911 What's the address of the emergency?
Hello. Will you promise me one thing?
What's that? You're just gonna
shoot without no questions.
What's your name, Sir? From
room 237? He calls 911.
I just wanna save it all,
a stranger tells operators.
What's that? Annoying. Loading my gun.
He intends to die
and it's 100% bonus.
And that's just the fact.
Either by your officers
hand or my own. How
concerned are you for the officers
that are in the field at that
moment? Absolutely concerned.
Molly McDaniel answers
three of his six calls.
It was clear that he needed help.
Just by the things that he was
saying, my name is Molly. And it's nice, he
tells her. Type this into YouTube.
And then pop up immediately
with my face talking through
a Sally port or. Let me see.
I see you. And
he was very deliberate.
He wanted me to see that video,
a 2006 documentary featuring a
young Iowa inmate named Brian.
Is that your name? It is recording.
It's why Louisville officers know
his name when they finally find him.
Outside you having weapons in your.
No, no weapons on you.
Hold on, hold on. Keep
your hands up for us.
And needs help. They can clean help,
a mental health hospital known
as Centennial Peaks offers.
Problem is, this night it has
only one person in intake and
she's worried about her safety,
so officers opt for UC health longs peak
and this is how it works.
This is how it works.
Not long after the officer
drops him off and leaves.
Brian does the same.
While Brian has not been evaluated,
the hospital staff did not view
him as a threat to himself.
To accept this call, press 5
now by phone, Brian offers more detail.
I told her security, I'm like,
hey man, nobody talked to me,
so I'm just gonna leave. He's
like, I'll walk you up to talk to me.
Just blew my mind.
Molly McDaniel learns of
the release the next day.
It it bothered me and it
really bothered me because.
He seemed like he really needed help.
Like he obviously needed help.
He needed somebody.
If I'm not under arrest.
And what does all this did, huh?
Two days later, Brian comes to the
Lewisville police headquarters. You
just gonna keep these on for the next day
and not lose them?
This time, officers try another
hospital at Vista Adventist,
and this time they wait with him,
talk to somebody. That's how it works.
Hours all night next day waiting
for somebody like I was trying
to do it. The other hospital
inside the room. We know
hospital staff completes a court,
ordered mental health evaluation.
We also know when it's done.
This hospital also lets him go.
And in this case, it highlights,
even when the police are bringing the
person to the front door of the hospital,
how difficult that can be.
Boulder's chief prosecutor Michael Doherty
says this is when officers decided to
take Brian to jail for those earlier 911
calls. And he was clearly going through some
very significant issues and challenges.
You can mail your cases 21 CFR 1941
prosecutors seek a $25,000 bond
on a possible felony charge.
Mr. Murray is a significant
danger to the community.
Asks for what's known as a PR bond.
Basically a no cash up
front promise to return.
We'll let Brian tell you what
happens next. Were you surprised
when the judge in Boulder County
let you go? I'm not gonna lie.
I was. I was very shocked.
I want you to stay on the line
with me, OK? And I'm gonna.
I'm gonna stay on the line with you.
OK. His full name?
Brian Murray. And his is a story of a
broken system with real consequences.
In four days, he left
two yards, one jam before
finally doing this.
Oh, my God. OK. OK.
About help on the way, OK.
Out of the state, Brian Murray
went to Denver and into
the home of a man he knew.
He left in that man's car.
Why do you think he was dead?
Blood all over the floor and
it's blood all over him.
Stew Habel's wife found Stew in
their basement, battered and beaten.
I will never see the oldster.
All I see is this dead body. Yeah.
It's the only image
that I carry in my mind.
Paige and Stu Habel, new Brian.
He'd help them move some things years prior.
Did some odd jobs for them, too.
Did you ever see Brian's temper?
No, never saw his temper.
She didn't know he'd
spent 20 years in prison.
Didn't know he'd spent most of those
years untreated for a mental illness
while living in solitary confinement.
Didn't know until we told her
what had happened in the days
leading up to her husband's murder.
If anyone of a number of things happen.
Along the way. This doesn't happen,
right? Right. I think that
the system is is hugely
broken, Brian agrees. Do
you think if they didn't release you that
Stu would still be alive? Absolutely, 100%.
In the days that followed,
in the days before police found him.
Well, if I'm going down, I'm going down,
Big Brother Brian called in.
More threats. Your guys won a war.
And give it to you because
I'm not going down easy.
In the end, however,
he surrendered without a fight to the charge.
How do you plead?
Guilty or not guilty?
Guilty.
He'll likely die in prison
for killing Stu Habel.
60 years for
him at the age of 41 is a life sentence,
but he did tell me this from his prison cell
when I was at the hotel in Louisville.
My brain was was starting to get screwed up.
Like I know because I did 19 years in
prison and I spent all those years in
solitary and I know what's up. Bats coming?
Brian Murray asked to be put in jail.
Brian Murray asked to be hospitalized.
Paige Habel lost more than a husband last
year. I lost not only my partner.
My sense of stability,
my security, my safety,
my home and an innocent sense of trust.
Daily I see my views of the world
I lived in changing dramatically.
The system has let me down.
Let down by a system that let go.
Of a man. They had him in their
custody and they let him go.
Chris Vanderveen 9 news.