I didn't feel like I should sign away my children. I would do whatever to fight for my children. You never told me that I wasn't going to have the boys,'" Perez recalls.Īnd if she chose to fight, they made it clear they would use Shawn against her. "'I said 'Scott will have custody of the children but you would have liberal visitation.' She just basically yelled out 'What!' and looked at Scott and said, 'You never told me that. Just one day before the shooting, Scott took Traci to Perez's office, and blindsided her with a plan. The detectives also learned that Scott had hired divorce attorney Nat Perez. It was the very same hospital where Scott died from the gunshot. These problems led detectives to the other man, Shawn Michaels, the unit secretary at the hospital where Traci worked. It was also what they learned that day about the final weeks and hours of Scott Rhode's life, including the marital problems. It was not only Traci's behavior that aroused the suspicions of Lucio and his partner, Detective Thomas Clipper. I'm sensitive to the smell of blood and I just had my hands up there and I just walked over to the kitchen sink and I just ran hot water over my hands and I just stood there crying." "I just could smell blood," Traci explains. What was she washing off? Gun shot residue? "Who would be thinking about 'I need to call work so they can get a replacement for me at work today because my husband got shot'?" Lucio asks.Įven more troubling to Lucio was that Traci had washed her hands in front of a police officer. "She's a nurse, but she gave no first aid to her husband whatsoever and the reason she says she didn't give any first aid was because she was in shock," Lucio says.ĭespite the shock, Lucio says she had the presence of mind to call work and say she wouldn't be coming in. Lucio says there were all the ingredients of a classic murder plot: a love interest, jealousy, and a pretty, young wife who was behaving suspiciously. Within hours of responding to the Rhode home, Brownsville Detective Sam Lucio's investigation changed course, as the focus shifted from attempted suicide to a possible homicide. The truth, they say, is that she committed cold blooded murder. "He was very upset, and he just looked right through me and said 'You have no idea what you've just done.'"īut police didn't buy any of Traci's story. Somebody is paying attention to me," she says. "And I said for the first time in my life, there is somebody. In the heat of the moment Traci blurted out her feelings for Shawn. I was shocked, but yet it was good to have somebody pay attention to me," she remembers.Īnd then, one week later, Scott confronted Traci in their bathroom, once again accusing her of cheating. "We just stood there talking and then he gave me a hug to leave and he kissed me. One afternoon they arranged to meet in a parking lot to talk. His name was Shawn Michaels, a co-worker. It was in Brownsville, far away from friends and family, that Traci really did meet somebody. They finally ended up in Brownsville, Texas in 2003. There would be stops in Maryville, Tenn., Kennett, Mo., and Batesville, Ark. She says Scott was so afraid of losing her to another man he moved the family five times in 13 years. To me, it was worth working out," she says.īut according to Traci, Scott didn't make things any easier. "As bad as our bad times were there were still good times. Traci says she stayed in the marriage because she loved Scott. Where the hell have you been?' And he said he went looking for me so he could show our children what a tramp they had for a mother. 'What happened? What happened? Is everybody OK?' And he's screaming at me, 'You tramp. As I'm calling the emergency room thinking the worst, I hear the garage door open and I go running out to the garage. She remembers one awful night when she had to stay a few hours late at work to help deliver a baby. Kant says there was no way Traci had an affair with any of these doctors.īut there was no convincing Scott, says Traci. "She would always tell me that Scott was saying she was cheating and having an affair with the different doctors that she worked with." She was almost like a possession," notes Raina Kant, who along with her husband Kyle, has been close friends of the Rhodes for years. But Traci says there was another side to Scott which was slowly destroying their marriage: she says he was very jealous and often accused her of having affairs. The Rhodes seemed to be the picture-perfect family, with Scott being the picture-perfect dad. The couple had three sons, Shane, Nicholas and Dalton. Scott put himself through college and became an engineer Traci would go on to become a nurse, specializing in birth and delivery care. The couple married in 1990, only a few years after Traci graduated high school.
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