On May 6th, 1996 Michael Dally reported his wife, Sherri Dally, missing. She was last seen in a Target parking lot in Ventura County, California, being arrested by a woman and placed in the back of an unmarked vehicle. The person that witnessed this had not realized that this woman was not a real officer but just a random individual in a costume.
Once the police received this information, they looked through any records they had and as they were looking they soon found out that there was no record of this arrest. At this point, it was starting to seem more like an abduction rather than an arrest. With all this newfound information, the detectives made their way to Michael Dally to do a little bit of questioning. Michael had a solid alibi so it seemed unlikely that he had abducted Sherri, but when the detective asked him if there was any information they should know, Michael revealed that he had a girlfriend. When asked more questions about this girlfriend, such as her name, address, and phone number, Michael claimed he only knew her first name but he did have her phone number. After further investigation, the detectives identified the girlfriend as Diana Huan.
Diana’s address was soon found and the detectives made their way to her house. Upon the police’s arrival, Diana tried to act like she was not home but since they had her phone number they decided to try and call her. She answered the phone and the police instructed her to open the door. She opened the door wearing very promiscuous clothing and, to the detective’s surprise, Michael Dally was also found inside her house. This seemed very suspicious. Although Michael made it clear that he had a girlfriend, it was odd that he was spending time with this girlfriend rather than trying to help find his missing wife. The police then took both Michael and Diana down to the station for further questioning.
After questioning, the police found out that Diana had been Michael’s long-time mistress and, at one point, he had moved in with Diana for around 5 months. Sherri had known about Diana and obviously she was upset about it, but when Michael decided to move back in with her, she was happy and felt like she had to do whatever she could to get him to stay, so she decided to start working out and wearing makeup. Unfortunately, Sherri had been so emotionally tormented in this relationship that she felt like she was the problem and she needed to be better so her husband would stay with her. The police also discovered that the day Sherri had gone missing, Diana had that day off from work, but nothing about her day seemed too out of the ordinary besides the fact that she mentioned a very long bike ride she decided to take.
Many families and friends volunteered to search for Sherri. She was really loved and trusted in her community. However, Michael did not participate in these searches. The most he did was put up posters in front of buildings. Soon, the police started searching for the unmarked vehicle that Sherri was last seen getting into. The car was a teal Nissan Altima. They were able to track down the vehicle. It was a rental car. When the rental company was asked about the car, they said the car was rented on the day Sherri had gone missing and when it came back there were signs of a struggle inside the car, the rearview mirror had been completely knocked off, and there were some small stains, but the company cleaned it up and still rented it to the next person. After inspecting the car, the police found a variety of evidence such as blood stains soaked into the carseat and some blonde hair strands which were all sent to be tested. Then they had to find out who this car had been rented to and after looking at the report, it was revealed that the person who rented the car had been none other than Diana Huan.
This information secured Diana the position of main suspect in this case. Once again, the police took her back into the station and, after some more questioning, they weren’t really getting anywhere until Diana heard Michael’s voice. Michael had gone into the station to ask some questions and once Diana heard him she asked if she could see him. The police took them into the same room to see if anything would happen and when they rewatched the video footage they heard Diana and Michael whispering to each other. Michael started feeding Diana lines to say and she would just follow his lead. The more Michael reassured her, the more Diana believed him and believed she did nothing wrong.
The police then arrested Diana but, unfortunately, the judge decided there was not enough evidence against her so she had to be released. This wasn’t the worst thing for the police, because the case had received a ton of press now, which would mean more tips would be coming in. One major tip they received was from a beauty supply shop owner who claimed that Diana had purchased a blonde wig from them a few weeks prior. Another tip the police received was from a prop store owner who claimed that she had purchased items such as a police badge, handcuffs, and other police props from them. The last major tip they received was from a local Kmart that claimed Diana had purchased an ax from their store. Along with all the information, the hair that was found inside the rental car came back from being tested and it turned out that it wasn’t human hair, it was synthetic. All of the evidence made it clear that Diana had been involved with the disappearance of Sherri Dally, but neither her or even a body had been found yet.
Most were confident that Sherri was not alive anymore, but they still needed to find the body, so they decided to look back into the rental car records and they saw that the car had only been driven around 120 miles during 3 days. This made it slightly easier to search as they now had a certain perimeter to base the searches off of. Eventually, after 4 weeks, the search team found a pair of sunglasses next to a ravine and one of Sherri’s close friends identified them as Sherri’s sunglasses. The search team made their way down to the ravine and once they reached the bottom they found the shorts and skeleton of Sherri Dally.
The police now had enough evidence to rearrest Diana Huan for not only the kidnapping, but also the first-degree murder of Sherri. The police came to the conclusion that, as stated by Tracy Wilson from the Los Angeles Times, “She had been beaten and stabbed, and the medical examiner said she may have been beheaded.” With Diana now arrested, the police needed to find a way to arrest Michael Dally, but this would be much harder since he had a solid alibi. Soon, multiple people had come forward claiming that Michael had been their drug supplier, so not only was he living 2 separate lives with Sherri and Diana, but he also had a third life as a drug dealer. Immediately after this was discovered, a girl came forward saying that after Sherri had gone missing, Michael had invited her to do some drugs and other activities with him and the spot he took this girl to was the ravine where Sherri had been found.
Michael and Diana had now both been arrested and they had to have separate trials. During Diana’s trial she stuck with the story that it was all Michael’s idea and he brainwashed her. The jury did not believe this and Diana was found guilty and convicted. According to Rebecca Reisner from ForensicFilesNow.com: “spectators watching a feed of the decision outside the courthouse broke into cheers.” Most were ecstatic to see justice being served for Sherri Dally. Michael’s trial followed the same path and multiple witnesses testified against him, but there was one star witness. It was his ex-girlfriend. She revealed that when they were together, Michael asked her if she knew anybody that could torture and kill his wife. Michael was then found guilty on multiple counts.
Diana was sentenced to life without the chance of parole and Michael faced the death penalty, but was eventually sentenced to life without parole and he was ordered to pay Sherri’s family $15,000. Unfortunately, this left Sherri’s children without either parents, so they were sent to live with their grandparents. Speaking about Sherri and Michael’s son Devon, Rebecca Reisner from ForensicFilesNow.com said: “...he believes his father is innocent. Devon also said that Sherri was a great mother and he remembers life with his parents as happy.” It is unfortunate that something as awful as this had to happen to someone so undeserving. Hopefully, Sherri’s story will never be forgotten.