The True Story Behind Netflix's The Widower and the Many Wives of Thomas Randolph

On the evening of May 8, 2008, Thomas Randolph called the Las Vegas police, alerting them to a disturbing incident. "My wife has been shot," he informed the dispatcher, adding that there was a man in his home and he had shot him. That night, Randolph and his sixth wife, Sharon Causse, had attended a Mother's Day dinner. After returning home, Randolph stayed in the car while Sharon went inside by herself.

Shortly after, an intruder, wearing a ski mask and carrying a bag of jewelry, opened fire, fatally shooting Causse. Hearing the gunshot, Randolph reportedly entered the house, telling police that he found Sharon bleeding on the floor. In a moment of reaction, he retrieved a gun and shot the intruder multiple times, killing him before clearing the house and contacting the authorities.

At first glance, the case seemed straightforward; however, as detective Dean O'Kelley delved deeper, inconsistencies emerged. For instance, why was the intruder's ski mask found on the garage floor without any blood on it? Why were multiple rounds fired in the hallway yet no bullet casings were present? Additionally, a neighbor had heard gunshots at 8:33 p.m., but Randolph's 9-11 call did not come until 8:45 p.m. The following day, Dan Slepian, a veteran Dateline NBC producer, learned about the murders from O'Kelley's colleague.

Intrigued, he proposed to Slepian and O'Kelley that they should investigate this case further. Slepian and O'Kelley embarked on a 15-year journey that would eventually expose the truth about Randolph, a former paralegal who had received life-insurance payouts after three of his previous wives died under suspicious circumstances.

Known as the "Black Widower," Randolph had managed to escape two death penalty convictions, continually evading the legal system for as long as he could. The new Netflix documentary, "The Widower: 'Til Death Do Us Part," directed by Chris Smith and executive produced by Tiger King, delves into this extensive investigation, featuring real-time footage of interviews with Randolph, witnesses from across the country, and family members of his victims.

As Slepian explained to TIME, "Normally, the more you investigate, the closer you get to an answer. This investigation did the exact opposite. Every answer widened the frame. Another marriage, another state, another death, another witness. And that's when I realized that what we were covering wasn't just a single murder case, but a pattern that had been unfolding over decades."