What happened to Annastasia Diane Hester? NBC's Dateline set to explore horrific Gresham murder case

NBC Dateline's episode titled The Undoing will focus on the gruesome homicide of Annastasia Hester this Friday, May 6. Its duration will be two hours, and it will closely inspect the murder of Hester, stabbed multiple times.

According to Josh Mankiewicz of Dateline, the program will focus on the investigation into Hester's murder and the suspects and possible motivations that emerged. Gresham Police Detective Aaron Turnage, Hester's sister-in-law Dyanna Holmes, Hester's former roommate, husband, and others will be interviewed.

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What happened to Annastasia Hester?

Annastasia Diane Holmes, sometimes known as "Ann," was born in Gresham, Oregon, a suburb of Portland, in 1981 and grew up there. After her father's death, she was left in the care of her mother and stepfather.

As a teenager, she was a big fan of tabletop role-playing games and used to frequent Gresham gaming stores. She met fellow gaming fan Matthew James Keone Hester there.

Annastasia and Matt met in high school, fell in love, and married in 2008. Their daughter was born in November 2011. Ann dearly loved Matt and desired to be a homemaker, mother, and wife, but her marriage quickly fell apart.

They experimented with having an open marriage as long as they were honest about their affairs, but that turned out to be a complete failure.

Ann then discovered that Matt had cheated on her at least once, violating the restrictions they had established, and she began talking about filing for divorce. In 2012, Ann and Matthew finally signed the papers.

Being a single mother who needed to provide for her young daughter, Hester worked at a call center in downtown Portland and moved into a one-room apartment in Gresham with her daughter. While she received full custody, Matt promised to co-parent with her peacefully.

Matthew Hester took in a roommate, Angela Rose McCraw, a single mother with three children, to share the rent with. In 2014, Matthew and Angela married after just a month of dating.

The former started demanding more time with his daughter after marrying again. While Ann still wished to peacefully co-parent with her ex-husband, that didn't happen.

Annastasia called Gresham 911 in the early morning hours of June 10, 2016. Scared for the safety of her life, she frantically reported that she had been attacked in her apartment.

Within minutes, the first responders came. According to KATU, a Portland ABC affiliate, she was immediately rushed to a nearby hospital, where she was ultimately pronounced dead. As per Gresham Police Detective Aaron Turnage,

"The stab wounds ranged in penetration depth from about half an inch to about eight inches. The knives pierced all the vital organs."

Per a news release from the Multnomah County District Attorney, Annastasia died of homicidal violence after being stabbed over 60 times. The location of Ann's daughter was ultimately discovered after her death. She was having a pre-arranged visitation with her father.

After extensive investigation and interviews, Angela McCraw-Hester was arrested and charged with aggravated murder and first-degree burglary in October 2017 after her DNA was found on one of the murder weapons.

During questioning, Matt stated that his second wife arrived home covered in blood the night of Ann's death. He claimed that he only assisted her in cleaning herself up, didn't ask any further questions, and that he had nothing to do with the murder.

Matthew Hester was arrested in the summer of 2019 and charged with one count of solicitation to commit murder, two charges of criminal conspiracy to commit murder, and one count of impending prosecution.

Don't forget to watch The Undoing on Dateline this Friday, May 6.