Did a woman kill her stepdad after finding explicit photos of herself on his computer?
CBSN
It was Dec. 15, 2020, when Jade Janks' stepfather, Tom Merriman, was admitted to Scripps Hospital in Encinitas, California, after a bad fall in his home. Two-and-a-half weeks later, Merriman would be found dead in his own driveway under a mound of trash. "48 Hours" correspondent Tracy Smith investigates the mystery of what happened to him in "Jade Janks and the Secret Photos," airing Saturday, Oct. 14 at 10/9c on CBS and streaming on Paramount+.
Janks first met Merriman when he married her mother when Janks was 14, and Janks says they stayed close, even after his divorce from her mom. After Merriman's death, Janks said of their relationship, "He would call me his daughter and I would call him my dad."
Janks moved next door to Merriman in April 2020 during the height of the COVID pandemic. In an interview with Smith after Merriman's death, their neighbor Ramona Hamilton said of Merriman and Janks, "I invited him for dinner, and he said, 'No, I always eat with my daughter.' And he called her his daughter."
