184. Lori Soares - The Web of Lies That Ended in Murder
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Hey everybody, welcome back to our podcast. This is Murder With My Husband. I'm Peyton Moreland. And I'm Garrett Moreland. And he's the husband. And I'm the husband. Another episode. Welcome to spooky season. It's October. I didn't even get to decorate this set. I know. That's a good point.

I don't have my decorations yet. Decorate the set. It is spooky season. What's everyone got planned? What do we got planned for Halloween? Oh, I already found some pumpkin patches. I'm already working on decor. I got us going. We have a live show. That was kind of good, actually. That was a little scary. See? Spooky season. Time for some pumpkin spice stuff.

Starbucks and what else? Pumpkin bread. Gosh, pumpkin bread is the best. What have you been ordering? Pumpkin pie, pumpkin pie. I actually really like October, November because everyone makes pumpkin pie everywhere you go. And for two months because it happens during Thanksgiving as well. So I guess we can kind of hop into my 10 seconds with all that going on. I love pumpkin pie. Pumpkin pie is probably some of my favorite dessert. Peyton, on the other hand,

I like pumpkins. Yeah. I don't know. It's a little sad. Do you like pumpkin seeds? No. You don't like anything pumpkin? I don't even really like carving pumpkins. Really? I don't enjoy. I don't love carving pumpkins.

If I could buy a carved pumpkin that looked good instead, I would do that. I would just decorate with plain, juicy, fat pumpkins on my doorstep. Okay. Orange, white. All the colors. Wardier, the better. Wardier, the better. Typical witch. Something I've always wanted to do and something that will probably never happen is I have always wanted to turn the place I live, our house, whatever, into a...

Mojo Dojo Casa house? The Mojo Dojo haunted casa house. Yeah, you do talk about that. I've always wanted to turn just our house into a huge haunted house that anyone in the neighborhood, not even anyone in the neighborhood, like everyone from worldwide just is like, oh, like that's the haunted house I have to go through. You are really about that. I am. I don't know why. Just something I really want to do that. But who's going to be the actors? I don't know.

Daisy? I don't want people in my house. Daisy will scare some people. I think it would be so fun. It's probably never going to happen. I mean, one, yeah, you have people in your house. I don't know.

I saw this house, someone sent it to me on Instagram, where they had like 50 skeletons all doing random things in their yard, like playing chess, roasting marshmallows, burying a body, like, and they had a whole skeleton. Like, it was insane. Yeah, I really want to do a haunted house. I don't know, maybe one year we'll rent out like a warehouse and just do a big haunted house. Okay, yeah.

You don't even like haunted houses either. I hate haunted houses. I hate them. That's what's so weird about your desire for this. I just wanted to host one, but I hate them. I don't hate them because I'm scared, I would say. You say you're bored, but I think that's just a defense mechanism. Nah, they're bored. I think you're so scared that you have to go, I have to be bored. But every time we walk through them, who's first? You. Garrett's first.

So we'll see. Maybe in a couple years from now. All right. I think that's all we got. We can hop into today's episode. Just a reminder of our bonus content. Ad-free bonus episodes, Patreon or Apple subscriptions. And we have our other two shows, Binge, Dan, Rise and Crime. Plug, plug, plug away.

Our sources for this episode are Every Woman's Nightmare by Stephen Long, Salt Lake Tribune, A&E TV, ABC News, Deseret News, CBS News, Oxygen, crimelibrary.org, and Wikipedia. Looks like we're doing a Utah case. So as we both know, marriage is supposed to be a sacred bond between two people, a promise to love, honor, and cherish. And there's some unspoken rules that go along with that as well, like being truthful till death do you part.

But when you're spending every single day with someone, growing old together, it's kind of hard to keep any giant secrets from the other person. Where they go to work, who their family and friends are, what they do in their spare time, it's all a part of your life as well. Unless their entire life has been one big lie and even their own family doesn't know the truth.

To pull something like that off not only takes massive time and effort, it takes a certain kind of person, someone who will go to the ends of the earth to keep themselves from being found out. And in today's case, one husband's giant web of lies becomes his wife's death sentence. Okay.

So our story starts in a little city called Orem, Utah, where Garrett and I went to college at Utah Valley University. That is where Peyton and I met. Now we are married. It's where we fell in love. Where we had our first kiss.

you know all that juicy stuff good old Orem so Orem lays right alongside the Utah lake and with its sprawling picturesque views backdropped by snow-capped mountains snapshots of Orem are postcard worthy and it really like when people visit Orem the mountains are just right there and they're so beautiful plus it's only about a 45 minutes drive south from Salt Lake City it's

It's a nice easy suburb from big city life. This is where nine-year-old Lori Suarez moved with her mother, Thelma, after her parents split up back in 1985. A quiet Mormon-centered town was a big adjustment from the California lifestyle that they had been living previously. Tell me about it. But Thelma's commitment to her faith was something she instilled in Lori, her daughter, from an early age.

In fact, Lori was adopted from a Latter-day Saints social services group by Thelma shortly after she was born. And as Lori grew older, her and Thelma grew even closer, sharing a love for movies, plays, and music, always attending performances by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Needless to say, the Mormon faith was the epicenter for everything in Lori and Thelma's lives. Like, it essentially was their life. It was the glue that kept their bond so strong as mother and daughter.

But when Lori entered her sophomore year of high school, she met someone who'd take on a major role in her life. During a camping trip with friends, Lori was introduced to a boy a grade above her, and his name was Mark Hacking. And his passion and enthusiasm for life was something Lori was immediately drawn to.

Plus, it didn't hurt that Mark shared her religious faith. The two quickly started dating, and in August of 1999, the 23-year-old Lori and 24-year-old Mark tied the knot in a Mormon temple in Bountiful, Utah. And if you remember from past episodes we've done, a marriage in the Mormon faith means you're bound together for all of eternity. It's not just till death do you part. So again, marriage is taken very, very seriously.

But no one in Lori's family had any qualms about Mark. He really was an earnest, all-around good guy. He seemed to genuinely care about the people around him. He strongly advocated for gay rights. He had a perfect record with hardly a parking ticket to his name. He even played the role of hero when he saw a woman in danger outside of his apartment one time.

Essentially, Mark seemed like the perfect upstanding citizen. Plus, he came from good stock. His father was a pediatrician. His mother was a nurse. His two brothers were also on their way to becoming doctors. So naturally, Mark wanted to do the same. He began studying at the University of Utah and planned to register for medical school once he finished his undergrad degree. Question. Is this the case of Mark?

Mark the one who did the bombings in Utah? No. Okay. No. I was curious because his name's Mark as well, correct? Yes. I think Hoffman, but no, this is a completely different case, but same place. Okay. So on paper, Mark was the ideal husband. Even Thelma, Lori's mother, loved Mark. She called him her big old teddy bear. Eventually, the couple relocated to Salt Lake City so Mark could be closer to school and his job in the psychiatric unit in the Salt Lake City Hospital.

Meanwhile, Lori got a job working as a stockbroker's assistant at a Wells Fargo in the city. And from there, the two settled into a routine. On weekdays, that unfortunately meant not getting to see much of one another since Mark put in a lot of long hours between his studies and the hospital. But other than their challenging schedules, the couple seemed perfectly happy together. Some might even say too good to be true.

In the spring of 2004, Mark graduated from the University of Utah with honors. He'd also just been accepted to the University of North Carolina's Chapel Hill School of Medicine. Lori, his wife, was supportive, even excited for the upcoming move across the country. She put in her notice at Wells Fargo with her last day being the middle of July. And around June of 2004, Lori discovered she was pregnant with the couple's first child. Both

Both she and Mark were ecstatic that a new baby would be included in this new chapter of their lives. They began packing up their apartment, and by the week of July 12th, Lori was putting in her final two weeks of work.

But that Friday, July 16th, Lori made a call to the University of North Carolina where Mark was planning to study. She had a question about their financial aid program. Maybe they could help them out a bit since the couple was now expecting. Okay. But after Lori hung up the phone, some of her coworkers noticed she'd gotten extremely upset. She started crying, then asked if she could leave work early.

But later that evening, everything seemed to have blown over. Lori showed up at a going-away party her coworkers threw for her, and Mark was by her side, seemingly without a care in the world. So whatever had upset her at work earlier that day seemed to just now not matter.

The next time the couple was spotted together was two days later. On Sunday, July 18th, the 27-year-old Lori and the 28-year-old Mark stopped into a convenience store by their home. A security camera caught them entering at around 9.19 p.m. The clerk said Mark was a regular who often came in to buy cigarettes and made the cashier promise never to tell his wife.

Which, this is actually a pretty big deal in his religion and the secret that he's keeping from his wife. Because essentially, if you're smoking cigarettes, that means that you wouldn't be able to go into a Mormon temple. And so, it's a pretty big, big secret. I also think that, I just think it's kind of weird to be like, don't tell my wife. Yeah. I mean, that's, I mean, obviously he's trying to hide it, but. I think it's just the first of many red flags. Yeah, I mean, I could assume what happened when she called.

um the school but I mean I'm sure we'll find out yeah so that evening the couple came in the clerk said Mark appeared to be in good spirits but Lori did look a little bit upset cut to the following morning it's Monday July 19th 2004 at around 10 a.m Mark calls Lori's office at Wells Fargo to ask how she's doing

But Lori's colleague says she never made it into work that morning, even though her shift was due to start at 7 a.m. Mark tells the coworker that Lori went out jogging at around 5.30 a.m. that morning, like she always did, in Memory Grove Park. However, he hadn't seen her come home. He assumed she just went right into work. Now he was starting to get worried. So here's the thing.

Memory Grove Park was not a place to go jogging if you were a newbie. It was definitely picturesque, but it was a bit dangerous. Some of the paths were on a steep incline, which was tough for someone who wasn't as experienced.

or maybe someone who was dealing with the early symptoms of pregnancy. Plus, the park was known to be home to poisonous snakes and the occasional mountain lion, which had attacked joggers there in the past. I don't even know where this is. Do you? No, I don't know exactly where it is, but I know it's in Salt Lake. What's it called again? Memory Grove Park. Okay. I mean, there's a lot of trails, though, in Salt Lake, so that's kind of hard. If you didn't know, Peyton and I,

We don't go running, so. No, or hiking. Or hiking. For that matter. But Lori wasn't someone who just picked up jogging as a hobby. She was athletic. She was seasoned. She knew the trails and what to watch out for. Plus, Mark said he'd been over to the path that morning and scanned the three-mile trail Lori usually took himself just to see if he could find her.

Which is strange because why wouldn't he call her work first to see if she's there before jogging three miles to look for his wife? Does that make sense? So his wife didn't come home from jogging. Okay, I see, I see. And instead of calling work to see if she just jogged right to work like he's saying, he went and also jogged the three miles to look for her. Got it, okay. So after hearing this, Lori's colleague encouraged Mark to call the police, which he did.

At around 10.07, seemingly right after he hung up, Mark phoned the Salt Lake City Police Department. Then, close to 10.30 a.m., he called Lori's mother, Thelma, to tell her that Lori was seemingly missing. From there, he began questioning people walking through the park about whether they'd seen his wife. He even went door-to-door around the neighborhood asking if anyone had seen her. So he's like,

trying to find her. I mean, he's jogged the three miles. He's called work. He's called police. He's called her mother. He's now going door to door. Then around 1045 a.m., one of those neighbors claims they hadn't seen Lori, but

but a car fitting the description of hers was parked outside of their house. Within the hour, a full-scale search for Lori Hacking was underway. By that afternoon, television crews were swarming the area, broadcasting updates on the search and interviewing the seemingly inconsolable Mark Hacking. I mean, this... It seems a little weird. I mean, like, why is everyone going so hard? Like, the news stations are already coming out. Well, because you have this...

perfect looking Mormon couple. The husband is like frantically looking for his missing pregnant wife. I mean, that's a catchy, that's a catchy headline. I just feel like we do so many stories where someone goes missing and nobody cares. I mean, these people fit the bill of who's going to get coverage. Yes, that's true. Especially in Utah, right? Yes.

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What Mark didn't yet realize, though, was by that afternoon, he was already a person of interest. Of course. Fairly normal. It's a husband. And all it took was one look at Lori's car, her car that was found parked in front of one of the neighbor's homes.

For starters, the seats and the mirrors in her vehicle were adjusted to fit a much taller driver. If Lori had parked the car there herself, she wouldn't have been able to even reach the pedals. Okay. Ordin,

Why would he adjust anything when he's moving the car? She was only 5'4", and Mark was around 6' tall. So it kind of more fit someone like him. I mean, it makes sense. Even when I get in your seating position, I'm like, whoa. And you're 5'7". So when cops arrived at the Hackings apartment, they also found Lori's car keys and wallet inside. So if her car was parked...

down the road how was her car keys inside their apartment and if she'd gone jogging and left her car near the park she would have at the very least needed to take her keys with her aside from that they found a brand new receipt for a mattress and bedding stuff that had been purchased that morning at 10 23 a.m that's around the same time that mark was making those panicked calls

and allegedly scouring the park for his missing wife. So he says, no, no, no, no. I was at the park. I was freaking out. I was making calls to her work. But then they find a new receipt for a mattress and bedding from around that same time. In a mattress? Mm-hmm. Then there was the nightstand in their apartment. In the drawer next to the bed, police discovered a knife.

as well as what they believe to be blood samples from the floor in their bedroom. They also found a letter written by Lori that proved maybe their marriage wasn't what it seemed to be from the outside looking in. This is every single case we cover. Like, this is no surprise. Every single case we cover that's married, it's always like, I thought they were this perfect couple.

Whether they're Mormon, not Mormon, whatever religion. There's always something behind closed doors. Yeah. Well, this letter they found read, quote, I hate coming home from work because it hurts to be home in our apartment. I can't imagine life with you if things don't change. So clearly it's not looking great for Mark Hacking at this point. But without a body or finding her, police couldn't say for sure whether this was just a missing persons case or an actual homicide.

So for now, they have to work off this hunch that Mark might have done something to his wife. And the police figured maybe it was a good idea to start checking the dumpsters in the area or at least any video surveillance surrounding them for suspicious activity. And when they look into this, they actually get a hit.

One security company says, hey, we have a shot of a guy putting something in a dumpster on the University of Utah campus. More specifically, behind the Neuropsychotic Institute, which was where Mark was working as an orderly at the time. Finally, the cameras. Let's come through. Well, and it's just like police being like, let's just check the dumpster footage. I mean, this is very obvious. And they get a hit.

And then they get a hit on another dumpster. While searching a church parking lot close to the couple's apartment, investigators discovered a mattress that had been cut up and disposed of. In the church parking lot? The serial number listed on that mattress, it's the same as the one on the box spring that was still in the Hackings apartment. Okay. So remember, there was a new mattress bought. Yeah.

And now this box spring matches some random mattress they found cut up in a church parking lot nearby. I'm not saying that I think murderers should be better at it, but it's just, it's interesting that you kill someone and you leave so much evidence behind. Yeah. It's just, I mean, not that I want them to be better at it, but it's just, I don't know. I also sometimes feel like

I don't want to say it's just luck of the draw, but for instance, we just covered the Josh Powell and Susan Powell case over on our Patreon. Yes. Very similar. Mormon couple, Utah. He also made rounds to dumpsters, we're pretty sure. Yeah.

Different, but there's no, there's nothing. There's no evidence. Yeah, there's nothing. So it's just like, why in some cases is it so easy? Again, missing wife. Well, for this one, there's cameras. Cameras are literally catching. Yes, that's true. A person. So it's different. So they're like, okay, now we need to go back to that original, um,

time he was caught on footage or some suspicious looking man was caught on footage remember behind the building but if that was mark who was caught on tape disposing of something the night before well the search was going to be a bit more difficult see those dumpsters were typically emptied before 10 a.m on mondays which meant whatever was in there that night had already been added to the landfill probably before lori was even reported missing

So when they even though they want to go check the other dumpster, it's already been taken. The following day, July 20th, Lori's family stood before the press to beg for anyone with information about her disappearance to come forward. By that point, they'd printed hundreds of missing persons posters and had recruited over a thousand people to join their search. So this case is really blown up in the city of Salt Lake.

They had no idea that at this point, police were already suspecting a homicide at the hands of her beloved husband. So they think it's still just a missing person case and Mark Hacking is like a totally innocent grieving husband. Which is kind of smart to surprise him rather than start questioning him little by little. Gather as much evidence as you can and go for it.

And it's kind of working because he's probably going to, you know, be more inclined to talk to people, give press interviews. And that's exactly what happens. Lori's parents weren't the only ones trying to get the world's attention. Mark Hacking was forming his own bizarre plan, uh,

Early that morning, Mark went to the Chase Suite Hotel in a busy area of eastern Salt Lake City. But he didn't check in or even inquire about a room. Instead, he just took off all of his clothes, aside from his sandals, and went streaking through the parking lot, screaming at the top of his lungs. At around 2 a.m., police responded to a disturbance at the hotel, only to find it was Mark Hacking seemingly having some sort of

nervous breakdown. But the police suspected the whole thing was just an act, that Mark was faking some sort of mental illness to prop up an insanity plea when the time came. That's so crazy. We've seen this happen before where people just fake everything. Mm-hmm.

After all, he probably sensed the police were closing in on him at this point. I mean, you're the husband. It was only a matter of time until they had enough evidence to arrest him. Still, that day, Mark was admitted to the University of Utah psych unit, the same place he had worked as an orderly. How...

Yeah, only now he's getting admitted as a patient. Oh, how the turns have tabled. But Mark felt confident he could pull off the charade. He'd seen how his patients acted, how they spoke, thought, and manipulated their doctors. Mark knew it was something he could recreate himself. After all, Mark had been lying through his teeth for years. In fact, his entire life was a lie, and everyone was about to find out. That's what even landed him in this situation to begin with.

By July 22nd, two days after Mark was admitted to the psychiatric unit, police learned that Mark had never been accepted to that medical school at the University of North Carolina. Saw that one coming. Because you can't be accepted to med school if you've never received your undergrad degree. See, Mark had dropped out of the University of Utah back in 2002. He never even graduated. Wait, so...

Wait, how does he have his job at the hospital then, correct? Mm-hmm. Okay. But he'd continued pretending he was still a student there, a lie he managed to keep from both Lori, his wife, and his own family by bringing home fake textbooks and studying for fake classes and exams. Oh my gosh. At one point, Mark even flew to New York to pretend he was interviewing at a medical school while he stayed with Lori's cousin.

He went as far as to wake up early, put on a suit, and even asked her cousin to drive him over to Columbia. That's how committed he was to this false narrative. He was better off just finishing school.

Yeah, a narrative that was pretty easy for him to create because remember, everyone else in his family is a doctor. He knows exactly how these things go. Oh, okay. I forgot about that. Medical jargon is being thrown around in conversations all the time. And Mark did work as an orderly at the hospital. However, that job required little more than a high school diploma. So sure, Mark could walk the walk and talk the talk.

which was probably why he had so many people fooled. Why Lori had quit her job and planned to move across the country to start a new life for her husband. Like, she's going to support her husband through medical school. Why his father had taken time off from his busy practice to help the young couple with the relocation. That is, until everything started to unravel for Mark just before Lori's disappearance around mid-July.

So once Mark's in that psych ward, we're going back to present time. Police tell Mark's brothers, Lance and Scott, like, hey, we have quite a bit of incriminating evidence on your brother and we're pretty sure he killed your sister-in-law.

And after hearing about all of these elaborate lies Mark has been keeping from them over the years, they figured maybe we should go to the hospital and confront him, confront our brother about everything police have uncovered. So around the night of July 24th, Scott and Lance sign into the psychiatric ward to pay Mark a visit.

And they tell their very visibly distraught brother, we're going to love you no matter what happens. So why don't you just get everything off your chest? And that's when Mark breaks. It's like he can't keep a single lie any longer because he spilled everything about what happened in the days leading up to Lori's death. And this is what Mark Hacking said.

That Friday, July 16th, remember this is the day of Lori's going away party with her coworkers. Remember how she made that phone call to Chapel Hill about financial aid and left the office early in tears? Well, apparently one of the staff members at the university began combing the databases searching for Mark's enrollment. And after several thorough checks, they realized we don't have a Mark Hacking registered for the fall or any semester here.

In fact, they don't even have an application on file for him. So, of course, Lori went home and confronted Mark about the situation. Like, we're supposed to be picking up and moving halfway across the country. Why can't they even find any evidence of you? But Mark, he was an expert liar. He had an excuse for everything. So he said...

Hmm, that's strange. Let me just make a phone call. He disappears. He comes back and says, here's the problem. Apparently their computer system had recently crashed over at the university and they lost his files. But don't worry because Mark had straightened it out.

Now, I'm not sure if Lori totally bought this. No, there's no way she believed this. But she decided to just brush it under the rug for now because they had her going away party to get to. So she and Mark got dressed and headed over to the party where many said the couple seemed totally fine. They were even in good spirits.

But as the weekend went on, things started to unravel rather quickly for Mark. Lori discovered that not only was the whole University of North Carolina thing a lie, but Mark's entire education was a lie. She starts digging. Many of the things he had said to her over the course of their marriage was even a lie. And Lori was willing to pick up her life and move across the country with him because of those falsehoods.

Well, come Sunday night, Mark started to panic. Lori told him to pack his things. She wanted him out of the house. It didn't matter to her that she was five weeks pregnant or that they had made a sacred commitment through marriage. It was over. Like her husband was a fraud and a liar.

But Mark isn't worrying about his faith or the fact that his pregnant wife is kicking him out of the house. He's worried about something else. He's thinking she's going to expose me to the rest of the world. She's going to tell her coworkers, their friends, their families that everything Mark had said and done is a lie. And Mark couldn't imagine anything worse.

He asks Lori if she'll come to the store with him. Maybe they can grab something to drink and talk everything over. So this is the exact footage and then the cashier that talked about them. Lori agreed but said the second they got back, he needed to begin packing. It's that Sunday evening, July 18th, that Lori and Mark were spotted walking into the convenience store. Lori looked extremely upset and that's the last time she was ever seen alive in public.

Because when they get home, Lori climbed into bed and wrote that letter to Mark, the one that police will find a few days later. The one saying, I can't imagine life with you if things don't change.

Meanwhile, Mark played some video games before grabbing some boxes to begin packing his things. And that's when he rediscovered an old .22 caliber rifle he had. He loaded the gun, entered the bedroom, and with Laurie sound asleep, he fired one shot directly through her head. Holy crap.

One shot was all it took to end the pregnant 27-year-old's life. Oh, I forgot she was pregnant too. After this, Mark hopped in Lori's car and went back to the convenience store to buy some cigarettes around 1 a.m. This time, the clerk noticed that Mark was alone. And when Mark returned to the apartment, he realized that Lori's blood had soaked through the pillow top part of their mattress.

Knowing he would have to destroy that piece of evidence, Mark grabbed a hunting knife, removed Lori's body from the bed, and began cutting the pillow top away from the rest of the mattress. Okay, and this is something I think about often, but I really thought about during this case. Okay. He leaves her body in the bed, drives to the store, grabs some cigarettes, comes back,

How eerie is that to walk back into your house, re-enter, and like her body's just laying there? Like as a human, how do you comprehend that? You're in a different state of mind. Personally, I think at that point, I think you're...

like there's a lot of shock adrenaline there's i think so much going on i would assume the last thing you were thinking is it's eerie like this is creepy yeah there's a dead body in my in my bed i don't think that's what's going through his mind he needs to hide the body he needs to not get caught i just don't understand i think there's just so many other

emotions and hormones running through your body, I doubt that's what you're thinking of. Because that's what I'm thinking. Oh, 100%. How do you leave a scene and then come back and keep dealing with it? I just would run away, I guess. I don't know. 100%. So after he cuts up the mattress, he then wrapped Lori in trash bags, carried her out back, and put her in the trunk of his SUV. This is his wife, a woman that he had impregnated. It's just crazy. It's insane because he obviously just...

He cares way more about what other people think than his wife. - Okay, let me guess. Your medicine cabinet is crammed with stuff that does not work. You still aren't sleeping, you still hurt, and you're stressed out.

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And then he places the disassembled mattress on the roof of his car. He then tossed the gun into a dumpster behind their apartment building, a gun that would never be seen again. After he made the short drive over to their local Mormon church, went behind the building and tossed the mattress that had his wife's bloodstains soaked into it into the dumpster. I mean, is that not just an ironic sentence? Yeah.

But now he needed to find a separate place to get rid of Lori's body. So he drove to another spot he knew well, the dumpster behind the University of Utah's neuropsychiatric unit. The same place he'd ironically be confessing to all of this a few days later. Mark figured that the lot would be deserted this time of night. No one would have eyes on him as he made the drop.

It was at about 2 a.m. when Mark pulled Lori's limp body from the car and threw her into this steel dumpster. A dumpster he likely knew would be emptied early the following morning before he would ever report her missing. Next, around 5 a.m., Mark got into Lori's car, drove it to a parking spot outside Memory Grove Park, and left it there, making it appear as if Lori had gone out for her morning jog and simply disappeared.

But he made that stupid little mistake and brought the keys back to the house with him. Yeah. I think another reason you mentioned earlier about the Susan Powell case that we covered recently, I think it's different. He went to places that were close by, sort of. Yes. Instead of going in the middle of nowhere.

- Nowhere where there's no cameras. - Josh went in the middle of nowhere. - Correct, where you wouldn't see anything. So I mean, of course he was gonna get caught. - Yeah, but Josh also made stupid mistakes like calling his wife's cell phone that was sitting in the seat next to him and police knew that.

After confessing everything to his two brothers on July 24th, Lance and Scott went to the police the following day. By August 2nd, they had enough evidence to arrest Mark Hacking for aggravated murder. And then just imagine the whole town, thousands of people who've been searching for her just to find out that her own husband killed her and dumped her body.

That day, Mark was sitting contently in his hospital room, completely unaware that his brothers had sold him out to the cops. What does he think is going to happen? I think he thought they kept a secret. Actually, there's a lot of families that would, so I don't blame him. Yes. And then police stormed in and placed Mark in handcuffs. Mark was transported to the Salt Lake County Jail, where he was questioned by authorities. By that afternoon, Mark was fingerprinted, photographed, and booked.

He was handed his standard-issue jumpsuit and told he'd be monitored 24-7. Mark Hacking had been placed on suicide watch. On August 9, 2004, he stood before the judge who announced he was being charged with first-degree murder and three counts of obstructing justice. His bail was set for $500,000, which later increased to a million. Are you surprised it is first-degree murder, considering...

It did not seem planned out and it seemed like he saw the gun and was like, oh, I'm going to kill my wife. I think because he found the gun in a different room and grabbed it and walked to her and she was asleep. Like he had time to think about it. And because she was asleep, that would be considered first degree murder. Okay.

Even if that plan was just a short two minutes. Yeah, whatever. The following day, Mark was brought back into the courtroom where he faced Lori's mother, Thelma, for the first time since his confession. After fessing up, many people assumed Mark would plead guilty. Only the opposite was true. Mark stood staring at his feet while his lawyer did all the talking, offering up a plea of not guilty. Without Lori's body, Mark's lawyers thought he stood a chance to get off.

His trial was then set for April of 2005. There's no way he has a chance. I mean, no body, no crime. That's what they say. That's true. Which meant investigators had almost nine months to deliver more evidence. So now it's going to be just a frantic hunt to try and find the body.

So remember, Lori's body had been left in the dumpster behind the psych unit. But that dumpster had been emptied on the morning of Monday, July 19th, before Lori was even called in as missing. Which meant her remains were now amongst the several thousand tons of compacted trash in a location nearly two soccer fields wide and 30 to 40 feet deep.

A needle in a haystack was an understatement. Between July 19th and 20th alone, local trucks had dropped off an additional 4,300 tons of trash, which meant Lori could have been buried beneath any of it. How do you find that? So the police's first order of business was making sure any new trash was diverted to new piles in the landfill so they didn't bury any possible evidence further.

Every day following, a crew dressed in coveralls, steel-plated boots, leather gloves, masks, and eyewear braved the summer heat to comb through the trash along with a team of cadaver dogs, pitchforks, and sometimes their own two hands.

The odds of finding Lori who'd been wrapped in just another trash bag were looking slim, but they had a formula for this kind of thing. Certain items that could indicate they were getting closer to Lori's body, like a piece of mail with the hospital's address on it or paperwork with dates similar to when she went missing. But by the end of September, they still hadn't had any luck.

Lori's father pulled one of the officers working in the dump aside and said, Look, I understand that the odds of us finding her in one piece are near zero, but if you can find even the smallest remains of her, we would like to have them buried. Which is a devastating sentence. That is heartbreaking. But Mr. Suarez knew the truth. Between the heat and the passing of time, finding Lori was getting harder and harder. After

As it stood, the only thing really tying Mark to the murder was his confession, that mattress receipt, and a few samples of blood that had been discovered in the bedroom. The gun, the murder weapon, was probably somewhere in that landfill along with other pieces of possible evidence.

Had Mark never even confessed to the crime, he might not even be behind bars, which meant as long as Lori and the gun were missing, there was a chance Mark could walk free. But on October 1st, 2004, that all changed. An officer named J.R. Nelson had shown up for what he imagined would be another disappointing day of searching.

That afternoon, he dragged his rake across another hill on the dump when it caught on something. It was a cluster of hair poking out of a garbage bag, which wasn't unusual. There was a lot of salons in Salt Lake City, and the police had come across more than several bags of discarded hair. But this looked different to Nelson. This hair looked familiar, like Lori's luscious curly locks, the ones that stood out in every single photo of her.

Nelson began pawing at the bag frantically, hoping to confirm his suspicion. And he quickly realized this wasn't just another bag of discarded hair. It was attached to human remains. Amongst those thousands of tons of trash, they had managed to find what they were looking for. Wow, what a miracle. They had discovered the remains of Lori. The chances of that are like zero. Yes.

Now that they could confirm Lori was murdered, Mark's case didn't stand a chance, especially because in the state of Utah, he could be convicted of double homicide. There, fetal homicide is also considered a capital offense. And remember, Lori was five weeks pregnant. Unfortunately, though, in order to make the conviction, an autopsy would have to prove Lori was in fact pregnant and with her state of decomposition confirming that was impossible.

Any chances of charging Mark with double homicide fell apart that day. But on October 9th, 2004, Lori's family finally got to give her the burial she deserved. However, in March 2005, about a month before the trial, Lori's parents came to a realization. They did not want Lori's last name to be listed as hacking on her gravestone. Instead, they replaced it with her maiden name, Lori K. Suarez, which...

Yes, of course. 100%. Come April 2005, many suspected Mark Hacking would maintain his not guilty plea when he entered the courtroom for his trial, especially since he stuck by that plea after Lori's body was found during his arraignment. But on April 15th, Mark was escorted into the courtroom before his family and the Suarez's. In his beige jumpsuit with his hands cuffed behind his back, Mark stood before the judge.

Oh, I wonder what his lawyers thought in that moment. Oh, God.

He claimed she was the greatest thing that ever happened to me, but I killed her. I took the life of my unborn child and I put them in the garbage and I can't explain why I did it. I don't know. I try to understand, but I can't. He concluded by telling the judge he was okay with whatever fate was decided for him and that he deserved to spend the rest of his life in prison. The entire hearing lasted a total of only 10 minutes.

In June, Mark returned to court for his sentencing. He was given only six years to life, which was the state's standard at the time for homicide sentencing such as this. But that means, I mean, I know it's six years to life, but that does mean that in six years, technically, if Mark was on good behavior, he could be up for parole. Ironically, the same amount of time it would have taken him to finish his undergraduate degree and complete med school. So what was...

So what happened? Because the six years obviously have passed by. I'll get that. Okay, okay. So Lori's father had a hard time accepting his daughter's killer could be back on the streets in such a short amount of time. He went to the executive director at the Utah Statewide Association of Prosecutors and had them urge the sentencing commission to change the law. They wanted the minimum sentencing to be raised from six to 15 years before being considered for parole. And shockingly, it worked.

In March 2006, Utah passed a bill saying those convicted of first degree murder must serve at least a 15 year sentence. They named it Lori's Law, which it's a pretty good law for first degree murder. But would that go into effect considering that's abstract?

after all of his stuff. Yeah, they'll change his sentence. Interesting. Ultimately, Mark's parole hearing won't be until 2035. Today, he remains incarcerated at the Central Utah Correctional Facility in Gunnison, Utah.

Since his time behind bars, Mark has corresponded with Lori's mother, Thelma. She claimed that while she can never forget what her son-in-law did, she has found it in her heart to forgive him. She said in an interview, if you do not forgive something so horrendous like that, it just destroys you. Which, yeah.

At least offering this absolution has given Thelma some solace in all of this chaos. And that is the story of Lori Hacking. Gosh. How do you... Not very often you see he killed her, did this horrendous thing, and then goes, I don't know why he did this. I'm so sorry. Like, I regret it. I feel like you usually don't see those emotions come back out. At least that seemed real. Like, it seemed like he...

i don't know was he lying was he not lying i don't know so it's also interesting you didn't we didn't go into too much detail but he obviously i mean he had a job he obviously lied about all his resumes all his um degrees everything yeah yeah he just was living one big lie and didn't want to be caught and he was just going to pretend to go where did he think it was going to end like he was pretending to go to medical school like

he was getting into just deep waters where at some point he wasn't gonna be able to lie about it like how was he gonna get a job and also it sounds like she wasn't just going to leave him with the letter it sounded like some things need to change yeah like maybe they could work it out yeah and maybe they could have worked it out where she wasn't going to tell anyone but he just killed her he freaked out

I also always wonder, like, according to him, he just stumbled upon the .22 while packing and decided to kill her. Yeah, that's true. It makes it look so much better than it actually looks. Is that true? Or did you go looking for the .22? You know what I mean? That's a good point, 100%. But that is our episode for this week, you guys. Thank you for your support. Thank you for your love. Thank you for being a part of Murder With My Husband. And we will see you next time with another episode. I love it. And I hate it. Goodbye.