The Murder of Sharon Hammack | Bloodline Detectives with Nancy Grace | Forensic Files

[OMINOUS MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1996, police get a 911 call.
Two men say they found a body dumped on the side of the road. PAUL VAN RHEE: And it looked to them at the time
like a white blanket that was wrapped around an object. Once they got out of their truck,
it was immediately apparent to them that this was a body. NANCY GRACE: Fear grips the community.
It's not the only body discovered in the Grand Rapids area. [SIRENS WAILING] JOHN TUINHOFF: In the 1990s, there were approximately
11 murders in the Grand Rapids area and surrounding counties. Typically, it would be a murder, and then
the body would be found the next day or even months later. NANCY GRACE: Police exhaust all leads
for a possible serial killer. The case goes cold. Can new, groundbreaking forensic science
catch a killer after all this time? This is the story of a 26-year search for a serial killer who may have murdered as many as 11 women.
I'm Nancy Grace. This is "Bloodline Detectives." [THEME MUSIC] [PENSIVE MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1996,
a small city only three hours northeast of Chicago, it's nicknamed "Furniture City" because of its
booming home industry. JOHN TUINHOFF: In 1996, there were a lot of murders in Kent County at that time
and in the city of Grand Rapids. As most metropolitan cities, there are times where crime does peak, and there's
times where it's not as bad. NANCY GRACE: October 3, 1996, two men on their way to work spot something unusual on the side
of the road. Once they got out of their truck, it was immediately apparent to them that this was a body.
And then the other one got into the truck and had to drive to a hotel to make the phone call-- we didn't
have cell phones back then-- and said that they were there waiting for the police.
While he was doing that, the other gentleman stayed with the body. But apparently, a number of people
kept coming over and trying to get to the body and to see it, and he was just trying to keep the area clear.
NANCY GRACE: Police arrive, and they immediately cordon off the area. BLAIR LACHMAN: When they first got there,
they combed the area for potential evidence. There was a lot of stuff that were-- you know, if you're
on the side of a road, where people are dumping cigarettes and beer bottles, there were plenty of those.
So they preserved that, not knowing if they were related to the crime scene. Then they took the body and placed it on a gurney.
They took that body to the medical examiner's office to do the autopsy. So no one actually saw anything until they
got back to the morgue. NANCY GRACE: The body in the blanket is soon identified as Sharon Hammack.
She's a local woman who's been known as a sex worker. PAUL VAN RHEE: She was in her late 20s.
We learned that she did have two children of her own, who she put up for adoption because she didn't want them
to be part of the lifestyle that she was part of, which included the prostitution and drug use.
She also had a family of two sisters that we knew about. Whenever these circumstances come up
in all of our investigations into homicides, it's hard to talk to the family and tell the family what has
happened to their loved one. TINA DE YOUNG: I had worked a long shift that day, and I remember feeling out of sorts,
like something wasn't right. And my boyfriend at the time called me, and he said,
I have to talk to you when you come home. And I'm like, just tell me. He's like, no, I'm not telling you while you're driving.
I came in the door, and he said, your sister-- and I knew who he was talking about because she was
heading down the wrong path. He said, they found your sister, and she's dead. And I lost it.
I just wanted to go be with my mom. That's all I wanted. I wanted to go be with my mom because I knew
it was gonna break her heart. But she knew that day was coming. [CRYING] When they knocked on the door, they told
my parents that they had found a woman dropped on 76th and Patterson. And my mom goes, are you sure it's her?
And they said, we're pretty positive it's her. And my mom lost it. NANCY GRACE: Sharon Hammack's death
is not the only murder investigation going on in Grand Rapids. JOHN TUINHOFF: In the 1990s, there were approximately
11 murders in the Grand Rapids area and surrounding counties. Typically, it would be a murder, and then the body
would be found the next day or even months later by someone. BLAIR LACHMAN: I think people were pretty
convinced that there was a serial killer on the loose in Grand Rapids. And it was weird because you had this series of rapes and murders
that happened in that time period, and then they stopped. I think they were convinced that the serial killer took
his show on the road and left. NANCY GRACE: Police talk to Sharon Hammack's family to get a clearer
picture of her final hours. JOHN TUINHOFF: Investigators in 1996 would have started looking at acquaintances of Sharon Hammack
to try to get an idea of the last 24 hours of her life, and also a pattern of life for her
and who she was associating with, what she was involved with, and who may have some information
on what had happened to her. TINA DE YOUNG: She was so beautiful. So beautiful. She just got hooked up with the wrong people
and was led down that path. My mother had eight children and I was the baby of eight.
She was so protective of me. I missed so many memories with her because he chose that she was better off dead,
that nobody was gonna miss her. But he's wrong. Is there a sadistic serial killer lurking in Grand Rapids?
Can police find him before he strikes again? We find out next on "Bloodline Detectives."
[AUDIO LOGO] [AUDIO LOGO] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1996,
police get a call from two men who find a body wrapped in a blanket on the side of the road,
the victim ID'd as 29-year-old mother-of-two Sharon Hammack. Investigators look for clues left behind by the killer.
JOHN TUINHOFF: Investigators conducted a search warrant at Sharon Hammack's house and went through the house
and located things of interest to them, including beer bottles and other items that a guest could have had,
for fingerprints. And also, they did examine her vehicle as well for any chances
of identifying a possible suspect or someone that could have been in her vehicle.
NANCY GRACE: For investigators, the scene of any crime is the first stop for clues left behind.
The condition of the victim, the victim's injuries, even the victim's position could provide vital clues.
In the case of Sharon Hammack, the coroner decides to remove Sharon's body from the scene,
still wrapped in a blanket. JOHN TUINHOFF: Sharon Hammack was found, once she was
unwrapped from the blanket, to have her hands behind her back, tied with shoe string, and also her feet tied together
and pulled up towards her hands so that she would be laying on her stomach with her hands and feet tied together
so that she could not move, and she would be rolling pretty much on her stomach.
It was a very unique situation, I believe, that for them to open that blanket up and find her
bound and tied in that manner. ELIZABETH BARTLETT: With each piece of evidence being removed from the victim's body,
it also has to be preserved. And so each of those cords would have to be removed very carefully and placed in evidence bags
to preserve any potential evidence, DNA, anything that they could down the line.
JOHN TUINHOFF: Reviewing the autopsy photos 27 years later, they are very disturbing on just how the last moments of Sharon's
life would have been. PAUL VAN RHEE: An autopsy is critical to the investigation
because it's a way for us to look for additional evidence that might be on the body to understand what
the cause of death may be, also, to take measurements of potential weapons that were used.
In this case, it was a knife. There was confirmed stabbed wounds on her head. There was also definitely indication
that she had been strangled with bruises around her neck. JOHN TUINHOFF: Sharon had bruising
all over her body, which would indicate that there was a struggle with her. And one thing that I could note that I noticed from photographs
is that her fingers, while she was bound behind her back, her fingers were clenched, and her fingers were
through the strings of the bindings that were holding her hands behind her back.
So you could tell that Sharon was fighting until her last breath. BLAIR LACHMAN: She was strangled with such force,
she had the pearl necklace wrapped on her neck. It wasn't used to strangle her. It was the force of the hands around the neck
squeezing created an indentation of the pearl necklace on her neck. PAUL VAN RHEE: DNA was very new at the time.
It was a new form of investigation, a new science. Although they knew that that was a possibility, at that time,
evidence was taken and kept and looked into. NANCY GRACE: A tragic blow in this case
comes during the examination. During the autopsy, we found out that she was pregnant when she was murdered.
NANCY GRACE: Now that the autopsy is complete, Sharon Hammack's family can finally bury their loved one.
TINA DE YOUNG: I remember having a closed casket because that's what my mom wanted.
It was horrible, horrible. I just wanted answers. I just wanted to know who took her from me.
NANCY GRACE: Law enforcement determined to provide answers to Sharon Hammack's grieving family,
but it's 1996. DNA science is still in its infancy, so police must rely on old-school methods
to search for her killer. JOEL SCHULTZE: There's four basic blood types that people have.
Type O, 45% of the population has. So if you have a type that almost 50% of the population
has, it doesn't really give you much information. The other three, some of them are under 10%.
But again, there's only four types. So it doesn't discriminate between people very well.
JOHN TUINHOFF: Several police agencies in Metro Grand Rapids formed a task force to investigate
the prostitution murders. And the detectives assigned at that time received hundreds and hundreds of tips
from people calling in reference this case. Nothing was ever revealed with any of those investigations
with regard to Sharon Hammack. They were trying to put together potential suspects by looking
at boyfriends or friends of Sharon and anybody that may have been a person in common with any of these other girls
that were also found. BLAIR LACHMAN: So she's walking the streets, so there's no witness to it.
They interviewed other prostitutes. They interviewed people that, I guess, for a better term,
labeled pimps, people who might know. Dozens of people they interviewed and nobody
had any information. Sometimes they'd say, OK, you might wanna check this person.
So then they'd go check that person, and then that person wouldn't pan out. Sometimes there were suspects that they would exclude,
but then they might come back to them again and try to re-interview. JOHN TUINHOFF: It was the belief of investigators
that our suspect was someone that could be transient or could be a truck driver that could be traveling the roads.
And that's why we were finding bodies on the sides of roads. NANCY GRACE: One by one, all the leads in the search for Sharon
Hammack's killer go dry. JOEL SCHULTZE: I came to the Michigan State Police in 1997
and helped start the DNA unit in Grand Rapids laboratory. And the-- obviously, the homicide had already taken
place. We started doing DNA analysis at the Grand Rapids laboratory in 1999, getting more complete DNA profiles.
ELIZABETH BARTLETT: They were able to obtain DNA from some of the items. The blanket had male DNA on it.
So then the next problem became whose DNA is it. BLAIR LACHMAN: All the DNA did at that time was
eliminate potential suspects. NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids Police have the killer's DNA profile,
but they don't have a match. They also have 10 other unsolved murders. Can a groundbreaking new forensic tool
crack this very gruesome case? That's next on "Bloodline Detectives." [AUDIO LOGO]
[AUDIO LOGO] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2008. Detectives have a DNA sample from the 1996 murder
of 29-year-old Sharon Hammack, a mother of two, her body found wrapped in a blanket on the side of the road.
Investigators fear they've got a serial killer on their hands because Sharon's death is one of 11 similar unsolved murders,
all in the same area. Now police turn to forensic science and CODIS for answers.
CODIS is the Combined DNA Indexing System, and that's set up to track offenders convicted of crimes
to potentially identify them if they've been involved in any other unsolved crimes.
BLAIR LACHMAN: Every time someone commits a crime or a felony, their DNA is extracted.
It's just a simple swab. You just take that. And a sample is created, and it's entered into this system.
And there's millions of people in that database. You're looking to see if someone, for some reason,
has been entered into that system, whether it's from a felony, from a rape. However they get into that system,
if they're in that system, you're looking for a match. NANCY GRACE: CODIS is the National DNA
database for convicted felons. In this case, investigators do not get a match on CODIS,
and that means the suspect in the murders has never been arrested for a serious crime.
The DNA sample, however, leads Michigan investigators to a similar crime in another state.
JOEL SCHULTZE: In 2008, we had a CODIS association, what we refer to as a forensic hit, which is a case-to-case hit
with a case out of Maryland. And exchanging information, we found that it was a 2006 homicide that occurred in Maryland.
We issued that report to the investigators, and then they were able to talk with the Maryland
investigators, the local ones. They had some information in Maryland that pointed towards the suspect being--
possibly being a truck driver. PAUL VAN RHEE: That case was a young female that was also
found on the side of the road. She had been killed by stabbing, and her name was Dusty Shuck.
She was found on the side of the highway in Maryland. And she also had DNA evidence from potentially the suspect
on her, and that DNA evidence on her matched a DNA profile that was obtained from Sharon Hammack.
We had DNA, but we have no one to match it up to because he was never in the system.
So basically, we were up in the air. And he would either have to get caught, or we would never find him.
NANCY GRACE: So far, this serial killer stays just out of reach for the Kent County Sheriff's.
That is until they hear the infamous Golden State Killer has been caught using a brand new forensic science--
investigative genetic genealogy. PAUL VAN RHEE: With a good-enough DNA profile or suspect DNA profile, that it was
possible to submit that DNA for processing and utilize different databases that contain genetic genealogy
to be able to find relatives of this potential suspect in order to drill down and locate or provide
a name for potential suspects that were involved in any related cases like this.
JOEL SCHULTZE: So we took a portion of that extracted DNA from the electric blanket and sent it to an FGG company,
Identifinders. NANCY GRACE: Identifinders International is a company that specializes in forensic genetic genealogy,
its leader, Dr. Colleen Fitzpatrick, a pioneer in this emerging science. And they developed their DNA for profile,
which, again, is different than what we look for. And the power of the FGG in that search is that they can go out
to third, fourth, fifth cousins twice removed as far as relationships. And then the second part of that, then,
is once they get these searches and some names back as doing the genetic genealogy portion,
and they're building these family trees, where they're finding a common ancestor--
and typically, in the cases I've seen, it usually goes back to the 1700s or so. I've seen it go back further.
I've seen it stop in the 1800s. And once they find that common ancestor, they build a family tree back to the evidence
and typically will come back with an investigative lead of the one generation. And then the investigation starts kind of all over again
for the Kent County Sheriff's Department. NANCY GRACE: Genealogists at Identifinders
make a remarkable breakthrough, but now they must combine their resources with Michigan
police to catch a killer. JOHN TUINHOFF: They identified a distant relative family
that I started to investigate to try to get a DNA sample from one of them so that we could get closer
to identifying our suspect. I knew if I obtained a DNA sample from someone in that family--
and they will get us a lot closer to our perpetrator to help us to identify them.
I made contact with a distant family member of our perpetrator in Caro, Michigan.
The family member was extremely cooperative with me. I explained to them the situation and what we were
investigating, and they voluntarily provided me with a DNA sample. I resubmitted it to Identifinders International.
And at that time, they realized that they were close to the suspect, but now they could get a lot closer.
And they came up with a target family for me. JOEL SCHULTZE: It was one of our first
that we did through the laboratory, so I was hopeful and excited when they did come back
with a set of brothers that they said needed to be investigated. And now it's up to the investigators
to investigate that family of brothers and get a known from those brothers so that we can compare it back to the evidence in the crime.
I can actually remember where I was when the phone call came in from them. I was actually at my daughter's basketball practice.
And I saw the phone number that was calling me, and I knew it was probably good news.
And in fact, it was. Genealogist Linda Doyle told me over the phone that she had just forwarded me an email,
and she had identified a target from a family that she believed was going to be my perpetrator.
Perpetrator was one of four biological male sons of Wilfred and Donna Artman. NANCY GRACE: Kent County sheriffs now closer
than ever to cracking this case, investigators begin to focus on the backgrounds of all four
for brothers to isolate a likely suspect. JOHN TUINHOFF: We knew the perpetrator was male,
so we had to go through and identify which one of the brothers had ties to Grand Rapids
and look for anything in his background which would lead us in the direction that he would
most likely be our perpetrator. And one of the four brothers had an extensive criminal history
for sexual assault. And he, at one point, was a resident of Grand Rapids in the '90s.
And when we did background investigations on these four brothers, it became very apparent
right away that one of the brothers, Garry Artman, was more likely the suspect that we needed to focus on.
BLAIR LACHMAN: So Garry was in the military for three years. He was discharged for a sexual assault
while he was in the military. While he was awaiting trial for that sexual assault,
he raped a 15 or 16-year-old girl at knifepoint multiple times. He was convicted of that rape and got
sentenced to 16 to 30 years. He only did 11 of those years. After he got out of prison, he moved to the Grand Rapids area,
which is where he resided during the time that Shannon Hammack was found murdered.
There was another sexual assault during his time in prison, and he was investigated
as a potential suspect. And we read those reports, and they were pretty telling,
which included a statement made by him to one of the deputies that the reason he was even in prison in the first place
is that he was leaving witnesses. In other words, he didn't kill his victims. JOHN TUINHOFF: When I saw Garry Artman's criminal history
and started reviewing some of the prior police reports of the violence of his sexual assaults on these victims from
the early 1980s and late 1970s, sometimes you just know that this is the guy we need to target,
and this guy matched everything for what we are looking for for the murderer of Sharon Hammack.
BLAIR LACHMAN: He was a recluse. He was an over-the-road truck driver. He didn't have many close friends.
We talked to his brothers, talked to the victims of the sexual assaults. They all painted the same portrait--
a very dark, scary man who they were all afraid of, uncomfortable with, capable of the heinous acts
that we're talking about. That was a pretty consistent theme. All those things raised our eyebrows to the point
where we knew we were really on the right path, but it wasn't enough just to stop there.
We had to keep taking all the steps. NANCY GRACE: Detectives are almost certain they've
got their serial killer, but they need concrete evidence to make an arrest. PAUL VAN RHEE: We continued to monitor where he lived
at the time, which was in Florida, continued to learn who he was working for and try to learn what his potential routines were.
And we also started to ping his cell phone. We were able to get his cell phone information.
We were pinging his phone so we could track where he was located at the time. We had meetings with the Kent County Prosecutor's Office,
along with several detectives, and we decided that based on the evidence that we had,
we had enough to get a warrant for his arrest, based on the information that we had obtained.
NANCY GRACE: The net is now closing in on a prime suspect. Name-- Garry Artman. Is Artman the man who so cruelly dumped
Sharon's body on the side of the road like trash back in 1996? We find out next on "Bloodline Detectives."
[AUDIO LOGO] [AUDIO LOGO] [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] NANCY GRACE: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2022,
police investigating the 1996 murder of a 29-year-old mother, Sharon Hammack, her body found dumped on the side of the road.
There have been no solid leads for over 20 years, until now. The science of investigative genetic genealogy
leads detectives to Garry Artman, a truck driver prone to violence. Now, they close in to make an arrest,
an arrest of a suspected serial killer. Their plan is to arrest Artman during a traffic stop
as he drives through the state of Mississippi. PAUL VAN RHEE: I was involved in tracking
Mr. Artman while he was moving towards the state of Mississippi. I had contact with the Mississippi State police,
and we were able to, based on his cell phone location data and knowing that he was driving a certain type of truck,
they were able to locate him on the highway and make an arrest. PAUL VAN RHEE: On September 22, 2022,
we conducted a traffic stop on the highway in Mississippi. From that traffic stop, Mr. Hartman
was located as the driver of that semi truck. And he was taken into custody at that time.
He was somewhat cooperative with investigators at that time and officers on the scene.
And it was just surreal for me at that time because there was always such a huge concern that we didn't know
if he would have the tendency to go out and continue doing violent things to people.
So once he was in custody, that was a relief to all of us investigators at the Kent
County Sheriff's Office. Now we had to continue doing our job so that he wouldn't be able to hurt anyone else.
BLAIR LACHMAN: He is arrested and taken to the jail in Mississippi. At the jail, he is read his rights,
and he waives his rights. And he does an interview for about three hours with the sheriff's department.
PAUL VAN RHEE: With any interview like this, our goal, obviously, is to-- to hopefully get a confession.
Because it had been so long since the homicide took place, we wanted to not only get a confession,
but first of all, confirm a lot of the things that we had found in his background.
My intention was to start out in the past and hopefully have him talk to me about what his timeline in life was,
especially after he got out of prison. And he was very open to talking about that.
BLAIR LACHMAN: He denied killing women, openly admitted that he used prostitutes in Grand Rapids
frequently. He acknowledged that he thought women, in general, but particularly prostitutes, were beneath him.
They were just objects. He actually used the word-- they're "pieces of meat." JOHN TUINHOFF: The demeanor that I reviewed from watching
his interview and also from the traffic stop was he didn't seem surprised that he
was arrested for a murder. He was very calm, would answer questions. To me, thinking, if you were being accused of a murder,
you would think that you would be putting up a defense to the investigators saying,
I didn't do this. But Garry Artman didn't really ever say that and just acted like he didn't know what we were talking about.
PAUL VAN RHEE: He denied being part of what happened to Sharon this whole time. I brought it up several times.
I told him that we knew that he had murdered Sharon based on the evidence that we had.
And he never really reacted to that. We had previously gotten some information from one of his recent coworkers, a female.
She had said that when he left his employer, he said, it's a good thing that I'm leaving,
or something bad might have happened. I brought that up to Garry Artman, and he immediately reacted.
He became incredibly angry. He was swearing at me. I was very surprised by it because up to this point,
he hadn't had much of a reaction. And I said, Garry, why are you so angry at me for saying that?
He said, well, because it's a lie. And I said, Garry, I've called you a murderer to your face
this whole time, and you've never once reacted. And he said, well, that's because I can't defend that.
It was the first time that he had had a significant reaction. And it was the first time that I saw his short temper.
NANCY GRACE: During the interview, detectives roll the dice on a very crucial piece of evidence.
They take a DNA swab from Garry Artman. Why? To confirm, without a doubt, it's his DNA on that blanket in which Sharon Hammond
was found wrapped back in 1996. PAUL VAN RHEE: During that interview, we did take a moment to take a DNA sample from him,
and we immediately had that shipped back to Michigan for comparison with the MSP labs.
JOEL SCHULTZE: They flew the buccal swab to us. And that's kind of a pretty straightforward test.
And I think we turned that around in six hours with a report out in, like, a total of eight hours.
NANCY GRACE: The buccal swab is a match. After all this time, police can finally inform Sharon Hammack's
family the man who caused so much pain for 25 years-plus has been caught. We thought that they just gave up.
And after my mom died, we never heard anything from anybody. And then one day, a detective knocked at my sister Terri's
door and said, we can't wait to tell you this, but we've solved your sister's murder.
I looked up at my mother, and I said, we finally got justice, Mama. [CRYING] We're gonna get justice for her.
And I'm sorry you're not here, but you're gonna be up there celebrating with her.
NANCY GRACE: The DNA match is fantastic evidence, but investigators plan to leave no stone unturned.
Before taking Garry Artman to trial, the Kent County sheriffs and the district attorneys
get a search warrant for Artman properties. We see what explosive evidence they find there
next on "Bloodline Detectives." [AUDIO LOGO] [AUDIO LOGO] NANCY GRACE: 2022, White Springs, Florida,
detectives have Garry Artman in custody for the 1996 murder of a young mom, Sharon Hammack,
in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Artman, a truck driver, is arrested at a traffic stop in Mississippi.
Now, investigators want to search Artman's storage unit. PAUL VAN RHEE: Part of the information that we received
during the interview was the fact that he had a storage unit where he lived in Florida.
Based off that information, we were able to obtain a search warrant for that storage unit in Florida
and conducted a search there. During that search, we located several journals that appeared to be writing from Garry Artman.
We located several different bibles with scriptures highlighted and other writing within the bibles
as well. We located women's panties and women's bras that were put in a bag that was in the storage unit as well.
And all these items were taken back to Michigan for further review. He was a man that kept journals.
He wrote down all of his feelings, quotes. He basically told us about his hatred for women.
Any woman in high school that turned him down, it stemmed this hatred and anger.
And he thought, if they're not going to give me what I want, I'm going to take it from other women.
And that's what he started doing. PAUL VAN RHEE: He had many writings about women,
specifically prostitutes. A lot of his writings, he referred to these prostitutes as "slaves."
He referred to his work as being told by God to-- that it was his work to do whatever he was writing about.
ELIZABETH BARTLETT: He talked about murdering women out of morality. It was, like, his right to do.
He mentioned raping 152 girls and showed no remorse for that. Given his meticulous notes and the things that he collected
and kept, I believed that there are at least 152 women that he raped. NANCY GRACE: Equipped with strong evidence,
Kent County District Attorneys now ready to face Garry Artman in court. ELIZABETH BARTLETT: My goal for this trial
was to tell Sharon Hammack's story without her being here, really focusing on her as a person, and the brutal way
that he treated her, and just painting that picture for the jury. They were filled with heartbreak and compassion for Sharon.
They did not judge her in any way. Some of the quotes that were read from Garry Artman's journal
in court, their faces changed to hatred and disbelief that there is somebody out there that is so monstrous.
BLAIR LACHMAN: He showed zero signs of remorse. He did engage, and not in a good way.
He would act up, say some funky things during the course of trial. Like, he commented on his knots and how good they were.
And we put the part about him saying, women are just a piece of meat. He openly acknowledged they are in the courtroom.
The sense we got was the jury was disgusted by him. I think they were. It wasn't just that he killed and raped her.
I think the volume of rapes-- I mean, he admitted to 150 rapes in his letters. He explained some of his rationale
in some of his journals. And I think they were disgusted by him. I think it was hard not to be.
NANCY GRACE: It doesn't take the jury long to decide the rest of Garry Artman's future.
JOHN TUINHOFF: Sometimes this can take a while. Some murder cases, it could take, you know, two days.
The prosecutors and the detectives, we decided that we were just gonna walk down the street
to grab something to eat. But while we were ordering our food, we got a call from the court saying the jury
had already reached a verdict. The only time I think I get a little bit nervous is when the jury is coming back in after they have a verdict.
And there's that unknown moment where you don't know what they're gonna say or do.
But it was a 30-minute verdict, so we felt pretty comfortable. When you have a 30-minute verdict, it's usually
favorable to the prosecution. NANCY GRACE: The jury finds Garry Artman guilty on three counts--
open murder, felony murder, and first-degree criminal sex conduct. And he is sentenced to life behind bars.
PAUL VAN RHEE: Even though he made it that long without getting caught, I'm glad for the family
that they were able to get their closure with this trial. TINA DE YOUNG: Is there still heartache?
Yes. There will always be heartache. I prayed to God that he would give me the answer.
That's all I ever wanted for her, was justice. She deserved that. That monster can't hurt nobody else.
BLAIR LACHMAN: I'm confident that Garry Artman thought no one would care. Because she was a prostitute, I don't think he thought anybody
would care a year later. I didn't think he thought anybody would care five years
later, and I definitely don't think he thought anybody would care 27 years later.
PAUL VAN RHEE: No matter what that person does in their lifestyle, we treat all of these scenes
and all of the homicides the same, no matter what the background of the individual is.
NANCY GRACE: Without the incredible work of the "Bloodline Detectives" and the science
of investigative genetic genealogy, this case would never have been solved. Boy, we've come a long way since 1996, between cell phones,
technology, DNA, familial DNA. There's just so much more we can do in solving crimes and giving
people their justice today. ELIZABETH BARTLETT: Forensic genetic genealogy is such a wonderful tool now, looking
back on these cold cases. It changes the game. Cases that would otherwise go unsolved forever
now have a chance. PAUL VAN RHEE: I think the highlight of this case was just seeing how this genetic genealogy
can work with these cold cases. And it gives me hope that there's additional cases that can be solved in the same manner.
NANCY GRACE: Now, Sharon's family can finally close this awful chapter of their lives.
I loved the way we hugged each other. And we always told each other we loved each other.
And my last conversation with her, it wasn't very nice. And we didn't end the conversation with "I love you."
And that-- [SIGHS, SNIFFLES] I know she knows I loved her and just as much as I know that she loved me.
She's a beautiful person that went down the wrong path. And I wish she wouldn't have because she was beautiful--
her smile, her soul, everything. She was a beautiful person, and she did not deserve to have her life ended at such a young age.
PAUL VAN RHEE: At the time, we had over a dozen similar incidents in the Grand Rapids
area during the late 1990s. And if I was able to interview him again, the most important thing I would want to know
is what other homicides out there was he a part of. The incredible work of the "Bloodline Detectives"
goes well beyond the tragic murder of Sharon Hammack. Between 1993 and 1996, 17 women, many of whom were sex workers,
disappeared in the Grand Rapids area. Some of them were never even found. 11 of them, including Sharon Hammack, were murdered.
On his deathbed, 2024, Garry Artman confessed to 10 of those murders, plus the murder of a Florida woman back in 2012.
I'm Nancy Grace, and I want to thank you for joining us here on "Bloodline Detectives."
[AUDIO LOGO] [AUDIO LOGO] [THEME MUSIC]

In Michigan, 1996, a body is found discarded on the side of a road, wrapped in a blanket. The victim is a young mother, Sharon Hammack. Can new technology solve this cold case?

Now in its fifth season, Bloodline Detectives is the leading true crime series that explores how police departments harness genetic genealogy to solve crimes that were once considered "unsolvable," bringing long-awaited answers to victims' families.

Brief Summary

The episode details the murder of Sharon Hammack and the investigation that led to Garry Artman's arrest through genetic genealogy.

Key points

The Discovery of a Body. In 1996, two men discover a body wrapped in a blanket on the roadside.
Sharon Hammack Identified. The victim is identified as Sharon Hammack, a local woman with a troubled past.
A Serial Killer on the Loose?. With multiple murders in the area, police suspect a serial killer is active.
The Autopsy Reveals Tragedy. During the autopsy, it is discovered that Sharon was pregnant when she was murdered.
DNA Evidence and a Cold Case. Investigators find male DNA on the blanket but struggle to identify the suspect.
Garry Artman's Arrest. Detectives close in on Garry Artman, a prime suspect in the murder of Sharon Hammack.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Can new, groundbreaking forensic science catch a killer after all this time?

Nancy Grace poses a question about the investigation.

0:57WatchApr 27, 2025

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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