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Willie Crain was introduced to Kathryn Hartman by his daughter on 09/09/98, while at a bar in Hillsborough County. Crain and Hartman danced and talked for four hours that night, until 1:30 or 2:00 in the morning. Crain dropped Hartman off at her trailer, and Hartman asked to see Crain again.

On the afternoon of 09/10/98, Crain returned to Hartman’s trailer, where he met her seven-year-old daughter, Amanda Brown. Crain and Brown sat at the kitchen table, playing games and doing her homework. Before leaving that afternoon, Crain accepted Hartman’s invitation to return for dinner that evening.

After dinner that night, Crain and Brown played games with Brown and told her that he had a large collection of videotapes at his trailer. Brown pleaded with her mother to let her go to Crain’s trailer, and she agreed. Crain drove Hartman and Brown to his trailer in his white pickup truck.

After beginning to watch the movie in Crain’s living room, Crain and Brown then went to his bedroom, where Hartman found the two sitting on Crain’s bed, watching the movie. Hartman noticed that Brown was sitting between Crain’s sprawled legs with her back to his front. At some point in the evening, Hartman asked Crain if he had any medication for pain. Crain offered her Valium, which she took, and marijuana, which she declined.

Eventually, Hartman decided it was time to leave, and Crain drove Hartman and Brown to their trailer. Around 2:15 a.m., Brown went to sleep in Hartman’s bed. Crain appeared intoxicated, so Hartman advised him to lie down to sober up while she went to bed. Within five minutes of Hartman going to bed, Crain entered the bedroom and lay down on the bed with Hartman and Brown.

Hartman awoke the next morning to find Crain gone and Brown missing. Hartman called Crain on his cell phone, and he told her that he did not know where Brown was and that he was loading his boat at a boat landing. Other people at the boat ramp testified at trial that Crain carried what appeared to be a rolled-up item of clothing with him when he was launching his boat. One of the men at the boat ramp that day testified that Crain had told him on two separate occasions that he had the ability to get rid of a body where no one could find it.

Police later interviewed Crain, and he told police that he left Hartman’s house around 1:30 a.m. on 09/11/98. He also told police that he accidentally spilled bleach in his bathroom and spent the early morning hours cleaning his bathroom. While searching Crain’s trailer, a detective applied Luminol, a chemical that reacts with blood, to Crain’s bathroom. The detective testified at trial that the floor, bathtub, and walls “lit up”. Detectives also found blood stains in the bathroom and on Crain’s boxer shorts, both of which contained DNA consistent with a mixture of the DNA profiles of Crain and Brown. Despite an extensive, two-week search of Upper Tampa Bay, Brown’s body was never found.