Killings in 'the biggest little city'

Victoria Corderi Correspondent • Profile

RENO, NEV. -

Reno is a little city with a big, gritty reputation as a 24-hour-a-day mecca for divorce, gambling and prostitution, and every so often a mighty storm blows in off the majestic Sierra Nevada Mountains. Some say it's Mother Nature's way of washing clean the sins of the city.

There was a storm of a different sort brewing in the spring of 2006. And for a little city that's seen it all, this was something big.

Victoria Campbell: I've been working in Reno for more than 20 years. And I have to say this is probably the biggest story I've covered.

It’s a dramatic story that stunned Reno and garnered nationwide headlines: a sniper-style shooting and a brutal murder, allegations of a cover-up, corruption, coercion, and an unbelievably wild ride through the criminal court system. It was the kind of storm this town will not soon forget, and it all started with an unhappy couple looking to get a divorce.

Victoria Campbell: This divorce, on a scale of one to 10, I'd rank it at about a 12.

It was an epic and bitter divorce, a relationship that ended in rancor, but began with hot-blooded romance.

It was the spring of 1994. Darren Mack, then 33, had been riding high in his career. He’d taken over Palace Jewelry and Loan. The pawnshop was a profitable landmark on the Reno strip. Darren’s brother, Landon.

Landon Mack: He just loved the family business.

Victoria Corderi, Dateline NBC: And he was good at it?

Landon Mack: Yeah, he was very good at it.

Victoria Corderi: What made him a good businessman, do you think?

Landon Mack: His honesty, his integrity.

Landon says Darren was a great motivational speaker who was part of a self-help organization.

Landon Mack: My brother has always had a pull to help people. And that gave him a vehicle to express that in a very large way.

In May of 1994, Darren Mack took a trip to Los Angeles to speak at a seminar. It was there that he first laid eyes on a younger woman named Charla. Charla's brother, Chris.

Chris Broughton: She was vivacious. She was energetic. She had a way about her that commanded presence and she had what-- it is commonly called a big personality.

Soorya Townley: She was magnificently beautiful. And when she would walk in a room, people sometimes would gasp because she was-- of her beauty.

Charla was a petite, 27-year-old brunette who ran a floral arranging business in L.A. She too was passionate about self-help education and loved to sing country music.

Her mother Soorya and her brother say Charla thought the divorced Darren seemed like the ideal guy.

Chris Broughton: He was accomplished. He was secure and stable. He already had two children. He seemed to be a good father to them. She was also attracted to him physically.

The following summer the couple got married in an intimate ceremony in nearby Lake Tahoe.

Chris Broughton: It was very obvious that they were deeply in love.           

Victoria Corderi: And you thought they had good chances, then?

Chris Broughton: Oh, yes, absolutely. I was so happy for my sister. I--

Soorya Townley: I thought that was it.

But Soorya says her daughter's marriage was dramatic and stormy right from the start.

Soorya Townley: It was right away. They were fighting. Very big and loud and dramatic and emotional.

Victoria Corderi: Big fights and then big, passionate making up?

Soorya Townley: Correct.

Victoria Corderi: And so, that was part of their passion together?

Soorya Townley: That was their passion.

A passion that wore thin. Soorya says a few years into the marriage, Charla decided to leave -- until she found out she was pregnant.

Victoria Corderi: What was her reaction?

Soorya Townley: Well, it had been unplanned. And that was when she knew that she was going to make the marriage work.

So Charla stayed, and soon after the birth of their baby girl, the Macks moved into a million-dollar mansion. They had elaborate family get togethers, fancy cars, and lived prosperously.

But Charla's mother says behind the fancy facade, this marriage was falling apart and Charla's desperation to make her husband happy took an ugly turn into a sordid world.

Soorya Townley: Darren came in and gave her an ultimatum. Right after the birth when she was still nursing, he said, "You either do this or I'm leaving you."

Victoria Corderi: Do what?

Soorya Townley: Swing.

Swinging...opening up their marriage to sex with strangers. Soorya says Charla and Darren began taking trips to adult resorts in places like Jamaica... went to strip bars and experimented with the club drug, ecstasy... all in the name of saving the marriage.

Soorya says Charla went along but became unhappy with the kinky lifestyle.

Soorya Townley: She just put her foot down-- finally and said, "I don't wanna do this anymore." And, that's when they started having serious problems.

Darren’s brother says Soorya's version of events is a lie, that Darren Mack never forced Charla into anything.

Victoria Corderi: As far as you were concerned, they were both on the same page?

Landon Mack: Yes. Oh, absolutely they were on the same page. It was a mutual consenting deal.

Landon Mack says Charla was not a frightened victim but a woman with her own demons, which included a violent temper.

Landon Mack: I watched Charla hit my brother so hard it knocked him over a bar table in a disco.   

Landon Mack says his brother's marriage continued to deteriorate until Darren finally moved out in the fall of 2004. In February 2005, Charla filed for divorce, a move that would land them in Judge Charles Weller’s courtroom -- and at each other's throats in a blistering battle over money.

Judge Weller: This is the case of Charla Mack versus Darren Mack.

Early in the proceedings, the judge ordered Darren to pay Charla more than ten thousand dollars a month in temporary alimony and child support. But Mack said he couldn't and afford it and declared bankruptcy. Charla's lawyer claimed Mack was far from being bankrupt and said Mack was making $44,000 dollars a month at the time and was hiding money and assets.

Attorney Shawn Meador: In my opinion, this court has to do something to impress upon Mr. Mack that he doesn't get to do just whatever he wants.

Mack vigorously denied that was the case.

Darren Mack: I was given an impossible situation, that is why I filed bankruptcy, your honor. I wasn't just saying, "Oh, I don't care about what you say." I was talking to my attorneys trying to figure out how we could do motions, "How do we deal with this? I can't pay it."

Judge Weller was not sympathetic. He came down hard on Mack.

Judge Weller: My inclination is to give your guy till Friday to pay all the money that he owes or to put him in the Washoe County jail.

Landon Mack claims from the moment his brother stepped in the courtroom, the judge had it out for Darren.

Landon Mack: From the very first meeting Judge Weller was going-- had already made a ruling that Darren was wrong, Charla was right.

As the divorce raged on, Landon Mack says his brother's hatred of the judge intensified. During that time Darren met and began a relationship with a woman who claimed she too had been mistreated by Judge Weller.

Alecia Biddison: Everybody loses in family court matters. But, I think what he felt as well as what many others feel is I'm not losing in any fair way. Decisions are being made without considering all the facts, all the evidence.

Alecia Biddison was on a mission, lobbying state legislators for judicial reform in family court. She says she found a kindred spirit in Darren who was searching desperately for someone to intervene in his court case.

Alecia Biddison: And he went to people saying, "Look at my case. Look at what's going on. Look at how these decisions are being made. Somebody intervene and help."

Landon Mack: He went to State senators. He went to judges. Pleading that he's being absolutely unfairly handled in the family court system.

Judge Weller: Some of Mack's apologists appear to have divorced themselves from reality in order to maintain their support for him. They have made similar outrageous attacks on me, other judges, and lawyers involved with the case. These attacks on the judicial process and those of us who administer it have been shown to be false.

In a statement, Judge Weller said that those who believe Mack’s allegations against him "appear to have divorced themselves from reality in order to maintain their support" for Mack. He wrote that "attacks" against his conduct and against others involved in the judicial process "have been shown to be false."

Darren Mack had even sought help from his old friend, Dick Gammick. The local prosecutor had counseled Mack during his first divorce a decade earlier.

Dick Gammick: This one was really getting under his skin. Really obsessed with it. To the point of that's about all he could talk about.

On May 24, 2006, Judge Weller was ready to make a final ruling in the Mack’s divorce.

Judge Weller: I can only pick one side or the other, and one of you has to lose.

Tensions between the couple were at an all-time high. Charla told the judge she was afraid to give Darren her new address.

Charla Mack: He gets so angry and so ripped up, that I don't feel comfortable him knowing personally where I live.

Darren accused Charla and her attorney of twisting the truth to get their way.

Darren Mack: Over and over, they lie, lie, lie.

In the end, Judge Weller ordered Darren Mack to pay Charla more than a million dollars, nearly $500,000 now, and $10,000 a month for the next five years. The judge's assistant Annie Allison recalls that day clearly.

Annie Allison: And I do remember judge coming back from that hearing looking at me, saying, "That guy gave me the look of death."

MORE FROM CRIME STORIES

Crime stories Section Front

Deadly intentions Murder on the mind Death and the millionaire drifter The stripper and the steelworker Man's obsession with college student turned deadly Mystery of the murdered millionaire Killings in 'the biggest little city' The secret life of a soccer mom Mysterious death at Pictured Rocks Park Inside the murder trial of Neil Entwistle Crime stories Section Front   Add Crime stories headlines to your news reader: