The suburban Erie pizza bomber case is still getting national attention.

Months after the streaming of the Netflix docuseries, “Evil Genius,” NBC’s “Dateline NBC” will present a two-hour show on the case on Friday at 9 p.m.

On Aug. 28, 2003, pizza delivery driver Brian Wells entered a PNC bank wearing a bomb shackled to his neck and carrying a cane gun, later telling police that mysterious strangers placed the bomb on him and ordered him to conduct the heist.

Wells left the bank branch with $8,702. He died a short time later as he was sitting in the parking lot of Eyeglass World near the bank when the collar bomb attached to his neck exploded.

The NBC show, titled “Death Trap,” will feature interviews with Barbara White, the sister of Wells; retired FBI special agent Jerry Clark; and jail informant Kelly Makela, who testified that Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong plotted the bank robbery in which Wells participated.

The case remained a mystery until Diehl-Armstrong and her fishing buddy Kenneth Barnes were indicted in 2007 on charges they concocted the plot along with her ex-boyfriend William Rothstein.

Barnes later pleaded guilty and testified against Diehl-Armstrong. She was convicted and was serving a life sentence plus 30 years when she died last year at age 68 of natural causes at an inmate medical facility in Fort Worth, Texas.

Rothstein died of cancer before the grand jury indictment was returned.

A “Dateline NBC” camera crew, the show’s producer, and NBC News’ correspondent Dennis Murphy visited Erie a few weeks ago to interview Clark, 57, an associate professor and chair of Gannon University’s criminal justice department.

Clark, who was the lead investigator in the case, spent three days working with the show’s crew while they were in Erie.

“They have consistently called me since then for fact-checking,” Clark said. “As lead investigator, I follow the evidence and I stuck with the facts of the investigation. That was my goal — the steps we took to ID the facts that led to the indictments. I kept focusing on the evidence. That’s what leads to the truth.”

In her interview with Murphy, White claims that Wells was a victim and “was murdered,” according to NBC officials. 

“It is murder,” White tells Murphy in the “Dateline” interview. “I don’t say the word killed. He didn’t pass away. He was murdered.”

“[The ”Dateline NBC” staff] probably talked to some people who haven’t been on camera before, but I don’t think there are any circumstances that I’m aware of that would change the outcome of the case,” Clark said.

Clark asserts Wells was involved in the plot, but he wasn’t aware that the bomb was real.

“It’s not what I believe to be true, it’s what the evidence led me to believe,” Clark said. “The evidence indicated Brian Wells had some knowledge and was duped by these individuals. Unfortunately, that resulted in his death. I still feel horrible for the circumstances and for what the Wells’ family had to go through. It was the true tragedy of this whole case.”

National awareness of the case intensified in early May, when Netflix started streaming the docuseries “Evil Genius,” which focused on Diehl-Armstrong. The 15th anniversary of Wells’ death in August added to the interest.

First Published: October 18, 2018, 3:30 p.m.