Angela Diaz worked with her husband, Ian Diaz, to frame his ex in a bizarre stalking and rape plot
Credit: Courtesy of Netflix; Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office
It seemed to be the story of a love triangle gone wrong: A woman says she was stalked and threatened with rape in her own home. A months-long police investigation ensues. An alleged stalker is arrested. Except none of it was true — and the real perpetrator behind the madness wasn’t who anyone suspected.
Married couple Ian and Angela Diaz started it all when they called the Anaheim Police Department and accused Ian’s ex-fiancée, Michelle Hadley, of sending violent, threatening emails in the summer of 2016. While police thought they had properly handled it by the end of July when they arrested Hadley, more secrets started coming out that blurred who was actually behind all the chaos.
Netflix’s true crime documentary A Toxic Love Story, which premiered on July 23, dives into the case with unseen footage and interviews. While there was a lot of media coverage surrounding the story at the time, producer Emma Supple told Netflix that “much of what happened took place behind closed doors.”
“It quickly became clear that the reality was far more complex than the headlines had suggested,” Supple said. “As the film progresses, viewers gain access to new information that reveals a far more complex truth than first appeared.”
Here’s everything to know about where Angela Diaz is today.
Hadley was arrested after Ian and Angela framed her
Credit: Courtesy of Netflix
In June 2016, the Anaheim Police Department showed up at the Diaz’s condo to address their concerns that someone under the email address “Lilith is truth” was emailing Angela threats.
The name has Biblical undertones and refers to a theory that Adam (of Adam and Eve) had a first wife named Lilith, who committed adultery with Satan and transformed into an evil being who kidnaps children.
The couple told the police that they suspected Hadley, a woman Ian had been engaged to in 2015. In turn, the police offered Angela the option to file a restraining order against Hadley, but said they couldn’t arrest her.
Over the next few weeks, the couple claimed they kept getting emails despite a no-contact order they had filed. One email told Angela that Lilith had contacted someone on Craigslist pretending to be her and accepting the poster’s request to fulfill a rape fantasy at their condo, per NBC News.
On June 24, 2016, Angela called the police claiming that someone broke into their home and tried to rape her. Anaheim police put the pieces together and believed the attack came from the Craigslist ad, giving them enough cause to arrest Hadley, according to NBC News.
After her arrest, Hadley faced the possibility of life in prison for felony counts of attempted forcible rape and stalking.
Angela was arrested in January 2017
Credit: Courtesy of Netflix
While Hadley was in jail, Ian called his best friend Leslie to tell her he had grown suspicious that Angela wasn’t actually pregnant with twins, like she had told him.
The two searched the condo and allegedly found pregnancy tests in Ziploc bags and believed Angela had faked the positive results, per the District Attorney of Orange County.
In A Toxic Love Story, Leslie said this was the point when she started to doubt Hadley was behind the emails to Angela.
“Is Angela the victim or the perpetrator?” Leslie asked herself.
Angela was arrested on Jan. 6, 2017, and pleaded guilty to all charges, including fraud, false imprisonment and falsely reporting a crime.
After 88 days, Hadley was freed from prison, per NBC News.
“There are a lot of misconceptions about what happened to me,” Hadley said in A Toxic Love Story. “And until you really understand it through my eyes, you don’t know anything about my story and why what happened to me happened.”
In their ongoing investigation, prosecutors realized Angela had lied about much more than the pregnancy and the emails. As also included in A Toxic Love Story, Angela had lied to her ex Jason Rayburn and their community about having cervical cancer and being an attorney.
Ian was arrested in May 2021
Credit: Courtesy of Netflix
A few years later, Jason Higley, a Department of Justice special agent, was asked to investigate the case because Ian was a U.S. Marshal. Higley is part of a team that is required to reexamine all cases involving Department of Justice employees, according to A Toxic Love Story.
While reviewing Anaheim police interviews and body camera footage, Higley said in A Toxic Love Story that he noticed Ian being “a bit anxious” when answering basic questions. In some conversations with the couple together, “It sounds to me as if Ian is trying to coach Angela,” Higley said. “It certainly makes me think that Ian is involved.”
Higley decided to reach out to Hadley to talk about her relationship with Ian. Hadley recalled feeling pressured to follow Ian’s demands in their relationship, and claimed that he installed security cameras throughout their home.
“I have never felt fear like that before, like I was a hunted animal,” she said she told Higley.
Hadley’s retelling of her relationship with Ian made Higley wonder whether “Angela might have only been a passenger, and that this was Ian’s scheme.” After investigating Ian’s Marshal-issued devices, it became clear that all along, Ian had been behind the Lilith emails.
“This is Ian pretending to be Angela pretending to be Michelle,” Higley said.
“To me, it boils down to Ian wanting to control someone,” he added. “He wanted to control Michelle, and she got away, and that got him angry. So he designed a scheme to frame his ex-girlfriend. In my view, Angela Connell [her maiden name] was a perfect partner because she craved empathy. Angela loved portraying herself as a victim, and Ian exploited that.”
On May 13, 2021, Ian was arrested. He pleaded not guilty to all charges but was convicted of cyberstalking, perjury and obstructing a federal proceeding. He received a sentence of over 10 years and declined to participate in A Toxic Love Story.
Where is Angela now?
Credit: Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office
After pleading guilty to kidnapping, false imprisonment by menace, fraud or deceit, forgery, possession of a forged check over $950, perjury and grand theft, falsely reporting a crime to a police agency and falsely reporting a crime to a peace officer, she received a five-year sentence, per ABC7.
In court, District Attorney Tony Rackaukas said, “Even while pleading guilty, Diaz showed no remorse, compassion, or empathy for the victim. We hope the resolution of this case brings some closure to Ms. Hadley so she can move forward in her life.”
According to Oxygen, Angela was released from prison in July 2020 and completed her parole a year later.
She did not participate in A Toxic Love Story.
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