Post Mortem | The Corn Rake Witness

Hey, I'm Tony DeCoppo, anchor of the CBS Evening News. On my new daily podcast, Great Question with Tony DeCoppo, we go deeper on the one big question you haven't heard answered, or maybe haven't even heard asked. Follow and listen wherever you get your podcasts. It was a gruesome discovery off a dirt road in Georgia. Hunters had found a body. Was it immediately clear to you that this woman had been murdered? Yes. But who was this mystery woman in the woods? That looks like Mindy. I'm Erin Moriarty, and from 48 Hours, this is The Woman in the Woods. I have never wanted to be wrong like this in my whole entire life. Binge the full series of Woman in the Woods wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to Postmortem. I'm your host, Anne-Marie Green. And. And today I'm joined by 48 Hours correspondent, Erin Moriarty, about our report on the conviction of Todd Mullis, an Iowa farmer sentenced to life in prison for the 2018 death of his 39-year-old wife, Amy Mullis. Now, the alleged murder weapon? A corn rake. This case, you know, I just keep thinking this is one of those cases where things are not always what they seem. This, to me, is a very important case. We should. We should point out that Todd Mullis and his family maintain his innocence, and they are now, right now, fighting to get his conviction overturned. This is also the first time that their son, Tristan, is speaking out. He was the one who found his mother with a corn rake in her back. And I was so impressed when I spoke with him. Before we get into it, a reminder to our listeners, if you haven't watched or listened to the 48 Hours episode we're about to talk about, it's called The Corn Rake Witness, just below this episode. In your podcast feed, or you can also head to the 48 Hours page on Paramount+, and you can watch it there. Check it out, and then come on back for this conversation. All right, so, before we get into the updates on this case, can we sort of go back in time and revisit how we got here, Erin? 48 Hours has actually been following this case since 2019 and during COVID, and so much has changed in this case in the last six, seven years. For this new show, we were able to go to the farm for the first time, and that was so illuminating to me. And of course, there was the big highlight, interviewing Tristan, whom we also didn't get to talk to for the first hour. A quick recap, on November 10th, 2018, Tristan Mullis, who was then 13 years old, was working with his parents, Todd and Amy, on their 400-acre hog farm. They were all together in one of these two large hog barns, until Tristan said, that he and his dad noticed that his mom was becoming unsteady. So they told her to go inside and rest, but asked her if she could, on her way back into the house, grab a pet carrier out of a storage shed. Tristan said then he and his father continued to work together for about another hour and a half, before noticing that the pet carrier wasn't where they had asked Amy to put it. So Tristan says his dad asked him to go get it from the shed, and that's, unfortunately, when Tristan came upon a horrifying scene of his mother lying on the ground with a corn rake protruding from her back. Tristan says he then yelled for his dad, and the two of them got Amy in the truck, and they drove her toward the hospital. She sadly later died from her injuries. What did Todd and Tristan say that they believed happened to her? At first, Todd told first responders that he really wasn't sure what had happened. He suspected, it was an accident. Amy had been dizzy earlier, and Todd said he thought that his wife had to have fallen onto the corn rake while trying to get the pet carrier. Four days earlier, Amy Mulls had had a medical procedure and was on multiple medications. So, you know, it just seems like such a freak accident, right? A corn rake. Had you ever heard of anything like this before? To be honest, before I worked on this case, I never heard of anyone being injured by a corn rake, by accident or on purpose, and I didn't even know what a corn rake was. And for anyone else who doesn't, it is like a pitchfork, but the tines are curved and they have dull flat tips, more like a flathead screwdriver, and it's typically used to pull out corn. When we aired this story, this story got a lot of viewer reaction. There were so many polarized opinions on it. There were some who said, oh, Todd had to do it. Other people said, oh my gosh, maybe this was an accident. But there was one that really caught our attention. And I actually have something to show. It's a copy of a newspaper article. A woman commented on Facebook after our show that she accidentally fell on a corn rake years ago when she was 13 years old. She lived in Iowa. She says that initially rumors swirled in their hometown, that someone from her family had to have intentionally hurt her. But thankfully, this young woman survived and could set the record straight. I found that so interesting. And there were other people who said online that they live on farms and they commented that unfortunately, freak accidents with farm equipment happen. That's life on a farm. I can see that. But we've also seen comments from our audience, people that agree, agree with Dr. Kelly Cruz, the state medical examiner who determined that Amy's injuries had been caused by someone striking her with a rake. She found bruises on Amy's jaw and on her knuckles and noted that while Amy had six puncture wounds on her back, the corn rake only had four times, which indicated to her that Amy had been impaled more than once. Law enforcement also determined that Todd had a motive because Amy was having an affair. Todd was arrested for Amy's murder. And in September 2019, his case went to trial as Todd's alibi. Tristan became a key witness and testified. Yes. Todd's alibi was a central issue at trial. Tristan told investigators that he had been with his father throughout the morning of Amy's death. However, just shortly before trial, Tristan admitted that he had lost sight of his father briefly twice when he went to get treatment. He said that he had taken a drink of water. Prosecutors argued that this provided Todd with an opportunity to kill Amy. Ultimately, Todd was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. So as you point out, 48 hours has been following this case for years. Back in 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, they had to get really creative doing remote interviews, finding experts locally who could analyze the case in person, for us. How did this brother and sister legal duo, Dina and Daniel Neshwat, how did they get involved in the first hour? Well, I had actually worked on another case of 48 hours with Dina. So when the reporting team back then started researching this case, they decided to reach out to her. She and her brother, Daniel, who's also a lawyer, agreed to just review Todd's case to provide that defense perspective for our first show. In that show, they, they raised the possibility because they saw it that Amy's death could have been an accident. She could have fallen and struggled. And then something really interesting happened. After our first episode came out, Todd's family, who is convinced he's innocent, watched the program and they said they appreciated the arguments that Dina and Daniel made in Todd's defense. So Todd's mom reached out to Dina and eventually Dina and Daniel began defending him. And I should point out pro bono. Wow. We'll get into more in a bit. That is very interesting. And then another big development is that Tristan came forward and clarified his testimony. This is huge. Tristan is speaking publicly about his testimony at trial for the first time. He says he never got to tell the whole story about exactly how long his father was out of his sight, when he took a drink of water and says his dad could only have been out of his sight for a matter of seconds. That was it. Tristan claims that would not have been enough time for his father to leave, murder his mother, and then come back without him noticing. Also, my interview with him, he told me he completely believes his mother's death was an accident and that investigators simply got it all wrong. He says that his father didn't get a fair trial. And that is the reason, he says, that he's speaking out. I want to play a portion from my interview that wasn't in our hour when I ask him very specifically about why he's defending his father now. There are some people who would say you've lost your mom and your dad is gone. Are you saying these things just to save your dad to get him back? If my dad had ever done something to harm my mom, I would not be sitting here telling you this story. He did. He did lose his mom too. only 13 years old. He's now 21. And what I found really interesting, and you've been through this, Anne-Marie, you know, you're interviewing someone who's never been on TV and you're worried he might be uncomfortable. He was not. He was so comfortable leading me around the hog farm. I didn't have to encourage him at all. In some ways, he was encouraging me. I was very taken by his poise. I found him very credible. He was really willing to open up so Tristan then shows you around the farm. And for me, that tour made all the difference. What were the big takeaways for you? Oh, Anne-Marie, you are so right. It is why we travel. In this case, the farm was really far away from everything, but it was so beautiful. You got a sense of how big and vast the farm is. It's 400 acres. And of course, you really got a sense of all the smells too. The smell of hog. It does take a little getting used to and it took a while for me to get it out of my hair. But why it matters so much to be in the barn is that you can actually see the distance from where Todd and Tristan and his mom were working to the red shed where Amy was later found. The barn and the shed were far, much farther apart than I expected. And you really can't understand what may have happened to Amy unless you go there. And see it for yourself. Yeah, I definitely got that. But this was a key argument for the prosecution, right? That Todd waited for an opportunity to run to the shed to kill Amy and then come back. Is this plausible to you? When I was standing in the barn with Tristan, he showed me that there were actually only two ways to get out of the barn. So he could have gone out the front door, but then Todd would have passed Tristan as he was getting a drink of water. Tristan would have seen him. Hmm. Or he could have gone out the back door, but it was at the far end of the barn. When you see it for yourself, even if Todd was running the entire distance, it was going to take some time. The round trip to and from the shed would have been around four football fields in length and you would have to be a little out of breath. And Tristan said he saw nothing. So then there was this other detail that Todd called 911 while driving Amy to the hospital. Instead, instead of calling 911 as soon as he saw the state she was in. I want to play a clip of that 911 call. I just grabbed her and threw her in the truck when the sun pulled me. Okay, you're headed to the hospital and she's in your vehicle? Yes, she's in my all-white truck. Okay, just a second here. Is she, is she. There's no pulse. There's no pulse. It's something we didn't really talk about a lot in the hour, but it's such an important issue. And there are varying opinions on it. The state claimed that Todd, delayed getting help for Amy by not calling 911 as soon as he found her. Instead, he got her in his truck and called along the way. Many people who live in rural areas like Earlville, in this case, actually told me that the response time for an ambulance can take longer than it would just to rush yourself to the hospital. So that's not uncommon to do. And EMS was mostly volunteer-based in this area. So, you had to count on that there were volunteers available. When you are out there, you see how rural it is. So again, I was so glad I went there and saw for myself. And if you believe Todd's story, that this was an accident and he was trying to get her the fastest help possible, it also raises the question, why would he rush his wife to the hospital if he was trying to kill her? I also found the 911 call, he really sounds. distressed when he does make the call. So I was curious though about this red shed. What's it like in there? Is it sort of messy? Is there stuff all over the place? Well, Tristan told us that the shed doesn't have any electricity. So we know that it was dark. It's also narrow with a lot of farm equipment. So I could understand why Todd's new attorneys believe that Amy might have accidentally tripped and fallen over in that dark and crowded shed. Being there, and this really, really struck me, I also saw how close the family home was to the red shed. I mean, it was closer than the barn was. We know that Tristan's younger brother and sister were inside the house that day. So to me, it really challenged the theory that Todd planned to kill his wife while he knew that all of his three children were at the farm and the two youngest were right by the shed. It just seemed difficult for me to believe. Welcome back. Todd's new attorneys, Dina and Daniel Neshwat, filed a petition for post-conviction relief and got a new hearing in February 2025. Now, as part of their investigation, they hired several experts to look into Amy's death, including forensic pathologist, Dr. Jennifer Hammers, and biomechanical engineer, Dr. Valentina Nye. You spoke to them as well. What conclusions did they find from reviewing the evidence in Amy's injuries? Dr. Hammers is a medical doctor who has a lot of experience and she can analyze the injuries that Amy had. Dr. Nye is an engineer who takes that information and then can figure out what caused those injuries. They reviewed the evidence in the case, and they also went out to the farm the way we did because they also wanted to get a sense of distance. Dr. Hammers and Dr. Nye did their own separate investigations, they said, and they both concluded that Amy's death was not a homicide. They say it was an accident. They also helped to create an animation that illustrated what they believed happened. Well, I want to warn you, it's very difficult to watch. What was so powerful about the animation? You know, I've seen it. I've seen it so many times that I could never quite get used to it. The animation shows a figure like Amy falling backwards onto the rake and then struggling to free herself from it. And they say that as she struggled to break free, she inadvertently caused additional injuries. Dr. Hammers says that falling on the rake would not have immediately killed her so that she was still alive and able to move. And this is a very important point. Dr. Hammers says that because one of the rake tines actually punctured her lung, it would have limited her ability to scream. You know, it's not like the prosecution's argument doesn't make sense, right? There's these multiple holes. Todd was convicted of swinging the rake multiple times into Amy's back. How are these experts so sure that that's not what happened? And in fact, it was this freak accident. Well, when I asked them that question, the scientists said that if someone had swung the rake into Amy's back, Amy's wounds would have looked different and they would have been at very different angles. There was also sign-outs that we didn't get to in the show, and I thought this was so interesting. Dr. Nye told me that swinging doesn't generate enough force to penetrate the clothes that Amy was wearing and also her back. Amy was wearing a thick coat. A sweatshirt and a shirt because it was November. According to Dr. Nye, falling onto the rake actually generates more force and energy than swinging the rake. I also want to point out, too, and this always gets people to kind of gasp, this animation was never presented at this post-conviction relief hearing because it wasn't ready yet and they didn't have all the funding in place. So our 48 Hours viewers are actually seeing a much more detailed demonstration than what the judge saw. There's another point, though. This is a pretty huge question because there are fewer holes in her coat than Amy has injuries in her back. On the outside coat, yes. Yeah, on the outside, yes. Dr. Nye told me that this was a crucial piece of evidence and to her proves that the rake could not have been swung into Amy's back. Dr. Nye argues that, repeatedly swinging a four-tined implement into someone's back would have actually produced more holes in the coat. I want to play a clip from our show where she explained this to us. Her body has six holes. The clothes have less holes than six. He was convicted on swinging this rake multiple times into her body. How do you swing a four-tined implement multiple times and have less holes in the outer clothes and more holes in the body? That is illogical. But another thing I want to point out is that the jury never saw the photo of that outside coat from the autopsy. Why not? We really don't know. It was part of the case file, which Todd's original defense attorney, Gerald Feierhelm, did have access to. We don't know specifically why it wasn't shown at trial because it really was an important part of this hearing. That's toddsnewattorneys.com. for him. So let us talk about this hearing, this post-conviction relief hearing. What were Dina and Daniel Neshwat hoping to get out of this relief hearing? And for our listeners, can you just sort of walk us through what exactly this is? Okay. In a nutshell, a PCR post-conviction relief hearing looks a lot like a trial, but the defense in this hearing has the burden of proof. The basis of Todd's complaint is that he did not get a fair trial and his new attorney's claim, among other things, that Todd's original defense counsel never investigated or argued the possibility that Amy's death was accidental. Dina and Daniel also say that if the scientific evidence from Dr. Nye and Dr. Hammers had been presented at trial, they believe there might have been a very different result at trial. And the whole point of this hearing is, if you're going to get a fair trial, you're going to have to get a fair trial. If they can convince a judge that a jury would have seen this case differently, then the idea is to win Todd a new trial. Todd's original defense attorney, Gerald Feierhelm, did admit in an affidavit, and I'm going to quote, I did not consider the accident theory to be a realistic possibility because I grew up on a farm with personal experience using a corn rake. Again, I'm quoting, I did not think that this was a likely accident. I did not consider the accident theory to be a realistic possibility because I grew up on a farm with personal experience using a corn rake. Again, I did not consider the accident theory to be a realistic possibility because I grew up on a farm with personal experience using a corn rake. Again, I did not consider the accident theory to be a realistic possibility. And the nature slash extent of her wounds. Feierhelm did testify at the PCR hearing, and I want to play a portion that wasn't in the hour when one of Todd's attorneys questioned him. Did you ever look at Amy Melissa's clothing from November 10th, specifically the coat, the sweatshirt, and the long-sleeved shirt that she was wearing when she was injured? No. Did you take any steps to reconcile Dr. Cruz's opinion that the rake would have been swung two to three times, but there were only four holes in the coat? No, I don't think so. This is tough. This is really tough. And the whole thing is a bit puzzling because Feierhelm did have co-counsel trial. He was with attorney Bob Sabers, who said in a 2023 deposition that Todd did not get effective representation. Okay. So you were actually at the hearing as well. What was it like to be in that room and hear all of that? You know, when you go into a courtroom, you try to stay away from both the victims and the defense side. You know, you just try to stay by yourself. But I unintentionally sat on Todd Mollis' side. And so I'm right in the middle of his family, and I saw how emotional this was for everyone. But they were just so kind to me, and that hit me very hard. They knew who I was. I think they seemed to appreciate that someone like me was willing to take another look. It appeared they really wanted someone to hear Todd's case and look at it in a different way. Okay. What about Amy's family? I mean, this has got to be really tough for them. Amy's family does to this day believe that Todd was responsible for Amy's death. The PCR hearing was very hard for them as well. It made them have to relive her death all over again. Amy's brother Jeff was at the hearing, and he told me later that he was not persuaded by the science he heard during it. So this hearing lasted six months? It lasted six days. What was discussed in court? The defense experts testified that Amy's death is best classified as an accident, and they said that the physical evidence supports that. On the stand, Dr. Nye was questioned about other ways that someone could have killed Amy using that same rake, suddenly bringing up the possibility that maybe, okay, maybe it wasn't swung, maybe it was pushed or kicked into her back. But Dr. Nye at the PCR hearing said, she tested those theories as well, and she ruled them out. And then what was the state's argument at the hearing? Well, I thought it was interesting. The state did not bring in any evidence to dispute the science that was presented at the hearing, but they maintained, especially in their closing, that Todd had not met the burden that they believed was required to overturn his conviction and get a new trial. They wanted his conviction, to stand. There was also the state medical examiner, Dr. Kelly Cruz, who testified at the PCR hearing that the holes in Amy's clothing were not important to determine the cause and manner of death. And she testified that she maintained her original homicide determination still held. Both families had to wait nearly 15 months for the judge's decision. I mean, you always wonder why it has to take so long because you know it's excruciating. That must have been the case. It must have been painful for everyone. Without question, it was. The wait for Todd's family was tough, but the decision was even worse. The judge denied Todd's petition for post-conviction relief, and he's not getting a new trial. She ruled that Todd did receive a fair trial with competent counsel. She also said that the jury reasonably found that the original medical examiner's testimony was credible. Todd's new attorneys disagree, obviously, with the ruling, and they say that while the judge summarized the scientific evidence, the judge never fully analyzed it. Now, Amy's family, they hope that the attention will just go back to Amy's life and her role as a mother rather than remaining focused on Todd's conviction. I have to be honest. I know from my reporting experience that when there are questionable convictions, there are times when there are questionable convictions. It is still very hard to get a new trial, and I think this was an example of that. So then, what's next for the Mullis family? This is another one of those cases I think that 48 Hours is going to follow for a while. Dina and Daniel say that they plan to appeal and continue to challenge the conviction. Tristan, of course, remains convinced that his father is innocent, and he says he's going to keep fighting for him. Hmm. We talked earlier about the huge, audience response to this case. What stood out to you the most? I love our audience. I love viewers. I love hearing from them. And so, after we aired this latest show, a lot of people were commenting online that they believe that Todd Mullis may be innocent. If not innocent, at least deserving of another trial, with many people believing that he is guilty. Many others online cited the length of time, as you and I both discussed, that it would take to run between the barn and the shed as solid evidence, too. Mm-hmm. I think part of what's so interesting about this case is that the facts have remained the same. It's the interpretation that paints a radically different picture. And to me, the science raises a lot of questions. The use of a biomechanical engineer, for instance, in this case, is so novel for me. And so, I'm hoping medical examiners and defense and prosecutors look at the science. What does the science say? Even when you've got a case like you did in this, where there could be a motive. Absolutely. Well, Erin, it may be to be continued. Thank you so much for joining us. I love being here. Thanks so much. If you like this episode, please rate and review on Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. You just have to know where to look. Escape to Pluto TV. Stream now, pay never. See 334 at Madison Square Garden, Saturday, November 14th, only on Paramount+.