PREMIERE

CYNTHIA MCFADDEN'S EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH A YOUNG MOTHER ACCUSED OF GRUESOMELY MURDERING HER HUSBAND, ON THE DEBUT OF "PRIMETIME: FAMILY SECRETS" S

ix-Part Series Airing Tuesdays Premieres June 26 on ABC

"Primetime" kicks off the summer with its latest limited series, "Primetime: Family Secrets." The series goes behind closed doors to learn secrets most families would never talk about, starting with the story of a young mother accused of the gruesome murder of her husband, the father of their two young sons. She speaks exclusively with Cynthia McFadden about why she says her husband was found dismembered in the Chesapeake Bay. "Primetime: Family Secrets" examines the poignant and sometimes shocking secrets of families -- why they keep them, how they keep them, and what happens when the truth finally surfaces. The series premieres TUESDAY, JUNE 26 (10:00-11:00 p.m., ET) and continues on subsequent Tuesday nights (10:00-11:00 p.m., ET) through JULY 31 on the ABC Television Network.

The premiere of "Primetime: Family Secrets" takes up the story and secrets of Melanie McGuire, who three years ago was a well-respected fertility clinic nurse living in New Jersey with her husband, Bill, a computer programmer, and their two young sons. But one night Bill vanished, and a year later Melanie was charged with his gruesome murder. Could she, a petite nurse with no history of violence and no apparent motive, have taken her husband's life? Cynthia McFadden sits down with Melanie to hear what she says were the surprising secrets she and her husband were living prior to his death.

Bill and Melanie were married two years after they met in 1997. But Melanie says slowly things changed, as he began gambling heavily. By 2003, Melanie tells McFadden, her husband was becoming threatening. She recalls that one time, after Bill got a speeding ticket, he called her saying, "When I get home I'm going to kill you. I'm going to smash your face in." But Melanie had her own secret. She was having an affair with a married doctor at the fertility clinic where she worked. Melanie tells McFadden that, despite the fact that she was "deeply in love with him," they never had plans to divorce their spouses because their children came first.

On the night Bill went missing, the couple had just closed on a new $500,000 home. Melanie says that a fight ensued and, "before I know it, I'm up against the wall and then he just smacked me." She says Bill stormed out and she never saw him again.

Prosecutors say that, while virtually no physical evidence and no eyewitnesses link her to the crime, the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming. Melanie told ABC News that, although the evidence is "a mountain� a lot of coincidences� it doesn't mean I did it." But could this nurse have committed such a cold-blooded crime -- drugging, shooting and dismembering her husband? According to her, "the bottom line is, am I an angel? Am I perfect person? Absolutely not. But that doesn't make me a sociopath or a killer."

David Sloan is the executive producer of "Primetime: Family Secrets."