Cliffside Betrayal: Dr Gerhardt Konig’s Deadly Plot

0:20 Hey, everyone, welcome back to Exposed, and I have got an absolute banger of an episode coming your way today. I'm going to bring you on a dream Hawaiian hike that absolutely turned into a nightmare when an anesthesiologist by the name of doctor Gerhardt Koenig attacks his wife allegedly attempts to kill her during this hike and what started out as a romanic celebration kind of ends with a rock to the head and a syringeful of the lethal drug. I've got all the details for you today, so let's get into it. And I'm going to tell you if you have not heard a little bit about this story, this Hawaiian doctor, you haven't been on the internet. It is everywhere. It got me really curious as to what happened in this case. And when I tell you, I deep dug into this one over about a seventy two hour time period, you better believe it. And I learned a lot of things. So we're gonna start off at the beginning of this one where it all starts, and that is where doctor Gerhart Koenig was born and when he was born in nineteen seventy eight in South Africa to his parents Peter and Anwar Koenig. Now he was the third child and the third boy for the couple.

1:49 They would have a daughter, a younger sister for Gerhart come along later in life, but he was the third boy and the baby as of some point in his life anyway, And the Cunnings did well for themselves in South Africa. His dad was a pharmacist. His mother was a homemaker. Three boys at home right with a daughter coming anytime now, and we all know if that's more work than you could ever do in a pharmacy. And his mother was just killing it being a homemaker, his dad being the primary breadwinner. Now in ninth grade, at fourteen years old, the family they wanted to move to the United States. They do, and they settle in San Diego, California. Now, his father he works in the States doing the same thing he did in South Africa. He's a pharmacist. And his mother she starts running a daycare out of the home.

2:43 She just loved kids. The whole family was very child oriented and she looked at it as a great way to make money and also a great way to do what she loved, which was dealing with children. So Gerhart he is smart from the time he's born. You can tell this kid has a brain on him. He attends and he graduates from high school in nineteen ninety six, and from there he attends U SEE San Diego. Now during college, at the age of twenty. Before he even graduates, he also gets married to his high school sweetheart, who he had dated since they were juniors in high school.

3:25 Her name was Jessica. And despite this new responsibility of being a husband, balancing that with college, couldn't imagine having done that. It doesn't distract this guy from his studies, and he actually graduates on time with honors from U SEE San Diego. And not only that, he doesn't get a degree in basket weaving. This guy gets a degree in bioengineering. You send him that brain on him already. I'm sure. As far as his personal life, he and his wife at this time they were in absolute love with each other. As a matter of fact, later on, Jessica would say for the first couple of years of their relationship, she said she would have to remind herself to breathe when Gerhart would walk in a room. That's how much in love they were at this point. That's important. Now, after graduation, Gearhart goes to work for a bio engineering firm for the next five years. Look, I tried to figure out a way to explain to you exactly what he did, but it is so far above my brain capacity.

4:40 Just google it. It deals with like cells and all this stuff in science that I have absolutely no interest in. And you've got to be much smarter than Jim Chapman to understand. So go check that out if you're interested. But trust me, very smart guy. Now along the way, early in that marriage, he and Jessica would have two children, a boy and a girl. So he's working for this bio engineering firm, and after about five years he figures out this ain't for me. I just want to do something else, and he starts looking into going back to school and specifically going to medical school. Gerhart wanted to become a doctor, so he decides, and I would assume he talked this over with his wife and maybe they decide together, and they packed the family up and he heads to Pennsylvania to attend the University of Pittsburgh Medical School.

5:40 At this point it's two thousand and six. He goes through medical school and he graduates in two thousand and ten. From that point, he does his internships, his fellowships, and then he starts his residency. Now it's during his residency that he and his wife had some problems. They just weren't getting along. It seemed like they were going different directions in life, and they end up getting a divorce. Now, this divorce is described as amicable. It's not one of these War of the Roses type thing where they fought and they were fighting over custody for the kids. They pretty much agreed on everything, apparently, even agreed on maybe spousal's support and that sort of thing. But it was something that Jessica would also say later that it really just came down to the demands that were placed on Gerhart during and following medical school, and it just caused them to kind of grow apart. It's people, and sometimes that happens in a marriage. It's nobody's fault. You just go down two different paths and the next thing you know, you're not in love anymore. So no real drama here, just life be lifing. Right. Moving on to twenty sixteen, that was a big year for Gerhart. He completes that residency and he is hired as an anesthesiologist for what's

7:12 known as McGee Woman's Hospital. This is in Pittsburgh, and he also accepted an assistant professor job at the University of Pittsburgh. And in an even bigger step, doctor Kuennig decides it's time to jump back into the world of dating again. So he does that, and he does that the way everyone seemingly does that these days. He joins a dating site and it was e Harmony, to be specific, and there he connects with a woman by the name of Ariel Worthington. This is in the spring of twenty sixteen.

7:53 They go out to a local bar, sparks fly so much so that they can you seeing each other for the next two years, and on September fourth of twenty eighteen, they actually marry in a small, private ceremony at Gerhard's home, which incidentally is no small home. As a matter of fact, it was valued at the time at over a million dollars. Nice home. What about Ariel Worthington, what's her story? Well, she was quite the catch in her own right. I'll say that, first and foremost, she was ten years younger than her new husband, doctor Coenig, and that's something not a lot of people on the Internet that are researching this story know or have realized. She was actually born in nineteen eighty eight in Illinois to her parents, Kevin and Judith, and she came from a more blue collar upbringing, I guess you could say than doctor Coonig. Her dad was a bricklayer, and she also did not come from what would be as stay an environment as her husband did.

9:04 He came from a family that had, you know, four kids. They moved to California, no divorces to speak of. She came from a broken household in some ways. Her parents divorced during her upbringing. Now her mother did get remarried to who would be a stepdad in her life. She goes through life. She graduates high school, then she attends college at Penn State. Now, this girl, Ariel, she is no dummy either. As a matter of fact, she is super freaking smart as well. And she would graduate from Penn State with a degree in nuclear engineering in twenty eleven.

9:45 Look at the big brain on Aeriel, right. That degree from that school means you are extremely smart. Now, after college, she takes a job with Westinghouse as a nuclear fuel and here basically meaning this woman would work with nuclear fuel and reactor technology, which these days, holy smokes, that is the field to be in, and she had some great foresight there. Now, after working at Westinghouse for about six years, she links up with doctor Gerhardt in twenty sixteen, as I told you on that dating app e harmony, and they marry as I told you in twenty eighteen.

10:28 So they start out their life together at this point, husband and wife, and in May of twenty twenty they have their first son together and everything seems fine. They are getting along great, so much so in twenty twenty two, Ariel is pregnant again and they're excited they're gonna have their second child together. And it's during this point that they start discussing and looking into possibly relocating. Why is that, Well, Pittsburgh was having some crime issues and look, this is in Pennsylvania. The winners in Pennsylvania brutal to say the least.

11:11 So they wanted to go somewhere a little bit safer, maybe not as fast paced as a big city like Pittsburgh, but also somewhere with better weather. And they figured this would be perfect to raise two kids. So doctor Koenig, being an anesthesiologist, he can pretty much find a high paying job anywhere in the world, right, his wife Ariel, thanks to COVID bringing along this whole remote working technology life that everybody experienced during that time, she also felt confident she could find something in her field that would allow for remote working. And as a matter of fact, just prior to them making the final decision on where they were going, she did land another job with another company where it was one hundred percent remote, so it was kind of a no brainer. I can go anywhere you want to go. Eventually they decide on Maui, Hawaii, and hey, why not, right, They had both been there in the past. As a matter of fact, they spent their honeymoon in Maui, Hawaii, so it checked all the boxes for them. Great weather. They were also very active.

12:31 They loved the outdoors, and they specifically loved hiking, and it has plenty of that in Hawaii, hiking all these volcano areas, especially so doctor Koenig. He starts looking around at the hospitals in the Maui area, and as I told you, Ariels, she at this point worked for a company called Terra Power, and she was fully remote with that company, so no big deal for her. Doctor Koenig would have to give up his assistant professor job at the University of Pittsburgh, and he knew that, and yeah, that's going to cost him a little bit of money, but hey, they were about family. They wanted to move somewhere safer, with better weather and a place that they felt like was better to raise their kids. So it was a small sacrifice for him to make. Eventually, he does find a job with a smaller hospital in Maui and it's off to Maui to make this move. Now, at this point, doctor Gerhart, he has two of the kids in a prior marriage, and at this point in my research, I'm thinking, well, what about those kids. Well, his daughter was older, she was already out of high school, she was in college, and she wanted to stay put where she was at going to college. But his son a little bit different. He was sixteen at the time, and he wanted to go with his dad. What sixteen year old wouldn't say, Hey, I want to go with dad and live in Maui, Hawaii. This kid's no different.

14:02 Gerhart talks to his ex wife and they discussed this, and she decides to let her son go to live with her dad and not give him any shit about it in Maui, Hawaii, So his sixteen year old son goes as well. Now, they also had to talk to Ariel's mother and stepfather, and they go to them and they say, we're moving to Maui, and the mom and stepdad they're like, what, that's not going to work. You've got grandkids with you that we love to see every chance we get, and Maui is just too freaking far away. But it was apparent to both the stepdad and the mother of Ariel that there's no stopping this. So they did the second best thing, and they said, hey, what if we moved to Maui. What if we find a house in Maui as well, which they did and everyone was excited about that. And they they only moved like a minute away from where the grain kids were and where Ariel and doctor Kunnig were. So at this point you have Gerhart, his sixteen year old son, Ariel, their two children, one being an infant, one being three years old, and they all go to Maui with mom and stepdad just a few streets down, like a minute's walk away, and they lived what you would call a dream life in Maui. For that first year and a half or so, everything was picture perfect. A lot of exploring of the

15:37 Hawaiian islands, you got hiking, you got beaching, you got all the things you could ever want, and beautiful weather and on the exterior, the perfect life. But no one really has the perfect life, right, So let's talk about Jeffrey Miller. Now, Jeffrey was a senior director at terror Power where Ariel was employed. He was a senior boss as a matter of fact of Ariels, and he was also married incidentally. So I'm going to take you to August of twenty twenty four and Ariel, as part of her job, she had to travel to South Africa for work. Now, on this particular trip, she was going to be accompanied by her boss, jeff Miller. So leading up to this trup, Ariel mentions this to doctor Cunning and at the time, according to Gerhart, no concerns. Now, this was just a short two day trup. And one thing Gerhart took note of was typically at the end of a night anytime she would go out of town for work, she would call and let him know I'm going to bed or whatever, or at least text him some form of communication. However, on this trup no end of night texts, she basically texted that she had landed, and then he didn't hear from her until she was on the way back home.

17:05 That was kind of out of character for her, so he took note of this in his mind, but he, according to his testimony, was not overly concerned about this. She returns from the trip and Gerhart casually asked her, Hey, why didn't you send me anything telling me you were going to bed or let me know? And she apologized and she said, look, we had meetings till late, and then the host who was hosting us in South Africa took us to dinner and by the time I got back, I need you'd be sleeping, and so I was so tired. I just went to bed. And that was pretty much yet and no harm, no foul. He kind of chalked that up to strange, maybe a radar raised a little bit, but it wasn't like he wrote her ass about it. Now.

17:56 One thing he did do was he would start paying a little closer at ten to things as it related to Ariel and her boss, and he would notice some things that would raise some eyebrows. If you will. He would notice that when Jeff and Ariel would converse over the phone, it just seemed much more friendly than professional, and that wasn't how they were talking prior to this TRUP. She worked out of her home, so she had a home office and he would ever hear her a lot of times in there when she would be talking during work, and he would pick up on the fact that it's like their relationship, meaning her and her boss's relationship had changed pretty drastically. Something just didn't sit right with him, and a lot of people call that intuition, and he kind of knew something maybe going on. He would describe their conversations as just an overly familiar tone, where before it was more of a professional tone. So he would also notice that she was very protective on her phone screen, he said. When he would walk in the room, for example, and she would be on her phone, it would look like she was in the middle of a text conversation.

19:15 She would kind of tilt her phone in such a way that he couldn't see it, or she would close out her phone quickly, and when he would ask her things like are you talking to her? Who are you chatting with her? Text? She would always say her best friend. But this would happen more and more frequently, and obviously those are red flags for this guy who already maybe was a little suspicious something was not right with her and her boss. So that would continue those behaviors, tilting the phone, closing out texts, almost like she's hiding conversations. This would occur more and more often, and in the meantime, while all of this was going on, they had also so planned a trip with some very good friends of theirs, and just prior to that TRUP one night, Ariel falls asleep a little bit early and Gerhart he can't take it anymore. There's just too many things strange going on that she's doing. And he admits in court that he goes through her phone while she's sleeping, and look, this guy, he's really smart. It would be hard to pull the wool over his eyes. And rather than just kind of scroll through her phone like most people would do to see if anything looks suspicious, if they go to the message apps and see if anything stands out as they're scrolling through text, he does something pretty smart to do,

20:45 and he actually goes to her app usage section of her phone and he wanted to see what apps she was using the most often, because with iPhones, it'll break down how many hours you use each individual app, and it will also kind of rank them in order of the highest use to the lowest use. And he notices that her top app used is an application called WhatsApp. Now, for those not familiar, WhatsApp is an application that number one is supposed to be encrypted, which I actually kind of question because I've done a lot of cases where WhatsApp was used to pull up chats after they were supposedly deleted. But that's kind of how it's marketed that it's an encrypted app. But in addition to that, it's also an application that is solely of itself. I guess you could say, meaning you don't go through the messages app on an iPhone to chat through WhatsApp. You pull up What's app and you chat through that application, and it's a little more secretive than if you were to just chat through messages for example. Now he not only notices she has a WhatsApp account, which he was very familiar with. What's app that's the messaging system that his hospital used, primarily because of the encryption features that come along with it. But the next thing he notices is

22:16 that WhatsApp had been hidden in a folder that application on her phone. So it wasn't you opened her phone up and as you wiped right or swiped left or whatever, you come to the WhatsApp application, there was actually a folder. I don't know what it was labeled, but something that wouldn't stand out in somebody's mind. It didn't say what's app application folder. It was labeled something completely different, and when you went in that folder, that's how you found What's app, the actual application. So that right there is a huge right flag. She's trying to hide the fact she even has the app. Right, So he pulls up the app through her phone and he notices a ton of text And these were not work related as much as they were like friendly related texts, things like good morning every single morning for like a moth, and it's back and forth with her boss, and they would chat her and her boss throughout the day about things that had nothing to do with work, and it all seemed like small talk, innocent shit, certainly a little more in depth than what you would have with a coworker. They seemed like very very good, friendly conversations, but What really stuck out to doctor Koenig was the amount of texts that lacked context. And what I mean by that, Well, you would have a text chain of conversations where it

23:47 would be Jeff, her boss, sending four or five texts in a right to Ariel, where it would look like she responded back, but the text had been deleted where she responded back to Jeff. So it was almost like he was reading a one sided conversation. And it was obvious many of the texts that Ariel would respond to were deleted. So put yourself in this guy's position at this point, what do you think is going on? Well, doctor Koenig, he thought the same thing, definitely. His wife was having an affair with this guy who was also married. Now, as I mentioned, they had a trip planned within a couple of days, and he just now is finding out all this information and his brain is swirling trying to figure out how he's going to handle this. So another interesting aspect to what's APPED is it's not only an application that you can download on your phone. It also has the capability to be logged into from a desktop or a laptop computer where they have an actual application you can pull up on line. You don't have to go through a phone to chat back and forth. You can kind of do both. And what makes that really interesting is that you can see text in real time as they are sent. So if you're logged in from a desktop, you can also be logged in from your

25:19 phone and you can kind of go back and forth as you text. And if you're on the desktop and someone's texting someone else on the phone and you have their login information, which he did, you can actually see these texts pop up in real time before somebody deletes them. So the next day, Gerhart goes to work and he logs into that WhatsApp application, which, as I said, he had his wife's credentials. He somehow figured those out and he can see his wife and Jeff texting back and forth in real time that day, which in his mind is an advantage for him because she can't just delete those messages without him seeing them as long as he's looking right at the computer as she's doing it. And he would just take screenshots right of these communications back and forth. So that's what he does, and as they're communicating, he's just steady continuing to take these screenshots and look they were careful, meaning Ariel and Jeff. They were very cautious on how they would speak over text, and they would never go too far with it where it was obvious they were in a sexual relationship. Now there was innuendo everywhere in these text but they didn't come out and say I loved having sex with you last night that kind of thing. So, as I told you, a

26:50 vacation with their friends was coming up within days and the next day actually they're going on vacation with these best friends Kunig. He calls Brian, which is one of the two people that he was going on this vacation with with his wife, the Mail side of that couple, and he confides in him about all this shit that is going on. He basically tells him, look, I'm going to confront Ariel on this trip, and I don't want to make ye all uncomfortable. I'm not going to do it in front of you. I'm going to do it in the hotel room. But we may end up leaving earlier or something like that. I want to give you heads up. But he also had another reason that he confided in Brian, and that was Brian and I'm not exactly sure how long prior to this instance with Ariel and the good doctor. I'm not sure if it was a year before that or six months before that, but Brian had been caught in an affair with his wife, and so he was looking for advice. Now, in Brian's case, it was a one night stand thing and he got caught a little bit different than what we're talking about here with the doctor and Ariel, but he wanted his advice because Brian and his wife managed to kind of work it out and work through it, and he wanted to work this out if he could with his watch.

28:17 So they go on this trup and as soon as they get there, they go to dinner with this couple, and y'all, I can only imagine what this dinner was like with this guy, knowing as soon as we're done with this, I'm gonna go back to the hotel room with my wife and I'm gonna have to confront her with this affair. But they do have dinner, everyone goes back to their individual rooms and he brings it up. He asked Ariel about this affair, and immediately she admits to it. She says what they were doing was inappropriate. She's very remorseful, she starts crying, and look, this is just me hypothesizing here. Obviously I was not there. I have no direct knowledge. But one thing that struck me was that she came out with it quick, she accepted it quick. She never tried to deny it, and it made me think, I wonder if Brian or Brian's wife had given her kind of a heads up that this was going to happen before they went on this trip, and that she had time in her head to kind of get her story together. I mean, she was just so accepting of what he said right off the bat, and she admitted to it so fast. It just I don't know, it seemed like she maybe would have tried to deny it first. She did the right thing. She didn't even ask him where he got the information or what proof he had of any of that. And so my suspicion was one of those two people told her

29:48 that was coming, but totally me just hypothesizing there. Regardless, she seemed very regretful, and to the doctor's credit, he wanted to make the this work now. He had already in this couple of days since he's known this was going on, had done a lot of research on how to deal with it when these sort of things happened, to help you get past it in a marriage, and one of the suggestions was the person who had the affair would have to move out of the home for a couple of months and remove themselves from the situation and you kind of work on this rekindling type thing. Now, the problem with that was they've got two small kids at this time, one year old and four year old at home, and they didn't want to disrupt these two babies lives, and so that would be a complicating factor to be able to do something like that. And they figured out pretty quick that's not going to be something we're going to be interested in doing. And Ariel was telling doctor Koenig, I'll do whatever you need me to do.

31:00 And in his research, among many suggestions was the person who did the cheating, they need to be forthcoming with any questions that the person that was cheated on had. So, for example, if doctor Kuennig says, out of the clear blue sky, let me see your phone. I want to go through it, the proper way to handle that would be to give him your phone and let him go through it. And what that is supposed to accomplish is build trust back in that relationship. Now, another thing is to be very open about the affair and the feelings involved in the affair, which also builds trust back. According to these books he was reading on the subject and speaking to her about, and he would also buy her copies of these books for her to read. One of them, as a matter of fact, was specifically about understanding how your spouse is feeling after they've been cheated on those sort of things. So both of them are in agreements on making this thing work, even to the point of starting to go to a therapist. So they get home after this trup and everything seemed as good as it should be, and she seemed to be very interested in working everything out. However, a couple of weeks past incident, she would get more and more inconsistent about the things that she agreed to. For example, he would ask her

32:31 a couple times to see her phone, and she would start to get frustrated with him for this. And I'm not judging it one way or the other, that's just the facts, he said. He would notice it would kind of start to piss her off when he would want to see her phone and he would say later, in his mind, she was a very gung ho to make this thing work. At the beginning, she wanted to stay together, and then after about a month, it just seemed like she wasn't on board with all of the things they had agree to anymore. Although she still wanted to work out issues and stay together, just not in the way that he wanted to. So by December of twenty twenty four, there was kind of a switch with her, according to doctor Kuennig, where she would start kind of minimizing what she did. And it's important to mention, I'm gonna tell you right here, right here, she never admitted to a sexual affair. Now, she told him it was an emotional affair.

33:30 That yes, they flirted with each other and flirted very flirty over the text, but it had never gotten that far. Now, again I have no direct knowledge, but it did come out in the trial that these two Ariel and Brian had texted each other over ten thousand times in just a few months, back and forth all day long, same people that were alone together in a whole nother country. Now, I don't know if I believe that that she supposedly did not have sex with him, but I suppose it's possible. I got no proof for one way or the other, so we'll go with what she's saying. But I can understand the doubts in his mind for sure now. Also, I did not mention this earlier, but he did email her boss's wife and let the boss's wife know that that affair was going on. In addition to that, one of the stipulations he had for this marriage, for them to stay together and work on this relationship rather than get a divorce, was that she had to end all contact with Brian. And that makes sense now. He would say if it was something work related that she absolutely had to deal with Brian, it could be through email only, and of course she was never to go anywhere where it would just be her and Brian. Again, there would have to be someone else there, And I think that's reasonable.

35:00 It makes all the sense in the world to me. But it's important to mention because it's going to play a key role in just a minute now back to it. They're working on this thing and in March of twenty twenty five, late March, it's Aeriels thirty six birthday, and just prior to that birthday, they start talking about what they want to do, and Gerhart mentions to her about a hiking trail that he's always wanted to check out. And look, these two hike together constantly, and they both love to hike together, so this is something they both enjoy. It was on the island of a Wahoo and he asked her, Hey, do you want to go do this hiking trip on your birthday? And she says yes, and that's just what they did. So March twenty fourth of twenty twenty five, they get there and just prior to this trip, I do want to mention this, within a few months of it, they had updated their life insurance policies.

35:59 Now people may say, oh, there you go, life insurance always leads to murder, and that's not necessarily true. If you're married and you got young kids, you for sure need life insurance. That's the responsible thing to do. And they have not done this yet. In life they didn't have life insurance policies. So Gerhart he handles this and he takes out a policy on himself meaning if he dies, Ariel gets one point five million dollars, and he also takes one out where if Ariel dies he gets two hundred and fifty thousand dollars total opposite of what you'd think, right, And it made all the sense in the world because he's the bread winner in the home. She made great money.

36:45 But I mean, this guy was an anesthesiologist and he got paid. He was the primary breadwinner. So something happened to him that income they would be missing out on, would it would kind of make that family whole, at least for a little while. I really don't think it had anything to do with what went down in this story, but it's important to mention, and it was mentioned in the trial as a possible motive. So there you haven't now Back to March twenty fourth, Gerhart gives this birthday card to Ariel and it's a loving birthday card. I'm gonna read it to you quickly. I'm going to tell you exactly what it said. Verbatim. It reads, Happy birthday, angel face. There isn't an obstacle in this world too hard for me to fight through for you. I would take on anything just to see you smile. You're the kindest, most giving and selfless person I know, putting others before yourself with so much love. You're the heart of our family, fun, fearless and a terrific mom the kids, and I hit the jackpot with you Love Always g and I mean pretty heartfelt card. Most guys and those of you that have husband's out there, you know how we roll. Typically it's just like we sign our name or you know, love whoever. But in this case, he took some time and it sounds like he puts some thought into what he wrote. So there you have it. So he gives her this birthday card. And they were only in a

38:16 Wahoo for a couple of days in order to fit this hike in. So they wanted to do it as early as possible because they had dinner reservations that night. So they leave at around you know, nine o'clock in the morning to go hike. And they get to the trailhead and there are a couple of other hikers there and they see it's two females. And they see these hikers and Aeriel kind of waves at them, and in her mind, they're looking for the trailhead and sometimes when you're doing this hiking, it'll be kind of hard to find the trailhead, and so she tells doctor Cunnig, hey, let's show them where the trailhead is and he's like, man, I really don't want to do that because I want to be a lie with you. And if we go start talking to him, they're gonna want to hike with us.

39:04 And you know, this is kind of like your birthday and I want it to be special. So they didn't say anything to these two people. So I'm gonna give you both people's story going forward, and we're going to start with Ariel, and I'm going to tell you her details of what happened. She said, they go on the trail and it's a rocky trail, and they passed several cliff faces and it was very uneasy on this trail, according to Ariel, and she tells doctor Cunnig she didn't want to continue forward. At one point, she was very nervous. It was very wendy that day, and they were going up pretty high on these cliff faces, et cetera, and she was concerned she might fall or something. She's not having fun anymore, let's just say that. So she said that at that point, Gerhart kind of goes past her and he hikes up for about five more minutes. And that's how they judge distance. They say Okay, hiked up five more minutes. Then he comes back and he tells her how beautiful it was, and he kind of tries to convince her to keep going, but she's like, screw that, I'm scared. We're heading back down the trail. So they start heading back down the trail and they're getting along.

40:17 At this point, they're talking, they're taking pictures, they're taking selfies. As a matter of fact, as they're doing this, they're sending pictures to family. And so her story was she takes a picture by a tree and that he snapped the picture, and she said at that point, she goes to walk past him and he totally out of the clear blue sky, freaks out, grabs her by the arm and basically says, I'm so sick of this shit. And he's got both of her arms and he pushes her toward the cliff as if he were going to throw her off this cliff, and she said, they start rustling, and she said, he's dragging me closer and closer to the edge, and so she gets an idea, I'm gonna throw myself on the ground and that'll stop him from being able to drag me. Now keep in mind doctor Kuennig is not that big a guy. He's like one hundred and sixty five pounds and he's five nine or something like that. She's like five to seven and one hundred and forty five pounds, so they're pretty much the same size, and so it wouldn't take much, I guess, for her to get him onto the ground on top of her, which eventually he is, and he's kind of straddling her at this point, and they just go to fighting.

41:36 And she said, while he was on top of her, he pulls out a syringe, which she kind of knocks out of her hand, and she said, next, he took off his backpack with one hand, and he starts digging in it with one hand while he's holding her down with the other hand. She claimed he had a vial in his hand while he was digging through the backpack. So there's a lot going on here. She's screaming all kinds of shit and he is fighting her. She said. At that point, she bit his arm and she grabs him by the nuts and she just like has a death grip on his testicles. Say, she continued screaming, and then she said, out of nowhere, he slams her head with a rock, and she said, in her mind she was trying to knock him out so he could drag her to the edge. Now, at that point, she said, she hears a woman's voice say we are here and we are calling nine to one one, and that's the two hikers. And she said at that point Gerhart froze and she was able to get away and catch up down the trail with these two hikers and call police.

42:47 So that's her story. Now, let me give you Gerhart's story better. Yet, I'm gonna let you hear Gerhart's version out of his own mouth. Listen to this, continue going on on the hike. What happens at some point we did something happen that led to an argument. Yes, tell the jury what happened that led to an argument? Well, first of all, how far up into the hike was? It? Not very far, just just like five minutes. Like after about five minutes of hiking, you get to a part where it flattens out a bit and it's the edge isn't like the cliff side isn't open. But there's a couple of spots where you can get to the cliff side if if if you wanted to. So we're kind of still in that area, the same area that that picture was taken. And Ay says, Hey, I need to talk to you about something. Uh, you know, I'm working on this this project with Jeff Miller and I'm gonna need to travel with him again and I and I need you to be okay with that?

43:46 Is that okay? And so she had she was kind of aked, telling you, like, hey, you know, there's just things that work going on. You know, I need you to be okay with this, you know, asking you to trust her. Yes, And again you mentioned you guys weren't talking about the affair at home anymore because of constant correct. That's correct, and were and you guys weren't talking about it in constant a lot at that time. We hadn't gotten to that kind of the core of it yet. So she brings this up. What is your reaction to it?

44:28 I'm I'm very surprised, And yeah, were you upset and angry? I wasn't angry? I was I was. I was surprised and and and upset. And I told her no, like, I'm not okay with that. And and not only am I not okay with that? Like I'm never gonna be okay with that, Like we haven't dealt with that part. Like the only reason why. I was okay with her still even working there is because we had placed these limits on there can unication. But in my mind, like she still needed at some point to quit her job, and this was only put on hold when we were while we were trying to.

45:09 Deal with all these other things. She basically said like, well, I can't quit my job right now because I don't even know if I want to stay with you. So we were dealing with like the issues that she brought up first, but it's not like any of the of the affair had been resolved at all, Like it had just kind of been put on hold. And so how did you feel that she was even that she would even think that this would even be okay? Yeah, I mean it it made me realize that that we were just not on the same page at all in terms of like here I am just kind of like supplementing my feelings and focusing on her hurt and waiting patiently for her to do the same to me. And this made me feel like she wasn't intending on doing that ever.

45:51 So what did you say about the herd did what did it? Were you guys kind of arguing about it? Yeah, we were for sure arguing. Okay, and then so what did you did you say anything to her? I said it out. Yeah, I said like, like, I I need you to move out, like this is this has gone far enough. I need you to move out. And I'm gonna tell people why you're moving out, and and I'm gonna show them what you did because like, unless you face this and unless you take full accountability for this, like we're never gonna get through this. So so, and that was like after you guys have been kind of arguing a while about I mean, an argument starts, you guys are arguing. You're telling her, no, you're telling her all these things. Yeah, I mean the argument developed more, you know, more slowly than what just happened.

46:32 And there's other things said too, but that was. That's how that it culminated with you telling her wealth that's the case. If that's how you feel, you got to move on. Yes, okay, what did she say anything to you about about her about her mom and Gianna? She did so, Like earlier in the conversation, she had be like, well, what if my mom chaperones my work trips with him. And I was like, no, like I'm not I'm telling not okay with that, Like that's not long term Bible solution. And then later in the argument, when things kind of got heated, she was like, actually, my mom just said the chill chaperone the trip, and she thinks Jeff is interesting and can't wait to meet him. And I'm like, you're obviously telling them a whole different version of what happened in me.

47:15 So so in the in the argument and in her in her effort to say for you to be okay with it and go on the trip, she said, well, what if my mom choper owns me? Yes? After you know, it comes to this point in argument where you say, well, you know what, you got to move out down. I want to tell everybody what you did. I mean, it was a pretty it got it got it got to kind of a it was a not a good conversation. It sounds like, yeah, okay, so what did you What did you do next? I stomped off. I just stomped off up the trail. And this was a point where we were both really kind of just upset with each other, and I went one way and she went the other way.

47:57 How far up did you go? Five to ten minutes? Why did you turn around? I uh, I was kind of at a loss of of of not not kind of a loss I was. I just didn't want to be there, Like like. Did it make sense for you to keep grounding? It's like no, I you know. I like five or ten minutes in, I was like realizing kind of where I was, and I was like, I don't want to be here. I want to go home and like start dealing with what we need to deal with. I don't want to you know. I got to the point where you where it. Opens up and it's like these these beautiful views, and I'm like there by myself and you know, upset, and I was like, I don't want to be on the hike by myself, upset, and I don't want to do this hike. I'm going to come back and do this hike at a different time when I'm happy. I was.

48:43 I was really looking forward to doing the hike. When you had him back down, where you're expecting Ariel to be where you had left there? No where, what are you expecting her to be? I thought she went to the car because I saw her you head, you know, down the trail, and you know. There was testimony that that when you that's you know, she said when you got there, you said, oh you're still here. Did you say that to you? Yes? And is that because you assumed she had gone back to the parking lot? Yes? How far away from the parking lot were you guys when this argument started. Like five minutes or less? Provaly? Yeah, okay, now you get back what is her demeanor and behavior like?

49:25 Now like one eighty reversal basically, So she was like extremely apologetic and said, you know, basically I'm so sorry. You're right, like I need to take accountability and like, let's just you know, not ruin the day. I don't want to ruin the day. Don't want to want to ruin a trip, and and and let's keep talking about this in therapy and and and she said, like, you know, I won't travel with Jeff. Did you guys end up taking a selfie? Yeah? First, she was like. Again like almost man like, like super happy, and was trying to basically, you know, get me to be in a better mood.

50:06 And and and she was like I'm gonna clean this tree. Take you know, take pictures of me and this tree. And so she haand on me in her phone and I took some pictures of her in the tree. And then after that, she said, let's take a selfie by the cliffs edge. That was her idea. Yes, okay, do you guys take one? We did? And what happened after that? Right after the selfie, I just I just remember kind of staying at the edge there and looking over the edge and just kind of still in thought about everything that had just happened and what's going on? And then. I felt like a shove and I was almost pushed over the edge.

50:48 Okay, you felt a shove? Okay, who shoved you? Andry did what did you do? Right after that? Barely caught mylf and turned around and looked at her and I was like, what the fuck was that? Like turned her honest and she was like what what like was like kind of in chocolate what what? What was? What the fuck was that? Yes? Okay? And then did you move towards her? Yeah? I did. I was like just asking her, like, you know, what was that? And and started walking towards her, because at this point she was like five or ten feet away from me. So you walked towards her, and h you mentioned where your you were you when you're walking towards you, where were your hands out? Okay? Now did you did you get close to her?

51:36 Yes? Eventually yeah. And when, by the way, when you start walking towards her, is she yelled? Is she saying anything? Not initially, But I turned around and I'm asking her, like, what the hell's you know, what the fuck just happened and. What's going on? And as I'm starting to walk towards her, she starts yelling. She starts yelling, yeah, help me, help me okay, And then what happens? And then I just keep talking to her, like what do you do? And I get like, why are you? Yeah, what are you doing? And I get to her and I'm like, you know, I'm like, you know, touching or just putting my my my hands on on her arms, and I was. Like, what are you doing? What's going on? What happens is then she keeps yelling and and she kind of grabs my wrists and throws herself on the ground and pulls me down with her.

52:18 So now you guys are on the ground, yes, okay, when you're on the ground, what starts to happen. She's holding on to me, and I'm trying to you know, I'm trying to figure out what's going on. But I'm also at this point trying to let go of, like trying to get free, because she's like actively holding on to me, like she has she says, she has her leg like wrapping on one of my legs, and like is actively holding on to me, and is and and is and is yelling and so I'm trying to, you know, get free, and I and I get my my one arm free, and I try to use it to get my other arm free, and she grabs me by the testicles. And let me stop you there. Did you ever, in the course of this whole thing you described so far, ever try to pull her towards, push her off, or drag her towards the cliff's edge?

53:11 No, not at all. Okay, So you guys are you're on the ground, she is, she's kind of holding on to you. She you guys, just would would just kind of like a scuffle going on. Yes, things and her legs wrapped around you. Yes, you mentioned we got right up to the point where you said she grab your testicles. Is that right? Yes, how hard did she grab it? I mean this was yeah, like she like was holding on to me by my testicles, basically like that hard. Did she grab it and let go or does she grab it hold on? She grabbed it and held on. Now what happens after she does that?

53:54 Then I try to free my testicles, and so I'm like thrashing with with Then I get both hands free and I'm trying to get her to let go of my testicles, and then she hits me with a rock on the side. Of the face. She's holding on to your testicles. You're kind of focused on that, obviously, and and then at some point while you're focused on that. It happened all really fast. But yeah, I'm glad you raised that. Was this like happening slowly. Where you all happened within like I mean probably less than a minute, maybe quickly slightly more than a minute, but I mean two minutes or something from from from from from the moment that like we were on on the ground and she was grabbing.

54:39 My testicles, was like it happened quickly. Everything after the grabbing of the testicles happened very quickly, and. You weren't timing it or anything. This is just your best set your okay. So now she's holding on to you, she's squeezing your testicles, and you kind of dealing with dot and she's on she's on the ground. You're kind of on top of her. Yes, okay. And you said then you felt you got hit with the rock? Yes? Where'd you get hit. On the side, on the left side of my face? How many times she kept doing it? The first blow? She she she landed really well, and after that I was able to block.

55:23 Fairly well. She she did like land a couple more, but not not as bad as the first one. She still got your testicle. Yeah, so she's like holding my testicle and it was like hitting me like that. And now do you stop dealing with You just focused on the rock at this point, yeah, ok yeah. Did it hurt when you got hit with the rock? Did? Could we? Could we publish? What's in evidence is Exhibit D thirty Your hon he yes, okay, okay, your heart is this? Is this where you got hit with the rock? Yes? Is that the area? Yes, we can take that down.

56:06 Now you get hit with the rock. Explaining to the jury what happens next and why. I was able to wrestle the rock out of her hand. She still has her testicles? Yes, still squeezing on Yes, what. Do you I was able to like, so we're like, she's hitting me, and I'm like blocking, and then I start like you know, and I get the rock. Yes, is it near her face? Yes? I mean it's it's yeah, it's happens, and I finally get the rock. What did you do? I hit her with the rock? How many times you thing you hit her? I hit her two times? And when you did was she still holding on to your testicles?

56:46 In yes? Why did you hate her? Why did you react that way? Just on an instinctive and myself? How fast was this all happening? M hm, pretty fast, really fast. In between when she hit you with the rock and in between the times she hit you with the rock and when you hit her with the rock, were you able to safely retreat and get away from her?

57:27 No? Why not? She was holding on me, including your testicles. Yes. Did you hit her in the face or the eye with the rock where you said two times? Where did you hit. Her on the side of the head. So we've seen these photos of the steady laceration you caused that by hitting her right, yes. Did you continue to hit her after those first those two hits? No? And why not because she stopped fighting. She's let go of my testicles and was able to stand up, and then you stop. Yes, you know there was testimony about the two witnesses.

58:08 Did you Did you stop hitting her because the witnesses showed up? No? I didn't know that they were there until after I stood up. Did you see blood? Yes? Was there a lot of blood. There's a lot of blood. Did you see her kind of scoot down towards the witnesses. Yes. Did you try to stop her in any way? No? You let her, You let her get to them. Yes. Did you hear her yelling to the witnesses he's trying to kill me? Yes? Garhard. Did you have any syringes on the mountain that day?

58:50 No? Did you try to poke her or stab her with any syringes? No? Okay, now, Garhard, she scoots away, she's now with the two witnesses. You see a lot of blood. What do you what? What do you physically do? Now? I'm just in a daze, and I just kind of watch her crawl away and then and then leave with the other two hikers. Okay, she got the hikers. What do you do next? Was was her bag in your bag? There? Yeah? So I just kind of reflexively gather up all of our stuff and and then I start walking up the trail. Let me ask you this, at this point, immediately following what just happened, you saw, you know, you guys had this scuffle. You saw a lot of blood. What was your state of mind and emotional state like right now, right at this point that we're.

59:52 At, it's a severe emotional distress. How did you feel at that time about the fact that you had responded and defending How did you feel about the fact that you and you know, even though you say it was you know, you were defending yourself. How did you feel about that she was bleeding? Okay? Did you ever plan on hurting her that day? Did you ever want to hurt her that day? You reacted to defend yourself in the heat of that moment, you said yes, yes, But did you still feel bad about it? Yes?

1:00:40 You mentioned that you were in uh, some kind of extreme emotional distress. I think you said, okay, yes, did you become at some point after that suicidal? Yes? Why? Why to the jury? Why the best of your understanding. I've I just felt hopeless at that point in terms of everything, Like I. I felt horrified, horrified about. What I did to her, like that I caused this to her, that I had resorted to violence against my wife, the person who I loved the most in the world, and and just kind of felt hopeless.

1:01:26 In terms of our relationship to Okay, and that being said, I mean, in that moment, were you defending yourself when you reacted that way? Yes? Oh yes? What did you do in next? Now you're heading Now you're heading up the hill? What are you doing next? I just kind of kept walking up and kind of got to the same place that I had made it the last time, where the trail opens up and you're finally on the ridge and. And we're thinking, I'm a jumping. I mean, I had ready decided, and I decided to jump, and kind of last second was.

1:02:12 Made. The decision to call Emil is to say goodbye. Now, Emil is his son from a prior marriage, and he does indeed call Emil, and he places two calls. And Emil testified about these two calls, and he said his dad face timed him and told him that his stepmom Ariel had been cheating on him, and that he had tried to kill her, and that he planned to jump off that cliff. And imagine your dad calling you and telling you this. He said. He told his dad not to do it, and he was struggling to recall many of the points of that first call, and it's important to mention he was struggling to recall many points of that first call. Now, he did ask his dad what was on his shirt because he saw blood because this was a FaceTime call, and his dad said it was Ariel's blood, he said. The call then ended and he goes to Ariel's parents' house and he tells them what his dad had told him. So a second call gets placed to him from his dad via FaceTime. This is about an hour later. Dad asked him if he was going to tell anybody, to which he responded yes, and he said that he was going to jump, and again his son tries to talk him out of it, and Dad says, I gotta go before the police get here, and he hangs up. So in this next clip, I think it's important what doctor Cunnig said about these conversations with the son, because to me, this is the entire

1:03:45 cusp of this case. If he in fact told his son he tried to kill Ariel, that seals it right. So here's doctor Cunnig's version. First of all, where were you when you face well? Was that a FaceTime? It was? It was FaceTime? Yes, Where were you when? When? When you did this FaceTime? It was a spot where the trail. Wasn't right next to the cliff edge because the cliff edge at that point wasn't really an edge. It was like a. Like a like a ten foot kind of sloped part and then the edge, And so I was basically between the cliff edge and the trail kind of hanging onto the side of the mountain. Was it a kind of steepish area, yeah, very steep. And were you kind of like on the side of the mountain? So you gotta yes, sorry, okay, And.

1:04:34 So so just to be clear, the place you face timed him from, was that the place that the incident took place? Okay? On the FaceTime, would it have looked like you were on kind of the edge of a mountain? Yes? Were you on speakerphones? Yes, I mean like holding it where he could see your face? Yes, no, And I showed him. I showed him the view and where I was like. There was tes stimony from police officers that that's it was a windy day and notoriously windy area was Do you recall it being pretty windy that day? It was windy? Yeah, up there, So. You're on the side of a cliff mountain. You have him on speaker on FaceTime. Uh, it's windy, is that right?

1:05:19 Yes? You were extremely emotional at that time. Yes, So that's the context of this phone call. Correct. Yes. Did you tell him that Ariel had was well you were. You were calling him to say goodbye? Is that right? Yes? It was your purpose to explain to him the whole, every last detail of what happened. No, but you did tell him several things, right, Yes. Did you tell him that Ariel had been having an affair? I didn't. Did you tell him that, you know, she got hurt, her head was bleeding? Yeah? After he about the blood of my shirt.

1:06:02 Now did you did the word kill come up in the conversation? It probably did. What What do you recall explaining to him about that. I didn't recall explaining. The only thing I can think of is that I said that she said I tried to kill her. So, so let's break back that up. So you were you told him that the blood was hers? Yes, yes, And you're telling him that you need you're gonna jump and yes, okay, And did you tell him something about well, we're going to get to the part about the police, but you're telling him about how you're going to jump.

1:06:42 And you were saying you heard her say to the witnesses he tried to kill me. Were you explaining to that to email? No, So I was saying I. Was talking to myself at the same time, too, And I was basically saying like because I remember saying like, wow, this is like so hard, because it turns out killing yourself was a hard thing to do once you actually like go go and do it. And so I was like talking to him about like saying goodbye and and and she had an affair and those things. But then I was also kind of like talking to myself and and I think I was saying to myself, like she said I tried to kill her. She said I tried to kill her.

1:07:25 Okay. Were you confessing to him that you had and you were trying to kill Arida? No? Okay, were you did you have an intention to kill Era dot Day? Would you have said it that way? I tried to kill Aria at Day? No? Okay, but you don't. You don't dispute that the word kill probably came up? No, okay? And can you understand how email and in that conversation could have got that impression? Yes? So what else happens in this first call? What do you mean when you say he tried to He tried to convince you not to jump. He basically just and I mean to his credit, I mean he.

1:08:09 Uh, he just reminded me that I had a choice, basically reminded me to have a choice, because he said, like, you know, do you do you really have to do this? After that, did he got to follow him? Well, he didn't jump, right. There was a second call an hour later, Yes, and he testified that he was at his Ari's parents house. Is that right? Yes? Okay? Now during that call, did did he did he tell you what he told to his parents?

1:08:51 Yes? What did he tell you that he told his parents? He said, well, yeah, he said I I told him that you tried to kill Erry. And what was your reaction to that? I was like, why why would you say that? And you didn't mean that in the first call, right, okay, So you're telling him why why? And I didn't know at that point. I was like so confuse that why he would say that? Okay? And then then what did you say to him after that? I said, I gotta go. I got you off the phone. And did you say to him because you were going to kill yourself again? Yes? Did you say to him? I said, I, I never mind, I got to think about this. I I'm probably gonna kill myself, okay.

1:09:35 And did did you say something to him about I gotta go so the police won't find me? Yes? And what did what do you mean by that? Why? Why were you trying to avoid the police? I I didn't want my choice of killing myself taken away at that time until I had made the decision to either do it or not. So what do you think now? Why you're moment on that? Let's get to it. And while Ariel is heading down that mountain after about six hours set his doctor Kuennig. He heads down the trail and here's a car at some point behind him. When he gets on the main road, and sure enough it's the police and he is taken into custody. In his words rather roughly. Now, let's talk about the syringe. Remember his wife Ariel had mentioned he pulled out a syringe and tried to injector with it.

1:10:30 So his story was that there was a work bag that was with him, because when they got him back to the headquarters to question him, they dumped out the bag he had with him and had all kinds of syringes in it, and he had to explain that, and he said, look, that's an oor bag that I used when I'm on call and before we came on this trip. That or bag was with me, and Ariel knows that I carry all that stuff in it. Now, why would he bring it on the hike? That's my question, not that he had it with him in a wahoo, but why would he have it on that hike? And his statement was the last shift before this trip, he had the bag with him, and so he just brought it with him. He didn't go home first, he went straight to the airport. Okay, that might even make sense, but why did you have it on that hike? That's questionable to me. So we'll move on. This was on March twenty fourth, twenty twenty five, and on March twenty eighth, he was indicted on a second degree murder charge. Now, during his plea hearing, he pleads not guilty, and it's during this hearing that his bail is denied and he is going to have to stay in jail until his trial.

1:11:48 In the meantime, in May of twenty twenty five, Aeriel files for divorce, and on March nineteenth of twenty twenty six, his trial starts and everything that I just told you comes out. Prosecutors they're claiming that he tried to knock her out with a rock, inject her with syringes full of drugs, all in an attempt to push her off that cliff, and the doctor's story is that this was all self defense. So over the course of the next three weeks, everyone testifies, and this was a tough one for me personally. I struggle to understand why the doctor would take so much risk. I listened to all the testimony, and to be honest, I found the doctor more believable than his wife. She just seemed like she was hiding something on that stand. But regardless, in the end, I think it was doctor Koenig's son and his testimony it was very credible. Wouldn't make sense why he tried to lie about his dad. I think this is what kind of sealed it for me. I mean, I believe his son when he said my dad said quote his stepmom was cheating on his dad and he tried to kill heruote.

1:13:06 So the question is, did I think doctor Kuenig is a cold blooded killer? No? I don't do I think he had some sort of plan that day to kill his wife. No, I don't. I think she asked him about traveling with her boss on that hike and he just fucking lost it. But what would a jury think, Well, after eight hours of deliberation, they would agree, but they didn't find him guilty of second degree murder on a lesser charge of attempted manslaughter. And that's the difference between a life sentence and a maximum of twenty years in jail. So this verdict occurred on April eighth, and his sentencing is scheduled for August thirteenth, And of course I will keep you posted on that verdict.

1:13:56 But there you have it. And I think the jury got it right here book second degree murder has to have some intent to it. I think this guy flipped out, and I don't know that he was even trying to kill her. It's hard for me to explain. This is just my opinion, but I think a manslaughter or attemptive manslaughter charge is more appropriate and probably more accurate. I'd love to know your opinion on it. Thank you so much for listening. Check out the Patreon I'm going to upload a bunch of files on this case. Of course, we do commercial, free early releases, bonus episodes, quarterly gifts, and files all through the Patreon site. I love and appreciate every single one of those people for supporting what I do here on Exposed. Couldn't do it without them.

1:14:43 Thank you so much, and until next time for exposed scandalous files of the elite, I'm your host, Jim Chapman. Much love, se