The Hanover House of Horrors & the Girl Who Escaped | The Case of Kelly Sutliff | UNSEEN

This is Kelly Sutliff. She's running to her neighbor's house after 911 received her disturbing phone call. Kelly is screaming for help when suddenly the 911 operator hears a man's voice. The man who just hung up on 911 is none other than Kelly's new husband, Chris. For the past 11 months, Chris has been the perfect partner, always caring for her every need. But on the night of December 16, 2019, things take a disturbing turn when she learns that everything she knows about her loving husband is a lie. Kelly is alone with him and for the next 45 minutes, she is forced to fight for her life. While she manages to break free, running out of her house and through the front door, looking for help from the neighbors, but then she does something unexpected. Only 5 minutes after escaping, Kelly runs back into the house to confront her husband, not knowing that he has been planning the perfect crime for months, and that only 3 days after attacking his wife, Chris will walk free, putting Kelly's life in danger. Now, it is up to Kelly to take him down and make sure he never hurts her or another woman ever again. The years 2018, an east hand over New Jersey, 36-year-old Kelly Sutlife has been building her dream life from the ground up. After years of schooling, she has earned her master's degree and became a psychotherapist opening a successful practice of her own. Outside of work, Kelly has a full and active life. Kelly is surrounded by close friends and one companion who has become an especially important part of it, her dog, Chester. Kelly rescued Chester years earlier, but after the death of both of Kelly's parents, it starts to feel like Chester has rescued her. He is a constant presence in her life, always by her side. Kelly seems to have everything, a beautiful home, and a thriving practice, born from a career she's worked years to build, but there is still something missing. Kelly wants to share her life with someone, someone she can build a future with. In August of 2018, I was on a dating app and there was Chris' picture. His profile seemed interesting to me, so I swiped right. When Kelly and Chris meet for the first time, their conversation flows naturally. The connection feels immediate. Chris is attentive and interested in Kelly's life story, asking questions about her family, her friends, and career. To Kelly, he's intelligent, thoughtful, and kind. For the first time in years, Kelly feels a sense of belonging with Chris, but at times, she thinks he seems almost too good to be true. There were times where I'd say to my friends, "He's too nice, Chris is just too nice." And everybody would say, "Kelly, you're just used to dating jerks." This is what a guy is supposed to be like. Over the next four months, Kelly and Chris continue to get to know each other and they both fall deeply in love. Chris showers Kelly with attention and makes a point of remembering the little things that mattered to her. He brings her chocolate-covered pretzels, her favorite snack, just to make her smile. He even buys her white lilies, knowing they were her mother's favorite flower. As their connection grows deeper, they decide to take the next step. In the fall of 2018, Chris moves into Kelly's house, but just as he settles in, Kelly starts getting sick. Some days, Kelly can barely get out of bed. She's constantly fatigued and unable to stay awake. Then, she starts noticing hives all over her body. For months, Kelly is in and out of the hospital doing tests, but doctors can't figure out what's making her sick. During this time, Chris cares for her and tends to her every need. He's attentive, thoughtful, and caring. The kind of partner she's always dreamed of. Before we continue with Kelly's story, we'd like to thank today's video sponsor, Quince. Our sponsors help make it possible for us to continue bringing powerful survival stories to life. Just like every story, the clothes we wear can carry meaning and help us express who we are. The right pieces can elevate your style, boost your confidence, and help you feel great every day. And that's where Quince comes in. Quince creates elevated essentials you'll want to reach for every single day. One of our team members here at Unseen recently purchased the 100% organic cotton cable crew cardigan, which has quickly become a staple in their office wardrobe. Quince works directly with top manufacturers and cuts out the middleman, so you're paying for quality and craftsmanship, not brand markup. Their luxurious essentials extend far beyond clothing, offering everything from hotel quality bedding and bath essentials to kitchenware and thoughtfully designed furniture. With over 3,000 5-star trust pilot reviews and satisfied customers, Quince's quality speaks for itself. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers, or go to quince.com/unseen. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns, now available in Canada and the UK too. That's q-u-i-n-c-e.com/unseen, and when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was unseen. It's the best way to support the show. And now, back to the story of Kelly Sutlift. On December 1st, 2018, as Kelly and Chris spend a romantic evening in New York, Chris leads Kelly towards the Rockefeller Center tree, and does something Kelly never expected, he gets down on one knee, looks up at her, and asks her to marry him. Kelly and Chris officially tie the knot just a month after their engagement. They have a beautiful and intimate ceremony with a small group of friends and family by their side, as they start their new chapter. But just shortly after they return from their wedding, Kelly starts getting sick again, and first, it's headaches and strange rashes, then the symptoms begin getting worse. Kelly breaks out in hives across her entire body, she is constantly exhausted, and soon she can barely get out of bed, at one point she loses all feelings in her legs and is completely unable to walk, Kelly is sicker than she has ever been. But through the worst of it, Chris is right there beside her, taking care of her every need. For nearly a year, Kelly is completely dependent on Chris, and he is deeply devoted to her. He takes care of almost everything, from her meals to every glass of water, he makes sure she never has to lift a finger. Finally in November 2019, after months of being sick, Kelly's symptoms all of a sudden vanish. And to Kelly, now that she's feeling better, her married life with Chris truly begins. But just as they start settling into their new life together, things take a disturbing turn for the worse. When on December 16, 2019, at around 7pm, 911 dispatchers receive a call from Kelly's house. As the 911 operator talks to Kelly, trying to get information, someone else takes control of the phone and starts speaking. When operators attempt to call the number back, it goes straight to voicemail. Then at 7.45pm, Kelly's ring camera, which faces the front yard, captures something, disturbing. The camera shows Kelly frantically running out of her house and down the street. The audio from the camera also captures the sounds of a man screaming, coming from inside the house. 7.46pm, less than one minute later, 911 dispatchers receive another call. This time, the call is made by Kelly's neighbor. Police are immediately dispatched to Kelly and Chris' residence, arriving just five minutes after the phone call. But before they even step inside, officers notice something horrifying. There's blood on the front window of the house. And as the cops walk through the couple's home that night, they would discover that the inside of Kelly's house is something out of a nightmare. The house Kelly built and shared with her husband, Chris, is now unrecognizable. Every room is destroyed, furniture broken, and displaced, and the place she once kept so carefully is left completely shattered. To officers, this doesn't make any sense. Just minutes earlier, she had to run from her house and distress, calling 911 from next door. But now, she's back inside her own home. As cops lead Kelly outside, they realize someone else is still inside the house. Her husband, Chris. When they approach him, he appears to be completely detached from reality. He isn't wearing any clothes and is mumbling to himself and pacing around. He was almost incoherent. He is naked and bloody. He just was not following any of our comments. Officers asked Kelly to walk them through her night, and she takes detectives back to the 9-1 call she made an hour earlier. Kelly tells him that the man who took over the phone told the dispatcher everything was fine, and abruptly ended the call was not some stranger inside her house. It was Chris, her own husband. For the last 11 months, Chris has been everything Kelly could have asked for in a husband. He was kind, attentive, thoughtful, and constantly taking care of her. From the beginning, Kelly had known him as someone loving and considerate. But that night, Kelly sees a side of Chris she never knew existed. Everything she thought she knew about the man she married has changed forever. On December 16th, 2019, Chris was passed out, and the way he fell asleep with his phone was so bizarre. Throughout their relationship, Kelly had never any reason to doubt Chris. She trusted him completely, but that day something felt wrong. I remember my gut something said, looking as fun. As Chris is sleeping, she picks up his phone and surprisingly, it's already open to a chat conversation with another woman. As Kelly scrolls through the messages, what she finds is devastating. The conversation is filled with pictures, videos, and sexually explicit messages with this other woman. In the messages, Chris even tells the woman that he doesn't love his wife. And I remember thinking, this is not the man I married because my husband would never do that. So I wake him up, and then I just very calmly started reciting some of those messages. In the moment, the charming, kind, loving Chris, she once knew, completely shifts. His face drops, and without saying a word, Chris walks into the bathroom and closes the door behind him. Kelly is now in the home she has shared with Chris for over a year, trying to process what she has just discovered. The man she trusted more than anyone suddenly feels like someone she no longer knows. As Kelly paces back and forth in her foyer, the bathroom door opens, Chris walks out towards his wife. Kelly freezes as she sees that her husband is completely naked, covered in blood, and holding a knife. And he says to me, thanks so much for always having the idea channel on. Because now I'm going to make this look like you, try to murder me. At that moment, she realizes that the man standing in front of her is incredibly dangerous. All she can do is run. But Chris, a former military veteran, easily overpowers her, and before she can get away, he catches her and smashes her head into the wall, causing her to lose consciousness. Kelly is trapped inside her own home, forced to fight for her life while Chris, the man she loved, terrorizes, and violently attacks her. At one point, Chris even cuts the phone lines, while Kelly is trying to call 911, but Kelly never gives up. Something just lit a fire in me. I'm not going down without a fight. I'm going to do whatever it takes to get out of here alive. And after 45 minutes, she finally manages to escape. Running out her front door at 7.45 pm. She makes it to her neighbor's house and calls for help. She's safe, but when she looks across the street at her house, she sees Chris walking towards the basement. And that's when Kelly realizes something. Chester, her dog, is still in the house. She knows that Chris is now going after him. I was not going to let that man kill my dog. There was no way in hell that he was going to lay a hand on that dog, that dog was everything to me. At that moment, Kelly makes a decision. Despite her neighbor's pleading for her to stay in their home until the cops arrive, she runs back into her home with one goal to save Chester. At the moment she steps through the door, she looks around for Chris. But he is nowhere to be found. She quietly walks toward the wide open basement door, spotting Chester, who is fortunately unharmed. But just before she reaches him, she hears Chris' footsteps coming up from the basement. Kelly reacts instantly. She grabs Chester and slams the basement door shut, using all her strength to keep Chris trapped on the other side. After Rops, he screams at the top of his lungs and throws his entire body against the door, trying to push it open. The door holds, but she isn't strong enough to keep him there for much longer. Then, she looks outside to see red and blue lights flashing through the window. The cops arrive, and Kelly and Chester are finally safe. As Chris is apprehended and taken to the hospital, Kelly is allowed entry back into her house, packing a suitcase of personal belongings because now she can't stay in her own home. Her own beautiful house is now unlivable, destroyed, and covered in blood, barely recognizable. But as she gathers her possessions, she notices something in the corner of her eye. Chris' phone, she picks it up and unlocks it. And that's when she keeps going through the rest of his phone for the first time. On his phone, she not only sees the conversation with the other woman, but she finds hundreds of videos and photos of herself that she doesn't remember Chris ever taking while Kelly was asleep. There's pictures of Kelly unconscious in different positions. While Chris smiles into the camera, there's even a video he recorded of himself violating her while she is asleep. As investigators process Kelly's house after the attack, they discover something shocking hidden inside Chris' closet, a variety of drugs, including tamoxifen and mammothin. New medications used primarily to treat breast cancer. However, when these drugs are ingested continuously by a healthy person, they can cause severe symptoms like hives, rashes, and extreme fatigue. Exactly the symptoms Kelly has had since she started dating Chris. When I saw all this stuff, it clicked in my head. Chris has been drugging me and beating me in my sleep. While Chris is at the hospital, he undergoes a psychological evaluation to determine whether or not he poses a threat to the community. But medical professionals don't find anything conclusive about Chris' actions that night. On paper, Chris appears healthy and stable, and the eyes of the law, he poses no threat to the community. He is treated as a first-time offender. The man who had spent the last year secretly drugging Kelly, and the man who had just tried to kill her, walks free. I was convinced he was going to come back and kill me. It really makes you paranoid. Kelly knows one thing for certain. Chris is dangerous, and she needs to do everything she can to make sure he ends up behind bars. So she takes all the photos and videos she found on his phone to the police, believing they could become some of the strongest evidence against him. Because the phone had been taken from the crime scene and searched without a warrant, police tell Kelly the material cannot be used in court. All of it has to be thrown out. In the next weeks after the attack, Kelly stays in constant contact with detectives, working with police and doing everything she can to build a case against Chris. But as the investigation moves forward, he is still out on the street, walking free, and Kelly knows there is nothing physically stopping him from coming back, finishing what he started. Kelly does everything she can to protect herself. She keeps her own gun at home, stays close to her dog, as multiple cameras always recording, and quickly files for a restraining order against Chris. But just a few days before her official restraining order hearing, she begins to feel like she is being stalked. Kelly's ring camera captures a vehicle slowing down in front of her driveway, stopping and waiting before driving off. The same car keeps coming back, always visible on her cameras. She can't prove it, but she knows that Chris is in the car. "We need to go, you win." But just when Kelly thinks things can't get any worse, on January 17, 2020, at 6.32 p.m., police show up at her front door, only this time they aren't there because of Chris. They're there, for Kelly. Police tell her that under a newly passed date law, the 12-round magazine in her gun is no longer legal, and must be limited to 10 rounds. The weapon Kelly had kept for her own protection is taken away, and she now faces a felony charge for even possessing it. "I am the first domestic violence victim in the state of New Jersey to have their gun taken away from them." Kelly now has no weapon, or even a restraining order to protect herself, but she refuses to stop fighting. She gets a guard dog named Stella, hires a private investigator, and begins sharing her story publicly on Instagram and TikTok. Kelly knew that Chris had been married before, but until now, she had never understood just how much of his past he had hidden from her. With the help of the private investigator, she tracks down three of his ex-wives, and finally speaks with them directly. As Kelly begins hearing their stories, she realizes she isn't the first woman to experience this side of Chris. Each of his ex-wives describes disturbingly similar behavior, revealing that what happened to Kelly was not an isolated nightmare, but part of a pattern that has been repeating long before she ever met him. "And I think it's getting worse and I'm afraid that there's going to come a day where a woman is going to die at his hands." After years of fighting, gathering evidence, working with police, and refusing to back down, Kelly finally gets the moment she has been waiting for. On October 20, 2022, Chris pleads guilty to aggravated assault and possession of a deadly weapon. Kelly turns once again to social media, sharing her story with millions of people and using everything she went through to raise awareness for other survivors. Chris may have taken years of Kelly's life from her, but he will never get to decide what comes next. Kelly does. "I got my dogs to both protection trains. They really saved my life in so many different ways." The dogs by Kelly's side become a huge part of her recovery, giving her comfort, confidence, and a sense of safety when she needed it most. Her German shepherd, Stella, helped Kelly feel protected again and gave her the confidence to regain her independence. Chris took away my freedom and Stella and Luca gave it back to me. In the years that follow, Kelly turns that experience into something bigger. She launches Kelly's canines, tails of courage, an organization that provides highly trained personal protection dogs, completely free of charge, to survivors of domestic violence and sexual abuse. For Kelly, it's a way of giving other women the same sense of safety and independence that Stella gave her. Today, Kelly helps other women find the support and protection she once needed herself. "Personally, I know what that feels like, so when I see a survivor start to laugh, start to smile, start to live their life, the most beautiful thing to witness." Through her growing psychotherapy practice and advocacy work, she has built a life focused on helping survivors feel less alone, more protected, and empowered. "It has taken a really long time to get to where I am today. I am not a victim. I am a survivor."