In Too Deep

(CBS News)  This story was first broadcast on Jan. 22, 2008.

In the summer of 2005, a young woman named Laura Hall found herself caught up in a gruesome murder case; the body of another woman was in her boyfriend's bathtub, and some time after the killing, the body was horribly mutilated.

As correspondent Maureen Maher reports, police did not focus on Laura as a suspect in the killing, but wondered if she was somehow involved in what happened after the murder.

Was Laura an innocent victim herself - a "good girl" - or someone much more frightening?

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It was just after dawn on August 17, 2005, that Laura arrived at her boyfriend's apartment.

Laura says her boyfriend, Colton Pitonyak, let her inside the apartment. She says Colton answered the door kind of "paranoid" and "fearful" and that she saw another woman's purse and keys on the table.

"And I'm kind of like sitting up, 'Colton, where, where, where are, who's hiding… what the deal, what's going on?' I'm kind of starting to freak out. A little bit. And he says 'Come here, come here,'" she recalls.

Colton led Laura to his bathroom. He had begged her to come over, telling her he needed to talk. But it wasn't so much what Colton wanted to say to Laura; it was what he wanted to show her.

"It looked like there was a woman's body in there and I said 'That's a mannequin.' I mean that's how much I did not believe or wanna believe," she says.

At first Colton told Laura that men with guns had broken in and that there had been a fight. But then he changed his story and said he didn't remember what had happened.

Laura says it was obvious Colton had been drinking and that he began to threaten her with a knife. "I remember him goading me out of the bathroom with a knife that had blood on it up to the hilt," she says, "I was like, man, 'Oh my God, you know what happened?'"

But then, surprisingly, Laura says Colton just let her go. Terrified, Laura says she went home, locked the door, and told no one what she had seen.

Asked if it never occurred to her to call police, family or friends, Laura says, "It didn't seem like a good move. I mean, look, he had tried to kill me. I didn't know what was gonna happen if I called the police, ok? There was nothing I could have done to save her life at that point."

The woman in the bathtub was 21-year-old Jennifer Cave, another pretty girl who hung out with Colton. Jennifer lived in Austin and just that week had begun a new job at a law firm.

Her parents lived in Corpus Christi. Her mother Sharon remembers getting a call from her daughter's law firm. "He said 'Well, there's a problem,' and he said, 'We're concerned.' He said, 'Jennifer didn't come to work today.' And I said 'What?'"

Sharon began frantically calling around to find her. "I started calling the numbers on the cell phone bill. That's when I got Colton's phone number," she recalls.

Sharon called Colton, and at first he denied seeing Jennifer.

Sharon knew very little about Colton. Jennifer had told her he was cute, and smart, a business student at the University of Texas. But Colton also had a serious problem with drugs, especially cocaine.

"And I'm like, 'Jennifer, please, just don't, just stay away from that,'" Sharon says. "And she's like, 'Mom, he's my friend and he needs my help.' And I'd be like, 'Jennifer, please stay away from that.'"

But Sharon knew it was in her daughter's nature to try and help. "Part of Jennifer's nature, and part of the pleasing and part of the loving people, is she had a real problem with stray dogs, and I'm not talking the four-legged kind," she says.

Jennifer had her own history with drugs. In recent months though, she had started to pull her life together. She appeared to be on a new path, with new friends and a promising new job at a law firm. But on that hot August night in Austin's party district, Colton reached out to Jennifer one more time.

"Colton called her, he said, 'You know, I really need a friend. Would you please help me. I just want to see you for a little bit. I'll take you to dinner to celebrate your new job,'" Sharon says. "And Jennifer would fall for that line every time, 'I need a friend.'"

The two ended up partying with friends, and around midnight took off by themselves. It was the last time anyone saw Jennifer alive.

It was the next day that Sharon got the call that Jennifer never showed up for work. Hours had now passed since anyone had seen or spoken to her daughter and Sharon was panicked.

When Jennifer's stepfather Jim got home from work, Sharon told him Jennifer was missing.

Jim tried to reach Colton, but he didn't pick up. "It went to voice mail and I said, 'Colton, this is Jim. We're looking for Jennifer. We know you were the last person she was seen with. If you have any idea where she is, you need to call me,'" he remembers.

Eventually, Colton called back. "On her phone. 'Hey dude, I'm eating pizza, don't bother me any more. Quit calling me,'" Jim remembers.

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[Agents99]

She is a complete psychopath. Acts mystified how she got in that situation, blames everyone else but herself, and has no concept of how horrific her acts were. She needs to be locked up until she figures out what she did wrong. Until she does she remains seriously dangerous.

[justv58]

Laura Hall is a complete psycho. Just watching her you can see right thru her. She is misguided in every sense of the word. What kind of human could say they saw a mutilated body and then just go about errands and then run away with the killer. She in my belief did the killing out of jealousy. She said she wanted to become a lawyer and the murdered victim was becoming a lawyer, it's almost as if she wanted to take this woman's identity. Laura Hall is a cold calculating woman, who I believe is a devil, because only a devil could smile while at the same time discussing the brutal mutilation of a human being. She should serve her sentence and then be put away in a mental institution for life, I say here and now, she is going to do this again. God help whoever her next victim is.

[tendario]

This is what happened:

This is what we know:

We know that Colton Pintonyak was a dissolved into drug abuse, and many young addicts experience a cycle of remorse, craving, escalation, and abuse.

We know that Jennifer Cave also had problems with drugs in the past, but was apparently getting her life together, based upon her recent job acquisition. Perhaps she shared this with Colton.

We know that Colton called Jennifer and reportedly stated that he needed a friend. Perhaps this was when he was feeling a bit of remorse about his addiction and wanted to talk to someone about it, and we know that Jennifer, wanting to help, went to him.

We know that they went out that night and that Colton proceeded to get intoxicated. Perhaps Jennifer was drinking too, but as most addicts are, it is likely that the more Colton became drunk, the less he was inhibited about his addiction to cocaine. We know that he later set up a deal.

We don't know if Jennifer resisted this, but she did originally agreed to meet him to help him. Perhaps, she began to intercede between Colton and the arrangement to but cocaine.

We know that Colton in reference to Jennifer later stated, "That ***** is going to get me arrested!"

We can guess that things escalated out of hand and in a fit of rage, Colton mortally shot Jennifer.

This is where Laura Hall comes in. We know that Laura stated repeatedly that she was "stupid for men," and she repeatedly stated that she was madly in love with Colton. Perhaps Laura was jealous of Jennifer. Perhaps as an act of devotion to Colton, Laura shot Jennifer post hominen, and as an act of repeated hostility and loyalty, stabbed the corpse of Jennifer several times. This Laura did to solidify her alliance to Colton.

Then she drove him to Mexico. As another act of ex post facto devotion, she got his name tattooed upon her.

Laura's statements since then are classic statements of denial. She talks about the cops like they are trying to frame her. She clearly does not like jail. However she identifies with other convicts and complains about the guards. An innocent person would be more likely to state that he or she did not belong with convicts, etc.

Now that she realizes that she is in deep trouble, she is using all of her emotional strength to manage her image, and maintain her "innocence." Interestingly, she uses the phrase, "I'm that Laura Hall," to refer to how the public knows her, but she like many convicts argue that she is a good person, as if what is in her heart is what really defines her. She talks about her time in school and wanting to be a lawyer. She wants people to see "that" Laura Hall.

Thus her speech, lack of remorse, and past actions indicate that she is a dangerous sociopath who will do anything to get what she wants.

[weeselkie]

does anyone know if there is a book on this case?

[bifuna]

WHAT MAKES MAUREEN MAHER THE BEST REPORTER IN THIS MYSTERIES IS THE WAY SHE BALANCES THE STORY BETWEEN ALL THE PARTIES CONCERNED. AND THIS IS ONE OF HER BEST.

[karen7868]

I watched this episode the first time it aired this past January. Is it just me, or did they cut out several things from the first time it aired. I didn''t see the part where she said "that''s just how I roll", nor the part about her handwriting was the one that wrote the list of things for Colton to pick up from the hardware store, hacksaw, Febreeze, etc. If he was supposedly so messed up on drugs, he would not have the sense to come up with things like "Febreeze." I think he took the fall for her on this one. She''s just a psychotic *(&%^& that flew into a jealous rage and killed this poor girl. What person in their right mind would have the guy''s name tatooed on her ankle AFTER the murder???? But I was wondering why they cut these parts out of this episode. Anyone know????

[graceesmom]

This is s bad situation and I believe that Colton might not be guilty. I watched this before when it aired and Laura seemed to have an answer for everything. I think she killed this girl herself because she has a sociopathic personality. I cannot believe she only got 5 years for something so terrible. I hope the victims family is ok. May she rest in peace.

[morilcayes]

I agree with zgomer human behavior is very complex and not too many of us can claim that they understand it perfectly. A trapped animal will do anything to get out of a dire situation. Some individuals are masters of deceit: the pimps are but the extreme of this category.
Again, I am suggesting we look inside of ourselves and see what''s in there. The tendency is to judge and pass sentence without having a full view of the human condition.
We have a part of us that the media, the court system and us as citizens have no clue about, and if we do we choose to ignore it because it is very uncomfortable to bear.
So, before giving Laura 55 years why don''t we study what brings human beings to be the way they are. For when it comes to the fact we are being manipulated this case is the tip of the iceberg.
How many of us are willing to admit that we have not been that innocent in our dealings with lovers, family members, friends and neighbors?

[cmpool1]

55 years.

[cjmyler]

I have a hard time believing that Maureen Maher was able to keep a straight face throughout her interview with Laura Hall. Some of the statements Hall made and some of the assessments she made convinced me that Jennifer Cave''s mother was right -- Hall is a sociopath. I listened to the tape online of the interview Hall had with the police, and she described the situation at Colton''s apartment as if it were a joke, and it is clear she is just not mentally balanced. I don''t buy any of her act, just from watching how she would smile at the camera or make light of things. She knew exactly what she was doing.