1991 Murder of Danielle Clause | Bloodline Detectives with Nancy Grace | Forensic Files

[TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura, California, 1991. The body of a 42-year-old mom, Danielle Clause,
discovered downtown Ventura. Her face was almost unrecognizable. It had been smashed in, her face, her head with some sort
of blunt instrument. And there was a bloody rock located nearby. She did everything she could.
She might have been taken by surprise as well. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The grisly crime
deeply disturbs investigators and the entire community. It was good old-fashioned police work--
interviewing witnesses, following up on leads, doing whatever detectives could. And in this case, detectives worked
incredibly hard to attempt to bring closure to this case in 1991. I was right along with the investigation.
And they were so good about talking to me with it. Unfortunately, it turned cold three or four, five years later.
And it stayed that way for years. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The case goes cold. Decades later, investigators turn to new and groundbreaking
forensic science. This is what law enforcement and prosecution is all about, seeking justice, being dogged and unrelenting in that pursuit,
and getting to a conclusion, some finality. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): This is the story of a 32-year-long
search for a vicious killer and two brothers who might fit that description. I'm Nancy Grace.
This is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC] Ventura, California, 1991. A coastal city north of LA, renowned
for beaches, watersports, and a flourishing cultural scene. It's a beautiful county.
It's a suburban community. Obviously, with beautiful coasts, beautiful mountains,
varied terrain. It's a great place to raise a family. There was more crime, particularly more
of what we would identify as stranger sexual assaults in 1991, than what we see today.
We have a number of biotech companies here. We also have a tech giant here in the city of Ventura,
known as the Trade Desk. It's also the home of the worldwide apparel giant, Patagonia.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Danielle Clause, a 42-year-old mom from Ventura, is passionate
about art and poetry. We were close as-- as young girls because she was only-- she was only a year and a month older than me.
So we were around the same age. She was very smart. She was very sensitive. But not cold.
She had a good sense of humor. She was a loyal friend. I remember she had a lot of friends that
had a lot of respect for her. All she ever wanted was to be a mother and a wife.
So, I mean, that was, like, her goal in life was to be a wife and a mother, and she was able to do that.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Sadly, Danielle struggles with addiction. Danielle was not someone who regularly
worked as a prostitute. She was someone who chose that out of an act of desperation.
And in this case, it was the need to get funds to buy narcotics. And that's when she would engage in acts of prostitution,
when she had no other avenue to get money to purchase narcotics. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): July 15,
1991 Danielle goes out with a friend, and she never returns home. I was living on Kalorama Street in Ventura.
And I remember that night, Danielle coming up our alley and honking the horn, telling me hi,
and asking me what I was doing. I don't know, we just talked. And then her driving away.
And the next morning, her friend was driving her car. And her friend came up the same alley.
And my sister wasn't with her or her car. That really upset me. Well, where's my sister?
They went looking for her. They searched different locations that she would be. And still, they were unable to find her.
At that point, the next morning, they reached out to the victim's sister as well as the victim's husband to see if she had gone home
or maybe gone to her sister's house. And at that point, she still hadn't turned up.
The people that she was with, they were very worried because this was not usual behavior for her.
The next day, a gruesome discovery on a hillside near downtown Ventura. Around 10 o'clock in the morning up on Tioga,
which is kind of an isolated area, there was a landscaping crew out there. One of the young men headed down the hill to use the restroom.
And when he went to go use the restroom, he observed her naked body there on the hillside.
And they called 911 right away. There were two patrol officers who responded first,
and really thinking ahead of their time, marked a very narrow path down to the body, using things
that they were carrying on their person, such as their batons and gloves, marking that path so
that additional personnel who responded would take the same path and limit contamination
of the crime scene. They walked up, confirmed that what actually was reported was,
in fact, the case of what-- and what was happening. So at that point, once they confirmed that there was a body
there and the person was deceased, they backed away and notified the proper channels
because it was gonna very quickly escalate. That case would go up to the detectives
and be worked from there. [TENSE MUSIC] The body was face down. It was the body of a female.
She was nude. Her shirt, black shirt, had been pulled up to the top portion of her torso.
She had a red pair of panties that was around one of her legs. Her jeans were off and nearby.
She was wearing one shoe and socks. The other shoe was never located. [TENSE MUSIC]
You might not see so obviously, like, shoe wear impressions, possibly a blood trail,
possibly, you know, any kind of other fluid, bodily fluid, anything else that might be around the scene as well.
So we're not allowed to do anything with the body until the medical examiner has arrived and actually
gone over it himself. And then we have permission to start taking photographs. At that scene, they identified multiple items around her body
because at that point, you really don't know what's of importance and what's not of importance.
So I know a lighter was collected. Cigarette butts were collected. There was AAA Auto Club membership
card that was collected. And then, of course, moving closer to the body, we had different forms of paperwork,
plastic bags, her clothing, which we're assuming is her clothing, the pair of jeans.
That lone tennis shoe, that was collected. But there was one key piece of evidence that was nearby,
and that was that rock. And that rock had a large amount of blood on it. And so looking at her injuries, that her face looked cave in
and that rock right there. So that was a key piece of evidence that was collected.
At that point, they would have also called the medical examiner, which I know the medical examiner did
respond. When they get there, they're observing her trauma, and there was a lot of blood around her head.
But they still need to identify, see her face. So at that point, I know that they flipped the body over,
and they could see that there was more visible trauma to the front of her face At that point, because of the severity,
she was unrecognizable. She had no ID on her. They would have searched around the area,
maybe in the jean pockets, and nothing came up. So at that point, once they're done,
they would have removed the body. And they took her down to the medical examiner's office.
At that point, they went back to good old-fashioned fingerprinting, took her fingerprints,
and ran them through the system. At that point, since she's had a criminal record in the past,
she was able to be ID'd through her fingerprints. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The woman,
ID'd as a 42-year-old mother of one, it's Danielle Clause. My brother came in and told me, turn off the TV,
because, you know, I just thought he was visiting. And I'd been watching, ironically, crime shows,
you know? And so he said, turn the TV off. And I said, well, why can't I watch the end of this
and see who did it? He said, no, turn your TV off. I have something to tell you.
I thought my mother had passed away. And he said they found Danielle murdered. My mother just dropped to her knees and-- and screamed.
It was a horrible thing for her. If any of us changed, it-- I would say that my mother changed the most.
I always wanted her to know who did this. And she always wanted to know who did it.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): A mother, sister, and daughter murdered in cold blood. Can Ventura police track down a ruthless killer
before he strikes again? That's next on "Bloodline Detectives." [TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): July 15, 1991.
A 42-year-old mom of one, Danielle Clause, goes missing in Ventura, California. The very next day, her half naked body
discovered on the top of Tioga Drive. She has been sex assaulted and severely beaten with a rock,
her body taken for autopsy. There are so many key pieces of evidence that the body holds onto.
You enter, and you leave something behind. When you move, you take something with you.
So knowing where she was at and the-- the position of her body and the removal of her clothes, you
know that there was some sort of possible struggle that happened. She came into close contact with their suspect.
So at that point, you're working with the pathologist, the forensic pathologist, and they're very focused in how
she died, the manner of death. But as a crime scene investigator, as in forensics, you're--
you're focused on what small piece of minute evidence is on that body that will tell a greater tale.
Fingernail scrapings are one of the biggest things that is-- it's very important, especially in a physical attack like this.
If you think about it, the victim is likely trying to fight back and defend themselves.
And it's very likely that fingernails in the process of defending oneself, you're gonna
put your hands on the person that's trying to hurt you. And there's a good chance that you're
gonna get some kind of transfer, biological transfer, under the fingernails. Just based on the manner that she's found,
partially clothed with her pants off and her underwear partially removed, it's indicative that there
was likely a sexual assault involved. So a sexual assault kit was taken. They take different swabs of the body
in key different areas-- around the mouth, the neck, the genitalia, anything that would have been manipulated
or there may be some sort of DNA sample deposited. So there were hairs that were found on her body.
At that point, they would have been photographed, and they were collected. I know throughout this case that there were many hair samples
taken from possible suspects to compare against those foreign hairs found on her body.
They were found on her torso area as well as the genitalia area. One of the most significant pieces was a softball-sized
rock that was there nearby. It was obviously used in the crime because there was blood on it, significant amount
of blood on it. The manner and cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head.
She had multiple skull fractures located on the front of her head. That would have been her cause of death.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Danielle Clause's family devastated by the gruesome crime.
My sister was unrecognizable. She was unrecognizable. And when my mother went to see her in the funeral home,
she looked at her and said, that's not my daughter. And that really got to me. I only recognized her hands because she was beaten so bad.
My mom just said, that's not my daughter. My daughter's not there. And she was right.
It was just, you know, where her spirit dwelled, I guess. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura police
began to interview Danielle's friends and acquaintances. They did consider the husband to be a person of interest,
not because of any specific information they had, but it's just common to examine the husband
to see if that's a potential suspect in this case. He was cooperative with the investigation
from the very beginning. He told investigators that his wife had been addicted to drugs for a number of years.
The day before, she had traveled to the city of Ventura to meet up with a friend and that that was
the last time he had seen her. It seemed that he thought he had no choice in this matter,
that he would from time to time give his wife money. But he didn't want her to use narcotics.
He also claimed to not want her to engage in acts of prostitution. He seemed, in some way, just putting up with the situation
because he loved her. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Detectives began to piece together Danielle's last known movements.
Danielle met up with a sex purchaser, engaged in a sex act, returned with money.
She and the friend returned to Oxnard, where they engaged-- where they purchased narcotics and ingested narcotics.
They returned to Ventura on July 15, 1991, just prior to 9:00 PM. Danielle said to her friend, let's just try one more time
before the night's over. So her friend agreed to it. So her friend was able to show that and tell
the story that Danielle was downtown Ventura, walking on the street. She sees her approach a small white truck
driven by a white male with blonde hair. She sees Danielle lean into the truck to talk to the guy.
At that point, she turns around, loses sight of Danielle for 30 seconds. And when she turns back around, Danielle is gone.
And so is the white truck. So at that point, she's unclear. Did she turn a corner?
Did the white truck leave? Or did she get into that white truck and go with that gentleman to perform one last trick?
So at that time, detectives, they interviewed the friend. She gave an amazing description of the type of truck
that Danielle was seen leaning into. They made a sketch of the truck. They gave all the details, and then
they started passing those flyers out to local law enforcement. They even went as far as to understand
that it was a small truck. It was a mini-truck. And at that time, the mini-truck culture was huge.
So they're looking at, like, car shows. They're looking at DMV records. They're trying to find any sort of existence
of a small white truck in-- you know, registered within Ventura County. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The tip about the white truck becomes
a dead end for investigators. Ventura police turn their attention to local sex workers and their clientele in the same area.
Once they started talking to other prostitutes in the area that were familiar with Danielle, that worked
the same streets, they were able to start picking up on certain individuals that were frequent customers.
And these frequent customers were keyed in on because they either displayed tendencies
of being violent with girls or rough with the girls. And so detectives were actually able to track down these men
and interview them and actually collect samples-- blood samples, hair samples. They looked at her past boyfriends and relationships
she had with other men, and it appeared that everybody that they contacted was willingly giving information about their whereabouts
and their relationship with Danielle and the last time that they even touched base with Danielle.
There were also people mentioned in the file that they had looked at that were convicted killers or people
that were currently awaiting trial because of their role in killing a prostitute or a female very violently.
So they really threw their net out wide and gathered information on a wide variety of individuals.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): One by one, all leads in Danielle's murder dry up. There are reports from four years after the crime.
So I wouldn't say there's a date that it actually went cold. It was constantly being worked.
And it's-- it's difficult and especially an agency this size. It's a smaller agency.
And there's a small handful of detectives that are working it. And you work cases as much as you can work
them until they're complete. These cases are a year-plus old. And so unfortunately, it comes down to an issue of manpower.
There's not a date that things go cold, but at some point, you work something until all the leads are exhausted.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): For 30 long years, Danielle Clause's murder stays cold.
But then a new team of investigators, armed with the very latest forensic science, takes over.
That's next on "Bloodline Detectives." [TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura, California, 2021.
After 30 years, police reopen the murder of Danielle Clause. The 42-year-old mom of one, Danielle, found dumped
like trash on a roadside, 1991. She was sex assaulted and beaten dead with a rock.
Ventura detectives turn to new forensic science to try and crack her case. In 2001, there was a new tool that
had become available to law enforcement, known as CODIS or the Combined DNA Index System.
And what was done at that time is the profile that was believed to belong to the suspect that was developed from Danielle's
sexual assault kit was uploaded to this new database to see if it would match any known offenders
contained within CODIS. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Unfortunately, there is not a single hit in the CODIS database.
Their hands were tied. They couldn't do anything. And I always thought, well, you have to keep trying.
So the case did go cold again in 2001, and it wasn't until 2021 when Detective Tyler Buck
was reviewing cold cases because of the Golden State Killer case. It kind of reignited the fire.
He looked at that case. And that's when he tapped me and my partner on the shoulder
and said, girls, there is an amazing case, Danielle Clause, 1991. Look at it. Well, at the time that this case was reopened,
I was in major crimes. I was a detective. I started in 2017. And I started looking into this right
after the Golden State Killer case. [TENSE MUSIC] After he got identified, I was asked
to go through a lot of old reports and calls for service around that time. And I came across this one, and it was 2018.
And they asked for a picture, a recent picture or a picture of my sister, so I gave them
a better picture than they had. They said, well, we're gonna reopen cold cases. Well, I thought that was something.
You know, it wasn't like what I was being told all these years, that they just didn't have any leads.
But now they were gonna reopen it. And I knew that things had been solved in the past
from reopening cases and relooking at people and places, things. And so my prayers became more, and then I began keeping
in touch with them more. I talked to Gabby. And I said, hey, Gabby, like, we could
potentially work this case. There's stuff to be done with it. Let's-- let's jump into it.
And so the first thing I know we did is we went and just confirmed what evidence we had.
And we realized pretty quickly that the rock and her fingernail clippings hadn't been tested.
So we knew that that was one of the first things that we needed to do. Right here, this is Danielle's sexual assault kit that was
collected during the autopsy. The key piece of evidence in this case, it displayed the semen on the slides.
And it gave us the DNA profile. So initially, this was the only item that was tested and put into CODIS.
This item yielded an unknown male DNA profile. So we knew that this probably was the killer's
DNA profile in the hair. But then realizing that the rock had never been properly tested
or the fingernail clippings hadn't been tested, we knew we had work ahead of us.
At that point, the next thing to be analyzed was the rock. Within two months, the data came back
and showed that there was an identical profile to this profile in here. The next thing were the fingernail clippings, just
reassuring that an identical profile developed on the fingernail clippings was the same profile that
was on the rock and the same profile that was here in the sexual assault. This was, like,
the triangulation that locked in and gave us beyond a reasonable doubt that this was our suspect's
DNA that we were looking for. This was the individual right here. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): By September 2021,
all the DNA results match a single unknown suspect. The sample is now ready for investigative
genetic genealogy analysis. But before that can happen, Ventura police need additional money to pay for this very expensive research.
Season of Justice, it is an amazing nonprofit agency that provides funding to agencies and families
that help solve cold cases through-- in violent crimes and missing persons. They are absolutely amazing.
So I went on their website. I filled out an application. I gave them, like, a synopsis of the crime
and why we feel it's so important to be able to move forward and the money that we need
to be able to move forward. And I think it was about a week later, I heard back from one of their representatives.
And they said, hi, Gabrielle, we absolutely love your case, and we would love to fund it.
Just please send us how much you need, and we'll get funding right over to you. And that was it.
I have funding to pay for everything-- for the genealogists, for the testing, for the DNA application.
Like, let's go. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura police contact Identifinders International, a company specializing
in investigative genetic genealogy. Its founder and president, Dr. Colleen Fitzpatrick.
We got involved in this case when Gabriel Wymore up in Ventura County contacted us, filled out
a form on our website, and we discussed it with her, and she decided to go with us, go forward with us.
And she basically told us the outline, that there was a young woman, Danielle Clause, who
was murdered up in Ventura County, you know, near a drainage ditch. I mean, she told us the basics.
Well, initially, they had done the DNA analysis on the sexual assault kit. And in that sexual assault kit, usually
you get more female than male. You get a little bit male, tons of female, which is not good for us.
So the lab in general does what's called a differential extraction. They wash the female out.
They're left with the sperms, which generally have really hard shells. And so once you have that, you can get the DNA of the male-only
because that's all that's left. So that's what we got. The DNA from the differential extraction that was all-male.
So we sent it off to Gene By Gene. And the process they use is they have a chip,
and they tune the chip to the markers, the SNPs, that we need. So basically, in-- in common language,
they put it in the microwave oven, they bake it, and it comes out, and we have the data we need.
When we get the data back, it's a SNP file, and we upload the data. I was able to build out their family trees, looking
for intersections to identify who our unknown sample would belong to. I had come across a line that was of interest because there
were intersections between the various matches that I was working on. And I had noticed that one female in this particular tree,
she had her own family tree. She seemed to be interested in genealogy. And I needed to get just a little bit
more information genetically to form my hypothesis. So I approached the police department
about reaching out to her to see if she would like to contribute her DNA to help with our investigation.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura police contact the woman and ask about her family tree.
She, at first, was a little in shock. But she let them in. And she said, oh, yeah, let me tell
you about my family history. But they told her, we're looking at this individual.
You are connected to this family name. Can you please tell us about your family?
And she did. She gave them the whole breakdown of her family tree. And at the end of it, they said, would you
be willing to provide your own DNA sample that may help us get a little bit further
in the investigation? She said, absolutely. So detectives ran that DNA sample back up to us
here at Ventura. So we got that out within two weeks. The DNA sample was sent out to the private lab.
They sent over the results to Misty, and it was like on a Thursday morning. She texted me at 7:00 AM, and I give her a call.
I said, what do you got? And she's like, that lady in Southern California is first cousins with our suspect.
At that point, you know, I'm excited. I'm jumping. We're both going, ee. We're just thrilled.
We got the names of the two first cousins. And I ran straight up, not to my sergeant,
but I ran straight up to Detective Tyler Buck. I said, chief, I think we found out who killed Danielle.
He's like, slow down. I was like, we got two first cousins. They're-- they're a set of brothers.
One's dead, one's alive. But I think we have it. We have it. Investigators narrow their search for Danielle's killer
to one of two brothers, last name, Welch. But which brother is it? That's next on "Bloodline Detectives."
[TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura, California, 2023. Investigators believe one of two brothers
murdered Danielle Clause. The body of the 42-year-old mom of one found on a Ventura
hillside back in 1991. Danielle was beaten dead with a rock. The case goes cold until new forensic science points
to the two brothers, last name, Welch. So it turns out that both brothers had very
different appearances to them. One brother was dark hair with hazel eyes, and the other brother was blonde with blue eyes.
And we couldn't really tell genetically which brother could be the viable lead. So Gabriella had approached me and asked
if we offered phenotyping services, and I had let her know that Parabon does. And so we had the file that was submitted
for genetic genealogy sent to Parabon for their phenotype snapshot services. Phenotyping means you can look at your DNA,
and there's certain of those SNP markers that indicate hair color and eye color.
So they looked at those particular markers, and they came up with the image that that generated
of the hair color, eye color, and skin tone that that generated. And the snapshot that came back, the phenotype prediction,
was for a man with dark hair and hazel or brown eyes. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): The brother
who matches these features is Larry Devon Welch. He dies, aged 50, 1999. Now detectives must track down his surviving brother.
The DA's office actually helped with that as well. We found out where he died, the county in which he died in.
And then from there, we were able to contact their coroner's office. And the coroner's office gave us the information on the case
and his manner of death and what happened to his body. So it was learned that he died from a potential drug overdose,
and he was cremated. So at that point, we knew that we weren't gonna have the opportunity to exhume a body.
Historically, law enforcement in these types of cases will have to look to a half-eaten pizza or a coffee cup or maybe
a straw from a fast food restaurant to retrieve and collect a DNA sample of the potential suspect.
Here, while there was some initial surveillance, we were able to obtain the cooperation
and assistance of the living brother in Virginia. He met with our investigator. He met with a member of the Virginia State Police,
talked to both of them, shared crucial information about his deceased brother, and voluntarily gave a DNA sample.
And they wanted to know everything. Like, who Larry was. What was his childhood like?
Where did he live? Everything and anything that they could find out about who our individual was.
So I believe they had a very open and free-flowing conversation with the brother.
Larry Welch was someone who had a deep addiction to narcotics. We also learned that he lived in Ventura County,
that, at one point, he had a sailboat in the Oxnard or Channel Islands Harbor here in Ventura County,
that he had a violent temper. His brother talked about a situation where he attacked their father and broke some property
inside of a residence. He also told a disturbing story that Larry had shared with him that was disturbingly similar to what
happened to Danielle. Larry had told him a story prior to his death that Larry had been in an argument in a bar in the desert,
that Larry and the man he was arguing with went outside of the bar to settle their fight.
And Larry told the living brother that Larry smashed this man's head in with a rock.
Now, we checked in the jurisdictions where Larry lived. There's no report of a homicide like that.
And so what we believe is that that was Larry's way of telling what he had done to Danielle in a way that
was more palatable. Hearing that gave us chills. We also learned that he drove a white pickup truck.
Furthermore, to place him in Ventura County, we learned that he lived at the Channel Islands Marina
in the city of Oxnard. He also made a revelation that he had molested a family member.
So we had, from hindsight, the profile of somebody who had a very deep and troubled history,
who had a violent and very savage streak. So when this all came together, it was not surprising to us
that this is somebody who could have taken the life and killed Danielle. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): To confirm the identity of Danielle
Clause's killer, all police need is a DNA sample from the surviving brother. Will it be a match?
We find out next on "Bloodline Detectives." [TENSE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Ventura, California, 2023.
After 32 years, detectives are just one step away from confirming the killer of Danielle Clause back in 1991.
The main suspect is dead. But his brother is still alive, and a match will finally close the case.
So in this case, the Virginia State Police had what's known as a rapid DNA machine.
So they collected the DNA samples from the living brother. They brought them immediately back to the department,
and they were able to test the samples that same day. And the results that were returned were astounding.
First, they eliminated the living brother as the contributor of the suspect DNA.
That let us know that the living brother was not the person who killed Danielle.
Further, what the result said was that the living brother was related within the first degree to the contributor
of the offender DNA recovered from Danielle's body and from the rock with a certainty of 99.99%.
It was a full sibling match. Motive is always speculative, but I will share with you that this is somebody who sought sex.
For whatever reason, something happened. And he went into a rageful, savage, and sadistic mode, which
cost the life of Danielle. He likely took her to this remote location for sexual activity.
Something happened. He grabbed a rock and bludgeoned her and bludgeoned her to death.
NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): Detectives go to Danielle Clause's sister, Marcy, to give her the news.
So meeting with her and bringing Detective Tyler Buck, my partner at the time, Kimberly Jung, who started
this investigation with us. We had to take a moment because this is big information for her,
and she needed to take a moment. And there was some small, like, chit-chat. And I said, OK, are you ready for us to tell you
about everything that we found? And she said, yes. So we presented who Larry Welch was to her.
And at that point, she just had to take a moment. And then it's like, the flood of tears.
It's just an overwhelming sensation for her. She was apologizing, and we said, no.
And then, of course, I started crying. I couldn't-- it was just so much emotion,
so much build-up and tension because it's big news, you know? Not just for us, for her.
I can't even fathom what she was feeling at that moment. It's just amazing that they could do what they did
and that the people involved could be so patient and work so hard and so long until they got the person they
were looking for. And as far as justice for Larry Welch, just the fact that I had a face and a person and a name to go with her murder
and know for a fact that that's who is guilty, I just didn't want to pass away without knowing
who did this, who took my sister away from us. And that's what I prayed for. And that's what I wished for.
And that's what I got. The lesson that I take away from this case is the importance of preserving the evidence.
We can't fathom today what we'll be able to do forensically tomorrow. Just like the investigators in 1991
couldn't possibly have fathomed that we would use genetic genealogy to solve this case.
I think it's going to be a very important tool. I see a lot of funding being made
available for genetic genealogy now in law enforcement investigations. And I do see the signs trending to a better results
with mixtures, better results with degradation. So I really think it's going to be a more powerful tool the more
in time it goes. I felt very honored that I could use a skill set that I have to be able to help police departments
and help society not only provide resolution to these cases, but keep society safer, in a sense.
Victims of crimes are daughters. They're brothers. They're sons. They're sisters.
They are people. They are human beings. And her life was taken from her way too soon.
I just want everyone to know, and if Danielle's listening, to know we never gave up on you.
We wanted this case to be solved. And we found the person who did this. NANCY GRACE (VOICEOVER): For Bloodline Detectives,
the tragic murder of mom of one, Danielle Clause, gives added meaning to the Bible phrase,
am I my brother's keeper? Thanks to one innocent brother, justice is finally served on a guilty brother after 32 years.
I'm Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us here on "Bloodline Detectives." [TENSE MUSIC]

Ventura Police struggle to find 42-year-old mother Danielle Clause’s murderer in 1991. Three decades later, will family trees and a new forensic science finally give them answers?

Now in its fifth season, Bloodline Detectives is the leading true crime series that explores how police departments harness genetic genealogy to solve crimes that were once considered "unsolvable," bringing long-awaited answers to victims' families.

Brief Summary

Danielle Clause's murder case, cold for 32 years, is solved through DNA evidence linking her death to Larry Welch.

Key points

The Gruesome Discovery. Danielle Clause's body is found in a shocking state, leading to a murder investigation.
A Mother's Pain. Danielle's mother reacts to the news of her daughter's murder, forever changed by the tragedy.
Cold Case Reopened. After decades, a new team of investigators uses advanced forensic science to revisit Danielle's murder.
Justice After 32 Years. Detectives confirm the identity of Danielle Clause's killer after decades of investigation.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

She was very smart. She was very sensitive.

Describing Danielle Clause's character.

3:23WatchJun 8, 2025

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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