Forensic Files: A Special Tribute | Forensic Files

[music playing] NARRATOR: "Medical Detectives" is a hard-hitting reality-based series.
It's about new scientific technology and how it's cracking cases and solving crimes like rape, murder, and missing person cases.
So, my idea was always to have a murder mystery format where the viewer would play along, put themselves
in with the investigators. What they were seeing, what they were learning from, what they were dismissing, what wasn't important,
and that was the whole idea of it. GARY LICO: I can remember being out there in the earlier
days of pitching and trying to explain to people that this was a new category. That, someone, was approaching the subject of true crime
with really an obviously, a cinematic touch, and a cinematic storytelling, and a cinematic look.
No one had ever gone to that degree to produce 22 minutes of television, and no one still is.
[video playback] It's what you thought. NARRATOR: On a dark, rainy day in the fall of 1986,
Helle Crafts learned from a private investigator that her husband was having an affair.
Is that your husband? Yes. [sobbing] That's Richard. [end playback] NARRATOR: Shortly after this meeting,
Helle Crafts disappeared. This is the story of how forensic science solved the puzzle.
When the show first started, and people would say, oh, I work on a television show.
Oh, yeah, what's it called? "Medical detectives." Dozens of times, people would say, wood chipper.
NARRATOR: Using his chainsaw, Crafts dismembered Helle's frozen body and put the pieces through the chipper along with some wood.
Since the body was frozen, it produced little, if any, blood splatter. Most of the debris blew into the river.
Only a few pieces fell short, landing on the bank. The male hella placed in her nightshirt pocket
passed through the chipper virtually untouched. PAUL DOWLING: The wood chipper show, I knew that the network
would bite onto that. I knew that they would want that as the pilot, and they did.
It was a terrible crime. It was hard to solve. There was a lot of science in it.
It was an opportunity to get people interested in science. The show is-- when it started, there was a lull in science.
When I was growing up, the space program interested people in science. By 1996, people were tired of the space program,
and there was no science on television really, and so forensic television was a chance to interest people
in science for a reason, to solve crime. NARRATOR: In November of 1999, Dr. John Schneeberger
went on trial in Saskatchewan for the rape of his patient, Candy, and his own stepdaughter.
On the witness stand, Dr. Schneeberger admitted inserting a plastic tube filled with blood from one of his patients under the skin
into his left arm. This is why he insisted that the blood be drawn from his left arm rather than anywhere else.
I think the advantage of forensic files was that I was an outlier. I didn't come from television.
I was a music major in college. I wasn't taught the trade of television, so I didn't have any rules to go by.
I set the rules that made sense to me, and I wasn't afraid to break the rules that I was told
that everyone should follow because they didn't make any sense to me. So, Steve, I see you have your breakfast of champions
there with you. NARRATOR: Janet McDermott planned to stop by her office only briefly on the morning
of October 15th, 1985. Have a nice day, Steve. NARRATOR: She had a number of business appointments
around Salt Lake City that day. [thud] Moments later, an explosion rocked the building, killing her colleague who worked next door.
Science uncovered a tale of forgery, fraud, and murder. PAUL DOWLING: It made sense to me.
I thought it would make sense to the viewer, and I did what I thought was right.
And I did what I thought I liked, and I said to myself, I'm going to do what I want.
If it works, it works. If it doesn't, it doesn't, and that's it. But at least I'll succeed, or I'll fail,
and I wasn't afraid to fail. I wasn't afraid to succeed, either. NARRATOR: And the deception turned a mild-mannered
documents dealer into a killer. I think Mark is probably the most evil of all people
that I've worked with. Serial bombers, by and large, are much more evil. They don't want to just hurt you.
They want to continue to hurt many people. NARRATOR: And how common is it for a bomber to blow himself up
when handling one of his own bombs? Not common enough. The storytelling means a lot.
That's the difference between a successful program and an unsuccessful program, whether it's
true crime, or a situation comedy, or a family drama, it doesn't matter. It's got to have a good story.
One of the networks used to have a slogan, tell us something about what we think we know.
So a lot of the times, the cases that were covered were not necessarily well-known cases, but if they were,
it was always giving you a different angle. I think what we had going for us the most, it preceded
any production on this show, was a growing interest in forensics, and we tapped into it right at the moment.
NARRATOR: And the hotel doorman said that Post introduced himself by name before going out for his run.
Boss, are you enjoying your stay? Yes, I am. Thank you. My name is Ed Post. I'm going on a run this morning.
I'll be going about 30 minutes, so watch out for me, please. Yes, I will. Have a nice run.
Sure. He made it a point to say good morning to the doorman at the hotel, say who he was and what
room he was in, and that he was going to go out and jog. I mean, you're like, it was from the book of who cares?
And the doorman didn't care. Somebody would say, you know, what do you do for a living?
And I work for Medical Detectives, or I work for Forensic Files. I wouldn't bring up the true-crime thing.
They would bring up the true-crime thing, and then all of a sudden, you get, how does this work?
Because there was clearly an appetite for it. NARRATOR: Virginia Ridley was found
dead in her bed, fully clothed. By the time medical personnel arrived, rigor mortis
had set in, an indication that she had been dead for at least eight hours. MATT HENSEL: It's kind of like comfort food.
You know what's coming, but it's just so good all the time, and you know like, OK, after we've revealed all
of the forensic evidence, you know that Peter is about to say, prosecutors believe, and then,
boom, and then you're into the re-enactments If you watch the show over, and over, and over,
you compare notes, you watch it clinically, we have a system there, and it worked, and it worked great.
NARRATOR: Prosecutors believe Janet gave Read Powell a ride home from the bar, then went to her hotel.
MATT HENSEL: Peter Thomas' voiceover starts two seconds after the bump. It ends two seconds prior to the bump.
The bumps were three seconds long. The opening line was usually two or three sentences.
NARRATOR: Up next, a well-known business owner is brutally attacked at work. There was a lot of blood on the floor, on the walls,
on the door. NARRATOR: Is it the work of a disgruntled employee? (VOICEOVER): No one trusted him.
He leaves due to stress. NARRATOR: Or a robbery gone wrong? MATT HENSEL: The thing about having
that system and having these, I hated calling them rules. They were more like these are the guidelines that we work on,
and once we understand that, then we can bend the rules, but having that framework takes the guesswork out,
which then gives us time and the ability to go tell great stories because we know that we could tell
a great story, we just have to get great information and fit it into our vehicle here.
And that's how-- that's, I think, part of the magic that we were able to do it. We weren't reinventing the wheel every episode.
We just had the ability to make great stories out of, unfortunately, sad events.
NARRATOR: Then police discovered another bizarre piece of information. A forensic analysis of Maryann's coffee cup
found a large amount of a prescription sleep medication, but Maryann hadn't been prescribed this medication.
VINCE SHERRY: At that time, nobody was making TV like that. I mean, I recognized it right away.
I was like, this is something. This is, oh, light years better than anything else that is on TV right now.
I mean, these people are doing something different. And I was determined to get on the show,
and it looks like a feature film. And my wife is watching this with me, and I'm like, honey,
I don't know what I have to do to get on this show, but this thing is a winner, and I'm
going to get my ass on this show come hell or-- oh, I did it. You can ask her. I said, this thing is going to take off,
and I got to get on this rocket ship. [music playing] GARY LICO: It'd be irresponsible to predict that a program can
last for 25 years and still be at the peak of its performance. So, did I know? A little bit.
NARRATOR: Here's a behind-the-scenes look at how "Forensic Files" re-enacts the crimes.
(VOICEOVER): The re-enactment for a show is basically a dramatization of what really happened.
So we take the actual crime, and we cast actors, we light it, we build sets, and we try to match everything to a t.
NARRATOR: Prosecutors believe Dale either knew or strongly suspected Bryan Ruff was having an affair with his wife
Kristi and was afraid she was going to leave him. The one thing I'll take credit for is not
having any budget for the recreations and making the priority to be I want them to be good.
I didn't want anybody to get hurt. We were blowing up things. We were crashing cars.
We were setting people on fire with those fire suits. The rule for me was nobody gets hurt.
And so I didn't care what we spent on it, and that was coming out of my pocket because the networks weren't paying me
what the show cost to produce. There were one time, I think, my deficit were in the millions,
and that was me. That was the house, you know. That was the car. That was the kid's college education.
NARRATOR: He entered his parent's home a little after 2:00 AM and deactivated the security system with a code known only to family members.
Prosecutors say Christopher used an ax to attack his parents. [screams] He struck his father 16 times and his mother three times
and left them both for dead. MICHAEL JORDAN: Obviously, the stories are true. So when the stories come to us, you know, Vince and Paul
they write a great script. They make the story work out, and then I get the script,
and I have to look at it. Well, how can we visually make this work? And a lot of times, it's figuring out what
actually happened in the crime. Sometimes the police say it happened this way, but when we set up our re-enactment
and we're doing it the way the police said, sometimes we discover, well, maybe it didn't
quite happen exactly like this. Maybe it happened like this. NARRATOR: Peter Porco regained consciousness and walked
through the house after the attack, even going outside for the morning paper before he died in the foyer.
MICHAEL JORDAN: Not only do we have crime scene pictures, later on, police were taking video cameras there,
and they were taking high-resolution video. So they would shoot the entire crime scene,
and sometimes we would have to show that and cut from that to our re-enactment. So it was all about the details.
You had to find out all the details. We started building sets to kind of match the locations because we want it to be as seamless as possible.
You don't want the audience to be jarred, going from a real crime scene video to our re-enactment
because you don't want them the first thing they say is, no, that's not real. NARRATOR: On a warm June morning in Tampa, Florida,
authorities discovered the bodies of three women floating in Tampa Bay. (VOICEOVER): They knew that there
was foul play because the women were tied up and had bricks around them. NARRATOR: The victims had their mouths tape-shut,
were naked from the waist down, and had been bound with yellow rope. MICHAEL JORDAN: So one of my favorite episodes to film
was waterlogged. It happened on the Tampa Bay. The perp, Oba Chandler, took these three women out
on the Bay for a sunset cruise, tied them up, tied them to the cinder blocks, and threw them into the water.
NARRATOR: Chandler took them out on the water, where they were at his mercy. MICHAEL JORDAN: When you're shooting
on land, once you set everything, it's where it's supposed to be. When you set everything on the water,
you are constantly moving. The camera is constantly moving, and the actors are always moving.
NARRATOR: They had no option but to comply. Lean on. Don't move. NARRATOR: They were found dead and, presumably,
sexually assaulted. Later, he tied each one of them to a concrete block and threw them over board.
MICHAEL JORDAN: Horrible, horrible story, but it was really fun to shoot because we were out on boats
on Tampa Bay at sunset, and it just was a really great crew to work with, and the actors were great,
and we had stunt doubles going under the water. We shot underwater footage, and the footage
came out looking great. NARRATOR: He called his wife on the ship-to-shore radio to tell her his boat had engine trouble
and that he'd be late for dinner. MATT HENSEL: From day one, I was struck by the quality
of the re-enactments, and from my first day until my final day there, the quality of the re-enactments always increased.
NARRATOR: After the children left for school, John List put his plan in motion. He shot his wife in the head at point-blank range.
He then climbed two flights of stairs and entered his mother's apartment. John. [gunshot]
MATT HENSEL: And that was one spot where the corners were never cut, and it was always quality.
There was always meeting, after meeting, after meeting before Michael Jordan and his team
went and shot the re-enactments. The editors were a part of it. We tried to contribute, saying, hey, yeah, OK.
We know this is coming down the line. We know we can do this. Maybe we could do some visual effects
here to kind of amplify what you couldn't get out there. MICHAEL JORDAN: For the episode fishing for the truth,
we had the challenge of shooting a scene that took place in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico
during a hurricane. We rented a airplane hangar, which was very big high ceilings, and we'd had a tank built for us,
and then we built a fake boat that goes in the tank. So, not only did we have to build the tank and the boat,
but we had to bring in the rest of the atmosphere, which was we had to bring in rain machines, we
brought in rain specialists who work on a lot of major motion pictures. We had a giant wind machine we brought in from New York City.
We brought in lightning machines, special lightning machines. Once we put the actors on the boat, made it rain,
made it wind, and it looked like they were in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico in a storm.
In the episode dark waters, we had to have one speedboat jump over another boat.
It was a boat accident that happened in the middle of a lake. NARRATOR: For reasons unknown, Harry didn't tie up his boat,
so it drifted into the boating lane without its running lights on. MICHAEL JORDAN: There the challenge was, well,
how do we get the boat to jump the other boat and make it look real? And the physics of the real boats
and how they would react to when one boat hit another boat. So there was a lot of variables that could have happened.
So we had to take that into account, whereas the shrimp boat, we knew what was going to happen
because we controlled it. Even after 25 years, the re-enactments for the show still stand up.
I believe the viewers really enjoy our re-enactments because we always provide them with the information,
action, and energy that helps tell the story and drive it forward. NARRATOR: Radisitch decided to use an assault rifle
with a homemade silencer reinforced with tennis balls to further reduce the noise.
Dana gave Dale the house keys, the alarm code and told him where his father kept the box
of 9-millimeter ammunition. To establish his alibi, Dana had dinner that night with his girlfriend and her father,
who happened to be an FBI agent. MICHAEL JORDAN: One of the big benefits of "Forensic Files"
is we're giving people pieces to the puzzle throughout the show, and at the end, you put those puzzle pieces together,
and that is unveiled in the final re-enactment. And we treated every final re-enactment like a mini-movie
in between Peter's voice, the editing, our shooting, Paul's writing, and the music.
That is the magic recipe that made our re-enactments what they were. NARRATOR: Dowling was back in his boat on the lake
sometime around 2:00 PM, when he reset the time on his video camera to 11:24. He never realized that he was a human sundial.
His videotape told the story of deceit, not innocence. All homes have a history, which includes the memories, hopes,
and dreams of all who have lived there, but this home in a quiet, upscale neighborhood
in suburban New York held something more. In a steel drum stored in a crawl space
was a secret that someone had hoped would last a lifetime. PAUL DOWLING: Forensic television
was a chance to interest people in science, for a reason, to solve crime. NARRATOR: Local police transported the drum
to the Nassau County morgue, where all of its contents were carefully removed for forensic examination.
PAUL DOWLING: And I think that hit with people, and I thought it would be interesting,
and we were going to take a moment and explain the science instead of just blurting it out.
There was DNA. What is that? FORENSIC SCIENTIST: When we're testing for paternity,
we look for shared DNA bands between the child or the fetus and the alleged father
at every region of the DNA that we test. PAUL DOWLING: And so, that's what the idea of the show
was based on. We're going to explain science. VINCE SHERRY: In 1997, even if they'd
watched the O.J. Simpson case ad nauseam and said to somebody, what is luminol? NARRATOR: To find out whether blood had been cleaned up,
detectives administered luminol, a chemical which fluorescences when it comes into contact with the iron component of blood,
even after it has been removed with water and detergents. When you spray luminol, it doesn't
really hurt the blood itself. It helps you find it. So it doesn't compromise the evidence.
It just helps you locate the evidence and helps you find a scenario, as far as what happened.
It's a presumptive. It's not a conclusive, but it's a tool that we use. NARRATOR: After spraying the luminol,
the lights are extinguished, and the camera with high-speed film captures the images.
FORENSIC SCIENTIST: It was the largest glow of luminol I had ever seen in my life.
It glowed like a Christmas tree. So when you look at the first couple of seasons of the show,
luminol, a substance that glows when in contact with hemoglobin, over and over, and over, and over again.
Now, you just say luminol. NARRATOR: The room was sprayed with luminol, and even seasoned crime scene analysts couldn't
believe what they were seeing. VINCE SHERRY: Gas chromatograph mass spectrometry, like people,
GC mass spec, they know what that is now, especially the hard hardcore viewers of this show.
NARRATOR: The tests were conducted with a mass spectrometer, which bombards chemical
molecules with ions, shattering them into their molecular components. The fragmentation creates a chemical fingerprint
that can be compared to other chemical fingerprints to determine the unknown's identity.
After weeks of testing and hundreds of tests, scientists finally got a break. I looked over in one corner, and in that one corner
was one piece of paper, and on that piece of paper was a perfect mass spectra of SUX and alkaline.
And that piece of paper was identified to have come from Shannon's tissues. It's become part of the common parlance,
and I would make a case that this show is largely responsible for that having happened.
NARRATOR: To identify the blood, scientists needed a blood sample from Shirley's father, Melvin,
for DNA testing. Since Shirley would get half of her DNA from each parent, scientists found that the blood in the car contained 50%
of Melvin Duguay's genetic markers, meaning the blood was Shirley's. I don't think people would know
forensics as well as they do if it wasn't for "Forensic Files." MATT HENSEL: It's easier now for me to talk about luminol
and blood spatter since everybody is now watching true crime, and listening to true crime,
and breathing true crime. Back when I started, it was a little awkward when you wanted
to point out that maybe someone didn't die a certain way because you noticed that the blood splatter was farther
than it should have been, or the husband's motive was a little suspicious. One of the things we noticed early on
is that if your spouse gets a $100,000 to $300,000 life insurance policy, you're probably in trouble.
It's never over that because they can't afford the premium, and it's never under that because it's not worth it.
But between a 100 300,000 is usually the sweet spot to commit a crime. NARRATOR: On the headrest, he found strands of hair,
but there were no roots attached, so they couldn't be used for DNA testing. Also in the car was a tube of Chapstick,
presumably used by Dr. Schneeberger. On the end of the Chapstick were epithelial cells from the lips
of the last person who used it. GARY LICO: Now you've got forensic psychiatrist,
forensic psychologist, forensic chiropractors, forensic mystics, forensic accountants,
that's my favorite, the forensic accountant. NARRATOR: Now, police wanted to know if Doug Beamish had worn
these shoes, so they turned to a forensic podiatrist, Dr. Keith Battles. VINCE SHERRY: When we first started out, DNA was sloppy,
and it was difficult to deal with. Now there's touch DNA and also security cameras.
I mean, in 1997, you're not likely to get shot by a security camera. Now your average American gets shot two dozen times a day.
I don't know how anybody-- they still do it, but how they can think they can get away with murder
is almost beyond my comprehension. NARRATOR: Prosecutors had so much forensic evidence.
They had a hard time deciding how to hold the jury's interest. We weren't certain that the public at large
would be as interested in all of this forensic evidence, and we were curious about how the jury would receive it,
and ultimately we ultimately set aside a week that we just referred to as forensic week.
We're shocked to see the jury sat on the edge of their seats. It was campfire storytelling.
OK. I expected the producers to come in and tell us a story, verbalize it, tell us as a campfire,
what's the story about? NARRATOR: On a sweltering Texas summer day in 1993, a work crew noticed something unusual
off the side of the road. Under a thicket of thorn bushes was the nude, decapitated body
of a young girl. PAUL DOWLING: And I used to go home and tell the children and my wife each story we were doing.
Not for them to enjoy, but for me to learn how to tell a story. OK? If their eyes glazed over, and they were looking out
the window instead of listening to me, I used to say to myself, and I always used to say to Vince
when I came into the next day, we got a problem. The kids weren't listening to this,
and they weren't terribly interested in it. NARRATOR: Just 200 feet away was another body,
a young, white male. Residents of this small town wondered, who would brutally kill two young people in this way,
and what was the possible motive? If they were sitting on the edge of their seats
saying, well, then what happened? Well, then what happened to the other suspect?
What happened to him? OK. Then I knew I was on to something. It was great fun, actually.
NARRATOR: This is the area where a road crew discovered the nude body of an adolescent girl.
She had been shot, stabbed, decapitated, and her hands removed. She also had extensive wounds on her abdomen,
thighs, and genital area. Some of the scariest criminals stick with you. NARRATOR: A couple goes on vacation
and is never heard from again. They're not looking for a missing person because adults don't go missing.
Adults leave a trail, and there's no trail. OK. NARRATOR: Police find evidence the couple may have been shot.
Hydra shock brand of ammunition is specifically designed for use against human beings.
NARRATOR: The last place they were seen was at a well-known nightclub in the resort town.
That was taken at Secrets nightclub the last night that they were alive. NARRATOR: But there were other secrets
that night, like what really happened to these two people. For me, it would probably be Erika and BJ
Sifrit from the episode dirty little secret. Here's two people that are roughly my age that went out
to a bar to hunt, to find a random victim, and the scary part is I actually, I've been to that bar
around the same time of the crime. So that could have been me. NARRATOR: Neither one had ever been arrested before,
but inside their car, police were surprised by what they found. VINCE SHERRY: BJ was a very highly regarded Navy SEAL.
I mean, even within the seal community, he was highly regarded. He falls in love with this, and I
don't mean to be pejorative here when I say this, this mouse of a woman who runs a scrapbook
shop in Altoona, Pennsylvania. OK. So, we're talking opposites of track here. Apparently, they run into some sexual issues,
and the way they resolve these sexual issues is by starting to commit minor crimes, and as they commit minor crimes,
this is having a positive effect on their sex life. NARRATOR: In the back of the Sifrit's vehicle,
police found ski masks and flex cuffs. VINCE SHERRY: But like with most drug addictions,
you have to use more drugs as you go on. So they ramp up, they ramp up, they ramp up,
they ramp up until they're in Ocean City, Maryland, and they meet this couple that they
bring back to their hotel room. I think they shot her. I think they, I'm virtually certain, I know for a fact,
they beheaded him. You should have seen that recreation. Trying to make that accurate and discreet at the same time
was no picnic. NARRATOR: Later, when Erika brought some rags and detergent to clean up the blood, she said BJ
was in the hot tub with the heads of their two victims. She said BJ removed the slug from Josh's
head to keep it as a trophy. I mean, it's really disturbing stuff that really sticks with me.
I mean, especially since I actually have the prop-severed head of the victim in my garage.
So, once in a while, if I go out to the garage to get something, there's the head in the bin full of body parts.
So that one, it's pretty disturbing. NARRATOR: This man, Ray Krone, was known throughout Arizona
as the snaggletooth killer. An unusual bite-mark on a murdered woman resulted in his conviction and death sentence.
A forensic expert told the jury that he was 100% certain that it was Krone who bit the victim.
He knew he was wrong, but he'd already committed, and his comment to me was I'm in too deep.
Ray Krone episode, once bitten, was my first episode at "Forensic Files." Vince Sherry was my producer, that's the first time Vince
and I ever worked together, and we still stayed friends. NARRATOR: The evidence suggests the killer grabbed a knife
from the kitchen, forced Kim into the men's room, and stubbed her death. MATT HENSEL: It was definitely a big learning curve for me.
I had to pick up quick, and it was good to see. Like I thought I was going into edit these things where
we were just going to be convicting people, and the story's done. Hairs were found on Kim Ancona's body.
They were black and not hers. It appeared that the killer had bitten through Kim's tank top,
leaving a bite impression on her skin. Two drinks were sitting on the bar, apparently
poured after closing time. Forensic scientists found Kim's fingerprints on one glass.
The other had prints not clear enough for identification. Ray Krone's case is an interesting case
because it's a case that exemplifies how forensic science has changed over the last 25 years.
He was convicted on a faulty bite-mark. There's nobody that gets convicted on a bite-mark,
no matter how good it is anymore unless there's DNA in that bite mark. NARRATOR: Some of the bar's employees
told police that Kim had expressed a romantic interest in Krone. If the bite mark, the shoe impression, and the hairs
could be tied to him, police were sure they had their killer. He was convicted twice, by the way.
He got a retrial and was convicted twice. So he figured I'm never getting out of jail,
but he was convicted on a faulty bite-mark that the second analyst knew was a faulty bite mark.
So he was in too deep and couldn't get out. But Ray holds no ill will toward anyone,
and he's the nicest guy you'd ever want to meet. NARRATOR: That expert was Dr. Raymond Rawson,
a forensic odontologist and also a Senator in the Nevada State legislature. At the trial, Dr. Rawson used this video in which photographs
of the bite wound from Kim Ancona's body were superimposed on Ray Krone's bite impressions.
Based on that evidence, Ray Krone was convicted of first-degree murder and was sentenced to death.
I didn't care if I was going to be in prison for something I didn't do. You might as well kill me.
I mean, what was life? My whole life. Everything I worked for. Everything I stood for, 35-year-old man was gone.
MATT HENSEL: It was interesting to watch how they were able to reverse the forensic bite-mark analysis
and find DNA evidence in order to exonerate Ray. When I first viewed that case, thought there were too
many inconsistencies for that to be a positive comparison between the teeth of Ray Krone, the suspect,
and the victim's wounds. NARRATOR: Dr. Sperber told his colleague working for the Arizona prosecutors that this evidence
was exceptionally weak. VINCE SHERRY: He's a wonderful guy. He's one of the sweetest people you'll ever meet.
It's kind of weird, I should say. All the exoneration cases we've done, you'd think if you spend 10, 12, 15, 20 years in prison
for a crime that you didn't commit, you pretty much want to kill the people that put you behind bars.
I would say invariably we find these people have come to grips with it, and they're just like it's OK,
which is inexplicable to me. NARRATOR: After serving 10 years and four months for a crime he didn't commit, he walked out
of prison a free man. When I'd spent over 10 years in prison, I will never forget that day I got out.
In fact, I commemorated it, so I won't ever forget it. [music playing] NARRATOR: For 18 years, a mass murderer
successfully eluded the FBI. He was wanted for the murder of his entire family. [religious music playing]
This is how art and science led to his capture. Many say that the list murders are their favorite episode,
and I think that's just because people are weird because that is one of the saddest and craziest episodes
where a man just murders his family. As on the "Forensic File" side and the production side,
that's considered one of like the gold standards. And that's one that everybody has to watch,
and everybody has to understand why things were done the way they were done, and that's
kind of like, that's the one you watch when it's like, OK, what am I going to do here as I'm editing "Forensic Files?"
Go watch the list murders. That's where you start. NARRATOR: What would he look like almost 20 years later?
The John List murder case would now enter the highly specialized world of forensic sculpting.
But it's a dark episode. From a TV side of it, not taking away the sadness of it,
they had great access to footage. They had great crime scene photos. There was the 3D-- the model of John List head,
it has all the things that can make a great television show. NARRATOR: In Denver, Colorado, a family recognized
the face of a mass murderer. I found that the mistakes criminals made were the most
entertaining sometimes. NARRATOR: Clay Daniels, an unemployed automobile mechanic,
was just 24 years old. Surprisingly, not everyone was sorry he was dead. (VOICEOVER): Absolutely, he's a loser.
I've always felt that he was not the best material for her. Right off the bat, anti-free is everyone's favorite
one that it comes up. I checked the "Forensic Files" fan pages, and I always see anti-free comments.
That one is one of the best. NARRATOR: At the same time, Stacey would routinely mispronounce the word anti-freeze.
So maybe that's why he had the anti-free idea. I'm really sure. (VOICEOVER): Stacy Castor used the word
anti-free in the interview. The goddamn black shoes. NARRATOR: Ken remained under the impression
her death would be ruled an accident. During questioning, Ken had difficulty playing
the role of bereaved husband. Goddamn black shoes. I still quote that line in my daily life.
My girlfriend looks at me like she has no idea what I'm talking about, and I see her black shoes
sitting on the floor, I'll trip over them. God damn black shoes. So then I saw on the black shoes.
God damn black shoes. I think he had been acting for that whole day. NARRATOR: But this was just opinion, not proof of murder.
I remember it like yesterday, cutting that together. I remember when we found that clip of footage
it was like, oh, my God. We got to keep putting this in. We got a hammer this one home.
This is so great. Then I saw on the black shoes. God damn black shoes. The guy who took the socks off his feet
to use as gloves on his hands, but then walked around the crime scene barefoot and stepped on a hamburger bun,
leaving a toe print on a bun. An unusual piece of evidence at the crime scene. They had what looked like a footprint in a hamburger bun
next to Christina's body. Investigators believed it was made by the killer as he fled the scene.
In order to verify their work, Iowa investigators took the bun and photographs to Gene Czarnecki,
a certified print examiner at the DCI crime lab in Des Moines, Iowa. Czarnecki not only confirmed this was a right foot
in the soft bread but found enough clear ridge detail to convince him that it was the footprint of Carlos Robinson.
The running joke is that nobody at "Forensic Files" has affairs on their wives because they
know how you can end up dead. So-- NARRATOR: But without proof, there was little police could do.
So Michelle conducted her own investigation. Inside a silk plant, Michelle and her girlfriend
hid a small video camera in her kitchen with a clear view of the kitchen countertop area.
MICHELLE BAKER: I was scared. I was afraid that he would see it. NARRATOR: She then invited Maynard to dinner.
As soon as he arrived, Michelle said she was going outside to put the steaks on the grill and asked
Maynard to prepare her a drink. The videotape clearly revealed Maynard pouring an unknown substance into Michelle's soft drink.
But cop's saying to me one time he was complaining about the show a little bit. I mean, we have a lot of--
law enforcement generally loves us. The guy's like, well, you did a show about somebody
bleaching a crime scene. That teaches people how to bleach a crime scene, and I said, well, what happened at the end of the show?
He said, well, he ended up in jail. And so, what's the moral of the story? I mean, you know you can try-- the moral of this show
is that you can try like hell, and it ain't going to work. I mean, it's just, you know, the bad guy
always gets it except for a few exoneration cases we do. NARRATOR: Police brought Jason Massey in for questioning.
(VOICEOVER): I said, Jason, I said, I said I want you to see something. And he looked at me enough, and I threw down some photos
of the crime scene, which showed Christina Benjamin and Brian King. And I said, Jason, I said, I want you to look at her.
I said, tell me one thing. I said, is she as pretty now in these photos as she was that night that you had her.
And he looked down, and he looked at me, and the next thing I know, he's kind of bending over,
and he's gagging real, you know, real big time, you know. And I knew I had hit a soft spot in him, you know,
when he did that. I never will forget that expression of him. The viewers learn a few things, and so do we.
As I'm reconstructing the crime scene, moving the actors and the props around, demonstrating the mistakes the perp made, I would always
say to myself, well, here, if they would have just zigged instead of zagged, they probably
would have got away with it. Now you do that a couple hundred times, you start to catch on to things.
Is that to say, I could get away with a perfect crime? No, of course not. NARRATOR: The motive was robbery and revenge
for past abusive treatment. The luminol evidence suggests that Hardin was bleeding
profusely in the kitchen, and the body was dismembered in the bathtub. Nobody could get away with a perfect crime.
Now, viewers at home who've seen every single episode might say to themselves, you know,
I think I would be able to get away with murder. Well, it's easy to be an armchair serial killer,
but once you actually put yourself in that moment, and you're going to take some missteps,
and the investigators are going to catch up to you. So, at the end of the day, there's no such thing
as a perfect crime. NARRATOR: Thanks for watching "Forensic File." [music playing]
Aaw.

Brief Summary

Forensic science's role in solving crimes is examined through notable cases like Helle Crafts and Dr. John Schneeberger.

Key points

The Wood Chipper Case. A chilling tale of dismemberment and forensic science's role in solving it.
The Birth of Forensic Television. Explore how 'Medical Detectives' pioneered a new genre of crime storytelling.
The Luminol Revelation. Discover how luminol helps uncover hidden blood evidence at crime scenes.
The Sweet Spot for Crime. Life insurance policies between $100,000 and $300,000 are often linked to suspicious deaths.
The Disturbing Crime Scene. A couple's vacation takes a dark turn when they are found murdered, raising chilling questions.
The Flawed Bite Mark Conviction. Ray Krone's wrongful conviction highlights the dangers of relying on bite mark evidence.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It was a terrible crime. It was hard to solve.

Paul Dowling reflects on a challenging case.

2:36WatchDec 1, 2021

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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