Vinson Filyaw: It became two things for me. It became, one, an answer to my problems, and also, another answer to make money.

Vinson Filyaw, sitting for months in a South Carolina prison, with its clean sheets and its three squares a day, got it into his head that his experiences were the perfect material for a book or movie. And so he set out to write one.

And it was more in the way of a self-proclaimed author that Vinson sat with us and answered our questions.

Keith Morrison: And we do have your manuscript, as you know.

Vinson Filyaw: And it got your attention, didn't it?

It is 120 cramped, misspelled pages of profoundly awful confessions, a moment-by-moment memoir of his rage, his crime, his imprisonment. What he had decided to say about Elizabeth had a long and disturbing prologue.

Keith Morrison: One of the paragraphs was how you … like to say that people used to marry at the age of 12. So there was nothing really wrong with what you were doing.

Vinson Filyaw: I still believe that.

He recounts the origin of his fury at the system, when his 12-year-old step daughter told authorities he had repeatedly confined and abused her.

In Vinson’s version, the girl welcomed his attentions, which he has -- shall we say -- sanitized.

Vinson Filyaw: She came to me every time.She would get up, make coffee, like I said, playing the little housewife role. Bring me coffee and then…

Keith Morrison: Crawl into bed with you?

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah.

Keith Morrison: How close did it come, if it didn't go all the way?

Vinson Filyaw: Well, I’m a man. I mean, I’d be lying if I said I didn't think about it.

Vinson's take on reality -- that all he did was 'think about it' -- did not square with Amber, or the authorities who investigated her accusations.

Keith Morrison: It’s a point on which your credibility may be a little weak, if you know what I mean.

Vinson Filyaw: OK. Now, in defense of what I just said, you are already accepting what she said as true. OK? Nobody ever questioned me. Nobody ever asked me anything.

Though of course there was a reason for that, which Vinson somehow avoided mentioning. Several reasons, actually: the hiding hold in the floor of his trailer home, his various bunkers in the back yard, in the woods.

No one talked to Vinson because they couldn't find him.

Vinson Filyaw: And who's going to believe me over a 12-year-old girl? I mean, you got an alcoholic high school dropout.

Keith Morrison: And you couldn't deny you have a pretty close relationship with that little girl.

Vinson Filyaw: Exactly.

Keith Morrison: That she actually did share your bed on frequent occasions.

Vinson Filyaw: Exactly, I mean…

Keith Morrison: Kind of hard to get out of that one, isn't it?

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah, how am I going to lie about that?

So Vinson ran, found his hiding place in the thickest part of the woods.

Vinson Filyaw: It was right in the middle of the neighborhood.

In fact, it was just a few hundred yards from his own single-wide trailer home.

At night sometimes, he'd sneak back to his house to see his girlfriend or prowl around the neighborhood.

Vinson Filyaw: I had night vision binoculars. I bought them at Wal-Mart. I actually got them on sale for $159. They had the zoom lens, just like binoculars. You could zoom right up on somebody's house, you could see them just like in the daytime.

So much time alone there with his pornography, his plan to kidnap, and maybe kill, Amber. A plan now ruined by the authorities of Kershaw County.

Keith Morrison: They took the kids away.

Vinson Filyaw: Yes, sir. They put them in different foster homes.

And so that second plan, to find another girl to kidnap and abuse as a lure to attract the whole police force to his booby trapped bunker.

Vinson Filyaw: In my mind, everything I did was justified at the time.

Keith Morrison: Including the sexual assault?

Vinson Filyaw: Like I said, at the time, I thought everything was justified.

To Vinson’s way of thinking, what he did to Elizabeth actually had the ring of true logic.

Vinson Filyaw: Since I had been accused of sexually assaulting a young girl in Kershaw County…

Keith Morrison: Then you were going to go out and sexually assault a young girl in Kershaw County?

Vinson Filyaw: Exactly.

Keith Morrison: So the linkage is, "They've got me labeled as a child predator, so I’ll prove I’m a child predator?”

Vinson Filyaw: Well, I didn't say it was genius. I mean, I'm in jail.

Around and around danced Vinson, sometimes even trying to claim some sort of moral high ground.

Vinson Filyaw: The motivations were the anger that I felt because of what had happened, you know. I mean, I basically lost everything.

Keith Morrison: Did you feel then that you were in a position where you could indulge this sexual fantasy?

Vinson Filyaw: No. It was never a time when this really had anything to do with sex.

Nothing to do with sex?

Really?

Keith Morrison: If you were so angry at them, and wanted to blow them all up, why didn't you just blow them all up? Why draw a young girl into what could be the worst experience any young girl ever has in her whole life?

Vinson Filyaw: Publicity.

Keith Morrison: For you?

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah, I guess.

Publicity? Well, yes --  for what Vinson considers his "book,” apparently.

We opened that scrawled manuscript.

Keith Morrison: If I may read?

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah

Keith Morrison: "She was so scared and crying to go home. Finally, after she wouldn't stop crying, I told her that the more she cried the more I would rape her. Eventually she became withdrawn and quiet. She just lay there, starting at the ceiling." I mean, how does that help you get back at Kershaw County?

Vinson Filyaw: I don't know. It just seemed logical at the time.

Video   Kidnapper’s bombshell before trial The twisted mind of Vinson Filyaw was let loose in an interview with Dateline just before his trial. Dateline NBC

Logical? Was any of this logical?

Suddenly, the bizarre conversation with Vinson dropped through something like a rabbit hole.

Vinson Filyaw: Well, it’s all going to come out in court anyway. Elizabeth, she's, I don't know how to say it. She's pretty much a wild person.

Vinson Filyaw, facing some of the most serious charges in law, and perhaps a long, long sentence in prison, looked up as sincere as can be and said:

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah. She could have went home anytime she wanted to. But it was like a vacation for her. I mean, we were having a good time. I mean, no more school for her, you know. It was just hanging out.

Keith Morrison: Are you saying that she was a willing participant the whole time?

Vinson Filyaw: Well, yeah.

Keith Morrison: Well, what about the plan to blow up all the policemen when they came?

Vinson Filyaw: That came from the media stories.

Keith Morrison: So what you're saying is you had no plan to blow anybody up?

Vinson Filyaw: No.

In fact, said Vinson, his real plan, and Elizabeth’s too, was to write a book together, and make scads of money.

Only he did write something and she didn't.

Vinson Filyaw: Me and Elizabeth discussed making a book … it was mostly to piss off Kershaw County.

Keith Morrison: So what you're saying is that Elizabeth and you planned this together and what, you went and had a ball in the country and had some fun.

Vinson Filyaw: Not exactly like that but basically.

Keith Morrison: Listen, do you think you really know what the story is, the real story?

Vinson Filyaw: Yeah. I know exactly what it is.

Keith Morrison: You got a good grip on reality?

Vinson Filyaw: I've seen five psychiatrists since I’ve been arrested and they are all saying I’m perfectly sane. Maybe a little eccentric.

Keith Morrison: I'm scratching my head here, Vinson. Why in heaven's name would you tell a story that portrays you as a monster if it isn't true?

Here, the night before his appearance in court, he seemed to be weighing the chance that anyone would believe his latest version.

Keith Morrison: Do you think she'll say that in court?

Vinson Filyaw: I don't know.

Keith Morrison: What will you say in court is the real story?

Vinson Filyaw: I don't know.

Make no mistake -- every scrap of evidence screamed that what Vinson had just told us was a vicious and self-serving lie.

Would he dare try out those stories of his in court in the morning?

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