investigators find a clue they think will lead to a Killer's front door but instead find themselves heading down a blind alley now their most important evidence is withering before their eyes when a man reports his wife missing her abandoned car becomes the biggest clue it's the nosy neighbors who drive the investigation [Music] it's clear she was no Runaway Bride investigators must rely on flimsy evidence to bag her killer for some lovers marriage can be murder even though proving it may pose a challenge Killers can't divorce themselves from the consequences of their broken vows [Music] foreign [Music] in the early morning hours of December 28 1995 Melinda and David McLean let themselves into the apartment of their sister-in-law Becky Vargas the telephone and electricity in her unit hadn't been switched on yet Becky was separating from her husband and had just rented the Ogden Utah apartment Becky she had told her husband Stephen Vargas but she was going to try to start organizing her belongings and would return in an hour or two but that was several hours ago Stephen had asked Melinda and David to check on her since they lived nearby Melinda who was Stephen's sister and Becky's best friend was glad to go though they didn't see Becky all seemed quiet and safe leaving them unprepared for what they found [Music] lay dead in the leaves outside the building even before the sun was up in Weber County Utah Crime Scene Investigation Unit began its day processing the murder scene [Music] victim's blouse had been pulled up [Music] at first glance the condition of her clothes made her appear to be the victim of a random sexual homicide but a closer look revealed the story was not so simple [Music] criminalist Russ Dean thought the scene might have been staged it was as if her body had been moved from one location to another uh her arm was under her body as if she'd been dragged her coat was removed and was under her body the leaves were bunched up in certain locations around her arms and legs and there was no other obvious indication of any type of sexual assault in fact though the victim had suffered a head injury most of the blood had pulled at her feet suggesting she'd been turned around whoever did this had apparently tried to throw off the investigators the forensics team documented and collected a set of car keys a cigarette lighter fragments of blood-spattered leaves and most significantly the apparent murder weapon a broken flashlight stained with blood and entangled with hair [Applause] spent six hours sifting through every inch of the area before they were satisfied they determined that although the body had been repositioned the victim hadn't been moved far the only blood found was just a few inches from where she lay [Music] because of the blood-stained flashlight was the most compelling clue it was analyzed first at the Utah State Crime Lab in Salt Lake City doesn't speak investigators could see that it had a partial fingerprint on it stamped in blood according to latent print examiner Scott spute a bloody fingerprint can be even better than a Smoking Gun when we have a bloody fingerprint for example it's the victim's blood it's not her finger it's someone else's finger on the evidence it's a crucial pinpointing item of evidence in which we can identify someone being at that crime scene leaving that Bloody fingerprint behind at the scene as they left [Music] it would be bad practice to home in on that one print the lab had to inspect the flashlight for additional prints [Music] the obvious ones and the ones that remained invisible required two separate processes [Music] blood stains because they're not oily conflate or rub off to fix them in place the flashlight was heated to 100 degrees Celsius for 10 minutes after I heat it on I then put a stain on there which is called a medal black which reacts to the blood and makes it very visible and oftentimes brings out areas of blood that were invisible prior to treatment to develop the latent or unseen prints the flashlight was exposed to Super Glue vapor the adhesive bonds to the moisture on the print creating a durable shell that exposes and preserves it then a fluorescent dye is applied which adheres to the super glue the latent prints shine under ultraviolet light testing revealed no other blood-stained prints the original one along with the latent prints would have to do once a suspect was isolated investigators were confident that the bloody fingerprint was all they'd need while the clues were being scrutinized Melinda McLean and her husband David went to the police station to give their statements Melinda told police that she'd been best friends with Becky Vargas for 14 years alone and then and then we went back Becky had been married to her brother Stephen Vargas for nine of them but it looked like their marriage was coming to an end [Music] as far as she knew the split was amicable though Becky was having an affair that her husband Stephen Vargas may have suspected there didn't seem to be a lot of tension between the couple Stephen who had called the mcleans to look in on her after the police told him they had no officers available to check on his wife David McLean down the hall told police a similar story he said that Stephen Vargas had called him just before 11 pm the night before the murder uh did Steve at all go over there Steven was worried because she was away so long the apartment had no lights sure he said that he and Melinda stopped by though Becky's car was in the driveway there was no answer the window to see if everything was okay but stopped when they heard moaning they thought that perhaps her boyfriend was there so he left they went to a pay Farm to tell Stephen that everything was fine they told him what they had heard then they left David told police that out of curiosity they drove back to Becky's a short time later now they were surprised to see Stephen vargas's Jeep parked out front [Music] soon he appeared from beside the building got into the vehicle and drove off David said that they caught up with him Stephen was wearing his bathrobe and slippers he told him he wanted to check on Becky himself but asked the McLean's not to tell anyone he was there and David revealed this detail to the police Melinda reluctantly admitted it was true David told police that Stephen called them once more early the following morning said that Becky still wasn't home and asked him to check on her again that's when they found her dead at autopsy the medical examiner determined that the lantern found that the scene wasn't the actual murder weapon but it may have been used to subdue the victim from the shape of the wound she was apparently struck down with a hammer or something similar no such object was located the killer was clever enough to carry off or remove some of the most incriminating evidence authorities hoped he'd left enough behind at the police station investigators continued to talk with the mcleans their detailed story seemed to Pivot on Stephen Vargas then it took a more provocative twist when the police dispatcher told detective David wheeloff that Vargas was on the phone but he wasn't calling about his wife she said that he was on the phone inquiring about his sister and his brother-in-law and if they were in fact at the police station and I told the dispatcher yeah that's who we're we're in here talking to and if she would ask him if he would mind coming down to the police station as well for your separation police told him about Becky's murder his in-laws were fine I was aware of but he might not be because Melinda and David saw him at the murder scene he admitted that he was there that night just as the mcleans had said he peeked in the window but he heard and saw nothing because the window was right next to where the victim was found wheelath didn't believe him if Steve had gone there to look and listen uh I don't think it would have been likely that he would have not seen Becky lying just a few feet away his suspicious Behavior and the eyewitness testimony by the mcleans was enough to get a warrant to search Stephen vargas's Jeep and to collect his fingerprints and the blood sample paper bag investigators were after anything that could link it to the crime scene they found nothing but minuscule fragments of leaves and not even many of those so I wish I could find my little the Jeep looked recently vacuumed they collected what they could then returned the vehicle to Vargas and sent him home the forensics team hoped they wouldn't need to rely on the leaves now that they had vargas's fingerprint they could compare it to the ones from the flashlight most of the prints did in fact match Stephen Vargas but that made sense he owned it so the only one that really mattered was the one stamped in blood the bloody fingerprint had a shape called a tinted Arch of the three features of fingerprints Loops arches and whirls arches are the least common and tinted arches are rarer still [Music] only five percent of the population has them Steven Vargas was among that group [Music] with the fingerprint on the flashlight wasn't clear enough to make a definitive comparison [Music] Vargas might have left it and and maybe not I cannot say he did not leave that print behind I can only say it's not enough to identify it positively they thought the flashlight would illuminate the Killer without it their hopes of solving the case looked considerably more dim [Music] investigators working to solve the Becky Vargas homicide saw their most promising piece of evidence rendered useless according to detective wheeloff a case that had looked cut and dried now depended on very fragile Clues after we lost the flashlight about the last piece of physical evidence we had that we could try and do anything with were the leaf fragments that were recovered out of the Jeep if investigators could find specks of Blood on the tiny fragments they would support the idea that Stephen Vargas was close enough to the body to have tracked them into his Jeep [Applause] it fell to supervising criminalists pillar short sleeve to analyze the minuscule samples trying to see blood on a small piece of colorful Leaf was difficult so we used hysteria Zoom so we could get down and look very closely at the leaves and then to kind of guesstimate if we had any stains and then we would do some preliminary tests well out of the five samples of leaves fill our short sleeve found traces of blood on two but she had no proof the blood was the victims she rushed the samples to a DNA lab for analysis fearing it might already be too late whenever blood or body fluids are left on soil or or samples that contain a lot of possible bacteria the bacteria begin immediately in destroying the sample they destroy not only the cells but they get into the DNA and start to break the DNA down it would take three months for the results to come back from the land investigators had to abide their time but they didn't do it idly they had to assume that the results would be negative or build their case some other way police served a warrant to search vargas's apartment they were after the bathrobe and slippers he was seen wearing at the crime scene if he had beaten his wife to death surely they'd be blood spattered Vargas left the clothes in plain sight easy to find he was supposed to be wearing a bathrobe and a pair of slippers [Music] the bathrobe had been freshly laundered the slippers had no trace of debris that in itself was strange considering he admitted walking Outdoors on them it seemed like uh Stephen Vargas was one step ahead of us on getting rid of any physical evidence that might link him to the crime scene it seemed like every step that we thought of to locate that evidence was foiled Robert but there was one clue he couldn't bury because it was 375 miles away in shot after several weeks of wrestling with his conscience vargas's half-brother Robert Esquivel called police to tell him a favor that Stephen had asked before Becky's murder Steve had asked him if he would come out here and kill Becky for him police set up a phone tap in esquivel's apartment and had him call Vargas to get him to talk about their previous conversation as Steve had gone through this denying her not remembering that part of their conversation that it had been a joke and towards the end even got threatening though it stopped short of a confession Vargas had said enough or he used to be arrested on January 11 1996 for the murder of Becky Vargas but they weren't sure they had enough evidence to convict him [Music] one month later the results of the DNA test on the blood-spattered leaves found in Stephen vargas's Jeep came through a comparison of the DNA from the blood on the leaves matched Becky vargas's DNA the blood on the blood fragments matched Rebecca Vargas now authorities were confident of a conviction where are you going based on the evidence police put together a likely scenario Stephen Vargas angry with his wife for her infidelity and their upcoming divorce confronted her at her new apartment they fought it escalated he moved her to the side of the house thinking she was dead he was wrong he wanted someone else to find the body so he asked the mcleans to check up on her they mistook her death throws for the throes of passion when they told Stephen he returned to finish what he'd begun using a more Lethal Weapon tiny fragments of leaves told the whole story well in this case in particular we had this flashlight that had a possible fingerprint in it in Blood and that would have been the piece of evidence that kind of closed all the Loose Ends but it didn't happen in this case it was a very small piece of leaf that was found in a vehicle that had blood on it that came from the victim and it was just the interesting and exciting part that something so small could be so integral in a case embargas was convicted of first-degree murder and is now serving 20 years to life the case of Becky Vargas began with the discovery of her body but when a person just disappears it's not clear that a crime has even been committed [Music] the names of the victim and the killer have been changed on the morning of July 31st 1987 Dan Remington of San Diego California was taking his kids to the YMCA on Route he noticed his wife's abandoned car on the side of the road not wanting to alarm his children he dropped them off at daycare then rushed home to call the police [Music] San Diego Police dispatched an officer on his way to Remington's house he stopped to examine the vehicle the car apparently had a flat tire the doors were locked and he could see no spare or any sign of 29 year old Liz Remington [Music] when the officer arrived at the Remington's home Dan Remington told him that he last saw his wife at 10 30 the previous night when she left for work after he saw her car at 7 30 he called the hospital where she was a maternity nurse but she hadn't shown up Remington admitted that their 12-year marriage was Rocky they were discussing divorce but hadn't filed the papers yet [Music] Dan and the officer a key to the car and granted permission to impound it in search of Clues while it was possible that Liz's disappearance could be logically explained missing persons cases fell under the domain of the homicide unit skills to collect and preserve every piece of potential evidence found at the scene check the spare yet they found nothing out of this communicate Foul Play or towed the car to the police garage [Music] any overlooked Clues would be preserved in case the car required a closer look foreign detectives visited a nearby convenience store thinking that Liz might have gone there after her tire went flat the clerk told him that she had been in the night before she needed to break a 20 bill to make a phone call he didn't know who she called police remembered that Dan Remington told them she hadn't called homes it seemed reasonable to believe she may have simply run off with someone else to walk towards the park Liz's sister told police that was inconceivable she wasn't the kind of woman who run from a failing marriage no matter how bad things became she'd never leave her children Sergeant Dennis brugos of the San Diego Metro task force found that was the consensus she was very devoted to her children and her family she helped at school she helped at little league and just not the type of woman that would ever walk away from her family [Music] Liz's sister told police it was strange that the spare tire was missing Dan had changed the oil two weeks earlier and made a point of Thoroughly checking the car including the spare investigators took statements from the Remington's Neighbors memories I described his character many spoke of the deteriorating relationship between Liz and Dan the information was duly noted but in terms of evidence that any crime had been committed investigators had absolutely nothing at the time of Liz Remington's disappearance San Diego Police were grappling with an apparent serial killer because there was no evidence that Remington had left against her will these more violent crimes took priority there was nobody there was no weapon and therefore she was simply one of many missing adults throughout this County and at that particular time there was actually a series of sorts that was going on where there was upwards of 40 women who were found murdered in the East County area so certainly that would have precedent over a missing person four years passed since Liz Remington's disappearance most of the murdered women were transients or prostitutes so she was not considered one of the killers victims but when a task force was formed to look into the serial killings her file came up too investigators realized she was still missing after all this time the neighbors taped statements and the detective reports were dusted off well before Liz's disappearance they had kept a close eye on the remingtons and helped Liz out whenever they could over time friction between the couple increased and neighbors grew concerned about her and the children one even kept a log of what went on at the house after Liz disappeared to demonstrate how the Remington's relationship had deteriorated a neighbor told investigators about how Dan tried to sell Liz's car without her permission [Music] according to the neighbor Liz wasn't just surprised she was Furious huge fighting suit he said that the only reason Dan didn't sell the vehicle was because Liz had the only key and wouldn't give it to him but police recall that on the day Liz disappeared Dan had the key to her vehicle in his possession police also learned that neighbors had reported seeing Dan Remington filling in a ravine at the back of his property with a bulldozer shortly after he Liz's disappearance they said that after her disappearance they saw him visit that part of the property every few days he never ventured back there before she disappeared remarkably because the case had never been officially closed Liz's car had remained impounded all this time Dan had sued to get it released but lost [Music] technically it was still considered evidence foreign [Music] one of the first things investigators found were coins in the ashtray reportedly this had been my convenient phone call the clerk statement suggested she was okay now investigators weren't so certain since she had ample change in her car they contacted the clerk to interview him again that clerk at the convenience store actually said he wasn't real sure that it was her so that helped us to establish the fact that we didn't really know for sure whether she was there missions of Foul Play had been aroused rubos wondered if the flat tire could have been staged foreign tire from Liz's car to Goodyear Tire and rubber in Akron Ohio their lab is designed to evaluate the causes of tire fit here the tire was examined on the rim report was the tire was flat it's still flat investigators found no outward signs of damage only a tiny puncture which would have led to slow deflation once the leak was isolated product analysis manager Chester Patterson took the tire off its Mount and examined it more thoroughly from the looks of it the tire went flat after the car had stopped we saw no damage on this tire we saw no reason to have alerted any driver in the vehicle that something was going soft or or whether the tire was deflating because in order to do that the tires beginning to come apart and you would see that damage on the tire itself and we saw no such damage but he did see something he'd never seen in his 35 years experience the tire removed from Liz Remington's car had been punctured From the Inside Out has been punctured from the inside see these two Impressions circular Impressions right under the punctures of the tire and we noticed the rust that's contained in them and told me that somebody had taken a nail and pounded it through the inside of the tire to cause that circular nail head Impressions on the liner itself [Music] he concluded that the tire had definitely been tampered with four years after Liz Remington's disappearance investigators had enough to get a warrant to search Dan Remington's house they found nothing of significance inside [Music] outside different stories [Music] in the yard the police backhoe went to work Excavating the filled in ravine the backhoe was probably two or three hours into the job when it hooked onto a piece of chain-linked fence that was lying flat the excavation slowed down what we found underneath that chain link fence was a tire the tire was the missing tire from Liz's car and underneath that tire wrapped in sheets and blankets was the body of a female and a missing person's investigation became a murder case [Music] Dan Remington was arrested taken away officially the body was considered a Jane Doe until a positive ID could be made a forensic anthropologist determined The Remains were those of a Caucasian female who had died of blunt trauma to the Head she had been in her late 20s to early 30s about the same height as Liz Remington seemed like they had found what they were looking for but the law required more proof than that forensic dentist Norman sperber was called in everything hinged on the teeth teeth are the most durable part of the body and we fortunately had Dental films from her dentist we were able to take films of her teeth because they were in very good condition by comparing the shape and position of the victim's fillings and teeth with Liz Remington's dental records sperber was able to make a positive ID Liz Remington had been found because the victim was discovered wrapped in bed linens investigators believed that Dan kilter while she was napping before work afterward he carried the body out to the ravine [Music] buried it in a shallow grave then rented the earth-moving equipment a short time later piling on 8 to 12 feet of dirt then he drove to the scene and replaced the good Tire with the one he had flattened next morning he reported his wife missing confident the police would never piece it together his unwitting accomplice was a suspected serial killer who demanded all of the police department's resources but the clues eventually resurfaced exposing the crime though Remington's exact motive will never be known authorities believe he couldn't bear the shame of divorce or the fact that he'd lose half of his wealth and property in October 1992 Dan Remington was found guilty of the first degree murder of his wife he was sentenced to life without parole Remington went to a great deal of trouble to hide his crime others take an easier approach which sometimes makes their crimes harder to solve [Music] on September 21st 1995 a body was discovered in a wooded area in Boise Idaho [Music] plastic bags bound with duct tape in case of the feet and head from its state of decay it had obviously been there several days no attempt had made to seal the body it appeared to have been hurriedly dumped there because of its position and Graphics investigators couldn't even determine the victim's gender without disturbing an already disturbing scene at this point anything could be a clue so the body wasn't unwrapped or inspected until it got to the more where it was scrutinized under controlled conditions the tape was carefully cut away and the bags removed and preserved [Music] the victim was female around 60 years old the coroner determined that she was strangled she was most likely killed elsewhere epped up and transported to the woods where she was found [Music] he fit the description of Wanda kuzma check reported missing six days earlier Wanda had been reported missing by her second husband Ben kuzmichev when she failed to return from work the couple had been married both had retired from the large firm they worked for your father again Wanda took a job cleaning offices you are beautiful Ben a Russian immigrant who had once been artistic director for the Idaho ballet now worked for a security company after Ben reported her missing detectives wondered if Wanda had had second thoughts about her second marriage and simply run off but a check of her jewelry and possessions showed she'd taken nothing with her never a good sign then her body turned up the victim's car had not been found so the bag she was wrapped in became the most important clue [Music] criminalist Cynthia Hill set to work examining them it was all she had well in this case we didn't have a murder weapon there were no eyewitnesses and the place where Wanda was found was not the murder scene so all these things were playing against us he'll fumed the bags in super glue to bring out any fingerprints glue contained in foil pouches vaporizes and bonds to the print preserving it foreign can then be dusted with powder to make it more visible then photographed to create a record Hill found only one print on the bag around the victim's legs but so far she had no one to compare it with Ben kuzmichev was called to the police station to provide a set of pants for comparison in a murder investigation it's standard procedure to get a spouse's Prince usually it eliminates the spouse as a suspect in this case that isn't quite how it worked out the print on the bag matched pens that didn't necessarily mean he'd had a hand in his wife's murder if the bag had been taken from the victim's own car Ben might have handled it prior to its use in the crime the print was lifted from a portion of the bag where one would normally grab it in terms of evidence it wasn't enough these people were living together they're touching objects that one another touch you have to be able to find a fingerprint in a location where they wouldn't normally have touched or it's in conjunction with another piece of evidence that puts them at the scene he'll still believe that the bags might contain more prints though she didn't have the technology to lift them she knew that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police crime lab did If Prince were there the mounties could find them for so she hoped she carefully packed her bags sent them to Canada and awaited the results while Cynthia Hill waited for her prince to come from Canada investigators in Idaho found Juan de kuzma Chef's car more than a week had passed since her body was discovered the vehicle had been abandoned in a store parking lot four miles from where she was found police processed the vehicle for fingerprints they raised two prints from the trunk lid their placement suggested they were left by the person closing the truck inside investigators found something surprising nothing at all for detective David Smith of the Boise Idaho Police Department that was a significant discovery and talking with family members they said that she would always carry her Jehovah Witness literature in the trunk in fact they said you could not put anything in her trunk because it was so full but the trunk wasn't entirely empty investigators found a single drop of blood it belonged to the victim whoever had put her in the trunk had also left fingerprints on the gear shift knob Prince on the trunk and on the gear shift matched Ben kuzmichette investigators faced the same challenges as before the car belonged to Ben's wife stood to reason that he could leave his fingerprints on still it seems strange that his were the only clear prints found especially since he told police that as far as he knew Wanda was the last person to drive the vehicle the evidence suggested that Ben drove at last leaving behind the clearest Prince tests were conducted to show that an approximately 70 percent of all cases the last person who drives the car and activates the gear shift lever will destroy the person's prince who drove the car prior to and leave their prints on the gear shift lever prints made 70 sure that Ben kuzmichev was lying that wasn't good enough an inspection of the car seat disclosed another clue I only wanted a stature in that she was five foot four and 140 pounds when I looked at the seat it appeared to me to be back farther than usual for a woman of that stature to be driving the vehicle So I placed a female of five foot four 140 pounds inside the vehicle she wasn't able to reach the pedals which appeared to be a comfortable driving position conversely I put a male matching binge description five eleven 190 pounds into the driver's seat and they fit very comfortable [Music] the experiment provided more circumstantial proof that Ben was a liar but it still didn't he was a murderer by now the Canadian Royal Mounted Police lab and performed their tests on the trash bag used to wrap the body of Wanda kuzmichev the test called vacuum metal deposition is a state-of-the-art method for lifting difficult prints from plastic the bag was placed in a vacuum chamber and then pelted with ions of gold we cling to the plastic but not to the oily prints then it's exposed to ionized zinc which clings only to the gold leaving the prints untouched and in contrast against the plastic [Music] the process revealed a second print on the bag according to Cynthia Hill the position of this print was far more incriminating the second fingerprint that was developed using the vacuum metal deposition proved that he had a direct contact with that bag because the positioning of the hand was in such a way that he would be grabbing the plastic bag wrapping the tape around Wanda and he would be the only one that would be leaving the fingerprint in that position at that time in most cases that would be enough to win a conviction but investigators weren't so sure proving a spousal murder on fingerprints alone would be a hard sell [Music] The Prince and other evidence they've gathered gave them enough to get a search warrant for the kuzma chef's home [Music] they found no signs that this was the murder scene but they did find the Jehovah's Witness literature that the victim's family said she never removed from her car the items presented more circumstantial evidence that Ben had been involved in the Murder by January 1996 four months after the crime investigators were still building their case against Ben kuzma check Detective he began to feel the circle of evidence closing in on you and he announced he was going back to Russia at that point police had no choice but to charge him with Wanda's murder if he returned to Russia he'd be a free man beyond U.S extradition though they had enough to arrest him they weren't certain they had a solid case for Murder in the First between the time of his arrest and the trial date investigators continued to gather evidence against kuzma check under surveillance in jail he couldn't make a move without authorities knowing about it we placed monitoring devices on approximately 17 phones inside the jail at the Ada County Jail that gave us the ability to monitor his conversations as outgoing as well as whoever he was seeing as a visitor the end result was that we received nothing that could be used in court though nothing incriminating came about the phone calls but help came from an unlikely source kuzma Chef had confided details of his crime to his cellmate's lack of remorse reported the details to authorities but nothing to gain by doing so Ben and herself May were watching TV one evening when the news media broadcast that we had located a witness who had told us that she had in fact sold Ben duct tape and trash bags the inmate told us that Ben found this humorous that he had in fact purchased from this lady but they were not the ones that we were looking for that he used in the crime the inmates information though hearsay provided one more strike against Ben kuzmichev investigators realized they'd gathered all they were going to get they weren't sure they had enough but because Ben was likely to be released and flee to Russia they had to take the case to trial from what police could put together four months after their marriage van and Wanda's honeymoon was over he had been dependent on her money but wanted to return to his homeland she refused to go their animosity built and then strangled her he wrapped her body in plastic bags emptied the trunk of her car loaded her in and dumped her in the woods then he abandoned the car in the parking lot based on the accumulated evidence Ben kuzmichev was convicted for the second-degree murder of his wife Wanda and sentenced to 21 years to life for detective David Smith solving this case meant more than simply delivering Justice did you become personally involved I mean this guy is coming to to your town committed this heinous act and now you have this grieving family that you want to do everything in your power to solve this case for and that's how I personally take it and I know any other seasoned homicide detective will tell you the same thing when spouse kills spouse the clues are sometimes difficult to read but the marriage of forensic science with good detective work can can bring together what the Killer and tried to put asunder [Music] [Music] police find a frozen body in the Arizona desert the chilling Discovery sends investigators searching for more victims a small town a brutal murder and a killer who could be anywhere when All Leads are exhausted the investigation focuses on a blurry surveillance photo when a young mother disappears detectives are left with few Clues but slowly the evidence begins to point to a dangerous and twisted predator a lack of Clues May cool down a hot investigation but there's no statute of limitations on murder months or even years may pass before forensics can spark a fire under these cold cases [Music] on June 3rd 1991 investigators from the Costa Mesa California Police Department pulled up to an abandoned car on the Corona del Mar freeway they were responding to a call regarding a missing person age 23. no one had seen or heard from her for almost 24 hours and that wasn't like her Denise's best friend had found her car on the side of the road while searching for her [Music] investigators examined it closely but aside from a flat tire nothing seemed to miss the only personal article they found was a pair of pantyhose on the front seat Denise preferred to drive without them though nothing in the car tipped investigators about what had happened detective Ron Smith concluded that Denise ran into trouble soon after she had pulled off the road what struck us as unusual about the scene and concerned us right from the very beginning was it very near to her car there were emergency call boxes there were pay phones there were all night convenience stores none of which Denise went to to call her parents would ask for help we knew right away that something was a mess something was wrong the last person who saw Denise was her date from the night before she had dropped him off after a concert Denise never made it home bright popular just graduated from college she wasn't the type to worry her parents by going off without a call or note her family and friends started to look for her the next morning after recovering her car the Costa Mesa police launched a massive search for Denise Huber they notified law enforcement agencies across the country they followed up every clue every lead these flyers Denise's friends and family put up posters and appeared on news programs begging for information as the months and years passed the tips dried up but police kept Denise's case open and as active as they could every day we would do something with the Denise Huber case we would review old leads we'd go over old reports again we'd look one more time at the photographs we never gave up even though we never really had anything good to work with after three years no one could tell her grieving family and friends what had happened to her [Music] Denise Huber had simply vanished [Music] meanwhile more than 300 miles away in Arizona's Prescott Valley authorities were grappling with a mystery of Their Own on July 9 1994 and went to buy paint at the home of a man aged swap meet while she waited for him she noticed a padlock rental truck and the paint and chemical cans cluttering his yard she thought they looked out of place for such a respectable neighborhood and wondered if any laws were being broken suspicious she called a friend who worked for the police her friend thought it sounded like a clandestine drug lab which police find in the most unlikely spots he sent investigators from the Yavapai come to check it out the rental truck with the California tags looked like it hadn't been moved in months the electrical cord snaking out of it and the paint cans all around reinforced the notion that this might be a mobile drug lab check if the tag showed the truck had been stolen and with a warrant police cautiously opened the cargo door [Music] inside was a freezer ready guys we're opening up not knowing what it might contain they suited up in protective gear [Music] lay a pool of Frozen blood carefully moving the bags aside the officers expected to find nothing more than a deer Lieutenant Scott mesher uncovered a horrific mystery initially when we opened the black bags and could tell that we had a human a frozen body with handcuffs behind the back ice crystals it was it was grim [Music] the homeowners still hadn't returned so police ran the license plates on the white pickup also parked in the driveway the owner was identified as John Joseph fomalero within an hour palmolero and his mother pulled up to the house sheriff's deputies charging him with stealing the rental truck they were anxious to find out more about the body in the freezer [Music] 30. [Music] Mrs famularo who lived next door told detectives that her son was a housemaider which explained the paint cans she said the truck had been parked there about two months she didn't know anything about the freezer or its contents except that the electricity in John's house had been turned off for one day and he had asked to run a power cord from her house to the truck a couple questions at the police station famularo was polite but uncooperative he refused to answer any questions and asked to see his lawyer without any assistance from their suspect investigators would have to rely on physical evidence at the scene to identify the body in the freezer and to find out how it got there any questions they charged by malero with homicide [Music] all we need to have a videotape the next day warrant in hand investigators entered famularo's house hoping to find information about the victim in the freezer in its frozen condition they couldn't even discern the victim's gender he's on the chair famularo's house was crammed with his belongings this was the home of a man who never threw anything away really hard over here after more than two weeks of searching investigators found several promising Clues the first was a set of handcuff keys that matched the cuffs on the victim [Music] okay the next clue took investigators by surprise two complete Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department uniforms [Music] in the garage the deputies found two boxes marked Christmas but there was nothing merry about them inside officers found blood-stained women's clothing and a bloody hammer and nail puller they also found a pair of women's shoes The Backs badly scuffed as though the woman who wore them was dragged bags here shot of this hammer that wasn't all right we did locate numerous female identifications that included social security cards I believe some driver's license and other identification uh obviously raising the concern of maybe we had additional victims [Music] Yavapai County Police had to face the very real possibility that John fomalero was a serial killer [Music] so Arizona investigators looking into a murder had every reason to believe that there may be more than one victim to test that theory investigators brought in cadaver dogs to locate more bodies on John pomero's property the dogs trained to detect the slightest whiff of Decay alerted their handlers several times officers dug up every spot and still found nothing but they never completely gave up the suspicion that the killer had struck before just got that paperwork from Costa Mesa police followed up on every piece of ID found in the Christmas boxes much to their relief they found that each woman was alive and accounted for except one from Costa Mesa California her name was Denise Huber to confirm her ID Yavapai County forensic technician Mike Winnie lifted a thumbprint from the thawing victim and compared it with the one printed on Denise Huber's California driver's license the prince matched identifying Huber as the victim to authorities in Arizona the name meant nothing but to Costa Mesa detective Ron Smith it was the news he had waited three anxious years to hear the call I received from Lieutenant Scott masher from Yavapai County was that he thought maybe he had a body identified as Denise Huber and asked us if we were familiar with Denise Hoover well of course I almost fell out of my chair when you mentioned the name now that she had been found investigators in Arizona had to determine how she had been killed working with the Frozen and decomposed remains presented a unique set of challenges to Maricopa County Medical Examiner and Bubbles in our environment to examine a woman of very unusual we deal 99 of the time with people who have been exposed to heat elements and that is more our area of expertise than someone who has been in a cold environment it took the body approximately two days to thaw where we could actually perform the internal examination Friday July 16th 9 avapai detective Scott mesher and Costa Mesa detective Ron Smith along with other officers gathered in the medical examiner's lab to observe the autopsy the cause of death was determined to be blunt force trauma to the skull resulting in multiple fractures to identify the murder weapon investigators needed to evaluate the entire skull to see where and how the blows had been struck they called in forensic anthropologist Laura fulginiti how many days are we looking at here reconstructing a person's skull is very similar to doing a jigsaw puzzle essentially you have about 50 pieces and you need to put them back into what you know to be the right composition it took virginity two days to reconstruct the skull never losing sight of the fact that this victim was once a person and I remember standing In This Very Room thinking to myself how did you come to be in my sphere this is not right it's not natural for you to be here she determined that the victim had sustained more than 35 blows to the Head the wounds were consistent with the hammer and nail puller pulled from the Box in famularo's garage to be certain the lab ran tests [Music] technicians were able to establish a DNA profile from the blood residue on the nail puller matched the DNA profile taken of the victim's own blood the match confirmed that they had found the murder weapon [Music] build their case investigators had to retrace the events that led from the victim's abandoned car on a California freeway to John famularo's freezer in Arizona it was very important for both agencies the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office and the Costa Mesa police department to work together and piece the evidence from California and Arizona to one case one solid case in order to successfully prosecute this the Costa Mesa police department gathered information on famularo's activities during the time he lived in California they learned that he had attended the Los Angeles sheriff's department Reserve account but he couldn't make the grade and dropped out after just a few weeks he kept his uniforms which police found at his house further investigation LED detectives to a warehouse in Laguna Hills 12 miles from where Denise Huber's empty car was found John fomalero had stored some paint and supplies in the warehouse then moved everything out when he left the area in August 1992 13 months after Denise Huber vanished investigators thought it was likely that famularo had committed the murder here they hope to recover forensic evidence that would tie the killer to the crime can determine where the Killer's trial would take place police searched the unit for evidence of the crime using luminol to expose traces of blood applied to a surface and viewed under an alternate light source luminol reveals blood stains invisible to the naked eye even traces left years earlier we found that the warehouse was huge but I wanted every square inch luminol for blood almost the very last bottle and the very last Corner that we looked we sprayed luminol into the corner against the wall and all of a sudden the luminol just lit up this bright glow showed us we found what we were looking for technicians compared this Blood to a sample taken from the victim in Arizona they matched the forensic analysis gave detective Smith of the Costa Mesa police the proof he needed to make the case the forensic science and testing the blood was absolutely critical number one it established that the crime occurred in California and that established jurisdiction it also positively identified that blood as Denise it put Denise at that scene palmolero never confessed the forensic evidence spoke for him the investigators had successfully matched the blood in the California storage unit to the Victor in Arizona and that placed the victim within deadly proximity of John fomalero [Music] authorities believe that Huber pulled off the road with a flat tire spotting his prey poached under the guise of Lending [Music] no he abducted Denise Huber in Costa Mesa California in the early morning of June 3rd 1991. famularo murdered her some time later hid her body in a freezer trucked it to Arizona and kept it until police discovered his crime three years later [Music] John famularo was sentenced to death he awaits execution on California's death row [Music] famularo hid his crime by keeping the body close to him other killers are not so conniving exclusive it was a December evening in 1990. Peggy Phillips wondered why her husband Dean was taking so long to lock up the launderette they owned in Ozona Texas it was just next door but he'd been gone 20 minutes [Music] she found him lying on the floor bleeding and barely conscious dear police and paramedics raced to save him Peggy thought that Dean must have fallen and hit his head but the paramedics could see that this was no accident Dean Phillips had been beaten nearly to death Peggy watched as the president exploded her husband into the ambulance it was the last time she saw him alive Dean Phillips died early the next quarter December 26th the cause of death blood force trauma to the Head investigators determined that Phillips had interrupted a burglary and paid dearly for it they found only one hard clue a single fingerprint lifted from a coin box left on the floor they sent the print to the Texas Department of Public Safety like Small Town police departments All Over Texas the Ozona police depended on the DPS crime lab for forensic services this time though the Department of Public Safety came up empty the coinbox fingerprint didn't match anything they had on file news of Dean Phillips's death spread through Ozona Crockett County chief deputy sheriff Alton Davis was determined to catch the criminal who had shattered the quiet of this little town we've got a population of probably three to four thousand people so it's a small town uh everybody knows everybody and uh it was it was a real shock to the community that something like this could happen in Ozone the community stepped forward to help the investigation a witness reported seeing two local men wearing bloody clothes the Knight Phillips was killed a warrant was obtained and their bloody clothes were confiscated before they had time to launder them brought in for questioning the men claimed they were hunters and that the blood was from a deer they had poached last night investigators were skeptical until they got confirmation from the DPS crime lab let's get to the question the blood was indeed from a deer and the men's fingerprints didn't match the one lifted from the coin box at Phillips's laundry the case's first promising tip amounted to nothing clerk at a convenience store right off the interstate gave investigators their next lead we've got a couple minutes I can talk to you yes a man came in an hour before the murder and asked where the launderette was and we're just checking the neighborhood she described him as stuppy with dirty blonde hair and a t-shirt with radio call letters yeah about what time was that he drove a beat-up blue van with a green door on the passenger side there may have been a passenger in the van investigators hope to see the suspect on the store's surveillance tape okay good okay okay listen you have a good evening thanks a lot but the security camera was old the man's face was a blur neither the DPS nor the FBI could enhance the image electronically the investigators were convinced they had their suspect on this tape but his image like their chances of finding him were dim [Music] how are you doing today as the investigation into the murder of Dean Phillips continuing Witnesses reported seeing a strange blue van in town the night of the murder some thought they saw two people in it Sheriff Alton Davis believed that Phillips's killer was a stranger just passing through town ozone is right on Interstate 10. we're more or less out in the middle of nowhere this is the first one we've had where the someone has came off the interstate and murdered one of our local people investigators knew the killing was probably hundreds of miles away by now and then they got the call a van matching the one described by the witnesses was stopped about 200 miles west of town Davis sped to the scene we found an old GMC van light blue that had a dark passenger door on it a dark primer colored and we took photographs of the van we talked to the there was a Hispanic male driving it which didn't fit the description of our our suspect the case had run into another dead end reviewing the clues they'd gathered so far investigators realized that all they had to go on was a blurry surveillance tape and a store Clerk's baiting recollection they needed some way to turn these hazy Clues into solid information [Music] then they recalled Karen Taylor an experienced forensic artist with a special crime service of the Texas DPS Taylor had worked with the Ozona police on missing persons cases she is a Pioneer in the forensic Art and Science of facial reconstruction developing Witnesses vague descriptions into recognizable faces of criminal suspects my function is to take some bit of information from a crime that occurs produce some sort of a visual image that can be put out in the media and hopefully it will trigger additional information that can be used to connect the crime to the victim or connect the crime to the suspect Ozona police sent Taylor Stills taken from the videotape but after she had evaluated the black and white photos she wasn't sure she'd be able to help so I had a look at those Stills to see just what I could determine about the face it was very blurry the quality was was pretty poor so I could see that there wasn't much likelihood we could enhance that video electronically and it would probably boil down to my trying to just do some sort of a sketch based on what I could see Taylor knew that while every feature might not be rendered perfectly the sketch's resemblance to the suspect would be strong enough to help the investigation well after years of doing this I've come to believe that the most important thing to capture in a face for a forensic artist to trigger recognition is getting the proportions right each of the component parts interface each of the features the eyes nose mouth is important but it's not as important as the arrangement of those features on a face Taylor wasn't sure the image had enough information for her to work from then she noticed a feature she'd overlooked the store clerk she had talked with the suspect face to face Taylor hoped the clerk might provide the missing details she needed to sharpen the picture using the video stills I prepared as much of a drawing as I could maybe 85 percent done and then faxed it to the witness got on the phone with her and she was able to make some changes she said she wanted me to make the eyes look light make the lower face look more slim and I did that we hung up I I spent about 15 minutes making those alterations and then I refaxed it to her and she checked it and said yes that's right so I was able to get the benefit of her long distance input over the phone and using the facts here he was the most likely suspect in the murder of Dean Phillips [Music] the Crockett County Sheriff's Office prepared a crime Bulletin Karen Taylor's drawing of the suspect's face was circulated across the country and to every radio station where someone might recognize the call letters on the suspect shirt Taylor's drawing represented the investigation's last hope but when all the publicity brought no response the dean Phillips murder case came to a dead halt location the beating death of Dean Phillips looked like it was destined to go unsolved Sheriff Alton Davis and his team had exhausted their last leads eventually we would ruled everybody out we were getting and the late stop coming in and we didn't have anything to work on and it just more or less went cold and we just had to set until we got some other type of leads five years came and went without another clue or lead but Peggy Phillips was determined to bring her husband's murderer to Justice she contacted a television crime show and asked if they'd run her story in August 1996 just over five and a half years after Phillips was killed the TV show aired the story of his murder and featured Karen Taylor's drawing that's what got the phones ringing from around the country viewers called in leads Texas Ranger Jerry Byrne fielded the calls and directed the investigation one tip led him to Paul Wesley Taylor a convict that Utah's minimum security prison in Draper Ranger Byrne contacted Draper prison and asked for Taylor's records and a photograph when he saw it Vern felt that at last they had tracked down their suspect the photograph of Paul Wilson Taylor was nearly identical to a composite drawing that a DPS artist had conducted back in 1991. um initially I felt like it was too good to be true burn sent Taylor's records and fingerprint card to the DPS they matched Taylor's right ring finger with the coin box fingerprint after years without progress this was a giant step forward investigators went back to the original set of Clues looking for more connections to the suspect they found out that Taylor's brother worked at a radio station with the call letters seen on Taylor's shirt they were now certain Paul Wesley Taylor was involved with the murder of Dean Phillips but they wanted to know about the van's passenger a witness or possibly an accomplice to Phillips's murder [Music] Taylor's arrest record showed that his girlfriend had been with him at the time of his arrest in Georgia authorities located the woman her answers filled the remaining gaps in the case against Taylor she told Ranger Byrne that they had traveled through Texas during December 1990 and the tailor had pulled up outside of a launderette and gone in she saw him fighting he returned to the van with blood on his shirt she certainly didn't know that anyone had been killed she led investigators to a field where Taylor had ditched his bloody clothes along with a stolen coin box they now had a credible witness who placed Taylor in the launderette at the time of the murder Utah extradited Paul Wesley Taylor back to Texas 998 nearly eight years after the killing he pled guilty to the capital murder of Dean Phillips first he was sentenced to light in prison forensic artist Karen Taylor had turned a single blurry photograph into an image that helped unmask and apprehend a bald-faced killer foreign that photograph and drawing were presented they knew that it was Paul Wesley Taylor that photograph and that composite drawing is what broke this case open investigators speculate that Paul Wesley Taylor got off the interstate in Ozona to get some food and gas short of money Taylor got the idea to knock over the launderette after closing time Dean Phillips was in the wrong place at the wrong time in other cases tragedy stalks its victims Joe Gilbreth finished work and arrived at his home in villanow Georgia he was looking forward to spending the evening with his baby girl Amber and his wife Nakia he noticed that his wife's car was gone this was odd Nikia was usually home fixing supper at this hour when he went inside he started to worry Nikia would never let Amber sit in her pajamas all day and there was no way she'd ever leave the baby in the house by herself doors were unlocked it didn't look like they had been tampered with when nakia's family told Joe they hadn't heard from her he called the police The Walker County Sheriff's Department sent officers to investigate Joe and his mother-in-law reported three missing items Blue telephone cord that had been ripped from the wall a bedspread that had a sheet stitched to one side and all of nakia's underwear based on what he found in the house Detective Pat Bedford believed that Nakia gilbreath's disappearance was more Sinister than the simple missing person's case he was originally sent to investigate my first impressions are you know she was taken out here bound somebody fortunately was taking her from this residence when you tie that into the fact that it was realized that a whole drawer full of her undergarments and lingerie was missing makes you think that we're dealing with on the serious crime here check around see if there's anything missing by chance um Joe Gilbreth told the police that the day had started like any other I checked all all the house the alarm went off at 5 30. Joe got up and got ready for work Nakia went back to bed by 6 a.m the house was quiet Joe and the baby were the last to have seen Nakia [Music] what car was stationed at the house in case she might return but Nikia never came home on August 18 1989 the day after she had disappeared The Walker County Sheriff's Department had little to go on we got a tragedy here we got we got a problem um at first no good leads to follow up on uh her car not been located she had not been located I didn't appear to have any leads from talking to neighbors and searching the media area we had nothing at that point soon changed his mother found her daughter's car abandoned on a Logging Road half mile north of the bill breath house 20. investigators hope they'd find Clues to help locate her [Applause] technicians raised fingerprints all over the car but they belong to members of the gilbreath family [Music] officers found indications of a second car parked next to nakia's it was an ominous sign but the tire impression wasn't distinct enough to photograph or print nikia's mother noted that the baby quilt Nakia always kept in the back seat was missing and that was it nothing at the scene offered a clue of what had happened to Nakia or where she might be now still her family held out hope that she'd come back to them on hard [Music] though investigators believed she was a victim of Foul Play they had no evidence and no suspects Joe had passed a polygraph indicating that he wasn't involved all they had were a few missing items and an abandoned car but still no sign of Nakia [Music] two days later a boy collecting empty cans along the highway made a crucial gruesome discovery [Music] the body was too decomposed or a positive visual ID though it was a white female about nakia's size with the clothes and jewelry job had described dental records confirmed everyone's worst fears the autopsy determined that Nakia had died from asphyxiation the examination also revealed marks around her wrists and ankles marks that could have been made with telephone cords but there was no other significant forensic evidence no hairs or fibers no fingerprints on the body nothing that might dictate The investigation's Next Step investigators considered a number of suspects but none of them panned out leads dried up the case went cold unfortunately we were going nowhere in the case we had no good leads no good Suspects any tips that we got we did everything from roadblocks car to car house to house door-to-door searches search the area thoroughly we weren't able to really locate anything that was helping us several months went by and we really weren't making any progress in solving this cash and you cannot let something like this go on you've got to be able to solve this case then four months after Nakia gilbreath disappeared investigators heard about a similar case in nearby Gordon County a young woman was abducted by an intruder while her child slept for 14 hours he forced her to model lingerie for him and assaulted her repeatedly then he brought her back home four police could identify the woman's assailant case took a bizarre turn the investigation into the death of Nakia Gilbreth had led to a similar account of a woman's abduction the connection was weak but it was their only lead two days after the assault the woman's father reported to police that he saw a strange man drop off a Christmas tree at her house [Music] foreign ERS ran the truck's license plate they discovered that it was registered to James Ray Ward he worked for a nearby well drilling company the woman picked out Ward's picture from a photo lineup she recalled that during the day she was being held she told her assailant that she hadn't had a chance to get her child a Christmas tree officers took Ward into custody a short time later Ward pled guilty to rape and was just starting a 20-year prison term [Music] check into his whereabouts prior to his arrest police learned that Ward had drilled a well at the gilbreaths a year earlier then he returned to check on it in July 1989 just a month before Nakia was killed Ward's employers said that Drillers were never sent back to check on Wells Ward had acted on his own the similarities between the Abduction of his rape victim and the Abduction of Nakia Gilbreth provided police with their only lead when officers searched the home Ward shared with his wife and children they found a stash of women's undergarments that did not belong to Ward's wife detectives also uncovered a receipt for well drilling made out to the gilbreaths but it was much more than a receipt I had directions the road name the mileage that would have led me right to the gilbreath residence the description of the victim he had written in there matched her description including an age of a daughter that the victim had then we had her first direct link from the murder to a suspect investigators also found items missing from the Gilbert's home foreign a baby quilt a bed spread and a blue telephone cord in order to build the strongest case against Ward investigators needed to prove premeditation they obtained a statement Ward had written regarding the abduction he'd pled guilty to they wanted to compare this writing sample with the incriminating notes jotted on the Gilbert's receipt found in his home document examiner Karen Scott performed the analysis a handwriting comparison is basically a side I look for features in the writing of one set and I see if I find the same thing in the other set and I'm looking for things like how the letters are on the piece of paper how they're formed how they're spaced Scott looks for the idiosyncrasies the little details that give a person's handwriting its individual character for instance the F and the word fine it's very uh short the very the very bottom of it the D and the word Road and side are written opposite the way people are taught Staff first and then the round part while this is not in and of itself a unique just to this writer it is not the way it was taught to be done after comparing the note with Ward's known handwriting Scott was confident that both documents were written by the same person foreign the bedspread quilt and bathing suit bottom found in Ward's house nakia's mother supplied the matching top which she found in the gilbreath's home because hundreds of identical bathing suits were manufactured and sold the prosecution had to prove that the bottom bound at Wards and the top founded the gilbreaths were parts of the same suit to make that assessment the lab had to compare the amount of fiber wear on both parts of the soup They concluded that the bottom matched the top the suit belonged to Nakia gilbreath the investigation turned to the other two items the bedspread and the baby quilt before she even put them under a microscope trace evidence technician Terry Santa Maria recognized their significance I knew that these types of bed spreads did not come commercially from manufactured with a sheet sewn to it so I knew that the item had been altered by somebody after determining that I then examined the baby quilt when I pulled the baby quilt out I immediately recognized that this was homemade [Music] Santa Maria called detective Bedford these two items the bedspread and the blanket were absolutely unique one-of-a-kind items they were a direct link from the suspect's home back to the victim this evidence completed the case against James Ray Ward at Ward's trial nikia's mother-in-law testified that she had stitched the sheet onto the bedspread to cover the rough cloth sewn the baby quilt for her granddaughter the only way that they could have come into Ward's possession was if he had gone into the gilbreath home and nakia's car and taken them Ward never confessed but based on the evidence investigators pieced together a scenario for the murder on the morning of August 17th Ward watched Joe Gilbreth leave for work when he saw it was safe he entered the gilbreath home and abducted Nakia I believe he pulled the telephone wires and the court away from the wall I believe he bound her wrapped her in the quilt and on the way out the door I also took a drawer full of her underwear and lingerie as a trophy prosecutors called Ward a meticulous organized stalker with a perverted mind investigators speculated that he fantasized that the women he was assaulting liked him that might explain why he returned to place a Christmas tree at the door of one of his victims homes jurors convicted him of murder July 1991 after deliberating just three hours he was sentenced to death for murdering Nakia Gilbreth when the leads disappear and an investigation stalls that doesn't mean a case is closed in a homicide invest investigators have an arsenal of forensic techniques all the Time in the World to catch the Killer [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] is murdered in their home it looks like a professional hit until investigators begin to suspect it was really the work of a gifted amateur [Music] the investigation into the drowning death of a woman in Pennsylvania sends ripples out as far as North Carolina where some dark secrets begin to surface detectives on the case of a murdered woman get more than they bargained for when they uncover a Sinister family business every family has problems every household has its secrets but when the skeletons in the closet are real forensics is called upon to get to the bottom of those family plucks foreign [Music] [Music] ER Sunday 1992 the Ewell family was wrapping up a weekend getaway at their beach house Dana a 20 year old college student bad farewell to his older sister Tiffany and his parents Dale and Glee Dana stayed behind to spend the evening with his girlfriend's family while the others made the 200-mile Trek back to Fresno see you at home have a nice flight it was the last time Dana would see them alive two days later when he couldn't get his family on the phone Dana called a neighbor to check on the house the neighbor accompanied by the Yules housekeeper made of gruesome Discovery Mr Ewell laid dead on the floor he appeared to have been shot in the back of the head [Music] as investigators from the Fresno County Sheriff's Department searched the house they realized that Dale wasn't the only victim his daughter Tiffany and his wife Lee were also found dead like her father Tiffany had been killed execution style ambushed with a single Bullet to the back of the head but Glee had known what was coming it seemed that she had tried to run before bullets to the back and shoulders stopped her the gunpowder residue on her sweatshirt told investigators that the killer had then fired into her body at close range based on the condition of the victims investigators knew that the Yules must have been killed almost immediately after they returned from the beach two days earlier five spent slugs were collected from the crime scene one more was found in Glee's body okay in the master bedroom investigators found an opened box of nine millimeter ammunition and an empty gun case the owner's manual showed that the missing weapon was a Browning nine millimeter pistol since much of the house was ransacked detectives first theorized that this was a burglary attempt gone awry but the evidence didn't support that theory looks like an amateur job there was no forced entry many valuable items including Dale ewell's gun collection were left in the home rather than use pillowcases to collect the loot bed sheets were laid out and loaded up with worthless items like audio cassettes and coins to homicide detective John Souza even though the killers slipped in and out without notice it just didn't look like a professional burglary a good burglar searches dressers and stuff by starting from the bottom and going up that way he has never have to close a drawer he opens the bottom one he searches it he opens the next one and they all stay open well here was a combination of everything there was no pattern at all the crime had been planned out to a t though many neighbors were in their backyards on Easter Sunday no one noticed anything strange at the eule house nor had they heard gunshots given the amount of poor thought that must have gone into the murders detectives could not discount a professional hit nor could they Overlook the prospect that someone might be coming back to finish off the Seoul family survivor Dana Ewell he returned from school and met with investigators if he feared for his life he was hiding it along with his grief he's been this told that his family is dead all his family they're not a tear and it just amazed me I'm going well I'll give him benefit of doubt maybe he's in shock he told police that his mother had once worked for the Central Intelligence Agency his father who owned an airplane dealership had a reputation as a ruthless businessman as Dale's eight million dollar Fortune grew over the years it seemed likely that he'd made some enemies [Music] investigators delved into the family's personal and financial background probing for dark secrets none were found Glee's history as a translator with the CIA was uneventful and though many people seem to have disliked Dale Ewell none had a motive to kill him and his family what's this Dana was asked to inspect the house keeping an eye out for anything missing see the blood stains here we're not sure whose blood that was detectives noticed that he seemed unaffected by the blood-stained carpet but he became indignant when he saw that investigators had damaged a light fixture [Music] immediately after the funeral he started spending money watching her back he lavished his girlfriend with expensive gifts and purchased a 130 000 plane for himself it was suspicious Behavior but Dana had an alibi [Music] during the murder he said he'd been four hours away with his girlfriend's family the girl's father an FBI agent confirmed it if you could take it Dana stood to gain millions of dollars from his family's death but his perfect Alibi meant that he couldn't have been the shooter detectives hoped that forensics would help find out who was [Music] but there was little to go on no Footprints or fingerprints even the shells had been removed the only physical evidence was the six nine millimeter bullets expended at the crime scene all hope of solving the case rested in the hands of ballistics experts at the Fresno County Sheriff's Department the crime lab determined that the bullets had come from the box of ammunition found in the victim's nightstand identical scratch patterns told investigators that all Six Bullets had been fired through the same Barrel but when these marks were compared with ones from a Browning pistol like the one stolen from the Yule's house investigators found an obvious discrepancy the scratches that indicate rate of twist didn't match rate of twist is the distance it takes a bullet to complete a single rotation the Browning has a rate of twist of 10 inches but the murder bullets showed a 12 inch rate of twist for criminalist Alan Boudreau there was no mistaking the findings [Music] to me that finished the issue it's not a Browning pistol that fired the murder bullets but these weren't the only marks on the Slugs each of the Six Bullets bore deep scratches Boudreau was puzzled by these peculiar marks I'd never really seen anything like that before although I had about 24 25 years experience enlargements of the bullet markings were sent to law enforcement Labs throughout the country but none was familiar with the etchings or the unusual rate of twist located on the Six Bullets had been fired yet no one had heard shots unusual Gun Barrel marks that etched a mysterious signature onto the resulting slugs this suggested that the weapon had been modified perhaps by a silencer but the sheriff's department had little experience with them [Music] I've never come across where someone had used a silencer silence was not I mean they're used and you see them on TV a lot but I think it's more a movie drama than than actually in real life silencers are not not used in crimes and so that was that was kind of unusual in itself before Souza had only theorized that murder was the motivation if a silencer had been used he now had the physical proof you got a silencer he got a killer that came to the house to kill people that was the sole purpose after their ballistics analysis investigators studied the microscopic residue from Glee's sweatshirt it's common to find gunmetal residue near close range shots but this one contained an unusual mix of rubber steel wool and bright yellow fibers [Music] the forensics team couldn't identify the source of these materials but knew that they had somehow been used to modify the weapon their findings corroborated the silencer Theory [Music] they proved that on Eastern night someone had entered the Yule home with a deadly agenda he ransacked the house to make it look like a burglary and stole the victim's gun to throw detectives off track but he had used ammunition he found in the home and that meant the killer would have had to know there was a box of nine millimeter ammunition stashed in Dale Yule's nightstand only a handful of people had intimate knowledge of the house and three of them were dead detectives probed more deeply into Dana's background College classmates at Santa Clara described him as a preppy clean-cut loner obsessed with wealth so it was odd they thought that he'd been best friends with a student named Joel radovsich who was nearly kicked out of school for stealing furniture Joel seemed defensive with investigators he told them that he barely knew Dana his whereabouts on Easter Sunday could not be confirmed look I already told y'all right now I don't know anything about it surveillance on Dana showed that Joel moved into the Yule home two months after the murders and lived there until the following October during that time Dana paid his friends bills and treated him to thousands of dollars worth of helicopter lessons yet when Dana was asked about Joel he denied knowing him detectives had caught both young men in a bald-faced lie they needed to find out what else they might be lying about [Music] more than a year after the triple homicide of a wealthy Fresno family detectives still didn't have enough evidence to prove that Dana Ewell and Joel radovich were involved and the pair was well aware of that fact when Dana returned to Santa Clara the following spring they communicated only through beepers and payphones was skilled at dodging the detectives Dana was always looking over the shoulder very cautious he would go to the Jet Center in San Jose airport and they had insulated booths pay phone books and most the calls were from those and he you couldn't even stand outside the booth and hear what it's been said Joel wasn't as careful he was overheard telling Dana that he was worried about what the investigators might have on them foreign ly it wasn't enough to tie the young men to the murders investigators obtained a search warrant for a duplicate beeper so that they could monitor Joel's pages weeks passed without any suspicious calls then in October 1993 Joel got a page from a man detectives knew very little about his name was Jack Potts okay there it is he and Joel used to go target shooting together Ponce admitted that just 11 days before the Yule murders he had purchased a feather industry's nine millimeter semi-automatic rifle he said he bought it to kill opossums [Music] detectives thought that was an odd choice of weapon and when they asked to see it the Ponce said that the gun had been stolen [Music] if investigators could somehow tie the missing rifle to the bullets and residue from the crime scene they'd be able to connect radovich and Yule to the triple homicide [Music] realizing he was implicated in the murders turned States evidence he admitted that he purchased the rifle for Joel [Music] Days Later Joel told punts he'd killed the Yules and asked him to dispose of the weapon Ponce threw it away the murder weapon was gone but another piece of the puzzle fell into place when investigators learned that Dana had purchased a book on how to build a homemade silencer I purchased the same books that he did he had purchased and brought him home and of course I gave him to Alan Boudreau and says make a silencer heard this book Boudreau built a silencer to the book's specifications among the materials were tennis balls and steel wool consistent with the residue found on Glee Yule sweatshirt but the real proof was in the firing for that they'd need the gun [Music] after interviewing 90 Firearms manufacturers worldwide investigators discovered that the rare feather industries rifle is the only nine millimeter manufactured with a 12-inch rate of twist even though he didn't have Cox's rifle Boudreau could still perform tests on other weapons of the same model he spent months tracking down nine millimeter feathers with serial numbers close to the one registered to pots the barrels of these guns would be nearly identical Boudreau test-fired the weapons through sticky paper to trap any microscopic particles blown through the barrel this trace evidence was compared to the residue found on Glee Yule's clothing the unusual yellow fibers the rubber particles and the steel wool were an exact match and it was not difficult to reasonably conclude yes there there is um tennis ball material on Mrs ewell's sweatshirt and it's consistent with the silencer that I constructed based on the information from detective Susan the test bullets closely matched the characteristics of the murder bullets the rate of twist was correct the deep scratches were nearly identical to the murder bullets and finally the gun extruded the same residue as was found near Glee yule no other type of weapon could have matched so closely [Music] in March 1995 nearly two years after the murders arrest warrants were obtained for Dana Yule and Joel radovsich here's the plan based on their extensive investigation detectives had finally pieced together the whole story hungry for his father's Fortune Dana conspired with Joel a year in advance to shoot his family and make it look like a burglary in exchange Dana would split the eight million dollar inheritance with him while Dana established his perfect Alibi 200 miles away Joel slipped into the Yule home with a spare key he shot Dana's sister and mother first then waited for Dale they'd figured that without the weapon they couldn't be tied to the murders but as cleverly as they planned Dana and Joel's designs weren't Bulletproof neither man ever confessed in May of 1998 Yule and radovich were found guilty of three counts of first-degree murder incentives to life in prison in the UL case creeping suspicions undermined a tight-lipped conspiracy elsewhere a murder investigation was triggered by an innocent comment Allegheny County on November 7th 1994 police in Pennsylvania responded to a 911 sir calm down what's your address Lee we got a detail in Ross Township it's a white female found in a hot dog wife Marianne had lost Consciousness in the hot tub he couldn't resuscitate her police arrived to see paramedics attempting to revive her what happened this evening their efforts failed she gonna be okay I was inside she was out here in the hot tub and I saw her and I just had heart stuff as she was rushed to the hospital [Music] yeah the 35 year old woman was pronounced Dead on Arrival she had a .22 concentration of alcohol in her bloodstream more than twice the legal limit for intoxication my wife drank boskowski told the nurse that Marianne had been a heavy drinker and that he blamed the drowning on her alcohol you got it in Allegheny County cases of accidental death are police matters so technicians processed the scene you tell us investigators questioned boskowski's parents who'd been called over to babysit while Timothy was at the hospital okay well it's a shock it's really a shock bazkowski's father made the comment that this wasn't the first time their son had endured such a tragedy his first wife Elaine had died four years earlier nearly to the day [Music] when boskowski returned from the hospital investigators were waiting for him described the incident throughout the day and into the evening he estimated that Marianne drank between 13 and 15 cans of beer around 11 30 that night the couple downed a bottle of wine Marianne was an alcoholic her husband said boskowski claimed that Marianne stayed in the hot tub after he got out thank you when he next saw her he said she was lying on her side in the water [Music] detectives searched the house they found beer in the refrigerator and a bin of empty cans but these cans were completely dry inside and had obviously been collected over several days cans that had been opened that evening would have still held some liquid the evidence contradicted paskowski's claim that Marianne had consumed beer after beer well into the evening they also learned that a friend of Marianne's had spoken to her on the telephone for an hour and a half earlier that afternoon the friends said that Marianne didn't seem drunk the more detectives learned the more they suspected that Mrs boskowski's death was no accident but a case of deadly deja vu foreign buskowski was murdered in her hot tub detectives in Pennsylvania had very little physical evidence to prove it there was no sign of violence found in or around the tub all they really had were some conflicting statements Timothy buskowski agreed to go down to the police station for further questioning to detective Jimmy svetic his exacting account seemed staged one of the things he was so consistent with his times too consistent tend to one I did this Marianne did this at eight minutes to one five after one I was putting on my shoes in this interview this afternoon is that okay yeah yeah well boskowski was relating his story detectives observed a scratch on his neck could you tell me how you got that my wife and I went on a cruise and I asked him to remove his shirt we made him want to take a picture [Music] on his back they saw a pattern of scratches boskowski explained that he and Marianne had been on a cruise recently while in the tub he had asked her to scratch his sunburned back given the suspect's pale skin and the Deep gouges the explanation seemed implausible oh okay that's uh some scratches there Tim these looked like marks from a struggled [Music] when investigators questioned boskowski about his first wife his demeanor drastically changed [Music] he cut the interview short and demanded a lawyer without enough information to detain him he was free to go investigators immediately contacted law enforcement in Greensboro North Carolina where boskowski and his first wife had lived they uncovered some uncanny similarities between the two Mrs maskowskis yeah boskowski had met both wives Marianne and Elaine in church singles groups already yeah okay all right because he worked as religious school teachers they were the exact same weight even more chilling were the similarities between their deaths [Music] according to North Carolina police boskowski had called 9-1-1 on a Sunday night in November just to see it done in Pennsylvania foreign tics arrived to find Elaine on the bathroom floor with her husband attempting CPR okay so we're here let me ask you a few questions about what happened last night boskowski claimed that his wife had been drinking heavily that evening fell unconscious in the tubs and drowned the detectives in North Carolina were suspicious they didn't have enough evidence to disprove the husband's account cause of death was left blank on the death certificate boskowski was never charged I tried to get her to stop but I mean now four years later detectives in Pennsylvania were faced with the possibility that their case would end the same way to bring it to trial you need more than just suspicion you need you need a case you got to put the evidence together and everything has to be there and they just didn't have what they needed though the bizarre circumstances of his wives drowning deaths pointed to Foul Play it would be a challenge for investigators in Pennsylvania to differentiate an accident from a murder especially when there were no Witnesses unless Marianne's body had a compelling story to tell Laskowski would have just washed his hands of another suspicious death autopsy began with an inspection of the body there was no evidence of external trauma just a few fresh bruises but the bruising wasn't enough to disprove boskowski's story the paramedics might have caused them the body was next examined for signs of drowning to Allegheny County coroner Cyril wet it was evident that something had cut off Marianne's breathing but it wasn't water these lungs were not wet and heavy at all and if she had drowned in this tub I believe that there certainly would have been a fair amount of water into the lungs the victim had sustained hemorrhages in her eye and the back of her tongue the muscle tissue of her neck had sustained deep bruising all of these were telltale signs of death by strangulation the coroner concluded that after a rough struggle someone had wrapped his hands around the victim's neck and squeezed the life out of her the findings in Pennsylvania caught the attention of John butts chief medical examiner of North Carolina he wondered if boskowski's first wife Elaine had also been asphyxiated four years earlier foreign the autopsy reports showed no indication that she was but the original examiner might have missed the telltale signs enabling boskowski to get away with murder Elaine's body had been long buried but photographs remained investigators hoped they'd be enough to rectify a grave oversight four years after Elaine boskowski died in her bathroom investigators in North Carolina finally had their chance to prove that she'd been murdered medical examiner John butts noticed a strange mark on one of the photographs taken at her autopsy important pieces in the puzzle of this case involve some distinctive bruises that were present on Miss boskowski's lower chest upper abdominal region this was the set of linear or elongated bruises that are Illustrated in this photograph these parallel bruises called railroad tracks match the shower door railing in the boskowski's bathroom at autopsy their significance was overlooked but knowing how Timothy boskowski had allegedly killed his second wife helped butts find Clues to the death of his first one she was literally squeezed to death this bruise was produced when This Woman's abdomen upper chest region was pushed or compressed down onto the shower track and again it was it was our our feeling or our conclusion that that's actually the mechanism of her death based on what North Carolina investigators had turned up detectives in Pennsylvania looked for more similarities between the two cases they learned that both of boskowski's wives were planning to leave the marriage neither had yet canceled their life insurance policies that named their husband as beneficiary felt that killing his wife his financial and romantic problems when history began to repeat itself with Marianne he resorted to a plan that worked in the past thanks to the astute work of investigators in North Carolina and Pennsylvania the stage drowning of his second wife would be buskowski's last in 1996 he was convicted of the murder of Elaine in 1999 he was sentenced to death for the murder of Marianne [Music] Timothy boskowski's murderous past eventually caught up with him in New Jersey police again would have to look backward to solve a death in the family early Saturday March 4th 1995 a jogger was having a run through East Side park While most of Patterson New Jersey still slept one of its residents had apparently chosen to sleep practically on the jogging path only a pair of feet stuck out of the sleeping bag the jogger wondered how the person could breathe realized the occupant wasn't police confirmed that the body in the bag was deceased they interviewed the jogger and fanned out to look for evidence of a possible homicide the victim was a young female 18 to 24. she'd been beaten [Music] the sleeping bag interior was bloodstained but not soap suggesting she was stuffed into it afterward probably to move her to this spot Detective Mike caseri led the investigation we knew it was a murder we knew that wasn't the original scene um it was just that we were trying to figure out who did it and that's where the whole thing started most every homicide investigation begins with the victim in this case she had no identity the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the Head the medical examiner found no sign of sexual assault the blood-stained portions of her clothes were carefully cut away and the blood tested against the victim's own if some of it didn't match investigators hope that it could be used against a suspected culprit but all the stains match the victim's blood they found neither hide nor hair of any potential suspect [Music] at the New Jersey state identification Bureau the victim's fingerprints were run through aphis the automated fingerprint identification system it Compares prints from police files all over the country [Music] within hours it found a match right in New Jersey the victim was 18 year old Tara Carter her prints were on file because she had once been arrested for shoplifting her parents had moved out of state but police found her closest relative her sister they brought a photo of the victim see if you see anybody recognized a friend came to help because she couldn't bring herself to look at it they made the ID now there was no doubt sure Tara Carter was dead police learned that Tara said she was going to spend the weekend with her boyfriend he went by the name original she didn't know his real name or where to find him she also said that Tara had been living with a family friend a widow named Celestine Payne and her children they might know more Payne lived in a nearby neighborhood where she occasionally rented rooms in her house foreign police paid her a visit Celestine offered to help in any way that she could directed us to the bedroom area where where Tara slept with her two daughters and myself and detective Reyes looked around you know it's common to look for phone books or anything with possible um you know names of friends or anything because we had nothing we didn't have anything to go on to solve this crime at that point oh no Wendy can't take that Tara Carter was treated like a member of Payne's family she was the best friend of celestine's daughter Wendy with whom she shared the room until Wendy moved to South Carolina detectives looked in the closet where Tara kept her belongings they found nothing to indicate she was in any kind of trouble with her mysterious boyfriend or with anyone else when pain could offer no new information about the victim's boyfriend original police put the word out that they needed to speak with him in the meantime they look for more information about the victim Payne directed them to the basement where more of terrorist things were stored [Music] they didn't know what they were looking for until they found it in one area drops of blood dotted the basement floor detective race automatically told his pain not to touch anything you know that it's possible that the crime happened here and she's again said well if it happened here I want to know about it this is my house see these drops right here the amount and position of the blood droplets raised suspicions but didn't suggest that this was the murder scene investigators weren't sure what the drops meant and you could see a dripping stain coming down from the rafter directly below it was a stain a stain of blood which indicated that it's possible blood may have dripped from the upstairs into the basement Celestine Payne gave her consent to a more thorough search of her house instead I want to know about it whatever it takes to figure out you guys do what you got to do while the forensics team was dispatched detectives continued their investigation [Music] they headed back to the victim's closet which turned out to be directly over the blood-stained beams they found Blood on the wall and floor of the closet along with blood-stained women's underwear and other garments it looked like bloody murder but investigators had to be sure can you hear me the club up please samples were collected and sent to the New Jersey State Police Central lab where genetic markers in the blood were scrutinized these proteins inherited from our parents don't change though not as precise as DNA testing genetic marker testing is often sufficient because certain markers are more rare than others senior forensic scientist Cynthia McSweeney analyzed the samples from the closet and I was able to determine that this blood stain was consistent with only three percent of the black population that three percent included the victim Tara Carter the evidence proved that she had met her death inside the house [Music] Celestine Payne accompanied detectives to the station for questioning told them that she last saw the victim at 11AM on Friday March 3rd the day before her body was found Tara said she was going to run errands Celestine and her son had errands of their own to run and were gone most of the day how did he get out in the backyard when Celestine returned a man named Charlie pincham was waiting on the porch pincham used to date celestine's daughter Wendy before she moved away and he was in the habit of stopping by celestine's house and hanging out she didn't know where he lived because he might have committed the crime while the pains were away Charlie pincham's name was added to the suspect's list while Celestine answered questions investigators combed her house for more clues besides the bedroom closet traces of blood were found in the kitchen the drain pipes were removed and The Traps empty to see what might have accumulated there almost 100 articles of evidence from there including blood drippings swabbings took the sink apart and removed later turned out to be a skull fragments inside the sink trap the toilet there was some hair and matter found inside there from there the whole thing exploded uh the investigation took off by now the victim's boyfriend original heard police were looking for him and presented himself along with an alibi he was off the suspect's list at least for now that left the equally mysterious Charlie pension The Grieving Celestine pain but detectives didn't know where Charlie pincham was and the forensic evidence didn't necessarily Place Celestine pain at the scene when the murder occurred this wasn't the first time police had been to Payne's house while reviewing the case detective Sergeant Ronald Pumphrey remembered a prior incident there was a a guy stabbed maybe about a year year and a half before that Eugene Cooper I remember Eugene living there but I never got to interview him he was in intensive care unit at the hospital on the Stab Wound and we couldn't get to speak to him upon Cooper's release from the hospital he refused to press charges and disappeared now 18 months later detectives tracked Eugene Cooper down to see if there was a connection Cooper told them that while he lived in the house Celestine wanted him to sign his life insurance policy over to her he didn't do it but led on that he had soon after Charlie pincham attacked him he said that uh Tommy got stabbed Charlie was the one that stabbed them and uh Celestine pain I put him up to it Cooper didn't go to the police because he was frightened and wanted to put the whole ugly incident behind him he picked out pincham's photo from some mug shots because Cooper implicated him in this stabbing it was more important than ever to locate him off now that Eugene Cooper was talking he had a lot more to say and the case took another unexpected twist he told police that Celestine had set several Fires at her house for the insurance money he also admitted that he helped Celestine move a body but it wasn't the body of Tara Carter Tara Carter had been found dead in a sleeping bag and the investigation into her murder began to disclose other skeletons and Celestine Payne's closet hang on according to Eugene Cooper the death of celestine's husband Alfonso years earlier may not have been accidental prior to his death Alfonso Payne had been suffering from severe hypertension and gout he was being cared more by his wife Celestine in 1991 his body was found in a field across town at the time Alfonso's death was considered to be accidental that he was doing drugs wandered away collapsed now three and a half years later Eugene Cooper told New Jersey police that he'd helped Celestine and her children Gump Alfonso Payne's body on the other side of town with Cooper's new information detectives pulled Alfonso's medical records and autopsy report they found that before his death he had been too ill to even get out of bed let alone get across town the autopsy showed that the drugs in his system at the time of death weren't those prescribed for his medical condition but High dosages of five kinds of tranquilizers and antidepressants all prescribed for Celestine yeah sure investigators had enough to get another search warrant for Payne's home they found that besides the policy on her husband Alfonso and for fire damage Payne also managed to get one on Eugene Cooper even without his signature it appeared that Celestine Payne may have killed her husband and once again Insurance seemed to be the motive they also found a policy on Tara Carter's life insurance this was strange because like Cooper she wasn't related to pain the policy provided a possible motive not enough evidence to arrest Celestine for murder Ed to talk to Lauren him present with you while you've been by this time Charlie pincham had been found and arrested for stabbing Eugene Cooper eventually he admitted to it saying that Celestine Payne put him up to it okay then investigators asked him what he knew about the Tara Carter murder he said he was there and tried to stop it but Celestine Payne killed her afterward he admitted helping her move the body using a car she rented they had what they needed to arrest Celestine pain then they tracked down the rental car Cynthia McSweeney tested the trunk for traces of blood found nothing but her job wasn't finished her tests of the liner below the trunk carpet yielded different results when I analyzed the liner and did get a positive result I began to think that perhaps the person had tried to clean up the area but had not done a thorough job as before a genetic marker analysis of the blood proved it belonged to the victim Tara Carter its presence in the trunk of a car rented by Celestine Payne linked the suspect to the crime you've got a pretty good wrap despite the evidence she flatly denied any wrongdoing I know he lies she hoped her child could mask her guilt detective Michael cassari didn't buy it Celestine was a devious woman um she would look at you and say child I didn't do this murder and almost melt into you you know I had nothing to do with this I would never hurt anybody and and she's using her kids to kill people including their own father she's killing her friends she's killing family people she is a she's evil it's the only one word to put an evil woman she passed that evil on to her daughter investigators learn that while Wendy pretended to be Tara's best friend she also pretended to be Tara at least long enough to sign a life insurance policy in Tara Carter's name oh yeah thank you once the policy was in effect Tara Carter's days were numbered the unwitting victim lured into a false sense of security in Payne's home was Marked for Death you look pretty it came quickly pincham admitted using a probard her body was stashed in the upstairs closet until it could be bundled and moved safely without being detected ultimately the forensics clinched the case and even Celestine pain couldn't deny it the blood stains the financial motive and the opportunity all pointed to pain her daughter Wendy and Charlie pincham when faced with the evidence they plea bargained Celestine Payne and Charlie pincham received life and Wendy Payne received 28 years to solve some homicides investigators need look no further than the victim's own home but just because a suspect was a relative doesn't mean the case will be solved with relative ease a killer in the home will take greater care to cover his tracks it's up to forensics to make sure that deadly Secrets Don't Stay buried in in class [Music] thank you [Music]