Forensic Files - Season 7, Episode 28 - Elephant Tracks - Full Episode | Forensic Files

from the evidence found at the scene of a double homicide police suspected there
might have been two perpetrators until they noticed a clue a small shard of glass on the bottom of
one of the victim's shoes which brought the whole crime into focus [Music] my in december 1996 a mail carrier in
toledo ohio noticed mail piling up outside the home of gertrude thompson and edward kowalczyk
neighbors said they hadn't seen the elderly couple for the last few days 69 year old gertrude trudy tour friends
and 72 year old edward had been living together for the past several years no one could see inside the house since
the windows were covered with plastic cardboard and aluminum foil in an effort to preserve heat
not knowing what else to do neighbors called police when i first went in i observed a lot of
what appeared to be personal effects of the residents there like boxes packed up it appeared to me someone
might have been preparing to move out of the house but in the disarray detectives found
trudy thompson and ed kowalski dead on the living room floor they had been dead for several days
and it was no ordinary murder just so violent you could see the bludgeon cut marks
stabs one of the worst crime scenes i've ever seen as a police officer an autopsy revealed that trudy and ed
had died of blunt force injuries to the head other evidence suggested that the assailant had wanted information from
the victims just slight wounds puncture wounds where this person probably was saying where's the money
where's the money or something like that and just torture to make a person talk there was a great deal of chaos there
in fact it appeared as though this was a almost a frenzy type of murder they the perpetrator or perpetrators
grabbed anything that was available to them in the house and used it as instruments
we always assumed there was at least two people that were involved and that's just because it was a double homicide
with two bodies right next to each other and they weren't killed with firearms they were killed slowly with
hand weapons detectives noticed that there had been no forced entry into the house
tells me that possibly the person that committed this crime probably knew the victims and probably
was let in ed and trudy not only lived together they were business partners they owned several properties that they
rented to lower income residents and college students when a tenant moved out the couple
usually kept items left behind never throwing them away this made it hard to know what if
anything was missing we were finding money hidden in books and in wallets that were still in their package
and in places where they would hide things that no one would think to look family members told police that a
necklace trudy thompson wore around her neck every day was missing it was a gold elephant pendant
a gift her father had given her years earlier as a child in austria the pendant was supposed to bring good
luck the police knew pretty quickly how important that was if you could track a piece of stolen
property back through a chain of owners you can learn eventually hopefully who had taken it from gertrude thompson
so police put a photograph of the pendant on the front page of the local newspaper the toledo blade
no one responded and none of the second-hand jewelry dealers in town had seen it either
in gathering information about the couple ed's daughter denise kowalczyk said that trudy was a tough
businesswoman i felt that trudy could be bossy and domineering i think she was probably
argumentative with her tenants and my father family members suspected that the motive
wasn't robbery but it was some sort of business disagreement a tenant that was really really mad at
them mostly her it's not totally unreal that this would happen because of the people they rented to
that information along with a message on the couple's telephone answering machine
would identify just that one of the couple's tenants someone police called the perfect suspect
when landlords trudy thompson and ed kowalski were found murdered in their home police and forensic scientists sorted
through the physical evidence at the crime scene for possible clues [Music] forensic pathologist dr diane barnett
first wanted to identify the murder weapon she had long linear impressions tool marks on the skull
she had a very characteristic beating pattern that had been left on the outer table of the calvarium
and she also had suggestions of a corner of something like a divot type of impression
dr barnett was able to match those wounds to a rectangular base lamp at the murder scene
forensic anthropologist julie saul matched another head wound to a brass lamp found near the bodies looking at
the lamp base with the beading near the edge and the tool marks on the bone i could tell them that this was
consistent with having made that mark and it was very likely that it could have made that mark
none of these items however contained fingerprints the coroner determined trudy and ed had
fought off their attacker or attackers since they had defensive cut wounds on their hands that could have been made by
a knife and a tiny clue on the bottom of ed kowalski's shoes answered an important
question it was a tiny piece of glass embedded in the bottom of his galoshes [Music]
that glass came from a broken light bulb leading investigators to believe that ed
entered the room sometime after the attack started most likely he walked in from outside
since his coat was found at the front door in a search for suspects the first clue
came from the couple's telephone answering machine a lot of the tape was complaints from
various tenants because gertrude thompson and edward walchek were landlords were people calling in leaving
the messages but only one tenant had called numerous times his name was ethan walls
when questioned walls told police that he stopped by ed and trudy's home to make his rent payment
notice the overflowing mailbox knocked on the door and when there was no answer he said he left his rent check there and
went home i put it in their mailbox there was a lot of mail in the box i didn't think anything of it
two three more days went by i left a note for them to contact me no one ever got in touch with me
waltz then admitted he went back to ed and trudy's house retrieved his rent money and spent it
these two admissions placed walls at the scene twice around the time the murders
took place and all of a sudden ethan's telling him this very bizarre story about dropping
off a check and then coming back and picking it up in addition an informant called police
to say she had seen ethan walls at the home of a well-known drug dealer around the time of the murders she also said
wall's shirt was spattered with blood based on the blood spatter on the ceilings on the walls
the condition of the victim's bodies you knew the guy that did this had to have gotten covered in blood he
knew that walls vehemently denied the informant story this is a lie from where did it come from
who put you up to saying what you said which is it's not true totally fabricated
in examining the blood spatter at the crime scene detectives noticed a significant clue
the blood spatter was in two different shapes and told two different stories in one area
the spots were elongated and radiated from where the beatings took place blood that comes from an angle is longer
and more oval usually with a little tail at the end of it the longer and more oval the spatter is the greater the
angle that it came from in another area away from the bodies there were several blood spots that were
perfect circles including two on the inside of a broken ceramic vase and one on a piece of paper in the desk drawer
the blood that was on these items was dripped straight down as if from right above
so from that we were able to determine that this blood most likely did not come from these two victims and was therefore
most likely the suspect's blood the blood was consistent with someone standing still but bleeding
and the blood dripping down on the items below police confiscated every knife they
could find in ethan wall's home testing them for human blood to see if any were used in the murders
none of them tested positive for human blood they also compared all of wall's shoes
to a bloody foot impression found at the crime scene non-matched but since the perpetrator left blood at
the crime scene investigators had a definitive way to tell if the blood belonged to walls
you know dna i mean one drop of blood looks the same your blood looks just identical to mine
it's those little scientists who can differentiate between one drop and another the results surprised everyone
especially ethan walls they arrested me like five months after the dna that's the part that i steal
right now today don't understand [Music] toledo police had a suspect in the murder of two elderly landlords
one of their tenants ethan walls who swore he was innocent walls had been to the couple's house
around the time of the murders and an informant claimed she saw walls at a drug party with blood on his shirt
around the same time walls gave police a blood sample so they could compare it to blood found at the
murder scene investigators believe the killer cut himself while swinging a crystal lamp to
beat the victims we surmised that that was probably how he held the lamp as he hit them
with the heavy metal base of the lamp and when that crystal broke in his hand that's probably how he cut himself
forensic scientists analyzed the dna of all the blood at the murder scene on the crystal lamp there was a mixture
of blood from three people the two victims and the killers dna analyst angela lanine compared ethan
wall's blood to the mixture if it matched two numbered markers or bands would match those found in the
mixture ethan wall's pattern was an 18 and a 28. the mixture also had an 18 but it did not have a 28 so he can
automatically be excluded as contributing to the mixture of that specimen but prosecutors always suspected that
there may have been more than one perpetrator and based on the informant's testimony that walls was one of the two
walls was arrested and charged with the murder of trudy thompson and ed kowalczyk
the day i was arrested last thing i said to them please don't stop looking for the killer
cause while y'all focusing on me somebody's getting away with it that was the very last thing i said as
they put them cuffs on me don't stop looking ethan walls knew he could face the death
penalty if convicted he was consumed with anger and frustration it's like if you down in a whale and a
and you hollering at the top of your voice [Music] okay nobody here you though you know what i mean
i'm innocent man you sh can't nobody hear you though as prosecutors were preparing to try
ethan walls their star witness the informant made a startling confession to prosecutor tim braun
she now said she had lied about ethan walls we never were given a good explanation
as to what her reasons were other than she's saying i lied about the man and this isn't right and i'm not
going to testify against him we can't necessarily control all the pressures that come onto a witness and
she flipped and that's the only way to describe it she flipped completely 180 degrees the other way
braun had no choice but to dismiss the charges against ethan walls you know the day you dismissed a death
penalty case when you're a prosecutor it's a bad bad day because everything you've been working
on for a long period of time has just blown up in your face i was confident that i would go home
that never ever wavered and mama i knew i was going home for the victims families it reopened the
fear that there was maybe someone out there that might be really sick and evil that they could do
something to someone else and for police it was back to square one it was very frustrating because we had
two elderly people murdered brutally in our community we felt we had some good evidence
blood and the misimpended if we could nail that down we definitely would have a person that we could totally
concentrate on for the next two years police made no further progress all the detectives talk about the
72-hour rule if a case is installed within three days the chances of it getting solved go way
way down and that's true and this was not solved within three days but they kept going
[Music] for two years after the murders of trudy thompson and ed kowalczyk investigators
pursued various leads in the case with no success but in july of 1998 their luck changed
the daughter of pawn shop owner annette chevrini decided to help her mother clean up some of the old newspapers and
magazines that had collected over the years my mother's more than eccentric she she believes in
not not throwing anything away type of an attitude she's a collector but annette wanted something to read
that afternoon to pass the time she reaches in the middle of the stack of newspapers and pulls the newspaper
out sure enough she opens it up and she starts to read this article that was there for the
toledo police department about a double homicide it was the two-year-old newspaper
article about the murder of trudy thompson and ed kowalczyk when she looked at the victim's
photographs she noticed something familiar the gold elephant pendant around trudy
thompson's neck she calls me on the phone and starts screaming about where's this elephant pendant
where's it i said mom it's in the safe mrs chevrini had been unable to sell the pendant
it looked identical to the one trudy thompson was wearing in the newspaper photograph
that's one in a million i would say for her to keep a newspaper like that fortunately mrs chevrini kept all her
old pawn tickets the one for the pendant was dated december 3rd 1996 around the time of the couple's
murder and it identified gordy candy as the seller candy said he was only a messenger that
it was james jordan who had asked him to pawn the necklace for him jordan had been working as a handyman
for trudy thompson at the time of her murder a background check indicated that jordan
was arrested just a few weeks after the murders for another robbery and was currently serving a 45-year prison
sentence in texas when questioned jordan denied he killed the elderly couple scientist swabbed the inside of his
cheek for a sample of his dna which was then compared to the blood drops of the crime scene
we concluded that james jordan was the person that left blood at the crime scene
james jordan was charged with killing gertrude thompson and edward kowalczyk prosecutors believe the motive was
robbery to steal money from the rent payments to use for drugs they think jordan first tortured and
killed trudy cutting his hand with a broken lamp and leaving blood drops in the living room
when ed walked in later from outside jordan killed him too as he was looking for money
blood from his hand dripped into the desk drawer before leaving jordan took trudy's elephant pendant
then asked a friend to pawn it for him the pendant fetched all of twenty dollars
that twenty dollar transaction led to jordan's capture he had to cash in that pendant
and but for that reckless act we never would have linked them back in court jordan represented himself and
tried to explain why his blood was found in trudy's desk he explained the drops of blood inside
her desk as being that's where she used to keep her band-aids and so sometime when he was moving furniture or doing
something he must have shed a drop of blood while he was looking for a band-aid but jordan couldn't explain his blood
drops inside the broken vase and he said he had trudy's elephant pendant because
she gave it to him as payment for his handyman services but the jury did not believe his story
we find the defendant james jordan was convicted of two counts of aggravated murder and was sentenced
to death the case was solved thanks to the pawn shop owner who never threw anything away
and the forensic scientists ability to recreate the crime based on the physical evidence
the police work combined with luck and scientific evidence a little bit above a little bit of everything
it all goes together [Music] [Music] you

The murders of an elderly couple leave police stumped until, two years later, they receive a major break. A jeweler looking through old newspaper clippings recognizes a necklace the female victim wore as having been pawned in her own shop.

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

A double homicide in Toledo leads to the arrest of handyman James Jordan after a gold pendant links him to the crime.

Key points

Double Homicide Investigation. Police suspect a double homicide might involve two perpetrators after finding a clue.
Ethan Walls Arrested. Ethan Walls is arrested based on circumstantial evidence and an informant's claims.
Confession of the Informant. The star witness confesses to lying about Ethan Walls, leading to the dismissal of charges.
Discovery of the Pendant. A pawn shop owner's daughter finds a newspaper article about the murders, leading to a crucial clue.
James Jordan Convicted. James Jordan is convicted of the murders after DNA evidence links him to the crime scene.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This is a lie from where did it come from?

Ethan Walls denying the informant's claims.

9:34WatchDec 10, 2021

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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