Forensic Files (HD) - Season 13, Episode 17 - Fashion Police - Full Episode | Forensic Files

[Music] up next an apartment complex is the site of a brutal murder she was stabbed multiple times it looked
like it was sexually motivated how could someone do that why would someone do that police find
a clue next to the body during that struggle is when the button came off and fell to the ground
but who killed her it was a sex crime but that didn't limit it just to men a jealous lover
an exotic dancer and ex-husband all had a possible motive and the button held the key
35 year old julianne braun worked as a consumer loan officer in fresno california
helping people get car loans and mortgages but that wasn't the only way she assisted others
if someone was hitchhiking down the road with the can in their hand for gas she's come on
let's stop and pick him up i said julia are you crazy i used to tell her you know to just be
careful she was always positive she never yelled at anybody if you didn't get along with
her then there was something wrong with you because she was the nicest person in
the whole world julie was always punctual so when she didn't show up for work one monday
morning it was cause for alarm julie's boss called and said she didn't come to work
and she didn't call in and i'm i just started shaking i knew there was something wrong because julie
was not that kind of a person julie's mother went over to her daughter's apartment
and found her body just inside the door she had been stabbed to death when my daughter died
it was like someone took a piece of my heart until it was my whole life the medical examiner estimated that
julie was murdered the night before her body was discovered she had been stabbed 37 times
it appeared to be a sexually motivated crime but oddly there was no sexual assault
she was in her underwear and there was just a massive amount of blood under her around her it was obvious that
there was a significant amount of physical damage to her body fortunately julie's two children weren't
home when the crime occurred they were with julie's ex-husband robbery wasn't a motive
julie's purse with money and credit cards still inside lay untouched on the kitchen counter
a possible murder weapon a four-inch steak knife was in the kitchen sink but it was clean there were no signs of
forced entry was it possible julie knew her killer everything pointed to whoever came in
that apartment came in non-violently was allowed in it wasn't something where they had
forced their way in and attacked julie police found some bloody shoe prints at the scene
one on julie's body when i saw that footprint that told me an awful lot about who i was looking for
he showed exactly what he thought about what he did by just pushing her aside like she was nothing more than a piece
of meat unfortunately none of the shoe impressions could be used as evidence with carpet you can't tell the pattern
of the shoe but you could tell the form of a shoe print in the in the blood itself
in a search for suspects julie's apartment managers told police an unusual story
three nights before the murder the manager's wife was taking her nightly walk around the apartment grounds
a new tenant a young man she barely knew told her there was a broken window at the end of
his hallway and he asked her to check it okay where out is the broken glass it's just it's done a dark walkway he's
persistent over and over he asked her come over here and take a look at it come over and take a look at it
she wants nothing to do with it the manager's wife told that person that she would notify her husband
manager the next day she checked there was no broken window for whatever reason that person had
that person wanted to take the apartment manager's wife into a very dark very secluded area of
that apartment complex and that raised a huge flag for us we wanted to talk to that person
coincidentally the tenant was julie's next door neighbor [Music] in a haunting irony julianne braun
chose her apartment complex because of its safety features she specifically rented that place
because of the security they had security gates you couldn't get in without a key to get you know the
glide key to get in and it was really a nice place the apartment manager's wife told police to question
julie's next door neighbor a new tenant 23 year old jeremy overstreet jeremy lived with an exotic dancer named
holly doyle they met at the strip club where she worked overstreet was unemployed and holly said
she found him articulate and attractive she was kind-hearted you know felt sorry for him you know
[Music] things of that nature you know she brought him home when questioned by police holly said
overstreet was home on the night julie was murdered and she saw no blood on his shirt when
he came in there were witnesses people that had been over at holly's apartment he had gone back to the
apartment instead of doing what he normally did which was sit down have some drinks and
continue to talk straight went straight to a room told people not to disturb him he was
tired a background check revealed overstreet had a criminal record jeremy had just been
paroled he had been incarcerated for a previous rape but overstreet violated the terms of his
parole by moving to fresno holly said overstreet took off when he saw all the police around the apartment
complex investigating julie's murder that by itself would have gotten him picked up by the
first officer that found him as police searched for overstreet another suspect emerged i had no idea who would
hurt my daughter my first thought was her ex-husband investigators learned that julie's ex-husband john braun did
something on the night of julie's murder that he'd never done before he didn't bring the children home to
julie's apartment as he had always done he said there'd been a change of plan it was strange because he always took
the boys home at six o'clock that night they had gotten back from the lake too late i'm sure i was the first one
they wanted to talk to they were wondering why were you late were you circling around did you come in
and leave the boys somewhere you know why why this night are you late in addition police learned that john
braun was a few thousand dollars behind in child support payments could this have been a motive for murder
with no signs of forced entry into julie's apartment john was certainly someone julie would
have allowed in when we have a homicide investigation we look at everybody everybody could be and as a potential
suspect anytime you're having a divorce situation where kids are involved and one half of that equation is getting
on with life and getting into a new relationship that gets volatile and john braun was
moving forward he was dating someone it was getting serious in fact john's new girlfriend brenda
stanton was another person police wanted to talk to julie would also have allowed brenda
into her apartment there's nothing to say that it couldn't have been a female suspect that went in
and did that brenda a 32 year old school teacher had no criminal record but three days
before julie's murder brenda and julie got into a fight apparently brenda believed that julie
was trying to get back together with her ex-husband we used to call his girlfriend alvirah
and she said elvira and her got into an argument and john and her had gotten into an argument
and it was just one big mess go question her too well question everyone i wanted to make
sure that whoever did this got caught then investigators found an important piece of evidence
in julie's apartment about 18 inches to two feet west of where her head lay i noticed a
button and it was just there on the cart right close to where her head is the logo on the button eddie bauer
1920 was clearly visible strands of thread were hanging from the button indicating
it had been torn from a shirt the button did not come from julie's clothes or any of the blouses in her closet that
didn't just fall from somebody who might have visited her the day before that was something that the killer left
behind [Music] according to the eddie bauer company the button found that julianne braun's crime
scene could have come from a woman's blouse or a man's shirt when questioned by police julie's
ex-husband john braun and his new girlfriend brenda stanton both denied owning an eddie bauer shirt we had to find out
who it belonged to where it came from we had to find a specific tie to this button
why it's there then julie's mother remembered something that julie said to her on the phone
the night she was killed i'll remember that day forever she said mom let me call you back
i'm helping a neighbor right now if that neighbor were jeremy overstreet it could account for the lack of forced
entry so the search for overstreet took on a new significance when questioned overstreet's girlfriend
holly doyle said she bought overstreet four shirts and one of them was missing she described it as a green tan and a
red plaid short sleeve shirt holly bought the shirt at an eddie bauer store just a few miles
away she immediately went to the men's department a particular clothing section she looked around said
this is it she picked it out of all the other shirts that were this is the one i bought him this is the
one that's missing and i asked her are you sure about this she said yes i'm sure the buttons on
this shirt appeared to be identical to the button found at the crime scene everything was
kind of falling into place everything was going in the direction that we needed to go in order to solve
solve this case police scoured the inside of julie's apartment for any signs of forensic evidence
that would link overstreet to the crime unfortunately they couldn't find any they also couldn't find jeremy
overstreet you could tell by looking at ben and i'm sure he could tell by looking at me that
our stress level was about it 100 percent one week later because of his credit card activity
police found overstreet in a san jose hotel 150 miles west of fresno police had nothing concrete to tie him
to julie's murder but were still able to arrest him we had him in custody for parole
violation but nothing else we had time on our side to work the julie braun case 100
in his wallet overstreet had one of julie braun's business cards what he had was a trophy
it wasn't a business card for business purposes it was a trophy to stamp another victim in his book
during his interrogation by police overstreet wouldn't say where he put his eddie bauer shirt
one of those shirts was gone and also a pair of pants were gone jeremy had no explanation for where they
were why they were missing and that's consistent with somebody who had slashed julie stabbed julie and had blood on
their clothes and that wasn't going to wash out not with that crime scene he had to get rid
of on overstreet's right hand investigators noticed a large healing scar across his knuckles
it sure looked an awful lot like a knife had gone down that knuckle but investigators didn't find
overstreet's blood or any other forensic evidence at the crime scene investigators needed more than a shirt
button to charge over street with murder and feared he could walk free the prime suspect in julianne braun's
murder was her next-door neighbor jeremy overstreet who had a previous conviction
for rape and robbery investigators didn't find overstreet's blood in julie's apartment
despite the fact that he had a recent wound on his right hand so investigators decided to look for
evidence in overstreet's apartment we did notice some items of clothing that belonged to
mr overstreet those were taken as evidence but none of them were the clothing that
we were looking for but with so much blood at the crime scene investigators paid particular attention
to anything that resembled blood in overstreet's apartment we observe these small brownish colored
specks one on the bathroom door and a couple on the cabinet below the sink and one
across on the opposite wall a phenolphthalein test showed it was human blood we can work with very very
small amounts of dna i've always said that if it's sort of pin sized i can see it that i can get a profile
but scientists didn't find just one dna profile they found a mixture of two female donors one
was from holly doyle which made sense because she also lived in the apartment which could have
been simply from her touching the door the other was compared to julie braun's dna
the dna that i extracted and typed from the bathroom door in my opinion came from julie braun i
have no doubt about that whatsoever it was a home run if there ever was a home run
in fact the odds were one in 2.3 trillion that it was anyone but julie braun i was told that the dna belonged to
julie words can't describe the feeling that came over me that came over us in the unit there's
only one way her blood got into his his bathroom and that was because he was at the scene at the time
jeremy overstreet admitted being inside julie's apartment he said she was giving him advice on how to get
a car loan since she worked in the finance field an unbelievable story you know you have
no job but you're going to go go talk to this person who's in charge of financing
to get financing for a car let's be real here overstreet denied any involvement in her
murder but he couldn't explain the blood in july of 1999 jeremy overstreet was charged with first
degree murder and attempted rape he gave her the same choice that he gave his victim from southern
california you can either have sex with me or you can die the choice is yours prosecutors believe overstreet was
hunting for victims and that the apartment manager's wife may have been a target
fortunately for her [Music] three nights later prosecutors say overstreet conned his way into julie's apartment
with a story about financing a car at 7 30 p.m julie's mother called the apartment
and that's when julie told her mother that she had company one of her neighbors at some point
overstreet grabbed a steak knife and ordered her to undress instead julie tried to get to the front
door there was a fight and she ripped the button from his shirt overstreet was much bigger than julie
and without a weapon she had no chance he stabbed her repeatedly spattering himself with her
blood [Music] he washed some of it off in the kitchen then grabbed one of her business cards as a
trophy [Music] he then went back to his own apartment to clean up and some of julie's blood landed on the
door this cross-transfer of julie's blood and a button from a shirt like one overstreet
owned led to only one conclusion jeremy overstreet was the killer jeremy didn't need to rape julie braun
he had an exotic dancer a beautiful woman who he could have had sex with just by
asking this wasn't about wanting to have sex this was wanting to dominate her to
use force on her it was a crime of violence how could someone do that why would someone do that
it's disgusting why would someone want that why would someone try to do that why
would anyone want to have other people go through what they would go through on march 1 2003
jeremy overstreet was convicted of first degree murder attempted rape and burglary at his
sentencing julie's family had some words for her killer i hate you but i'm not gonna let that
take control of me because i'm not that kind of person i'm stronger than you and my mother was
stronger than you you know it i felt sick just speaking to him i kept looking at jeremy over street
then all i could see was his gl glum face smirking then he looked down sometimes a button
and a speck of blood told the story a jury heard it and sentenced jeremy over street
to two life sentences with no possibility of parole this guy isn't part of my friends but an evil bastard
and i'm relieved he's going to go to prison for the rest of his life you can try as hard as you want to to
cover all your bases but with forensics and what it's becoming on a day-to-day basis
you better be awful damn good to get rid of everything because that little speck of blood was julie's
blood and i could prove it they always say that god works in mysterious ways i believe that the button was put there
was left there for us to find and for us to continue on our investigation and led us in the right direction
you

The victim has been stabbed more than thirty times, and the crime scene is awash with her blood. Near her head, police discover a distinctive button with strands of thread still attached.

Brief Summary

Julianne Braun was murdered; her neighbor Jeremy Overstreet was convicted based on key evidence including a button and DNA.

Key points

Brutal Murder Unfolds. A woman is found brutally murdered in her apartment, raising questions about the killer's identity.
The Key Evidence. A button found at the crime scene leads investigators to a potential suspect.
Conviction and Sentencing. Jeremy Overstreet is convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Words can't describe the feeling that came over me.

The moment the DNA results were revealed

16:06WatchMar 5, 2021

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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