Is there a new episode of Dateline this week (April 4, 2025)? Explained 

Dateline returns with a new episode on NBC that dives into one of Kansas’s most talked-about murder cases on Friday, April 4, 2025, at 9 pm ET. The story dates back to 2002 when Mike Sisco and his fiancée Karen Harkness were found shot to death in Topeka. The Dateline episode is called Deadly Obsession, and it traces the twists and turns that have kept this case alive for over two decades.

At the centre of it all is Mike’s ex-wife Dana Chandler. She was first convicted in 2012, but that verdict didn’t last. In 2018, the Kansas Supreme Court tossed it out after finding serious misconduct by the original prosecutor. CBS News revealed that in a report dated September 1, 2022.

Chandler went back to court in 2022. That trial didn’t stick either because the jury couldn’t agree. However, the third time around, it was different. In March 2025, a jury in Pottawatomie County found her guilty. According to WIBW’s April 3, 2025, report, she’ll be sentenced on June 3, 2025.

This week’s Dateline features Andrea Canning on the ground as the episode pieces together years of courtroom drama, testimony, and emotional fallout from both sides of the case.

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A new Dateline episode, Deadly Obsession, airs April 4, 2025, at 9 PM ET, covering the 2002 Topeka double murder of Mike Sisco and Karen Harkness

NBC’s Dateline returns this Friday, April 4, 2025, with a new episode titled Deadly Obsession, which investigates the long-running case of Mike Sisco and Karen Harkness, who were murdered in Topeka, Kansas, in July 2002. The episode airs at 9 pm ET and revisits the legal developments and controversies surrounding Dana Chandler, Sisco’s ex-wife, who has now been convicted three times in connection with the case.

The Dateline episode explores how the case unfolded over more than two decades, beginning with the murders of Sisco and Harkness, who were found shot multiple times in bed inside Harkness’s home on July 7, 2002. According to the Oxygen report dated September 2, 2022, authorities initially lacked physical evidence tying anyone to the crime scene. Despite this, Chandler was eventually arrested in 2011 and convicted in 2012.

However, Chandler’s conviction was overturned in 2018 due to prosecutorial misconduct. As per a CBS News report dated September 1, 2022, the Kansas Supreme Court found that lead prosecutor Jacqie Spradling had made “made-up” and “misleading” claims during the trial, including allegations that Sisco had obtained a restraining order, which did not exist.

The overturned conviction led to a second trial in 2022, which ended in a hung jury. CBS News reported that jurors deliberated for six days but could not reach a unanimous decision. The state proceeded with a third trial in 2025, held in Pottawatomie County due to concerns over pretrial publicity. Chandler chose to represent herself during this latest proceeding.

According to the WIBW report dated April 3, 2025, Chandler was found guilty by a jury on March 7, 2025. Her sentencing is scheduled for June 3 at the Shawnee County Courthouse, with a motion hearing preceding it on April 16. Chandler has attempted to file for a new trial, citing the "prison mailbox rule," arguing she submitted her motion on time despite it being filed late by corrections staff.

Throughout the case, prosecutors have argued that jealousy and obsessive behaviour motivated Chandler to kill her ex-husband and his fiancée.

“They've learned there's one person that has motive to have committed these crimes. And that was Dana Chandler,” as per CBS News, on September 1, 2022, Deputy District Attorney Charles Kitt told the jury.

The defense has maintained that no direct evidence places her at the scene and raised concerns over investigative tunnel vision and missed leads.

This Dateline episode features correspondent Andrea Canning and includes interviews with family members, legal experts, and witnesses involved in the years-long investigation.

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Stay tuned for more updates.