Forensic Files (HD) - Season 13, Episode 13 - Sands of Crime - Full Episode | Forensic Files

[Music] up next my wife heard a really awful screen from our apartment complex a college co-ed goes missing and police
suspect it's foul play it's pretty brazen could have been a peeping tom could have been a car
burglar a witness thinks he sees the victim's car but doesn't get a good look at the
driver this guy kept looking at him in that rearview mirror he would look at people
on the side of the street and wonder i wonder if that could be julie's killer for eight years the mystery goes
unsolved until a pair of shoes and the cell phone call give new life to a very cold case this did not strike
me as a run-of-the-mill murder for 21-year-old julie buskin a bachelor's degree in dance from the
university of oklahoma was the culmination of a lifelong dream julie always knew she wanted to be a
ballet dancer from the time she went to a recital of her friends in first grade her goal was to teach children
possibly even special ed children and have a dance studio julie completed all of the courses for
her bachelor's degree by christmas so her parents drove from arkansas to help julie move her belongings home
when they got to her apartment julie wasn't there and neither was her car a police officer
came to me and asked who we were ask if we were the buskins said yes and he said
you need to contact the ou police department your daughter's missing and mary jean said you know something's
bad wrong and i said you know she's somewhere everything it'll be okay police learned
that julie took her girlfriend to the airport around four o'clock that morning and told her friend she was going back
to her apartment and that was the last that julie was seen by any of her friends or family
around 5 30 someone in julie's apartment building called police yeah we were just sleeping and my wife
heard a really strange like really awful screen from our parking lot of our apartment complex
do you see anything outside no i'm kind of afraid to go outside actually one of the neighbors heard a male voice
say shut up get in the car several of the neighbors heard a woman scream one of the neighbors heard a car leaving
the scene i believe the scream that was reported to the norman police department
at that time in the morning probably was the scream of julie buskin i have no way
of proving that but i believe it to be so 12 hours after she disappeared julie buskin's body was found on the bank of
the lake about 15 miles from her apartment she was in the water from about the waist up her hands were tied behind her
back tied with a pair of shoelaces she had been shot once execution style the gunshot wound
to the back of her head was very obvious it was a contact wound meaning the pistols barrel was in actual
contact with her scalp and there were signs of sexual assault the evidence would
certainly indicate that her pants had been pulled down at some point in time then i got mad as hell and i went
outside and i cussed at god i wake up it's mad you feel very helpless there's just nothing you can do nothing
and nothing was going to help police hope that evidence at the scene would lead them to julie's killer
[Music] julie buskin had many friends at the university police interviewed as many as possible
to see if anyone could provide useful information julie had lots of friend boys but they weren't boyfriends
and and that was she just wasn't i don't think ready for that i don't think she had time for it first of all right
right at that point i wasn't over any boyfriend troubles that she'd had i wasn't aware of any
bad breakups or anything like that police found julie's apartment in perfect order
there were no signs of a struggle they found julie's car in an apartment complex just one block
away it was a little eerie knowing that that vehicle had been sitting right across the street in another
complex probably since whoever had used it had dropped it off and been sitting there
all day waiting to be discovered red sand on the floor of her car looked like the sand from the banks of the lake
where her body was discovered that struck me as bizarre that uh whoever had abducted her had uh then brought the
the vehicle back why if you commit a crime like this uh you want to get rid of the car
obviously but you don't want to take a chance of returning almost to the literally to the scene of the abduction
there was no blood inside the car and no obvious signs of a struggle investigators could find
no foreign hairs fibers or prints we knew immediately that the cell phone was missing and
several things out of her ring julie had on an opal ring and the girls knew she had that on and
it was missing julie's cell phone records indicated someone had used her phone after her death there was a call for the
weather forecast and one to a number not in service at the time at the lake investigators discovered
possible evidence in the sand near julie's body there were two sets of prints that went down to the lake
only one set returned one set appeared to match julie's shoes the other didn't that set
we believe belonged to the person that killed julie buskin a strong wind had blown
sand into the shoe prints obscuring some of the tread pattern even so analysts found an identifiable pattern
consistent with a size 9 men's nike running shoe from the photograph that we sent the nike corporation
they were able to identify the specific shoe that they believe made this impression
in the sand it was a nike air 2 running shoe about 20 feet from the body investigators found
a crumpled pink leotard with the initials jb on the label it was julie's it had material on it that turned out to
be seminal fluid the leotard was sent for dna testing an autopsy confirmed julie was shot to
death with a single 22-caliber bullet ballistics experts were able to determine that it had been
fired from a distinctive gun the projectile had 16 lands and grooves with a right hand twist
and that's a little bit uncommon it allowed me to narrow the number of firearm brands down to just
just a handful of possibilities research showed only six companies made 22 caliber handguns
with this combination of lands and grooves despite the leads and a seventy thousand
dollar reward there were no significant breaks in the case you began to believe this sort of break in the case was never
going to happen there was a great fear with law enforcement that if this crime were not solved if this
person were not taken off the street that there would be other other homicides that we would be
investigating but a month later after seeing a picture of julie buskin's car on the news a man called police to say
he might have seen her killer on the morning of julie's murder he saw a car like hers pull out in front
of him and they almost collided [Applause] this was near the lake where julie was
killed it made him mad he stayed right on the little red car that was speeding quite rapidly he got a little
road rage going he followed the red car for about five miles he's watching him through the rearview
mirror he was that astute to realize that something's not right here and so he kept watching because the guy
kept looking at him kept looking at him in that rearview mirror the witness wanted to describe the
individual but wasn't sure he could when you view this person in your mind what's the first thing that pops up is
the hairstyle is it the body structure forensic artist harvey pratt showed the witness
examples of each facial feature trying to get a reaction he didn't realize he actually was a
witness to something until someone tweaks his memory his recall that's what i refer to as a
disassociated witness slowly a portrait emerged of a young man possibly a college
student possibly hispanic with long black hair and a muscular build this was eventful and so he was able to
focus on what it was because this guy almost ran over him i remember being very excited when that profile
came out of course you know i'm pretty literal of a person and so i expected that looks just like the guy
and they're going to have him in no time because now they know what he looks like
or did they [Music] [Applause] a witness was able to describe the man he saw driving julie buskin's car
on the morning of her murder the composite sketch was broadcast repeatedly by the local
media in oklahoma when you believe it's a stranger as opposed to an acquaintance it certainly
broadens the investigation and rather than a few suspects you're now looking at hundreds of thousands of suspects
but no one recognized him and the case eventually went cold we would drive down the street and look
at people on the side of the street and wonder i wonder if that could be julie's killer
he was walking around he walked around for a while so we may have passed him somewhere along the line
then four and a half years after the murder police received a letter from a female
inmate at the oklahoma county jail she said an old acquaintance 23 year old dennis sturmer
might have murdered julie buskin sturmer a construction worker had no criminal record but at the time of the murder
he lived only four blocks from julie's apartment and he bore a resemblance to the
composite sketch police tracked him down he refused to answer questions and he wouldn't provide his dna sample
so police had to get a court order to collect his dna after almost five years it looked as if
the case might finally be solved his dna profile was very very close to the sample that was taken off the
leotards and off the underwear that she was wearing at the time but unfortunately being very very close
is not a match and unless it's an exact match they're excluded so mr sturmer was
excluded as a suspect in the case but sturmer's profile was so similar it opened up a whole new avenue
of potential suspects the chemist at the time felt so strongly that the dna was so
close that it was their opinion that it could possibly be a relative of this individual which caused law
enforcement to look at any relatives that this person might have which they did sturmer's only immediate living male
relative was his brother and his dna didn't match again the case went cold i think as years went on and we didn't
have an answer we had pretty well accepted the fact that we might not live long enough
to know who did this to our daughter investigators also performed a dna dragnet they asked every male julie knew from
school and all males in her neighborhood with a criminal record to voluntarily provide a dna sample
virtually everyone that she came in contact with became a suspect everyone who was asked
complied more than 200 people were tested in one of the largest dna dragnets in u.s history
but no one matched after 200 plus dna tests with no match you begin to get pessimistic about
whether this case is ever going to be solved [Music] then six years after julie's murder a
man named anthony sanchez was arrested for the rape of his former girlfriend as with all alleged sex offenders
sanchez provided his dna sample for testing while that was underway investigators
noticed some curious facts about sanchez's background first at the time of julie buskin's
murder he lived only one mile away from julie buskin's apartment when police tracked down his former
associates [Music] one of them an old girlfriend showed police her diary for the month julie was murdered
there is an entry in i believe it's october of 1996 where she wrote anthony bought me a new set of nike
shoes and he bought the same style but boys sanchez wore a size 9 shoe this was proof
sanchez owned a pair of sneakers the same brand and size as the shoe impressions found
next to julie's body and there was one more clue someone presumably the killer used
julie's cell phone after her murder the number dialed was one digit off from the phone number of a girl sanchez was
dating at the time one of anthony's former friends a young lady that lived here in norman had a
telephone at her house and that telephone number shows up on julie's phone records after she's dead
was it possible that sanchez tried to call the girl's number from memory but got one digit wrong
that was pretty good circumstantial evidence even without the dna finally sanchez's girlfriend told police
he had an unusual habit they had received information from one of sanchez's girlfriends
that he and his father like to fire 22 caliber firearms into the wall uh at their duplex
sort of an odd father-and-son type of bonding since julie was murdered with a 22
caliber weapon investigators got a warrant and used portable x-ray machines to check the walls of the duplex where
sanchez lived with his girlfriend when that turned up nothing they tore down the walls
again nothing after the police had run rough shot over the apartment and created absolute mess in there
the landlord went back in and started cleaning it up he had some what a shop vac
he cleaned up and as he was emptying out the bag what falls out but a bullet a 22 caliber
bullet a ballistics test showed the bullet was consistent with the highly distinctive one retrieved during julie's
autopsy finally when tested anthony sanchez's dna was compared to the biological
sample from julie's leotard the results were no surprise the morning that the police called and
told us they had a match to be honest it's still it's kind of foggy obviously we were excited
we weren't sure at this point if that day would ever come when his dna matched the biological
material from the crime scene anthony sanchez was arrested and charged with the murder of julie
buskin sanchez was 18 years old at the time of the crime and lived only one mile from julie's
apartment prosecutors said sanchez was an accomplished thief and was stealing christmas presents from parked cars on
the night of the crime and that's when he saw julie buskin when she returned from driving her
friend to the airport [Music] investigators said sanchez abducted julie at gunpoint
forced her back into the car and made her drive 15 miles to the lake there he sexually assaulted her
and shot her execution style sanchez left his dna his size nine shoe impressions in the sand and
afterwards tracked sand into julie's car as sanchez left the area [Applause] he cut off another driver who got a good
enough look at his face to describe him to police sanchez used julie's cell phone to call
his girlfriend he misdialed one number had he called the right number he most likely would have been caught within
days nevertheless the scientific evidence eventually caught up with him they said the dna
that was left at the crime scene is what's going to convict this guy and we're going to catch him
and they did anthony sanchez was tried and convicted of julie buskin's murder and sentenced to death this was a
senseless killing by a cold-blooded killer that had no respect for human life whatsoever he didn't kill julie he just
did and that's evil that's just evil often in the face of senseless violence the only hope for the family is justice
increasingly science helps provide it in cases like this where there's absolutely no witnesses except the
perpetrator and your victim who's now deceased there's no way these could be solved without forensics
how do you account for a crime like this for what there's no money there's not a
crime of passion why why do this there's only one man who can answer that question and he's on death row in
oklahoma i think that julie's more at peace and that maybe somebody may think i'm a
little crazy but i do believe that julie is at peace because she knows we're at peace
and i believe that with all my heart you

In the early hours of a morning just before Christmas, a college co-ed was abducted from the parking lot of her apartment. Her body was found later that day; she'd been sexually assaulted and then shot at point blank range.

Brief Summary

Julie Buskin's murder case unfolds, leading to Anthony Sanchez's arrest after years of investigation and DNA evidence linking him to the crime.

Key points

The Disappearance of Julie Buskin. Julie Buskin goes missing after a night out, leading to a frantic search.
DNA Evidence Leads to Arrest. Anthony Sanchez is arrested after DNA evidence links him to Julie's murder.
Discovery of Julie's Body. Julie's body is found in a lake, revealing the brutal nature of her murder.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

You need to contact the OU police department, your daughter's missing.

A police officer informs Julie's parents of her disappearance.

1:44WatchMar 5, 2021

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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