Unsolved Mysteries Season 4: What Happened to Amanda Antoni
What Happened to Amanda Antoni? inUnsolved Mysteries Season 4 has just premiered, and it features new unsolved crime cases, from murders from the 1970s that are still open to some supernatural cases that no one can explain. This season includes the case of the serial killer Jack the Ripper, the legend of the Mothman, the case of a decapitated head, the mysterious death of Sigrid Stevenson, and the murder of Amanda Antoni, which is one of the most disturbing of the season. The case became known as “Body in the Basement” because it all began when a man returned home from a vacation to find his wife’s lifeless body in his own basement. That man was Lee Antoni, and his wife was Amanda Antoni, whose murder happened in 2015 and now Unsolved Mysteries brings it up again.
Unsolved Mysteries Season 4: Who Was Amanda Antoni?
Raised by a pair of loving foster parents and two doting older brothers, Amanda Antoni is remembered as an animal lover and playful prankster with a kind heart. She met Lee in her 20s, and the two got married in 2009. Lee says they were inseparable — the weekend of her death was one of the rare times they were apart. Like many couples, Amanda and Lee had their problems. At one point, Amanda’s brothers report, Amanda was the breadwinner, running a housecleaning business while Lee struggled to hold down a job.
Was Amanda Antoni Murdered?
Castleridge, the neighborhood where the Antonis lived, had a statistically higher level of crime, and transients had at times their backyard to collect recyclables. While investigating the case, police heard from Amanda’s neighbors, who reported that around the time Lee was on the phone with Amanda, they heard a loud barking coming from the Antoni home followed by the sound of yelling. Another resident reported seeing someone running away from the area through a neighbor’s backyard. There were no signs of forced entry, so if there was an intruder, they either entered the house with a key or went through the back door. Lee couldn’t recall if the door was locked or not when he arrived home and let the dog out.
Amanda’s autopsy revealed that blunt force trauma caused Amanda to bleed to death. Despite numerous bruises and a broken right orbital bone, analysis showed that only her DNA was found at the scene. As intruder theories began to seem more unlikely, investigators had to consider the possibility that Amanda’s death resulted from a tragic accident. Her family, however, doubts this theory. For those who loved Amanda, there are too many details that can’t be explained away by the idea that she simply fell down the stairs: an overturned chair in the dining room, a broken piggy bank on the ledge (whose fragments were found embedded into her forehead), and the odd fact that the family dog did not go down into the basement to be with her for almost 48 hours. Perhaps most bewilderingly, detectives know that Amanda stood up at some point after her fall. Her bloody footprints were found at the base of the stairs, but for some reason, she didn’t climb them.
What happened to Amanda Antoni from Unsolved Mysteries?
On October 26, 2015, Lee Antoni headed to the Calgary home he shared with his wife, Amanda, after spending a weekend visiting his mother. Upon arrival, Lee discovered his wife’s body in the basement of the home. The scene was bloody and brutal, so much so that, according to Netflix, Calgary Police Service Sergeant Trent Petersen, who was one of the first officers to respond to the scene, said that “It was the bloodiest scene I have ever witnessed. Frankly, it was horrifying”. Lee told authorities that it was unusual for them to spend their holidays apart, even if they were short, but he said he discovered his wife dead after spending a weekend away on vacation, so his story began to sound suspicious. But Lee had an alibi and could prove that he wasn’t there when his wife died, so they had to rule him out as a suspect.
It was then that the investigation became filled with doubts and questions that seemed to have no answers, as shown in the Netflix documentary series. Amanda Antoni was an ordinary woman, the couple seemed happy and stable, and she even owned a cleaning business, so her murder was especially strange. According to Netflix, Amanda had planned to meet with her husband during the weekend before his death, but she had a migraine on the day she was supposed to leave and that led her to decide to stay home, but keep in touch with her husband through texts and calls. Amanda’s body showed signs of being hit in the head and had other injuries and broken bones, but it was determined that she died from blood loss. But no weapon, DNA, or signs of forced entry were found, which made things more complicated.
One theory was that perhaps an intruder broke in and attacked her, another that Amanda may have had an accident when she fell down the stairs, but nothing quite fit. Lee told authorities that during his last call, Amanda told him she was getting better, but that he then heard a strange noise and the connection went dead, and he was unable to reach her again after that. When interviewing neighbors, authorities learned that they also heard a strange sound, followed by a scream, and then saw a person running, though they did not know if it was coming from the house or somewhere else.
What is known is that Amanda did not die immediately after suffering her injuries, and that detail was very strange, as it raised questions about why she did not go up to the house or why she did not try to call someone for help, so they began to wonder if maybe someone was there with her and prevented her from calling for help. But the neighborhood was safe, Amanda Antoni had no friends, and her husband had no motive to kill her. All of this created more confusion, and it was the result of the fact that it was never possible to determine exactly what happened to Amanda Antoni. In 2016, according to NBC, it was decided that Antoni’s death had been ruled accidental. To this day, Amanda’s family does not believe that was the case.
