Wife of killer preacher Coley McCraney breaks her silence about chilling moment she learned her husband had been arrested for murder of two teen girls 20 YEARS after their deaths

The wife of a killer preacher has described how she went from 'living the American dream' with her family to her husband being convicted of the murders of two teenagers in 1999. 

Twenty-five years on from the homicides, Jeanette McCraney has spoken about the moment she learned the father of her two children was the prime suspect.  

'I start calling him, no answer, a couple of hours go by and my phone rings, and he (the cop) says, is this Mr McCraney's wife?' Jeanette tells ABC's 20/20 in a preview exclusively obtained by DailyMail.com ahead of Friday's episode. 

'I said, "Has Colin been in an accident?" He says, "No." I was like, "OK, is he in trouble or something? I'm confused." They said, "Yeah, he's in big trouble."' 

In March 2019, modern DNA evidence tied Alabama preacher Coley McCraney, now 49, to the 1999 of 17-year-olds Tracie Hawlett and JB. Beasley. 

The wife of a killer preacher has described how she went from 'living the American dream' with her family to her husband being convicted of the murders of two teenagers in 1999

Twenty-five years on from the homicides, Jeanette McCraney (pictured right) has spoken about the moment she learned the father of her two children was the prime suspect

In March 2019, modern DNA evidence tied Alabama preacher Coley McCraney, now 49, to the 1999 of 17-year-olds Tracie Hawlett and JB. Beasley (pictured)

Jeanette's life would never be the same again. 'I feel like we had everything together,' she adds in the clip.    

The mother of two, who maintain Coley's innocence and is standing by his side, said she was 'living an American dream' in Dothan, Alabama, with their idyllic family life in 2019. 

They appeared to be the model Christian family, with Coley working as both a minister and a truck driver at the time of his arrest. 

'My kids are growing up in church,' Jeanette tells ABC News. 'They're seeing their mom and their dad do the right thing.' 

But everything was not as it seemed. Coley McCraney's DNA was matched to samples found on Beasley in March 2019, and he would later stand trial for capital murder and rape. 

The case dates back to July 31, 1999, when Beasley and Hawlett met to celebrate Beasley's 17th birthday at a field party in Headlands, Alabama. 

But they never made it to their destination. 20/20 also hears from the parents of the victims, who describe their last interactions and the nightmare years ever since. 

Hawlett's mother, Carol Roberts, recalls how her daughter called her from a gas station in rural Ozark, Alabama, where the girls had stopped en route to the party. 

They had got lost and were asking for directions back to Hawlett's home. But they never made it. 

'"We've got directions,"' Roberts remembers her daughter saying on the phone. 'She didn't talk like anything was wrong. There wasn't any fear or anything in her voice. We said, "We love you," to each other, and I went on to bed.'

The next morning, Roberts realized her daughter had not returned home. 

Coley McCraney's DNA was matched to samples found on Beasley in March 2019, and he would later stand trial for capital murder and rape. (Pictured: McCraney's arrest)

J.B. Beasley (pictured) had been on the way to celebrate her 17th birthday when she was killed

Hawlett last spoke with her mother from the gas station hours before she was killed 

She called 911, and within hours, the cops discovered Beasley's black Mazda sedan on the side of the road less than a mile form the gas station. 

Their bodies were found with gunshot wounds to the head inside the trunk, while their belongings, including purses, money and Tracie's keys, were still inside the car. 

'That crime scene, that trunk, those two girls is the only homicide that I ever turned around and had to walk off,' Barry Tucker, a former Trooper Captain with the Alabama Bureau of Investigation, tells ABC News. 

'When you see the innocence and a life that's just been snatched away, that's hard to swallow.'

For the next 25 years, detectives would comb the southern state for clues about who killed the teenage girls, but to no avail. 

In 2018, Ozark Police Chief Marlos Walker caught wind of new forensic genetic genealogy being used to catch the Golden State Killer in California. 

Walker sent DNA samples from the 1999 file to a lab in Virginia, and five months later he received results which matched a familiar name.  

'I was looking at the list again, and when I saw the name McCraney, that stood out because I knew of a McCraney in high school,' he reveals to ABC News. 

When approached McCraney willingly gave a DNA sample, and Walker was 'blown away' when it came back as a match to samples found on Beasley. He had never been a suspect. 

On March 15, 2019, police arrested Coley McCraney and charged him with four counts of capital murder as well as first-degree rape. He was later sentenced to life in prison.

'I was in shock,' Roberts says. 'We'd waited 24 years for this, and finally, somebody's going to be held accountable.'

Coley McCraney's DNA was matched to samples found on Beasley in March 2019, and he would later stand trial for capital murder and rape

Pictured: The scene from McCraney's arrest decades after the killings in Alabama

'When they read, "Guilty," I fell forward and tears just streamed down my face,' Beasley's mother Cheryl Burgoon tells 20/20. She described her daughter as a 'beautiful gift.'

McCraney maintains that he had sex with Beasley but did not kill the teenagers. 

'They can call me a cheat, they can call me a dog. They can call me a lot of things at that time, but they cannot call me a killer,' McCraney says in the phone interview with ABC News from his prison cell. 

He has appealed the verdict and hopes to secure a fresh trial. The ruling on this appeal is expected sometime this year.  

ABC's 20/20 airs Friday at 9pm ET and will be available to stream the next day on Hulu.