Martin MacNeill had a model wife, stellar career and 8 children. Then he met Gypsy online.

Michele MacNeill had been a good wife. A perfect wife, some could say. 

Athletic, good at school, musically inclined and exceptionally beautiful, she was a beauty queen before she met her 'just-as-perfect' husband, Dr Martin MacNeill. 

The pair met in their home state of Utah, at an event for young Mormon singles. 

They married young – just 21 – and quickly started a family. Within five years, Michele had given birth to four children. 

Her daughter, Alexis Somer – who now goes by her mother's maiden name – told the ABC all her mum cared about was her family, her children. 

The couple went on to adopt more children, including three from war-torn Ukraine, making them a family with eight children. 

Meanwhile, Martin had been cementing his stellar career. He was a doctor and a lawyer, and he made sure people knew he was successful. 

Nothing was really wrong with the happy family, until he turned 50. 

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Everything changed in what could be called one of the deadliest mid-life crises. Daughter Rachel said her dad became obsessed with his appearance, losing weight and tanning his body.  

The new efforts weren't lost on Michele either. But when she confronted him asking if there was another woman, he suggested she herself update her appearance, specifically referencing a full face-lift. 

The children said her mother had never been interested in plastic surgery, but her dad found a surgeon and insisted the procedure happen in haste. 

Prior to the surgery, Martin, a doctor, gave the surgeon a long list of medications to prescribe after her surgery – drugs not meant to be taken together. 

The surgeon accepted this direction as Martin was a medical professional himself, and would know how to administer them correctly.

Michele finally decided to undergo facelift surgery, on April 3, 2007.

The next day, Alexis said her mother was in pain, but her father told her to leave the home, that he would handle her post-op medications that evening.

Another day passed and her mother was totally out of it.

Martin admitted to giving Michele too much medicine because she vomited the first round up. Alexis was in medical school, and insisted she administer the rest of her mother's medication during her recovery. 

"She told me, she said, 'Give me each of the pills so I can feel it with my finger so if he tries to give me something else, I'll know what he's giving me,'" Somers told the ABC.

Her mother's recovery continued, but then she said something that made Somers stop in her tracks. 

"She started to cry. She said, 'If anything happens to me, make sure it wasn't your dad,'" Somers said.

Michele is found dead.

On April 11, 2007, Michele MacNeill was found dead in her bathtub, firstly by her young daughter Ada who rushed upstairs to greet her mum after being picked up from school, and then her husband.

A respected doctor, Martin called emergency services, said he was performing CPR and hung up the phone.

When Alexis was told of her mother's death, she immediately thought her father had done it. "I just started driving to the airport and I was just screaming. Just screaming. He killed her. That was my first instinct," she told ABC. 

She even went to count her mother's remaining medication but found it had been flushed down the toilet.

Martin said Michele had died of natural causes – cardiovascular disease – just days after the facelift surgery and authorities believed him. Alexis said the notes on her mother's death were just over two paragraphs long.

Martin hurried to have Michele buried, just three days later. 

But her children weren't convinced. They led a campaign to have Martin's then alleged involvement in Michele's death investigated.

Martin was not a 'perfect husband'.

Alexis' hunch was not based on her medical training alone. 

Before her mother's death, Michele had asked her daughter to procure her father's phone records while he slept. They found one phone number kept coming up, a woman named Gypsy Jillian Willis.

Willis told the ABC that she met Martin online and was aware that he had a perfect life and wife. She didn't want anything serious, and was happy to continue the dalliance as 'the other woman'. 

When Michele died, Gypsy decided to attend her funeral, an event much of Michele's family was forbidden from attending. 

Soon, Martin was positioning Gypsy as a 'nanny' who would look after the younger children, despite daughters Rachel and Alexis offering to do the job. 

Knowing her name and the likely nature of the relationship, Alexis told he dad that he was not to bring Gypsy into the home. In return, he threatened to sabotage her life at medical school. Alexis and Rachel were kicked out of home and onto the street, without any of their things. 

Gypsy moved in. 

But Alexis did not quit. She went to authorities, to every Utah newspaper, and eventually her pressure saw the case reopened for investigation. 

Investigators Doug Witney and Jeff Robinson began unpinning Martin's web of lies. 

It turned out his career was based on falsified transcripts that admitted him to medical school, and that Martin had been fired from the military for claiming he was schizophrenic. He collected $3,000 every month from the Vet Affairs office after that. 

He'd written fraudulent checks and spent extravagant amounts of money. Martin was convicted of forgery and grand theft after he married Michele and had spent time in jail for it. 

After Gypsy moved in, he stole his daughter, Giselle MacNeill's identity after forcing her to move back to the Ukraine. 

Gypsy assumed the identity with social security, ID cards and a birth certificate under the name 'Jillian Giselle MacNeill'. 

He moved the house from Michele's name to hers. 

But Michele's sister found out about the children who were sent back to the Ukraine with no arrangements made for their return – and their shocking living conditions while they were there. 

Eventually Martin and Gypsy were arrested and convicted of identity theft. They were sentenced to jail. 

A murder charge. 

While in jail, the prosecutors continued investigating the murder case and managed to convince the medical examiner to re-examine the toxicology report. 

It showed a cocktail of drugs in Michele's system, and the case was formally reopened.  

Six years after Michele died, Martin was finally put on trial for trying to kill his wife of 29 years. Prosecutors said his motive was to start a new life with his mistress Gypsy. 

The doctor who performed Michele's plastic surgery testified about Martin's excessive prescriptions after the face lift. 

His daughters also took the stand and described how their trust in their father had crumbled as they found out more and more about him. 

Even one of Martin's other mistresses – because yes, there was more than one – took the stand about his disturbing 'pillow talk', in which he said that he could make a heart attack look natural when it wasn't. 

After 22 days in court, Martin was convicted of murder and obstruction of justice in 2013, with a sentence of 15 years in prison. 

Gypsy Willis was never charged with murder and denies knowing about it. 

Unfortunately, Martin wouldn't rot in jail. 

After just over two years of incarceration, he was found dead in his cell, with officials saying he took his own life. 

It was a tragic end to a case that tore a once happy Utah family apart. 

His daughters, however, have gone on to live full lives. Alexis became a doctor, got married and had kids. She successfully adopted her little sisters as well. 

Michele's gravestone has since been amended, removing 'wife of Martin' from her epitaph. 

Alexis Somers told People, "It turns out he was a father we never knew. We grew up loving our dad. But his entire life has been a lie."

Featured image: Released family photo.