Forensic Files - Season 5, Episode 2 - Dew Process - Full Episode | Forensic Files

in august of 1986 betty wolcifer a 32-year-old housewife and mother was strangled and murdered by
an assailant who had broken into her home her husband dr glenn wilsopher was also
strangled and knocked unconscious but survived the attack his younger brother neal lived right
across the street and was the first to arrive at the scene a few months later neil wulcifer was dead too
some say because of what he learned about the intruder [Music] [Applause] [Music]
[Applause] [Music] glenn and betty wilson had been married for nine years it was the romance that
had begun 20 years earlier the family both on betty site and on glenn's side came from very well
established influential families within the community very well liked by all of the community
betty and glenn were childhood sweethearts they went through high school together
glenn wilsopher went on to dental school later married betty and after graduation
the couple returned to their hometown of wilkes-barre pennsylvania to set up practice
the wolsifers bought a home on birch street just a few houses away from glenn's younger brother neal
the two brothers were unusually close they were almost like twins they very rarely did things apart they
were really big into sports and and they they just grew up together like that and they lived near each other and
they were inseparable he and his brother and when glenn and betty gave birth to a
daughter danielle their life together seemed perfect but tragedy struck on saturday morning august 30th 1986
just after dawn glenn wilsopher called his younger brother neal telling him that an intruder had broken into his
home neal ran across the street to glenn's home and when he saw that glenn had been
assaulted neal phoned police when police arrived glenn wilsopher was downstairs on the floor fading in and
out of consciousness upstairs had been ransacked furniture was overturned desk drawers emptied
one of the officers then went upstairs found his daughter who was still sleeping in her bedroom five-year-old
and then went into the the wallsphere's bedroom and found betty laying on the floor and she was dead at
that time betty wilsopher's body was on the floor next to the bed there were abrasions around her neck and
her face showed signs of a severe beating it was obvious that it was a homicide because of the marks around her neck and
and the uh you can see it was a vicious attack upon this woman my father had told me
that that betty was murdered and they were the specific words how or what had happened i didn't know
but that just took me totally by surprise of course and so many things go through your head you
just you can't even sort them out it appeared that the intruder climbed a ladder to the roof over the back porch
and entered through a second story window the window screen had been removed and
placed on the roof glenn wilsopher told police that he was asleep when he heard a loud noise in the
back of his house around 6am he said he grabbed his gun and saw a masked intruder running down the stairs
and he followed him [Music] [Music] the intruder surprised him from behind strangled him with a belt and knocked
him unconscious with a blow to his head [Music] sometime later when glenn regained
consciousness he phoned his brother now it's me get over here now come on things like that just didn't
happen in wilkes-barre a very nice woman getting killed in her own home did not make sense to a lot of
people glenn wilsopher told police that thirteen hundred dollars in cash was missing from his desk in the study and
some gold and diamond jewelry and a house key were also missing but police noticed something suspicious
the phone in the kitchen was hanging off the hook police wondered if the victim's brother
neil had simply forgotten to hang up the phone after calling police or whether it was evidence of crime scene
staging [Music] the news of betty wolcifer's murder and the assault on her husband glenn stunned
the small industrial community of wiltsboro pennsylvania dr glenn wilson was a successful dentist
in town his wife an active volunteer for many local charities neither had any known enemies
they were very popular couple everybody knew them they were the pretty couple betty was very popular he was kind of
quiet type but still he was a jock good looking and so for those reasons everybody knew who both of them were
police acknowledged that there had been a number of recent burglaries in the wolfers neighborhood
since 1300 dollars in cash and some jewelry was missing from the woolsepher's home robbery was a possible
motive it appeared that the intruder used a ladder the wulcifer stored on the side
of their house to gain entrance through an open second story window a partial palm print was discovered on
the inside of the windowsill which did not match anyone in the family or the police
the autopsy on betty wilsopher was performed by luzerne county coroner dr george hudoc who found no evidence of
sexual assault the cause of death was strangulation which would take from three to five
minutes during that time it was obvious to dr hudak that there had been a fierce life
and death struggle i believe that she really fought back with fury and that she inflicted
some injuries on whoever has sailed her blue fibers and a small speck of blood found under betty's fingernails
confirmed that she had been in close contact with her killer but dr hudoc noticed something unusual
despite a severe beating there was no blood on betty wilson's nightgown and very little blood on her face that was
the outstanding thing that imprinted itself on my brain when we saw the body you didn't have to be a trained forensic
pathologist to recognize it there was something suspicious there all of the injuries to the mouth and the
neck and no blood on the face and no blood on the clothing it appeared that after killing betty
wilsopher the killer had washed her face and changed her nightgown police search for her bloody clothing in
the house the surrounding neighborhood and the nearby susquehanna river without success
since the body was lying in front of the fan time of death was difficult to gauge
but dr hudoc estimated that betty wulcifer had been murdered between 2 30 and 4 30 in the morning
two to four hours before glenn said he heard the intruder and there was another inconsistency
doctors at mercy hospital noticed injuries on the back of glenn wilsopher's neck even though he said he
was strangled from behind it doesn't make any sense it just could not happen that way the only way you could get that
entry to the back of your neck is somebody pulled from the front friends told investigators that glenn
often wore a gold chain around his neck if he was involved with a fight with his
wife where his wife would have been saying the bed underneath him and he was on top of her in that position he would
have sustained those type of injuries from that piece of jewelry that type of force would have damaged
the spleenus capitus muscles two long muscles which support the head the same injury emergency room doctors diagnosed
in glenn wulcifer after his wife's murder when investigators dug a little deeper into glenn wilson's dental
practice they discovered his relationship with his dental assistant was more personal than business the two
had been carrying on an affair for five years she told investigators that she expected
glenn to leave his wife for her but she realized that wouldn't happen when she discovered that glenn was
carrying on another affair with an aerobics instructor in town from motel receipts police learned that
glenn would sometimes have trysts with both women on the same day before going home to his wife here was a man who not
only had an affair and cheated on his wife but here was a man who had an affair and cheated on his girlfriend at
the same time and police wanted to know why glenn's younger brother neal failed to go
upstairs to check on his brother's wife and child while he waited for the police
to arrive while on his way to the district attorney's office to answer that very
question neil made a decision that would change the course of the investigation when homicide investigators learned that
betty wulcifer's body had been washed and her clothes changed after the murder they looked a little closer at the
statements glenn and his younger brother neil both gave to police on the night of the murder
glenn wilsopher said he was out with friends at a local nightclub and drove home around 2 30.
he said that he went right to bed and slept until dawn when he heard the intruder and went downstairs to
investigate but the police video taken on the morning of the murder shows that glenn
wilsopher's car in the driveway was not covered with dew yet his wife's car was to help sort out the discrepancy police
called in a forensic meteorologist dr joseph sobel who studied the weather patterns on the night of the murder
dew is moisture it's condensation that actually forms on the object we're talking about whether it be a blade of
grass or a rooftop or a car top or any object that happens to be outside during that time
the temperature on the afternoon of the murder was 70 degrees so the dew point temperature the point when water in the
air becomes cold enough to change from a gas to a liquid producing dew would have
occurred when the temperature reached 50 degrees we know the night was clear surface weather observations showed us
that we know it was very cool so that the temperature was able to drop considerably and we know that there was
little or no wind the temperature hit 50 degrees at 11 p.m glenn wilsopher said he drove home at 2
30 in the morning yet there was no do on his car when police arrived at 7 a.m if he had driven home at 2 30 in the
morning glenn's car would have had the same amount of dew as his wife's car the lack of do meant that someone had
driven glenn wilsopher's car some time after glenn returned home from the nightclub at 2 30 and before police
arrived at 7 am evaporating the dew that had been present and the same dew points produced due on
the wilsapher's roof yet there were no foot or handprints in the dew on the roof when police arrived
when police looked more closely at the ladder they discovered it had been placed up to the roof backwards with the
steps facing in the opposite direction the partial palm print found on the windowsill could not be identified
potentially corroborating glenn's story about an intruder police were also investigating what
connection if any glenn's younger brother neil may have had to the murder he was the first one to arrive at the
scene and was the one that called the police but when police arrived the phone was
off the hook hanging from the wall unit police were also suspicious of neil's behavior he admitted that he did not go
upstairs to check on glenn's wife and five-year-old daughter danielle before police arrived
neil wolford denied any involvement in the crime but when asked to take a lie detector test he refused a lot of people
think that neil knew everything that when he came in the house that glenn told him what happened and said
you have to help me we have to concoct a story there's people that even think that neil
may have been the one that knock glenn on the head then there's the other school that think
that neil suspected and he just kept putting two and two together and things that
glenn may have said to him and just just the very thought was too much for him to
bear [Music] neil was asked to report to the district attorney's office for an interview
he went past the time and he was supposed to arrive and gary sworn left the room and he came
back in and he says uh the wilsonverse dead i was shocked i was shocked so we found out where the accident
occurred or the incident occurred so he went up and took a look at the scene and it was gruesome he passed the
courthouse he drove about another five miles and that his car swerved in front of a dump truck
and he was killed instantly investigators could find no skid marks it appeared that neil wulcifer
intentionally turned in front of an oncoming truck the coroner ruled the death of suicide
it made me feel sad the fact that somebody was involved with a crime and because of guilt
some innocent person had to die and when you have the death of a person there's always so many other people that
suffer we know that joy can be shared with others but how grief can only be endured alone
and what neil wulcifer may have known about the murder went with him to his grave
with dr glenn wilsopher as the prime suspect in his wife's murder police discovered that the all-american image
he presented to the public was just that an image before her death betty wulcifer told friends that she
knew all about her husband's affairs with the aerobics instructor and his dental assistant and that she had had
enough we found out from some of betty's girlfriends that she was very annoyed with some of these things that were
happening very annoyed with him going out at nights and not coming in until all hours of the morning and some of the
girlfriends even made comments to her well maybe you should confront him maybe he should ask him what's going on
to see if there was any evidence of a physical confrontation between glenn and his wife
fbi analyst doug dietrich analyzed the debris under betty wilsopher's fingernails
there he found a number of blue cotton denim fibers using micro spectrophotometry dietrich
analyzed a spectrum of color in the dye of those fibers and concluded that the dye was consistent with the dye used in
the denim shirt and jeans that glenn wilsopher was seen wearing at the nightclub just hours before his wife's
murder finally diedrick analyzed several head hairs on the bed spread next to betty
wolfer's body the hairs had been forcibly removed and were compared to hair samples from glenn wulcifer from
the laboratory standpoint the hairs that were forcibly removed on the bedding were consistent with the husband i
looked at other hairs that were recovered from the bedding and from the towels and there were no hairs out of place i
mean the hairs that i found were consistent with people that lived in that house
on november 5th 1990 glenn wulcifer was charged with first degree murder he pleaded not guilty
prosecutors stated that on the afternoon before the murder glenn met his dental assistant for a sexual encounter
[Applause] a few hours later glenn saw his other mistress at a local nightclub he may
have been hoping to have sex with her too but her husband was there glenn drove home around 2 30 in the
morning and betty may have confronted glenn over his sexual liaisons what are you doing do you know what time
it is the argument turned violent as she fought for her life betty pulled glenn's hair clutched and grabbed his
shirt and caused the injury to his neck by forcibly pulling on his jewelry after the murder glenn removed
his wife's bloody nightgown and washed her body in what was probably a psychological attempt to mask his
guilt over what had occurred prosecutors believe that glenn used his car to dispose of the bloody clothing
which evaporated the dew when he returned he staged the crime scene by placing the ladder up to the
back of his house but he made a mistake and propped it up backwards he also removed the window
screen and ransacked some of the rooms the telephone receiver found off the hook was either a mistake made during
the staging of the crime scene or neil wulcifer simply forgot to hang up the telephone after calling police
the jury had to choose between glenn wilsopher's intruder story and the circumstantial case put forward by
prosecutors and amid the discrepancies in glenn wilsopher's story one fact stood out
after an alleged life and death struggle with an intruder neither glenn or his brother neil ever went upstairs to check
on betty wilsopher or five-year-old danielle before the police arrived glenn wilsopher was found guilty of
third degree murder and was sentenced to eight to 20 years in prison the death of my sister
it's the hurt on behalf of both families very close friends and friends and people in the community in general
that this one person is hurt that's devastating that's unbelievable here's a guy who just cared about
himself the only person that he ever cared about was himself glenn was worried about
glenn and no one else and i think that was shown by the verdict in this case benjamin franklin once said
three may keep a secret if two of them are dead that might have been true in this case
had it not been for the role of science and when i go out to talk to people about forensic meteorology i always talk
about this case and i go through the whole scenario and the setup and and then i asked people okay so where's
the weather connection you know where does weather become involved and usually all i get is a set of blank stairs so to
think about that and to tie it in and then to go get expert corroboration i think was really a very very good piece
of police and detective work [Music] [Music] [Applause] you

When the wife of a well-known dentist is found dead, police are unsure who killed her and injured her husband. Some fibers and a study of the weather patterns on the night of the murder break the case open and reveal the killer.

Forensic Files is the longest-running true crime series in television history. Evidence and interviews with experts help solve real crimes, disease outbreaks and accidents around the world.

Brief Summary

The episode details the murder of Betty Wulsopher, her husband's infidelity, and the investigation revealing family secrets.

Key points

The Tragic Murder of Betty Wolcifer. In August 1986, Betty Wolcifer was murdered in her home, shocking the community.
Glenn's Double Life. Investigators uncovered Glenn's affairs, revealing a complicated personal life.
The Suspicious Circumstances. Evidence suggested the crime scene was staged, raising questions about Glenn's innocence.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It was the romance that had begun 20 years earlier.

Describing Glenn and Betty's long relationship.

1:07WatchNov 11, 2021

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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