Forensic Files — Season 3, Episode 3 — The Talking Skull (In HD) | Forensic Files

[music playing] NARRATOR: In the fall of 1987, a mapmaker was surveying the grounds of a Boy Scout
ranch in eastern Missouri. Suddenly, something strange caught his eye. At first, it looked like a turtle shell,
but it was a skull. A mystery now unfolded. To solve it, detectives would have to put
a face on the grisly discovery. [music playing] The S Bar F Boy Scout Ranch covers
5,400 acres of picturesque countryside in rural Missouri. The mapmaker had discovered the human skull
in a remote area of the ranch. Teena Orling was his supervisor. He was a professional mapmaker from Finland,
and he saw the skull his-- within the first few days here. He did not say anything to me or to anyone else about it
because he was afraid. NARRATOR: But three months later, just before he returned to Finland, the mapmaker finally
told Teena about the skull. Using a detailed map of the ranch, and following the mapmaker's directions,
Teena and a scout ranger searched for the skull. They found what they were looking for in a sparsely
wooded clearing. TEENA ORLING: The sun was glinting off this white object. You could tell right away it was a skull.
And I thought to myself, oh, boy, we finally found it. NARRATOR: Along with the skull, searchers found a few strands
of hair, a lower jaw, and about 40 bones, including a pelvic bone, a femur, and some ribs.
My initial thought was that it may possibly be an Indian grave, until we saw the blue jean material.
NARRATOR: Searchers unearthed the tattered remains of a pair of jeans, pieces of a flowered shirt,
remnants of a plastic shopping bag, and a metal button. To begin the task of identifying the victim,
the physical evidence was sent to the forensic crime lab in Jefferson City, Missouri.
They began their evaluation with the tattered blue jeans. The outside seam was intact.
This helped criminalist Tom Grant determine the overall height of the victim. From cuff to waistband, the outside
seem measured 37 inches. Based on that outside measurement, the inside seam length would probably been approximately 27
to 28 inches, which is from a short person who would have worn that pair of jeans.
NARRATOR: Grant estimated the victim's height to be about 5 feet. And scientists discovered evidence
of foul play in the dirt itself when they analyzed a white substance which they found mixed in with the soil
at the grave. The trace section of our laboratory analyzed those and determined the presence of calcium carbonate,
which is a-- could have been a byproduct of calcium oxide, which is lime. People put lime there to either stop
the odor of the decomposing body, or to actually cause it to decompose faster. NARRATOR: Scientists analyzed the hair
found at the grave site. hair can be identified as either Caucasoid, Negroid, or Mongoloid.
But the hair was badly damaged. The only conclusion scientists could reach was that it was not Negroid.
THOMAS GRANT: The hair on the left is the hair from the gravesite. The hair that's on the right is a Negroid or African-American
head hair. And its characteristics differ considerably from that of at the gravesite.
So I would determine that the hair at the gravesite is not of African-American origin.
NARRATOR: The preliminary information indicated that the victim was a female Caucasian.
She was short, about 5 feet tall. Police sent this information to the National Crime Center,
a database of all missing persons in the United States and Canada. And that was unsuccessful.
We believed it to be murder. The problem was identifying who the victim was. Really, the first thought in my mind
was, was this was probably going to be one that we won't be able to solve. NARRATOR: But were investigators even on the right track?
One tiny piece of evidence unearthed from the shallow grave would change the course
of the investigation and take medical detectives halfway around the world. [music playing]
Investigators believe that the skeletal remains found in the shallow grave had been there for less than 8 years,
and were those of a petite, Caucasian female. One piece of evidence had puzzled investigators
from the start, the small metal button found with the remains. THOMAS GRANT: Half of it was somewhat
rusted and deteriorated, but the upper half had a logo that was stamped on it. The letters T-E-X-W-O-O-D was present, Texwood.
And in the O's, there was a star-type pattern that was present. None of us at our laboratory had ever seen
or heard of that logo before. NARRATOR: But not even the FBI had heard of a product or company by the name of Texwood.
So we began calling all over the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Couldn't find it.
So I called a friend of mine with US Customs. NARRATOR: US Customs Special Agent
Timothy Quinn entered the name Texwood in his computer. What he discovered gave investigators
the first crucial break they needed to identify the victim. Checks of our computerized importer files were negative.
Then had to make a series of phone calls, the last of which was to our national import specialists in New York.
And from the Office of the National Import Specialist, we were able to determine that the name Texwood is
a make of jeans that was manufactured strictly for consumption in Asia. The brand was not intended to be exported to the United States.
NARRATOR: This meant that either the victim had traveled to Asia before her death and purchased the jeans
there, or was, in fact, Asian. To find out more, the bones were sent first to anthropologists
at the University of Missouri, and later, to Colorado State University. NITA BITNER: If you have the right bones,
you can find out everything you need. You don't need a complete skeleton. The more you have, the more complete picture you can have.
NARRATOR: For instance, a skull can tell an anthropologist about gender and race.
The first step was to determine whether the skull was Caucasoid, Negroid, or Mongoloid, which includes
Native Americans and Asians. A Mongoloid's skull usually has broad, squared cheekbones.
The anthropologist confirmed police suspicions that the skull was Mongoloid. NITA BITNER: The bridge of the nose,
the squared cheekbones, the overall smaller features led me to believe that this was Mongoloid.
NARRATOR: The anthropologist confirmed that the victim was indeed female. Since the cranial sutures were closed, and judging
from the wear of her teeth, the anthropologist estimated that she was young, most likely in her mid 20s.
The bones had smooth surfaces, an indication that the victim was not particularly muscular.
Anthropologists estimated her weight to be approximately 120 pounds. And they learned something else from examining her pelvic bone.
When a woman has delivered at least two children, the separating process of the pelvic bones
creates a groove like this one. Such a groove was found on the pelvic bone at the gravesite.
Investigators now knew that the victim had given birth to at least two children.
Still, they were at a dead end. It's very frustrating because you cannot start the investigation of who committed the crime until you
determine who the victim is. And you-- you continually-- it's like spinning your wheels,
not going anywhere, until you can identify the victim. NARRATOR: With little else to go on,
the next step was to give the unidentified skull a face. The skeletal remains told authorities what they were
looking for, an Asian female who had given birth to at least two children. They knew she was petite, standing about 5 feet tall
and weighing about 120 pounds. But what did she look like? Police asked the anthropologist to bring
the skull to life through the technique of facial reconstruction. First, the reconstructionist makes a latex mold
of the actual skull. Once the mold is made, the skull can be returned to police to be used as evidence.
Then, a plaster cast is made from the latex mold. Using this plaster cast, rubber pegs called landmarks
are glued onto the cast. They represent tissue thicknesses at various points on the face.
Facial tissue thickness differ from men and women and vary with race and age. Next, the landmarks are connected
with strips of clay following the contours of the skull. NITA BITNER: Each individual skull is like a blueprint
or a fingerprint. No two are alike. We follow this blueprint, then, to create our faces, following the shape, the bends of each skull.
NARRATOR: The spaces between the clay strips are then filled in to flesh out the face.
Plastic brown eyes are carefully aligned and set in the sockets and lids are molded.
Final touches include a nose and lips. And because the victim was presumed to be Asian,
the bust was given a black wig. The identity of the victim was still unknown, but police now had an important tool in their investigation,
a face they hoped would jar someone's memory. They sent photographs of the bus to newspapers
and television stations in the nearby cities, hoping for a response. The wait lasted just three days.
REPORTER: The skeletal remains of a woman were found in-- NARRATOR: Wilaiporn Cox was watching
television when she saw the bust on a local news program. Then I call my husband, tell my husband
what I saw in the TV. NARRATOR: Her husband, Karmen, picked up a newspaper, looked at the bust, and thought he recognized it as well.
Call her back. I said, boy, it's awful close. I think we ought to do something. NARRATOR: The Coxs said the bust looked like their friend who
lived in a nearby town, 33-year-old Bun Chee Nyhuis, whom they hadn't seen for the past five years.
They told police that Bun Chee had left her husband, Richard, and had returned home to her native Thailand.
When police questioned Richard Nyhuis, he did not believe that the skull found at the Boy Scout
ranch 100 miles away from his home was that of his wife, Bun Chee. Richard said Bun Chee had told him
that she missed her family in Thailand and that she wanted to divorce him. He said he personally drove her to the St.
Louis airport five years earlier to take her flight to Thailand. He said that was the last time he and his children saw her,
and they never heard from her again. And neighbors confirmed that Bun Chee had, in fact, spoken
of returning to Thailand. I knew she told me she had gotten her pass-- her passport.
She had gotten her citizenship and her passport. So it wouldn't have surprised me, you know,
if she had done that. She mentioned to me, you know, she's a not happy. She liked to go to Thailand, visit family.
NARRATOR: And if Bun Chee was indeed the woman found in a shallow grave, why hadn't her family in Thailand
reported her missing during the last five years? For the information police needed,
scientists once again looked for answers in the bones. Had Bun Chee Nyhuis left behind her two children
and returned to Thailand as her husband claimed, or were her remains those found in the shallow grave
at the Boy Scout ranch? The answer lay in the skull and a technique called skull
photograph superimposition. Police obtained this photograph of Bun Chee from her husband, Richard, and sent
it to the anthropology department at Colorado State University. Police also included a photograph
of another Asian woman who was reported missing in Georgia. The photographic work was done by the late Dr. Michael
Charney, a world-renowned forensic anthropologist at Colorado State University. Charney positioned the skull in the same Pose
as the photographs of both women, then superimposed slides of the skull over the photographs.
The skull did not match the woman from Georgia, but it did match the photo of Bun Chee Nyhuis perfectly.
Face is at an angle. She's clowning around, making a face. We find that the jaw line is within the chin,
the top is within the top of the head, the cheek is within, the eyes are in the orbits, the nasal opening
corresponds to the nose, and the teeth match up very nicely to the jaw line here.
In spite of the fact that it's a very difficult angle to approximate, an expression to approximate,
we felt this was a very good match. NARRATOR: Now armed with a positive scientific
identification, police turned their attention to Richard Nyhuis. They suspected that he knew more about his wife's disappearance
than he was telling them. Her friends indicated that they had a very volatile relationship,
that they argued quite a bit. NARRATOR: And police also learned of a disturbing coincidence, that Richard Nyhuis was a Boy
Scout leader and often camped at the Boy Scout ranch where police discovered Bun Chee's grave.
And I turned to my partner, and we looked at each other, and we just couldn't believe it.
That's when we knew we had to formulate a game plan, and we'd have probably just one shot at him.
It all started fitting together at that point. All the pieces started coming into place.
NARRATOR: When police confronted Richard Nyhuis with the forensic evidence, he confessed,
although he gave conflicting accounts of what actually happened. He said Bun Chee fell during a scuffle
and hit her head accidentally, but admitted suffocating his wife. Bleeding real bad, blood all over the place,
and she was yelling, scared. So I put my hands over her mouth, her nose, and suffocated her.
NARRATOR: In light of the confession, forensic pathologist Dr. Mary Case examined the skull.
She studied the small wound on the back of the skull and concluded that it was not the result of an accident,
but rather, the result of blunt trauma to the head. This is a very limited area.
It's pushed inward, and we tend to see this kind of a depressed skull fracture when you strike the head with something
that has very forceful impact over a very small striking surface. A hammer would be a good example of something
that could do that. It's a tool. It's meant to strike. And all of the force is directed onto a very
small striking service. NARRATOR: Based on the forensic evidence and parts of Nyhuis's
confession, prosecutors believe that Richard and Bun Chee argued one night in the basement of their home.
We're not moving. We've been through this before. We are not moving, all right? NARRATOR: Bun Chee wanted to move into a new house.
Richard refused, saying they couldn't afford it. And I'm taking the boys and leaving.
[music playing] NARRATOR: The blow to her head was, not fatal, but while she lay bleeding on the floor,
Richard suffocated her. He used a service merchandise bag to contain the bleeding wrapped the body in a sheet of plastic,
and placed her in the freezer, where she remained for the next three months. Nyhuis fabricated the story about driving
bunchy to the St. Louis airport for a flight to Thailand. When spring arrived and the ground thawed,
Richard took Bun Chee's body to the Boy Scout ranch, a two-hour drive from his home.
He chose a secluded area deep in the woods for the burial, but made a number of mistakes.
The lime he spread over the body most likely aided decomposition, but the grave was only 2 feet deep, not
deep enough to keep burrowing animals from bringing her bones to the surface. And Bun Chee was buried in Texwood
would jeans, which told a story since they were made and sold exclusively in Asia.
Nyhuis never anticipated that his wife's remains would be discovered, and if they were, that they would ever
be successfully identified. Finding the Texwood button, the pelvic bone that revealed
the victim had at least two children, the Mongoloid skull, the forensic sculpture, and the photographic
superimposition, all were essential elements in the identification. During the trial, Dr. Case testified
that it takes between three and five minutes to suffocate an individual. After a minute or two, the person
would only be unconscious. It was entirely possible that Nyhuis put his wife into the freezer while she was still alive.
Richard Nyhuis was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility
of parole for 50 years. MARY CASE: It was great forensic science, and, of course, that's how it's supposed to work.
You get a button, you get a hair, and the expert in that area can tell you. And if you look at the button work, it took about a month.
It was less than a month for someone to look at that button and say, well, that's only manufactured
in that part of the world. Well, somebody had to collect all that information. And I-- I admire that.
I think that's wonderful. It took all the-- all the different scientific and forensic people to make this thing happen,
any one piece of which could have stopped the investigation. One of the unique things about the case
was actually having the remains to do the trial. And Bun Chee Nyhuis actually came alive in her own trial.
[music playing] This was one of the few cases where a prosecutor got to try a murder case with the victim
actually in the courtroom with him. Speaking to the jury. [music playing]

In 1987, a human skull and some bones were discovered at a boy scout camp near Farmington, Missouri. A facial reconstruction aided the investigators in this case. Now in HD.

Brief Summary

A mapmaker's discovery leads to the identification and murder conviction of Richard Nyhuis for killing his wife, Bun Chee Nyhuis.

Key points

The Discovery of the Skull. In 1987, a mapmaker found a human skull at a Boy Scout ranch, sparking a mystery.
Identifying the Victim. Forensic scientists determined the victim was a petite Caucasian female, height about 5 feet.
The Breakthrough. A metal button led investigators to discover the victim's jeans were made for Asia.
Facial Reconstruction. Police used facial reconstruction techniques to create a bust of the unidentified victim.
Richard Nyhuis's Confession. Richard Nyhuis confessed to suffocating his wife, revealing a violent history.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

A mystery now unfolded.

NARRATOR introduces the discovery of the skull.

0:29WatchSep 30, 2025

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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