Fatal Visions

That by reason of transgression cometh the fall, which fall bringeth death...

Pearl of Great Price, Moses 6:59

If you drive about 30 miles south of Salt Lake City, you'll come to Timpanogos Cave National Monument. Rugged, beautiful, and at the very heart of the mystery surrounding the death of Faylene Grant. Something happened here.  Exactly what, even years later, is still in dispute.

Here's a picture Doug took of Faylene just before -- he claimed -- she slipped and fell off a cliff-- 60, maybe 80 feet. The fall should have killed her.  But Doug said Faylene landed in a tree that slowed her fall and saved her life. Why doubt his story?  For one thing, to get to the cliff, Faylene would have had to climb over an imposing man-made wall.

Josh Mankiewicz: Was she the kind of person that would approach a 60-foot cliff and--

Glenna: No.

Josh Mankiewicz: --kind of lean over the side?

Glenna: That's what's strange about it.

Jody: Fay was never a daring person.

Glenna: Never. Not close.

Jody: Very cautious.

Glenna: Kind of wimpy.

Records show no calls for help that day. No report of trouble. Doug did take Faylene to a nearby hospital. She had cuts and bruises, but no broken bones. The doctor doubted she really fell 60 feet. Tree or no tree. So what did happen? Each family had suspicions, very different suspicions. Here's Doug's sister Tammy:

Tammy Fuentes: When I heard about the accident , I worried that maybe she may have tried to take her own life at that point. 

Why would she think that?  Because, Tammy says, Faylene had mood swings, fits of depression, for years.  She even recorded them in her journals, in handwriting that seemed as agitated as she was.

Faylene: I then tell Doug I need help & how I am feeling & why & that I'm suicidal & that I think of crazy things to do to myself & that I need his help & he says he doesn't know how to help me... I see he isn't feeling what I feel and it kills me!  well, finally Doug grabs me & gets on top of me on the bed & I'm trying to say, "leave me alone-- you don't love me, you (I'm just a failure) should just admit it & quit hurting me."

Danny Fuentes: Well, I do know that Doug had-- on two or three different occasions-- tried to get her help and counseling.

Faylene's family says she was never truly suicidal. They thought all her troubles started and ended with Doug, including, perhaps, that fall off the cliff. Faylene's brother recounts a conversation he had about it with Doug.

Douger: He kept telling me that he was ten or 15 foot away from Faylene.  And he said that multiple times.  And I-- and I thought it was odd that he would keep clarifying that he was ten or 15 foot away from her.

Josh Mankiewicz: Almost as if he wanted you to remember that detail.

Douger: Just a very odd detail.

The couple stayed in Utah two more days, visiting the hospital twice more, then flew back to Phoenix, arriving the afternoon of September 26.

Danny Fuentes: She had on dark glasses and her arm was in a sling.  And obviously she was battered and bruised, but she was able to speak to us ---

And what did Faylene say? Attempted murder?  Attempted suicide?

Tammy Fuentes: She said, "I'm so clumsy." I 'member her tellin' me, "I'm just so clumsy."

Faylene told the exact same story Doug did-- an accident, followed by a miracle.

Tammy Fuentes: She told me that she slipped and fell. And she told about hitting the branches in the tree.  She would land in one branch, fall down to the next, fall down to the next, fall down to the next.  She--

Josh Mankiewicz: The tree-- the tree broke her fall--

Tammy Fuentes: The tree broke her fall.

Josh Mankiewicz: --and saved her life.

Tammy Fuentes: And she told me she should've died up there.  She said, "I should have died up there."

Video   Witness stand: Hilary Grant A tearful Hilary testifies about her relationship with Faylene. Dateline NBC

That evening, Doug called someone who'd appeared in one of his workout videos, a physician's assistant who came to the Grant home.  He prescribed painkillers, and sleeping pills: Five tablets of Ambien. That night, Cherlene called to check on her sister.

Cherlene: Well, Doug had left to buy the prescriptions. And I called her.  And she was happy, healthy, glad to see her kids. 

That would have been about 6:30 p.m. Sometime, somehow, during the next 13 hours, two things happened. Faylene took the all the Ambien, and then she went under the water. The detective who came to the Grant home was a newbie, who did almost no investigating. He snapped just five photos and left without securing the scene. He didn't dust for fingerprints. He didn't measure the depth or temperature of the water in the tub. He didn't even save the bottles of medication Faylene was taking. Soon, everyone wished he had done a lot more.

Josh Mankiewicz: You're describing a fairly diabolical plot here--

Det. Sy Ray: Correct.

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