.
Sergeant Glover would learn one more heartbreaking and horrific detail. First responders had found the Pew's two-year-old son, Andre Jr., in bed with Tiffany. A.J. was crying hysterically and trying to wake her. Thankfully, he was unharmed. One of our officers actually had to take the child from Miss Pew and take the child outside to the father. What ran through your mind when you heard that? It...
It hurt. It hurt bad. It hurt me for her. It hurt me for the family. Outside the house, Tamika still didn't know what had happened. While she waited anxiously for news, she spotted Tiffany and Andre's other child, seven-year-old daughter Jasmine, sitting in one of the police cars. She was like, T.T., why are the police and the ambulance at my house? I was like, Jasmine, I don't know. We're still trying to figure it out.
It wouldn't take long. Tamika soon learned her friend Tiffany was dead. That's when it hit me, because I started, tears started rolling. It was like living a nightmare that you just wanted to wake up from.
By now, Andre had left the scene for the police station to answer some routine questions. He took A.J., still inconsolable, with him. How did Andre and A.J. end up at the police station together? Because A.J. would not go to anybody else.
As Sergeant Glover kept moving through the house, he learned that security sensors on two windows had been tripped. Glover couldn't find any broken windows. He suspected the gunshots set off the security sensors, so he searched for the shooter's point of entry. "It appeared to be a back window or the back door."
The back door was open and also one of the windows downstairs were open as well. In the basement? Is this the basement area? Correct. Near the door in the basement was a palm print.
that we located, and we did send that for forensic analysis. What other evidence was gathered at the scene? We did find some gloves in a trash can in a bathroom. What kind of gloves? Looked like surgical gloves, and they were turned inside out like somebody possibly had quickly discarded them.
So we took those and had them checked for evidence. Did you think maybe the killer left DNA behind in these gloves? Quite possibly. Police didn't find a murder weapon or any shell casings. Glover then searched the rest of the house. If this was in fact a burglary gone bad, he wanted to know what, if anything, had been taken. There's some things that are disheveled around the house, but it wasn't like it was...
ransacked. I couldn't tell that anything was missing. By now, it was clear this wasn't a botched burglary. That left the detective with just one other option, a targeted killing. An execution, a pure execution. Nothing more, nothing less. How can someone harm such a sweet person and such a loving mother?
For Sergeant Glover, it would become an investigation like no other. This young lady had no business dying. None. I wasn't letting this one go. It would take him into Atlanta's glitzy and high-stakes club scene, a world already reeling from another murder. Was it someone targeting this lifestyle? And when the killer finally came into focus, no one could believe it.
As dawn broke over Atlanta, word began to spread. Tiffany Jackson Pugh, a young wife and mother, had been murdered in her bed. Tiffany's close friend Kenya Wisnant was at her daughter's dance class when she received a horrifying text from a friend. Kenya called her immediately.
And she was like, "You haven't heard?" And I was like, "Heard what? What are you talking about?" And she said, "All they're saying is it was a home invasion and Tiffany was killed." I just remember letting out this huge, "What?" I'm literally causing a scene because I'm just devastated. What do you make of that timing?
For her to be killed at that hour with both her very small children in the home. Heartless. Tiffany's colleague and friend, Carmetria Burton, got a call from a co-worker. She said, Tiffany's dead. They found her dead. Her son was on her chest and she was dead. I said, no. No. Tiffany's dad, Tommy Jackson, was 2,000 miles away when he heard the news. I go, what?
You can't be telling me this. The enormity of it was almost unbearable. Along with the agony came the question, who would want to harm such a vibrant and loving daughter, wife, and mother? No one who knew her could fathom it. She was just very warm and loving. Like, it was, you just couldn't help but be happy around her.
Kenya worked with Tiffany at Delta Airlines. It was just an instant connection when we met. You know, every morning we had this thing. We'd come in, whoever got there first. It's like, hey, girl. Tameka Smith also met Tiffany at Delta. The two became fast friends.
What was it about Tiffany that you connected to so strongly? Her personality. She's very, was a very caring person, very friendly, easy to get along with. Tiffany was a rising star at the airline where she worked as a commodities manager. We actually had pegged her as one to watch in the organization. She was just a go-getter. Carmetria said the thing about Tiffany that stood out most was her character.
You know how you just meet kind people? That was her. She was just kind and just a nice young girl. Quiet, but she smiled a lot. Tiffany liked having a good time. Oh, she loved having a good time. She loved to dance. Dancing, anything with music just moved her. So it made sense when Tiffany started dating a DJ, Andre Pugh, known in the clubs as DJ Awesome.
What were your impressions? Very nice guy. I mean, you know, he was a jokester. He had a good personality. He had a great personality, yeah. Tiffany started dating Andre when she was in college. I got to know Andre pretty well. He lost his father early in his life, so I became kind of a father figure for him. Did he seem like an industrious young guy to you? Pretty industrious in terms of what he wanted in life.
Back then, Andre had two jobs. He too worked at Delta, the day shift. But his nights belonged to the clubs. For him, the DJ position was, the money was great. And I think it was something he just loved to do. Tiffany didn't have a lot of time for the club scene, but she was thrilled Andre had a passion.
We would often go to the club certain nights and just kind of sit in the DJ booth while he worked. I think it was exciting for her. He knew a lot of people. Four years after Tiffany and Andre started dating, little Jasmine arrived. Tiffany was over the moon. If you looked up mother, her picture would be there. She enjoyed being a mother. A couple of months later, the couple decided to marry.
Andre took his future father-in-law to a jewelry store, where his best friend Adrian worked, to pick out a ring. He picks up his ring from his best friend, who was a sellman at the time, and he showed it to me first before he presented it to Tiffany.
The wedding was on Valentine's Day. Daughter Jasmine was the flower girl. Was it a special day for you and your wife? Yes, it was a special day for both of us, for all of us. Then came Andre Jr. and a new home. Say hi, Yaya. Hi, Yaya. They were both great parents. Seeing them so young and just kind of evolving from purchasing a home, building a family, was just kind of exciting to watch.
Tiffany celebrated her 30th birthday just weeks before she was killed. ♪ Happy birthday to you ♪ Which made the news of her murder all the more tragic. We were just beginning our process of interviewing everyone that knew Miss Pugh, family members,
Co-workers, everybody. Sergeant Glover started with Tiffany's husband, Andre. Mr. Pugh may have information of who may have been angry at him, may have been angry at Ms. Pugh.
Mr. Pugh was very distraught in the interview. He had just lost his wife, so we were being very compassionate about that. This is painful. This is hurtful. I have two young kids. I don't know how to explain this to them. He was upset, wanted to know who did this and wanted to get to the bottom of it. The person that did this to your wife, they've got every reason to worry. I hope so, and I pray you guys find him. I pray you guys find him.
Glover asked Andre all the typical questions a detective would ask the spouse of a murder victim. Give me your start-to-finish version of what happened. Okay, I work at Club Ionics. Left work probably about 5.15 in the morning. Mm-hmm.
And I was on my way to another club. Mr. Pugh said that he was going to a friend's club after he left Club Onyx to watch him DJ. He was en route there when he got the call from the security company. Did you ask him about Tiffany and their relationship? Yes. Asked Andre how the marriage was. He said it was fine.
Just like any others, you know, not without fault and good days, bad days, but it was a good marriage. What did he tell you about Tiffany? Mr. Pugh said that Tiffany gets along with everybody, doesn't have any enemies that he knows of, just a good person.
Sergeant Glover was also still working the crime scene, which so far yielded few clues. No unusual fingerprints. As for those surgical gloves, there was no DNA on them. And that palm print? Police couldn't find a match. But there was something else inside the house that caught the detective's eye. The camera system at your house. Right. How many cameras does it have? It has, I believe, seven working cameras.
They have what looks to be a really good video camera surveillance system. So that piqued my interest. You think there's a pretty good chance you could have the murderer in the house? I felt really good about it. The funeral for Tiffany Jackson Pugh filled the very large Elizabeth Baptist Church one week after her murder. She had friends from college, of course everyone from work.
People that Andre knew were there in attendance. Tiffany touched a lot of people's lives, didn't she? She did. And it was reflected in that service. I remember it was a ton of people there. The church was full. What does that say about Tiffany? Were you surprised to see all those people? Absolutely not. Tiffany was that girl. Tiffany was an amazing woman, mother, spouse. Did you come across any reason why anyone...
would want to hurt her, let alone kill her. No, Tiffany had no enemies. She was just a pillar of society. You had a killer on the loose who just killed a woman, totally innocent, not involved with anything, a businesswoman who worked at Delta. Correct. And the community was looking for answers, just as we were.
By now, Glover had discovered some extraordinary evidence that he hoped would put him inside the Pew home at the very moment Tiffany was murdered. Video from the Pew's home security system. "How many cameras does it have?" "It has, I believe, seven working cameras. Two on the sides, one over the garage, one pointing at the front door, one shooting inside the house, one on the patio, and one by the back door." That's a lot of cameras.
Mr. Pugh was a DJ in the Atlanta area. He's pretty well known and, you know, he wanted home safety. Did he think he had reason to be concerned? Apparently so. You think they'll be something on the video? I don't know. I don't know. Because the way my cameras are set up, they hit it. So unless you've seen my house thousands of times, that's the only way you say, oh yeah, there's a camera right there.
"We always hope for that smoking gun. We always hope for that one frame of that one video that shows who may have committed this crime." But that's not what Glover found on that video. "Inside the home we saw actually not a lot. It's dark. You can't hear anything. There's no audio." But you don't see the shooter. "We never saw the shooter inside the home."
on the surveillance footage. How surprising is that? With all those cameras in there that you don't see the shooter. I was disheartened to take the route that apparently was taken. You would have been pretty lucky not to have hit any of the cameras. Still, the video did provide some clues. Here you have the foyer area of the Pew household. There's no movement in the house.
Then, suddenly, Glover noticed something in the early morning air. "If you'll notice right here, you see dust particles. These dust particles that fly up, we believe those are the initial shot." Dust, Glover believed, shaken from the house when the gun went off, which gave the detectives a better idea of when Tiffany was murdered. Minutes later on the video, Glover saw something even this seasoned detective found hard to watch.
You'll see AJ come into the view. AJ had been sleeping with Tiffany, was probably in her arms at the time that she was killed. And then he comes in to the frame, probably disoriented, looking for someone, looking for help. We shed some tears on this video for sure. Two years old, upstairs, a daughter. That hits home.
With little evidence revealed by the indoor cameras, Glover turned his attention to the cameras outside. Did they show you anything? The one in front over the garage did show us Mr. Pugh pulling the driveway while he was on the phone with 911. But as far as the possible shooter, nothing initially. ♪
But when the sergeant rewound the tape, he saw something interesting and suspicious. A car passed by the Pew house not once, but three times. The third time, the car came to a stop just beyond the house and right around the time Tiffany was shot. Clever wanted to know why was that car there and who was in it?
As details about Tiffany's murder spread, her friends couldn't shake one horrifying thought: the possibility Tiffany's son, A.J., was in her arms when she was shot. Knowing that the kids were in the house said to me there was no regard for the children. It said to me they wanted to get the job done by any means necessary. They didn't care.
There is the immediate danger involved with a gunman in the house. Absolutely. And then there's the trauma. Absolutely. I'm seeing it. By now, Sergeant Glover was focusing his attention on a mysterious car parked in front of the Pew house when the murder occurred. You see the car enter...
the frame here. What does it tell you and what doesn't it tell you? We could tell there's a dark color vehicle. We're not sure of the color, but that's about it. Glover checked to see if the car was Andres. It was not. You can still see the taillight there, but can you make out the tag? Cannot make out the tag. The quality is just not good enough on that camera.
Not only that, the car stopped just far enough out of frame so you couldn't see who was driving it. So the car pulls outside of camera view. And what do you think? What I thought was...
I wish she would have, or she would have stopped sooner. Sure. And I may have been able to see them get out of the vehicle. But at that point, I was like, okay, I do have at least some sort of a vehicle. Was it moving at a time of day and in a manner that looked suspicious? Oh, yes. A timestamp on the security footage put the car in front of the house just one minute before police believed Tiffany was shot.
You're looking at that car thinking, this could be our murderer in this car, right? Correct. From our other information in the other cameras and the shots ringing out inside the home, we believe that the driver of that vehicle exited and went in the home, and that's when they executed Ms. Pugh. Sergeant Glover then watched the car pull away. If Glover's theory was correct, it took the shooter just under three minutes to kill Tiffany. That's kind of fast, right? Very fast.
We think at that time that the shooter knew exactly what he or she wanted to do. They weren't there to steal anything. They were there to kill Ms. Pugh. They were very methodical, very quick. As for the car's first two drive-bys, Glover suspected they were for reconnaissance. Here you can see the driver stopped for several seconds before pulling away. This appeared to be the shooter casing the home.
What's more, it seemed the shooter knew to avoid not just the inside cameras, but the outside camera as well, by stopping so the driver was just out of frame. You've got all those cameras set up and the person's not on camera. You've got no fingerprints. You've got no shell casings, which would mean they'd probably picked him up. Certainly, it seems to be a bit of sophistication in how it was executed.
It appears that luck played a part and also sophistication due to being planned, apparently for weeks. For weeks? I think so. But there was one security camera Tiffany's killer may not have known about. It was on a home next to this cul-de-sac, just two doors away from the Pew house. The homeowner shared his footage with police. Someone handed us a jump drive that was a video camera.
from two houses down. A neighbor. A neighbor of Pew's, two houses down, of surveillance of the front of the house that was facing this cul-de-sac down here. A lot of times, people give you information that it proves to be nothing. But sometimes it proves to be something, and this proved to be something. On this footage, investigators could see the same car that parked in front of the Pew home. But now they could tell it was black.
Was this video from the neighbor much better quality? Much better. As the car goes by, the neighbor's floodlight comes on, which shines on the car and brightens it for us. You actually saw a pretty decent view of the vehicle, and actually the window was rolled down at one point to where you could actually see someone inside.
Still no way to ID the driver, but on this tape Glover saw another tantalizing detail. The front left headlight appeared to be inoperable. Parking light, running light, or headlight, we weren't sure at the time, but one of those lights was out. That's pretty notable and pretty identifiable, right? That's definitely notable, and if later on you find a vehicle that looks like it, you can check.
Rewinding the tape, Glover saw that before the black car got to the Pugh's house, it pulled into the neighboring cul-de-sac, where a second car was parked. When I first watched the video, I could see a cul-de-sac, which was pretty obvious that it was this cul-de-sac here. And there were two vehicles, and one would leave and go this way, and then it would come back, and then they would meet up again. The first video, you see one car.
Correct. Second video, now you're seeing two cars. And what does that tell you? Well, it was obvious that there was at least two people that were involved at that point. What were the chances that this was just casual meetup in the middle of the night, just down the road from where Tiffany Pugh was killed? It felt to me it was a part of a conspiracy to commit the murder of Miss Pugh. So now you're not just looking for one murderer, you're looking for two.
At least two. I didn't know at that time how many people were in each vehicle, so. Sergeant Glover wanted to know who was in those two cars, lying in wait, he believed, to kill Tiffany. When the sergeant asked Andre, he said he had no idea who might have been there that night. You can't think of anybody that would want to harm her or you? I mean, not off the top of my head. If I can think of somebody, I want to give you a name. As soon as I came in here, I want to give you a name.
But in that same interview, Andre said something that got Glover's attention. Andre mentioned there was trouble at Club Onyx, not long before Tiffany was killed. "I heard that was over some money. I don't, I try not to owe nobody money."
It was something Andre also shared with Tiffany's friend Tamika. He had some concerns that there was some violence connected to Club Onyx. Yes, that someone was out there and they had a target for DJs. What could Atlanta's club scene have to do with this suburban mom's murder? Sergeant Glover was determined to find out. People get mad if you don't play their music. And if you don't, you know, sometimes there's violence.
Somebody's going to have a conflict with the fact that somebody else is getting a lot of recognition. The mentality and the ego that's involved, there's going to be some clashes. Tiffany Jackson Pugh's husband Andre told investigators he wondered if her murder might have something to do with his job as a DJ at Onyx, one of the hottest hip-hop clubs in Atlanta.
The city's music scene could get intense, with ambitious DJs competing for top spots in the booth, and young rap artists offering up a lot of cash to get their songs played, desperate for a big break.
As Sergeant Glover investigated the murder, he learned that in Andre's world, there's a lot of fame and money at stake. Mr. Pugh says that a lot of people want them to play their music. When an aspiring rapper comes into Club Onyx and they hand you a CD of their music, they either play it or they don't play it. And if they don't play it, you know, a lot of times people get upset about that.
Sergeant Glover wondered if that anger might have turned to violence. Because Atlanta isn't just a place where people come to listen to music. It's a city where rap careers can be made
or broken. "There's the earth, there's the world, and then there's Atlanta." "You know with the Ryan Cameron rewinds…" Ryan Cameron is a globally syndicated radio DJ in Atlanta. He says for rappers to make it here, they first have to impress the DJs in the clubs. DJs like Andre.
The DJ is like the Wizard of Oz. He is the person that is behind the curtain that kind of makes everything go. He is a conductor. He is the one that keeps the tempo going. He's the one that dictates everything. And the music that he uses is kind of like the sheet music of an orchestra. So DJs wield a lot of power. They absolutely wield a lot of power. It's their ears that count the most. Journalist Christina Lee covers Atlanta's music scene.
She says there's a reason club DJs are so influential. It's the people who come out to listen to them. You have radio DJs that are trying to pick up on what the next hit is going to be. You have label execs trying to figure out, OK, we need to sign the next great artist. Who is that artist going to be? You can have music managers. It's a great place to network.
Celebrities like Usher, Killer Mike, Gucci Mane and Drake have all turned up to party in Atlanta's clubs. But these aren't just any clubs. They're strip clubs, a focal point for Atlanta's music scene for decades. What's really interesting is that in this particular time period, strip clubs are emerging as like a testing ground for music. That changed the culture of the music.
International hip-hop star Jeezy, seen here performing in front of thousands at the 2024 Dreamville Festival, has sold more than five million records. But he says it's the people who first heard him in Atlanta who turned him into a star. You could be from Denver, you could be from Kentucky, you could be from wherever. But when you're there, what do you hear? You hear our music. What do you take back when you go home?
What you heard. What do you tell people when you like what you're listening to? I heard this in the strip club, I heard this in Atlanta. And that's how the music is being spread. But Atlanta's strip clubs also became known for a lot more. You have five-star cuisine and an executive chef. First-class service, sophisticated lighting, and state-of-the-art sound systems. Club Onyx, where Andre performed as DJ Awesome, was at the top of the list.
Sabrina Swinger was the club's housemom, supervising the dancers. She's seen many DJs go from regular guys to stars. That's what Andre Pugh was hoping for when he started at Onyx. He DJed in college at college parties. Then he landed this job at a strip club. You know, it's a big difference from a college party DJ to a major club.
Tiffany's father, Tommy Jackson, says both he and Tiffany supported Andre. "When did you learn that he wasn't just DJing at clubs, he was DJing at strip clubs?" "I think he felt that he could make a lot more money in the strip clubs. And Tiffany, she seemed to be okay with it. Matter of fact, she had actually went there with him and sat in the booth with him while he was spinning records."
What did you think of Tiffany? She was so sweet. She fit in. She was cool. She would come to the Christmas party. She embraced the girls. We danced. They were like the nicest couple.
But Tiffany was wise enough to understand that even in this welcoming environment, the pressure could be intense. Everyone knew the DJs could crown the next star, and they were often swarmed by up-and-coming artists looking for a break. But there was no guarantee they'd get one. You know, people get mad if you don't play their music. I mean, they're aspiring rappers. They can hit the big time if you play their music. And if you don't, you know, sometimes there's violence.
Now, police had to wonder if that violence had entered Tiffany's home. Especially since almost the same thing happened just months before, involving another DJ from Onyx and another brutal murder. It's way too coincidental that there are two DJs who are very prominent at Onyx having these incidents happen to them.
For true crime fans, nothing is more chilling than watching Dateline. Have you ever seen such a thing before? For podcast fans, nothing is more chilling than listening. What goes through your mind when you make a discovery like that? And when you subscribe to Dateline Premium, it gets even better.
Excuse me if I sound a little skeptical. Every episode is ad-free. Ooh, wow. So this could be your ace in the hole. And not just ad-free, you also get early access to new intriguing mysteries and exclusive bonus content. So what were you afraid of? Dateline Premium. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or datelinepremium.com. You ready for what's coming?
They are the families of the missing in America. And they're desperately searching for answers. Somebody knows something. I'm Josh Bankowitz. Join me for season three of Missing in America. Listen carefully.
Because just one small detail might allow you to solve a mystery. We have seen miracles happen. Dateline, Missing in America. All episodes available now, wherever you get your podcasts. Just 10 months before Tiffany Jackson Pugh was killed at home, there was another murder connected to Club Onyx. William Fernando Barnes, a.k.a. DJ Nando, had finished up a shift when he pulled up at his house in a quiet Atlanta suburb.
As he got out of his car, a gunman suddenly appeared and shot him to death in his driveway. There was very little Sergeant Alan Glover knew about Nando's shooter. Who raised the issue of DJ Nando to you and his murder? Andre did. I'm not sure if you know, but a DJ was murdered in January that worked with us. Right in front of his doorstep. Did it seem an unlikely coincidence?
that you would have two murders like this associated with the same club? It seemed unlikely in the same year, yes. According to her friend Kenya, Tiffany had been rattled by DJ Nando's murder. She was friends with him. It was close to home. So you guys talked about that murder? Yeah. I think for Tiffany, immediate thought was, okay, my husband DJs at the same club,
Is it something, are they coming after the DJs at that club? Nando's death shocked everyone. Nando was the king amongst kings. Nick Love, who managed a group of local DJs, says Nando was one of the best-known DJs at Onyx.
Nando paid attention to every single thing in that club. So Nando's nights even sounded different than the other nights. It was louder, the bass hit harder because Nando was bringing in his own speakers using his own sound system. From the time you hit the parking lot, you hear his music, you feel his vibe. Nando also knew how to work the crowd, sometimes getting the wealthier customers to tip huge amounts of money.
He would really rile people up being like, "I know you got more money to tip. I know you got more money to tip." And so when all these artists are coming to see what's coming up, he's like, you know, having them drop $10,000, $20,000, $30,000. A downpour that covered the dance floor.
Nando was also making lots of cash as a top DJ. Andre was hoping to capture some of that same magic as he tried working his way to the top.
Tiffany's friend, Carmetria Burton, learned that Andre envied Nando's status and his shifts. He had a coveted spot, and that's a pretty big deal in a strip club from what I understand. And Andre wanted that.
There was a lot to envy about Nando. His influence went far beyond the doors of Onyx. How big a star did he become in this world? Nando became a huge star in this world. Imagine you have Usher calling you at any hour on any given day, being like, "What song should I push as a single next?" Nando had that type of reputation.
Nando gave many young artists their start, like hip-hop star Jeezy. How wild was it to have your record played start to finish at a club by Nando? It was unbelievable. Jeezy says it was Nando who helped turn him from a street kid to rap royalty. I'll never forget, he had a real conversation with me one day. This is the exact words. He said, don't let them kill you. Don't let them take you out.
because there's something bigger for you. Without DJ Nando, I probably wouldn't be sitting here in front of you now. You know, I would probably got caught up in everything that happens to anybody that's in the streets, and that's death in jail. Nando may have helped launch Jeezy to superstardom, but that doesn't happen for all young artists. Nando would also refuse to play music if it didn't meet his standards, and that could cause tempers to flare.
Did someone have it in for Nando? Investigators didn't know. But Nando's friend said in the months before he died, he seemed on edge. "The weird thing that we all kind of seem to remember is that Nando had all of a sudden started carrying a gun with him, which was unusual for him. He just seemed a little more antsy, a little bit more stressed." And then, in the early hours of January 14, 2014, Nando was shot dead in his driveway.
Onyx house mom Sabrina Swinger got a phone call. And before I could say hello, all I heard was screaming, just screaming these cries. I'll never forget those screams. After Nando gets killed, now it's like, okay, everybody's on high alert. What happened? None of the DJs knew. Nobody could tell me anything. Just 10 months later, Tiffany was killed the same brutal way.
Andre wondered if he had been the target, and Tiffany was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don't know if somebody followed me home. I don't know if somebody was waiting for me. I don't know if somebody followed me before. I don't know. There was something investigators noticed at Tiffany's home, something from that security footage the morning she died. It captured a man arriving at the scene, even before the police. I will tell you...
That was very odd to us. Detectives probing the death of young mom Tiffany Jackson Pugh were looking closely at Onyx, the hip-hop club where her husband Andre worked under the name DJ Awesome. Less than a year earlier, another DJ named Nando had also been murdered, both shot to death, execution style, at home. The people working at the clubs were on edge. Just the DJ community took it really, really hard.
DJs are looking around and saying, wait, people are like, people are killing us. There was good reason to be scared. So just to backtrack, Nando gets killed in January. And Christmas Eve, my house got broken into. A month before that, one of our other DJs' tires got slashed. And then all of a sudden, Awesome's wife gets killed. Now, everybody's saying, wait, hold on. Is this a DJ thing?
Sergeant Alan Glover wanted to know, too, and tried to figure out what, if anything, was happening at the club that might have contributed to the two murders. As he studied the details of the case, he delved into something unusual he'd noticed on the security footage outside Tiffany's home on the night she was killed. Minutes after Andre called 911, his supervisor from the club suddenly showed up at the house, arriving even before the police did.
You initially see Mr. Pugh pull up in his Nissan, and then Cliff Adams pulls up, which is his work boss from Club Onyx. What did Cliff Adams do at Club Onyx? He started off being security at Onyx, and then they promoted him to be the manager over the VIP area. Cliff was management slash security slash security.
Boss man. If you were anybody who was trying to move and shake, you know, within that building, you needed to know Cliff. What was Cliff Adams' reputation? Cliff and I were okay.
But Cliff's reputation was known to be, you know, stern. According to Nick Love, Cliff and Nando regularly butted heads. When Cliff would, you know, maybe allow another DJ to use Nando's system or tell Nando that he could or couldn't do something, that would cause some friction. But again, never enough to...
Sabrina says the relationship between Cliff and Andre was different. They were tight? Yeah.
So when Andre appeared to be at his weakest moment, he turned to Cliff for help, phoning him just after the security company reported there'd been a break-in. He called Cliff Adams to come to the house. This was all during the time that the murder had just occurred. He called his boss before he called the police? I will tell you, that was very odd to us. Sergeant Glover's colleague, Sean Buchanan, was a lieutenant in East Point's detective division at the time. The first officer
person you would have called was the place in that situation. So we didn't understand that." When Buchanan interviewed Cliff shortly after Tiffany's murder, the lieutenant asked him to describe what he saw at the scene. "I turned around and two officers, two units were pulling up. When they pulled up, he was identifying himself and letting them know that I was his brother and I just pulled up."
Cliff appeared so devoted to Andre that he went to the police on his own. Cliff Adams actually came to the police department on the morning of the homicide. And we were speaking about the crime and he stated he couldn't believe it. He told us, you know, he just wanted to kind of find out what's going on. That was very strange. Why would he just show up at the police station anyway?
The lieutenant also wondered why Andre had reached out to Cliff so soon after the murder. I asked him, you know, why would he call you? He said, well, we're very good friends. We've known each other a very long time, and he just needed somebody to confide in. He just didn't know Mr. Adams' involvement. So Buchanan asked Cliff to carefully outline his movements on the night of the murder. Yeah, I said, you need me to come to the house? He's like, yeah, come to the house. I said, I'm on my way. Do you know anything that could have possibly happened tonight to his wife?
Cliff was adamant that he had no idea what happened to Tiffany, and with that, he left the station. The detectives still didn't have any answers, but they were about to get some, because Atlanta's nightlife was about to give up its secrets. At the time, there were rumors. You know, girls come back and talk. You hear so much.
Never miss a moment of the 2024 Olympic Games from Paris. For in-depth coverage of the athletes, events, and medal counts, download the NBC News app.
Detectives wondered if Tiffany Jackson Pugh's murder was connected to her husband's job as a DJ at Club Onyx. So far, they hadn't found any direct evidence of that. But there were rumors simmering about something else: the state of Tiffany's marriage. You started to have conversations with friends. The marriage didn't appear to be as great as Mr. Pugh had initially said.
Seemed to be some bad times that were being had. What did you make of the fact that that's not what Andre told you? I took note of it, but at the same time, he could have been embarrassed. He may have been, you know, just didn't want people to know his business. Andre had a problem with infidelity. He had girlfriends? Yes. Multiple? Yes, directing them to the house. He's working at a strip club? Correct. And he's having girls over the house? Correct.
Tiffany confided in her longtime friend Kenya about these late-night rendezvous. Did she tell you about any infidelities? Well, yeah. I don't think she knew it was as big of a problem as it was. Club Onyx house mom Sabrina thought Andres' trysts were part of his attempt to build up his reputation of what he thought a successful DJ should be.
When Andre started having affairs, he's thinking, oh, Nando got all the women. You know, as if he's sleeping with all these women. No. When we went somewhere, Fernando and his business partner, all the girls went. Everybody wanted to go. Not to sleep with them because they were fun people.
He is confused. So he started trying to sleep with everybody to keep up with Nando. What did you think about Andre running around with all these women when he has a wife and a couple of small kids at home? Well, you learn to mind your business in a strip club. Did you feel bad for Tiffany, though? Of course. You can't do nothing but shake your head. You know, like, it's not my position to go and
And then also at the time, there are rumors. You know, girls come back and talk about
You hear so much, you know. Three years before Tiffany was killed, things came to a head, and the couple separated. She got her own place and took their daughter, Jasmine, with her. But less than a year later, Andre and Tiffany decided to get back together. They moved into a new home, and soon, their second child was born, little AJ. Their friend, Tamika, watched them get a fresh start. How did it go from...
I need to move out to I'm ready to move back in and actually give this a shot. Tiffany decided she would, you know, give it another try. Did they miss each other? I would say yes. Yeah, I would say they both missed just having two parents in a home. Did she want to get that stability back? Yes, she did. That stability returned for a while. But then Tiffany's life upended again.
In summer 2014, her dad Tommy called to say her mother was seriously ill with pneumonia. She was fighting for her life in an Arizona hospital. "Tiffany flew right out immediately." Days later, her mother passed away. "We created a circle around her, and we all prayed until the last breath left her. Well, Tiffany was pretty devastated by that whole experience."
Kenya says Andre had trouble rising to the occasion. I remember the funeral. He didn't even stay. He left immediately after the funeral to come back to go to work at the strip club. So, you know, that says a lot.
Tiffany had forgiven Andre for the affairs once, but not standing by her after her mother's death was inexcusable. After the funeral, Tiffany told Kenya she was leaving Andre for good. She really was on the straight and narrow to live out her best life. Did you see in that moment that independence? Absolutely. You could just feel the difference in the way that she was moving. You could visually see the difference in her.
She was done this time. All of their text messages back and forth pointed to a marriage that was ending. Glover says toward the end, Andre did try and save the marriage one last time. Do you know how much I love you? I told you before, we are a team. We the best together. I love your strength and your drive. You always.
But Tiffany had made up her mind, so she decided to have a heart-to-heart with Andre and tell him it was time to call it quits. She said they had a great conversation. They were up at 4 o'clock in the morning talking about co-parenting, you know, moving out. It sounds like he took it okay. It sounded like...
Two individuals who knew that things weren't going so well, and they both were just maybe waiting to have that conversation. It was going to be like, who was going to have it first? It didn't sound like he was disappointed. It didn't sound like he was angry. It just sounded like they were both kind of upset.
you know, relieved that they both were able to have that conversation. If they're discussing how they're going to share custody of the kids and how all of that's going to work, that all sounds pretty amicable. Yes, it does. Then, just weeks later, Tiffany was dead. Sergeant Glover wondered if the couple's crumbling marriage gave Andre a motive for murder. But Andre's phone showed he was not at his house when Tiffany was shot.
and he didn't own a car like the one seen on the security camera. Glover concluded that he couldn't have pulled the trigger, so he turned his attention back to the crime scene, and who might have been in the area when Tiffany was killed. By now, police had checked out Cliff Adams' story and determined he had nothing to do with the murder. They concluded his actions that night were those of a friend helping out in a time of need.
But there was another friend in the neighborhood that night, and police were about to learn his name. Do you have your phone with you? I have my work phone, yes. Okay, can I see it? No, you can't. In the days following Tiffany Jackson Pugh's murder, Sergeant Alan Glover requested data from cell phone towers near the Pugh house. It proved Andre wasn't home when Tiffany was killed.
But Glover wanted to know who was in the area at the time of the crime. He received the data dump and cross-referenced it with Andre's contacts. One number stood out. That phone number in Andre's phone was to a person named Adrian. Had he mentioned Adrian? Did you know who Adrian was? Up until that point in the investigation, Adrian had not been mentioned once.
The number was registered to Adrian Harley. The record showed he was in the area at the time Tiffany was killed. And he knew Andre Pugh. Coincidence? Glover didn't think so. What was the dynamic between the two of them? Did you come to understand what the friendship was like? He said they were best friends since they were younger.
They've been friends for a long time. Kenya says Tiffany was close to Adrian, too. As far as I knew, she really loved and adored Adrian. Tommy Jackson knew him well. He'd first met him all those years ago when he went engagement ring shopping with Andre. I met Adrian when he sold Andre his ring. He worked for the big jewelry store downtown that we went to.
Adrian was close with the whole family. Tommy says when the Jackson pews gathered for the holidays, Adrian was always included. "Everybody was there. And so Adrian would always come over with his girlfriend at the time, or sometimes he would come by himself." Kenya says Adrian had been right beside Andre for all of life's big moments. "He was the best man in the wedding. He was godfather to the kids."
And when Andre was DJing at Club Onyx, Adrian was right there with him in the booth. But house mom Sabrina Swinger says Adrian didn't quite fit in at Club Onyx. He was always quiet. He seemed like the quiet guy, you know, like my impression was, wow, I work at a strip club, you know. Quiet, maybe even uncomfortable.
She didn't think he would have been working at Onyx without Andre. Did Adrian kind of look up to Andre? Yeah, he had to. You know, he seemed like, gosh, I don't even know what words to use when I talk about them. They seemed like two nerds. Two nerds. But Andre was the hipper nerd. Adrian was the quiet one, the follower.
Adrian was Andre's money runner at Club Onyx. He collected cash from rappers who wanted DJ Awesome to play their music. They would go to Adrian and say, hey, I want my music played, and they'd hand money. Because you always had to hand money with a CD to get them to play it.
It could be a dangerous job telling rappers who desperately wanted their music played, no. Glover said Adrian took care of that for Andre, too. Did a little of the dirty work. Correct. Yep, that's exactly what Adrian did.
Glover wanted to know just how much Adrian would do for his friend, so he took a harder look at him. He ran his phone number, did a background check, found an address, and then, on a hunch, he looked to see if any black cars, like the one seen in that home security footage, were registered to Adrian's home.
At this point, you're looking for a particular vehicle. Describe that vehicle to me. We're looking for a black vehicle. Hopefully that when we do find this vehicle, that it has a parking light that's out. Adrian didn't own a black car, but his girlfriend did.
There are breaks in the case, and then there are big breaks in the case. Does this qualify as a big break? That's one of those butterfly moments, we call it. I mean, you're...
Like, ooh, this is very interesting. This could lead nowhere, but I'm liking the prospects of this information. A big break, yes, but not a solved case. Sergeant Glover couldn't be sure it was the same car until he saw it in person. Glover and his colleague decided to pay Adrian a surprise visit. So we drove up to Alpharetta, Georgia, to see if we could speak with Mr. Harley.
Shortly after the detectives arrived, a black Infiniti pulled into the parking lot. Investigators couldn't tell if the car's parking light was burnt out, but they were able to identify the driver. It was Adrian. They introduced themselves and recorded the conversation. Do you have your phone with you?
Sergeant Glover quickly realized Adrian wasn't going to give him any information easily, but he wasn't prepared for the fireworks that were about to begin. Police brutality!
Less than two weeks after Tiffany Jackson Pugh was killed, detectives showed up at Adrian's apartment complex unannounced. They wanted to find out what he knew about the murder. We wanted Adrian's time of events on the night of the murder, where he was. Where were you on Saturday? At the club. Mr. Harley gave us that he was at Club Onyx. He went to another club near Club Onyx. He went to another club. All of the clubs that he mentioned...
Everywhere that he went the entire night was on the north side of Atlanta. But Glover already knew that wasn't true. That cell phone tower dump he had received a day earlier put Adrian near Tiffany's house on the south side. He stepped away to call for backup.
When he returned, he noticed things had become heated between his colleague and Adrian. You're at my home. Okay, let me explain something to you, Mr. Hartley. Go ahead. Go right ahead. Yes, sir. I'm in charge of this conversation between me and you. Is there a reclurement? Listen. Listen. Okay? Don't be disrespectful. I've not been disrespectful to you. I'm trying not to be. It escalated when Glover told Adrian they were going to search his home.
According to Glover, Adrian took a step toward his car.
I am not going towards my vehicle. You're going to stay right here. Oh, no. I didn't touch you. I didn't touch you. My hands are away. If you want me from my vehicle, put your hands behind your back.
Glover says they had to forcibly stop him from walking away. What did he do? What did he say? He started yelling and saying, screaming police brutality. Police brutality! Cuff him, please. No, because it's being ridiculous now. Police brutality! That's okay, sir. That's all right. Police brutality! Call 911, please!
Glover says there was no police brutality. And according to the East Point Police Department, Adrian never filed a formal complaint. Glover found Adrian's reaction surprising,
and suspicious. "He's just very combative." "He snapped." "He snapped." Adrian continued to insist he had nothing to do with the murder. He said he was planning to help police with the investigation the next day. "Okay, but I wanted to do it tonight. Because you know why? Because I can't sleep at night because a mother has died." "Exactly. My godson. My best friend's wife got killed. Yes, you're right. Yes, you're right." Eventually, Adrian's girlfriend gave detectives permission to enter their home.
But after a thorough search... We didn't find anything inside the home, nothing of any value whatsoever in the case.
Nothing inside the home, but outside, Glover got a closer look at the car Adrian was driving. Once I was able to go over to the Infinity and see that their light was out, that seemed like when all the pieces to the puzzle were coming together. It was just that moment to where I felt like we're on the right track. I think we're getting somewhere on this case, and it was big.
Clever thought he had his man, and he had a good idea about who Adrian might have been working for. You were starting to think that perhaps Andre had his buddy Adrian kill his wife. That's correct. Based on the surveillance videos and every piece of information that we had, I felt that might have been what was happening. But why would Andre have his wife execute it?
Glover said he was blinded by anger, furious that his marriage was ending, contrary to what Tiffany's friends thought at the time. I spoke with a friend who said he was actually going to be okay with it, that he came around. Did you see any indication that that was the case? Andre would be cordial one minute and then would be upset the next. He was not okay with Tiffany leaving. He was upset about that. He was very upset about it.
And while Andre's cell phone showed he was not at home when Tiffany was shot, it did show him in the neighborhood before, around the time those two cars were in the cul-de-sac. How urgent was it at that point to arrest them? After interviewing Adrian Harley, I began questioning.
having a strong fear for the children of Andre Pugh. After all, Andre was now suspected of having his wife murdered with his young children in the house, one of them found in the very bed where his wife was shot. Did you think Andre was capable of anything? Absolutely. I think he's had his wife killed by his best friend, and I figured he was capable of anything. He has no conscience whatsoever.
The next day, Sergeant Glover arrested Andre Pugh following his shift at Club Onyx. Local police arrested Adrian Harley at his home earlier that same morning. Andre found himself back in the East Point Police Department, this time in handcuffs and with a whole new story. He still denied killing Tiffany, but he said he knew who did. Well, he came in the booth. He called me. He said, listen, I killed your wife.
And I said, "What the f--- are you talking about? Are you insane?" When Tiffany's friend, Carmetria Burton, heard that Andre Pugh had been arrested for his wife's murder, she was overcome with emotion. Just the thought that he could have done it, knowing the kids were in the house to possibly witness it all, was too much to bear. No conscience, no heart, no regard for life. A monster.
The police had already told Tiffany's dad, Tommy, that his son-in-law was a suspect, so he wasn't surprised by news of Andre's arrest. "After learning the police were suspecting him, my immediate thought was that Andre had something to do with this.
But Adrian's arrest caught Tommy off guard. He didn't see that coming. He was the best man at their wedding. Not only that, he was a pallbearer at Tiffany's funeral.
The arrest brought an end to the suspicions that the city's DJs were being targeted.
Shortly after Andre was brought to the police station, he asked to meet Sergeant Glover in the jail hallway. Andre started talking, and Glover started recording. He came up to Club Onyx. And that's when Andre said it was Adrian alone who killed Tiffany. He'd confessed to it at the club just hours before. He said, listen, I killed your wife. And I said, what the f*** are you talking about? Are you insane? Did you ask him why he killed your wife?
Glover got Andre into an interview room to follow up on his allegation. As Andre told it, it all made sense to him now. Like how his wife's killer was able to evade the security cameras. The crazy part is, the person that broke into my house
As he told me, he's the one that shot my wife. He knows my camera system. Who, Adrian? Yes, he knows my camera system. Okay. I mean, I'm pissed off beyond mad. I mean, it's heartbreaking. It's hurtful. I asked him, what did you do? He said, I was just, I didn't know what to do. I was just upset. You didn't punch him? You didn't nothing. He just kept DJing. Did you believe that Adrian had revealed to him that he had killed his wife? I did not believe that at all.
I believe and I knew that Andre had set the whole thing up. But Andre insisted he had no reason to kill his wife. I just know my wife was giving me the house. My wife was going to give me child support money. Me killing her doesn't benefit me. This is insane right now. Everybody's going crazy. I'm freaking out. Glover decided it was time to play hardball.
There was something else Glover found suspicious. Andre lived on his phone, but Glover found hardly any texts from the days leading up to Tiffany's murder.
almost as if they had been wiped clean. Why would I delete my text message? Because you set up your wife to be murdered and you don't want the detectives who are about to talk to you to find them. You could have found them because there's nothing in there saying, kill my wife. He was not changing his story. So he just denies and denies and denies. Deny, deny, deny. I know I didn't do it, nor did I set someone up to do it.
The evidence against Andre was compelling, but still highly circumstantial. Would it stand up in court?
I did not think this was a home run case. Fulton County Deputy District Attorney Pat Dutcher knew he had his work cut out for him. One of the challenges was, you know, why did this happen and how can we prove it? Andre wasn't caught on video, and Dutcher believed that his cell phone data would not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he planned his wife's murder.
What he needed was motive. I mean, we could have gotten up there and said, well, you know, they were going to get a divorce and, you know, he must have done it for some reason related to that. But that's generally not going to be good enough to a jury. So Dutcher ordered a deeper dive into the 14,000 or so text messages police had downloaded from Andre's phone. Those text messages were essential in determining
determining exactly what his thoughts and motives were and how it all related to the death of Tiffany. With Tiffany gone and Andre behind bars, Tamika took in Jasmine and AJ until their families worked out custody. She tried to make their lives as normal as possible. Every year, Tiffany's mom would have a Christmas cookie party.
and all the Jasmine's friends would come over and she would get these like little chef's hats and apron. And so I wanted to keep that tradition going. So had a cookie party at my house. - Good for you. - And it was really nice.
But a month after their father had been arrested and charged with their mom's murder, Andre made bail and took his children back. The court let Adrian out, too. Kenya was horrified. How is that okay? What is wrong with our justice system? Did you have this fear? Oh, my God, I'm going to be out doing something, shopping for the family, and I'm going to run into this guy. I did. I did.
Kenya was a potential trial witness. So was Tamika. Were they now at risk? I had cameras installed actually after. You were worried? I was, yeah. I was afraid that, you know, with him being out there, okay, I had such a close relationship with them that I still think about it today, too. Oh, my gosh. There was reason to keep an eye on Andre. He may have been facing a murder charge, but that didn't keep him from popping up on the police's radar again. ♪
Andre Pugh had been out on bail for 13 months when Deputy DA Pat Dutcher got word that he had been up to no good. By then, Andre had a new girlfriend. But after she broke up with him, he apparently tried to get even. It was all on video. The facility where this girlfriend of his worked was under heavy surveillance and it had security guards. But he found her car in the parking lot and placed a nail under her tire.
Andre's bond was revoked, and he returned to jail to wait for his day in court. And on September 24th, 2018, almost four years after Tiffany was killed, prosecutors were ready to make their case. I knew that we were going to be in for a challenge.
But Deputy D.A. Dutcher was armed with some new evidence, courtesy of the FBI. They had analyzed Andre's cell phone records in more detail and confirmed he was in the neighborhood the morning Tiffany was killed. Dutcher showed the jury maps that pinpointed Andre's location. It was always our theory that that other car was Andre Pugh. And the FBI's cell record analysis helped us substantiate that theory.
Prosecutors said Andre's actions were suspicious right from the start, like that phone call he made to Cliff Adams just minutes after the security company alerted him about the break-in. "He told him on the phone that my house has been broken into. They came in through the basement." But prosecutors told the jury the security company never told Andre about the basement
So how did he know that's how the killer got in? So that was a big deal. He had information about how it all went down that he couldn't have had at that point unless he was involved. Absolutely.
And when Andre arrived home, prosecutors told the jury, he did not act like a worried husband and father. Surveillance video showed him entering the house for less than a minute before coming out, leaving his kids in the house where his wife had just been shot. Why would you just go stand outside and wait for the police? I mean, you'd think that the safety of your family and the well-being of your children would be the first thing on your mind, but to him, it wasn't.
According to prosecutors, Andre's family was never a priority. Even those affectionate texts he sent his wife, trying to save the marriage, weren't sincere. At the same time he was expressing that to his wife in the text messages, he's still continuing to have inappropriate relationships with other women and prostitutes. Dutcher said the text revealed something else, too. A motive for murder.
The messages showed that Andre couldn't afford his extravagant lifestyle on his own.
He was often out of cash, and the family relied on Tiffany's income to make ends meet. Throughout the text thread, there was this discussion of how he couldn't pay his bills and he didn't have enough money, and that he was asking Tiffany for money. In addition, Andre's previous home had gone into foreclosure, and his credit was shot. If Tiffany divorced him, he wouldn't be able to pay the mortgage. He'd lose the house and the status it gave him.
And when he realized he wouldn't have a luxurious place to live, he had to devise a way to keep his lifestyle and to be able to stay in the house. And that way, the prosecution argued, was getting his best friend to kill his wife. Dutcher told the jury Andre turned hostile the moment he realized he couldn't win Tiffany back, even sending her threatening texts, including one that said, I won't let you leave me. Now or never.
She actually responded to that text and called him out on it, saying that she took that as a threat, a threat to her safety and a threat to her life. Tiffany went on to say, I am done. I'm done being unappreciated, taken for granted, disrespected, unsupported, controlled, talked to any kind of way, abandoned, neglected.
I'm done. Tiffany stood up and that takes a tremendous amount of courage and bravery to do that.
Dutcher put almost 30 people on the stand, including Sergeant Alan Glover and Tamika Smith. But he says his most powerful witness was Tiffany. I was able to show the jury that Tiffany, in her own words, was telling them that it was Andre who was responsible for her death. I do feel that she was present beyond the grave, that it was her voice that was one of the most powerful pieces of evidence.
But the defense was about to get its turn, and Andre Pugh had a big name on his side. His defense lawyer was Stephen Sadow. You may know him as a lead attorney for former President Donald Trump. If you go against an attorney like Stephen Sadow, if you have a crack in your case, he will find it and he will exploit it. Off the bat, Sadow told the jury that his client had nothing to do with Tiffany's murder.
On cross, Cliff Adams testified that Andre earned good money at Onyx. More than enough, the defense said, to pay the mortgage. Contrary to what the prosecution said, the defense argued the texts showed Andre loved his wife and had no motive to kill her. The defense said Adrian acted alone.
"They argued that there's no evidence that the defendant assisted him, or there's insufficient evidence to prove that beyond a reasonable doubt." Sadow told the jury investigators had tunnel vision, ignoring evidence that might have exonerated Andre. Like failing to investigate a person Adrian was in touch with shortly before and after the murder.
As for the basement break-in, Andre claimed in his police interview that he just assumed that's how the intruder got in, based on his call with the security company. "They did not say which window. They didn't say the bedroom window that has the glass break-in or the basement window. The only thing they had to think of was the basement window." And the defense argued, police didn't know what the security company told Andre because they never bothered to listen to a recording of the actual conversation.
Sadow grilled Glover on the stand. Were you a little nervous about it? Well, of course. You didn't have any DNA? You didn't have a murder weapon? We didn't have the smoking gun, but circumstantial evidence can be just as strong as material evidence. The trial lasted two weeks. The jury returned with a verdict after a few hours. Guilty. They had prepped us for...
we were not to show emotion. How do you do that? It was hard. We all kind of were sitting there holding each other's hands and shaking and crying, but trying to hold in any outbursts. Tiffany's dad, Tommy, couldn't help but look straight at his former son-in-law, still bewildered by what he had done. Why did you decide you're going to destroy your life, my daughter's life,
and your family's life, your kid's life. Why did you take that step? That's what I was thinking. Andre was sentenced to life without parole. And when it was time for his alleged hitman, Adrian Harley, to stand trial, he met the very same fate. Glover, who retired in 2023 with the rank of major, felt vindicated. The long journey to justice had become deeply personal. I had a child at the time that was seven years old.
And that hits home. You know, for all murders, we work them hard, but this one, I wasn't letting this one go. She didn't deserve to die. She had no business dying. No business. Neither did DJ Nando, whose murder remains unsolved. What are your outstanding questions about the Nando case? Glover thinks investigators on that case should take a close look at Andre and Adrian. Yeah.
I'd love to know whose cell phones were in the area of the DJ Nando murder. There are similarities between the two cases that I don't think can be overlooked. Almost a decade after her murder, Tiffany's dad is still dealing with the profound loss. I always think about no matter how much I tried, I couldn't protect her.
Tiffany's children, Jasmine and AJ, now 16 and 11 years old, are being raised out of state by Andre's mother, and they have not been in touch with Tiffany's family or friends for many years. There's a pretty good chance that Jasmine will watch what we're doing here today at some point. Do you have a message for her? Wow. Um...
I would hope that one day she would connect because I want her to know how wonderful a mother she had. To honor Tiffany, Carmetria and Delta Airlines created a university scholarship in her name. Tiffany represented our next generation of leaders. A Black woman in her community trying to do the right thing, gone too soon. The kids, the family, friends, everybody appreciated
was robbed when Tiffany left this earth. What do you want her memory to be? Life. Light. Light. Tiffany was joy.
And that's all for this edition of Dateline. And check out our Talking Dateline podcast. Stephanie Gosk and Josh Mankiewicz will go behind the scenes of tonight's episode, available Wednesday in the Dateline feed wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you again next Friday at 9, 8 Central. I'm Lester Holt. For all of us at NBC News, good night.