The Man Who Loved Christmas

Lester Holt (0:00)

Tonight on Dateline.

James Allen (0:01)

I will never again be able to hug my brother.

Blayne Alexander (0:05)

The three of you are three brothers against the world.

Matt Allen (0:09)

This guy that meant everything to me was worth absolutely nothing to them.

Samantha Allen (0:16)

He knew that he had been struggling and sick.

Clint Burcham (0:19)

He was diabetic, he had some cardiovascular issues.

Lindsay Fleetwood (0:22)

The autopsy report says that he died from natural causes.

Blayne Alexander (0:26)

About nine months after Harold dies, you get a phone call.

Matt Allen (0:29)

He said, we're looking into a burglary at your brother's home.

Clint Burcham (0:33)

We know who that individual is. Starts telling his story.

Stephen White (0:37)

This woman's a psychopath. And I'm telling you guys that right now.

JL McElfresh (0:42)

We started seeing messages by Harold. They had actually done something to make him sick. Putting something in like a margarita, chili, a brownie.

Lindsay Fleetwood (0:51)

They're upset because he's not dying fast enough.

JL McElfresh (0:54)

They start talking about making root beer floats.

Hannah Allen (0:57)

It's just so heartbreaking.

James Allen (0:59)

This was almost a perfect murder.

JL McElfresh (1:01)

How in the world can somebody be that evil?

Lester Holt (1:05)

Murder by root beer float. You've never seen a case like this. I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline.

Here is Blayne Alexander with The Man Who Loved Christmas.

Blayne Alexander (1:28)

There's a saying, it's always darkest before the dawn. And here in this quiet Indiana town, most people were still fast asleep.

But inside one home, two men were hard at work moving through the dark. They had their eye on something and seemed to know exactly where to find it.

Clint Burcham (1:50)

They're drawn to the safe, and he's opening up the safe.

Blayne Alexander (1:55)

Nothing about this break-in felt random. In fact, it was a clue.

A key to a mystery investigators didn't even know they needed to solve.

Hannah Allen (2:06)

We're like, okay, this is weird, right?

James Allen (2:08)

We're small town kids from southern Indiana. You see it in the world, there's crazy stories, but it doesn't happen to us.

Blayne Alexander (2:24)

This corner of southern Indiana is the kind of place where roots run deep. Surrounded by farmland and country roads, it's where the Allen brothers grew up.

Matt is the youngest.

Matt Allen (2:36)

I grew up with two of the best older brothers that you probably could ask for.

Blayne Alexander (2:42)

James is the middle brother. You speak about it almost as if it was a magical childhood.

James Allen (2:47)

It was. It could not be any better of a childhood.

Blayne Alexander (2:51)

And then there was the oldest, Harold, a big guy in personality and stature with a nickname that somehow fit him to a T. Peanut.

James Allen (3:02)

Right. Yes.

Blayne Alexander (3:03)

Where did Peanut come from?

James Allen (3:04)

When he was born, he was kind of a preemie, and his first visit to our grandmother's house, she said he looked just like a peanut, and it stuck.

Blayne Alexander (3:15)

Hannah is married to James. What would your kids call him?

Hannah Allen (3:19)

Uncle Peanut.

Blayne Alexander (3:20)

Uncle Peanut.

Hannah Allen (3:21)

Yeah.

Blayne Alexander (3:25)

Harold worked as a computer programmer and had a passion for music. He taught himself to play. But what you notice most, his family says, his endless generosity.

James Allen (3:35)

He loved through giving, and there wasn't a birthday or a Christmas that he did not make a to-do about, right? Every year, hey, what you guys want for Christmas? We're like, Bob, we're 40, okay?

We don't need Christmas presents. We're good.

Blayne Alexander (3:51)

But for all his strengths, there was one part of life Harold hadn't quite figured out. You've said that Harold, for all of his successes, wasn't typically successful in relationships.

James Allen (4:03)

No. Unfortunately, my brother had a fatal flaw, and that is he somehow equated having a relationship as being successful, as being happy.

Blayne Alexander (4:18)

Samantha is his other sister-in-law.

Samantha Allen (4:20)

I think he was just really seeking love. He was just really looking for that connection.

Blayne Alexander (4:28)

And then, he found it, in perhaps the most unexpected of places, his 30th high school reunion.

Matt Allen (4:35)

I thought it was odd that he met somebody because, I mean, his graduating class. Yeah, it was like probably 70 people.

Blayne Alexander (4:42)

So you're thinking, how did you not already know everybody?

Matt Allen (4:44)

How are you just meeting?

Blayne Alexander (4:46)