If there's anything like a holy grail, a gold standard, in a high-pressure murder investigation,

then surely that must be the confession.

Skilled interrogator leads tormented killer to inevitable and satisfactory conclusion,

saving everyone a lot of time and trouble,

not to mention, giving the family the answers they so desperately need.

But three confessions? This was very good indeed. Four would have been even better, of course.

There being four suspects, after all, but three would certainly do for now.

Confessions from family cousin Matt Livers, I did the shooting, he said.

I just stuck it to him and blew him away.

Confessions to having been there from the two hopped-up kids in the stolen red truck,

Jessica Reed and Greg Fester.

Shut again.

We all run out of the house.

The fourth, Nick Sampson, was a holdout, yes.

Oh, I wasn't there. This is where to God's truth.

But a little triangulation by two states' worth of detectives ought to put him in the frame, too.

First, the Wisconsin investigators would have to dredge up evidence to support or refute the stories Greg and Jessica were telling.

Both of them, remember, said they witnessed but did not commit the gruesome murders of Wayne and Charmin's stock on an Easter evening six weeks before in Murdoch, Nebraska.

It was Jessica who fingered Nick Sampson after they showed her a picture of the guy.

At least, he looked familiar, is how she put it, which if she was telling the truth, would back up Matt Liver's confession rather nicely.

Now it was the job of the Wisconsin detective Jim Roar to find out if she was telling the nicely. Now, it was the job of the Wisconsin detective, Jim Roar, to find out if she was telling

the truth. They had a confession in Nebraska. If she recognized as a picture of one of the people

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