“Jerry Springer” Guest Won Legal Victory Against Her Cheating Ex and His Mistress. Hours Later, He Murdered Her
“Jerry Springer” Guest Won Legal Victory Against Her Cheating Ex and His Mistress. Hours Later, He Murdered Her
Angela AndaloroSat, April 18, 2026 at 12:00 AM UTC
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Jerry SpringerCredit: Ralf-Finn Hestoft/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty -
Nancy Campbell-Panitz was murdered by ex-husband Ralf Panitz, just hours after their episode of The Jerry Springer Show aired
Nancy believed that Ralf was coming back to her when she was brought on the show, only for him to reveal he had married his mistress
Nancy's attorney, Lisa Kleinberg, appeared in ID's Hollywood Demons to discuss what went wrong on that fateful day and how it could have been avoided
A Jerry Springer Show confrontation that led to murder came just hours after the contention could have been over for good.
The incident between Nancy Campbell-Panitz, ex-husband Ralf Panitz and his mistress-turned-spouse Eleanor Panitz played out on an episode of the controversial talk show. Nancy was brought to the show believing Ralf was breaking the news of their reconciliation to Eleanor, only to learn that he'd married his mistress and was staying with her instead.
In the docuseries Hollywood Demons on ID, Nancy's attorney, Lisa Kleinberg, tells her side of the story. "What Nancy had told me was, she was going to be told that Eleanor was out of the picture and that her and Ralf were going to reconcile, which is not what happened."
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Nancy Campbell-PanitzCredit: Jerry Springer Show
Nancy's attorney says she made an appointment about Ralf before the episode aired and that there had been domestic violence in their relationship in the past. Court documents indicate that Nancy had filed for a restraining order in both 1998 and 1999.
"There had been acts of domestic violence in the past. He's threatened to kill her, and he had threatened to hurt her. He did actually batter her and hit her and shove her, in the past," the attorney explains.
Things came to a head when Ralf feigned reconciliation with Nancy, only to move Eleanor into her home, leaving Nancy "kicked out of her house and living on the street, in her car."
That's where Kleinberg stepped in, "To get Ralf out of the house."
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Jerry Springer talking to a guestCredit: Ralf-Finn Hestoft/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty
"On the morning of July 24, 2000, on the day Nancy was killed, we went to court for a hearing on the petition for protection against domestic violence, which is pretty much synonymous with what we would call a restraining order. The judge granted Nancy's petition and gave Nancy possession of the house. And I remember that I gave her a big hug, that she could go home, and that was the last time I saw her."
After being removed from the home, Ralf went to a local bar, where he saw the episode being aired. Angered by what he saw and what had transpired earlier in the day, Ralf returned to Nancy's home that night and beat and strangled her to death.
Reina Friedman Watts, who appears in the documentary as one of the former producers on The Jerry Springer Show, admits that background checks were not performed on contestants.
Talk show host Jerry Springer stands on the set of his TV program 'The Jerry Springer Show'.Credit: ©Ralf-Finn Hestoft/Corbis via Getty
"We didn't do formal background checks on people. We brought people who had restraining orders. We brought people who weren't supposed to leave their state," she shared.
Kleinberg noted that at the time of filming, "Ralf had been on probation for battery."
"And I don't understand why the producers couldn't just vet these people. It is so easy to check the public records in the counties where they live in. This isn't rocket science. This isn't brain surgery. This is just like doing a little, quick computer search."
For the show's part, Watts shared, "We were more concerned about whether they had been on another show, because we didn't want to bring people that had been on other shows, and they were just like bouncing from show to show, like telling their story. We were more worried about that than if they were actually criminals.”
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Source: “AOL Entertainment”
