4 things to know about the Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk case

While fleeing their home country on a rented plane in 1982, Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk and his girlfriend Dianne Babcock went through a devastating plane crash. Babcock was found strapped to the passenger seat of the aircraft's debris at the bottom of the lake, but there was no sign of Ambrozuk. Later, he was charged as authorities believed he was responsible for his girlfriend's death.

Twenty-four years later, a Google search led to the arrest of a man named Michael Lee Smith, who was eventually identified as Ambrozuk. Authorities believed all those years ago, he fled the crash scene with money and clothes, leaving Babcock to die and started a new life under a different identity.

An episode on Dateline: Unforgettable revisits Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk's shocking case. The episode, titled At the Bottom of the Lake, airs on Oxygen this Thursday, June 1.

The synopsis of the episode reads:

The Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk case: The plane crash, his disappearance, and 2 other key details

1) Ambrozuk and his girlfriend had planned to start a new life in the US

Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk, 19, crashed a rental aircraft into Bitterroot Lake in Montana in August 1982 while attempting to flee Canada with his 18-year-old girlfriend Dianne Babcock. The aircraft was later found at the bottom of the lake with the latter's dead body strapped to the passenger seat.

The pair was trying to leave their home country and move to America to start a new life. But after the crash, Ambrozuk left his partner to die as he swam out of the lake with his clothes and £10,000 from Babcock's savings account, which she had taken out to pay for their life in the US. He then disappeared while a manhunt for him ensued in both Canada and Montana.

2) Authorities claimed that Dianne Babcock did not sustain grave injuries in the crash

Authorities said that the suspicious circumstances surrounding the accident were what first drew their attention to the case. The first red flag, according to them, was the aircraft that was meant to fly from Penticton, British Columbia, to Vancouver, but somehow ended up being found at the bottom of Montana lake.

Moreover, back in 1982, when authorities first arrived at the crash site, Babcock's corpse was still inside the plane strapped to the passenger seat. They found that she had not suffered serious injuries in the collision and that her seat belt was not jammed, as per claims Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk later made.

3) Weeks later, Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk called a friend and told him about the incident before disappearing

Ambrozuk failed to report the plane crash or get help for his drowning girlfriend after it happened. Instead, he took the money and clothes, ran away, changed his address under a fake American passport, adopted a new identity, and got a new social security number. After he vanished, a manhunt was initiated both in Canada and Montana. The fugitive was also charged with negligent murder.

Investigators claim that in the weeks after the crash, Ambrozuk called a friend and told them how he was able to swim out of the wreckage, but couldn't help Babcock because her seat belt was allegedly jammed.

Following this, he disappeared without a trace and only resurfaced two dozen years later owing to a Google search.

4) Ambrozuk was arrested in Texas 24 years after the incident

Two dozen years later, in August 2006, authorities in Montana received a crucial call from a woman who claimed to have met a man named Michael Lee Smith via a lonely hearts ad.

She claimed that they initially exchanged a few emails and when they met in person, the man pretending to be Smith revealed his true identity as Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk. She looked up his name on Google and learned of the case.

This information allowed law enforcement to arrest Ambrozuk in his upscale Plano, Texas, residence, where they found a £38,000 Dodge Viper car in his driveway and a pool in his garden. He had a phony social security number, a US passport, and owned a software firm.

Jaroslaw "Jerry" Ambrozuk's decades-old case features on Oxygen's Dateline: Unforgettable this Thursday.

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