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The Playboy Murders Season 3 Episode 2
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Transcript
00:00Linda was a very attractive girl.
00:07She was so all-American.
00:11She was there to photograph the Bunny of the Year contest.
00:15I couldn't believe it.
00:21Who would do something like that to this wonderful woman?
00:24Then, over the next month, four more women were brutally murdered in Tampa.
00:34Police called the summer of 1983 the Summer of Hell.
00:39If you're one of the bunnies working at the club, it must have been terrifying.
00:45It could have been me.
00:47Or another bunny.
00:50I was frightened.
00:54Was I saved?
00:58Should I watch my back?
01:01It's one of the most bizarre stories in the history of Tampa Bay, no doubt.
01:06It was Monday, July 11, 1983, early in the morning, around 7 a.m.,
01:23and a man was on his daily morning walk when he spotted something unusual.
01:29At a dead end of Old Memorial Highway, near a creek, he found a woman's body.
01:38She was face down, had a towel over her head, and was nude from the waist down.
01:47He ran to a neighbor's home to use their phone to call the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office.
01:58They looked around and didn't find a purse, a wallet, or any kind of identification,
02:04so detectives were not able to identify who this woman was at the crime scene.
02:11She had been shot four times in the head with a small caliber weapon,
02:17and they were able to find evidence of sexual assault.
02:22The same day, in Clearwater, about half an hour away from where this body was found,
02:29a group of kids finds this knit purse and turn that person to police.
02:37The cash was gone, but the credit cards were still in it.
02:41The police saw that it belonged to a woman named Linda Lanson who lived in Tampa.
02:46Police are trying to track down the owner of this purse.
02:49They reach out to Lynn's apartment complex, and they find that she hasn't been seen for days.
02:56But then, detectives get a really big clue when they discover where she was last seen in public,
03:02and that is at the Suncoast Playboy Club in St. Petersburg.
03:08Playboy clubs were huge across the country.
03:10When the first Playboy Club opened in 1960, people were going out for these long,
03:16like, three-martini lunches, and they would want this really upscale night.
03:20But by the 80s, things had really changed.
03:22People were a lot more casual in their style of going out.
03:25There were a lot more people going out.
03:27There were a lot more people going out.
03:29There were a lot more people going out.
03:32But by the 80s, things had really changed.
03:34People were a lot more casual in their style of going out.
03:37Playboy was still this giant worldwide brand that everybody knew, super popular,
03:42but business-wise, they were having a lot of trouble.
03:45So the Suncoast Playboy Club was struggling a little bit,
03:48and in order to get more publicity and attention,
03:50they would have publicity stunts like the Bunny of the Year pageant.
03:55In 1983, I met Linda.
03:58She was there to photograph the Bunny of the Year contest,
04:02and I was nominated.
04:05I remember her being very pretty and very personable.
04:10Linda was a very attractive girl, but she didn't try to be flashy.
04:15She was very shy.
04:17She was sweet and nice.
04:19Linda moved to Tampa from New York City, got married, had a daughter,
04:24and wound up getting divorced.
04:27Now she's a 41-year-old single mom renting an apartment in Tampa,
04:34and she is trying to build a new life for herself as a photographer
04:40while her 7-year-old daughter is spending the summer with her dad in Orlando.
04:45She was starting to get some regular gigs with a Tampa radio morning show
04:50called Q-Zoo.
04:52Q's the morning zoo.
04:54Get up, it's the morning Q-Zoo.
04:56Good morning to you from the zoo. Who's this?
04:59Radio was red hot, and I was the program director
05:03and morning DJ on Q-105 radio station.
05:08We would go out and do live shows from different places.
05:12We would go out and do live shows from different places around Tampa Bay.
05:17And I remember our promotion director mentioned to me
05:21that we were going to have a new publicity photographer,
05:26a girl named Linda Lanson,
05:29and she would take pictures of what was going on there
05:32and all the personalities mingling with the fans.
05:35She'd be sneaking around taking pictures.
05:38You never knew when she was going to pop up.
05:41I remember I was asking her about why she was so particular
05:46about taking so many damn pictures,
05:49and she says, I wanted just the right pictures because I got to make money.
05:54This is my job. I'm a single mom, and I don't depend on anybody.
05:59I do it myself.
06:01She kind of didn't quite tear up, but she really loved her child.
06:07She was looking to grow in this new career
06:10and to be hired to take the photos at the Bunny of the Year contest
06:15at the Suncoast Playboy Club.
06:17That would have been an incredible opportunity.
06:23The Suncoast Playboy Club opened in the spring of 1981.
06:27It was right on the beach. It's a town that caters to a lot of tourists.
06:32I was single, and I loved Domingos,
06:35and Tampa was burning up.
06:40Florida was such a huge destination in the 80s.
06:43This is like right when Miami Vice was coming out.
06:46It was so glamorized.
06:48It had a very distinct look, a very distinct style,
06:52and everybody was excited to go there.
06:56I began working at the Suncoast Playboy Club when I decided to audition,
07:01and I'll never forget the day because I was very excited.
07:05I was so broke at the time. I had to borrow a bathing suit.
07:08I had to borrow a friend's high-heeled shoes.
07:11There were about 1,500 beautiful women that came for the audition,
07:17and they hired only, I believe, 25,
07:21and I was one of the original bunnies.
07:24I was 23. I was one of the older bunnies.
07:28Almost all the other girls were 18, 19, 20 years old.
07:34We did a lot of trips where we would go out
07:38and maybe do a golf tournament or a boxing ring and hold the cards,
07:43but it was forbidden to fraternize with any of the guests.
07:47So when we were out in public, we always hung out with other bunnies.
07:56Being a bunny is kind of like being in a sorority
07:58because it can be really supportive,
08:00but it can get really competitive too.
08:03When the Bunny of the Year contest came around,
08:06you're competing against some of your closest friends,
08:08so that can definitely bring some tension.
08:11I think there was a little bit of jealousy.
08:14It was a very prestige position.
08:17Being named Bunny of the Year is like being chosen
08:20to be a Playboy Bunny but on steroids.
08:24The Bunny of the Year contest was held in each club,
08:29and there was quite a significant package when you won.
08:34There were prizes involved.
08:36I remember one of them was a diamond ring and there was a cash prize.
08:39What was so special about wanting to be Bunny of the Year,
08:43I think for me personally,
08:45was I knew I would get a chance to visit the mansion in Los Angeles.
08:50I would get to meet Hugh Hefner.
08:52Hugh Hefner must have been a very mysterious person
08:55to a lot of the bunnies that worked around the country.
08:58They would never have met him. He didn't really travel too much.
09:01The Playmates are so different from the Playboy Bunnies.
09:06The Playboy Bunny is more of a high-class waitress.
09:11A Playmate is someone who's in the magazine
09:14and is usually at the Playboy Mansion.
09:19So it was a chance to mingle with the Playmates for 10 days.
09:35The Bunny of the Year was very important for the club
09:39because it generated business.
09:41It got a lot of guests involved in picking the winner.
09:46It's not only an important night for the club,
09:48it's an important night for up-and-coming photographer Linda Lanson.
09:52This could potentially be a huge opportunity.
09:57On the night of the Bunny of the Year contest,
09:59the nominees were Bunny Kim, Bunny Shonda, and myself.
10:04I remember our bunny mother introducing me to this lovely woman.
10:07Linda is a photographer, and if we want,
10:10we would be able to have copies of the photographs.
10:12So I was very excited about that.
10:15Bunny Kim, Bunny Kathy, and Bunny Shonda.
10:18These women all look like the typical 1980s Playboy Bunny.
10:23They've got the big, curly hair.
10:26They're all very thin.
10:28They have that almost purplish-bluish eyeshadow
10:32that was really in style back then, but they all look gorgeous.
10:38The bunnies were able to vote.
10:40The guests were able to vote.
10:43I would give everyone a slip that they could cast their votes,
10:48and I would definitely always put in a plug for Shonda.
10:52Bunny Shonda's real name was Carolyn Merricks.
10:56She was a very good bunny.
10:58Everybody loved her.
11:00She was genuine. She was elegant.
11:02She was educated, smart.
11:04The customers would come in and ask to sit in her station.
11:07I was closest to Bunny Shonda.
11:10We weren't the all-American girl.
11:13Blonde, tall.
11:15Bunny Shonda was the only African-American
11:19that worked at our club.
11:21And being of a Latin background,
11:25I just felt that I didn't fit in.
11:29So I wanted Shonda to win.
11:34Despite Playboy being a platform for male fantasy,
11:38it was progressive on issues like sex and race.
11:41Hef was very inclusive for the time.
11:44Having African-American models on the cover of Playboy and in Playboy,
11:48you think of that first cover
11:50with the first solo African-American model.
11:52It's so iconic.
11:54It's one of the most memorable Playboy covers even to this day.
11:57So I can only imagine how exhilarating the night was.
12:02How exhilarating the night of the Bunny of the Year pageant was for Shonda.
12:07It was very exciting.
12:09I was literally shaking.
12:11They'd call us up individually,
12:13why do you want to be Bunny of the Year?
12:16Gosh, I was so nervous.
12:18I wasn't used to standing up and speaking in front of a crowd of people.
12:23I remember Linda was very capable,
12:26moving around quite a bit to get the best shots from every angle.
12:30And then they were going to announce the winner.
12:33And we were all just anxiously awaiting.
12:38They announced Shonda had won Bunny of the Year.
12:43Everybody wants to win,
12:45but I definitely was happy for her.
12:52This is such an exciting, fun, joyous event.
12:57And these women have no idea that
13:02two of them will be murdered.
13:14The sheriff's deputies see the body of a woman
13:17lying in the high grass on Memorial Highway.
13:21That started an investigation to figure out who she was
13:25and what had happened to her.
13:27So the police produced a sketch that they issued to the local media.
13:32And there was a call out of,
13:34you think you know who this person is?
13:36Call us.
13:38And Linda Lentzen's ex-husband called the sheriff's office
13:42and said that it looked like her.
13:47Shortly after, Tampa police found her car
13:51abandoned on a residential street in Tampa.
13:54And the windows were down and the keys were in it.
13:58Now the investigators have Linda's car and her purse.
14:03So they bring Linda's ex-husband in to see the Jane Doe.
14:08And he confirms that that is the woman he used to be married to.
14:15Of course they're going to think of Linda's ex-husband as a suspect,
14:19but they find out he's got an alibi.
14:24So detectives rule out Linda's ex-husband.
14:28And when detectives ask her friends and family,
14:32none of them can think of a single person who would want to hurt her.
14:37Tampa police were able to lift a fingerprint from her car window,
14:42but without anybody to compare it to, it didn't produce any leads.
14:48Detectives tried to retrace Linda's steps,
14:52and they determined that the night before she vanished,
14:57she was hired to photograph the Bunny of the Year contest
15:02at the Playboy Club in St. Petersburg.
15:10I came into work and I approached a co-worker.
15:15And I said, so, when do you think we're getting the photographs?
15:18I'm so excited to see them.
15:21She said, well, unfortunately, it's going to take quite a while.
15:24And I said, why?
15:26And she said, they found the photographer Linda murdered
15:28the night after she left the club.
15:31And the police department are keeping the photographs as evidence.
15:35I was devastated. I couldn't believe it.
15:38Who would do something like that to this wonderful woman?
15:42When the bunnies at the club learned that Linda had been murdered,
15:45that must have just been absolutely terrifying.
15:48Of course, detectives went to the Playboy Club to talk to everyone
15:52about anything they might have noticed,
15:55since she was found right after photographing that event.
16:06I told the detectives, Linda left about 1 or 2 hours after the event.
16:11She left about 1 or 2 a.m. by herself.
16:15And I did not see her flirting with anyone or drinking.
16:20I told them that when I would leave the Playboy Club after working a shift,
16:24it was usually about 2, 33 in the morning.
16:27I did not always feel safe.
16:30The club could have done better by having security walk us out,
16:34because there were times when there were people
16:36that were lurking out in the parking lot.
16:40When it comes to working at a restaurant environment
16:42where there's a bunch of scantily clad women,
16:45it can be so easy for creeps and criminals to hide in plain sight.
16:51When the detectives came to ask questions,
16:54it was basically talk to this one, talk to that one,
16:58and OK, move on to the next.
17:01I really don't feel that the detectives really took it seriously
17:06when they interviewed us.
17:09And the investigators were not able to speak with Bunny Shonda
17:13because she had already left for her trip to the Playboy mansion.
17:18It was scary.
17:23Detectives also searched Linda's apartment looking for clues
17:27to see if there's any items that will indicate what led to her murder.
17:32Detectives find a dark room in her apartment
17:36that was set up so that she could develop the photographs that she took.
17:39When they're looking in Linda's dark room,
17:42they see that she has taken a lot of photographs of Scott Shannon.
17:47Linda's friends tell detectives that
17:51she had mentioned having a crush on Scott Shannon.
17:56It was a person in her life that the detectives felt like they needed to question.
18:03When the detective called me and told me that Linda had been murdered,
18:08I was stunned.
18:13They started asking me questions whether or not I knew Linda.
18:18And I said, why are you asking me?
18:21He told me that she had an affection for you.
18:25Did you have a relationship with her?
18:27I'm trying to digest the fact that this girl who I knew
18:31had been brutally murdered,
18:33and then they're talking to me like I might be a suspect.
18:38I said we worked together and I thought she was wonderful,
18:42but no, I did not date her or have any relationship with her.
18:47I had no inkling that she had a crush on me at all.
18:52The last time I saw Linda was when we were doing our farewell morning zoo show
18:58before I left for New York.
19:00She gave me a big hug and said we're going to miss you.
19:03I told them that I was living in New York when it happened
19:07and I could prove that.
19:08They seemed to understand.
19:10After I hung up with a detective from Tampa,
19:13I started thinking, who in the hell would kill that girl?
19:20After several weeks, the leads just sort of dried up.
19:25The detectives are no closer to finding the killer of Linda Lanson.
19:35And then a month after Linda Lanson was killed,
19:38Barbara Grahams was murdered.
19:41She was 19 and she was attacked and killed
19:49while she was walking home from her job at the Tampa Bay Center mall
19:53and she was found the next morning behind a dentist's office.
19:58The crime scene was similar to the Linda Lanson case.
20:02Barbara Grahams was also found with no pants on her body
20:07and she was barefoot,
20:10and it was evident from the scene that she had been disrobed.
20:13Similar to Linda Lanson,
20:16a rape test found that she had also been raped.
20:22We didn't know if these murders were connected.
20:25And then over the next month,
20:28four more women were brutally murdered in Tampa.
20:36It was a very scary time.
20:40Was I safe?
20:42Should I watch my back?
20:45Was there a serial killer out there?
20:53Woman after woman after woman kept turning up dead in public.
20:59They were all brutally murdered.
21:02Some of them were found partially undressed,
21:05and some of them were raped.
21:08Police didn't know if these murders were connected,
21:12if these were all separate violent crimes,
21:16or if Tampa had a serial killer on their hands.
21:19People were scared.
21:22Police called the summer of 1983 the summer of hell.
21:25To know that young women are being targeted and murdered
21:28at the rate that they were,
21:31I can only imagine if you're one of the bunnies working at the club
21:34and you're hearing about all this, it must have been terrifying.
21:37We never were alone. We would have a buddy system.
21:41Downtown was not a place to be by yourself as a woman
21:45in the middle of the night.
21:49Then, in October of 1983,
21:53three months after Linda's death,
21:56an arrest is made in the murder of 19-year-old Barbara Grams.
22:00When the investigators were examining Barbara Grams' body,
22:06they take note of a suspicious mark that is on her left cheek,
22:12and the medical examiner says,
22:16and the medical examiner immediately identifies the mark as a bite mark.
22:21At that time, bite mark evidence
22:26was becoming a popular thing in criminal investigations,
22:31but it wasn't something that the detectives found
22:34in the other cases that summer.
22:37So detectives started talking to different people in the neighborhood
22:42and asking them to give samples of their teeth
22:47to compare it to the bite mark.
22:49They thought if they could find teeth that matched that bite mark,
22:55they might be able to solve the murder.
22:58And they went around taking bite imprints,
23:02and they enlisted the help of this famous odontologist,
23:07Dr. Richard Suveron,
23:09who had been instrumental in the conviction of Ted Bundy
23:14to try to help them match the bite mark.
23:18One of the men who agreed to give a sample was Robert Dubois,
23:23an 18-year-old kid who lived in Tampa.
23:27At the time, he was working at an auto upholstery shop in Tampa.
23:31His family had lived in the neighborhood where Barbara Grams was found,
23:36and as police were investigating that crime,
23:39one of the witnesses pointed them at Dubois
23:43and said that he was somebody they might want to look at
23:46because supposedly he was a troublemaker in the neighborhood,
23:49and so that was enough evidence to say that they had a suspect.
23:57Robert Dubois is adamant from the beginning that he is innocent,
24:04but detectives were focusing on this bite mark.
24:08It was a few more years before DNA evidence
24:13started being used in criminal cases.
24:16Bite mark evidence in the 1980s
24:19was considered to be as good as a fingerprint,
24:24and when a forensic dentist compared that model
24:28to the mark on Barbara Grams,
24:31he opined that it was Dubois' teeth that created this bite mark,
24:36and that became enough for the police to arrest Robert Dubois
24:40and charge him with Barbara Grams' murder.
24:44He ultimately was found guilty by a jury,
24:49and he ended up being sentenced to death.
24:53Detectives aren't able to connect him to Linda Lanson
24:58or any of the other women who were killed,
25:02but after Robert Dubois is arrested,
25:06the murders seem to stop.
25:10So by that time, there isn't a lot else
25:14that's happening with Linda Lanson's case.
25:20I spent some time thinking about Linda.
25:23She was so all-American,
25:26just a sweet, nice kid,
25:29and I thought how terrible it was that whoever did it tore her away.
25:35So eerie, in so many different ways, it kind of shook me up.
25:45The summer of hell sounds absolutely terrifying,
25:49and then in the fall of 1983, the Suncoast Playboy Club closes.
25:54They just weren't making the money that they needed to stay open.
25:58The trouble with the Playboy Clubs in the early 80s
26:01is they weren't really capturing that aspirational mystique
26:05that the Playboy Clubs used to have.
26:08We found out quite abruptly, and I was really surprised.
26:12I was one of the original bunnies.
26:15I worked from day one I was hired to the day it closed.
26:19We were crying on the last night of the club closing.
26:23I thought, oh, this is the best job I ever had.
26:26This is going to last forever.
26:28You know, I wish it would have.
26:31It was the end of an era.
26:40After the Playboy Club closed,
26:43several of us would get together and go out.
26:47I stayed friends with quite a few of the girls,
26:50and we had a little mini sort of reunion.
26:53About a year after the club closed,
26:56the owners of the club took us out on a boat.
26:59Bunny Kathy was there with us.
27:02Shonda was there with us.
27:05Shonda didn't mention anything about her dating life to me,
27:09but she seemed happy.
27:12She was working as a cocktail waitress at Tierra Verde.
27:15It was a jazz club,
27:18but her aspiration was to become a TV news personality.
27:24We were all happy to catch up about what we were doing
27:28and looking forward to.
27:31It was lively, it was fun, it was great to see the other girls
27:35and just kind of celebrate.
27:38The bunnies still maintained a tight-knit sorority
27:42and were forever connected by their time as bunnies.
27:45And then the hell that was the summer of 1983
27:48comes crashing back with a vengeance.
28:01It's been a year since the Suncoast Playboy Club's
28:05Bunny of the Year contest and the murder of Linda Lanson.
28:10A woman went to her sister's apartment,
28:14which was not far from where the Suncoast Playboy Club had been,
28:19and saw her sister on the floor covered in blood.
28:26She had been stabbed to death.
28:30When investigators are on the scene,
28:33she told them her sister was Carolyn Merricks.
28:38As far as she knew, Carolyn wasn't dating anybody
28:42or living with anybody at the time,
28:45but that she was a cocktail waitress at a resort in Tierra Verde.
28:49And she used to work the Suncoast Playboy Club
28:53going by the name Bunny Shonda.
28:56And she won Playboy Bunny of the Year at the club the year before.
29:05It was a total shock to not only us at the club,
29:09but to the entire community.
29:12It made no sense, and I was devastated,
29:15and still when I think about it, I become tearful.
29:19It was devastating to hear
29:22that something like that would happen to someone like her.
29:26And then when we found out some of the details
29:29of her being stabbed to death, you think it's personal.
29:35Another woman is found murdered,
29:38who was at the Suncoast Playboy Club's Bunny of the Year contest in 1983.
29:43But unlike Linda, Carolyn's body was found in a private place,
29:48in her own apartment.
29:51There weren't any signs of forced entry.
29:54Leading law enforcement to believe it may have been someone she knew,
29:58and the murder weapon was different.
30:01But detectives were looking to find out
30:04whether these cases were connected to the Suncoast Playboy Club,
30:08and so they reach out to the people who were at the Playboy Club.
30:12Talking with the investigators,
30:16it was definitely an interrogation, is what I felt.
30:20Who did I know? Who was there? Who did she hang out with?
30:25They really thought it had to be someone inside,
30:30rather than a stranger.
30:33I do remember Sinbad was a good friend of ours
30:37that kind of hung out with us, more as protection.
30:43However, they really focused in on him.
30:47Could he be someone that might have done this?
30:51And of course, he was cleared.
30:55I also thought it could be due to winning the Bunny of the Year,
31:00because Shonda was then sent with all the other Bunnies of the Year
31:05from different clubs out to the Playboy Mansion.
31:09I got the feeling that she felt a little uncomfortable being there
31:14because she didn't discuss a lot of what happened there.
31:18So there were a lot more things that went on
31:22that maybe she wouldn't have wanted to take part in.
31:29I don't know if anything sketchy happened
31:32when Shonda went to the mansion.
31:35Shonda truly kept her entire personal life private.
31:39A lot of people didn't even know where she lived.
31:42A lot of people didn't even know she had a child.
31:46And that could have been to her demise,
31:50because I believe if we would have known more,
31:53we might have been able to help.
31:56Detectives were looking to interview people
31:59trying to get to know Carolyn better to solve her murder.
32:04No one wants another summer of hell.
32:07But the investigation into Carolyn Merrick's murder went nowhere.
32:11Her case went cold.
32:14Total devastation is what her sister must have gone through.
32:19It was so tragic.
32:25It just becomes frustrating.
32:27There were several murders that were still unsolved, including Linda's.
32:32When I think about the situation, I think about her daughter
32:36and what it was like to grow up
32:40thinking about your mother and how she was murdered.
32:44And then the complications of the whole case
32:49that went cold for so long.
32:52Oh, my God, what an injustice.
32:55In Linda's case, there were rape kit slides
33:00that were taken during her autopsy.
33:04There was the bloody towel that they found on Linda's body.
33:08There was a fingerprint on Linda's car window.
33:12But DNA technology was not available in 1983.
33:19It didn't become routinely used until really the 90s.
33:24It didn't really get advanced until even after that.
33:30More than three decades later,
33:34there was a big break in two of the Summer of Hell cases.
33:40Good afternoon, everyone.
33:43Today is an important day for justice.
33:46Justice for the family of a victim
33:49and for the man convicted of the murder and attempted rape
33:53of 19-year-old Barbara Grams back in 1983.
33:57Even though he was sentenced to death,
34:00Robert DuBois always adamantly denied
34:02that he was at all involved in Barbara Grams' murder.
34:06For almost 37 years, he had made efforts
34:10to try to prove that he was innocent,
34:13including asking the courts for DNA testing.
34:17And in 2020, DuBois was represented
34:22by the Innocence Project.
34:25As they conducted their investigation,
34:28they became aware that there were samples from the crime
34:33that were taken during Barbara Grams' autopsy
34:36that were still stored in the
34:38Hillsborough County Medical Examiner's office.
34:42When investigators examine Barbara Grams' rape kit,
34:47they find DNA matching two men.
34:51Neither of them are Robert DuBois.
34:55This is painful and tragic, but it's the truth,
35:00and when you tell the truth, justice is done.
35:04Our office has identified a man wrongfully convicted of murder
35:08after spending 37 years behind bars.
35:11Robert DuBois was exonerated for the murder of Barbara Grams.
35:17Now, they had this DNA,
35:21and they needed to try to determine,
35:25well, whose DNA is this?
35:27Also, the investigators were able to identify DNA
35:34on rape kit slides that were taken
35:37during the Linda Lansing case.
35:40They were able to determine that the DNA was a match
35:43with the DNA that they had in the Barbara Grams case.
35:47So they put the samples into the National DNA Database,
35:53and when they did that, they got a match.
35:5937 years after Linda Lansing took the final photographs
36:04of her life at the Suncoast Playboy Club,
36:07Tampa investigators have matched the DNA
36:11in her rape kit to two men,
36:15Amos Robinson and Abron Scott.
36:19The DNA in the rape kit matches
36:24Amos Robinson and Abron Scott.
36:27Both Amos Robinson and Abron Scott
36:30were serving life sentences in Florida's prison system
36:34for a murder of a young man
36:38they decided to target for a robbery
36:41three months after Linda Lansing was killed.
36:45In addition to the DNA from Linda's body,
36:49investigators were able to identify the DNA of Abron Scott
36:55on the bloody towel that they found on Linda's body.
36:59So detectives go to question Amos Robinson.
37:05Amos Robinson completely denied
37:08that he was the person responsible
37:11for the murders of Linda Lansing and Barbara Grams.
37:16But in March of 2024, the other suspect in Linda's case,
37:20Abron Scott, told detectives
37:23that he and Robinson are guilty
37:27of Linda Lansing and Barbara Grams' rape and murders,
37:31according to the Tampa Bay Times.
37:34And they report that he is cooperating
37:38with the prosecution and is going to testify
37:41against his former friend in this case.
37:45The court case against Amos Robinson and Abron Scott
37:50is still ongoing, and so there's certain details
37:54that haven't become public yet.
37:57From what we now understand with all this new information
38:01that's come to light, Linda Lansing,
38:04after an incredible night
38:07photographing this Bunny of the Year contest
38:11at the Suncoast Playboy Club, was driving home
38:16and has a chance encounter with 2 criminals
38:21who rape her and shoot her in the head.
38:27One of the really disturbing and tragic things about the case
38:32is it seems like it was a random crime.
38:36Linda wasn't doing anything to put herself at risk.
38:40It was really just kind of happenstance
38:43that this ended up happening to her,
38:46and it's all the more tragic because of that.
38:50In addition to the murder of Linda,
38:54In addition to the murder that Amos Robinson and Abron Scott
38:58were convicted of in 1983,
39:01Abron Scott has pleaded guilty
39:03to the murder of Linda Lansing and Barbara Grams.
39:07Amos Robinson awaits trial.
39:10They are considered persons of interest
39:13in one other unsolved case that occurred in Tampa
39:17in September of 1983 during the Summer of Hell.
39:22It's clear that Robinson and Scott
39:25couldn't have murdered Carolyn Merricks
39:28because by the time she was killed in 1984,
39:32those 2 men were already locked up.
39:43Carolyn Merricks' murder is still unsolved.
39:46You want the victim's families, of course, to get that closure,
39:50but you remember that it never brings that person back.
39:55It's such an outrage that Shonda's case
39:59remains cold to this day.
40:0244 years later, when I think about Bunny Shonda,
40:06the pain is still there, and we have a saying,
40:09once a bunny, always a bunny, because it was so special.
40:13And Shonda's there with us in spirit, though.
40:15I do know that.