Can you tell me what happened to your daughter?
Just in your own words, what you understand took place.
What had happened is they went out to Wasilla
and as they're out there, you know,
my daughter's hanging out, having a good time
with her friends.
They got to Wasilla on the way back,
they stopped by Thunderbird Falls.
My daughter, she just wanted friends.
She just wanted to have fun
so she was going with the whole thing.
Denali and Kayden decided to walk up a path,
were up there, have a good time.
And then somehow Denali convinced my daughter,
she was the type of person that,
if you asked her to do something,
and she really liked ya, she'd do it.
And they made some sort of duct tape game.
But when they went too far with the duct tape game,
my daughter started panicking.
So they released it off her mouth,
and released it off her hands and my daughter says
"I'm calling the police for sexual abuse and kidnapping."
Well, when she turned around,
Kayden reached over to Denali
and Denali held her hand open out with Denali's gun.
Kayden grabbed it and shot my daughter
in the back of the head.
And when he shot my daughter in the back of the head,
my daughter fell down twitching,
still trying to make the phone call.
And then I believe she got pushed
in the river by both of them.
I don't think it was just Kayden.
I'm so sorry, Timothy.
Forget about Dr. Phil, just dad to dad here,
I can't even imagine you trying
to wrap your head around this.
I am so sorry for what you're having to go through here.
Thank you.
Do you know where the gun came from?
The gun belonged to Denali.
She brought the gun.
I'm sure this was pre-meditated because
she had the gun, it was loaded.
She had the duct tape, she had the things,
and she was prepared for it.
When you last talked to her at 2:37,
at that point, do you think there was already
a plan to go into the woods and take your daughter's life?
Yes.
You said that they got out there
and started playing this duct tape game.
So do you think they said to her,
this is all just a game
in order to get her to go along with it
and allow herself to be taped up?
Yeah, my daughter would've went along with it,
trusted Denali because to her, it would've be funny
until she got her duct taped and her hands duct taped.
Knowing her, you think she would've
at that point, panicked, been uneasy
with what was going on?
Yes, she felt uncomfortable what was going on.
She panicked and they released her mouth and hands.
And at that time, she threatened to call the police,
and as she turned around, that's when she got shot.
Mikayla, you certainly knew Cynthia
about as well as anyone.
Is it surprising to you that she would be so trusting
and believe that these friends were just having a good time?
No, it's not surprising.
Cynthia is very trusting.
She considered Denali her friend because they had
said they were gonna play this duct tape game
and then they were gonna take pictures
of each other being duct taped up,
and they started with Cynthia.
There wouldn't have been anything that Cynthia
would've recognized as danger.
Cynthia's a vulnerable adult.
You're talking about they were going into the woods,
and they're saying, okay, we're gonna tape
each other up and take pictures so we can
tease people or trick people into thinking
we've been abducted or we're somehow being
bound and gagged here and we'll put these
pictures up on social media or whatever.
But this was a gag, this was a prank
is what they said to her.
Right.
And you two know this because of what's been
said in the police reports, correct?
Yes, what's been said in the police reports
is where that information came from
and just knowing that this would not have
set off a red flag for her.
This would've just been a game,
something fun to do and they were gonna do it to each other.
Everybody's pictures were gonna be up.