by Keith Morrison, Dateline NBC correspondent

Eric Volz is a nervous man.  Understandably so, too, given the nightmare he has been living through.  Has been - is still - living  through.

So on the morning we meet for the second time, he is driven the short city block from New York's Today Show studio to Dateline's interview facility. He's accompanied by his mother, step-father, and a young woman who has been acting as a publicist for the family (together, these three generated and kept alive the international pressure that helped Eric win his freedom).  All of them greet us warmly, and all, especially Eric, wear the look that says this isn't over.

I'll back up a minute. The first time I met Eric he was the best-known inmate of the Modelo Prison, a huge maximum security institution not far from Managua, Nicaragua.

He'd been sentenced to 30 years, convicted by a Nicaraguan court of  murdering his one-time girlfriend, a striking beauty named Doris.  The killing was particularly shocking for its extraordinary brutality, and Doris's mother, as well as many people in her town, and one of
Nicaragua's most popular newspapers, appeared determined to ensure Eric was held responsible.

In fact, after one of his court hearings, a local mob chased him through the streets of town, intent on - well, we don't know what. After Eric's parents hired security guards to protect him, rumors circulated in Nicaragua that Eric's people were trying to bribe their way to an acquittal.  And, in spite of clear and convincing evidence that Eric was hours away when the crime occurred, he was convicted.
 
So, to say that Eric was living through a nightmare was, if anything, something of an understatement. 

His imprisonment lasted 15 months, while promise after promise of an appeals court review came and went without result. Then, just in time for Christmas, Eric was finally freed, after the appeals court judges agreed he simply could not have committed the crime.

But it was not a man who wore a look of contented relief who joined me for our second visit, back in New York.  For one thing he was, he said, tired... though gaining strength every day that he's free.  He quibbled with the inclusion in our first report of a portion of his interview which made it seem, he felt, as if he'd behaved as a bit of a jerk toward Doris.

This time he went out of his way to repeat how sorry he was that the loss of Doris has not played a larger roll in his story. His demeanor seemed to me to be that of a man who has been on a campaign somehow extended beyond its expected end.  He worried about the fate of the appeals judges. Reports in Nicaragua suggest that one of them, at least, has been threatened, and an official investigation has been launched to reconsider their decision.

Does that mean Eric will become a wanted man? Will he been tried again, this time in exile?  Will he ever again be able to travel in Central America?  The morning of our meeting, those questions were clearly eating at him.
 
So, when Eric told the story of his experience in that prison, he seemed to be hampered by an odd 'disconnect,' as if he is still unable to face those memories, at least until he knows the end of his story.

It was only when he read from his prison diary that his daily trials somehow came alive.
 
Will he write a book?  Someone already has, he said, and without talking to Eric at all!  Will there be a movie?  He doesn't know.  All questions to be addressed later, said Eric Volz and the family who surround him, after the long, strange, campaign for freedom is done.

by Hoda Kotb, Dateline correspondent

You never know quite what to expect when you sit down to do an interview. So when Drew Peterson took a chair opposite me, I'll be honest:  I wasn't sure what was coming.

I knew his backstory well.  My producer Sue Simpson had provided me with information, news articles, police reports, autopsy reports.

His life did seem complicated -- when it came to women. This was a police officer with almost 30 years on the Bolingbrook Police Force.  He'd been married four times. His first three marriages ended in divorce; after he split from his third wife, she was found dead in her bathtub and his fourth wife, Stacy, was now missing.

I wondered if he was the unluckiest man on earth, with two of his four wives either missing or dead, or if there was more to the story. What would he tell me? 

Drew Peterson walked into the room. He had just finished an interview with Matt Lauer on the TODAY Show and was ready to sit in the chair opposite me.

He seemed calm. Collected.  I'd watched Matt's interview with him and he hadn't shown any emotion then although he gave lots of information.  I was expecting something similar.  Our camera crews and soundmen were all set up and ready to roll.

In the beginning, we talked about the media and how loud it was in front of his house in Bolingbrook, Illinois. He told me he was tired of  the generators from the TV live trucks going non-stop; he hoped this interview would put an end to the media chase.

He talked about Stacy: how they fell in love, the courtship, his proposals and their kids.

He also talked about the 30-year age gap, saying he had talked it over with Stacy,  adding that it was "exciting" to  have a young, beautiful woman interested in him.

Some of the things he said stood out including his description of how he pampered Stacy.   He got her, in his words, " a boob job. She wanted a tummy tuck, she got that. She wanted braces, lasik surgery, hair removal ... anything. ... we did all these repairs on her."

Then at one point in the interview he seemed overcome by emotion. He actually got up, left the interview area and said "I'm sorry. I need a minute."  He stood off-camera for a bit, composed himself and sat back down.

I wasn't clear what brought that emotional wave on, so I asked him.  He said, "Different things touch me off." And I when pressed him, he indicated that he'd been remembering Stacy's emotion at the time of her sister's death.  "Because it hit her very hard," he said.

He also told me that people didn't understand him: that he was a guy with a good sense of humor, a man who had tried to live an honorable life and worked hard to provide for his family, a man who was now being unfairly portrayed by the media.

Near the end of the interview, I asked him if he had anything to do with the disappearance of his fourth wife Stacy or the death of his third wife Kathy. He answered "no" to both questions.

Then Drew Peterson left the room and I was left with my original thought: you just never know what to expect when you sit down to do an interview.

Click here 'Deadly Suspicion,' the full Dateline NBC story about the case, including photos, a timeline, audio and documents.

 

In her first interview since the final chapter of the Harry Potter series went public, J.K. Rowling revealed the secrets she could never previously discuss to TODAY's Meredith Vieira in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Rowling covered all topics including the rationale behind her plot choices;  the character she saved and the ones she decided to kill later in the writing process; what Harry, Hermione and Ron are up to these days; her plans for the future; and the way Harry Potter has saved her own life.

Meredith's interview with Rowling airs both this morning and Friday on TODAY and in a one-hour Dateline special this Sunday.

But to give you a little taste, allDAY talked to Meredith about the most poignant moments in the hours she spent with Rowling.

allDAY: So, after all you read about Jo going into this interview, what surprised you the most?

Meredith: I had read that she was not an easy interview; I think "aloof" was the word I read.

But I found her very much the opposite.  I found her warm, I found her charming.  I found her protective of her material, but not proprietary.

In so many other interviews she had to be guarded.  There was still this whole series and she didn't want to reveal secrets before now.

allDAY: There were a few really delightful off-camera moments with Jo and the children during the interview.  Did any of those in particular stand out for you?

Meredith: She asked how many of us had gone to the last page first and a few of us raised our hands and she said, "How could you!," (as an author would).  She was teasing the kids.

I love that she was so protective of them during the interview.  She didn't want to spoil this book for anybody.  That spoke a lot to Jo, the person, not just the author.

allDAY: While she was quite concerned about not spoiling the book for anyone during the portion of the interview when the children were present, you also got a chance to speak with her one-on-one when went into more detail about the book and also spoke openly about her own life.  What struck you about that portion of the interview?

Meredith: She talked about Harry saving her, financially, and him being her touchstone for 17 years, that's important.

She also said her biggest regret is not telling her mother about Harry.  At the end of the day her biggest regret is that her mom never knew about the books, and if she had she would have been at every book opening, every signing.  That was such a lovely moment.

allDAY: It was a story about her mother that actually brought you to tears at one point when the cameras were off….

Meredith: Yes, she had been talking about her mom having MS and a case where she declined very rapidly.  I starting talking to her about my husband having MS and I just connected with her on a special level.

We were just talking about the strength of character of people dealing with illness – not the caretaker, the person with the illness – and I felt a bond with her.  Then I was embarrassed because I started crying a little.  I said I didn't mean to cry, and she said, "Don't worry, I'm usually the one crying!"

allDay: Of all the things she talked about – and she talked about a lot! -- what are you most excited to share with the TODAY audience?

Meredith: I think they're going to be most excited to know why she killed off who she didn't, and the choices she made throughout the series. 

For more coverage of Meredith's interview with J.K. Rowling, click here.

By Joe Delmonico, Dateline Producer

Let me be candid:  I was predisposed not to like these guys. 

You see, I am not a royal watcher.  Quite the contrary.  It's always been hard for me to care about the doings of people who were born into immense wealth, guaranteed admission to the finest schools, and assured of a lifetime of total privilege, comfort and security, without having to earn any of it.  William and Harry don't just automatically go to the head of the line—they never see the line.  How can they possibly have insights that are relevant to those of us leading normal lives?  And aren't they so programmed to always say the right thing that they're incapable of the spontaneity that makes an interview interesting?

Add to that the inherent hassle of interviewing such people.  It's nobody's fault, just the way it is.  For example, you can't interview two princes just anywhere.  Their representatives decided the interview should take place at Clarence House, which is the official London residence of the Prince of Wales.  It's a lovely old building with manicured gardens and a courtyard where there's a footprint reputedly left by Henry VIII.  Clarence house also has security cameras watching your every move, machine guns on the roof, and guards who wear those very photogenic red coats and beaver hats and carry very impressive assault rifles.  We were cautioned – only half in jest-- not to stray too far from the area assigned to us, lest bullets start flying.

Also for reasons of security and the princes' comfort level, the palace representatives required us to severely limit the size of our crew and radically simplify our usual lighting setup.  (The fact that this ancient building has ancient wiring also argued in favor of the fewest lights possible.)  We all of course underwent the usual background checks, and all our camera and lighting gear was gone over by bomb-sniffing dogs.

All the while I am asking myself: for what?  So we can interview a couple spoiled kids with nothing much to say?

Then the interview started.

Matt mentioned that Princess Diana has always wanted the boys to lead as normal a life as possible.  Would she think they were doing a good job?

Harry jumped right in:  "I think she'd be happy in the way that we're going about it, but slightly unhappy about the way other people were going about it, as in saying: 'Look, you're not normal, so stop trying to be normal.'"

William soon interrupted: "You may be abnormal.  I'm pretty normal,"  which made everybody laugh. 

So the tone was set: surprisingly forthright answers, leavened with humor.  Harry in particular impressed everybody who saw him in person or has seen him on tape.  Over the years he's managed to get himself photographed in more than one awkward situation, and has mostly been portrayed in the media as a party boy and a loose cannon, even a bit of a lout—and he knows it. When Matt asked the brothers to describe each other, Harry offered that William is "definitely the more intelligent of the two of us, which I'm sure is the next question!"

Yet the Harry we met seemed thoughtful, straightforward, and genuine.  He provided what was to my mind the most poignant moment in the interview. 

Speaking of about his mother, Princess Diana, Harry said, "You know when people think about it they think about her death.  They think about how wrong it was. They think about whatever happened.  I don't know for-- for me personally whatever happened you know that night.  Whatever happened in that tunnel.  No one will ever know.  And I'm sure people will always think about that the whole time."

"Have you stopped wondering?" asked Matt.

Harry responded, "I'll never stop wondering about that," and the look on his face showed he never would.

Right about then I had the belated realization that despite their vast wealth and immense privilege, these were two guys in their twenties dealing with some enormous and universal challenges: their mom's death, not to mention the messy divorce that preceded it; their dad's remarriage; the normal twentysomething issues of romance and career choices and the occasional boneheaded behavior at the local bar.  The huge difference of course, is that since William and Harry were infants every one of these dramas large and small played out on a world stage, with, as William put it, "all eyes on."

One of the classic setups for storytelling is putting ordinary people in extraordinary situations.  The fact that William and Harry seem so very normal, coupled with the fact that their life situation could not be farther from normal, means that at the end of the day, despite my misgivings, they do have a story to tell. 

Hope you enjoy it.

Watch the full interview on Dateline, Monday at 10 p.m. on June 18. Click here for preview video, which aired on TODAY this morning.  Click here to read a Q&A with Matt Lauer about what it's like to talk with the Princes.

by Josh Mankiewicz, Dateline correspondent

This will be Paris Hilton's eighth night behind bars, probably the most-discussed jail term ever.

Monday on "The View," Barbara Walters talked about the phone call she received from Hilton, who's in the medical ward of the L.A. County jail.

Harvey Levin, TMZ.com: She's doing better.  She's adjusting to it.  She's still fragile.  But I think, just psychologically, from what I'm hearing, she's not this ping pong ball anymore.  She knows she's going to be at this facility for awhile. 

Last week, Harvey Levin's TMZ.com was reporting Hilton was disintegrating under the pressures of incarceration...saying she'd become sullen, withdrawn...a train wreck....and being visited by her psychiatrist.

That set up last Friday's tug-of-war between a sheriff who sent her to home detention and a judge who wanted this Hilton back in the crossbar hotel.

What's also astonishing about this case is not just the attention it has received, but the venom it's generated. Browse any Internet board—you'll find a legion of posters wishing Ms. Hilton a long, unpleasant stay in the hands of the law.

It's not just the blogosphere—one Web site is selling "Paris Go Away" T-shirts.

And while she's a familiar target in the late-night cross hairs,  the huge audience reaction to any mention of her plight is so enthusiastic, it's become predictable.

Why do people care so much about her fate? Is it because she's seen as an emblem for young Hollywood, living fast, loose, and out of control? Or is it simple class warfare, a rage against the rich? Either way, a simple legal two-step, a release from custody into home detention, Became, in the public's mind, a deal with the devil in a city of angels.

Harvey Levin: It was like throwing stones in, you know, the old Roman town.  Everybody felt part of it.  Yeah, she's getting it.  I mean, there was a lot of anger toward her because they've seen her get away with things.  That's wrong, but that's the way a lot of people felt. 

Over the weekend, the heiress issued a statement saying she would not appeal her sentence, even after she and her family, and her attorney first protested it as being unfair.

Harvey Levin: This judge was a jerk.  There was absolutely no basis for what he did.  Nobody gets this kind of punishment for what she did.  He punished her for who she is, not what she did. 

But keep in mind Hilton's original sentence of 45 days follows this arrest by the LAPD last September for driving under the influence, for which she received probation, a fine, DUI classes, and lost her right to drive.

Then there were two more police stops, each when she was driving under a suspended license. To top it off, she was late to court.

Attorney Lawrence Taylor, who literally wrote the book on DUI legal-defense work says Hilton's attitude is what really worked against her.

Lawrence Taylor, lawyer: She came in and instead of being contrite and suggesting that she might be sorry for what she did and that it will never happen again, instead said essentially that it was not her fault and blamed some other people, her handlers, whoever those were.  That's not the kinda thing you say to a judge after you've just violated probation three times.

Hilton has regularly been depicted as being neither especially virginal nor cerebral. Today Barbara Walters quoted her as saying she's no longer going to play dumb.

That act, if that's what it was, was on full display two years ago when the LAPD interviewed Hilton as a witness in an unrelated criminal case.

So tonight, Paris Hilton is on a prison diet, and says she's learning a bitter, important lesson.  She also says she's shocked that so much public and media attention is being paid to her...instead of to the soldiers serving this country in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It's probably the first time she's ever asked for the world's attention to be focused elsewhere.

Click here to watch the video of the Dateline report.

In a rare television interview, Angelina Jolie sits down exclusively with NBC News' Ann Curry to discuss her upcoming movie, "A Mighty Heart," in which she plays Mariane Pearl, the wife of Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter who was murdered by terrorists in Pakistan in 2002. Click here for a transcript.

In a separate interview, Brad Pitt talks to Curry about his behind-the-scenes role as a producer in "A Mighty Heart," which is produced by his Plan B shingle in conjunction with Revolution films.  Dede Gardner and Andrew Eaton, two producers of the movie, will also join Pitt in the interview.

 

The interviews will air on NBC News' "Today" and "Dateline NBC" Wednesday, May 23.

by Keith Morrison, Dateline correspondent

It was a perfectly sunny L.A. afternoon, a charming curb-side restaurant right there in the sweet spot of the Sunset strip, lunch with a couple of members of an extremely exclusive club.

And one of them popped up and was across the place — and back — before I quite understood what was up.

"______," she told me, sitting down again.  "He was the guy in the Paris video..."  THAT Paris video.

A friend of hers, apparently.  Or was he?  As we had been discovering, the tight little world inhabited by the people who show up week after week on the covers of tabloid magazines is not quite the bright wonderland lots of us like to imagine.

Behind those velvet ropes, our lunch companions told us, it's a sometimes dangerous world, inhabited not just by the famous or the wanna-be famous, but by dark characters, bottom feeders and bad boys intent on making use of those very faces you see on the tabloids.

Our purpose, when we started, was to look into a terrifying home invasion robbery way up in the nosebleed section of Bel Air. I mean, way up.  Nancy Reagan's neighborhood. Homes so expensive you can't even see them, in there behind their hand built gates, up their hedge-lined private driveways. 

The victim of this robbery is a celebrity himself:  Joe Francis, the man behind a ridiculously profitable moral quagmire called "Girls Gone Wild."  Joe has been flogging his videos - college girls lifting their tops for the camera, playing sex games with each other, etc, etc - long enough to have built a boy's dream of a lifestyle. 

Here is a partial list of Joe's toys:  private jets (two), Bentley, Ferrari, the really nice house, other big house across the country, a place in the Caribbean.... and... friendships with people who are famous.

Like Paris Hilton.  Who says, the second Joe's name comes up, "He's NOT my ex-boyfriend."

But did she know who got into his house one night, tied him up, threatened to kill him, forced him to make a video apparently aimed at making him look gay?

And thus, from our curiosity about a robbery, we found ourselves drawn into the bizarre world of Hollywood night life.

We listened to Paris call herself "like, not that smart." We heard her memory improve remarkably...  after a sandwich.

What's it like behind those Hollywood velvet ropes?

Next time you find yourself in a check-out line and your eye is drawn to some ultra-famous party girl — or boy — splashed on a tabloid cover and you wonder, just for a second, how cool it must be to live in that world... you might remember this simple definition of celebrity life, from an L.A. County prosecutor named Hoon Chun: "Its a jet-set version of high school."

The Paris Hilton tapes previously aired on Dateline in September of 2006. An update of the report is supposed to air this Sunday, March 4, 7 p.m.

by Josh Mankiewicz, Dateline correspondent

This week, two strange soap operas attracted an audience of millions. On TV, on the Internet, and in print, the sagas played out. And depending on how you see all this, you can choose your own storyline -- women gone wrong, women done wrong, or girls gone wild.

Singer Britney Spears, more than accustomed to headlines for her sexy onstage persona, found her image publicly deep-fried for behavior that could only be described as very troubling. She took a one-day trip to a drug and alcohol dependency center, then she stopped off at an L.A. salon and, seemingly on a whim, she shaved her head. Then, that same evening, she made a pit stop for a couple of tattoos, followed by another spin through the revolving door of rehab after her ex- threatened to take her to court over the kids.

For Harvey Levin of TMZ.com, the Internet encyclopedia of celebrities-in-crisis, Britney needs help. "Her family knows she needs help.  And the world knows she needs help.  And you know what?  She probably knows she needs help too."  

Anna Nicole Smith needed help as well, but she either didn't get it, didn't want it, got too much of it... or got it from the wrong people. That might be the curse of being beautiful, vulnerable, and constantly on the verge of being hugely wealthy. The result was that long, bizarre hearing we all saw unfold in a Florida courtroom.

The model and actress didn't have much of a career, but it wasn't her body of work that was being litigated -- it was her body, the one that made her so famous.

And 13 days after Anna Nicole Smith's death, the local medical examiner warned she was literally decomposing as her companion, her mother, and her ex-boyfriend argued about what would be done with her. It was a hearing awash in both theater and regret with Smith's estranged mother on the stand remembering her daughter's addictions.

She tried taking her daughter to the Betty Ford center. But the former Playmate of the Year didn't last in rehab. 

And so far, the former Mouseketeer seems at best ambivalent.

We talked to author and talk-radio host Dr. Drew Pinsky, an expert on addiction and the nexus between public fame and personal agony.

"People that are driven to be a celebrity, by definition, have very high incidence of what we call, 'cluster-B personality problems,' particularly narcissism," says Pinsky.  "Lots of trauma in childhood, lots of substance and alcohol use.  This predicts, guarantees more addiction and more chaos in their relationships."

So is the common theme here drugs or alcohol? Or maybe fame-- living with it and trying to hold onto it? And don't forget money. Men are lining up to claim the paternity of Smith's infant daughter who may be soon a millionaire.  Britney Spears' hair is for sale on the Internet. It's all enough to make you want to turn your head away...or at least, to tell people you do.

There's a kind of hypocrisy in this country, isn't there?  I mean, people will tell you, "Oh, I can't believe you spend so much of your time following Britney around."  And then the minute there's a story, they want to know about it.  They're clicking on TMZ.  And they're buying the latest magazine.

For Levin, it's not unlike watching accidents. "It's the same principle."

More of my conversation with Harvey Levin:

Mankiewicz: But what's our responsibility here, yours and mine?  We both, to some extent, make our living covering these people, and fueling this interest.

Levin: I mean, I don't apologize for covering it. These are celebrities who court publicity.  They want their lives covered. It's a door they opened. I mean, you can't say to me, "I open the door but I'm having a bad hair day, so this door gets shut today."

And lately, for a young woman who only a couple of years ago was at the top of her game, it's been one long bad hair day.

Levin: I think she is viewed as a dark figure, which she never was before -- a troubled person. She's not this darling anymore.  I mean, honestly, I think it's pretty amazing that Kevin Federline looks like the stable one. These women are not our royalty. They lead lives few would envy.  It turns out that when that door to fame opens, it sometimes opens to a lot of other things as well.

Mankiewicz: It was different when the studios ran Hollywood.

Levin: Totally.  Totally different.

          Mankiewicz: Certain things just didn't get reported.

Levin: Most things didn't get reported.  Hollywood looked like the perfect place, where people had the perfect marriage, the perfect looks, the perfect children, and nobody ever had a substance abuse problem.  And nobody committed a crime.  And everybody was happy, happy, happy.

Now, we get everything we always wanted to know...and so much more. And all of it's a sad, painful, and sometimes embarrassing lesson about our stars, ourselves, and the vapor trail of celebrity.

Even though the life of Anna Nicole Smith was defined by tragedy and high drama, the news of her death still came as a shock.

Controversy and scandal, success and failure trailed Anna Nicole from the moment she came into public view — make that full view — as a Playboy centerfold 15 years ago.  Her sudden and still mysterious death today is a final ironic chapter for a woman who modeled herself after her idol, Marilyn Monroe.

And this week, it may have been one of the strangest court battles you've ever seen: Since the death of Anna Nicole Smith more than two weeks ago a battalion of lawyers has been fighting over her final resting place.

Meanwhile, another fight is raging over the question of who fathered Smith's baby girl, an infant who could inherit millions.

But it was the complex and often colorful court battle over Smith's remains that riveted the nation over the past few days. Click here to read the Dateline report on the legal drama. Click here to read the interesting quotes from Judge Seidlen.

Use the comments section, below, to share your thoughts on the death of a centerfold.

In dramatic display, pop princess Spears shaves her head and gets a couple new tattoos.

Dateline is watching this story. Last year, before her divorce, a defiant Britney spears took on the tabloids in an interview with NBC's Matt Lauer.

Weigh in and sound off on her new look (slideshow here.) Can fame drive celebrities over the edge?

 

On Dateline Saturday, we reported on the life and death of Anna Nicole Smith. Included in the 3-part report was an interview with Trim Spa CEO Alex Goen, a close friend of Anna Nicole and Howard K. Stern.

In the interview, Goen revealed that Smith's house in the Bahamas was broken into, but that the baby is safe and that Anna's will is in Stern's hands. 

Here are a few more quotes from that interview.

On how Howard is doing
GOEN: First 12 hours or so, he was sobbing non-stop, having difficulty catching his breath.  I mean, and understand he lost his wife.  He lost someone that he catered to for the last, almost 15 years of his life.

On the house getting broken into
GOEN: Thank God Howard was very clever. In fact, when Anna passed, he recognized that Dannielynn could be somewhat unsafe in the house, even though she was in very good care—told the people watching the baby—who are very close friends of Howard's—actually family members—to take the baby to an undisclosed location for safety… He made sure Dannielynn Hope was completely secure.

I found out the house was broken into.  And many, many items have been taken from the house.  And  Howard has to deal with a house that's been broken into-- who knows where that-- the materials are going to end up?  

On the baby
GOEN: She's safe.  And she's at a private location.  And I think the best thing for her safety is to keep it private.... The baby is not a public person, hasn't made a decision to be in the public spotlight.... I'd rather just say that the baby is safe.  Howard is very concerned about the baby.  And Howard called this one right.  He called it right.  You have to say in a very tragic situation he made sure Dannielynn Hope was safe.  And thank God he moved the baby outta the house that got broken into.

Does Anna have a will?
GOEN:  Think about this.  I mean, if the will was at the house and nowhere else, whoever broke in could've had the will.  He did have the will in another location as well.  And there's, I'm sure, other issues along those same lines that he has to deal with. You know, everybody says you should have duplicate set of documents in different locations.  Even lawyers should probably know that.  But I mean, how many people do that?

On suspicions around Howard
GOEN: I just ask that people give him number one, the benefit of the doubt and number two-keep him in their thoughts and prayers.  Just think about how difficult it must be for him. This was a person that was not only a caring person and loving, he went overboard when it came to his care and love and protection of Anna.  So, for there to be an allegation that he could have something to do with this-- I think it's very unfortunate.

Comments from Dateline viewers have been a mixture of suspicion about Stern, frustration with the media, and thoughts and prayers for the late centerfold. Click here to read some of what's been said.

What did you think of Matt Lauer's interview with Miss USA Tara Conner? Does she deserve to keep her crown? How do you feel about her realizations on alcoholism and recovery?

Sound off here.