of Amie Harwick The terrified roommate frantically called 911 late on Valentine’s Day 2020 to report being attacked in her Hollywood Hills home in Los Angeles.

“I was down. I heard screams. I know she’s under attack. I heard her go to the ground,” Michael Herman told 911 dispatchers.

When officers arrived at her home around 1 a.m. on Feb. 15, they found Harwicka popular Hollywood sex therapist, on the ground, outside the house, under a third-floor balcony. He had defensive wounds on his hands and arms. The glass doors to the front yard were broken. The black beads from her crucifix necklace were scattered around her room. And a syringe filled with a mysterious liquid was found on her balcony. She died in hospital a few hours later.

“She was, you know, somewhat of a celebrity,” former CBS reporter Leyna Nguyen said at A plan to killaired Sundays at 7/6c on Oxygen True Crime. “At one point she was engaged to Drew Carey, who was the host The price is right.”

As police spoke to family and friends of the 38-year-old victim, it quickly became clear who the prime suspect in her murder was.

“During our interviews with Amie’s friends, several of them told us that Amie had suspicions that Gareth was stalking her,” LAPD Homicide Detective Scott Masterson said on A plan to kill.

Gareth Pursehouse45, was Harwick’s ex-boyfriend. Even though the two broke up eight years before her death, police said he terrorized Harwick before her murder and that she even predicted her own death.

“She was really worried at that point,” said Harwick’s friend Robert Coshland A plan to kill. “She said, ‘If anything happens to me, it’s him.’

Amie Harwick and Gareth Pursehouse’s romance turns into a nightmare

Amie Harwick and Gareth Pursehouse dated from 2009 to 2012. They met at a party in Hollywood while she was working as a hostess to pay her way through school.

“He was really cool, fun, smiley,” Grace Stanley, Harwick’s friend, said A plan to kill. “It was one of the nightlife shots. It was very clear that he was taken by her. Because he would always want to take lots of pictures of her.”

But Harwick’s friends told police there were red flags in the relationship from the start.

“Amie and Gareth lived together and he was very possessive of her,” Harwick’s friend Marcy Mendoza said on A plan to kill. “He wanted to know where she was at all times. Who was she with? He was always checking his phone.”

The relationship was also abusive. Harwick filed a police report in May 2011 alleging Pursehouse choked, choked, kicked, punched and pushed her, as well as slamming her head into the ground.

“This relationship between Amie Harwick and Gareth Pursehouse ended with her obtaining a restraining order against him,” said Victor Avila, Assistant District Attorney for the LA County District Attorney’s Office, on A plan to kill.

But that restraining order did nothing to stop Pursehouse from continuing to terrorize Harwick. Within a month, she thought he had moved into her new apartment.

“It was very specific. Picture frames were broken,” Stanley said. “And her laptop was wiped.”

But there was no evidence to prove Harwick’s theory.

“She tried to go to the police and they said, ‘Well, there’s no proof it was him,'” Mendoza said. “She was terrified.”

A meeting between Harwick and Pursehouse prompts him to plot her murder

A month before she was killed, Harwick ran into Pursehouse while attending the XBiz Awards in Los Angeles, and he was a red carpet photographer.

“Amie hadn’t seen Gareth in eight years. And when he was on the red carpet, he noticed him taking pictures,” Coshland said. “When he saw her, he walked right up to her and started yelling and screaming at the top of his lungs: ‘You’ve ruined my life!'”

Even though he had changed his phone number, the next day Pursehouse began contacting Harwick again.

“He kept texting her. He left voicemails. Like just crying,” Stanley said. “And finally he had to block it. And again, she feared for her safety.”

Police believe Harwick blocking Pursehouse pushed him over the edge.

“The theory is that once Gareth Pursehouse was locked up, detectives believe he prepared and began planning her death,” Avila said. “All these actions show that he was going to punish her in some way for rejecting him. And that he figured out how to do it.”

Police piece together how Gareth Pursehouse killed Amie Harwick

Harwick’s roommate, Michael Harmon, told police he was out with friends on Valentine’s Day. He remembered waking up around 9:00 p.m

“Michael told us he thought Amie came home and dropped a plate or a glass or a plate or something,” Masterson said. “He didn’t think much of it.”

But police believe that’s when Pursehouse broke down the front doors and went into the house to wait for Harwick. Blood was found near the broken glass doors. An FBI analysis showed the blood matched Pursehouse’s DNA.

At this point, a neighbor’s back camera also showed a man wearing gloves and a cap and moving the camera. It fit the overall structure of Pursehouse.

“It shows his forethought and event planning,” Masterson said. “Has he been there before? Most likely. Because he knew exactly where he was going to jump the fence.”

Police then developed a theory about what happened.

“She laid in her bed and waited for Amie to come home,” Masterson said.

Harmon told police he woke up a second time around 1 a.m. to the sound of Harwick screaming and ran to get help. The unknown man was seen on camera climbing back over Harwick’s fence and running away at that time.

“So for me, that was the biggest moment,” Masterson said. “It is very likely that he targeted and planned his entry and exit.”

FBI analysis revealed that the syringe found in Harwick’s home was filled with liquid nicotine – a poison that is difficult to detect. A similar syringe was found in a search of Pursehouse’s home.

“Gareth’s master plan would have been to inject her and make Amie disappear, and nobody would have been the wiser,” Masterson said.

But her autopsy showed that Harwick was never injected with a poison.

“So now it looks like he couldn’t inject them,” Nguyen said. “His plan failed. And he resorted to violence.”

“He grabs her and rips the necklace off her neck,” added Masterson. “Gareth is suffocating her. She is fighting for her life. I think he picks her up… he went to the edge of the balcony and just dropped her at the back of the yard.

Police gathered more evidence when Pursehouse was arrested just 14 hours after Harwick was killed.

“He had scratches on his neck, chest, arms,” ​​Masterson said. “He had a big bruise on the inside of his bicep. It looked like a bite mark to me.”

A jury agreed with the prosecution and found Gareth Pursehouse guilty of the first degree murder of Amie Harwick. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

“I think Gareth decided to do this on Valentine’s Day on purpose,” Assistant District Attorney Catherine Mariano said. “I think Gareth decided to kill Amie Harwick on a day that symbolized love and couples. And I think it was poetic justice in his opinion.”

Watch all new episodes of A plan to kill Sundays at 7/6 on Oxygen.